Lex Talionis

by Keira Michelle Telford

  “How touching.” Honey looks unimpressed. “But it’s not that simple I’m afraid. The militia cares little for budding romance, so make no mistake: if Luther wants the Russian, Luther will take the Russian, and he will kill you for meddling in his business.”

  “If he’s such a great threat, why doesn’t he come here himself? Why doesn’t he try to take her back?”

  “He’s not that stupid. Only one law prevails out here: the law of retaliation. You hurt me, I hurt you—lex talionis. As far as he’s concerned, we took the Russian from Slade as payback for Slade taking Tomkin from us—that makes us square with the Manchester militia. If he were to come onto my land and take the Russian now, that would instigate a further bout of hostilities, and it would make him look quite desperate.”

  “How so?”

  “Luther operates the main flesh smuggling route in and out of London, and he’s got no shortage of willing tail. If he were to commence warfare over a common whore, people might start to think he was going soft. Never mind which, he knows the Russian wants to go back home, and the only way she can get there is by traveling through Mercia. All he has to do is sit back and be patient.”

  Honey hands Silver a tablet device with a West Mercia Police report up on the screen: a missing persons alert for Rianne Zykova, with a substantial reward offered for her safe return.

  “Every Mercian from here to London is going to be eager to get their hands on that reward. Some Deltas might even be tempted by the offer if they learn of it. She’ll never make it, and I pity her, but I can’t keep her here any longer. Luther might not launch an attack on my land, but he can certainly make my life very difficult by meddling with our trade network. If he terminates his current contracts with us, my people will suffer.”

  “What’re you saying?”

  “I want her gone from here.” Honey crosses her arms sternly. “First thing in the morning.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Silver shoos the guard away from her bedroom door and returns to Ria, finding her sitting by the dresser, braiding her hair in front of the mirror. The bedroom window is wide open, a gentle breeze spilling through the room, bringing with it scents of lavender and calendula. Every little flutter ruffles the hem of Ria’s dress, until one sharp gust finally lifts it over her knee, exposing her stocking. At that moment, she catches Silver’s reflection in the mirror.

  “How soon does she want me to leave?”

  “What makes you think she wants you to leave?” Silver draws her eyes away from that tantalizing, milky splash of skin above the lace of the stocking and meets Ria’s eyes in the mirror. “How do you know we weren’t exchanging cupcake recipes?” She crosses the room and stands behind Ria, squeezing her shoulders.

  “I brought one of Luther’s men to her door. Albeit dead.” Ria finishes the braid. “I don’t imagine she’s in the mood for cupcakes, and I certainly wouldn’t blame her for wanting rid of me.” She leans back, resting against Silver’s chest. “Nobody wants to be on the Arch Rogue’s bad side.”

  “My bad side isn’t that much fun either.” Silver slips her fingers inside Ria’s dress, rubbing her shoulders and neck, half massaging, half exploring. “No-one’s gonna touch you again, I promise. I won’t let them.”

  Ria closes her eyes and relaxes in Silver’s hands, soothed by such heartfelt words.

  “That’s a lovely thought,” she murmurs. “But sadly, you won’t always be there to protect me.”

  “Says who?” Silver glides her hands down, over Ria’s shoulders and collar bones, stopping before she reaches the mounds of her breasts.

  “Reality.” Ria whimpers with longing, wishing Silver would go further. “Sooner or later, I’ll have to leave, and unless you’re planning on returning to London with me …”

  She opens her eyes, looking up at Silver in the mirror, scarcely daring to believe that could be a possibility.

  “We’ll be heading out first thing in the morning.” Silver works her hands back up to Ria’s shoulders and navigates a finger under one of the shoulder straps of the corset she’s wearing beneath the dress. “Together.”

  She tugs Ria’s sleeve off that shoulder, sliding the corset strap down with it, baring her pale, silky skin.

  “Why would you risk your safety for me like this?” Ria angles her shoulder so that Silver can pull the dress down further, undressing her upper arm.

  “I think you know why.” Silver bends and kisses her shoulder, starting at the top of her arm and working inward.

