CHAPTER FIVE

Becky White awoke to find herself in a strange room, in a strange bed and with a heavy weight across her stomach that wouldn't let her move. She looked around and slowly her brain started to work, her memories revealing to her where she was and with whom. She took in the fact that the heavy weight was in fact a huge arm and her eyes travelled slowly sideways until she could see the giant laying next to her. Well, she thought, laying next to her wasn't exactly accurate. He was curled around her, his arm holding her close and his face about two inches away from hers. After an initial moment of panic she relaxed and took the chance to study him. He had said his name was Glen, she remembered, and he had been incredibly kind to her although she had seen in his face that he wasn't used to company.

He looked different when he was asleep, relaxed and innocent. She reached up a hand and carefully pushed his overlong hair out of his face, her fingers touching on the straight nose and firm jaw that was hidden slightly by a goatee and a five o'clock shadow. His jaw would have looked heavy on a much smaller man. But Glen was impressive with his size. The only thing marring his masculine beauty was the long, jagged scar that ran down the left hand side of his face from just below his eye to curve down and under his chin. It was deep too, but it was obviously old. Becky decided it didn't actually ruin his looks at all, he was still a very handsome man, at least to her eyes and she stroked slowly down the deep mark without thinking about her actions. She jumped back as his eyes shot open and she was fixed with a glare from the hazel depths.

"What the hell are you doing?" he growled at her, disconcerted to wake up and find her touching what he felt was an unsightly disfigurement.

"I just...I was...oh.." she stuttered, shocked by the anger he was showing and the fact she had been caught. "I'm sorry," she whispered, dropping her face down and scuttling back away from him as far as she could with his arm still wrapped firmly around her waist.

Glen frowned at her guilty face. She was acting as if she'd been caught stealing. "What were you doing?" he asked again, curious as to why she would touch him like that.

Becky cleared her throat and glanced up at him, quickly dropping her gaze again at his intense stare. "Nothing."

He couldn't help but smile at her mumbled response. "Nothing? Are you sure? It felt like something to me," he said, lifting her face up with one hand until she had to look at him. "I think you should explain yourself."

Becky swallowed again. Well, they said honesty was the best policy, although she had found that to be untrue in the past, to her cost. "I was just touching your face....I didn't mean to wake you up or...make you angry," she said on a rush.

"Why were you touching my face?"

"I think you're handsome," she blurted out and then blushed to the roots of her hair when he stared at her in amazement.

"That's why you were looking at me in that weird way last night?" he asked her, thinking back to the odd expression on her face the previous evening.

"Yes," she admitted, looking down again and wishing she were anywhere but here and this embarrassing situation. "Sorry."

"You don't need to be sorry about it, honey, but I do think you need an eye test," he said lightly, and her head shot up again at his tone. He sounded carefree, but behind it she could hear a slight bitterness and she could see it in his eyes. He almost looked hurt.

"An eye test?" she asked, frowning as she looked at his face again. "Why?"

Glen gave a short snort of laughter. "Oh, come on, don't tell me you really think I'm handsome. With this?" he pointed to the scar and shook his head. "I don't think so. Listen, you don't have to lie and flatter my ego just to get a hot meal, I'm well aware of what I look like."

"I don't lie," Becky said, losing her embarrassment. "I don't flatter people, I wouldn't know how. I can't help it if I think you're handsome, because you are. It's a shame you have a scar, but it doesn't make you ugly." She shrugged and then looked down again because he was staring at her strangely.

Glen stared at her with his mouth hanging open. He could see she was sincere, see it in her eyes, and he couldn't decide how he felt about it. She didn't think he was ugly and she didn't seem scared of him, although she was a little intimidated because she kept breaking eye contact with him. He realised he still had hold of her, his arm curved possessively around her waist, but for the life of him he couldn't bring himself to let go.

The robe she had worn all night was starting to loosen a bit and he kept getting enticing glimpses of curved flesh, her cleavage just peeking out of the deep v of the loose neckline. He looked up to find her sending covert glances at him as well, and remembered that he was only wearing shorts, his body on display for her.

