Forsaken Talisman Page 20

  The moment she felt his release—the swift pulsing of his cock inside her—and heard his ragged moans, she came harder than she ever had before. The room dimmed around her as her arms trembled and finally gave out and she collapsed onto the bed. Dusty moved with her, keeping them joined, the deep connection still echoing between them.

  He draped himself over her back and she snuggled against him. “That was…it…” She paused, unable to put her feelings into words.

  “I know.” He kissed her neck, her hair.

  “I didn’t know it could be like that.”

  “Me either.”

  He withdrew his cock from her, removing the condom she didn’t even remember him putting on. Then he returned, taking her back in his arms, pulling her onto his chest then laying the blankets over them both. One hand stroked her hair, his fingers playing with the tangled strands.

  They hadn’t used a condom last night. How many times had they made love? She wasn’t an idiot, knew it only took one time to get pregnant. Was she ready for that? Was he? “Do you want to have kids?” she blurted out.

  Dusty paused, uncertain how he could answer that question. With her, yes he wanted to have kids, if just to see her ripe with pregnancy, to watch her mother his children. But fatherhood scared him, the potential for the cycle of abuse to continue was a constant fear.

  Before he could come up with an answer, she lifted her head and looked into his eyes. “Dusty, you will be a fantastic father. I know this. You are the warmest, sweetest, strongest man I have ever met. You are a protector and a provider and so full of love to offer. I can’t imagine a better father for my children. So when you’re ready, so am I, and I’ll wait as long as you need me to.”

  It still amazed him the things she saw in him that he’d never seen in himself. “Wow. Thank you for having so much faith in me, but really, I’m not all that. My childhood…it wasn’t perfect. And parts of it still haunt me to this day.” Dusty looked into her eyes, imploring her to understand there was one demon from his past that he was still dealing with. “I am an alcoholic, but I have been sober for over two years. Two years, seven months, nineteen…no, twenty days.”

  “I know,” she said, not an ounce of censure in her voice.

  He was prepared for shock or dismay, but not this simple knowledge and acceptance. “You know?” he repeated.

  “I still have Mariah’s memories, remember?” She smiled. “Dusty, there isn’t much you could say that would scare me away. Maybe it’s crazy of me to feel that way since we only just met, but a year or a decade isn’t going to change what I already know. Even without the knowledge I’ve gleaned from Mariah’s memories, I’ve seen your soul, your heart. And they’re beautiful. So don’t think I’m going to run away because you have secrets in your past. We all do. That’s what makes us human.”

  “God, I love you, Skylar.” He wrapped his arms tighter around her, ready to sink himself fully inside her again. “But it goes a lot deeper than that. Mariah doesn’t know my darkest secrets. The stuff that makes me worry about being a father. She doesn’t know the whole picture. She probably thinks I started drinking with my friends. But it was my own mother. I drank with her so I could feel accepted. So that she’d love me instead of throwing things at me and my brother after my dad took off. But it didn’t work—I never compared to the pleasure she got from her bottle. I’ve always tried to live beyond all that and be a better loving person, but I still worry about being a dad because I don’t want to repeat even the smallest bit of the cycle.”

  “You told Mariah once that you were afraid of being a father. Dusty love, you aren’t your parents. You’ve broken the cycle. You stopped drinking. That right there shows your strength.” She lifted up on one elbow, one hand resting on his chest. “But I’ll wait as long as you need. And I’ll just tell you everyday how damn special you are until you believe me.” Her eyes sparkled with love and devilish mischief.

  “Dammit. There you go again, being the world’s most wonderful woman, making me the world’s luckiest man. You really are amazing. I—I…I don’t even know what to say. I love you, Skylar. I will always love you. And I’ll do my damnedest to be the man you see inside me.” He held her so tight he thought he would squeeze the air out of her lungs.

  She squeezed him back. “Hey, I know what I want when I see it. I knew last night when I first woke up that I could trust you, even when I couldn’t trust myself. Although part of it was Mariah’s memories of you,” she paused, a blush lighting up her face, “it was still more than that. I just knew.”

