Deadly Oath

5. Kian

5

KIAN

I know I should leave Sabrina alone for a little while, after what transpired out in the woods. At least half the reason that she was so eager for me to leave her house, I’m sure, is because she’s wondering how I so conveniently turned up at the right moment to save her from that snake.

But that’s my job. Patrolling this town and the surrounding trails, keeping an eye out for what the people living here need, and providing protection if necessary. And today, Sabrina Miller was very much in need of my protection.

The look on her face when she saw that snake told me that she’s never seen one so close before—not the animal kind, anyway. Maybe she’s run into a few human snakes in her time. Her paranoia makes me think that’s the case.

She was quick to run me out of her house. I shouldn’t have followed her inside in the first place, not without an invitation—but I was concerned about her. She was shaking like a leaf, even after the half-mile walk back up to her house. I know the signs of shock well enough, and she was headed in that direction.

But she told me to leave, so I went. That doesn’t stop me, though, from circling back late that evening to check on her once more. Although—maybe not exactly in the way that she’d like.

I park my truck at the end of the road leading up to her driveway, walking the rest of the distance. It’s late, after eleven, and I’m pretty sure by now she’ll be back from her book club. When I walk into her yard, I see that most of the lights in her house are off—all except one towards the very back.

Her bedroom.

I feel a thrum of anticipation in my chest as I circle around towards the stand of trees at that end of her house. It’s just thick enough to shield me while I look in on her, and my pulse beats a little faster as I slink across the yard, slipping into the copse, craning my neck to see through the large window at one side of her bedroom. I have to move to the very edge of the trees to see her, but as long as I remain still, it’s dark enough that she won’t see me. A shadow, at most—easily explained away.

She’s standing in the middle of the room, in jeans and an orange sweater, biting at one of her nails. Her lips purse around the tip of her finger, and my cock instantly twitches, coming to life at the sight of her standing there, pushing the tip of her finger into her mouth.

I can only imagine how soft her lips must feel. They’re full and plush, one of the first things I noticed about her. They’d feel like heaven around my cock , I think as her hand drops away from her mouth, and a fresh throb of desire pools in my groin as all the blood in my body starts to rush in a single direction.

She’s home. Safe and sound in those four walls, right where she’s supposed to be. I’ve checked up on her—there’s no reason for me not to leave now. No reason—except for the fact that as she reaches for the hem of her sweater, I’m frozen to the spot, the need to see what’s underneath it suddenly overriding all else—including my common sense.

My breath catches as she grabs both her sweater and the tank top underneath it, stripping both off in one swift motion that reveals almost every inch of her smooth, creamy-pale torso. Her small, elegant breasts are covered with a black cotton bra, and I lick my dry lips as she tosses the shirts over the back of a nearby chair and reaches for the bra’s clasp.

Fuck. Yes . My cock throbs, straining against my zipper, and I have to fight off the urge to slip it out here and now. Just the sight of Sabrina nearly topless is enough to make me hard, my fingers itching to run through that thick blonde hair that brushes against her shoulder blades, to wrap it around my fist as I push her down to her knees.

I’d discover exactly how good her mouth is, then.

I grit my teeth against a groan as my cock pushes against my zipper. Sabrina undoes her bra with a quick flick of her fingers, the straps sliding down her shoulders, and I suck in a breath as the cups fall away.

Her breasts are perfect. Just big enough to fill a man’s palms, topped with rosy nipples that stiffen in the cool air of her room, making me run my tongue over my lower lip as I imagine what it would feel like to suck one of them into my mouth. I want to roll my tongue over the point of her breast, feel her arch into my mouth, hear her moan?—

My hand is at my zipper before I can stop myself. I used to be a man of self-control, but this—as Sabrina reaches for the front of her jeans, I’m already sliding a hand inside of mine, palming my cock as I slip it free and wrap my hand around the taut, straining shaft.

This is a bad idea. I know it, from the moment that the cool air hits my hot flesh, and I start to stroke, watching Sabrina push her jeans over her hips. This could undo everything. If I’m caught outside a woman’s window, jerking off as I watch her undress—the fallout would destroy everything I’ve worked so hard for.

But whatever is left of my self-control seems to be gone, as my palm rubs over my swollen cockhead, pre-cum gathering for lube as I stroke faster. Sabrina is in nothing more than a pair of black cotton panties now, her long, smooth legs and hips entirely visible to my view, and I stroke faster, suddenly desperate for release as she starts to tug her panties down.

