“I haven’t had time to read the report.”
“I’ll give you the Cliffs Notes,” Jasper said. “It’s quite possible that people, her assassins, were using her phone to track her down. It’s been hacked in the past. It’s not completely compromised, but it’s not secure, either. I tried warning her about that. She wasn’t particularly receptive to my opinion on her communications at the time.”
The captain’s voice came over the radio again. “They’re asking again for permission to board and inspect. I’m going to have to give it to them.”
Tansy scrunched his face. “Since when can they just board and inspect in foreign waters like this?”
Tucker turned to him. “How fast can you work on this?”
“Work on what? You want to know if . . . if she’s being tracked?”
“I’m wondering,” Tucker said. “If you can track the trackers.”
“Again, you’re not saying it right.”
“Who cares.”
“But I know what you mean.”
“Well, can you?” Jasper said.
He had to know. If the personnel on the boat were in contact with Macy’s phone, if they were using the same means her assassins had to track her . . . an official US government convoy wouldn’t be actively tracking her right now. Would they? Of course they fucking would. He knew most of the story of what had happened to the four men—Jackson, Jasper, Matt, and Tansy—before he’d joined DARC. It wasn’t pretty.
“Okay,” Jasper said, patting Tansy’s shoulder as the hacker spun back around to his laptops. “Let’s let him get to work. I’ll head up to see the captain. Tucker, get back to your bird’s nest.”
Tucker nodded and moved swiftly to the door, stopping by his room to grab an extra radio and blanket. Carrying them outside, he jogged past his nest and headed for Macy’s container. He took the stairs two at a time, jumping down each and then racing through the middle aisle of containers, the colors dim in the darkness, rushing past him, the wind at his face, the thoughts in his mind urgently hoping that she would still be in there and be alright.
When Tucker arrived to her storage container, he was out of breath. Not from the run, but from what he saw there. The door was shut.
She had to be in there, right? Tucker just hoped to God she was. He hated to think of her wandering around somewhere on the ship, mere minutes before a possible boarding and inspection. The American agents—if that’s truly who they were—would be looking for the uranium, to make sure it was secured properly. And to make sure of the identities of those who were doing the storing. Macy wasn’t one of them. She might also be on a different kind of list.
He swung the door open and called her name, the echo of his voice bouncing off the rear metal wall. He could tell just from the sound that it was empty. Another voice echoed through the room, but it wasn’t from Macy. Through his radio, Jasper said, “Stand down, bird nests. Repeat, stand down. We’ve got friendlies boarding. Prepare for inspection.”
A shiver ran down Tucker’s spine as he thought of an inspection with Macy loose. Macy being inspected, and most likely worse. He reached to his holster and drew out his handgun, the flashlight equipped, illuminating an empty container. He looked at the bed for minute, to make sure. The Naugahyde top looked wrinkled, but nothing else. When he clicked off the light, it was hard to see anything, even outside the container where there had been dim orange deck lights. It was as if the spot of light he’d just seen had burned into his retina, with him now seeing that same damn spot wherever he looked. He was looking outside, down the aisle, when through the blind spot came a set of hands, pushing at him, shoving him backward into the container, his feet stumbling back over the lip and onto the metal. He couldn’t see who it was, but the hands were small and soft. A familiar energy plowing into him and pushing him back. And then a familiar laugh, a nervous giggle he’d known for years.
The hands were at his waist now, Tucker instinctively flinching away.
“Sorry,” Macy said. “Did I scare you?”
It was too dark too see her. “What are you doing?”
“What do you mean? I heard we’re being inspected, so . . .” Her hands slowly glided away and off him. “Did you come here to join me?”
“I just wanted to make sure you were safe.” Now it was his turn to reach for her, his hand finding hers in the dark.
Macy held his hand. “Are you going to stay?” She squeezed his palm.
“I’m a little surprised you want me to.”
“Who said I did?”
