Drawing Deep (5 page)

“Yes, ma’am.” Ria replied solemnly, her mouth already watering for a taste of the tea. She’d not found the same anywhere else, and she’d searched everywhere. Nothing had compared to her memory.

The same problem she feared she had when it came to Santos.

Tucking the thermos in the outside netted pocket of her backpack, Ria said her goodbyes and fled the homey kitchen. She’d worn a long-sleeved shirt over a t-shirt, and
that
over a tank top, knowing layers were key when it came to working in the field. The temperature had risen enough she didn’t require a jacket.

Following a pretty flagstone pathway, she crossed behind the impressive garden and stepped off onto dirt. Trees flanked both sides of the crop shop, providing shade and a sudden chill. She walked quickly along one side of the metal building towards the rear entrance. It was the cursing that reached her ears first as she turned the corner and located the entrance provided by a set of open metal doors.

“Stupid piece of shit. What’s wrong with you? You were working an hour ago.”

She might have smiled at the clearly frustrated male tone if her belly didn’t suddenly quiver with excitement. Her nipples, already tight due to the cold, budded into even tighter points. The physical reaction made her pause in confusion, until she reached the threshold.

It wasn’t Porter her eyes lighted on, but Santos. More specifically, his backside. Even though all the Felix males had dark hair and similar strong physique, Ria knew in that second she would be able to pick Santos out blindfolded. It was in the way her body responded to his presence, the increase of her heartbeat, the unsteady flow of air entering her lungs.

It took a second for her to realize he hadn’t heard or scented her, an oddity in a shifter. Then again, maybe the herb cigarettes were working. Or it could be that the strange, sharp thumping noise intermixed with loud voices that carried through the far wall, the one shared with the processing center, or the crop shop, held his attention.

“The dial needs to read 4500,” Santos straightened and yelled at the wall, confirming her thoughts.

Taking advantage of the opportunity, Ria ogled the man in front of her. His head was down, face tilted as he focused on the happenings in the other room. Strong thighs, encased in jeans so worn they cupped his very delectable ass, were spread slightly for balance. Corded muscles rippled along his arm as he twirled a wrench in his right hand, his left on his hip. His dark hair was pulled back in a thick tail at the base of his neck and ended two inches lower, bisecting his back and drawing her eye to the way the dark t-shirt stretched over masculine shoulders.

The palms of her hands began to tingle. She wanted to run them through those thick strands, along those wide shoulders and down over the sleek muscles that encased a potent male form.

Bet he had a six-pack.
She plucked at the neckline of her shirt, feeling overly heated in the most unsuitable places, and swallowed the buildup of saliva in her mouth.

There was no denying what she could see of the outside package was weakening her knees, but outside packages fade. It’s what the inside contains that mattered most. Her own paternal side of the family boasted of good-looking men, who were filled with nothing but cold arrogance and nasty pus.

Knowing this, Ria still couldn’t seem to stop mentally mauling the eye-candy in front of her, feeling things low in her body start to tighten, yet melt at the same time.

And this from just looking at his backside.
What would happen when he turned around?

The thought made her shiver.

Santos nodded when the sharp thumping noise began to even out into a low bumping sound, and he opened his mouth to berate the hapless quad once again.

“Bastard. It’s your turn now you...” Pivoting on his booted heels, he stopped in mid-sentence as he came face-to-face with Ria, who was silently watching him from a mere ten feet away. She might have greeted him, if she hadn’t suddenly come down with a case of muteness at the sight of those deep brown eyes that ensnared her, reeling her in like a fish on a hook. She could feel the muscles in her legs begin to quiver with the need to move closer.

A lovely flush of color darkened his cheeks. “Uh, sorry.”

His words broke her stupefaction and she gave him a tight smile. “It’s nothing I haven’t heard before. Or said myself for that matter.” Uncomfortable under his steady gaze, she shifted her weight and nodded at the machine with the engine cover lifted. “Problem I take it?”

Santos finally took his eyes from her to frown at the quad, frustration once again lacing his words. “Nothing that a sledgehammer won’t fix.”

While Ria had felt the same sentiment with her laptop on a few occasions, Santos didn’t sound like he was joking. “That’s a bit severe.”

“Not on the quad. On Porter.”

