Entangled (Evolve Series Novella 2.5) Read online

  Entangled

  An Evolve Series Novella

  S.E. Hall

  Copyright 2013, S.E. Hall

  Toski Covey of Toski CoveyPhotography

  Sommer Stein of Perfect Pear Creative

  Editor: Erin Roth, Wise Owl Editing

  Book Design: E.E. Long, Biblio/Tech

  All rights reserved.

  This book may not be reproduced in any form, in whole or in part,

  without written permission from the author.

  This book is intended for mature audiences only

  .

  To My Fabulous Four...who always rock my world!

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Prologue

  People probably think streets like this don’t exist anymore. I know I did. But as Dane and I drive down Elmhurst Drive in his shiny silver Roadster, top down and an unusual Georgia breeze in my hair, the neighborhood looks downright picturesque. All the lawns are perfectly manicured with huge maple tress dotting the area and 1428 loves pink, evidenced by the rows of flowers lining the walkway. I glance sideways when I hear his chuckle; his tan, smiling face looks back at me, a flirty glint in his dark eyes.

  “You trying to break my fingers, baby?” he asks, lifting our joined hands between us.

  “Oh, sorry.” I blush, relaxing my grip, seeing that the ends of his fingers are now crimson.

  “It’s okay,” he kisses the back of my hand, “I know you’re excited. I’m glad.”

  The street is a dead end cul-de-sac, a community basketball hoop in the circle, several young boys playing a game there now. Two older men watch the game from their lawn chairs parked nearby and wave to us as we climb out of the car. I giddily wave back, once again earning Dane’s lighthearted laugh. The whole scene is worthy of a “Welcome to the Neighborhood” brochure and makes me smile, already feeling homey.

  My duplex is precious, red brick with white shutters and a large bay window right in the front; I literally bounce my way up to the front porch. The landscaping needs to be touched up, the hedges are way overgrown and all the plants looking half-dead since no one’s lived here to keep it up, and I can’t wait to do just that. I look over and notice Bennett’s already got a sunflower flag flying proudly over her porch next door and it just makes my fire to get started burn brighter—I have my own house to fix up! I’ve never been so pumped about a project in my life!

  “You ready to go in, Miss Walker?” he teases in my ear, swatting me playfully on the butt.

  My “yes” turns into a squeal as I’m swept up, bride-style, in his arms. “Then go in you shall,” he responds before leaning down to kiss my lips and carrying me over the threshold.

  Chapter 1

  ~Laney~

  I love everything about the place, from the long list of things that need to be done to those which are only necessary to make it mine. As we wander from room to room, my excitement spills over and I start to tell Dane my ideas.

  “I think in here I’ll paint it softball yellow and then draw red stitches all along the top, like a border.”

  “I think that’s the worst idea I’ve ever heard,” he groans, backing away from me as he says it—good idea.

  “Don’t hold back, Dane, tell me what you really think.” I cross my arms over my chest, because he just lost his boob ogling privileges with that comment.

  He’d bought this duplex for me, sick of the 11pm curfew that often can’t be “worked around” in the dorm, not to mention it’s a closer drive to his house, strategically located at almost the dead middle between Chateau Kendrick and GSU. But, he’s being a bossy boots caveman—a trait he’d kept somewhat hidden until he felt absolutely comfortable with me—and shooting down all my top notch decorating ideas.

  “Baby, if that’s what you really want, go ahead, but it sounds gaudy and juvenile, and you have to think of resale. When it comes time for you to marry me and move into the big house, we’ll have to make the room look normal for potential buyers.”

  Some girls probably would have heard “marry me” and melted right where they stood, fanning themselves and batting their eyelashes.

  Not this girl.

  “What do you mean gaudy? Juvenile?” I mock and shrink him on the spot with my glare. “Just because it’s not black, white or gray,” (yes, I’m referring to the sterility of his house right now) “doesn’t mean it’s ugly. I think it’d look cool and you said this was my place. I should be able to decorate it how I want.”