  “Wait, wait, wait a second. What’s with all your skin turning bright red like we just stepped out of the shower? What the hell do you know that I don’t and you’re blushing about, huh?” He tapped her nose with one finger.

  “Well,” she squirmed. “I have Mariah’s memories. A lot of them. And…”

  “And you like them enough that you blush when you think of them? What the hell kind of memories have you got in that pretty little head of yours? Did Mariah watch a lot of porn or something? I mean, I know she was a stripper, but what’s making you blush like that?”

  “Ummm…” If possible, her blush grew an even brighter shade of red, but something else happened as well. Her nipples swelled and heat radiated from where her sweet pussy was pressed against his leg.

  “What, you remember sex? Mariah and Stephan goin’ at it all the time?” He ran a hand through her hair, then let it tease down her body.

  She nodded, the blush of embarrassment fading into a flush of sexual excitement.

  “And the memories enflame you, don’t they?” He didn’t need to ask. Her desire was obvious, the heat melting him and hardening him simultaneously. “Tell me what you remember,” he whispered into her ear as he took the soft flesh of her lobe and tugged on it with his teeth.

  She shivered and gasped, arching her body against his. He flipped them over so she lay on her back beneath him, her skin almost opalescent in the slivers of light filtering through the room. Her eyes were hooded, her breath coming out in soft pants. When her tongue peeked out between her lips, teasing at her bottom teeth, Dusty thought his dick was going to grow another six inches.

  “I remember…” She mewled as he took a nipple into his mouth, rolling the taut bud on his tongue.

  “What? What do you remember?” he asked before turning to her other breast. Curiosity overran his senses. Her sexual memories from Mariah explained her enchanting mix of innocent and temptress. But what was it in particular that her mind remembered, but her body hadn’t experienced until she was with him?

  She tangled her fingers in his hair, holding her to him. “Dusty…you’re making me forget…what I remember…”

  He chuckled around her nipple. “Do you want me to stop?”

  “No!”

  “Then keep talking. I want to know what turns you on so hot your body’s ready to come and we’ve barely gotten started.”

  “You do,” she whispered. “The memories are just…just a…”

  “Stimulant… It’s okay, baby. There’s nothing wrong with what turns you on.”

  She was quiet for a moment, and then her eyes fluttered shut. Her lips curled up in a soft smile. “My favorite memory of Mariah’s is when you walked in on her and Stephan. The knowledge that someone was watching, someone else was excited because of what I—they—were doing…”

  Her fingers pulled tighter on his hair as he tasted her stomach and hips. She arched restlessly beneath him, but continued talking, her voice husky. “It’s strange, because I know how Mariah felt. I know how much she loves Stephan, but I also know how much it turned her on to see you watching them…”

  “It turns you on, too.” He slid a hand over her mound, enjoying the evidence of just how much it aroused her. She was so hot and wet that it almost killed him not to enter her. But he forced himself to wait, knowing the anticipation would heighten their pleasure.

  She nodded. “But they’re not just memories, Dusty. I can practica
lly feel what she felt. I know what it’s like to be Mariah with Stephan.”

  “Does he lick her like this?” Dusty traced her lips with his tongue. She sighed and opened her mouth, so warm and inviting beneath him. He continued kissing her, loving her.

  “Does he touch her like this?” Skin brushed against skin as he lowered his body against hers. Her flesh was soft and warm. His cock slid easily through the moisture welling from her channel. Back and forth, back and forth until he was covered in her juices, trying to show her how much he needed her. “Is this what you remember?”

  Blue eyes opened, focusing on his. “Dusty…no one touches me like you do. I have Mariah’s memories, and although I know it’s Stephan who is with her, in my mind, it’s different…I can feel his cock slamming inside of me…can feel the harsh tugs of his fingers on my nipples…and even though I can see you watching, it’s still you inside me…not him…all I want is you…I love you…”

  She cried out as Dusty easily thrust himself inside her, mimicking her words. One hand fondled her breasts as he increased the speed of his movements. He’d nearly come just listening to her softly spoken words, so when her body trembled beneath his, he shattered, spending himself inside her.

