The Keepers Book Two of the Holding Kate Series (21 page)

Why should I fight it? She feels it, too. It seems something greater keeps throwing us together. It’s meant to be. I’ve always known, she is the one.

He craved another kiss. Alive and in his arms she felt so good, so soft, full of tenderness and warmth
.
He ran his hands down her arms and back. He didn’t think he would ever have another chance, but once again the nearness and need of Kate consumed him. He buried his face in her hair and breathed her name.

“Kate.”

She stiffened, then slowly withdrew from his embrace, but clasped his hand tightly in hers.

“What are we supposed to do, now?” she asked.

“I guess we wait.” He drew her over to a corner and they slid down to sit on the floor with their backs against the wall. He tucked her under his arm and she pressed into his chest and wrapped her arms around him.

“Trip?”

“Yes, love.”

“Trip, don’t call me that, please,” she whispered.

“Sorry, Kate, but I am not going to hide my feelings for you anymore. I can’t. Now that we’ve started things up with that kiss, I just love you. I can’t help it.” Just the memory of her passion for him made his pulse race.

She pressed her face into his chest.

“I know that you love me too. Kate, I almost lost you. I thought you were dead on the jackal world and just now, I thought I lost you again. You can’t ask me to stop. I’m just not capable of giving you up after all we’ve been through.”

“You have to, Trip. I’m m…married to Corey. I chose him,” she begged. “I am so sorry I kissed you. We can never do that again.”

Not convinced, the passion and fire lingered, he could tell she sensed the magnetism between them, even now.

“Kate, what we have is not wrong. Our kiss stands as the first right thing we have done since you came back from that stupid Scriptorium experience!”

“Trip!” Hurt saturated her reply.

“Kate, I am sorry. I don’t want to hurt your feelings, but you can’t honestly think that you are married to him. Where are the papers? The license? The witnesses? It takes more than speaking words and having sex to make a marriage.”

“Trip, stop,” she whispered.

He gathered her into his lap. “Katie girl, I am not saying this to hurt you. “

He took her face in his hands and felt for tears. Her cheeks were wet. He wiped them with his thumbs. “Kate.” He couldn’t stand for her to cry. Kissing her cheeks where the tears had been, he wished he could see her beautiful face and simmering gaze.

His mind went back to the closet experience during the tornado jump. They were just like this, locked in each other’s arms. In the dark, hiding from the tornados, she chose him. She chose him first. He sensed her passion rise. He felt her need of him. He felt it then and he felt it now.

“Kate,” he whispered. Heavy with desire, the air thickened between them. Her face, a centimeter from his, strained toward him. He could taste her ragged breath. He went to kiss her cheek again, but she closed the small distance between them and with a moan of desire she kissed him.

QUANTUM PERSPECTIVE SOURCE (QPS): KATE WILSON

Once again Kate found herself alone with Trip and he had saved her.
How did this keep happening?
Kate tried to resist him, then he started confessing his love. His warmth and protection covered her in this dark scary place and she surrendered to that familiar need of him.

Kate couldn’t stand his pain. Even in the dark, she could feel his agony. She started to cry, tired of hurting him. A good-hearted person, Trip didn’t deserve the way she kept stomping on his heart over and over. Like she insisted on reducing it to a size too small to love her or anyone else for that matter.

He lifted her into his strong arms and kissed her tears. Suddenly they flew back in time to the tornado closet. All of the reasons she chose him came back to her, his strength, his need to protect her always. Magnetic, the attraction spiked, then flooded over her in an irresistible undertow. He leaned toward her and she wanted—no, needed— to taste his lips and secure his strong protection.

Kate kissed Trip Carson, loosing the wild passion they had constrained. In a flash her mind took them play by play down the path this kiss led. She saw it all. They groped each other and ripped each other’s clothes off, even now her hands slid under his shirt. He ripped the zipper of her jacket. They would do unspeakable things to one another in the throes of heated desire, and end up naked on the floor in a twisted mass of adulterated ecstasy. Part of her hungered for it and she moaned in his mouth, aching for his touch. He ran his hands down her neck. Another, weaker part of her screamed.
Stop this now or become your father!

She ripped away from the kiss with a gasp.

“No!” She pushed away from him. “No, no, no! I can’t. I won’t.” She scrambled backward off of his lap and crab walked until her head hit the far wall.

“Kate!” he pled.

“No,” she whispered. “Stay away from me, Trip.” She scrubbed a hand over her mouth, removing his evidence. Curling into a ball on the floor, she let tears flow freely in silence, her palms pressed together and against her mouth to silence her sobs.

“Kate,” he whispered from across the room. “Don’t do this to yourself.”

“Shhh,” she managed.

He chuckled. “Why are you trying so hard to give up what you so clearly want?”

“I want Corey,” she whimpered.

“You want me more. That much is obvious.”

“No.”

“Kate,” a condescending tone coaxed. “Be honest with yourself.”

She sat up and wiped her tears. “You want the truth, Trip?” Her voice quavered.

