Heather's Gift (16 page)

“I want you.” His lips pressed beneath her breast as his hands moved to the clasp of her jeans. “I need you, Heather. I need you more than the air I breathe.”

And she didn’t have the strength to deny him. Not now, not while the fire of the arousal he called up, poured through her body. As though her blood was lava and her nerve ending receptors of heat that only made it burn brighter. Her jeans loosened. Heather watched Sam as she gasped for breath, shadowed sensuality in his expression, the intent in his dark eyes. His head lowered again as he kissed his way down her stomach, her smooth abdomen, his hands pulling her jeans and panties down her thighs with teasing strokes of his hand along her skin. She was shaking as he blew a puff of air across her burning cunt, then shuddered as he finished removing her clothing.

“I want to taste you,” he growled. “Lick you like smooth, warm chocolate, Heather.”

He dropped her jeans and panties to the ground a second before he moved between her thighs, spreading them slowly as he stared up at her.

“Sam.” She could barely speak as she fought for breath. “Someone will see…”

“See me lapping at you, fucking you with my tongue, drawing liquid paradise from your body, Heather. Let ‘em watch, baby. Let them see how fucking pretty you are as you come for me.”

Her hips jerked, rising from the lounger as his tongue swiped through the narrow slit of her inner lips then licked around her swollen clit. The breath halted in her chest, then released on a rising moan. Smooth flame, his tongue was like snaking fire as it licked and probed at her soaked cunt.

He licked around her clit, pulled it into his mouth for a second less than it would have taken for her to climax, then licked down again before his hard hands lifted her hips and his tongue plunged inside her clenching pussy. She could hear the wet sound of his suckling at her vagina, drawing the cream from her body as more replaced it. Her hands gripped the rails of the lounger as she twisted against his mouth, fighting for more. She needed him deeper, harder, licking her like that to her very womb.

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He slurped at her cunt, his lips smacking as he released her, then his tongue plunging again. His hands moved to her buttocks, holding her open as his fingers spread the delicate mounds, one placing exquisite pressure on the puckered entrance to her anus.

She twisted in his grip, needing more. Her vagina shuddered around his tongue, her clit pulsing, throbbing as her fingers went to her nipples to ease the heated ache there. She pinched lightly, biting her lower lip as she fought back her moan of rising ecstasy.

“So good, Heather.” His voice washed over her senses. “Like candy baby. Like warm, sweet chocolate.”

His tongue plunged deep, the tip of his nose burying against her clit, stroking it, caressing it. Heather gasped, caught her breath, but when the resulting explosion hit her she couldn’t contain the low, breathless wail that tore from between her lips. Her body tightened, her cunt spasming as the pleasure streaked over her in drowning waves of sensation. Sam was crooning as he licked her, sucked her, his tongue fucking her through the sharp bursts of exquisite pleasure until he moved back with a groan, his hands going to his own jeans.

“You’ll scream for me this time,” he bit out. “And everyone will know you’re mine, Heather. Mine.”

He was within an inch of freeing his cock to take her when the tree behind them cracked, spraying shards of the wood as the first gunshot rang out. Lora Leigh

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Chapter Twenty-One

They rolled from the lounger in a tangle of limbs and virulent curses as the bullet struck the tree at the same angle that Sam’s head would have been had he not been lowering it to her body. Heather grabbed her jeans, cursing as she pushed Sam behind the shelter of the trees, struggling back into the suddenly uncooperative denim.

“Dammit,” Heather cursed as she jerked her gun beneath the lounger. She struggled against Sam, cursing as he plastered himself to her back, holding her harder to the bark of the tree. Dammit, he was trying to protect her. She was supposed to be protecting him.

She jerked her comm. link from the back pocket of her jeans, bringing it quickly to her ear as the raised voices of the agents rushing for the pool area could be heard.

“Rick, dammit, where the hell are you? Sam’s with me and we have incoming gunfire.”