  “Tell me anyway.” Ria closes her eyes again.

  Silver works her kisses all the way to Ria’s neck. “Because I fancy you,” she whispers, nibbling on Ria’s earlobe. “And I’m not gonna let anybody take you away from me. Not Slade, not Luther—not anyone.”

  “But …” Ria struggles to concentrate on forming words, her senses overloaded with the sensation of Silver’s lips and teeth against her skin. “What about your husband?”

  “He’s not a factor in my decision.” Silver sweeps her hands down Ria’s back, under her arms and around her ribcage, still kissing her.

  “Your marriage …” Ria whines as Silver starts stroking her just below her breasts.

  “It doesn’t change a thing,” Silver insists, tiptoeing her fingers over every inch of Ria’s body between her bellybutton and breasts. “Honey’s giving us Delta escorts to the Mercian border. We’ll be on our own from there, but I think we can—”

  Ria turns in the chair. Kneeling on the seat, she flings her arms around Silver’s neck and engages her lips in an unexpectedly passionate kiss.

  Everything about it is perfect.

  Silver moans into Ria’s mouth, pulling her into a tight embrace, enjoying the softness of her lips, the taste of her lipstick, and the playful caress of her tongue. When it finally ends …

  “Mmm.” Silver keeps her in a firm hold. “I knew that’d be worth waiting for.”

  “Are you sure this is what you want?” Ria keeps her arms wrapped around Silver’s shoulders, tickling the nape of her neck. “There’s no telling what Luther might do if he catches us, and I don’t want to be the cause of any harm.”

  “He’s not gonna give up easy, I know that.” Silver admires Ria’s ass in the mirror behind her. “You seem to have made quite an impression on him.”

  “I don’t know why.” Ria looks sorrowful. “I didn’t do anything.”

  Silver roams her hands over the curves of Ria’s waist, hips and bum. “If you could see what I see, you’d understand.” She pinches Ria’s lower lip between her teeth, biting on it gently. “I think I’d chase you to the ends of the Earth for the chance of a kiss.” She lays her hands firmly on Ria’s ribcage, moving slowly up to her chest. “Or more.” She rubs her thumbs over the undersides of Ria’s breasts. “I’d fucking kill for more.”

  Ria quivers with arousal. “I wish we’d met under different conditions.” She feels her nipples tingle and stiffen inside her clothing, yearning to be touched. “You stir my heart and body in ways I can’t even begin to describe.”

  Silver instigates another kiss, pinching Ria’s lips between her own … but it doesn’t last long.

  Knock, knock, knock!

  Someone raps on the bedroom door and Ria breaks the kiss, looking immediately sheepish as she slinks away from Silver and slides back down into the chair, willing the color from her cheeks.

  “What is it?” Silver calls over her shoulder.

  The door opens and a female Delta in a nurse’s uniform stands in the threshold, out of breath from running.

  “I was sent to fetch you, Missus King.”

  “Don’t call me that.” Silver scowls. “Who wants what from me?”

  “It’s your husband, ma’am.”

  Ugh. Ma’am sounds worse than Missus King. Both make Silver cringe.

  “He can’t bring me his own messages now?”

  “No, ma’am. There was some trouble at Clocaenog.” She takes a deep breath, trying to swallow though he
r throat is dry. “He’s in the infirmary.”

  Alex never looks like Alex when he’s lying in a hospital bed. He looks vulnerable, and Silver’s always found it difficult to see him this way. He’s supposed to be her big, strong Hunter, and it seems so wrong for him to appear so weak.

  The first time she saw him in hospital was after he broke his pelvis falling from some poorly constructed scaffolding. He’d taken her virginity the night before, and she’d always wondered if the accident was somehow her fault.

  Was he distracted? Was he overtired? They’d barely slept. He made love to her all night, alternating between penetrating her and giving her head. She lost track of how many orgasms he gave her, and how many times he was able to release before he had nothing left to give.

  Her crotch throbbed the whole day afterwards, burning from the repeated friction of his hard cock inside her tight, virginal body. She’d only ever had fingers before, and two of her slender digits—or those of whichever cute female classmate she’d been fooling around with—held no comparison to the girth of his fully engorged cock.