Ria took a step back. Santos didn’t need any weapon to cause physical harm. He was a weapon. He was also angry, and she didn’t want to get caught up in a shifter’s anger.

Santos raised a brow at her cautious move, his head cocking slightly as he perused her nervous stance. “Relax. I’m only kidding. Mostly.”

The verbal reassurance did nothing to ease her jangling nerves. Her eyes flitted to the heavy wrench he held in his hands, her brain immediately reverting back to childhood stories about shifters and their brutal and unforgiving temperaments.

Following her gaze to the tool gripped in his hand, Santos pursed his lips. Then he slowly headed to a long worktable that lined the far side wall, putting the entire room between them. “The engine’s still warm so I knew that’s the quad Porter used when he mucked out the stalls this morning.” His tone was low and meant to be soothing, his movements deliberately careful as he replaced the tool and tidied up the bench. “One of our rules is to report a problem immediately so it can either be resolved without delay, or at the very least, known about so it can be tackled when time permits.”

It was telling, the cautious way Santos handled her reaction. It was also a little mortifying as she’d skilled herself in controlling any outward signs of fear or anxiety. Not to mention he probably thought Ria either timid as a mouse or the victim of assault or abuse. The fact that he was right didn’t make her feel better.
He
hadn’t threatened her.

Her great-grandfather had threatened her often, and followed up on those threats. Though her father was subservient to Kalin, it was Ria who took the brunt of Kalin’s dictatorship and displeasure. Whether it be a test subject for the latest and most painful spell Kalin had concocted, a whipping post when something went wrong, or whored out to her sister’s husband to be used as a broodmare. It didn’t matter. If Ria hadn’t acted that fateful night without delay...

“Delays can cost.” Though her words were a bare murmur, Santos caught them none-the-less.

Turning so his back leaned against the worktable, he settled his forearms on top of the bench, crossed his booted feet and nodded. “Exactly.” Though his posture was all nonchalance, his dark eyes were both gentle and probing, as if he were coaxing a wounded creature out of hiding to be tended to. She had the strangest feeling that if she walked up to him, he wouldn’t hesitate to draw her into a tight and protective embrace.

Odd for one whom she’d been told killed the weak.

And for one who was told to fear shifters like the plague, Ria found she wouldn’t mind having those arms wrap around her, snuggling her to that powerful chest. She also wouldn’t mind seeing what that chest looked like bare, and there was no denying she wanted to run her hands over all the planes and angles his shirt hinted at.

But that wasn’t what she was here for and if she didn’t get out to the site, God knew what kind of mess Chris would create with his heavy-handed approach to the delicate task ahead. If he had his way, they would have arrived with power washers and blasted all the dirt from stone walls, destroying any evidence as to the origin of the ruin.

Stepping smoothly into the maintenance room, she walked to the second quad hitched to a tarp-covered trailer. “Thanks for gathering up all the supplies.”

“Welcome.”

Pasting on a smile, she turned to him. “I’m sure you have many other things to do, so I’ll just be on my way.”

“Actually,” he straightened and picked up a keyring from the table, “We’ll be on our way.”

“Oh. There’s no need. I know how to drive one of these.”

“I’m sure you do.” With each step that brought him closer, Ria felt her heart sped up. Only this time it wasn’t in some childhood fear. His hips moved with a lithe grace that drew an appreciative eye. Wide shoulders rolled with each step, turning his muscled frame into an animated work of art. Living, breathing and very male work of art. Her belly reacted to all that prime, grade A beef with an embarrassing quiver that made her squeeze her thighs together.

Swallowing the extra spit that formed in her mouth, Ria asked, “But?”

He stopped on the other side of the trailer and she caught his scent for the first time, a combination of clean male and musk. It made her blood heat. “The gate to the reserve is now secured with a thumb scan lock. I need to go with you to give you access. Same as Gwen did for the rest of your group earlier.”

Her eyes went wide. She knew they’d had some problems with thieves and trespassers – yeah okay and some men with guns chasing down Gwen and Rome – but a thumbprint scanner?

When she said that aloud, Santos jerked up his chin. “We protect what’s ours and we don’t mess around.”

So noted. “Guess not.”

He reached for the cooler in her hand and tucked it securely under the tarp before straddling the quad. “You have a jacket?” When she didn’t respond right away, he looked up from slotting in the key. “You might get cold.”

