One more swig from the cup, hot enough to burn his tongue, and then he all but fell in, standing under the brutally hot spray and groaning as it beat down on tense, tight muscles.
Just needed to get past the dream. Needed to wake up . . .
Needed . . .
Dru . . .
Groaning, he slammed his head back against the tile wall. He needed not to think of her just now. Because that was all it took. He’d woken up edgy and needy and now . . .
The heat from the shower wrapped around him, kissing his skin almost like a woman’s mouth. Almost, but not quite. That was fine. He’d close his eyes and pretend.
Pretend Dru was here. Wrapping his fist around his cock, he let himself slip back into the dream he was trying to forget and started to stroke. Thought of her lips. Her smooth, honey gold skin and that sleek, shiny hair.
His breath hitched in his lungs as he neared the head, imagined it was her hands on him. Or her mouth. Or her sweet, sweet pussy . . .
“Fuck,” he snarled, jerking harder. Harder.
Hunger, almost painful, twisted in his gut, and he surged away from the wall, slamming a hand against the tile in front of him, head bowed, water pouring down. Her face . . . her eyes. Her . . .
He needed her here. With him.
Instead he was alone . . .
With a ragged, tortured groan, he came.
And even though he was there alone, with nothing but his thoughts, they were thoughts of her . . . and it was more satisfying than anything he could remember in a long, long time.
She was real. Real. Here. And he could find her.
As soon as this damn job was done and he could leave.
* * *
LEAVING was the last thing Dru needed to do. She dressed like she was going to work out in the fitness facilities provided. She did that often enough. Sometimes she even ran on the grounds.
So that wasn’t so unusual.
She kept her pace steady, knowing she had a shadow.
But she kept going longer than her shadow could.
Running was her escape. Even when she knew she had to come back.
She’d done this more than a few times, and Patrick hadn’t been particularly pleased, but neither had he said anything.
The dumbfuck following her was going to get his ass ripped for letting her evade him, but that was his own fault, and this time, she had a hard time feeling guilty that another was going to suffer over Patrick’s anger with her. She’d seen this one through the flashes with Patrick, seen him enough to know that Patrick used him for his dirty work.
If he chose to work for a monster, then he needed to be prepared for what the monster would do.
And maybe build up his endurance.
He fell back after the second mile.
By the third mile, he was no longer in sight when she rounded the corner and she let loose, pounding the pavement and letting herself take off.
Her muscles were loose and easy by the fourth mile, and she breathed easier once she’d fallen onto the lesser known paths to leave the resort property. She hadn’t spent so much time crawling over satellite feeds of all of this property for nothing. She knew it like the back of her hand.
Part of her wanted to just keep running. She could do it . . . throughout college, she’d done long-distance running and she still kept up with it. Her muscles would ache and burn if she did more than eight or ten miles, but she could do it, if she had to.
She could run, leave this place behind.
She had contacts. She hadn’t come into this job blind—that would have been suicide.
She had her phone, cash, stowed on her. She never left her room without taking a few necessary items with her after all.
And in a secure location not too far from here, she had everything she needed to get back to her life. To who she was . . . She could go back to England, pick up the pieces of her business, and forget all about this.
The echos of the screams stopped her. The pain they’d suffered. The loss.
Slowing to a halt, she bent over and gave herself a minute to catch her breath.
Yes. She could run.
Yes. She could leave Patrick behind, disappear and return to life, pick up the pieces, and get back to