Raised voices began to fill the night as bodyguards rushed into the pool area. Several more unknown shots were fired, but none returned as the men rushed to surround Sam as the sound of a helicopter lifting from the front yard cut through the din of raised voices.

“Contain August. Get his ass in the house.” Tara’s voice was sharp as she barked out the orders to the bodyguards swarming around them. “Dammit to hell. If he gets hit I’ll kick all your asses.”

“Chopper’s in the air,” Rick called out. “Stay put until we know where the hell it’s coming from. Goddammit, how the hell is he doing this?”

Heather struggled against Sam as he pressed her closer to the tree, his body a heavy weight behind her, an effective shield between her and any bullet that might cut through the darkness. The other agents surrounded them, guns drawn, watching the darkness with the night vision goggles attached to their faces.

“Stay still,” he growled as she struggled against him.

“Dammit, I’m supposed to be protecting you,” she hissed. “Let me move!”

“Listen to me.” His voice roughened, savagery reflecting so harshly in his tone that she automatically stilled. “You will not take a bullet for me, Heather. Do you understand me? You will not stand in front of me, you will not try to protect me, or so help me God, I’ll make sure you regret it.”

Then he was gone. “Sam.” She cried out his name as he jerked from her and began pushing his way through the small garden. The bodyguards surrounded him as he stalked toward the house, rushing to provide a force of protection around him. Lora Leigh

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The agents scrambled to move around him, to place themselves where they could protect him as he pushed them roughly aside. Heather propped her hands on her hips and watched his furious face, breathing out thankfully when he made it into the relative protection of the house.

“Son of a bitch is going to get himself killed.” Rick stalked toward her. “Did you tell him that, Heather?”

She shrugged, fighting the rapid beat of her heart. She made certain her shirt was in place as she faced her boss, thankful she had managed to pull her jeans back on. Only God knew where her panties were.

“Does it do any good to tell him anything?” she bit out as she tucked her gun back in the holster. Glancing over the wall surrounding the pool, she checked the helicopter’s progress as its bright lights swept over the hill behind the house. “Where were those damned dogs? I thought they were patrolling the hill back there.”

“Not in the dark.” Rick shook his head sharply. “It’s just too damned dangerous for the animals and the men. It would be a hell of a lot easier if you could keep Sam’s ass in the house.”

“Me?” Incredulity rocked her system. “What in the hell makes everyone think that man listens to me?”

“He follows you around like a fucking buck during rut,” he snapped. “Don’t pretend he doesn’t. You have house duty from now on, no exceptions.”

Heather shook her head desperately. “Forget it. You know what goes in there at night, Rick. I’d get everyone killed. I’d never keep my mind on the job.”

For some reason the August men thought the family room was the place to fuck, rather than their bedrooms. She avoided that room at all costs. She avoided any room but her own until after everyone else had settled down for the night.

“Do what the rest of them do,” he snarled then. “Join the others in the kitchen for coffee or park your ass at the front or back door. I don’t fucking care which, but keep your ass in the house. That bastard gets his ass killed and Cade will kill us.”

“Why don’t I just go ahead and fuck him then?” Sarcasm laced her voice. “Hell, Rick, that would solve everything, wouldn’t it?”

“Damned right. And it’s not like you’re not itching to do it.” He faced her, anger tensing his body as bodyguards milled around them and the helicopter continued to search the hill behind the house. “I don’t give a damn how you keep yourself in the house, just fucking do it.”

She would have snapped back. Would have told him where the hell he could shove his orders if he hadn’t stalked off as her mouth opened to blast him. A growl of frustration broke past her lips as she barely restrained herself from stomping her foot in fury.

“Damn, Heather, I can’t believe you don’t want to guard that August hard body.”

Amusement echoed in the female voice as a chuckle reached her ears. Lora Leigh

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Heather turned back again as she watched Helena approach her. She was still breathing hard, sweat gleaming on her face as her blue eyes regarded her with a laughing glint.

Heather shook her head as she took a deep, weary breath.

“Men should be outlawed,” she bit out. “Excuse me, Helena, I’m going to go see if I can find out if anyone, anywhere, has any idea what the hell happened to security tonight.”

