“Here goes,” he said, turning it on. “This needs to be worth upsetting Cadence.”
The screen lit up. She scooched closer, her shoulder resting on his arm, their hips aligned, legs outstretched. She’d make things right with her prickly roommate but if they had no signal, this job would be over, and she wasn’t ready to be stymied by such a small thing as a missed phone call. She also wasn’t ready to give up her time working with Zeke.
“You can do it, baby,” he said, holding the phone so they’d both see the screen as the phone tried to find a network to attach to.
There was a stupidly tense couple of seconds where the handset scanned for coverage and they bent over its tiny green glow, faces almost pressed together, breathing synchronized. She’d never been so het up over such a small thing.
Then four little bars filled on the screen. Full signal.
“Fuck yeah.”
Zeke’s voice was oil over grit and gravel, and her belly bats ate it up like it was nectar, rolling around in ecstasy. He threw his arm around her. She lifted her face to find him looking at her with such heat all their urgency time shifted, the need to make the call slipped behind the naked hunger in his eyes.
She stopped breathing. Oh God. It wasn’t the phone call she was het up about. It was the idea that he looked as if he’d been waiting his whole life for her, that when he’d told Cadence Rosie was his life, he’d been Zeke telling that to Rory.
She touched his chest lightly, not sure what to say. Not sure what to feel, except turned inside out by the sudden soul-deep awareness of him.
He shook the moment off and dialed.
“May I take your order?” Tres said, in a perfect tip-me-big hostess voice, through the handsfree intercom. She followed up with, “About time. I was five minutes away from sending in a chopper.”
“No grace period?” asked Zeke.
“You have no grace full stop, you big jerk,” Tres came back with. “Status.”
“No specific findings to report.” Zeke said, looking to Rory for her confirming nod.
“Slackers. Next check-in,” Tres said.
“The jammer isn’t easy to get to. I don’t know if we’re going to be able to call back regularly,” Rory said.
“Find a way,” said Tres. “You have another month.”
“Two,” Zeke countered. “We’re safe. It’s strange but not volatile and we have no information we can use.”
“I don’t like it,” Tres responded.
Zeke’s arm tightened around her, but his voice was light with Tres. “The only reason we’re doing this at all is because of what happened to Cal and me the first time and this is not like that.”
“You both could’ve died the first time.”
“That was fourteen years ago. You were a little kid,” he deflected.
“And I remember how panicked Mom and Dad were.”
Rory remembered that too. She pressed her face into Zeke’s chest and spread her fingers over his heart to feel the comfort of its steady rhythm.
“Even if I could convince Cal, you think Mom and Dad would let me leave you both out there without checking in?”
“Tres, we’re perfectly safe,” she piped up.
“You’d better be,” Tres said. “Weapons?”
“Yes, but no evidence of them yet,” Zeke said with annoyance.
“Time on the call, two minutes,” Rory said softly. The quicker they were, the less chance they had of the call being noticed if someone was looking for it.
“Hawaii is still going strong, right?” Zeke asked.
“Surf is still up as far as I know,” Tres said.
“Good. Final offer. Six weeks, but you’ll hear from us earlier if possible.”
“You had better not be starving, injured or dead in the meantime,” Tres grumbled and disconnected.
Before Rory could sit back and give Zeke space, win herself some thinking time, he nudged the top of her head with his chin. “Tell me what happened with Orrin.”
She looked up at him, brushed a fall of hair off his forehead. “You’re exhausted and starving, judging by the rumble in your gut. It can wait.” Better to wait until she got some distance from him.
“And I stink.” He opened and closed his hand, his palm and knuckles all torn up. “My blisters have blisters.” Whatever had been going on before the call, it’d pass.
“Poor darling. I’ll fill you in tomorrow.” She should move, put some actual space between them. Like never before, this proximity to him felt heady, perilous.
“We’re alone and I don’t have to climb, tote, nail or saw anything, and I’ve fucking missed you, Aurora Rae. Fill me in now.”
It was the Aurora Rae that did it, said in that gravely tone, heavy with feeling. She rested her head on his shoulder and told him about her boring days and event-filled nights, about the meal delivery. About Orrin’s intentions. He listened silently, commenting through the weight of his arm, the steadiness of his breathing, the fingers he rested on her hip, and his full attention.
“That’s not all of it,” he said when she was finished.
It was everything she could put words to. He didn’t need to know how confused she was right now. How much she wanted to turn her face up to his and kiss his lips for the sheer relief of having him here, for the milestone of the phone call, and the ridiculous way she’d worried about him this week. And that other set of feelings she was having trouble identifying but made her think about her hot skin sliding on his.
“The plan was to lay low with Orrin,” he said.
“Until it wasn’t.”
“I don’t like the idea of you taking him on while I’m not around.”
She tapped his chest. “Deal with it, partner.”