Oh, fucking hell. My teeth are gritted hard against any noise as I see nothing but smooth skin between her thighs. She’s shaved bare, and I feel a jolt of fresh arousal as my cock stiffens in my hand, so close to erupting. I can imagine that smooth skin against my lips, the way it would feel to part her folds with my tongue, and at that moment, I feel almost desperate to know how she would sound if I did exactly that. What she tastes like. How she would cry out as I tease her to the brink of orgasm again and again, waiting until I decide that I’m ready to let her tip over.

Completely oblivious to what’s happening outside of her window, Sabrina turns, bending over to open one of her dresser drawers. And then, in that instant, as I see the puffy, soft lips of her pussy framed in the perfect shape of her thighs, my own orgasm crashes over me.

My cock goes rigid in my hand, my vision narrowing for a second with the force of it as the first spurt jets from the tip, splashing into the dirt at my feet as my hand strokes frantically along my length. I squeeze my cock hard, bracing myself with one hand as spurt after spurt spills out, a small voice in my head screaming at me as I come that I’m doing the stupidest thing imaginable. Now there’s evidence of the fact that I jerked off outside of Sabrina Miller’s window, my own DNA a foot from her house. But I can’t stop. It feels so fucking good, as I stare at her soft pussy, the curve of her ass as she stands up, the orgasm longer and harder than any I can remember having in a long fucking time. Certainly not from my own hand.

I’m breathing hard as the last of my cum spills from the tip, my heartbeat pounding in my ears. On the other side of her window, Sabrina is dressing, covering up all that smooth, soft skin as I shakily tuck my cock away, zipping up my pants as the clarity of what I just did comes rushing in.

I need to get out of here. But I stay frozen to the spot as she walks to her bed, not wanting to risk her looking out of her window and seeing me standing here. Whatever excuse I could have come up with is long gone, now that I’m standing here flushed and breathless with a puddle of my own cum at my feet.

She slips out of view, towards her bed, and a second later, the last light goes out. I swallow hard, backing carefully away from the trees—only to hear the sharp crack of a branch under my boot.

Shit . I suck in a breath, going still for a moment as I wait for her light to come on. But it stays quiet and silent inside of her bedroom, and I start to back away again slowly, slipping out of the copse of trees and walking quickly back towards the road.

That could have been real fucking bad, I tell myself sternly as I walk back to my truck, unlock it and jump inside. Don’t do it again.

Besides, I tell myself, the thrill is gone, now that I’ve done it once. I won’t make that mistake twice. With any luck, I won’t need to.

The next time I come for Sabrina Miller, it’s going to be inside of her.

—

By the time I wrap up my first half of the day’s work the next morning, however, I can feel that urge to see her again, already scratching at the back of my mind. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about her since the first time she opened her door to greet me, and after last night, that urge only seems to have intensified.

I’ll stop by on my lunch break, I tell myself, tucking some files away as I power down my computer for the next hour or so. That seems like a perfectly natural thing to do. After all, it was just yesterday that I saved her from possible death from a rattlesnake’s bite. I’m just doing the gentlemanly thing by swinging by and making sure that she’s holding up alright.

I drive over, feeling a tightening in my gut the closer I get to her driveway. The memory of how it felt to watch her through her window is still very close, and I feel a twinge of arousal, remembering the thrill of it. The kind of thrill I’ve never felt before.

I’ve never spied on a woman like that before. I’ve never felt the urge to. And I didn’t go over to Sabrina’s house with the intent to do what I did. I didn’t have any plans other than to look in on her, to reassure myself that she was home, safe, and where she was supposed to be.

I never thought I was the kind of man to lose control like that, watching a woman take her clothes off. Hell, I’ve never even been all that crazy about strip clubs. Something about the manufactured nature of it, the fact that the women have to be there, taking off their clothes for the men watching and paying them, has always been a turnoff to me.

But Sabrina didn’t know she was stripping for me. She didn’t even know I was there. And the throb I feel at that thought tells me clearer than anything else could that that was the reason why I couldn’t stop myself.

I liked spying on her. Liked taking that from her. There’s a flicker of shame in my gut, thinking of it like that, but I push it away. She doesn’t know. And I have no intention of doing it again?—

I slam on the brakes as I pull into her driveway, my train of thought abruptly derailed by the sight of smoke pluming out of the back window of Sabrina’s house.

