The Breaking

by Imogen Keeper

  They both gasped as he pressed inside her slick, welcoming heat. He kept on pushing until she winced and wiggled her hips, and his balls pressed against her ass, and nothing in the universe had ever felt better. Almost painfully tight, slippery hot, and silky smooth.

  He stroked a hand down her cheek, tracing her jaw, holding that yellow-green gaze. “There’s something I want you to know, now before everything changes.”

  She stared back at him.

  “I love you.”

  29

  No more secrets.

  No more lies.

  Parts of this were familiar, if she were honest. Ajax wasn’t touching her anywhere she hadn’t been touched before. But the way her body reacted, the way her lungs shuddered against the onslaught of burning physical need, was something else entirely. Ajax’s touch seared far deeper than her skin, to that innermost sanctum that had always belonged to her alone.

  Not anymore. He shoved aside all the layers of protection that had allowed her to survive Utto, that she’d relied on in the days following her escape, leaving her open, defenseless and bare.

  He saw the parts of her that were ugly and dark. The scared places, the selfish places, the broken places. Her darkest deeds. And he loved them.

  The guilt and the shame, the anguished fear, and the self-loathing… all of it faded away. Ajax filled her so completely there was no room for anything else. The thrashing in her chest receded.

  Inhaling sharply, she forced herself to focus on this man inside her. On this moment with him and the eyes that penetrated every bit as deeply as his body.

  The vibrant turquoise of his eyes steadied her, reassuring and familiar, but dark too, revealing the person within him, beneath the layers of civilization, respectful manners, and gentle motions. There was a dark, selfish place inside Ajax too. And it only wanted one thing.

  Her.

  She squeezed her eyes tightly shut, breathed in deeply, tightened the grip of her legs wrapped around his waist, the muscles of her sex contracting around him.

  Thick and full inside her, he stretched her to aching.

  I love you.

  His words echoed across the room. No sound but for their panting breaths as he drove inside her.

  She couldn’t say it back.

  She tried, but he lowered his mouth to hers, touching his velvety tongue to hers. His hands roved down her body, capturing her bottom, pulling her tighter, until she was surrounded by him on all sides. Every breath smelled like him, overpowering her. He didn’t let her escape to the place she’d always gone before. He followed her there, demanded responses of her. He countered her every retreat until she became the aggressor.

  He tried to hold back. His voice in her ear was little more than a breath. “Slow down.” He panted. “Fuck.”

  She denied him the luxury of lingering or caution, thrusting her hips against his, taking him deeper. “No. I don’t want to wait any longer.”

  He tried to be gentle. She didn’t want gentle. Tearing her mouth from his, sucking at his neck, she reveled when he grunted, fingers tightening into her skin hard enough to bruise.

  He tried to be sweet. She wanted rough. She sank her teeth into his earlobe, smiling when he bucked.

  She didn’t want lies or secrets or distance from him. Not anymore.

  She wanted him. All of him. The dark glimmer of possession and passion that spoke of the loss of control the night before. Everywhere, until he drowned out every last trace of anyone else.

  She dug in her claws, dragged her teeth over the skin of his chest until he cursed. He thrust his hips so hard she winced. He fisted her hair in a rough hand, pulling her head back, baring her throat to him. Shoved deeper, pulled tighter, fucked her harder until her brain shut down and her body took over.

  He took her mouth in a scorching kiss that stole the air from her lungs. Proprietary.

  She bit his lip, and he growled, his other hand moving down to hold her hips in place so he could shift the angle, plunge his cock in deeper, matching the beat with his thrusting tongue.

  It stung, the hand in her hair, but it stung in a good way. It didn’t sting because he wanted to hurt her; it stung because he’d forgotten to treat her as though she might splinter into a thousand fragmented pieces.

  He snarled against her lips, hips growing erratic.

  She’d never felt stronger in her life as she did with him inside her.

