Was Connor fucking with me? I couldn’t tell. He was so earnest with his belief on the ‘mana’, but I didn’t think he was a true believer in “magic” until he sprung that visit with Julio on me.

It made me uncomfortable. Not because I didn’t believe it, but because I wasn’t sure what I believed.

I was already perched on the back of the Harley by the time Connor joined me. Julio stood in the door behind him, his blind eyes seeing far too much. He’d look straight through the artifice that I donned myself with, and made me feel like a little girl again stuck in nowhere Mississippi. The south was filled with superstition and tradition, and my little hometown of Beaumont was no different.

I looked away, hiding my reaction behind a pair of sunglasses, and ignored them both. If Connor would stop with stories about the Moai statues I might be able to enjoy Easter Island. Instead, every time I looked at the huge volcanic stone figures a shudder raced down my spine.

Connor swung his lean legs over the motorcycle and revved the engine. He turned halfway in his seat, and pierced me with his hazel eyes. “That was rude, Princess.”

“Just drive.”

The motorcycle lurched and I slid into him, once more holding onto him tightly. Our drive out to the far reaches of the island had almost been idyllic. The drive back to our hut was terse. My tension fed his and then reflected into me until a knot formed between my shoulders.

Finally, with the late afternoon sun bright on the horizon, we arrived at the fishing village that Connor had chosen for his home away from home. Knowing that he’d been on the island five years ago, it made a bit more sense to me that he would knew the ins and out, and maybe why he had chosen this God forsaken place as the place to regain his crown.

The engine purred beneath me as I slid off the back of the bike. He gave me a quick nod, and then he pulled off, leaving a puff of dirt behind him.

I sighed. This was going to make sharing living space with him difficult. But, maybe this was for the best, right? If he was angry at me, and I was angry at him, this attraction I felt towards him would die.

Lord, I hoped so.

I gazed towards the crest of the volcano that the island was mostly made up of. Clutching my necklace again, I shoved all thoughts of mana and stupid magic beliefs out of my head, and stomped towards the hut.

After organizing my things for an hour or so in the place, I stepped back outside to get some fresh air. I’d been wondering why Connor took so long to come back inside, and when I went out I had my answer.

He was standing in what looked to me like a yoga pose. His eyes were closed, and he was facing the direction of the sunset. He stood on one foot only, his arms together like a tree. He had on only his short fighting shorts, and they left extremely little to the imagination. I took a moment to admire the way he was made. He was unique, that was for certain. Then again, you didn’t get to be one of the best MMA fighters of all time by following the status quo.

And you certainly didn’t get abs like that by following the status quo, either. “Connor? What are you doing.”

He calmly opened his eyes and let his foot down. “The limalama.”

“What did you just say? Lima beans? What does that even mean?”

In a series of many quick dodges, ducks, and jumps, he danced his way toward me. My pulse soared as he quickly jumped his way toward me, pausing only inches before touching me. He stood in front of me, bearing his sweaty, ripped chest.

“The Limalama is the ancient art of self-defense taught on this island. It’s part dance, part attack.”

You left out part sexy man. “Well, it’s an...interesting technique.”

“It is. Now if you don’t mind, I can’t be staring at you while I’m in the middle of my training. You’re quite gorgeous, and it’s incredibly distracting.”

If he wasn’t hot as hell with a pretty Irish accent, I might have been taken aback that he’d just blatantly called me sexy. “Oh? Well I’m sorry for breathing and distracting you.”

“Look, Crystal, now I like you, don’t get me wrong. But this is the fight of my fucking life coming up in sixty days. And if I don’t stick to my training regimen, I’m not going to be in peak shape. Now please, leave me alone so I can be in peace with the mana.”

“The Mana? Seriously? It’s not a thing.”

“Tell that to my millions of fans who say I fight like magic.”

I rolled my eyes and headed back to the hut. I’d had enough of Connor’s shit for one day.

That week, I settled into a routine to complement Connor’s. I’d shower in the morning, put on one of my nice dresses, and Connor would drive the motorcycle to the hotel where the MMA TV had made a base of an office for the skeleton crew they’d brought out to the island. There I could have lunch and use the internet to get marketing done and touch base with Zoreto, Connor’s agent, and my friends and family back home. It was a nice daily escape to pretend I wasn’t living in a town that was eighty percent dirt roads, in a cabin, alone, with a damn celebrity who kept strutting his washboard abs around me constantly.