  Their bodies still trembled as they held each other, sleep creeping over them like the thick fog of a San Francisco morning. Dusty’s last thought before dreaming was that he’d forgotten to tell Skylar that Mariah was her cousin.

  Something to talk about tomorrow…

  Still lost in dreams, Dusty barely noticed when Skylar slipped out of bed. From a distance, he heard the bathroom door close, water running. Time passed, not long before he heard her walk back into the room.

  His eyes flashed open at the sharp, stinging pain. “Skylar?!”

  Then the world went black.

  * * * * *

  “Are you cold?”

  There was no response.

  Suppressing a curse, Marlin watched Ana out of the corner of his eye as they patrolled in the older, industrial part of town. They’d been working together for half the night, and she hadn’t said more than a dozen words to him.

  “I said, are you cold?” He waited, hoping she’d give him a dissertation on just how cold she was. All he wanted was for her to talk to him, it didn’t even matter what they talked about.

  “I’m fine,” she replied, then belied that notion by shivering and snuggling deeper into her leather jacket. Shit. What the hell happened to the trust they’d shared? Neither sweet talk nor harassing got anything more than three words out of her. Stephan was going to kick his ass if he didn’t fix whatever was broken between them.

  When Stephan gave the orders that Ana would team with Marlin during tonight’s patrol rounds, there was a very clear motive behind it. Everyone had noticed the thick tension between Marlin and Ana, and it had to stop. The Shadow Walkers could not have any more problems within their organization. They needed to be strong and completely united.

  “Should we cut through this alley or the one on the next block?”

  “I don’t care. It doesn’t really matter.” Shrugging her shoulders, she kept walking.

  Looking almost unfortunately damn sexy in her black denim and leather, her long wavy red hair loosely tied back with a leather strip, and all Marlin wanted was to get her to talk like they used to. Well, maybe that wasn’t all he wanted to do. If he’d felt it would be okay, he’d pin her to the wall and kiss her until she remembered how they used to make out on the rocks near the cave and share their deepest darkest secrets while the waves crashed onto the sand and spray blew in their faces.

  There was a whole world of stuff he wanted to share with her. But this quiet Ana was not the girl he used to know. The woman next to him looked over her shoulder every ten minutes and stared into the shadows as though willing them alive.

  “Okay, then, let’s just turn here and take Twenty-eighth Street instead.” He turned to her and bit his tongue to avoid going off on her for being so damn terse all night. In his pause, he took a breath and searched for something else to say. “Do you think we should stick to the industrial end tonight or go through some residential, too?”

  “Doesn’t matter.”

  What was up with her? They’d never held back before. Twelve years was a long time, but Marlin certainly hadn’t forgotten about her and his feelings for her hadn’t dulled. What they’d had wasn’t earth-shattering love, but it was just as powerful.

  When he abruptly turned down an alley, she looked all around, apparently to see if he was going to attack something. Truthfully, he did wish that there was some kind of creepy-crawly to obliterate just so he could let go of some frustration. He wanted his Ana back, the girl who was always on the same wavelength with him, who could match his movements without a word passing between them.

  After years of friendship and counseling each other when wickedness overshadowed goodness, it had hurt deeply to lose Ana the day after they had bared both souls and bodies, making love for the first time. That night, they’d escaped death together and desperately needed someone to cling to. The natural choice was each other. When her mom had whisked her out of Talisman Bay, Marlin felt she’d taken a piece of him with her.

  He had always assumed Ana would come back, that The Order would make her fulfill her destiny along with the rest of the Talisman Bay Shadow Walkers. He just hadn’t anticipated twelve years would pass before her return.