“Yes.”

“I don’t want to hurt you, but I fear the truth will.”

“It won’t be the truth then.”

“Yes, I promise it will be the truth. Are you sure you want to hear it?” Again, she swiped at her tears, but they kept flowing.

“Okay.”

“I love him. Corey. He is everything and more. He has the purest heart and most noble spirit. His strength rises up from within his very soul. He loves me for who I am and who I will become. His love does not come with strings or demands. It just is. Unconditional, pure, sacred. I chose Corey, because I love him and because I love who I am with him. I am strong when I am with him. I am whole, anchored in something beautiful and awesome, pure and divine when he is with me.”

“Right, but does he make you feel the way I do?” Smug, he thought he had her.

“No, he doesn’t. I have never felt wicked or sinful or adulterous or weak or worthless in his arms. I only feel that way when I am with you, Trip.” She croaked out the last sentence knowing it would hurt him. She hated to say it, but it rang as truth, and Trip needed to hear her resolve.

“You are bad for me, Trip Carson. I love you, but you would end up devouring me, or I would end up a rotting carcass on the inside if I stayed with you. Not because you are a bad person, Trip. You are a great person. But I am not good when I am with you. I think only of my own pleasure, not even your pleasure, just mine, when I kiss you. I am driven only by selfish need of protection and desire. It’s wrong. I am wrong for you.”

He sat, quiet. She wondered if he had fallen asleep at her lengthy lecture.

“Thank you for telling me the truth, Kate.” He spoke flatly.

Her heart stuttered. She wanted to rush to him, to take it all back and tell him they would work something out. She didn’t, though. She rolled back into a ball and stayed on her side of the room, and he stayed on his.

A pink light strobed overhead, a panel in the wall slid open, and the pink light spiraled out and down the walls. Corey and Navarro rushed in.

Dear Lord, if I hadn’t pulled away when I did, they would have walked in on us right at the peak of—

“Aht!”
Her stomach turned.

Corey heard the noise and focused on her, and then snapped his head to Trip on the opposite side of the room. “Kate?”

“Corey!” She stood and stumbled into his arms. The sight of him entering the room echoed the feeling of hope rekindling in her heart.

He embraced her then touched her chin and looked at her tear stained face. “Are you okay, sweetheart?”

“Yes,” she whispered and hugged him tightly. For the first time since she had kissed Trip after the jackal attack, she knew they were going to be okay. They had some things to work through, but they would tackle them together.

He brushed her hair back to assess her neck. “What happened?”

“I don’t know. Big bugs?” She gently probed the sting at her neck. “It was dark.”

Corey grabbed her hand and directed it away. “Don’t touch it, honey.” He tilted her chin to the side so he could see it better.

“I gave her that.” Trip pointed to the half empty vial on the floor.

“What is it?”

“I don’t know.” Trip shook his head. “I took a leap of faith, I guess. She was dying. It worked.”

Corey moved to Trip and hugged him. Trip stiffened at first.

“Thank you, Trip, for saving my wife again.” The timbre of Corey’s words rang sincere. He loved Trip, Kate could tell. Corey, loyal to the bone could never betray Trip the way Trip had constantly betrayed Corey. The way she had constantly betrayed him. She wrung her hands and swallowed the big ball of guilt wadded in the back of her throat.

Trip wrapped his arms around Corey briskly. “Don’t mention it.” He tapped a fist into Corey’s shoulder blade, then stepped back quickly.

Kate shifted a glance to Navarro, but he just looked down awkwardly.

A section of a wall slid open across the room. Kate screamed, afraid the giant mutant bugs were coming back. Dirk ran into the room carrying Tara. Mel and Donnie whisked in behind them and whirled around to make sure the panel closed.

Tara dangled, unconscious in Dirk’s arms, her leg covered in huge bulbous stings. Trip bounded over and ripped her out of Dirk’s arms. He carried her to the vial in the center of the room and sank to the floor. Holding her head, he tipped the vial into her mouth, then poured the remaining fluid onto her stings. They exploded in a puff of green smoke and pus. A putrid odor assailed them.

“Come on, baby,” Trip growled. “Come on.” He leaned over and listened to her heart and then felt for breath. “Tara, come on, fight.”

Watching his face, Kate believed he loved Tara. He kissed Tara’s cheek and her eyes fluttered open. She raked in breath and blinked at Trip, beaming pure love and gratitude. Then her face blanched and she turned dejected eyes aside, flared her nostrils and flattened her lips.

As though she had cast a net of wire over Kate’s soul and left it to die, Tara pushed Trip away from her. Kate watched her rejection of Trip and the violence of it crashing over him.

I did that to her. My weakness caused Tara to lose faith in Trip.
Kate’s heart broke for Trip and Tara.

Tara reached for Dirk. He stepped around Trip, scooped her up and supported her beside him. She clung to him until her breathing slowed, then she lifted her leg and looked at the stings.

“I hate bugs,” she grumbled.

Kate definitely agreed.