  Standing in the infirmary entranceway, her starved sex pulses at the thought. Unfortunately, the pleasurable feeling doesn’t last long: Linx is sitting at Alex’s bedside.

  Silver considers turning around and leaving, but Alex looks up and clocks her, making it impossible for her to sneak away without causing a fuss. So, instead, she approaches his bed with attitude, her target Linx.

  “Scram, little girl.” Silver waves her off like one would an annoying cat. “He doesn’t need a sponge bath.”

  “I was just checking on him.” Linx gets up, but seems in no hurry to scurry away.

  “Don’t worry, I’m sure his dick still works. That’s the part you’re interested in, isn’t it?”

  Thoroughly embarrassed, inexperienced Linx doesn’t have the confidence nor the mental dexterity to engage with Silver on this level, so she capitulates without a fight and dashes off with her head down and her tail between her legs.

  “I didn’t ask her to come.” Alex strains to sit up, wincing as he bears weight on his right arm, bandaged from wrist to elbow.

  Hating to see him suffer, Silver snatches another pillow from the neighboring bed and helps him to sit forward while she props it against his back with the others, giving him added support. In this position—kneeling on the bed, leaning over him, his forehead resting against her stomach—she can see down the slit in the back of his gown, spying a bandage that starts at his lower back and wraps around his waist.

  “You’re all fucked up.” She settles him against the pillows, glimpsing the tip of a bloody bandage poking through the top of his gown on his left shoulder. “Is it really bad?”

  Although part of him would like to blow it out of all proportion to manipulate her sympathies, Alex can’t bring himself to exaggerate the severity of his condition.

  “Nah, I’ll be out of here in a day. You know how it is.” He points to his bright violet eyes.

  “I know how it was.” She flops down onto the bed by Alex’s knees, glancing at her own bandaged shoulder, which is still angry from the stitches Ria gave her earlier.

  “What? No kiss?” He feigns surprise.

  “I’m here, aren’t I?” She avoids eye contact. “That’s gotta count for something.”

  Alex reaches for her hand, but she keeps out of his grasp.

  “Can’t you pretend that you still want to be my wife? Even for a minute or two while you’re here. Give me something—anything—remotely tangible. I’m not fussy.”

  It hurts to hear him plead for affection so casually. She scoops up his hand and moves closer, dragging her fingers through his thick, graying hair the same way she does when they’re locked together in coitus. When you strip away all the bullshit and anger, and the unnaturally violet eyes, he’s still the man she fell in love with when she was fifteen years old.

  “I’ve always wanted to be your wife,” she reminds him, holding that thought firmly in her mind as she bends forward and presses their lips together.

  Taken aback by the sudden intimacy—but welcoming it without hesitation—Alex cradles her neck and prolongs the lip-lock, flicking his tongue into her mouth at the first available opportunity. He half expects to be rejected, but she reciprocates.

  The kiss lasts for an easy thirty seconds, and when it ends—when both of them need to stop to draw air—Alex adjusts his position to conceal a small tent forming under the bed sheets.

  “You taste like cherries.” He licks his lips.

  Silver rubs her lips together, sucking off the last remnants of Ria’s lipstick, swiftly diverting the conversation. “So what happened out there today? And how come you’re the only one in a gown?”

  “I fell off my horse.”

  Silver stifles a laugh. “Seriously?” She snorts. “Here I was thinking you’d been gored by some three hundred pound militia man, but you did this to yourself.”

  “Hey, the fucking horse saw a snake, reared up, and threw me down a gully. I could’ve died.”

  “What gouged you?” Silver chuckles heartily. “A vicious tree root?”

  “Stop laughing.” He spanks her thigh playfully. “I tumbled down the bank, broke three ribs on a protruding rock, and sliced myself up on some barbed wire left behind from a collapsed fence. That shit was rusty. I had to have another tetanus shot.”

  “If other people ask, you should probably say you got gored by a three hundred pound militia dude. Jussayin’.” She pats his knee.