Oh, wow, thought Becky, this guy is huge! He had looked big the night before, but with virtually no clothing on she could see just how big his muscular body was, how well defined. His arms were positively massive and she looked at the one he was using to hold onto her, getting an insane urge to stroke over the huge bicep. Her eyes dropped down the length of his torso and she blushed a deep crimson when she saw the growing bulge in his shorts, her eyes jerking away in case he caught her staring. She didn't know too much about a man's anatomy, but she knew enough.

Glen chuckled when he saw her face colour, knowing that his body was giving away the fact that she aroused him and finding it amusing that she was so flustered by it. "Something wrong?"

Becky kept her eyes averted, only briefly flicking them in his direction and only looking at his face. "Should...er...shouldn't you get dressed?" she asked him quietly, biting her lip.

Glen raised one eyebrow and sprawled back on the bed, crossing one muscular leg over the other and raising one arm to prop behind his head. His other hand tightened on her waist and she found herself being dragged slowly toward him.

"I'm pretty comfortable like this. Is there any reason I should get dressed?"

Becky's hand shot out to steady herself when he successfully pulled her right over next to him, and her fingers landed on his stomach, the firm muscle tensing under her touch.

"You...well...you're nearly naked and you're....you're..." she stammered, her eyes dropping briefly again to his shorts.

"I'm what?" he asked, raising his eyebrow again and smiling at how red and flustered she was. He dropped his eyes to her mouth as she lay there against him, her mouth open as she tried to think of something to say. Before either of them realised what he was going to do, he bent his head and covered her lips with his, exerting a gentle pressure on them as he softly kissed her.

Becky gave a small gasp at the shock of his kiss, then forgot whether or not she should protest the intimacy as the feel of his lips got to her. His mouth had looked so firm, and yet it felt so soft as he moved his lips over hers, his tongue licking slowly along her bottom lip until she opened her mouth a little wider. He took instant advantage and plunged his tongue inside her mouth, meeting up with her tongue and coaxing her into following his movements. He realised that she didn't seem to know what she was doing at first, but she copied what he did and soon got the hang of it, a small moan rumbling in her throat as the kiss went on and on. It was only when one of his huge hands delved inside the robe and covered her breast that her senses came back to her and she pushed at him, breaking the kiss and trying to move away, her eyes wide with shock.

"I'm sorry," he muttered, letting her go all at once and looking guilty. "I had no right to touch you like that." He frowned when she said nothing, watching her pull the robe together with shaky hands. "I didn't hurt your back did I?"

Becky looked surprised. She had totally forgotten about her back. "No...i...its fine."

"Well, I better take a look. That bandage will need changing, and don't argue," he said when she opened her mouth to protest, "you can't manage it yourself."

"Okay," she said, her voice husky.

"Right, well, I guess you should lay on your front and...er...take the robe off," he said hesitantly. It had been one thing treating her wounds when she was unconscious, it was something else again doing it whilst she was awake and aware of his every move. He watched as she laid on her stomach, her hands fumbling underneath her to undo the belt and then try to shrug it off her back.

"Ow," she said, hissing in a breath as she pulled her back into an awkward position as she was shrugging the robe off. "I can't take it off," she admitted and looked over her shoulder at him.

"It's okay, I can do it. Just relax alright?" he said, drawing the thick robe off her back until he had exposed the bandages.

He tried to be as careful as he could, but the bandage had stuck to some of the wounds and he ended up having to bathe it off and then bathe her skin clean too. It still looked bad, but it was starting to heal now he had tended to it properly.

"Does it look awful?" Becky asked him, glancing back at him once more.

"It's not too bad," he murmured, thinking she'd probably freak if she saw how bad it actually was.

