Heart of the Hunter (36 page)

I’d intended to leave after breakfast, to get the job over with, but something about the way Faith looked at me stopped me. I just couldn’t pull myself away from her. She was going to be the mother of my child. I knew it with a certainty that defied logic.

But I wanted her to know it too. I wanted her to know she was mine so completely, so utterly, that even if Staten and his men killed me and she never saw me again, it would hardly matter. I wanted to burn myself on her soul, brand her with my body, so that she wouldn’t ever be able to free herself of me.

It wasn’t that I wanted to take her freedom from her, or her future. I didn’t want to take anything away from her. I wanted to give her something. And this was what I knew how to give.

“Faith,” I said.

“Yes, Jackson.”

“Climb onto my lap.”

“Now?”

I didn’t say anything. I didn’t want her to answer me back. I wanted her to do as I said. She eyed me suspiciously as she straddled me. She didn’t believe I could go again. She thought I was spent. If only she knew, when it came to her body, I’d never be spent.

I’m big in every way. My chest is broad. My arms are built. My cock is like an extra limb. My naked, scarred body is terrifying. Faith looked at me like she was the one who was going to do the devouring. She wasn’t scared. She didn’t mind my scars. I loved her for that.

She did as she was told, climbed on top of me, and put her arms around my shoulders. I pressed her against my chest. My throbbing cock was in front of her, pressed against her tender stomach. I knew my baby was in that stomach. Faith didn’t realize it yet, but she would soon enough.

She was so small against me. I put my hands beneath her buttocks and lifted her up, testing her weight. She weighed nothing at all.

She looked up into my eyes like a child. She was going to let me do whatever I wanted to her. I could tell.

“I’m going to protect you,” I said softly.

She nodded.

“Everything will be taken care of.”

“Thank you,” she whispered.

“The only thing you have to do, is surrender yourself to me completely.”

She leaned in to me and started kissing my neck, her mouth sucking gently on the sensitive skin. I shut my eyes as my cock grew in my lap. It rose up between her legs like a tree growing.

She looked down at it.

“Spit on it,” I said.

She glanced up at me.

“Do it,” I said insistently.

She let a stream of saliva fall from her lips over the head of my weapon. My tip glistened, perfectly coated in her saliva.

“Do you trust me?” I said.

She nodded.

“What I want to do, it might hurt at first,” I said.

She nodded again.

“Just remember, everything comes at a cost.”

She clung to me. I lifted her a few inches from my lap and held her, suspended over my cock.

“Wrap your legs around my chest,” I said.

She did as she was told. Very slowly, I lowered her back down onto my erect penis. Her pussy was right there, already dripping for me, but it wasn’t her pussy that I wanted. I lowered her so that the tip of my cock pressed against the tight muscle of her virgin asshole.

She gasped.

I locked eyes with her.

“This is what I want from you, Faith. This is what I demand.”

She whimpered as I lowered her another inch, the head of my cock pressing hard against her anus. She tried to kiss me but I backed away.

“Not yet,” I said. “Not till I say.”

She shivered. I didn’t know if she was cold or scared. I lifted her higher and lowered her again, my cock pressing harder against the tight ring of her ass. I wanted to enter her there. I wanted to pour my seed in there. I wanted to make sure she was mine, completely mine, for now and forever.

I knew what I had to do in Nevada, it would be dangerous, and there was every chance I’d never see her again. If my plan had worked, if she was already carrying my child, I had to make sure she remembered me. I had to make sure she’d remember she was utterly mine, even if I was dead. I didn’t want another man coming along after my death and winning her heart. I had to burn myself on her heart like a cattle brand. I had to get so far inside her that nothing, not even death, would ever be able to rip me back out.

I needed that. I needed it for my child. I needed her to speak of me to the child. I needed it for myself too. If I was going to ride to my death, I had to know my life had meant something. But most of all, Faith needed it. I could sense it, like some animals can sense water in the desert. She needed to belong to someone. She needed to know her place in the world. And I was going to show her.

She cried out. My cock was pushing its way through the barrier, entering her passage, and it terrified her.

