Hunger's Mate (6 page)

“The last time I checked this was a free country and I could do whatever the hell I wanted, whenever I feel like it.”

Her words were curt and cold, and she immediately regretted them. Of course, Ezra was quicker than she and reacted instantly.

“When I see a woman running for her life, all that freedom crap goes straight to hell. Now, you can tell me what happened or I'll find out for myself,” he warned.

And it was definitely a warning. She had no doubt he would do exactly what he'd said and perhaps much more.

Yet, again, her hesitance was her downfall. She just wasn't on top of her game tonight and she hated that she was so close to falling apart in front of him.

“You do not want me snooping around in your life, Jewel. I can guarantee that.”

He was absolutely right and so she was sure to speak up quickly then.

“It's nothing. I thought I heard footsteps behind me and I forgot how dark it tends to be out here at night. That's all. No big deal.”

He nodded again, but she knew he wasn't buying a word she'd said.

“So what's with the wig and shades?”

“I like change,” was her retort. “Can you back up off of me, please? I'm not a criminal, you know.” Those words resonated in her mind and again, she wished she hadn't said them.

“No, you're not a criminal.”

He continued, lifting his hands, until she reached up, catching his wrists before he could remove her glasses.

One thick eyebrow rose as he watched her intently. “You wanna know how I know you're not a criminal, Jewel?” he asked without making a motion to pull out of her grip.

And he could, Jewel knew without a doubt. If he wanted her glasses off, he could easily overpower her and take them off. If he wanted the wig off, that would be on the ground too. Hell, if he wanted to kiss her … she knew all too well the strength of a man when he wanted something from a woman.

“How?” she asked, the single word a mere whisper against the sultry night air.

“Because you can't lie worth crap,” he replied instantly. “Your lips have been trembling since you looked at me. Unless…” He paused. “Unless you're trembling for another reason.”

Jewel shook her head instantly. “No. No. I'm not trembling at all,” she said, dropping her hands from his wrists and turning so that he couldn't reach the glasses. She pushed at him then. “You're taking up my oxygen being this close.”

He took a step back, still watching, still knowing. Dammit, he knew there was something wrong, knew without her wanting or needing him to.

“I'm an adult. I work for Perryville Resorts but what I do in my personal life is my business. What you are doing, Mr. Preston…” She said his name with great emphasis after their morning exchange. “Is borderline harassment. Shall I file a formal complaint with the management?”

She'd moved from the spot against the wall, figuring that was aiding the entrapment she felt and reached for the door handle while he continued to look at her.

“As you stated, you're an adult, you can do whatever you want,” he told her as she slipped inside the building and thankfully out of his reach.

 

Chapter 5

“And so can I,” Ezra continued, following her inside the stairway.

Before she could take another step he had her back against the wall once more, his fingers buried deep in the wig he was certain she was wearing, his lips crashing down over hers. Her sunglasses fell from her face to the floor. His tongue took hers by surprise, but only momentarily. In the next instant she was kissing him back, her head tilting, her tongue dueling hungrily with his.

Fueled solely by desire now, Ezra lifted her leg, locking it behind his back. His hand slipped quickly beneath the dress she wore, going straight for the warmth he knew was waiting just for him. Slipping her panties aside, he thrust two fingers into her quickly. His heart thumped in his chest as if he'd run a couple of miles, his cat roaring the instant the warm, wet walls of her pussy gripped his fingers tightly. He growled into the kiss, his other hand tightening on the back of her head. Her hips bucked once beneath him and then she froze.

She turned her head away from him and gasped, “Stop it.” Her breathing was heavy, hitching on her words as she pressed as far into the wall as she could to get him away from her.

Moving away was the last thing Ezra wanted to do. Taking his hand from the moist pleasure between her legs was like asking him to stop breathing. But as he looked down onto the side view of her face, and saw that her eyes were tightly closed, her body so tense now, he feared his brute strength might actually hurt her. He eased his hand away from her, dislodged the other from her hair, and took a step back.