  I’m not pouting, really. I’m standing with my legs braced apart with my hands on my hips and a scathing frown on my face—ready to spar.

  “And the other bedroom?” he asks, patronizingly calm.

  I wave a hand and scoff, “do whatever you want with it. Go absolutely crazy with your three-color palette.”

  And now for the zinger that’s really gonna get him.

  “Men shouldn’t know how to decorate anyway, using words like gaudy.” I let one brow raise and give him a suspicious smirk. “Do I need to learn how to fix the cars then? What if I get a flat?”

  “Oh, baby,” he growls, his feet pounding the floor as he stalks toward me, “are you questioning my manliness?”

  “Maybe,” I tease, slowing backing up, “Nancy.” My eyes dart anxiously around the room, mentally planning my escape route in this new territory.

  He laughs deeply, not a “ha ha, that’s funny” laugh, but more an “uh huh, I’m coming to get ya” sexy laugh. “Got it planned yet?” He grins knowingly, one eyebrow cocked. “Better run to wherever looks the most comfortable.”

  There’s no furniture yet, what is he talking about comfortable? Seeing the confusion on my face, he answers unasked.

  “I’ll be showing you how much of a man I am when I catch ya,” he creeps closer, “so I’d stay away from the tile, it might hurt your back,” the mischief in his eyes ignites as he continues moving slowly closer, “or your knees.”

  Do I still have to pretend I don’t want to be caught? I love this side of Dane and I love that the dominant, controlling, hunter comes out more and more every day.

  The game’s precept itself is laughable; no one could question Dane’s virility. It seeps from his pores, an aura around him that takes up all the air in a room. And he’s all mine. From his forever-jostled brown locks and matching warm eyes to his cocky, lopsided grin to his sculpted chest, all the way to his tight back, that irresistible V and toned, tight ass—he is mine.

  “You wouldn’t!” I challenge, knowing delightfully well that he would.

  “Oh, baby, you know I can and I will.” He flips open the button on his pants, that cocky grin suffocating me from where he stands. “And I think you want me to.”

  The man is a degree of hot and sexy that cannot be measured and I’m instantly aflame, tingly and wanting, every single time I look at him. And when his dominating stare is fixed on me, telling me I’m helpless to stop him when he wants me this badly, my ability to move, think, or possibly resist leaves me. I am but his for the taking, whenever and however he wants.

  I shake my head back and forth, biting my bottom lip in the way that I know drives him crazy. “Do not,” I say throatily, barely above a whisper.

  Only Dane makes me forget that not too long ago I was simply a girl; a scared, unsure, shy girl a long way from home. With him, as his, I am anythin
g but. He revealed the true me—a confident, sensual woman ready to embrace all that makes me feel alive.

  I cut my eyes right, staring at a deceptive destination, waiting for him to take the bait, then juke left, squealing like a schoolgirl in a slasher film as he grabs me. He never even flinched right, stepping in front of me effortlessly, growling into my neck as he swings me in his arms.

  “You’re mine now,” he warns in a deep, sultry timbre.

  “Wasn’t I already?” I breathe out, pulsing from head to toe just from his touch, his tone, his command.

  “Mmm hmm, but the chase makes it so much sweeter. And now, baby,” he hoists me up by his strong hands spanned across my ass and my legs wrap around him of their own volition, “we’re gonna christen your carpet.” He goes down to his knees, still holding me tightly against him as he slowly lowers me to my back, laying his body across mine.

  “You can’t be serious!” My moan betrays my protest as he suckles my neck, hands still kneading my backside. “There aren’t any curtains. Someone could see us!”

  Another interesting fact I learned about Dane after the first time—he wants it all the time. Anytime, anywhere, any way…now that the seal is broken, my man can’t be stopped.

  Can I get an Amen?

  His warm breath fans across my already sensitized flesh, raising goosebumps and triggering a pull in my core. “If anyone peeps in your windows, I’ll take care of them later. And,” one hand slides to the front, snapping open my jeans, “we can keep it as discreet as possible.”

