We get to the outside, and I look around. The sirens are loud, and you can hear guns and shouting, but it’s in the distance and off somewhere to the right. I pull Tess the opposite direction and just like the men discussed in the cell next to me, the hole in the fence is there.
“Slide through,” I order.
She looks at me, back to the small opening, shakes her head and then slides through. I push the fence out, knowing it will be a tight fit getting through. I’ve barely started when Tess takes off, running down the small grassy area between the hill and the fence. I growl out in frustration. I should let her go, I have no use for her, and she’s the reason I’m in this mess. For some unfathomable reason, I don’t. I rush through the fence. I grimace, at the pain I feel when the fence slashes into my stomach, but don’t give it much thought. Instead, I run to catch up to Tess, before she gets away. The simple truth is; I don’t want to let her go yet.
“I don’t think so, Kitten,” I tell her, wrapping my hand around her arm. She huffs when I pull her back around to face me.
“You don’t want to do this, Mad Max. I’ve read your folder. You’re not a bad man; you were most likely going to get your parole today. You don’t want to add kidnapping and attempted escape onto your record. Let me go.”
I ignore her plea and lead her the opposite way she was going. I pull us close to the building. If there are any guards left in the towers that the men didn’t overpower, I want it to be hard to spot us. The line of grass we have to walk on gets smaller as we reach the creek bank. We cross it to get into the swampland. As I direct her to the edge of the water, she pulls against my hold.
“What are you doing? We can’t go through that water, we don’t know how deep it is, and that’s swampland beyond it. You do know we’re in Florida right? The state, alligators freaking love? We’d have to be insane. We should hit the main road.”
“Kitten, this is not a democracy. Now shut it and go through the water.”
“I can’t swim,” She says, eyeing the water.
“Of course you can’t.” I sigh and then bend down and wrap my arms around her thighs, tossing her over my shoulder in a fireman’s hold. I feel a small, stinging pain from the cut I got earlier and a wet feeling where my shirt meets the cut. I ignore it because I feel her nails dig into my back, and that feels fucking good.
“Wait, can we talk about this? I really, really don’t want to go into the water. I can’t swim! What if you fall? I’ll drown. I’m a rock in the water.”
“I’ll catch you,” I huff, letting the cold water cool my body. It’s October and for Florida it has been unseasonably cool.
“That’s great, Mad Max, a perfect plan, except you will have already fallen into the water?”
I ignore her and slog on through. She starts beating my back, kicking her legs. My prison-issue shoes have slick bottoms, and I start slipping. The water is up to my waist, and I’m doing my best to keep her under control.
“Max! I’m going to drown, switch me around! The water is close to my face!”
I don’t see how since she’s barely over my shoulder, but I shift her so that I am cradling her against me. I like having her weight in my arms. I bury that thought. My life is over. I can’t go back and wouldn’t even want to. I’m about to get her settled when she tilts too far to the right and my foot slides against the rocks underneath. I shift the opposite way, but can’t correct quickly enough, and we fall into the water.
It takes me a minute to get my bearings and before I can, Tess’s foot, still wearing the pointy ass heels, pushes into my side and she’s swimming back the way we came. I try to catch her, to keep her from getting away from me, but I fall back down. Fucking hell! I finally get back up and manage to grab hold of her leg and pull her back to me. Her head goes under, her arms beating against the water as she flails and tries to break free of me. Back over my shoulder she goes, and I don’t bother being gentle this time. I’m mad, and she’ll know exactly how mad as soon as we get to the other side. Can’t swim my ass! Afraid of the water! Damned little liar.
She squirms harder against me, and my anger is already amped up high. I brace my feet against the sandy bedrock of the lake. Then I shift her back against my chest, but not in a protective sense this time. I use one hand to grab her hair, most of which has fallen from the clasp she had it in. I wrap it around my fingers and pull her head back hard. She inhales from the pain, her eyes open wide as she looks at me. Lucky for her, she keeps her tongue in her mouth.