When I found her, she was utterly lost. Now she was carrying my child, but that wasn’t enough for me. I had to have more. I had to take everything from her.

And I was going to give her my ultimate sacrifice too.

I had to penetrate her deeply. I had to burn myself onto her very soul. It wasn’t just for pleasure. It wasn’t just an idle desire. I wanted to break her, the way a horse-whisperer breaks a mustang. I needed her to know she belonged to me. I didn’t just want her just to love me, I wanted her to fear me too. To respect me. I wanted her to worship me like an animal worships its master.

She cried out, but she was powerless to stop me. I lowered her onto my erect spike and it slid up into her like a sword killing a warrior.

“Please,” she mouthed but I didn’t listen. I couldn’t stop now. If I stopped now, she’d never forgive me. She’d despise me. I couldn’t stop until she was utterly mine. I had to defeat her will, her resistance.

“Jackson,” she whispered.

I refused to feel compassion. I kept lowering her until she was resting again on my lap, my shaft all the way inside her ass, my balls touching the cheeks of her butt.

“Some things have to come with pain,” I said.

“Why are you doing this?”

“You’ll understand after I’m gone.”

“No,” she cried.

“If Los Lobos kill me, I’ll live on within you, Faith. I’ll live on within your womb.”

“You don’t even know if I’m pregnant.”

It was then that I kissed her. My cock was in her ass, all the way to the very center of her body, and I shoved my tongue into her mouth so that she couldn’t say another word. She tried to cry out, she tried to moan, to beg for mercy, but I stifled all of it. I couldn’t bear to hear it.

I was simultaneously creating and destroying the only thing in the world that mattered to me. I was forcing her to be mine for the rest of her life. I knew she’d never look at another man after this. But I was also forcing her to hate me, to look at me as a monster. She’d never forgive me for leaving her. Not for as long as she lived.

If I left her now, if Wolf killed me, if I never returned, she’d hate me for it.

My cock pulsed inside her. She struggled but I held her firmly in place. There was no escape. She bit my lip and I released her from my kiss.

Her claws dug into the flesh of my back.

“Don’t resist me,” I cried. “I’m doing this for us.”

She was crying. My cock burst, the flood of my semen pouring into her anus in waves of pleasure.

“I know,” she cried.

Surge after surge of my orgasm pulsed inside her.

“Harder,” she cried.

I thrust my groin upward, forcing it against the soft flesh of her ass. My cock was lodged so firmly inside her she wouldn’t have been able to break free even if I let her.

“Harder, Jackson,” she cried again. “If you’re going to break my heart, you better break it all the way.”

I shut my eyes. Her nails were so deep in my back that blood was flowing down over my scars. Her mouth pressed against my neck, her teeth biting me painfully. Her legs were so firmly wrapped around my waist I could hardly breathe.

As the last throbs of my sperm flowed into her ass, I knew it was true. She was mine. She was utterly mine, and she always would be.

I’d broken her. I was her master.

Chapter 15

Faith

W
HEN JACKSON TOLD ME HE
was leaving to ride north, something inside me broke. He was going to ride to his death, and he wasn’t even considering where that would leave me. I didn’t care that he said it was for me. It wasn’t for me. I didn’t need revenge on Wolf. All I needed was Jackson to stay with me, to protect me by being with me, to never leave me. All I needed was for him to stay.

“I can’t stay,” he said. “You know that.”

“Then go,” I cried. “If you’re going to leave me, go now. It would have been better if I’d never met you. It would have been better if I’d never left Wolf.”

“Faith,” he said, but it was too late.

I shook my head. I wanted no more of his words. He was breaking my heart and he knew it. How could he do this to me? In the space of two passionate nights he’d made me fall completely in love with him. I knew I was already carrying his baby. There was no doubt in my mind I was pregnant. I don’t know how I knew, but I knew.

Now he was breaking me heart. He was breaking my body and my heart at the same time. He didn’t realize I’d forgive him for anything, if only he would stay. He didn’t realize I didn’t care about Wolf Staten. All I cared about was Jackson being at my side.