Shit .

I jump out of my truck, yanking the keys out of the ignition as I jog up the driveway to Sabrina’s front door. I grab the knob, but it doesn’t give—unlike everyone else in this town, Sabrina seems to lock her doors.

“Shit!” I growl, pivoting to head to the back of the house. Maybe she hasn’t locked the back door, or at the very least, she’ll hear me knocking. I can see the smoke billowing out of what is definitely the kitchen window, and I feel a flare of unexpected panic.

It’s followed by relief, as the back door opens. I rush in, directly into the kitchen, to the sight of Sabrina throwing a flaming pan into the sink, reaching to turn on the faucet as she tries to dodge the heat of the fire. The burner on the stove is flaring, too, and I shout abruptly, worried she won’t hear me over the panicked sounds she’s making.

“Sabrina! Don’t turn that faucet on!” I have no idea if she started a grease fire, but it’s entirely possible she’s about to make it all so much worse. “Where’s the fire extinguisher?”

She pivots to stare at me, her blue eyes round in her pale face. “I—I?—”

It’s clear she has no idea. I look around the kitchen, spying a small pantry at the far side, and bolt in that direction, yanking the door open so sharply it almost comes off the hinges. A fire extinguisher is in the back corner, coated in such a thick layer of dust that it’s clear no one has touched it in some time. I reach for it, half expecting to be bitten by a spider as I yank it out.

“Get back!” I snarl at Sabrina, not bothering to moderate my tone. Her house is far too close to going up in flames for me to worry about how I sound to her.

Her eyes somehow go even rounder, but she jumps back, skittering back to the kitchen table, her hands curling around the back of one of the chairs. I aim the fire extinguisher at the flaming pan and flaring stove burner, the foam erupting over the entire space in a mess that’s going to take some time to clean up.

Better than the house burning down, though.

Breathing hard, I set the fire extinguisher down, turning to look at Sabrina. She’s staring at the mess of foam and ruined food with a look of such utter despondency that it makes something twinge in my chest, as unexpected as the feeling of panic that I had earlier.

“What the fuck were you doing?” It comes out unnecessarily sharp, as much a reaction to that twinge of sympathy that I felt as frustration. “You almost burned your house down.”

Her eyes well up instantly. “I—I was trying to cook something for lunch. I don’t actually know how to cook, and—” She gestures helplessly to the mess in the sink. “I bought some chopped chicken, and I thought I’d cook it and mix it into some mac and cheese. I don’t know—Marie mentioned it to me as an easy meal. Something she makes for her kids. So I thought it would be a good place to start.”

With every word, her voice wobbles a little more, her eyes welling up until the tears spill over. “I don’t even know how I managed to set the pan on fire. It just started smoking, and then?— ”

Her voice collapses then, her hands clutching the back of the chair so tightly that her knuckles are white, and I feel that twinge in my chest build into a pang of sympathy that I didn’t expect to feel. Before I know what I’m doing fully, I find myself crossing the kitchen to where she’s standing, enveloping her in my arms, and pulling her close against my chest.

Her nearness feels like a shock. For the briefest moment, she seems to forget the suspicious chill that she’s had towards me as she leans into my chest, her face pressed against the rough polyester of my uniform shirt. Her hands press against my shoulders, and I can feel my body tense at how close she is. My muscles wind tight, my cock swelling against my zipper, and I grit my teeth, willing it to calm down. The last thing I need is to freak Sabrina out even more by grinding my erection into her thigh.

I need her to trust me. I need her to look at me as a protector, not a predator.

Then you probably shouldn’t have jerked off outside of her window last night.

I shove the thought away, before it makes my burgeoning hard-on even worse than it already is. But Sabrina is still curled against my chest, letting out soft whimpers as she tries to get her tears under control. They’re far too close to other sounds that I can imagine coaxing from her.

She starts to push herself away, her chin tipping up as she does, and her gaze catches mine, blue and luminous. She goes very still, and I feel her fingertips curl ever so slightly against my shoulders, see the moment that her gaze flicks down to my mouth and back up again, so quickly that I could almost miss it. Her lips part, and I wonder if she’s ever been kissed before. From the tremor that I feel run through her, I’d bet that she hasn’t been.