  “You’re insa— Oh, Dane,” my breathing is labored and stuttered, his fingers deliciously teasing me, “discreet could work.”

  “I love it when you see things my way.” He lifts his body off me slightly, the loss of his heat like an arctic blast. “Pull ‘em down, baby, just enough.”

  I comply with his demand wantonly, no longer caring where we are, raising my hips off the floor and pushing only my jeans down to the middle of my thighs.

  “Good girl, so discreet,” he teases as he looks down at me with a mischievous curl to his mouth and a growing flame in his gaze. “Now let’s see if I can do the same.”

  Watching through my lust filled haze, he reaches in his back pocket, tossing a condom packet by my head. Seems he had this christening planned all along. Still balancing himself on one forearm above me, a hand slides in between us, easing down his zipper, pushing his pants and briefs down in the front. If a peeping Tom did happen upon us now, we might get away with the infamous “we were just making out and his jeans are baggy” defense.

  He pulls the neckline of my shirt down with his fingers and the cup of my bra with his teeth, his mouth finding the center of my bare breast quickly. “See,” he points out huskily as his tongue circles my hardened point, “shirt still on. I’d never let anyone see you but me, Laney, ever. But this is happening, right here, right now. I want you.”

  “How are we—”

  “Shhh.” He silences me by covering my mouth with his, greedily seducing my senses, grinding against me and kissing me as though he may never get to again. Everything with Dane is intense, always; even an afternoon quickie on the carpet, he finds new heights to take me to. “Want it, baby?” he asks, rubbing his rock hard length along my saturated panties, one hand tight again on my ass, pushing me into him. “Say you want it, Laney, tell me.” His voice is edgy, he’s losing his control.

  “Yes,” I reach down, slipping my hands into the back of his loose jeans and grabbing his firm ass, digging my fingers into the hard flesh, “I want my Dane, so bad.”

  He rolls the condom down himself in milliseconds, the most dexterous man ever—it’s quite impressive actually. “Move your panties to the side,” he growls, voice and eyes hazed with lust and hunger, both imploring me before he leans down to suck along my chest, my throat, frenzied and impatient. “Do it, baby, just pull ‘em to the side, I need in you.”

  So, unlike anything I’d ever dreamed myself capable of, I do it. I snake a hand down, between our seeking, wanting bodies and yank my panties over, giving him the opening he so desperately wants, that I just as desperately need. And the second I do, he connects himself to me in one hard thrust.

  “Ahhh,” I cry out, my back arching off the floor in the most exquisite mix of pleasure and pain, legs clenching tighter around him and toes curling.

  “My baby,” he croons, his open mouth inching up the column of my neck, tasting and nipping along the way, finding my ear where he likes to whisper all his dirty thoughts. “So fucking good. Every. Single. Time.”

  I lose the self where I am only Laney, now the perfect version where Dane and I are the same entity. The physical sensation is amazing, like my body and his are one in the same. My insides ripple in time with his feral heartbeat, his hums of satisfaction timed to my shallow pants. He always knows just what I need; how hard, how fast, where to touch me, when to touch me there; he’s an attentive, unselfish, anticipatory lover. The emotional connection that I crave just as much as the physicality is as strong as ever. I’ve never felt, could never feel, closer to another soul, my partner, the person to walk this life with me, than when Dane and I make love.

  He moves over me, in me, stroking the spot inside me that makes my breath catch and my mouth open in a silent scream. His head falls back, eyes closed and a trickle of sweat gracefully make its descent down his slickened skin to get lost in the light thatch of hair on his chest. “You feel so perfect,” he grunts out.

  His ass clenches under my hands with each plunge into the deepest part of me and I can do nothing but stare up at him, strikingly beautiful in all his animalistic nature.

  “You close, baby? Need to come, want you with me,” his moans, his low grumble a plea. “Too good, need to,” he pants again, opening his eyes now to gauge my reaction.