“Your hand,” he said, squeezing hers back. “The same hands that pushed me in here.”
“So? How about it?” She let go of him and walked away, back into the darkness. Tucker heard her sit on the bed. “Want to keep me company while the inspectors come snooping around?”
“I would,” Tucker said, hating the words as he said it. “But the ship’s getting boarded. I might have some other duties to take care of.” He’d like nothing more than to hide in here with her for the rest of his life, but keeping her safe meant he had to be elsewhere.
“That’s too bad.”
He went to move, to return to the nest, but his feet wouldn’t cooperate. He felt an incredible urge to stay. She needed protecting, after all. Wasn’t that also a part of his mission? He could do that best if he was right next to her. Surely Jasper had enough men to handle the bird’s nests and the inspectors. And they were just inspectors . . . right? Tansy would know something by now if they weren’t.
While he was weighing the pros and cons of staying exactly where he was, he heard a set of footsteps coming closer, clanging on the metal as it reached the container.
“Who’s that?” Macy whispered. “An inspector?”
“No, they haven’t even boarded yet.”
Tucker tried listening to the sound of keys, something jingling. By the sound, and by the walk, he could usually tell who it was. But this time, the sounds were all foreign. Even the voice, one he’d never heard before, which asked, “Macy? You in here?”
“Yeah,” she said, sounding startled. “Why?”
The next sound was even more strange, a creaking sound that grew louder until a loud clang of metal sounded, the trap door swinging shut and locking into place. It happened quickly and before either of them could say a word.
Tucker rushed into it, pounding his fists against the wall until he felt Macy’s hands on his back.
“Okay,” she said. “That’s it, then. They locked us in.” She almost sounded happy about it.
Tucker, meanwhile, was busy racking his brains, trying to work out what the hell was going on. Were his men really in that much of a rush to hide her from the inspectors?
He pounded again, before stopping, thinking of his radio. He grabbed it and moved it to his face but then felt the invisible hands again, Macy, holding him back. “No,” she said. “You’ll broadcast to everyone. The inspectors.”
“I’ll use code words,” he said, despite the fact that they hadn’t come up with her code words yet. He’d make it up on the fly—the boys would understand. He clicked on the radio. “This is Tucker. The bird is caught in the cave.”
“The what?” Macy said, laughing.
“The bird in the cave? Should I have said bat?”
“You should just stay quiet and let them do your job. We already did ours.”
“We did?”
“Well, I have. What do you have left to do?”
It took Tucker only a minute to realize what she meant. To figure it out.
He’d done a lot for his team, risking his life, saving Jasper’s life. Maybe even saving Macy, though she was having no trouble saving it herself. So what else had he done for her?
He brought her to Johannesburg in a private jet. And now he’d put her into a box, securing her in a safe like a rare work of art. A beautiful painting to be appreciated. The only thing left now was the appreciating.
Tucker walked toward the sound of her sweet voice, feelin
g her warm body pressing up against him. He found her face with his hands, feeling first at her soft neck, and then up around her jaw. And behind, holding her head close, Tucker leaning closer until his mouth met hers in the dark.
32
Macy
The whole day had been marked by mixed emotions: fear, elation, uncertainty. But there was nothing uncertain about the way her and Tucker’s lips felt together. The way his body wrapped around hers in a strong and hungry lock. Even his kisses, strong and forceful. There was almost a desperation about it, how he devoured her as if it was the last time. Maybe he’d learned a lesson about that.
It really wasn’t her plan to lock him inside the container like this. Originally, she wasn’t even sure if she wanted to see him for the rest of the night. But after watching Tucker stand there in the doorway, looking for her, and after they’d stumbled in together and the door locked behind, Macy’s hesitations melted away. It was like ice thawing between them, their passion warming the distance between until they were melting together as one.
She was flying.