She hurriedly stepped away from him then, turning her back on him, but not going up the stairs. Ezra watched the movement of her shoulders, the up and down as she tried to calm her breathing. He inhaled deeply, let out the breath slowly, and his teeth clenched.

“It's not my intention to hurt you, Jewel. You have to trust that I would never do anything to hurt you,” he told her in response to the heavy stench of fear filling his senses.

She'd been afraid when he'd first stopped her in the parking lot, but this was different, this was a soul-deep fear that made him want to kill the bastard that rooted this emotion in her.

“I don't know you,” she said quietly. “And I don't want to. I don't want to trust you or anybody else.”

“Because of what he did to you,” he replied and watched knowingly as her head instantly shot up. She turned around to face him.

“You don't know me,” she stated, her voice louder than before.

Ezra stepped to her then. She tried to back away but her legs hit the steps that were right behind her. Reaching out he caught her again, one arm wrapping around her waist, the other going up to her head to pull the wig away. “Do you know yourself?” he asked.

Ezra backed away from her, holding the wig in his hand, watching her lift her hand up to touch the short strands that were naturally hers. His mind screamed for him to back off, to drop the weird-looking patch of hair and get the hell away from the female and whatever her troubles were, but he didn't listen.

“It's just an accessory,” she told him, making a point to meet his stare. “Like the belt you have holding up your pants. If you take it off you're still the same person.”

He liked how fast she could think, how quickly she rebounded after what was an assault to the persona he figured she'd worked so hard to build. Ezra was positive that this was more than just an accessory, it had become a part of her life, a necessary part. The question was, why?

“Are you the same person, Jewel?” he asked. “Without this wig, without those contacts, are you the Jewel Jenner everybody here thinks you are?”

There'd only been one other occasion that Ezra had seen the look Jewel now wore on her face. It had been just before the cat had taken form and subsequently taken a life. The other time, place, and circumstances may have been drastically different but he had done something he now regretted. That was then and it was a place he didn't want to go, hadn't gone to in years. Now, thankfully, Ezra was certain that his eyes hadn't changed to that of his cat, and his human form was still very much intact. So why was she looking like she'd just seen a ghost?

“It's none of your damned business who I am!” she yelled at him. “None of your business at all!”

This time when she turned he knew she'd run up the stairs. She probably knew every corner of this resort, Ezra thought as he stood there fingering the wig and not going after her. She'd parked in the shipping parking lot, where he just happened to be after enjoying a run in Bas's secluded wooded area. He'd watched her pull up as he dressed in the shadows of the building. Then she'd climbed out of the car and run as if she actually thought someone was out there with her. Ezra hadn't seen anyone, only her.

Even now as he walked back outside, retracing her steps to her car, he still didn't see any signs of another person and the only scent he picked up was hers. The fear was so thick it could possibly choke him, if it wasn't already making him angry as hell. His fingers gripped the wig as he made his way back to the building. He tossed it into the Dumpster just before going through that same back door once more. This time trying like hell not to remember how hot and wet Jewel was beneath his fingers. The fingers that still carried her female scent, which if he lifted them to his nose right now would have his dick growing even harder than it had been when she'd been there with him.

More energized now after his run, senses overloading his mind, dick hard and ready to sink inside her hot, sweet … By the time Ezra came to the resort lobby his mind was definitely where it should not be. Still, he made his way to the elevators, to the floor where Jewel's room was located, because despite the warning in his head—the spiritual one that he'd vowed like hell to fight—he needed to know what the hell was going on with Jewel Jenner.

*   *   *

Don't cry. Don't break. Don't panic.

Jewel recited these words over and over again as she paced back and forth in her room. She was overreacting, she was sure. There had been nobody following her. If there had, why wouldn't they have approached her in the parking lot? Why not come for her at the nursing home? She'd been alone at each instance and nobody else had been around. It would have been the perfect opportunity. For what? For Larry to make good on the threat he'd repeated to her time and time again.