  His hands move under me again, gripping my ass like a vice and tilting my pelvis up, where he knows he’ll hit right where I need him to, then begins to circle his thumb on my clit, the combination exactly what it takes to set me off like a Roman candle.

  The howl that leaves me bounces off the walls of the empty room, no objects to absorb the sound, increasing the volume to embarrassing—as if I cared.

  “Uh huh,” he goads me, rubbing harder, twisting his hips at the end of each slide in. “That’s it, fuck yes, baby, squeeze me. Who makes you come?”

  I can’t answer, delirious as my body bounces in time to his maddening thrusts.

  “Baby,” his strained yell breaking through my trance, “who makes you come?” He asks again and again, each word coordinating with a pound that grazes my cervix, or maybe my throat, his lip curled and teeth bared.

  The muscles in his arms flex with each move, the pulse in his throat begging me to raise up and lick it, but I’m pinned here at his mercy. “You,” I somehow answer, intoxicated with the feel of him, the scent of our mingled sweat and passion. “Only you, babe.”

  “Damn right,” he moans, satisfied with my reply. He lays flush against me now, giving me all his weight, which I welcome.

  There’s something about the heaviness of the man you love on top of you.

  “Need you there, baby,” he says again, his thumb mercilessly swirling on my clit, begging me to catch him in release. “Now, Laney, again, for me.”

  It takes but a minute; he knows to keep his thumb fast and right there if he wants me to join him. This time as I explode around him, shamelessly screaming his name as he too lets go, twitching inside me.

  I do this to him, me—my love, my body—undoes this god. This territorial, bossy, controlling…and phenomenal man that is all mine.

  “Love you,” he says in between slowing pants, trying to catch his breath.

  “Love you,” I hum, caught up in bliss, rubbing up and down his now damp back.

  I love this part.

  Chapter 2

  ~Dane~

  Obstinate, stubborn woman—good thing I’ve figured out the one language she’ll always listen to: Dane Dic
k. She speaks it fluently, actually, and I have great success with what I call Triple D, aka Dane Dick Diversion. I only call it that in my own head, of course; if she heard the title, she’d rip off the weapon of coercion and choke me with it. Who would have thought she had a side to her that could only be drawn out by me? She’s a lil’ freak when she wants to be, and the first time I let go, showing her the innermost Dane, the one that likes to control…the lustful sparkle in her eye and coy twitch to her lip told me it was okay to be me, that she liked it. Score 1 for Dane.

  So occasionally I use Triple D for my own purposes. Sue me. I don’t think Laney really minds, anyway. And now, with her sated and purring beside me, we can discuss her awful decorating ideas. And if she continues to argue, well, I’m more than happy to distract her again.

  Inside Laney is the tight, warm haven where I’d spend every waking minute if I could. It’s only then that she completely lets go, trusting me to take her away from everything else; the place she goes when I’m buried in her is made of total contentment, somewhere she’s safe, cared for, loved, and she has no other worries in the world.

  The minute I slip from her, though, my challenging little hellcat is back with a vengeance, testing me…her mind, mouth and spirit reminding me why I am so in love with her.

  But softball yellow walls? Not happening.

  She’s still lying on her back, eyes closed and small smile on her lips when I stroll back in from cleaning up.

  “Why you smiling, gorgeous?”

  “I’m happy,” she answers, not opening her eyes or making any attempt to move.

  “Then I did my job.” I lower myself and crawl over her, burying my face in the sweetness of her neck. She smells of me, of us—the best scent in the world—Dane on Laney. “I love you, Disney,” I whisper in her ear.

  I tell her as often as I can without feeling like a sap. Hell, I’d tattoo it across my forehead if she asked me to. She needs to know that even though one look at her turns me into an animal and I’d like to fuck her paralyzed, she means everything to me on every other level as well. If I could never make love to her again, I’d still want all that makes Laney, “Laney” to fill my days.