Kidnappping Casey Read online

  He grinned, reaching out to cup her face with his hand. The man had great hands. Rough skin brushed her cheek. She almost turned her head to look at his palm but that meant she would have had to tear her eyes away from his and she just couldn’t do it. He nodded his head.

  “I turn you on?”

  Blue eyes narrowed, his nose flared, as he softly growled. Thick lips parted, showing his sharp teeth. A sigh came out next. Tearing his gaze away from her, he turned his head to stare behind them at the falling water for long moments. His body tensed when he looked back down at her, pointing to the water.

  “You want us to leave? But we just got dressed. We’ll get wet again and those men are out there looking for us. If they find me it’s one thing but nobody can get a good look at you. You know what will happen if someone sees you, don’t you? They’ll take one glance at you and know you’re different. They’ll—”

  A growl cut her off. He shook his head, the hunger in his eyes replaced with anger. Casey bit her lip. Had he been captured before? Was that why he looked furious? Had someone once hurt him? She really wished that they could talk to each other. He took a deep breath, letting his touch fall away from her cheek. His fingers brushed down her arm to grip her hand, turning his body, tugging her gently to the water.

  “No,” she dug in her heels while yanking on his hand holding her. “We need to stay here where it’s safe.”

  He chuckled as he turned quickly to face her. Casey saw him bend over and in the next instant her world turned upside down as her hip hit his wide shoulder. He was carrying her again over his body, his arm locked behind the back of her knees to make sure she stayed there. The backpack next to her cushioned some of her body from his back.

  “Damn it! Put me down. You don’t understand that when you attacked those two assholes they would have called for backup. More people are out there looking for us, searching my property, and if we go out there they will find us. No one knows about this cave so they won’t find us if we hide out here where it’s safe. We should stay hidden. We should—”

  Casey gasped as the man just jumped from the ledge through the waterfall. Pounding icy water soaked her for a heartbeat before they were plunged into the river. She couldn’t make a sound as her lungs seized in shock from the frigid cold. Her upper body floated in the water as he broke the surface of the river, the arm still firmly locking her thighs to his chest. He was moving, swimming quickly for shore, and she felt the jar of his boots as he found purchase along the riverbed. She turned her head, felt air and gasped in a deep breath.

  He walked out of the river still carrying her as if all hundred and fifty pounds of her wasn’t a burden as he stormed for the woods. Using both of her hands, she shoved her long hair away from her face. There wasn’t an inch of her not freezing from being drenched in river water. It was growing dark so she knew they were only going to get colder as the night wore on.

  Fear crept into Casey when he stopped and growled deeply, his body tensing over something he obviously saw or smelled. It was probably the state police who would have been called in when the two deputies had been attacked. That’s how it would be looked at even though Casey knew that Bigfoot had really protected her and taken her to safety. She knew for sure that’s not how the police report would read. Now they were both going to be caught because he hadn’t listened when she’d warned him how unsafe it would be to leave the cave.

  “Shit. What is it?” she whispered in case they hadn’t been spotted yet. “Take us back to the cave.”

  He growled deeper. What scared her was the fact that she heard another growl respond that she instinctively knew hadn’t come from the man carrying her. It was farther way but close enough to let her know it came from something within easy range of them. She twisted, shoving frantically at the wet brown hair that fell over her face, trying to see around his wide back, but she couldn’t see around him. Were there two of them?

  What if Bigfoot had a brother? She wasn’t a sex toy, damn it. She didn’t roll that way. If he expected to share her with another man he was going to learn differently. Worse, what if they were enemies like two bears crossing in the woods? Bears fought each other when they met up unless they were of the opposite sex and both in the mood for some loving. She’d heard bear fights from her home. It was rare but she knew the large beasts roamed her woods. What if it was a bear? The man holding her tightly was big but he wasn’t a match for a large, vicious animal.

  Casey finally twisted enough so that she spotted the second male who looked a lot like the Bigfoot holding her. She stared opened-mouthed, upside down, at the new male who wore a similar leatherlike outfit that matched the ones Casey and Bigfoot wore. His hair was long and wild like Bigfoot’s only it was shades lighter than black. She saw glowing eyes, a different shade of blue, and those eyes locked on her. He growled deeper.

  Casey’s Bigfoot growled back. It sounded like a threatening kind of growl that a predator put out to warn off another animal. Fear inched up her spine more at the thought that they might fight. Were her woods full of these things? Where the hell had they come from? She had a ton of questions but not a single answer. The man holding her took a deep breath, jerking his head at the other one and growled again. He wiggled his shoulder so the backpack hit the ground.

  The second man tore his concentration from Casey. With a jerk of his head he walked closer, grabbed up the backpack and stepped away while he lowered his face, almost bowing, before he spun around. Casey was stunned as she watched the male march into the woods a second before her Bigfoot moved to follow him.

  “Put me down.”

  To her annoyance Bigfoot ignored her. He kept walking, carrying her over his shoulder, so Casey was left to put her hands on the curve of his back where it turned into his firm ass. She shoved upward trying to lever herself so she wasn’t dangling over his shoulder. All it got her was shifted on his body so her hip was hooked higher on his shoulder. It made her center of gravity off so it was impossible to lift her upper chest away from his back. It also brought her face closer to his ass and she knew he did it on purpose. She pushed but gave up when she realized he wasn’t going to put her down.

  Casey was afraid as they walked quickly through the woods. She didn’t know there were going to be two of them and she had no idea where they were taking her. What if they had a few dozen Bigfoot men camping out on her land? She wondered if they all got together every year like a family reunion. Was her land their version of a park to hold it at? The sun went down, getting so dark that she couldn’t see a thing anymore, but it didn’t slow down either man.

  Casey was starting to get a headache from all the blood settling in her head. She sighed. “Bigfoot guy?”

  He softly growled at her, his hand rubbing her leg, but he didn’t stop walking. They must have traveled for miles but he wasn’t even slowing down.

  “I’m getting a headache from this position. Do you understand? All the blood in my head is causing me pain.”

  Relief swept through Casey when he stopped. He shifted her on his body to slide her down his chest, adjusting her in his arms until she was almost nose to nose with him. He held her firmly off the ground with one arm around her waist securing her to him. She could barely make out his shadow in the darkness. The moon hid behind dense trees overhead making him just a dark shadow in a darker terrain. Her hands gripped the curve of his shoulders.

  With his free hand he shifted her legs for her so she understood. She clamped her legs around his hips as her arms wrapped around his neck. Two large hands cupped her ass, holding her against him. She locked her ankles together and then threaded her fingers behind his neck to help her hold on. She felt watched, but she wasn’t sure if it was her Bigfoot or if it was the other one.

  “You can put me down. I can walk.”

  He released her butt with one hand only to reach back to grip her bare foot, rubbing it. Casey nodded. What he was trying to tell her came across.

  “Right. I don’t have shoes. I’ve