Any girl would be physically attracted to him, and I wasn’t about to lie to myself and say that I wasn’t. He had the type of genetic build that put out the message to the female species, ‘your babies with me will be amazing,’ sure. Yet something deeper about Connor drew me to him aside from his gritty, raw hotness.

Every time I felt like I was solving the mystery of the man, I’d find out some other fact that would blow my mind. Like how he claimed he had wandered for three straight days over Easter Island five years ago, thirsty, emaciated, and hopeless, until he stumbled randomly into Julio’s house. There Julio nurtured Connor back to life with maté tea and taught him the art of the mana. How he’d loaned money to Erma years ago so she could start a small business where she harvested fresh vegetables and drove them into town to sell herself. That one broke my mold of a man who I considered to be as narcissistic and full of himself as they come. The facts and the anecdotes I had collected from the locals seemed to point to the fact that Connor was telling the truth about most things, which made me wonder about the damn mana he kept talking about.

Whenever I tried to ask him if the mana was real, or if he was just trying to describe some sort of positive thinking, he’d brush me off. I had been living with the man for a week, and I still couldn’t tell if he was just using his thick Irish sense of humor to mess with me, making up all these stories for his own amusement.

The mana is very real, he’d say with a smirk.

I didn’t believe in the mana, or any sort of magic. I hadn’t been to church in years, since the day in my childhood when my world came crashing down. And there was no damn way I was going to tell Connor why I didn’t believe in any sort of superstitions, and had trouble being spiritual. The world was a place of logic and rules, and if you didn’t follow those, you got hurt. My father had taught me that years ago.

* * *

On day thirteen of the fights, Connor and I stayed out late to watch them. Tonight, wearing a dark blue suit with his hair slicked back, he’d grabbed the mic and personally welcomed the two fighters to Easter Island.

On the motorcycle ride home, it began to drizzle a little. Connor hit the gas, and suddenly we were going so fast, my hair stood on end and I felt a little panicky. We flew over bumps, and I had to cling hard onto him to not get tossed from the motorcycle.

“Hey! Slow down Connor! What the hell!”

He sped up even more, and with it, my heart began to thump with rage.

“I said slow down!”

“Can’t slow down. Tropical storm coming. We gotta make it home or else we’re going to get caught in it. Trust me baby, you don’t want that.”

I had donned one of my nicest dresses for the night in case the camera panned to me, and dirt was flinging up onto the fabric as Connor flew over the bumps. My grip on him tightened. I dug my fingers into his abs, half in anger, and half afraid that I’d get tossed from this thing. My dress collected just enough rain from the drizzle to make it a magnet for the dirt. I clenched my jaw and rested it on his shoulder. I took deep breaths, trying to calm myself, but it was a lost cause. A tear rolled down my cheek. I saw my whole life flash before my eyes as we flew over another bump. I hated not being in control. I wanted to stop this vehicle, I wanted Connor to turn around and go back to the hotel where I could stay in sheets with high thread counts, and have internet.

“Connor, please,” I murmured, one last weak attempt to get him to stop.

“Almost there. Almost home. Trust me.”

The rain came down harder as we pulled up to our cabana. I jumped off as soon as I could.

I ran toward the cabin, but stopped before I made it inside. “You’re such an asshole, you know that? I’m sick of this.” I was done. Maybe his head games had gotten to me. The loss of control over the little decisions. But him not listening to me, not slowing down when I’d asked him was the final straw. Some might have seen it as a small detail, but I was done here. He could fend for himself. I’d go back to the five-star hotel in town and have internet when I woke up and stop being the chewtoy of a deranged jokester.

He got off the motorcycle slowly, his hazel eyes focused on me. His suit had the same coat of rain and dirt on it as my white dress, but he didn’t seem to care.

“Right you are. I am quite a bloody asshole.”

I was about to launch into a tirade and tell him exactly what I thought of him. But right as I was about to speak lightning flashed across the sky, followed by the biggest crack of thunder I’d ever heard. My mouth moved, but my voice drowned in the noise.

I literally jumped it was so loud.

Connor rushed to me. “I wasn’t trying to ignore you. Have you ever been in a tropical storm in the pacific? It’s about to get feckin’ ugly. I’ll buy you a new dress, but that’s the least of our worries. We need to be inside. And we definitely can’t be on the road during a storm.”