  His hips moved, wild and bestial. And when he exploded, and his serum hit her, hot and powerful inside, she tightened around him, spiraling beyond reason, and out of control. Their gazes locked, his irises darkened, and the pupils tightened to sharp pinpoints.

  It was strange… reliving her life through another person’s eyes. Their bodies dissipated under the onslaught of memories, neurons firing.

  The images crossed before her eyes as if on a loop. Her childhood and her parents and friends and the Green Sea outside Trian. Herself, skipping through the Red Gardens, over lush red ferns, singing and laughing with Mamma.

  And Ajax’s life as well. At the same time, simultaneous as twin holo-vids in fast-forward, as he toddled on bandy legs across a mossy blue yard to pick up a yellow ball, which he threw at another boy, older, but clearly his brother. The other boy laughed, and somewhere in the distance an infant cried.

  Though she couldn’t see him, she sensed him beside her.

  They sped through their childhoods, superimposed across one another. She felt Ajax’s pain when his mother died, and then his sister. The horrible burial. His father withdrew into himself, leaving Ajax even more confused. Through Feola’s teenage years. Finally, Mamma’s death and the isolation after.

  Tears burned at the last glimpse she’d ever have of Mamma’s face. They sped through Ajax’s schooling, and his decision to join the Tribe, to become a warrior.

  The slavers came to her planet, pale and moving as if their bodies consisted of nothing but sinew and muscles, all smooth and fast, until finally, they arrived in a dark cave, where she hesitated, staring down at an orb-shaped preservation pod, desperate to escape Triannon at whatever cost, desperate to find a place where she belonged.

  And then they were in a room she recognized. The white-and-silver room on Sierra-Six where Ajax had found her, where she’d woken up to his handsome, gentle face for the first time.

  He stroked a strand of hair back from her forehead. The healing bay was empty and quiet. He didn’t need to be there. The look on his face, the way he studied her—she’d belonged with him the first minute he’d found her.

  This time, maybe because she was prepared for it, she was aware of the Bonding changing her. She knew the exact moment that Utto’s furious, rearing Bond vanished from her chest and Ajax took up residence there, firm and gentle.

  It wasn’t a massive physical sensation like an ache that pressed against her heart; this felt more like a spring, attached on one side to him, and on another to her. Binding. Reassuring. Warm and light.

  When his body shook in climax, she felt it. Happy, light, and joyous. That, more than anything, put her at ease. He knew her secret. He knew she’d killed Rennie. Stabbed him in the back as he’d walked away from her.

  She woke at some point. On the third day? Maybe it was the fourth? She’d collapsed atop his broad chest, her face pressed against the smooth skin and prickly hairs over his steadily beating heart. Was he awake? She glanced up. He wasn’t.

  He slept with his face turned away, and as she shifted gently, just enough to see him clearly, he stirred and murmured but didn’t open his eyes. Exhausted.

  He looked like he’d lost weight. She probably had as well. If they’d had more than three meals in all that time, she’d be surprised. In sleep, he looked younger, sweeter. She stroked his hair.

  He smelled… about like one would expect… after spending three or four days doing not much but Bonding. So did she. Like him. Like her. Like sex.

  They needed to bathe.

  She glanced at the windows. The thin crack of
light visible through the drawn, faded curtains confirmed that it was day.

  Moving slowly, scarcely breathing, she shifted her weight to lift her leg over his torso.

  His eyelids fluttered. “Feola?”

  “Hush. Go back to sleep. I’m just going to get some water and use the bathroom.”

  His brows lowered, and he was back to sleep before she’d even drawn the blankets over his chest. Poor thing.

  She couldn’t resist pressing a kiss to his forehead. A fleeting smile crossed his face.

  “Let’s go hunting,” he said later that day from the window as he leaned against the frame. He stood naked, with his sharply defined back to her, looking over the plains. Bracing his hands on the frame, he stretched, sleek muscles rippling. “I’m hungry enough to eat about twelve of those grazers out there.”

  He inclined his head toward the pale gray animals with long, slender legs roaming the plains below.

  She frowned. “You can hunt?”