  Things between them always used to be this easy. But this is nothing more than a mirage.

  Wiping tears of laughter from her eyes, Silver sobers up her mood and prepares to risk crushing Alex’s rarely cheerful disposition by informing him of her impending departure. She has to do it soon: she’s leaving in less than twenty-four hours.

  “Look, I wish I could wait to tell you this, but I can’t.” She strokes the back of his hand, twirling his wedding ring. “Something happened with Ria while you were gone doing your manly shit.”

  “Oh, yeah?” He sounds suspicious, anticipating a sexual confession.

  “Luther knows she’s here and he threatened Honey.”

  “So?” Alex shrugs. “Send her on her way. That was the plan anyway, right?” He challenges her to say otherwise.

  “Always.” Silver ignores the bait. “But things are more complicated now.”

  “How so?” Alex leans back and stares at the ceiling, still waiting to hear Silver admit that she has feelings for the Russian.

  “Luther reported her to the police as a missing person, and he’s offered up a reward for anyone who’ll bring her back to him.” Silver shakes her head, disgusted by the behavior of almost everyone she’s met since arriving in this country. “He’s acting like she’s his fucking pet.”

  “What do you care? There’s nothing you can do about it.” Alex sighs, running his hands from front to back through his hair. “This isn’t our country, El. It’s not our fight.”

  “She’s a human being, Alex. She’s a vulnerable woman who’s been taken advantage of and treated like shit. What am I supposed to do? Look the other way? Like everyone else seems to do.”

  “What’s this leading up to, El? Feel free to come to the fucking point.”

  “Okay: I’m escorting her to London.”

  Silence.

  After letting that sink in his thoughts for a few moments, Alex shakes his head vehemently. “You’re not doing this.”

  “Yes, I am.” Silver’s eyes seem extra steely. “Carmen’s coming, too, and we’ll have Deltas with us till we reach the Mercian border.”

  “Let the Deltas take her all the way.”

  “They won’t go any farther than the border. It’s too dangerous.” She leaves out the fact that Luther will kill anyone caught aiding Ria’s escape. “Anyway, I don’t trust them with her, Alex. Given half a chance, they’d rape her, then trade her back to those brutes to claim the reward.”

  “Fine
.” Alex clenches and unclenches his fist. “When are you going? Wait a few days and I’ll go with you.”

  Silver doesn’t waste a second putting the kibosh on that. “No can do. Honey wants her out of here tomorrow.”

  “Why are you being so stubborn?” Alex rubs his hands over his face, groaning with frustration. “You really want to get away from me that badly?”

  “I’m not trying to get away from you, Alex. I just want to make sure Ria’s safe.”

  “Do you? Or are you looking for an excuse to go to London so you can execute the goddamn King?”

  Silver refuses to answer. Happy to have the distraction, she spots Luka heading out from a private cubicle at the end of the room and ushers him over.

  “What’re you here for?” She notices a bandage on his left wrist. “Are you injured as well? Serves you both right for not letting me come with.”

  “Nope.” Luka holds his wrist out proudly, peeling back the bandage to reveal a fresh Delta brand on his skin. “I’m immune.” He grins. “They tested me.”

  Neither Alex nor Silver can articulate an immediate response to that little revelation. Silver, knowing what she does now about the history of the Deltas in England, is thankful that they’re no longer in Amaranthe. What if people with immunity are going to be treated the same way there? Alex, on the other hand, veers off down another mental pathway entirely, and he’s still stewing on it when Luka excuses himself to have dinner with the nurse who gave him the brand.

  “He’s such a hound.” Silver laughs.

  Alex isn’t listening. In his distrustful mind, Luka’s immunity means only one thing: he can sleep with Silver no matter what. Back in Amaranthe, when Silver was still infected, the only reason Alex accepted her denial that an affair had taken place was because Luka remained uninfected. But this news changes everything.

  “How come the baby’s a Delta?” he asks then, his conclusion already drawn.

  The somber, accusatory tone of his voice raises Silver’s hackles. “Excuse me?”

  “Luka’s immune, just like your child.”