I could be her first kiss. The first man to ever claim that soft, full mouth. The thought is so swiftly intoxicating that I feel as if I’m in a haze for a brief second, and it takes everything in me not to act on it.

Not yet. Sabrina affects me in a way that I hadn’t expected, but if I push too fast, she’ll panic and run. That’s not what I want from her .

I feel the moment she sways towards me, almost subconsciously. I’d be willing to bet that she doesn’t fully understand what her body is asking for. And even though I know it’s not the right time, it takes everything in me to deny her.

I take a step back, reaching up to disengage her hands from my shoulders as I put space between us. I don’t fail to notice the way she flinches as I do, or the slight spark of disappointment in her eyes. And I have a feeling that this reaction is just as subconscious as the first.

Sabrina is innocent. I’d bet money on it. I doubt she understands her body or the feelings that she’s having in the slightest. And right now, it’s taking every bit of control I possess not to begin her instruction here and now.

If I don’t leave soon, I will.

“I have somewhere I should be,” I say gruffly, putting another few inches of space between us. “Maybe stick to the microwave for a while, hm? Or make sure you have a fire extinguisher on hand.”

Sabrina’s cheeks are pink with embarrassment. “It’s the first time I tried to use the stove,” she says defensively. “I’ve never—” She breaks off, her face reddening even more than she realizes that she’s all but admitted that she’s never tried to cook before.

“Doesn’t surprise me a bit, princess,” I tell her, my mouth quirking up on one side amusedly. Sabrina’s eyes flash, a little of her embarrassment receding as the nickname clearly strikes a nerve.

“I like that even less than city girl ,” she snips, crossing her arms over her chest. “And you left a mess in my kitchen. You’re not going to help clean it up?”

“Better than you burning it down,” I counter. “I was just driving by on my lunch break, to make sure you were alright after that run-in with the snake yesterday. And here I find you about to set fire to your house. Now I gotta get back to work.”

Sabrina tilts her chin up, her arms still crossed over her chest. It’s clear she’s gone from embarrassed to annoyed with me, maybe even a little pissed. But I just find the glimpse of her fire amusing .

I let my gaze slide over her body, just once, letting myself remember what she looked like as she stripped off her clothes last night. Letting myself picture those small, bare breasts, the slender, willowy curve of her hips, the perfect, soft shape of her pussy framed in the oval of her thighs.

I feel that hot throb in my groin, my cock instantly rising to attention, and I push the thought away before it can become too overwhelming. “I’ll see you around,” I say tautly, turning to head towards the half-open backdoor.

“You said that last time.” Sabrina’s arms are still crossed over her chest, her eyes narrowed, and I smirk, winking at her as I glance back at her once more.

“And I did, didn’t I?”

I hear her muttered curse as the door swings shut behind me. And I feel that twinge in my chest again, the sensation of feeling the tiniest bit bad for leaving her with that disaster in her kitchen to deal with. But it was her fault. Just another symptom of what a spoiled existence she must have led up to this point, that she’s twenty-two years old and doesn’t know how to cook.

Apparently, she’s never even tried before.

I shake my head as I stride back to my truck, trying to push all thoughts of Sabrina Miller, her perfect body and soft mouth, and the way she looked up at me for just a second like she was dying for me to kiss her out of my head. I have actual work to do, and while I’ve known she was going to be a distraction from the moment I saw her, I have to keep that distraction in its place.

With some effort, I manage to finish the rest of my day at the station without letting my thoughts drift to her all that often. I have a staff meeting with the other deputies to handle, plenty of paperwork to sift through from the transition, and there’s a summons I have to serve before I’m done with the day, which requires me to drive over to the other side of town.

By the time I’m finished with all of that, I’m ready to hit the gym. The encounter with Sabrina has left me humming with pent-up energy, and while I’m tempted to spend a little time in the locker room with just me and my hand, right now, I’m more inclined to take it out on the boxing bags.

I have a fight coming up. Since I was a teenager, I’ve trained in boxing and mixed martial arts, and while I’ve never been able to fight in any official capacity, there are plenty of unofficial, unsanctioned fights to be had if a man knows where to look. And I always do.

The routine is a relief in and of itself. I strip out of my uniform, down to a pair of silky basketball shorts and no shirt, wrapping my hands quickly before heading out to the empty gym floor. It’s past seven, and in a town like this, the gym is barely used at all outside of the middle and high school kids who use it for weightlifting practice. By now, they’ve all gone home for dinner, and no one else will come in for the rest of the evening. In the short time I’ve been here, I’ve seen someone stop by all of twice while I’m using the facilities.

