To the Brink (33 page)

Invasive nonconsensual mind control experimentation.

This was
Manchurian Candidate
shit.

Maybe it was a mistake. Maybe this Edward M. Walker wasn't who Dallas thought he was.

"And maybe the sun don't rise in the east," Dallas muttered, reaching for his cell phone, understanding now why Amy might have felt the need to lie about not having family.

"Jillian. Hi, it's Dallas," he said when his sister-in-law answered.

"Hey, Dallas, what's up?"

"I was just calling to check on Amy."

Silence, then surprised. "Isn't she with you?"

Dallas felt his gut tighten; his heart started to pound.

Damn it.

Goddamn it!!

He'd known something was up when he'd left Amy. He should have trusted his gut. He should
always
trust his gut.

"Dallas? Amy's with you, right?"

"No. She's not with me," he said, and listened with half an ear while Jillian told him she'd come home from shopping an hour ago and Amy had been gone.

"I thought maybe you took her out for some fresh air," Jillian continued. "Maybe ... maybe she went for a walk. She's bound to be restless cooped up all day."

"Yeah. That's probably it," he said, but he knew, deep in the gut that he'd trusted too late, that Amy Walker had gone for more than an afternoon stroll.

She was gone.

Gone.

He felt... hell. What did he feel?

He rose, walked to the window, and absently rubbed the heel of his hand up and down along the center of his chest where a dull ache had settled.

She had no business out there on her own. She wasn't well. She hadn't fully recovered. And what he'd found out about her family ... Jesus.

Okay. He needed to step back a few feet here. He was drawing semi-sized conclusions with a Matchbox truck full of information.

Yet, if he was wrong, why had she felt the need to leave like this? He glanced back at his computer, where he'd bookmarked page after page of information on Edward M. Walker.

...
sadistic abuse... ritualized torture... nonconsensual mind control experimentation
...

And her mother was in a mental institution.

Dallas wiped a hand over his jaw, let out a long breath.

"What did he do to her, Amy? What did he do to you?"

And why did he feel such a huge, yawning hole inside him knowing that in all likelihood, he'd never know?

Because he knew, bone deep, that in all likelihood, he'd never see Amy Walker again.

By the next afternoon, Ethan had had it.

He and Darcy had been tiptoeing around each other the past two days since they'd been holed up in his town house like they were walking barefoot over needles.

There was so damn much about this entire situation that pissed him off. Starting with the slow return of his physical strength and ending with Darcy's stubborn determination to protect him from who was after her by refusing to tell him what was going on.

And that's what she was doing, he thought grimly as he hobbled into his den where his free weights and bench were set up. She was protecting him. In her misguided process, she was tying his hands from protecting her.

Well, he had all the time in the world. He'd wait her out, damn it.

Feeling surly and restless, he straddled the weight bench, tinkered with the bars until he had a set of thirty-pounders, and started to curl.

He worked up a sweat in five minutes.

"Fuck." Angered by his physical weakness, he pushed himself harder. Pushed until his bad leg, which he had to use for leverage, screamed. Pushed until his muscles burned. Until he was drenched in sweat.

And then he curled some more.

"What are you doing?"

He didn't turn around at the horror in Darcy's tone.

"Minding my own business," he grunted, and started another set of fifteen reps. Implied, but not said, was,
Now go away and mind yours.

But he was lying to both of them. He didn't want her going anywhere.

Christ, he could smell her through his own sweat. She must have just gotten out of the shower. Eve had supplied Darcy with a shopping bag full of shampoo, lotions, soaps, powders, creams... you name it, his sister had brought it. From the scent of Darcy—floral and musk and citrus—she had taken full advantage.

He wouldn't, he told himself, and set his jaw. No matter how badly he wanted to, he would
not
take advantage. Darcy may be tough. Mentally she might be one of the strongest women he knew, but emotionally she was fragile right now.

Plus, he'd seen the look in her eyes. The one she tried to hide when he caught her watching him. She was as aware of him as he was of her.

And he wanted her.

Yeah. He wanted her, but not until they figured out what was happening between them. And what had gone so wrong.

He'd been thinking about that, too. If there was a fix for them, he wanted to make it. The question was, how? She wouldn't even confide in him about the trouble she was still in.

"Do you think this is a good idea?"

Her voice startled him. He'd thought she'd left the room.

"Well, darlin', seems I'm all tapped out of good ideas." And because he was feeling mean suddenly over any number of things—from her secrecy, to wanting what he couldn't have, to this damnable weakness—he took it out on the closest target. "I'm also damn tired of being treated like an invalid."