“You’ve just bought yourself a world of trouble, Kitten,” I growl, pulling her hair even tighter just to get my point across.
My heart is hammering in my chest. I’m breathing hard from the exertion of trying to get away from Max, but the fear rising in me has more to do with the look in his eyes. Still, there’s another reason. The feel of his hands in my hair, the clinching of his muscles around my body as he holds me to him, and the forceful way he has grabbed me, they all combine to excite me. How can anything about this excite me? How can I still have any kind of feelings for Max? What in the hell is wrong with me? He kidnapped me during a prison break. Kidnapped! I am a grown woman, with a history of working in the law field. I know better than most, what kind of people get put away in jail. Yet, I still managed to get infatuated with a man I didn’t know. Infatuated with a convicted felon, who kidnapped me and is threatening me. That reminder should wake me up. I find it doesn’t.
I don’t know why Max’s file spoke to me the first time I read it, but it did. It was heartbreaking. While I certainly can’t condone his actions, a part of me sympathizes with him and even understands his reasoning. When I looked at his pictures, something in his eyes felt like he was staring right at me. I know that sounds insane. It’s still true. Meeting him in person should have pulled me out of my dreamland. Meeting him like this, definitely should have. So what’s wrong with me?
He scares me, more than a little. He also intrigues me. My mind is whirling with all these feelings, questions and a healthy dose of panic mixed in, maybe that’s why I keep quiet. Maybe it’s because I know I’ve pushed him too far. Whatever it is, I don’t say another word until we make it to the other side of the water. He falls, somehow being careful not to let me hit the ground. I’m cocooned in his body. I can’t help, but take note of how he protects me with just that simple gesture. It reinforces that I’m safe with him. I’ve mouthed off to him constantly, and he’s not done one thing about it. In fact, had he not kidnapped me, I don’t think I would have survived the prison riot and break out. I can still remember the look in that other man’s eyes as he touched me. If I didn’t already have chills running through my body from the water, just that memory alone would be enough to chill me to my bones.
Max moves me off of him and rolls to his back, breathing hard. As further proof that I’m a little nuts, I instantly miss having him under me. I lie on the ground looking up at the crystal blue sky, praying the sun warms me. My thoughts are spinning, and I have no idea what to do or say now. That’s when I feel his large hand wrap around my ankle. I jerk and sit up watching him as he breaks the heel off my hundred dollar, Nine-West, gladiator heels that I got on sale for forty-nine dollars. I was so proud of these shoes! I mourn their loss and want to kill Max for destroying them!
“What are you doing? These are my favorite shoes, you moron!”
He watches me as he throws the heel into the water. It lands with a plop, and before I can jerk my other foot away, he repeats his actions. I am getting ready to unleash the fires of hell, like only a woman who lost a beloved pair of pumps can, when he jerks me so that I am forced to roll over on my stomach. I raise my head up, or else I’d be eating marshland. I put my hands on either side of my body and try to push up so I can get away. He doesn’t allow that. Instead, what he does next, takes my breath.
He roughly handles me so that my lower half is arched over his body. Somehow, and I don’t even know how, he reaches his hand under and unbuttons my slacks and then crudel
y pulls them down exposing my ass. None of this is gentle in the least, especially since my clothes are wet and trying to stick to my body. I want to scream, I might have. I’m just not sure. I’m definitely in shock. That’s surely the only reason why I’m not kicking and screaming to get away from Max. His large hand lands on my exposed ass and the impact of his hand on my skin resonates around us. I’m wearing my pink, no line panties that rise high on the ass and feel like silk. They’re my favorite pair, and I’ve loved them up until this point. The contact of his hand, half on the skin of my buttock and the half on the silk, stings badly. I inhale at the pain and try my best to wiggle away from him, but Max clamps one hand down on my lower back and makes it impossible for me to move. He delivers another slap, and the tears sting my eyes.