Not that Heather had much hope for answers at this point. All she had was questions. The least of which, was how the hell the stalker had gotten on that damned hill without being spotted. And had he even been on the hill? That bullet had been too close, the aim too precise. Somehow, it wasn’t adding up. Lora Leigh

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Chapter Twenty-Two

Heather couldn’t forget her confrontation with Sam in the pool area the night before, or the stalker and how easily a bullet could have taken out the back of his head. Chills raced over her body each time she thought of it, and she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that if Sam were killed, then the August family would be irreparably damaged. Until they all faced the past, there would be no true healing for any of them. The three men had formed an exceptional bond together in their sharing, one Sam had denied all but once over the past months. He hadn’t gone to his brothers’ women, and his brooding anger had only intensified.

The conversation the night before between her and Sam wore at her suspicions regarding them all. She had noticed over the months the lengths the other men went to in protecting Sam, in keeping the memories carefully hidden. She had thought it had been a form of mercy. Their own memories were brutally clear, she believed. She had believed they hadn’t wanted that for him. But now she knew it had to go much deeper. She knew Sam didn’t possess many memories of the time spent confined in his abuser’s basement. He knew what happened, he knew the pain, and he remembered clearly the first weeks there. But after that, she knew that many of the events were hazy. Cade had not been very forthcoming with Rick on actual events. The notations in the files Rick made available to her the next day showed an incredible amount of frustration regarding the information he was given. It had taken nearly a year to track down anyone who could have known or seen any of the events that happened that summer. And it was taking even longer to track down the missing Jennings brother. The old servant of Marcelle’s that Rick had tracked down had provided information on the drugs Marcelle had used on the men. Potent drugs that sustained a sexual erection for hours, even days, on end. Keeping their cocks in a state of readiness, no matter the state of their minds. They had been young. Brock and Sam were still in their teens, Cade barely over twenty. At a time when their manhood was most important, it had been stripped from them.

Reginald Robert Jennings, the man suspected now of threatening the family, had attempted to follow his brother’s footsteps in a medical career, but had been unable to succeed. Marcelle himself had been a well-respected member of the medical community for decades before an early retirement beneath a cloud of suspicion that arose in his final years. Suspicion of drugging several of his male patients and abusing them. Rick had found the men who first made the complaints and learned they had been generously paid to retract their statements. But it didn’t change the stories they had to tell, or the hazy, drug clouded memories of abuse.

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The suspicions of sexual perversions hadn’t abated then. The winter before the brothers had been sent to his ranch, Marcelle had visited a doctor in Madison for a broken nose, cracked cheekbone, and severe bruising. A result of Sam’s rage after the bastard had snuck into his bedroom during a visit to the August ranch. Cade had known what had happened, but when his father ordered them to the Marcelle ranch to learn a new technique in ranching, his father had assured the boys they could leave the moment any impropriety was suggested. Old Joe August had sworn the ranch’s livelihood depended on those new techniques. The only techniques available for them to learn, though, had been those in pain and torture, Heather thought as she finally closed the last of Rick’s files.

The servant’s accounts of those days were frightening. The screams that filtered from the basement, the horrendous amounts of blood sometimes shed, was reported as sickening. As a doctor, Marcelle had known how far he could abuse their bodies and yet keep them alive, and he had pushed them to their limits. Especially Sam. It had always been worse for Sam.

The files she had managed to dig up on Raider gave her no evidence, period, to suspect the other man of having a reason to want to hurt the Augusts. Russell “Raider”

Kincaid was known for his loyalty, his abilities, and his determination to get the job done. Considering his credentials she couldn’t help but believe if he wanted Sam dead, then Sam would be dead.

Heather tapped her fingernails against the table she was sitting at as she stared outside the RV the Agency was using on the August Ranch. Heat rose in waves outside the air-conditioned comfort of the motor home. Horses dozed beneath the shade of several large trees, as cattle lay in small gatherings along the shaded stream that ran through the pasture.