I reached out and interlocked my arms with Connor’s. Had I overreacted? Was I the one experiencing emotional overload now that I’d been away from home for so long.

I melted in his arms and let him wrap me up in a hug.

“Still mad at you,” I murmured as I pushed my head against his chest. The rain fell harder on us now, but I no longer cared. My dress couldn’t get any more ruined.

He grabbed my hand and led me inside.

The hut’s interior was chill and damp, and the weather had ruined my clothing. I glanced down at my dress. The material hugged every curve, outlining it in almost sheer fabric. Connor flicked on one of the room’s only lights.

I bit my lip and looked up. His hazel eyes seared me as he unabashedly looked at the mess the rain had wrought.

I shivered, but it wasn’t from the cold. It was that hot-eyed intensity that I’d felt crackling between Connor and I since the first time I’d met him. I hated him, yes. But Lord did I want him.

My hands shook as I spun around, hiding my body’s reaction to him. My nipples were painfully hard pushing insistently against my bodice. “Stop looking at me like that.” My voice was reedy, a lust-hungry breath. How was I going to remain platonic and professional when Connor’s look almost sent my clothing combusting?

His body warmth touched me before his breath did. “How can I not? You’re a feckin’ goddess.”

Connor’s accent came through thickly. When he was in high emotions the flavor of his birth place thickened his voice until it sounded like a brogue-rich growl.

I shuddered, and goosebumps rose on my skin. “You can’t say that.”

“Why? You know it’s the truth. You keep dancing around what’s between us.”

His calloused hands cupped my elbows, and he pulled me against his chest. God, what a chest it was. Rock-hard and sinewy, ripped from all the effort he put into turning his body into a fighting machine. But that wasn’t the only thing that was hard. His cock, every enormous inch of it, prodded my butt.

I bit my lip and closed my eyes, trying to summon some willpower in the face of the madness brewing between us. It was the storm’s fault, right? The tension and electricity in the air was conjured by the tropical weather gusting and howling at the windows.

Only I knew it wasn’t.

“We have to keep this professional.” My protests were weak. Even as I tried to summon the strength I needed to resist Connor, he tugged me into him. His heat beckoned me like a furnace, promising forbidden things. I shivered again.

“You’re cold.” His mouth hovered near my ear, stirring the damp tendrils of hair which had escaped my ponytail. “Let’s get you out of these wet clothes.”

It wasn’t only the cold that had me shivering in his arms, but the possibilities which grew with every flutter of my pulse. I couldn’t deny Connor, I didn’t want to, as his rough hands traveled up my arms, and fell onto the discrete zipper at the back of my dress.

I held my breath as he tugged it down, every second felt like an eternity as the metal teeth gave way, and the fabric gaped around my shoulders, then slid forward away from my breasts.

I whimpered when the sodden material fell to my feet, and I stood before Connor in just a lacy bra and panties. I usually was a matching sort of girl. But lace panties in the tropics was a no go. The cotton bikinis were damp, but only partially from the storm outside.

I was wet for Connor.

He nuzzled my neck. “I’ve fantasized about this, princess.”

I couldn’t even find any anger for his continuous use of that damnable nickname. If anything, it warmed me further.

He spun me around, and I closed my eyes like a coward. He didn’t let me hide from him, though. He nudged my chin.

“Look at me.” His command snapped my eyes open, and I drowned in his eyes. “Have you thought about this, Crystal? Have you wanted me to touch you, strip you naked, and fuck that stick straight out of your ass?”

I bit my lip. I knew I should lie to him, but I couldn’t. Not when his touch demanded truth. “Yes.” My voice cracked, but I didn’t shy away from him.

His large palm cupped my nape, and he pulled me close until my hands were trapped between us. The world around me fell away. There were no hurricane-force gales shaking the hut. There was no island. No fight. It was just me and Connor and the need that burned low in my belly. I drowned in him, his battered face became my whole world.

I whimpered as his head lowered. “Have you fingered your tight little pussy thinking of me? Have you come with my face in your mind?”

He was so dirty. The half-smile licking his face revealed he knew the answer, but he wanted me to say it.

I swallowed hard, my suddenly dry throat begged for moisture. “Yes.”

His fingers tightened, and slid into my hair. He yanked my head back, and a flash of pain and desire burst over my body.

