Possessed by a Warrior. Sharon Ashwood
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go of me! she screamed in her head, but somehow the words couldn’t find her tongue. She was paralyzed, the man’s hot breath stroking her skin as he chuckled, long and low.
“Can I trust you not to move?” he said.
It was then she felt the cold kiss of a gun muzzle against her spine. She sucked in a stuttering gasp. She felt his lips brush her ear. “I’d rather not shoot. I’d rather leave without attracting attention. Get it?”
“Y-yes,” she whispered, feeling a hot sting as tears filled her eyes. She squeezed her eyelids tight, stifling a sob. She wanted to scream so badly, but her voice had abandoned her. She’d taken self-defense classes, but the gun trumped any tricks she knew. She’d never been so terrified in her life.
She felt a sudden weight on her back as the thief straddled her, pinning her arms with his body and squeezing the air from her lungs. Her head was turned to the side, but it was still hard to breathe. Chloe struggled, gulping air that stank with her attacker’s sweat.
She sensed him grabbing a pillow off the bed. A moment later, the cool cotton muffled her face, filling her nose and mouth. A gun might make too much noise, but suffocation was silent.
Desperate, Chloe tried to squirm away.
“Damn you!” he muttered, and she felt his grip tighten.
Fighting would only get her killed a different way, but Chloe couldn’t stop. The will to survive was too strong. She bucked hard enough that the pillow slipped and she gasped in precious oxygen.
Wham!
Her eyes went wide as the bedroom door slammed against the wall. The pillow fell away and a flare of sudden light filled the room as someone turned on the overhead. The thief swore, pushing Chloe’s face against the bed with his bare hand. Her mouth flooded with the metallic taste of fresh panic.
“Get away from her!” someone barked. Someone used to shouting orders. It sounded like Faran Kenyon.
“Now!” That one was Ralston!
Chloe felt her attacker’s weight shift.
The deafening noise from his gun came from right above her, making her skull ring.
Oh, God!
A hot spray of blood spattered the pillow in front of Chloe. She recoiled, covering her head, and realized a beat later that she could move her arms. Her attacker had leaped off the bed.
Or been blown off. She scanned the sheets in front of her, crimson spreading across the white like bright drops of paint. Nausea lurched in her throat.
Ralston vaulted over the bed with an unholy snarl, leaping for her attacker. Chloe twisted around to catch a glimpse of a dark-clad man lunging toward the window. She covered her face as the window smashed, her own scream sounding muffled because she was still deaf from the gunshot.
Her attacker disappeared in a hail of glass. Ralston skidded to a stop as he reached the gaping mess where the window had been. Kenyon joined him a second later. Both had their weapons up, standing to the side of the window frame and scanning the grass below.
Chloe could guess what they were thinking. Her room was on the second story, but a porch roof jutted out below. Someone could use that as a halfway point while jumping to the ground.
“Do you see him?” Ralston demanded. He was wearing nothing but worn jeans and sneakers, his torso bare. His big body was still ready to spring, coiled muscles drawn tight.
“Not from here,” Kenyon replied.
“Go.”
Kenyon turned, running for the door and thumbing on his cell phone as he went. By the time he reached the door, someone on the other end of the connection had answered. “Close the gates!”
Chloe could make out the words, but beyond that was nothing but the muffled ringing from the gunshot. For a moment, her emotions felt the same: numb, stunned, distant.
I nearly died.
“You okay?” Ralston stared out the window, still scanning the darkness.
She cleared her throat. “I think so.” The words quavered.
“Good.”
As her pulse slowed, Chloe studied his back, her gaze tracing the muscles and bones of his broad shoulders. Half naked, he looked far more at home than he had in a suit.
It was as if, stripped of clothes, the real man was visible. Sam Ralston moved with an animal grace that stirred something primitive in her. Her fear responded to his blatantly male presence, wanting all that size and strength on her side.
“Is he gone?” she asked, her voice shaking.
“Not for long,” he replied, his head moving slowly as he scanned the grounds. “He’s going to pay for this.”
Finally, Ralston turned away from the window, a furrow between his dark brows. His gaze flicked over her face. “You’re not okay. You’re pale.”
“So are you.”
His gaze flicked around the room. “It’s the smell of blood.”
“I hate it, too.” Chloe hiccupped, feeling a wave of nervous energy shudder through her. The numbness was fading. She wanted to scream. Or cry. He held me at gunpoint. He tried to smother me.
The very idea was surreal. For a moment, she doubted that it had happened at all.
“You’re safe now.” Ralston took a quick step toward her. The speed of it, the size of him made her flinch. He stopped, looking at her for a long moment. Chloe felt her pulse speeding again, pounding in her head.
Slowly now, he set his gun on the nightstand and put his hands on his hips, a gesture that showed his broad chest. His gray eyes were dark and angry. “Do you know what he wanted?”
Chloe felt slightly dizzy. Adrenaline aftermath and unexpected desire hit her like strong brandy. Sam rescued me! A wave of new emotions—ones she couldn’t even name—lapped dangerously at the edges of her thoughts. “He was after the dress.”
They both looked over at the gown, which pooled like a deflated cloud on the carpet. Sam crossed over to it, picking it up by the hanger and replacing it on the wardrobe door. The gesture was surprisingly careful.
Something about it—the crumpled dress or the way he handled it—made her start to cry in soft, gulping sobs. Chloe covered her face, horrified at the pathetic sounds coming from her throat, but the feel of the pillow against her face, the attacker’s hands on her skin played over and over again in her mind.
The bed dipped as Sam’s weight settled next to her. He pulled a blanket around her, his gestures efficient but gentle, as if he were holding himself firmly in check. “It’s over. He’s gone.”
“Then why am I crying?” she snapped. She was weirdly angry, as if it were all Sam’s fault.
“You’re in shock,” he said quietly.
“I don’t cry.”
“I know.” He sounded apologetic.
She wanted to demand how he could possibly know what she did or didn’t do, but it was clear he was just being kind. Biting her lip, she struggled to stop weeping. She craved Sam’s protection but was furious that she needed it. I’ve got to pull myself together.
Frustrated, her mind lunged for specifics. Something besides the horrible feeling of being pushed and crushed and threatened that played over and over in her head, like a bad song that just wouldn’t shut up. “How did he get in?”
“Probably the window. I don’t know yet.”
Yet? That meant the mysterious Mr. Ralston was going to investigate. She swallowed down a fresh batch of sobs. “How did you know I was in trouble?”
“I heard something