Tears fill my eyes. I can still feel it, what I’ve been hoping and praying for. I know it’s a fake feeling that he gave me and not the true forgiveness of God, but it feels so, so real. I’m dying of thirst and Geraint held a cup to my lips. This bed, being in his arms, might be the only time in my life I’ll ever feel this way. One step might be enough to hurl me back down into the abyss of pain and darkness where I’ve been living for so long.
“Shit!” Geraint exclaims and sits up, taking the sheets with him. I almost let out a yelp and cover my nakedness with my arms. He looks all around the bed, and then at me. I stare back at him, bewildered, wondering what’s wrong.
“I didn’t tie you up after,” he says, his dark hair falling into his sleepy eyes. “You’ve been unbound for hours. Why didn’t you try to escape?”
Stupidly, I look at my wrists. It didn’t even occur to me to try and get away from him.
Geraint smiles, and it’s the same smoldering, hellfire grin he gave me last night, all chiseled beauty and pointed canines. A person shouldn’t possess such a smile. His eyes travel down my naked body. “I knew you were a good girl, Branwen.”
Stop saying that. I’m a bad girl. I’m the worst girl.
I reach down and tug at the sheet, trying to cover myself. Geraint holds it fast and stares down at me. He’s naked too. He must have stripped before we fell asleep. I avert my eyes from the sight of his…thing, so thick and upright with its engorged head and traces of swollen veins. He’s using his power of forgiveness to slake his lust with me, and I can’t give in to either.
Geraint rolls on top of me, moving his hands to either side of my head and his knees between my thighs. I make a tiny sound of fright as his you-know-what rubs against my sex. I can feel its power against my fragile flesh. Ready to take, ready to plunder and consume. The silver crucifix around his neck dangles between us.
He cups my cheek with his hand, rubbing his thumb across my lower lip. My gaze has become locked on his, as if he’s a snake poised to strike. Maybe this is how Eve felt when the snake offered her the apple. Maybe she had no choice. Geraint slides his hand down my throat, squeezing me there for a moment and making my head spin, and then roaming further and taking a handful of my breast and doing the same. The heat is radiating off his broad chest. My fingers itch to take hold of him again as I did last night, if only to hold on for dear life, but I don’t dare in the cold light of day.
But Geraint dares. He’s more than brave enough to touch me. He runs his knuckles over my belly, and then reaches down between my parted thighs. He just brushes the seam of my sex, as light as a feather. He caresses me again, and the sensation expands to fill my whole world.
“My silent girl,” he whispers, the black stubble gleaming on his chin. “What secrets do you know? How can I make you offer them up to me?”
He draws his finger through my sex, the delicious drag making my eyes close and my heart race. How can it be sinful when even Geraint’s touch feels like forgiveness?
“I’ll coax them from your lips, babygirl,” he murmurs, and I feel his lips flutter against mine. Then he moves away, and when I open my eyes, I find he’s kneeling on the bed, his hard penis jutting out over my naked body. He grins at me, scratching his fingers through his dark hair before levering himself off the bed.
“But first, coffee.”
I scramble to cover myself with the sheet, my heart thundering in my ears. It’s frightening how fast I come under his spell. Just a few words and touches, and I’m pliant in his arms, ready to welcome whatever he chooses to do to me.
Geraint lets me shower and use the bathroom first, and then he ties me to the bed once more while he does the same. I listen to the rushing water and the sound of him singing in a deep baritone. Only last night, he was in a sinister, barely contained fury as we burned a piece of someone, and now it’s as if he doesn’t have a care in the world.
He emerges from a cloud of steam ten minutes later, his hair dark with water and stuffing his dirty T-shirt into a bag. He’s got a fresh white tank top and black shirt on, unbuttoned to show the crucifix on its long chain at the center of his chest. I’ve had to put on the same clothes I was wearing yesterday, down to my underwear.
“If you keep being a good girl, tonight, before we stop in a motel, I’ll buy you some new clothes. Would you like that?”
I look away quickly, not wanting to feel grateful to my kidnapper but knowing it’s too late.
He unties me and holds out his hand. “Come on, time to go.”
As if we’re boyfriend and girlfriend, he walks me to the front desk and checks us out, then takes us to his car. The morning is bright and clear and there are plenty of cars passing us by on the high street. I could scream. I could beg and cry out for help and people would rush to my aid. I?
??m small and slight while Geraint is large and mean.
He’s taking me back to the place where it all began, like a pilgrimage. I should have faced what happened months ago, but I thought prayer would give me release. Geraint needs something too. I can feel anger and grief pulsating in him, breaking through his moments of forced cheeriness and seductive danger. We’re being pulled toward a place that will change both of us, forever.
So, I won’t run. I’ll return to Avallonis and face whatever lies in wait for me there—be it salvation, or death.
We pull out onto the main road and Geraint takes us into a drive-thru coffee joint. It’s a long way from Texas to Napa. I picture the map in my mind. We’ll probably head up into New Mexico and then on to Phoenix and Los Angeles. A shiver passes through me at the thought of seeing the walls of Avallonis again.
“Black coffee?” Geraint asks me, and I shake my head. “White coffee. Sugar?”
I hold up two fingers, and he orders for us. We drive to the next window and he collects our drinks, passes me mine, and then we speed out of town.
Out on the interstate, Geraint puts his foot down. I can tell he’s feeling the pressure of all those miles ahead of us and wants to eat up some of them this morning. He doesn’t speak, merely taking occasional mouthfuls of his coffee and tapping his long forefinger on the steering wheel. I wish he’d stop doing that. He keeps drawing my attention to his hands and reminding me of what we did last night. There’s a power to his touch that I don’t understand, something divine that shouldn’t belong to a mortal man. I remember the feel of his arms around me that rainy night, when a terror so great filled me that I couldn’t stop running. He gathered up all that fear and took it into himself, and the release was so great I couldn’t stay on my feet a moment longer. Surely a demon wouldn’t do that. Only an angel can swallow darkness.
Geraint
By one in the afternoon, we’ve traveled two hundred miles and I can hear Branwen’s tummy rumbling over the sound of the car’s engine. She’s been fidgeting a lot and that big coffee she drank probably means she needs to pee. I can see the pole-mounted signs of fast food restaurants in a town up ahead, beckoning drivers to pull over.