“Don’t do this Max, I…”
Slap.
“Max!”
Slap. Slap.
I stop protesting. Something in the way he delivers his reprimand lets me know that objecting will only make it worse. The contact burns and the cool air hitting my skin only makes that worse. But somewhere around eight or ten spankings, it stops being something I endure. The pain is there, but it’s different. He’s careful to never hit the same spot twice, he just grazes as his hand finds new flesh. When the last sound of his hand connecting on my ass is ringing in my ears, and nothing else happens, I find my body reacting against my will. My ass pushes up into the air, searching out his touch, wanting it—needing it. He spanks me again, and I bite my lip. It doesn’t stop the moan that escapes. His rough hand moves over my ass, caressing it, almost as if praising me. I’m confused by my response. I’m aroused and ready to beg for more. I should be terrified. I’m not. He slides his hand under my panties and touches the stinging skin. I whimper as his fingers stroke against my opening and the moisture there is exposed.
“Fuck,” he groans and then slides his fingers inside of me.
I want to say that wakes me up, that I’m no longer in some lust-filled haze where I’m allowing a total stranger, an escaped criminal who is holding me hostage, to finger fuck me out in the open after having just spanked me. I would love to say that. I can’t. My head goes down, and I whimper as his fingers slide farther inside of me and stretch my walls.
I haven’t been with a man in well over a year, and even his fingers make me feel tight. It brings back memories of skin against skin, hot breath on my body, being filled by another person and being close to someone. They are all things that I’ve missed in the past year and are none of the things my vibrator fulfils. I shouldn’t be finding anything with Max. I need to stop this before it goes any further, but I don’t get the chance. His fingers slide out of me and then his hand cups my pussy as he bends down to whisper in my ear.
“For however long this lasts, you will listen to what I say and obey me,” his harsh voice rumbles in my ear and it should scare me. It should infuriate me. Why do I feel the urge to do everything he tells me?
Slowly he removes his hand, and I waste no time sliding off him and standing up. I’m pulling my clothes up; the heat is coming off me in waves. I’m embarrassed. I’m humiliated, and yet, I want more. I don’t even feel like I know myself. Is it the danger? Is this what happens to women who suffer from Stockholm Syndrome? I dart a glance at Max, and I guess he is waiting for me to do that very thing because he waits until our eyes meet before he brings his fingers to his mouth and sucks on them. I’m already drenched with need, and that only magnifies it. I look down at the ground, wishing it would swallow me up.
The feel of his hand under my chin, urging my head up, startles me. I look into his dark eyes. Max is beautiful. There’s no escaping that. His body is toned and well defined. It’s broad enough to make me feel small, and he has dark hair with just a hint of a lighter color running through it, here and there. Almost as if it has been lightened by the sun. Is that possible? Don’t they keep you confined in prison? The word prison shakes me and reminds me of all the reasons I shouldn’t be attracted to this man and of all the reasons I definitely shouldn’t let him be touching me. Just as I begin to list and enumerate each and every one, they go flying out of the window with his next words.
“You’re a dirty girl, Tess. I’m going to learn to control you with what your body needs—just because I think it is the most fucking beautiful thing I can remember seeing. But, don’t for one fucking moment forget who I am. It’d be too dangerous for both of us if you do that.”
His words rock me. I take them in, one by one, digest them, separate them and do my best to decipher them. I give up as he takes me by the arm and starts leading me through the swampy land that lies ahead. I should have my mind on watching for gators and other things, so I don’t die. Instead, all I can think about is having Max’s hands on me again.
