Incubus Moon Read online

  Copyright © 2014 Andrew Cheney-Feid

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN: 10: 1463674066

  ISBN 13: 9781-463674069

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2011911431

  CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform

  North Charleston, South Carolina

  CONTENTS

  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

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29

  CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31

  CHAPTER 32

  CHAPTER 33

  CHAPTER 34

  CHAPTER 35

  CHAPTER 36

  CHAPTER 37

  CHAPTER 38

  CHAPTER 39

  CHAPTER 40

  CHAPTER 41

  EPILOGUE

  CHAPTER 1

  I’d never done anything like this before. Was I actually going to go through with it?

  The trembling in my legs and my accelerated breathing was becoming more difficult to hide with every anxious step I took toward the old house. Why didn’t I bail on the ride over when I had the chance? It would have been easy to ditch the car following me.

  Too late now.

  The record-breaking chill that had descended on Southern California a few days ago, coupled with the late hour and thin denim jacket I was wearing, weren’t doing much to help calm my jittery nerves, either. Winter might not officially begin for another two weeks, but the outside temp graphic on my cell phone displayed thirty-two degrees. Hardly unbearable for many parts of the country, but by Los Angeles standards it was damn cold.

  I let out a ragged breath and watched it spiral up to vanish into the cloudless, star filled night. You started this, Austin. It’s Piper time.

  So I steeled my questionable resolve and glanced over at the man in the black Stetson and Sherpa suede jacket standing next to me on the walkway, the outline of his hat and chiseled profile etched by silver moonlight. A self-assured smirk played across his lips as he scanned the dark, wraparound porch for movement. Then he lifted his gaze to scrutinize the unlit upper floors and steeply pitched roof of the impressive-yet-creepy three-storied Craftsman that seemed to rise up out of the ground and lean in toward us; almost as if it was daring us to make a move.

  The cowboy turned his head in my direction and gave a slow nod of approval, his grin lengthening to an all out smile. “Let’s do this.”

  A few neighboring properties still glowed with cheery icicles and multicolor Christmas lights, despite the Holidays having drawn to a close a full week ago, a fact which leant a more sinister air to the shadowy grounds surrounding us now. It certainly helped to ratchet up my sense of anxiety (and excitement) over what we were about to do.

  What if someone sees us and comes over to investigate? Or worse, calls the cops? I could have sworn I saw the drapes part and close again in the old Victorian across the street.

  The cowboy took a few shuffling steps back along the concrete walkway to better appraise the house and whistled loudly. “Sure is a big one.”

  I winced at his carelessness, but also couldn’t help thinking, So is he.

  At six-six, the man stood half a foot taller than I and was broader through the chest and shoulders. That he bore a striking resemblance to a handsome Texan television star, right down to the square jaw, hazel eyes, and honeyed Southern drawl shouldn’t have meant a damn thing to me. And yet, here I was about to do something dangerous, unpredictable, and completely out of character for me—and all with a man I’d met a few short hours ago, and whose name, thanks to way too much tequila, I could no longer remember!

  Again, I had to remind myself, You started this, Austin.

  “She all yours?” he turned to ask with the same lopsided smile.

  With a final, hesitant glance over my shoulder at the now dark Victorian across the street, I stunned myself by hustling a perfect stranger onto the covered porch and through the front door of a house that had belonged to my family for five generations.

  “Right down to the oak floorboards,” I told him, kicking the door closed behind us and giving an impatient tug to the waistband of his jeans.

  The Texan gave a throaty laugh and removed his Stetson, tossing it onto the foyer bench.

  I should have been more freaked out. Hell, I shouldn’t even be standing here with this guy in the first place! But something inside me quickened. An inexplicable shifting of energy that I’d experienced, albeit to a lesser extent, earlier in the evening at the sports bar where I’d met this man. It suffused my body and mind, compelling me then, as it was doing right now, to bait him into conversation, and then lure him home with me to explore something about which I’d never even fantasized let alone acted on!

  We stumbled from the entry into the darker living room, bumping into a wall or piece of furniture along the way. On most nights, I could navigate the rambling old house with my eyes closed, which I was pretty much doing now. It was just harder to plot a course when you were shit-faced and playing tonsil hockey with a hunky cowboy.

  Kissing another man for the first time went beyond mind-blowing. Everything about what we were doing, what we were about to do, was terrifying and also beyond thrilling. The electric sensation of his stubble rubbing back and forth across my chin and jaw, the primal heat continuing to build between us, coupled with the intensity of the pure male aggression driving us, had given me one hell of a hard-on.

  I moaned into his mouth, savoring the faint oaky taste of whiskey on his tongue. I wanted more of him. I wanted all of him, until a series of deep gongs broke the spell.

  I stiffened in the darkness, but soon realized that the grandfather clock at the end of the hallway was the culprit. It was heralding midnight and the official end to my membership in the Twenty-Something Club. I was thirty now, and marking the occasion by making out with another man. A decided WTF moment if ever there was one!