In her head, out of her body, her mind began traveling away from the cramped confines of the shipping container, away from the cargo ship, away from Africa. Tucker took her up in his arms, lifting her body though the dark, both of them moving back together. She wrapped her legs around his waist for support, her hands tensing around his strong back, her head buried between his shoulder and his neck as he lifted her. He walked casually with her, as if he’d still just been carrying the folded bed sheet. Certainly not a full-grown woman. Though he carried her that way, the way a woman should be carried, snugly against hardened biceps. And then lowered somewhere through the dark, where Macy couldn’t see, but where she trusted would be the soft landing of a bed.
For a half second it felt like the bed would never come, that she’d be falling through darkness forever. And then she realized all along that she’d been on the bed, and it was her head that was spinning, drunk with passion now, with a hunger for Tucker. As soon as she got her bearings, she clutched the bottom of his shirt and pulled it up and over his shoulders. He leaned back, helping, his head momentarily stuck and laughing a little as he pulled away in the dark. When Tucker came back, it was the warm, bare skin of his chest pressing down into her, against the bed. Her fingers explored each contour of his muscled back as it flexed and heaved, his breathing getting deeper as he nuzzled into her neck, as his hands moved up her shirt, fingers sliding under the cups of her bra. His mouth moved along the side of her neck, finishing the job he’d started in the hotel, the gentle sucking, the possibility of him leaving a mark. She wanted that. She wanted to be marked up by him, by his mouth. His body. She wanted bruises along her inner thighs, damage from his hips, from his fingers gripping her as he fucked her. Hard. She wanted something to remember him by, even if it hurt a little.
It was happening so fast, her arms already raised above her head, her shirt peeling up and off her body. Their skin, touching, melting into each other’s. The contact felt better than she’d imagined, especially the silence of it. They had talked for too long, gone over too much of the past. They’d complicated things with their brains, the talking, the accusing, and the paranoia getting in the way of what their bodies should have been doing all along. Every hour of the last two days, it should have been like this. It should have been Tucker’s mouth, not a source of words, but of ravaging.
Macy had filled her mouth, too, along the thick convex of his pectoral muscle, ending up on his nipple and licking there, making him moan with pleasure. It was exhilarating, taking such a tough, hulk of a man and then breaking him with the simplest little sensation. Tucker was a target she’d wanted for a long time. And although she may have broken him in another way, a horrible way, in the past, she wanted to make up for her misdeeds, starting here.
Would he let her?
Tucker pulled away, sliding down her body. Her hands were already there, loosening her jeans for him. Then she realized she’d been mistaken. Tucker wasn’t helping her undress. He had his own work to do. She could hear the clatter of Tucker’s belt buckle as his pants landed on the floor next to the bed. He was in a hurry. And so was she, faster now with her pants, taking them off one leg, and then helped by Tucker with the other as he returned, his warmth sliding back to her, into her, between her legs and burning there. She wrapped her thighs around his hips, her ankles feeling bare skin in place of his boxers. The muscles around his lower abdomen flexed hard as he pulled her in closer. His skin burned against her thigh, his bare cock, the firm immensity of it, the idea of it inside her already burning through her mind. A scalding hot idea. Now she wanted to be burned as well as bruised by him, and whatever other destruction he could accomplish with her in this container meant for lifeless inanities like pallets and cargo and kitchen appliances.
When Tucker’s face neared hers again, she held back nothing. Her tongue, especially, plunging into his mouth, tasting him there, knowing him. She was that girl again, years younger. Foolish and innocent. Stupid and horny and living for the moment. She could be unreasonable and wanting and brain-damaged with lust for him.
“Fuck me,” she said, barely vocalizing, whispering. Perhaps not even saying it at all, but just mouthing it into the air between their faces, between kisses. She closed her eyes and said it again, this time even quieter. In anticipation of his body, his cock filling her, she had lost all resistance, all worries. Everything had faded away. She was ready.