"No one is treating you like an invalid. You're recovering from a gunshot, for God's sake. You lost most of your blood."

"Yeah, and now I've got it back. I need to do something other than lie around and take up space. I need to build up my strength. So unless you've got a better idea on how I can do that, just back off, okay?"

Silence.

He expelled a deep breath. Bowed his head and finally leaned down and set the dumbbells on the floor.

"You didn't deserve that."

More silence.

"I'm sorry," he said, finally looking back over his shoulder.

He immediately wished he hadn't.

She was wearing a silky short jade green robe over a matching gown. Eve's doing again.

Lust coiled in his gut like a spring under about ten tons of pressure.

Her hair was wet. Her legs were long. And smooth, and, Jesus, he wanted her. Hadn't stopped wanting her since she'd left him five long, empty years ago. Since he'd spotted her on the ground in the jungle with her wrists bound and her eyes bleak.

He turned away from her abruptly. Then he lay on his back on the bench, his head beneath the big bar loaded with a lousy 120 pounds of free weights when he was used to working out with 250.

He lifted the bar off the base and started pressing. And immediately got in trouble. All the blood that was supposed to be in his bicep and shoulder muscles had gone south.

After the fifth lift, his arms started trembling.

And not entirely from muscle fatigue. He could still smell her. Couldn't stop thinking about the silky skin beneath the silky gown. Couldn't block the memory of how she tasted, how she felt moving beneath him ...

And then she was there. Standing behind his head. Her hands clamped beside his on the bar, lifting with him as he pushed and finally helping him settle the bar on the cradle.

The hem of her gown brushed the side of his face. Her bare thigh was less than an inch from his mouth.

Aw God.

She was so close, he could feel her heat. Smell her woman scent mixed with bottled scents. She was so damn tempting, his belly muscles clenched like he was in the middle of a lift.

"You shouldn't do this with ... without a spotter," she said, the huskiness of her voice telling him more than he wanted to know. More than he should know.

The fact that she didn't move—not one fraction of an inch—told him even more. She seemed as frozen as he felt, standing above and behind him, her fingers still wrapped around the bar beside his.

Their eyes met.

He didn't know how long they stayed that way. Him on his back. Her standing behind him. Their eyes locked in a haze of smoky heat.

Neither did he know who made the first move. He only knew that one minute he was dying to touch her and the next their fingers brushed. Then twined together, clutched.

And then nothing mattered but the need to be inside her. Under her. Surrounded by her.

It was wrong. He no longer cared. She was vulnerable. He didn't give a rip. He physically hurt with the need to make love to her.

"Kiss me. For God's sake, Darcy ... kiss me."

It was all sensation then. Soft, soft lips. Warm wet tongue as she walked around the bench and bent over him, offering her open mouth and, at his urging, straddling his lap, pressing the giving heat of her core against his erection.

He gorged himself on the tastes he had never forgotten. On the kitteny sighs he'd heard in his dreams. Felt like he
was
dreaming as he reached for the loose belt of her robe and untied it. He dragged it off her shoulders, let it slide across his legs to the floor as he lifted the slip of green silk up and over her head.

She was so outrageously beautiful. She felt exactly as he'd remembered ... supple and alive and on fire beneath his hands. Her nipples, sweet Lord, her nipples. They were a velvety, dusky brown until he surrounded her ribs with his hands, drew her down to his mouth, and sucked her in. Velvet turned to diamonds against his tongue.

She cried out as he devoured her, braced her hands on the barbell above them, and, suspended like that, arched her breasts into his mouth as he reached down, clamped her hips in his hands, and rubbed her hard against his erection.

He turned his head to her other breast, frantic to taste more of her as he lifted her hips, fumbled with his shorts, and freed himself.

He groaned in absolute mind-numbing pleasure when he guided the swollen head of his penis into her, clenched his jaw to keep from coming when she took him home, took him deep, settling herself slowly down on top of him.

Her eyes were closed when he summoned the presence of mind to look at her. Her hands were still clamped on the bar above his head; her beautiful breasts swayed close to his face. Her mouth was tightened in concentration as she strove to hang on to every nuance, every intense, heated stroke of her body on his.

He felt the tension coil tight in her, sensed the moment she surrendered to the power. He was right along with her when she came on a deep, lush cry, her internal muscles convulsing around him like a greedy, clutching fist, and he couldn't... couldn't hold back... couldn't hold on... couldn't breathe for the need of her.

Couldn't imagine anything—
anything
—better in this life than the feel of spending himself inside her snug, gloving heat.

If you were going to make a mistake, it might as well be a big one,
Darcy thought when she finally came back to herself.