We’ve been walking for an hour and haven’t spoken. I’m mad at myself. What was I thinking to touch her like that? I should have never let that happen. Now that it has, it’s all I can think about. She was on fire for me. I think it shocked her as much as me. She wanted it, hell she was ready to beg for it. I can’t manage to get her or her reaction out of my mind. Since I need to be alert right now, that definitely means trouble. I might have been okay if I hadn’t tasted her. I don’t know what inner demon possessed me to taste her sweetness off my fingers, but now that I have, I know I will want it again. There’s no way I will be able to walk away from Tess Oliver without another taste. Unless she stops me. That’s the only hope I have. Hell, it’s the only hope she has. If she doesn’t stop me, I will bury myself so deep in her that I will be able to remember every small detail of being with her and carry that with me back into the darkness when the time comes.
“Max, I need to rest, and I’ve got to go to the little girl’s room,” she says quietly, and you can tell she wishes she didn’t have to talk to me. Hell, I wish she didn’t have to at this point too. I ignore her and keep walking. It doesn’t take long, maybe five or ten minutes, before she jerks against my hold. “Max! I need to go to the little girl’s room!”
“In case you have missed it, Kitten, we’re in the middle of nowhere. There’s no little girl’s room out here.”
“That doesn’t change the facts that I need to use one!”
“Fine. Squat,” I turn around and order her. I stand back, crossing my arms over my chest and wait.
Tess has beautiful eyes that remind me of emeralds. They grow large as she stares at me. Her mouth drops open for so long that I push her chin to close it before half of the mosquito population of Florida flies in there.
“I’m not peeing in front of you! I don’t know you.”
“You weren’t saying that when I had my fingers inside of you,” I reason, enjoying the way the heat flushes her face. She looks like she wants to kill me and then stomps off the path we’re on and goes in the direction that will take her deeper into the marshlands. “Whoa! Where do you think you’re going?” I ask grabbing her arm and bringing her back to my side.
“I’m going over behind that big tree over there to pee,” she grumbles and jerks hard to get free of me. I let her go and find myself wishing that I wasn’t living on borrowed time. For the first time in years, I have the urge to take my time with a woman and train her. Show her everything that pleases me and learn exactly, what brings her the most pleasure. There’s a feeling deep inside of me that says this woman could be someone that would fulfill every need I’ve ever had.
She’s not mine to have. She never will be.
“Wouldn’t it make more sense to go that way? It will take us to the road quicker,” she grumbles when she makes it back to me. She looks annoyed, but sexy as hell at the same time.
“We’re in Florida, in marsh and swamp lands,” I explain to her, taking her by the arm and pulling her back the way we were headed to begin with.
“I’m not exactly stupid,” she grumbles.
“Well, then you’re apparently not originally from Florida because there are snakes in the trees that could wrap around your pr
etty body pretty easily.”
“I…uh…I’ve seen them on the news. I was trying not to think about them. Thanks for the image though, you’re a real pal,” she huffs and keeps walking.
I notice she’s limping and look down at her feet. It’s the damn shoes; even without the heels she’s going to have blisters. I shouldn’t care. I find I do, which is annoying.
We walk for another hour, and we’ve not said two words to each other in that whole time. I can tell Tess is getting tired. Her steps are starting to falter, and I hear her stomach growl for about the fourth time. I should offer to stop, but I don’t. I’m pushing her. I want her to ask me when she needs something. I like the idea of her coming to me. Hell, I want to see how far she goes before she breaks.
“Max can we please stop and catch our breath?”
I ignore her. I grew up in this area. I know exactly where I’m at, and I have plans to let her rest ahead, but I want to see how far she’ll go.
“Max, please.”
She doesn’t mean it sexually, and still, when her soft voice calls my name and combines it with the word please, I get a vision of her chained to my bed, her body naked and glowing from being rode hard and my face buried between her legs. My cock throbs just thinking about it.
Her stomach rumbles again, and I know I need to search for some food. More importantly, I need to clear my head, before I just attack and fuck the hell out of her. That can’t happen. It just can’t. I’ll let her rest for a bit, and then we can move on. I know where to take her, the trouble is the cops will also know to look for me there. So, we absolutely can’t stay long.