“I’ve come for you Connor. I’ve rubbed my pussy, slipped my fingers in deep, and swallowed your name.”

His large body shuddered against mine. Suddenly there weren’t any more words. He hauled me into his arms, and he crashed his mouth over mine.

This was not a romantic kiss. It wasn’t a gentle seduction, but a claiming. I had no choice but to submit to the ardent demands of his mouth, lips, and tongue. I whimpered, and his tongue slipped forward to claim dominion over my mouth. He stole my breath until I was panting and dizzy, clutching at his broad shoulders for support.

He had me draped over his arm by the time he was done kissing me senseless. Through heavy lids I stared up at him. His ginger hair was wet and wild, slicked back off his face. Connor’s sex face as intimidating as his war face: harsh lines, thinned lips, and burning eyes.

He tugged my hair free, and my hair fell in a heavy sheet around me. “I love your hair down,” he murmured. He gathered a fistful of my hair and lifted the strands to his nose. “Coconut, how appropriate. Every time you’re in the shower I get a fucking hard on.”

He circled his hips against mine, and let me feel every inch of the Irish package he was sporting. Lord, he was huge, and I whimpered as that simple touch fired me up.

“How is it my fault you have a fetish for coconut,” I taunted him back.

He narrowed his eyes. His fingers bit into my waist, and he hauled me up, making me squeal until he pinned me to the bed beneath his powerful body.

“That mouth is going to get you into trouble, princess. Keep saying that shite and I’ll teach you what naughty girls should do instead of flapping their gums.”

“You’re a beast,” I said as I dug my nails into his arms. He was granite wrapped in flesh. Each time I thought I was prepared, thought I was ready for the way Connor felt, the truth caught me by surprise.

“Is that what you want, Princess? A beast to your beauty?”

His grin grew feral, and I didn’t even deny that my pussy pulsed with the thought of what he could do to me. If I let him.

I quivered beneath him. “What a big mouth you have,” I taunted him.

He lowered himself down my body, leaving a trail of kisses over the tops of my heaving breasts, and down my trembling belly. His grin grew wolfish. “All the better to eat you with.”

Fuck.

I whimpered fully as he yanked my thighs open. “Connor!”

“You can’t say you don’t want this. Feck, Princess, you smell sweet as apple pie. Your panties are all wet, and don’t even try telling me that’s from the rain.”

He rolled his thumb unerringly along my clit. My hips bucked off the bed.

“What should I do with you?” He raked his teeth gently over my stomach, and another volley of shivers rippled through my body.

“Maybe I should show you what to do with your mouth,” I parroted back his earlier comment.

He narrowed his eyes at me, and then tore my panties down my hips and off my legs.

I gasped as he wedged his shoulders between my thighs.

“Is that what you want, Princess? Do you want my Irish tongue sucking on this juicy pussy?”

God, his words, they were going to kill me. I slapped my hands over my face. I couldn’t handle the sight of his smug face looming between my thighs.

He slapped my inner thigh hard enough to sting. “No hiding. Look at me.”

I mewled and reeled my hands away, once more locked in a staring contest with Connor fucking McGrath.

“Better. Watch me, Princess. You aren’t going to be daydreaming about some other man. You’re going to know, when you come all over my face, just who it is that got you there.”

“Connor,” I moaned.

“That’s better. Keep moaning my name.”

His rough hands smoothed over my sex, and he uttered a sinfully hot sound in the back of his throat. “Feck I love that you’re smooth. Were you keeping yourself shaved hoping we’d get here? Were you wishing each time you took the razor to this tight little pussy that I would be here soon?”

Lord, that accent. He was growling and dripping that Irish brogue all over my skin.

I should lie. I wanted to lie. Instead, the truth tumbled free. “Yes, Connor. Fuck yes, I was. Please touch me.”

His smirk depicted exactly who he was: a fighter with his prize.

I struggled to keep my eyes open as he spread my swollen lips open, and introduced his tongue to my aching clit. I squealed, writhing on the bed.

“Mm, look how sensitive you are. And I haven’t even begun.”

Connor proved he was as adept in the bedroom as he was in the ring. His tongue was a volatile beast swirling around my clit, occasionally passing over the most sensitive part of it with a flick, before he went back to licking down my slit.

My hips rolled into his face, and he gave a playful growl and wiggled his face against my pussy, rubbing my juices into his skin. It was dirty and erotic. My toes curled beneath the pleasure.