I lose myself in the rhythm of my workout, of stretches, pushups, and drills. I’m so focused on it that I don’t even notice the time passing, barely noticing the sweat breaking out across my muscles as I work the bag, putting all of my pent-up energy and frustration into the punches. I picture my opponent at the fight, how I’ll attack, how I’ll make sure I win. I’m so deep into it that I don’t even hear the sound of the front door opening or soft footsteps moving across the floor, not until I circle around to the other side of the bag and see Sabrina Miller standing there, her eyes as wide in her face as they were this afternoon.

“Do you need something?” Once again, it comes out much sharper than I meant for it to. But she’s the last fucking person I ever expected to see walking in here, and the way she’s looking at me, like she’s never seen a shirtless man before, is lighting me on fire in a way that feels dangerously difficult to control. She looks almost hungry , staring at me, her gaze roving over my bare, sweat-slicked muscles as a flush starts to crawl up her throat.

I’d bet money she’s wet right now . Wet, and as hot as she’s making me feel. The thought sends a surge of blood to my cock, and I grit my teeth, willing it down. These shorts won’t hide a damn thing, and if I get a hard-on right now, she’ll see it. But my libido has been raging since that near-kiss in her kitchen earlier, and the adrenaline from my workout only fuels it.

I’ve always liked a good fuck after a fight—or a session in the gym. My body doesn’t know the difference, only that Sabrina is standing there, soft lips parted and looking fucking delicious, and I want to toss her down to the mat inside the ring next to me and devour her.

God, it’s going to feel so fucking good when I make her scream for me. When I show her just how good it feels to be fucked by a man who ? —

“I’m sorry,” she says, finding her voice only for the last word to end on a squeak. “I—I asked Marie where I could find you, this time of day. After work, I mean. If you weren’t at home. I didn’t want to just come by your house. And she didn’t know, but she asked Greg—that’s her husband, but you probably know that already, and he said—” She trails off, seemingly realizing that she’s rambling. “I just wanted to thank you again,” she says lamely. “Actually, I’m not sure I said thank you before.”

“You didn’t,” I tell her with a rough chuckle. “But I’ll take it now. Anyway, it’s all just part of the job.”

Except standing outside of her window at night with my cock in my fist. That’s definitely not part of the job. And thinking about how I could make her scream with my tongue in her pussy isn’t, either.

“Is it?” she ventures. “I guess I don’t really know what your job is.”

“Well, I was driving by, and I saw smoke coming out of your house. Responding to an emergency is, actually, a part of my job.” I reach up, running a hand through my sweat-damp hair, and I see her gaze flick to the movement of my arm, fluttering over my chest and back up as if she doesn’t know where to look first. She’s so innocent, so obviously undone by my partial nudity, that it’s amusing and intoxicating all at once.

I’d be her first for everything. I’m almost sure of it. The thought is dizzying, arousal hitting me like a slap, and I struggle to keep from moving closer to her, from taking advantage of her obvious discomfiture.

What the hell, I think as I watch her eyes skitter nervously back up to my face, her tongue darting out along her lower lip as if she’s trying to figure out how to respond. Why not push a little? See what happens. If my little rabbit runs from this snare, I can always set another for her later. It’s not as if she can leave town.

And I’m certainly not going anywhere.

I take a step forward, putting me within touching distance of her. Her nostrils flare, her cheeks turning red, and I think I see her draw in a breath. I can imagine what she’s smelling—sweat and musk, salt and heat, and my cock throbs insistently, half-hard and threatening to stiffen further.

Sabrina takes a quick step to the side, skittering back as nervously as a bunny, but she miscalculated her direction. Her back smacks directly into the boxing bag, and she squeaks as she goes stock still, frozen in place as I stalk towards her, closing in.

I put one hand on the top of the bag, holding it still as I loom over her. “Where are you going, princess?” I murmur, and Sabrina’s lips part, her eyes flashing that irritated spark again. She swallows hard, glancing from left to right, but there’s nowhere for her to go. I’m so close our bodies are almost brushing, my arm blocking her on the left, and she knows I’m faster than her. If she tries to dart to the right, I’ve got her.

“Caught you, rabbit,” I murmur, my gaze locking onto hers.