Taken Over

   “ Howdid you find me?”

   His smile was slow and lazy and so achingly familiar that I couldn’t help gri

   It wasn’t a real answer, but I didn’t care. The only thing I cared about was that he was here! I threw my arms around his neck again, burying myself against him. He placed gentle kisses against my face and neck as I stroked and clung to him. There was nothing sexual about this, it was simply a need to touch and feel each other. To reassure each other that we were not dreaming, that the other was in factreal.

   He pulled me down to the ground, cradling me gently against his side as his fingers entwined with mine. I couldn’t stop touching him, couldn’t get over this sudden good fortune as we simply held and stroked each other late into the night.

CHAPTER 12

   I bolted upright the next morning, my heart leaping and jumping in my throat as I searched wildly around. It couldn’t have been a dream, it simply couldn’t have! It had been so real! My lips were still swollen from his kisses; my skin tingled from the lingering effects of his heated touch. I searched frantically as I leapt to my feet, tears burning my eyes as I took a frightened step forward. Oh God, please no, I pleaded silently.

   I couldn’t take losing Cade again, even if it had only been a dream. I searched the woods desperately as I took a shaky step forward. It had been so real. I could still smell him upon me, still feel his lips against mine; still taste him! It couldn’t have been a dream. It couldn’thave been.

   “Bethany?” I spun, a strangled cry escaping me as Cade stepped out of the woods. I didn’t know where he had gone to, or why, and I didn’t care as I raced at him, throwing myself into his arms. “Whoa what’s wrong? What happened?”

   “You weren’t here. I thought it was just another dream, I thought it hadn’t been real.”

   I could feel the surprise in his body, but his arms came slowly around me as he pulled me against him. He sighed softly, pressing his face into my hair as he inhaled deeply. “It wasn’t a dream. I’m not leaving you ever again Bethany.”

   “You can’t promise that.”

   He hugged me tightly before lifting me against him. I instinctively wrapped my legs around his waist as I leaned back to look down at him. “Maybe not,” he admitted. “But I canpromise you that I will do everything possible to make sure that we are never separated again.”

   I studied him for a long moment before nodding slowly. I wanted to be soothed by his words, but I couldn’t be. Our world was so precarious right now, so full of danger and death that every day was an uncertainty. I kissed him gently, clinging to him in my relief at finding that he was nota dream. I had meant for it only to be a quick kiss, but our long time apart and aching longing for each other quickly turned it into something more.

   His hands grasped hold of me, clasping my head to him as he held me firmly against him. I lost myself to the blissful feel of his mouth as I clung to him. My heart hammered, my body responded eagerly, but I broke away before I lost myself to him. Before we finished what had been started last night.

   “Cade I’ve never…” I broke off, heat flaring over my face and down my throat as the words clogged in my throat.

   He frowned at me, his dark eyebrows drawing tightly together as worry flitted over his features. “Never what?”

   I couldn’t bring myself to look at him as I slid from his grasp. His hands remained on my waist as he set me on the ground. “Never you know… ah… I’ve never…”

   “Had sex?”

   I was fairly certain that even my hair was about to catch on fire with my mortification. “Yes,” I mumbled. “I mean no.”

   He laughed softly, his fingers threading through my hair as he pulled me a step closer to him. I frowned angrily up at him, irritated by his laughter. “I know.”

   “What do you mean you know?” I demanded thrown off by his words. Was it so obvious then? Was Iso obvious?

   “Bethany…”

   “I wasdating Bret for a year.”

   He cocked an eyebrow at me, but his amusement did not abate. “You were,” he agreed. “But it wasn’t the same.”

   “You don’t know that.” I regretted the words as soon as I uttered them, what I felt for Cade was extremelydifferent than anything with Bret. I never wanted him to doubt that.

   His smile vanished, but his were still sparkling. “I do know that.” He kissed me gently, then again, and quickly once more. “I haven’t either, you know.”

   I started in surprise. I pulled away from his mesmerizing kisses as I gaped at him. “How is thatpossible? All the girls in school were after you, you could have had anyone you wanted…”

   “And I dohave her. I told you once Bethany that it was you; that it has always been you, and I meant that. Do you think just anyone could have taken your place, even for a moment?” I opened my mouth to answer, but I had no idea how to respond to that. I was adrift, caught up in his words and the love that brought tears to my eyes. “No, they couldn’t have. Just as no one could have taken my place with you.” I was crying openly now, weeping with the wonder of it all. “You may have been dating Bret, but you were never withBret, not in your heart.”

   He placed my hands against his chest. Beneath the muscle and bone I could feel the hard, steady beat of his heart. “And you are in my heart.” He wrapped his hand into my hair, brushed his lips over my forehead. “I was made for you Bethany; and you were made for me. You always have been, and nothing could change that.”

   I was humbled by his words, enveloped by the weight of them. He was right, I knew he was right. I had always known where I belonged, always known who I belonged with, even when I had been dating someone else. My body, my heart, my soul was all his. It always had been; it always would be. “Yes, yes, yes.” I agreed with him wholeheartedly.

   He wiped my tears away, bending to me as he kissed me ever so lightly upon my nose. “Yes,” he mumbled, smiling as he kissed me again.

   I wanted to lose myself to him, but I knew that I couldn’t. Not right now anyway. Soon though, so very soon I could shut out the rest of the world by losing myself in him. Then a thought occurred to me. “But if you knew all this, if this was what you had always wanted, why did you avoid me so much? Why didn’t you come to me before I started dating Bret? Why did you leave me all those years ago?”

   Something flickered in eyes, there was a slight recoiling that he was quick to bury, but had been unable to hide. My eyes widened, I wanted to grab at him, to pull him back to me, to make him stay when I felt his withdrawal. Then he was smiling, a small curve of his mouth that barely tipped the hard edges of it. “Because I wasn’t sure how you felt about me, not until all of this anyway.” He shrugged absently. “I didn’t approach you because I was afraid of being rejected by you. I had nothing to offer you, I was an orphan, and definitely not the golden boy Bret was. It was obvious to me that your feelings for him were more platonic than his were for you, but I wasn’t going to stop you from going down a path that I felt you needed to travel.

   “I knew you’d eventually realize it was me you were supposed to be with after all.”

   His tone was light, airy. He said the words, but there was something crawling through me. A dark knowledge was slithering through my mind, one that I could not shake. For the first time ever, Cade had just lied to me I was certain of it even though I had no proof. I just didn’t know why. It had been such an easy question, but one that he had not answered honestly. There was something behind his eyes, something withdrawn and secretive, even as he smiled at me.