Tucker’s hands were already between her thighs, rising up smoothly along one side, then inside, over her panties. She could feel only his hand’s pressure over her. Then he moved his hand away, and rocked his hips in place, and suddenly she felt a different kind of pressure. Something sharper than a hand, harder. He ran the head of his cock over her, up and down through her panties, brushing over the thin, wet fabric. God, it would be so easy just to slip inside . . . just a little bit closer. He was so close now.
She reached down and felt him, starting at his thickened head and then running down the length of him, holding his balls in the palm of her other hand. They felt so full for her. His cock so hard and ready. Her body wet and opening for him. She felt it herself, dropping her hand to her underwear and dipping inside. She was soaked. With one hand pressing against her clit through the fabric of her panties and the other stroking his length, she massaged them both. Only seconds passed before she couldn’t stand it anymore. She pushed her panties down, out of the way, and then grabbed the head of his cock, guiding him. Tucker groaned and surged his hips forward, sliding into place, deep inside her with a single thrust. She’d become so wet for him, so hungry, that it was effortless.
He held himself there for a moment, taking a deep breath before thrusting forward, splitting her open. It made her breath gasp in, the sensation almost shocking her. But she wanted more. She pulled her hands around his ass and pressed him into her, a little deeper, a little faster, until she had all of him, that amazing feeling of completeness once he’d slid himself completely inside and their bodies connected at the hipbone with a quiet thud. A deep and locking thud, their bodies held together there, his cock throbbing inside of her.
He began slowly, rocking himself back and forth, his thrusts more and more lubricated with each stroke into her. She’d almost forgotten about her underwear. It dangled from one ankle, and she kicked it off. Her hands were free to roam him, exploring the contours of his chest, and then around his back, feeling it flex as he propelled himself, as the work got busier. Soon, she considered bringing her hands back to her own body, to her mouth, to stifle the little gasps that left it. She couldn’t help them, the little noises getting louder and more pronounced until she was almost whimpering with the pain and pleasure of his fucking. And then came another sound, not from her, or even him, but from the side of container. The mattress slamming into the metal, the thudding of their bodies mixed with a much deeper echoing that came with each of his plunges into her. He went faster now, ignoring the nois
e—both from the bed and her. She didn’t care, either, how it sounded to the outside world. How suspicious it may have seemed to the inspectors who were no doubt boarding the ship right as they fucked. She even peeled back her forearm from covering her mouth. She needed the air, each gasping breath a measure of how hard he was taking her, fucking her. She felt like she was suffocating, drowning, crushed by his body and his strength, the combined lust of all those needing years coming back now and ravaging her into oblivion.
Tucker was working so hard. She could feel beads of sweat dropping onto her skin. He gasped for breath, too, as he worked even faster, his cock pushing into her, over and over again, the heat between her legs almost unbearable. His cock slid inside again, this time deeper, to her very limit, before pulling out almost to the tip and thrusting back in to the hilt
“God, Macy,” he said, panting out the word.
He fought to catch his breath and she took the moment, pushing at his chest.
“Wait,” she said. She slid out from under him, and his cock slid out of her, leaving her feeling empty—if only momentarily. She would fix that. In a hurry.
“Roll over.” The strength was returning to her voice and her body. She quickly got out from under him and then rolled on top of his body, groping at his cock, still erect and harder still, his girth slipping nicely in and out of her hand. He felt so hard now, and likely ready to blow. And if he was, she’d take the greatest pleasure, knowing she was the one to make him explode.
Her body was shaking as she climbed on top of him, adrenaline racing through her. She felt like a school girl again, the shakiness of a first heavy make-out session.
Or was it withdrawals already?
She was ready for another dose, straddling and guiding him inside, where she needed it, his dick filling her completely, perfectly, like her was meant to stay inside her forever. Like it hadn’t been years since she’d seen him. Like they hadn’t just gone through hell together and now were being shipped across the ocean in a metal box.
DARC Ops: The Complete Series Page 124