"I guess it doesn't matter, really," she said softly, laying her head back down. "My friend Ellie used to get beaten a lot, and her back was a real mess, covered with scars and all. Her stepmother really hated her. I was told that she'd been sold to some man the day I ran away, but I don't know how true it is. It might just be my stepmother playing mind games, I suppose, but I'm never going to go back long enough to find out anyway, and if it is true, then she's probably better off."

"Who was the man?" Glen asked quietly, because he had a suspicion he knew.

"No-one you'd know, I shouldn't think. His name is Calloway and he lives in that big old house on the mountain, the one everyone says is haunted?" She gave a deep sigh and a shudder. "I hope Ellie will be all right. I wish I could see her again."
Glen kept quiet, not letting on that he did know Mark and that they were in fact friends. Maybe he'd take her there as a surprise, once he'd made sure it was okay with Mark. He frowned as he carefully cleaned the dried and crusted blood from her soft skin. So Mark had actually bought a bride? He had thought he was joking when he started talking about doing just that, but he was obviously deadly serious. He supposed he could understand his actions, especially after his disastrous marriage. Glen wondered if he would ever do something like that and decided he would, if his bride looked anything like Becky. His eyes refocussed on what he was doing. It was a shame that she would have scars on her beautiful skin, he thought. The rest of her had been pale and smooth, he remembered from last night, and the feel of her firm breast in his palm a short while ago would haunt him for many nights he was sure. Unless she would actually let him touch her again? The brief possibility made him smile. Then a plan started to form and he frowned. No, he couldn't do that. But she didn't want to go home, in fact she would probably do anything to avoid it. He swallowed the faint feelings of guilt his plan made him feel and decided he would carry it out, it couldn't hurt to try.

Becky felt him hurriedly finish her dressings, and then he draped the robe over her back and sat on the side of the bed. "There, it's done. I'll need to change it again later on, but it's not too bad now."

Becky studied him and wondered how long she'd be able to stay here with him. "Thank you," she said softly, giving him a small smile when he glanced her way.

Glenn had only meant to look at her briefly to acknowledge her thanks, but he couldn't look away from her beautiful blue eyes, and her smile further captivated him. What the hell, he thought, might as well start this little plan in motion, see if it works!

"I'm going to take you home today," he said and Becky felt what little colour she had in her face drain out of it in a rush. She struggled to slip her arms into the robe and pull it closed underneath her so she could sit and face him.

"Please....I can't go back there, you don't know what it's like, what they'll do," she said, pleading with everything she had, her eyes huge as she wondered why he would do that to her, when he had seen what her stepmother was capable of. "Please, can't I stay here?"

"And how would you pay your way? You can't work at the moment, and if you do get a job then your family would find out where you were," he pointed out, shaking his head. "The last thing I need is to have the police knocking at my door saying I've kidnapped you!"

Becky tried to think logically, but she was panicking too much. "I could work eventually....I...!"

Glenn hid a smile. This was already working out better than he had hoped, she was so desperate not to go home. He swallowed down the sudden guilt that assailed him, knowing it was wrong to use her this way to get what he wanted. But what he wanted was her, and he would do just about anything to get that.

"You won't be working for some weeks, not a proper job anyway," he said, seeing the disappointment flood her face.

"There has to something I can do," she said frantically, her mind already thinking ahead to what would happen to her if she went home.

Glenn cocked his head to one side. "There is one thing," he murmured, watching her suddenly brighten.

"What is it?" she asked eagerly.

"You could work here, I'm not too good at cooking and cleaning, and there are other things you may be able to help me with, too," he said, shrugging.

"But....you cooked that stew and it was really good," she said softly, remembering the night before.

"Yeah, well that's all I can cook. So how about it?" he asked, staring at her with raised eyebrows.

Becky chewed her lip and tried without success to read his face. "Okay, thank you."

Glenn stood up. "Good," he said. "We'll go over what your job will entail later on and if you want to back out of it afterwards, then I'll take you home. But one thing Rebecca," he added, suddenly looking more serious than she had yet seen him, "If you agree to my terms, you can't ever leave."

Becky stared at him without comprehension and watched as he left the room. What on earth did he mean?