She dropped down onto the couch, her legs screaming for mercy after she'd run up four flights of stairs and straight down the hall to her room. She hadn't stopped even when she'd almost knocked down one of the room-service attendants and the tray he was holding in the hallway. She'd kept right on running until she'd slammed the door to her room, slapped the two latches against it, and lodged a chair beneath the handle for good measure.

Now she sat trying to get control over what was going on in her mind and with her damned traitorous body. Her fear had been palpable, lodged in her throat like a knot and yet the moment Ezra had touched her she'd melted into a simpering puddle of desire. She'd wanted his mouth on her, all over her. The way his tongue dueled with hers had lit a flame long since blown out. Her breasts had instantly swelled, her juncture quivering with need. And as if he'd sensed that need he'd zeroed in, touched her there and with an immediate rush of arousal anxiety surfaced.

Sex was not good. Not for her. It had been a necessity, yes, but it had never been good. And she'd sworn if that was the way it had to be, she would simply forego it altogether. The exposure of her most intimate self, the vulnerability it produced simply wasn't worth it. Not to her, not again. So with hands still shaking, body still alive with the basic physical reaction she'd decided to ignore, she figured it was time to strategize once again.

Her shower had been quick because, allowing the fear to take precedence over the arousal, the last thing she wanted was for someone to come for her while she was naked and dripping wet. The last thing Jewel wanted anyway was for someone to come for her. She'd been safe so long, they'd both been safe, but now, now she felt like that might be over.

Running her hands through the damp curls she tried to think of what she would do, where they would go. It had to be someplace far. She knew she hadn't gone far enough when she'd settled here in Sedona. She should have left the country. Dropping her head, she whimpered, then cut off the pathetic sound. No crying. No whimpering. No turning back.

She stood again, went into the bedroom area, and fell to her knees on the floor. Pulling the largest of her luggage from beneath the bed, she opened the flap and looked inside. Fleece blankets, some with lovely canyon designs, others with brilliant colors. She'd been collecting them since she'd arrived here. One, her favorite, in the rich golden hues of her father's favorite sunsets, was wrapped around a safe. She held the cool metal of the small box in her hand and let her nervous fingers work the lock until it clicked free.

The velvet bag inside was warm when she lifted it out, holding it in the palm of her hand. She clasped her hands together, bringing them to her forehead as she closed her eyes and prayed for more time, for another location, for the peace she'd had for three years but was probably no more. Opening her eyes she unworked the rope holding the bag closed and poured the contents into her open palm.

They sparkled and glistened, staring up at her with such potential, such excitement. Jewel took a deep breath as she stared down at the diamonds. They'd been cut and shipped from a mine in the Sierra Leone rain forest. She knew this from the note that had originally been included in the pouch. The note she'd scanned then burned. The diamonds were worth millions. If she sold them, she could leave the country. Her father could leave the country and they'd both be safe, they'd be happy. She doubted the latter, but she was at least holding out for safety, especially for her father.

The loud and persistent knock at her door had her jumping and almost dropping the precious stones onto the floor. With hurried movements she put them back in the bag, closed and locked the safe, and buried it beneath the blankets once more. Kicking the suitcase under the bed she brushed down the wrinkled T-shirt and old sweatpants she'd thrown on after her shower and hurried out to answer the door.

It took her a couple seconds to dislodge the locks, move the chair, and then she was yanking the door open. Jewel was beyond surprised to see Jacques standing on the other side. It was late and there was nothing pressing on their agenda that he would need to visit her, in her room, at this hour. Jewel knew that some of the staff at Perryville thought she was sleeping with Jacques, but that could not have been further from the truth. When she'd first began working here she'd thought that maybe she would have to lay down the law early about relationships with any of the men that seemed to sprout from the ground out here, but surprisingly, she hadn't. It was as if she'd been wrapped in bright yellow DO NOT TOUCH tape so they'd all kept their distance.