At the moment she would relish a little cool air. “I’ve got several layers on. I’m good.”

His eyes raked slowly down her body, from head to feet, pausing at her breast and hips, leaving nothing out. Ria usually ignored such a blatant perusal. She was a woman after all and men had a tendency to check out her sleek form and generous curves. But she couldn’t ignore the smoldering interest that filled Santos’s eyes when he made contact with her own once again. Not when her body mimicked that sexual interest and tossed it back at him with brazen need. “Hop on then.”

The husky invitation made her toes curl, inciting a wicked desire to take him up on the double entendre and climb on board. From the front. Facing him, with her legs wrapped around his waist. As the erotic image formed, an overload of pressure snaked through her body to collect at the hot, aching place between her thighs. As if aware of her naughty thoughts, and approving whole-hardheartedly, Santos watched her through dark eyes now glittering with sparks of electric green at the edges.

That was what brought her back from the abyss. She couldn’t forget what he was. What she was. Not yet, anyway. While she no longer believed, at least deep down, that this family of shifters would harm her physically should – when – her vampirism was brought to light, she had no wish to see disgust fill the face before her at sleeping with the enemy, so to speak.

Vividly conscience of his heightened senses and the liquid heat that had pooled to dampen her panties, she quickly settled herself behind him on the padded seat before she could change her mind. There was no bar at her back to hold on to so she curled her hands into fists, her spine stiff as a poker, trying to distance her body from his as much as possible. But there was nothing she could do about their legs. Her inner thighs naturally pressed along his muscled ones when she set her boots on the foot rests.

The engine came to life with a loud roar and they set off at a crawl until they made it through the doorway and over the bump created by the higher concrete floor of the maintenance room. He didn’t pause to shut the doors, the reason clear as they passed Andreas walking toward them.

“Morning.” The Felix patriarch nodded at Ria.

“Good morning, and thank you for the loan of your tools.”

Andreas’s eyes flashed briefly to the trailer before returning to Ria. “No problem. I’d prefer nothing be left out overnight.”

Ria understood what he didn’t say and could appreciate his stance. “We’ll bring everything back when we finish for the day.”

Another nod. “Just leave the quad and trailer outside the kitchen and we’ll take care of it.”

“I’ll be back within the hour,” Santos told his father. “Tell Porter that if he wants a quad for the morning, he’d better fix the one he broke.”

This induced a raised brow from Andreas. “Will do.”

“Thanks, Dad.”

Unprepared, Ria let out a gasped goodbye when they leapt forward with a jerk, her hands reaching for Santos’s waist so she wouldn’t fly off the back of the quad. Getting her bearings only took seconds, but she found it difficult to let go. Her grasping fingers had found solid flesh and wanted to explore. Because of it, she did let go, placed her hands on her thighs and kept her face away from the masculine neck that had suddenly becoming akin to an enticing treat. Trying to ignore the heat traveling along the inside of her legs, nestled as they were along his, Ria turned her attention up, down and around; anywhere but straight ahead and at the man who was quickly becoming all that she remembered, and dreamed.

The sun filtered through the heavily-loaded trees they were passing under, creating a dappling affect over the ground. Under the trees themselves there was little to no grass, but the swath between each row was recently mowed, the scent tickling her nose. She quickly realized Santos was using it as a road.

They cleared the grove and moved through and around a few more trees before reaching a section of the land about half a mile out that seemed almost barren. Then they hit the dirt road that led to the reserve. She saw the rented Lincoln and one of the company’s jeeps at the gate and had the strange urge to sigh in regret.

The ride was over.

Though they hadn’t driven at full throttle, the speed had been fast enough that the wind whipped her thick, short hair into a nest and turned her nose into an ice cube. Her body was still plenty warm, but her hands and face were freezing.

Santos cut the engine, looking at her over his shoulder. “All right?”

Ria nodded. “Yes.”

His lips curved slightly. “I need you to get off so I can.”

An uncomfortable flush of heat raced to her face and she leapt off the machine as if poked by a cattle prod, only to scuttle several feet away, leaving more than enough distance between them so he wouldn’t accidentally brush up against her when he stood.

“This will only take a minute.” Santos sauntered past her to the gate and flipped open the cover of a metal box screwed into the fence next to the opening of the handle. “I suggest you leave no later than five, otherwise it will get to dark to see the trail safely.”