  The Texan broke from our kiss and took a few disoriented steps away from me. He leaned against the newel post at the base of the stairs to the upper floors to catch his balance and shook his head a few times, as though trying to wake from a really strange dream.

  I knew the feeling.

  He took in his surroundings, seemingly unaware of where he was. Then our eyes met and I saw all traces of bewilderment fade from his expression. In its place, raw desire reignited inside him. I could actually feel it taking him over. Talk about fucking bizarre!

  It jumped from him to me again; this new something that proved more powerful than my own will to fight it. More to the point, I didn’t want to.

  I approached the Texan with slow, deliberate steps and reached both hands out toward his waist hidden within the dark suede jacket. His body was warm beneath the heavy fabric and I ran my palms along the firmness of the sides of his torso up to his thick lat muscles, before working them across his pectorals to the inner shoulders of the jacket. He knew what I was trying to do and dropped his shoulders, making it easier for me to push the Sherpa lined coat back and down over his arms, where it dropped to the floor behind him. Then I let my fingertips travel down the hard plan
es of his chest and stomach to caress the cool, metal longhorns of his belt buckle, holding his gaze while I did so. Desire reflected back at me. Hot. Longing. Ravenous.

  This was it.

  “You won’t be needing this for a while,” I said with a snap and a quick tug.

  He opened his arms wide and grinned down at me.

  About to unbutton his jeans, a rush of dizziness hit me with such force that I lost my own balance and lurched forward, falling smack into the guy. Not the smoothest move, but one which allowed the firm warmth of his muscular chest and arms to break my fall.

  God, his heart was beating so fast against the side of my face through the denim of his shirt and the rich, woodsy scent coming off of him sent a body-shuddering jolt of lust rippling through me that obliterated any lingering doubt I might have concerning what I wanted to happen between us. My skin literally hummed with need, as if tiny, electric impulses were racing just below the surface of it to fuel my inexplicable hunger for this man.

  “Y’all feel that?” he said with a hoot, pulling me in tighter against the line of his body.

  Raw, irrepressible yearning? Oh yes, I felt it!

  My dizziness was further compounded by the abrupt rise in temperature in the room. It was like standing in a sauna fully dressed. The hot, sticky press of clothing against my skin was maddening. Especially when all I could think about was stripping off and getting this handsome stranger naked and in bed. I longed to feel the crush of his muscular body on top of me, to feel its warmth press against and glide over my own.

  Never mind the white elephant in the room with us; that I’d not once in my life sought physical intimacy with another man before tonight. Or, the fact that I’d been about to approach a petite, curvy brunette I’d been eyeing at the bar when the Texan stepped between us to order a beer. My focus slipped. Suddenly shifted. It demanded the handsome stranger exploring my body with his large, insistent hands right now.

  Another wave of heat and desire collided inside me. It was as if a nuclear reactor of lust was churning at my core, its intense energy a living, pulsating thing that was pouring out of me and funneling into the Texan, whose breathing had sped up, and whose body now pressed hot and desirous against mine.

  There was nothing I could do. Nothing I wanted to do more than give myself over to this energy. So I transferred every ounce of burning need to his mouth and savagely kissed him, savoring that same oaky tang of whiskey on his tongue and the slight saltiness of his lips, as he returned my advances with equal enthusiasm.

  He breathed his excitement into me, breaking the kiss solely to grab my hand, which he rubbed in a slow back-and-forth motion across the fly of his jeans.

  “Jesus H, you’re like walkin’ Viagra,” he leaned in to breath into my ear.

  The thrilling surge of sexual power continued to thunder through my veins. “Today’s my birthday,” I told him in a voice thick with desire.

  “S’pose that makes me your present then.”

  I popped the top button of his jeans. “Only if I get to finish unwrapping you.”

  “Gotta catch me first.” He jerked his head toward the darker second floor and took off.

  I sprinted up the stairs after him and he let me corner him midway. Laughing and groping each other, we stumbled to the second-floor landing, where I stripped him down to boxers and socks. I still had my jeans on, but they were unbuttoned and riding low on my hips.

  “You sure are pretty for a dude,” he whispered, nuzzling the side of my neck, his stubble a riot of pleasure against the moist heat of my skin.

  I laughed again when he bent down, hoisted me over his shoulder, and then set off at a trot.

  My laughter quickly died when I realized he was rushing us toward the thin seam of light seeping from beneath the closed door at the end of the hallway. “Wait! That’s not—”

  He bumped open the door with his hip and we were through it and into a room I hadn’t been able to bring myself to enter for close to a month. The lamp was hooked to a timer and turned on and off automatically at the same time every day.

  “Ain’t you the kinky lil fucker.” He lowered me to my feet, his thick, sculpted torso on full display. “We gonna do this in your sister’s room?”

  “Mother’s,” I corrected him. “And no, we’re not. Mine’s down the hall.”

  I couldn’t stay in here a moment longer. I couldn’t move, either.