“Lord, Connor,” I gasped.

“Mm, keep singing my name.” His voice rumbled against my pussy, and I about died as a new wave of pleasure surged through my body. He hauled my thigh up, balancing it on his shoulder, and dove in as if I was his last meal before meeting his maker.

The storm outside raged, but the chill which had chased us inside was replaced with steam and the scorching need to ride his face. I didn’t want him to stop. Not ever. I couldn’t recall the last time I felt this wanted, this beautiful, this feminine. I might dress the part of a southern belle, but I was as far from a true belle and much closer to a poor farmer’s daughter.

I screamed when he nipped at my clit. My fingers gripped his hair as if I could guide him right where I wanted. He refused to give me what I wanted. Instead, he played with me as if I was his chew toy. His wet mouth sucked on my inner thigh, doubtlessly leaving sucker bites behind, and then he would face-dive straight between my legs again to slake his thirst—or attempt too—with my arousal.

“Stop teasing Connor, fuck please please please.” I chanted his name as the tension he wreathed me with corded my limbs. I shuddered, as frail as a leaf caught in a tsunami, and teetered on the edge.

“Do you want to come for me, Crystal? Do you want to come all over my face? Feckin’ say it.”

Connor growled, and I melted. This, I realized, was what he had been wanting for me. He wanted me out of my head, and living in the high of him.

I spread my legs wider and dug my high heels into his back. Belatedly I realized I still had my shoes on, and bra, and that half nudity made me feel so damn erotic.

“Yes. Yes, Connor oh god please I’m right there. Please make me come. Please.”

I didn’t even sound like myself as I panted, begging for him to give me relief.

I was sure he was going to keep playing with me. He locked his eyes on me, only the upper half of his face was visible between the clench of my thighs. But I knew, just how the corners of his eyes scrunched and wrinkled, that he was smiling.

Oh. Jesus.

I thought I was prepared. I thought I was ready. I wasn’t. He had been toying with me, playing my body with a proficiency I should be suspicious of. But I wasn’t. I knew his reputation, and he fucking earned it with that golden tongue of his. He curled the tip right against the bottom of my clit and rolled. At the same time, he knuckled his finger straight into my quivering pussy. His finger was so rough I felt my walls drag over the callouses. The one-two punch was a straight knockout.

I screamed as I rode his mouth, his fingers, his face and I came for him. I was a shooting star streaking through the heavens as all the tension I’d carried since learning I would be going to Easter Island with Connor evaporated in a blissful haze of pleasure. Behind my lids the magnificent colors of the aurora borealis streaked in a blaze of glory; blues, greens, and golds; the same shade as Connor’s eyes.

I came down to find Connor leaning over me. He still wore his pants, though they were loose. The head of his giant cock poked from the band of his boxers. I quivered as I got my first glimpse of the monster Connor sported. Not only did he have a golden tongue, but his dick was a girthy behemoth worthy of all my orgasms. My belly fluttered with a new wave of arousal.

“Welcome back, Princess,” he said with that cocky smile.

He lowered himself onto me, and his words fell into my ear. “I’m so glad you’ve come around. This will be a great fucking stress relief. God, I’ve been dying to fuck you. You and me. We’ll have a good time over the next month and a half before we head home, back to our lives.”

His words iced the languid heat wave I’d been riding.

What had I done? I wasn’t a fucking ring-bunny. I wasn’t some easy toy.

I wriggled beneath him and shoved at his shoulders. “Get off me. Fuck. Just. Get off me!”

Connor pushed up on his hands and blinked down at me. “What…Crystal?”

“No. Ohmigod I can’t believe I let this happen. This was a mistake. This will not happen again. I’m not your island toy!”

Connor recoiled as if slapped him, and I sat up, grabbing the blankets and covering my lower half.

My eyes stung, and I wanted to cry.

Was that all Connor saw me as? Just a way to relieve stress?

My heart thudded in my chest, and I hid myself behind my hair so he didn’t see the tears I felt stinging my tears. I’d gone from heaven to hell in the span of a few words.

Connor rubbed his hand over his face. “What the hell, Crystal?”

I shook my head, crawled off the bed, and ran into the bathroom.

I was a fool. I was a colossal fucking idiot.

How was I going to repair the damage I’d just caused between us?