  He looked affronted as he turned to study her. “Of course I can hunt.”

  “Why?” They spent their lives in space, on ships, with nothing to hunt.

  “I’m an Argenti man,” he said simply, as if that should have been answer enough. “We can all hunt.”

  “Why?”

  He lowered his brows at the question. “Why would I not? I may be a healer, but I still went through all the normal manhood rituals.”

  So many memories had transferred through their Bonding, but there was still so much they didn’t know about one another.

  “When I met you, you lived on a ship in the middle of nowhere. What reason would you have to learn to hunt?”

  He straightened his shoulders, eyes tracing over her legs, bare beneath the hem of his shirt she’d put on. “Did you not hunt on Triannon?”

  “Me?” She smiled. “No. There were lots of women who did, I suppose, but mostly we ate animals that came from farms.”

  Ajax nodded. “It was an important ritual on Argentus. Far fewer of us lived on bases when I was a child. In fact, most of us lived on Argentus or in one of our colonies. It was only after the Plague of Days that the bases were expanded and repopulated. We’d demilitarized to a great extent before that.”

  She sipped her own eeffoc, swirling the bitter, dark liquid over her tongue.

  He turned back toward the window. She moved to join him, looking to see what he studied. A herd of large mammals grazed.

  “What is the ritual like?”

  A half smile lit his face. “The manhood one? There is a big hunt. A celebration. And then time with a dominess. By the time I came of age, there were far too few dominesses and too many males. Years ago the rituals took a full week. But for me, it was only three days.”

  A burst of jealousy spiked through her belly. She should be grateful to the woman who had shown kindness to young Ajax. Instead, she wanted to go back in time and tell her to back away from her man slowly.

  She pressed her face in the hollow between his shoulder blades. Pressed a kiss to his freshly washed skin, wrapping her arms around his waist, careful not to spill on him.

  He took her mug, placed it on the sill, and pulled her around to stand in front of him, facing away. He pulled the shirt over her head in an easy motion, and cool morning air puckered her nipples, raised goosebumps over her skin. “Put your hands on the glass.”

  “Wha…” She stopped talking when he took her hands in his. His motions were gentle but firm. She didn’t even try to resist, didn’t want to, as he placed her hands in front of her so she leaned forward, bent slightly at the waist.

  He pulled at her hips, so she took a couple steps backward until she was leaning forward, forced to take more of her weight on her palms.

  A finger tracing down her spine had her arching her back for him, pressing out with her bottom. “Spread your legs a bit wider.”

  A rush of liquid heat coursed through her body, and a quick gasp escaped her lips. She widened her stance, blushing.

  He walked around to stand beside her, stroking her breasts, pulling at her nipples. “When I first saw you, I thought you were the most beautiful person I’d ever seen in my entire life.”

  It was true; she’d felt that in the Bonding.

  “I was wrong.”

  She glanced at him sharply.

  “You’re so much more beautiful now that you’re mine.”

  She didn’t have a response, couldn’t think past the delicious husky whisper of his voice. Lust had confused her. She’d lost control of her body and her mind, so instead she just stood there and stared, pressing into his hand, desperate for his touch.

  His fingers trailed, feather-light along her neck, turning her chin so he could capture her lips in a long, possessive kiss. “Am I scaring you?” he whispered.

  She shook her head. Ajax had never scared her.

  His hand trailed over her hip to cup her bottom. He groaned, moving to stand behind her, his lips against her ear, bristle scraping, breath sending shivers down her spine. “This ass… Gods, this ass is perfect.”

  He thrust the rock-solid length of his cock against her, and she sighed, writhing against him. He traced the broad head along her slit, gathering fluid, running it to the tender bead of her clit, and back across the folds and higher. The blunt head pressed in against the tightness of her bottom.

  She froze, tightening her fingers on the glass, fear, arousal, curiosity roiling within her.

  “Did he touch you here?”

  She could do nothing more than shake her head.

  Moving slowly, he traced his cock back down to the opening of her core, and she relaxed as he eased inside.