  Paralyzed by the onslaught of memories of that terrible night shortly before Christmas, I relived rocking her in my arms as she closed her eyes for the last time. I re-experienced that hollow, sick feeling in my heart and gut when the paramedics lowered my mother’s body onto a gurney, zipped her up in that terrible black bag, and then took her away from me forever.

  Memory after painful memory collided with the present; the indentation of her head still in the bed pillow, a throw blanket at the foot of the bed half-hanging to the floor. The room even smelled the same, a mixture of her favorite perfume, undercut by the metallic odor of medication. I was suffocating. I had to get out of this room!

  The cowboy clearly had other plans. He spun me around and covered my mouth with his warm, insistent lips; an unexpected lifeline to which I desperately clung.

  Whatever was happening between us, be it mystifying lust or an act of sheer desperation, it helped to dull the debilitating heartache that profound loss had brought to me.

  In the end, did it even matter whether or not the vehicle of my deliverance came in a female or male wrapper? This simple yet complex recognition was all it took to reignite my former lust.

  Except that when it took hold of me this time, I let it swallow me whole.

  The instant I returned the Texan’s kiss, everything else faded away. My world narrowed to this singular moment, to this one man and his eager tongue, and to the exquisite fire coursing beneath the surface of my skin.

  The sexual dominant in my relationships with women, I thrilled at letting go like this, willingly losing myself to another man’s alpha. Because as any good submissive knows, there is often no better way to dominate than through complete and utter submission.

  We were both breathing hard when I broke the kiss to turn in his embrace, molding my toned, lean body to fit the front of his. He smelled like every delicious food I’d ever craved and, God help me, I wanted nothing more in that instant than to take all of him inside me.

  I teased the swell of his crotch with a deliberate grinding of my ass. “Do it.”

  He gave a deep, knowing laugh. “Right here in your momma’s bedroom?”

  “Anywhere!”

  That was all the go-ahead he needed. He stepped around in front of me now, his hazel eyes filling with predatory intent and forced my jeans past my hips, where they bunched at my feet.

  How well I knew that look, had given it on so many occasions and seen it reflected back in the half a dozen faces of the women in whom I’d sought solace since Mom left me. Sweaty, alcohol-fueled nights with pretty, naked strangers I’d never see again; strangers who, through no fault of their own, brought me little more than fleeting comfort.

  All of that was about to change.

  This wildly unexpected encounter, I convinced myself, would be different. If only that it had to be. Because tonight, peace of mind and heart would at last come to me in the form of a well-hung Texan.

  CHAPTER 2

  Nothing could have prepared me for this raw but utterly exhilarating experience.

  Thanks in part to the tequila I’d put away back at the sports bar, but more to the white-hot sexual energy continuing to drive and fuel my appetite for the Texan, I cried out in greater ecstasy than pain when he first entered me and began to move inside me.

  There was nothing gentle about how he began to take me. This was not slow, gentle lovemaking. It was fucking, pure and animalistic, and I didn’t want it any other way.

  As if he’d read my mind, he flipped me onto my back in a single, swift movement. Hoisting my legs over his warm, slick shoul
ders, he let the full weight of his muscular body press my shoulders into the compact fibers of the Oriental rug at the foot of my mother’s bed. A sweet, electric warmth was beginning to build low in my groin, and when I gazed up into his eyes, filled with that same, single-minded aim, he reached up and grabbed a fistful of my damp hair.

  Pain and pleasure fused into a string of delicious little spasms when he twisted it, the slight curve of his girth rubbing against the walnut-size pleasure spot inside me and making me writhe beneath him. I had to force myself to hold back until we could both—

  “I’m close,” he growled, jerking us into a seated position, the length of him slipping out of me when he brought me to my feet and heaved me up onto the dresser, where I choked out a startled laugh. The marble top was cool against my bare ass, the height of the antique piece of furniture perfect for what he had in mind.

  We came hard and fast, the sound of splintering wood and shattering glass background noise to the most intense orgasm of my life.

  Dimly aware that the Texan had released me, I slid off the dresser and fell to the floor, landing square on my ass. Mom’s Venetian jewelry box lay on its side between us, its glittering contents strewn across the intricate patterns in the Oriental rug.

  Tex let out a whooping noise, the kind men often gave after an invigorating experience.

  Except that I was sitting there staring up at him in disbelief, his naked body glistening in the lamplight, his passion still hard. He was utterly unfazed by my tumble to the floor, or that my mother’s mahogany dressing mirror had shattered into dangerous shards right next to me. Within the larger fragments, a distorted reflection of myself stared back at me; a curve of tanned, lean muscle, strands of longish blond hair sticking to my forehead and neck, and the humiliating sting of shame reflected in blue eyes. What did I just let happen?

  “Lemme do you again. On your mamma’s bed this time!”

  Any residual sexual heat abandoned me now. Raw emotion burned at the back of my throat and I scrambled to my feet, shoving him backwards and off the strand of pearls she’d worn to my college graduation, and which he’d been crushing into the rug under his heel.