  Now that the time had come, he’d expected to see more of her. He’d thought they would resume the close friendship they’d had before she left. Not necessarily the sex, although he wouldn’t have minded.

  “I thought we were going to cut across on Twenty-eighth,” Ana said, interrupting his musings. It was the longest sentence she’d spoken all night.

  “I changed my mind. I thought maybe there’d be something down here. I killed a Crayken here a couple weeks ago.” He glanced at her. She still only looked at him out of the corner of her eye. Dammit.

  What he missed was the girl he could just kiss and talk to for hours without any expectations. The one who always loved to hear his stories about the girls he dated, who offered advice about what a woman wanted both in and out of bed. The girl who kissed his forehead and smiled at him like she gave a damn, and who was honest with him when no one else would be. Hell, he hadn’t even told her about Judy. If anyone in the world were capable of understanding the kind of joy and pain he’d felt, it would be Ana. But since she came back, she avoided anything that had to do with him. Apparently it wasn’t on her list of priorities to ask him how he’d been. Openly talking with Twyla last night had made him realize what he’d missed about his friendship with Ana.

  Maybe Twyla’s ultra-forward, get-in-Ana’s-face-and-ask-her-what-the-hell-is-going-on tactic would work. Nothing else seemed to.

  Marlin abruptly stopped patrolling, stopped walking, hell, he was prepared to stop breathing if it meant that Ana would actually tell him what was really going on between them.

  She turned and faced him, an eyebrow raised. “What? Why are you stopping?” She looked around as though she was about to be jumped by a demon. “Where is it?” She even looked up. “Okay, I’m not seeing it, Marlin. And this isn’t the first time you’ve stopped for no reason. What the hell’s your problem?”

  “No, what the hell is your problem? Me, I’m just pissed that it takes patrol orders to get you to even come close to me and now that you are, you won’t hardly talk to me.” He stood there, asking with his eyes that she confide in him.

  Restlessly, she placed her hands in her pockets…going for the comfort of her weapons perhaps? She threw a quick glance over her shoulder before facing him, but didn’t meet his gaze. Her eyes gave her away, though. She wasn’t going to give in. She was going to keep fighting whatever it was between them rather than just telling him what was on her mind.

  Being this close to her and seeing just how profoundly this…thing…was bothering her made him wonder if maybe he’d hurt her in some horrible wa
y. She wasn’t afraid to be around him, but she was definitely afraid to talk to him. Was she afraid of saying the wrong thing? The right thing? Dammit all to hell. Marlin swore he’d never fall into any kind of caring situation with a woman ever again. There’d be less pain for both parties involved.

  Frustrated, Marlin jerked a hand through his hair. “And why the hell do you keep looking behind you like that? Not a single ghoul, wraith or hellion has attacked from behind all night. I’m worried about you, Ana. I really am. I miss the honesty we had. This is rippin’ me up.”

  Ana sighed and looked over her shoulder again. “I’ve always felt like I’m being watched. It’s nothing new. Like someone or something’s gonna jump out of the shadows and claim me for good or evil.” She stepped closer. “You really don’t need to worry about me, Marlin. I’ve just had a lot on my mind since I got back.”

  “You can share with me. I’ll trade some of what’s on my mind if you trade what’s on yours.”

  The corners of Ana’s mouth tilted upward in a small smile. “Like the good ol’ days… Wasn’t that how we ended up in bed the night we became Shadow Walkers?”

  So, she hadn’t completely blocked their past from her mind. He resisted the urge to kiss her and hold her and tell her that whatever was wrong in her world, he’d make right. But he knew that if he did anything of the sort, she’d likely push him even further away. “Yeah, but now that I know if I sleep with you, you’ll disappear the next day, I don’t think I wanna take that risk again. I mean, where the hell did you go for twelve years? Why didn’t you come back to me?”

  He knew he’d said too much before the words were even completely out of his mouth. It was subtle, a change in the air between them. Dammit! He should’ve waited until he knew she was ready to talk to him. Now, she was going to pull away from him again.