I wanted to tell him that I released him from his promise, that he didn’t have to go, but he wasn’t listening. He thought I’d hate him for being a coward. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The only thing I’d hate him for was leaving me. He didn’t have to do it like this. He didn’t have to leave a trail of destruction. We could have stayed at that house together. Or he could have taken me somewhere else. I’d have gone anywhere with him. I wanted him. I didn’t want justice. I wanted Jackson to help me raise this baby he’d been so determined to put inside me.

“Tell me where to find Wolf,” he said.

I flashed daggers at him with my eyes. I was so angry I’d have shot him through the heart if I’d had a gun.

“You’re leaving me now?” I said.

“Faith, I have to go.”

“You don’t have to do anything. It’s your pride that’s making you leave.”

“Wolf Staten deserves to die.”

“I don’t care about him. All I want is to run away with you.”

“I’ll never run away. You know that.”

“You’re running away from me. You’re a coward, Jackson Jones. If you leave me now, you’ll be a coward till your dying day. I swear to God.”

“I warned you,” he said. “I told you you’d regret getting involved with me. I warned you it would lead to nothing but pain.”

I took my wallet from my purse and threw a piece of paper at him. If he wanted to kill himself, who was I to tell him otherwise?

“The address is there. He goes to that house every night. It’s remote. There’ll be guards there, and they’ll shoot you dead before you get within a hundred yards of him. If that’s what you want, if you want to kill yourself rather than raise our baby together, go ahead.”

He shook his head.

“I warned you Faith. You knew from the beginning you’d regret ever meeting me.”

He was so wrong. I didn’t regret meeting him at all. Not for one second. The only thing I regretted was losing him.

Tears fell down my cheeks.

He grabbed his things and left. I collapsed to the floor. His sperm was still inside me, dripping out of me in a pool on the floor. I heard the motorcycle fire up and recede into the distance. I held my breath and listened. He’d stop. He’d change his mind. He’d come back to me. He had to.

But he didn’t. He never came back.

Chapter 16

Jackson

I
RODE NORTH AS IF
being chased by a wildfire. The clouds in the sky rose above me, curling in a vortex. A storm was brewing.

I had only one thing on my mind—to keep my word. I was going to do for Faith what I’d promised.

And she was going to do for me what she’d promised.

A life for a life.

If I had to die, I was ready for it. I’d done my best to be a man. I’d tried to love a woman, briefly though it was. I’d burned myself into her soul in the short time we had together. I’d put my baby in her—left behind a son to carry on my name.

Now I was going to kill the man who threatened everything I loved. He threatened every chance at happiness and peace Faith would ever know. He’d never let her escape his clutches. I knew that with a certainty that burned in my soul. Men like Wolf Staten didn’t care how much suffering they caused. His honor wouldn’t allow her to escape. It would threaten his manhood and his position as the head of Los Lobos.

I’m bad. I know that. I’m bad to the bone.

But like I said before, I never meant any harm.

I was doing the only thing I knew how to do. I was being the only man I knew how to be. I didn’t see that I had any other option. Faith called me a coward for leaving her, but could she have lived with a man who didn’t stand up for her like this? Could she raise the child of a man she didn’t respect?

She deserved better than that.

I crossed the state line into Nevada before stopping for gas. There was a payphone and I called the Brotherhood from it.

“Jackson, where the hell have you been? You left without a word. We thought you were in trouble.”

It was Grant Lucas, my friend, one of the brotherhood, a man I’d gladly give my life for. A man who’d step up to protect me no matter what.

“I had to clear my head, Grant.”

“Well, come home. It’s not safe out there.”

“That’s what I’m calling about.”

“What?”

“Did you hear about the shooting at the motel near Salinas?”

“Shit, that was you?”

“It’s a long story, brother.”

“Well, shit, Jackson. Where the hell are you?”

“Listen,” I said. “I’m mixed up with something.”

“And it involves Los Lobos?”

“Yes it does.”

“Come in and talk it out. The Brotherhood will sort it out.”

“This is something I have to face alone.”

“We’re brothers. All of us. You face nothing alone.”

“This is about a woman.”