  A hand on the small of her back kept her bent forward as he pressed his hips in close, the hairs on his thighs tickling the skin of her bottom. A finger traced over her ass again, finding that spot, slippery and wet from earlier. She flinched as he pressed his finger inside. It didn’t hurt, but she’d never felt so tight.

  When he wiggled his finger, she groaned a deep, primitive sound.

  “Someday, woman,” he said in her ear, his voice hoarse, “I’m going to take this ass.”

  There were no words that made sense. On a deep primal level, she loved the idea of him taking her in a way Utto hadn’t. On another, the thought elicited shivering fear. What if it hurt? He wiggled his finger, thrusting his hips, taunting her. It didn’t hurt now. She pressed against it, wanting more.

  “Do you want me to take you there?”

  She did. She didn’t want there to be anywhere he hadn’t been. Not with her.

  His teeth stroked over the thin skin of her neck. She was shaking, shuddering as if she were freezing. “Yes.” It came out long and high pitched.

  His laugh muffled against her neck. “That’s right. And you’ll sing for me as I do.” He thrust his hips again, his free hand coming up to knead her breasts, holding her steady for the violence of his thrusts.

  She couldn’t do anything but brace herself against the window and enjoy the knife’s edge of pleasure and violence as his sack smacked against the pulsing bundle of nerves, as his finger moved, stretching her, and his breaths in her ear drove her insane.

  She was vaguely aware of saying his name, begging for something as he drove them harder, pressing them toward a final, violent, shattering, piercing release that left her sagging forward. She’d probably have fallen over if he hadn’t grabbed her waist, holding her steady as his hips pumped erratically and he grunted and cursed out his own release, hot and thick within her.

  30

  A shiver in the guts.

  In the end it was a joke how easy it was for Ajax to hunt.

  The animals clearly hadn’t been exposed to man before. They eyed Feola and him suspiciously as they approached, scenting the air, gathering tighter in their herd, but ultimately they didn’t recognize danger until after he’d fired his first blast. And by then it was too late.

  The animal wasn’t very big. It probably weighed about half as much as
Feola. He’d selected a smaller one from the edge of the herd on purpose. It would be more than enough meat for them.

  Not knowing what attracted the birds, though, he was loath to bring the carcass back to the hotel.

  They built a fire right there in the plain, and he gutted and skinned it, cutting the meat into strips beneath the wide periwinkle bowl of sky. Not a cloud on the horizon.

  He tested the meat using the same reader he’d used to check the water and the fish they’d eaten. It was fine. Untainted.

  The shadows grew longer, and they packed up what meat they could.

  “We should get back.”

  Feola met his gaze with a coy smile. “Can it wait about ten minutes?”

  He felt it, he realized. The unease in his chest. She was ready for him again. And godsdamn, that made him happy. As did the warm weight of their Bond in his chest. The Bonding had been singularly perfect, like floating on a warm haze of bliss and love and deep connection. With one major exception.

  He was going to fucking kill Utto for what he did. And for what he let Rennie do.

  She pressed him down to sit on the ground, reaching with nimble fingers to unbuckle his belt. His cock responded instantly to her smile. It was ready for her as she closed her fingers around it. And—oh fuck—when she wrapped her lips around it, his head dropped back.

  He leaned back on one arm, stroking her orange-pink curls with his other, thrusting his hips against her hot, wet mouth. “As soon as we get back, I’ll return the favor,” he promised.

  She purred against him, a low hum that vibrated through his balls, making him groan.

  She sucked harder, bobbing her head up and down, setting up a steady, driving rhythm. He couldn’t help it. When she looked up at him, eyes wide and beseeching, he came hard down the back of her throat.

  He shuddered, pumping his hips, holding her in place. She smiled with her eyes, swallowing him down greedily.

  Oh, gods, life was sweet.

  He flopped onto his back, dropping his arm over his eyes to block out the sun, shaking as she continued sucking gently, massaging his balls.