He moved to release her, taking his arm away. “Aurora Rae, I’m serious.”
“I’m being careful. Nothing bad happened,” she said.
“But it could.”
And suddenly they were arguing.
He reached out to grab her arm. She shifted to stop him touching her. “This is not my first rodeo.”
He got to his feet. “Yes, it is. This isn’t like charming billionaires in ballrooms. Those guys still acknowledge there are rules for civil behavior even if they flaunt them. Orrin makes the rules here and he’ll make them expediently to suit himself and no one is going to question him.”
She stayed on the floor. “You don’t think I’m patently aware of that? His current ruling is that only you, Macy and Cadence voluntarily speak to me. I have to stand in the corner like a naughty child all day until it breaks me.”
Zeke was pacing, dragging a hand through his hair. His energy was all jerky movements and sudden direction changes. She didn’t want to fight with him, but he didn’t get to question her skill or commitment. She had that covered all by herself.
“I don’t think you recognize how dangerous Orrin is,” Zeke said.
“You just got through convincing Tres we were safe. You don’t think I can handle myself. You don’t think I’ve got the goods for this.”
He groaned and went to a crouch, eyeing her from the other side of the room. “That’s not what I’m saying.”
“Then what?” She could feel him watching her. It was an irritating electric current zinging over her skin. “I don’t know why we’re fighting. We wouldn’t have a call signal, and we’d be on our way out of here if I hadn’t acted, and you know it.”
“Orrin has bent this whole place to his will to isolate you. He has no interest in charming you into his bed. He wants you terrorized into it.”
“He is not the first to try that with me.”
“This is different. We always work in pairs for a reason. Cal always had eyes on you and you had them on him. I can’t help but worry about you when I can’t see you, hear you. Anything could happen to you here.”
Oh. He wasn’t doubting her. Her hackles smoothed. They didn’t have a problem here. Stick together. “You’re exhausted, Zeke.” She sighed. She’d had
the same worry about him all week. “It won’t look so bad in the morning.”
“Tomorrow there’s a bonding ceremony.”
She frowned. Unlike the games night, she’d heard no chatter about it. Her isolation was more complete than she’d known. “They won’t expect us to bond.”
He shook his head. “They expect me to. Everyone knows Orrin has spoken for you. We need to be prepared.”
“You should fake bond with Cadence. It will take the pressure off both of you and after the tree, it will be believable. Let people see you kiss, that should be enough.”
Zeke was back upright, his hands to his hair. “I don’t want to kiss Cadence and she doesn’t want to kiss me. She thinks I made a sport of embarrassing her.”
“I can fix that. I’ll talk to her.”
He shifted about restlessly. “You can’t fix things for me.”
“You’re hungry and—”
He moved abruptly, going to his knees in front of her. “I only want to kiss you.”
Oh God. She needed no convincing. He looked wretched, his shoulders slumped, his mouth drawn into a fierce line and his breathing quickened. “Yeah, I got that.”
“You know why I can’t.”
“I used to know.” The words caught, making her throat get tight. “It used to be so clear what you and I were to each other. I’m confused about us.”
He dragged his fingers through his hair. “It’s not real. It’s this place.”
She put her hand to her chest, her own breathing was ragged. “It's real enough.” It was vivid in her body, in the liquid want coursing through her, heating her skin, making her face get hot.
He looked away, closing his eyes. “We’re not together and we’re working.”
Yes. This was a bad idea. But it was the only thing in the world that mattered to her. Kissing Zeke. Taking his face in her hands and exchanging his breath for hers. She got to her knees and crawled to close the space between them. It simply couldn’t happen. It was a distraction. Dangerous and wrong for them. “We’re family.”
“You were in love with Cal.”
Zeke wouldn’t look at her, his head bowed, much as she knelt before him and ached for him to. “I still love Cal. I always will, but I’m not in love with him anymore. And he never was with me. You know that.”
“I can't kiss you, Aurora Rae.”
He said it like it was a rule he had to obey. They’d talk each other down. That was the right thing to do. “No, you can’t. We can’t want this. Not even for the comfort of it.”
She lied. She lied. If she thought this was about comfort she wouldn’t be shaking from the effort of not touching him.
He lifted his head and pinned her with a look that stripped all her excuses and defenses away, his face carved by shadows and his eyes so dark they were lie assassins. “I might not survive the comfort of you.”
It boiled over inside of her, bats wings and desire, thrill and risk and want. A smarter person would back away from this edge. She put her hands on his wonderful face and dove into the chasm of him.
Chapter Seventeen
God. Fuck. Zeke’s world exploded, shattered into a zillion pieces, and took the core of him with it. He was stardust, space trash. He was kissing Aurora Rae Archer. Softly, slowly, as carefully as he knew how, for the unadulterated erotic privilege of it.
Her hands started on his face as if she was scared he’d disappear. He should’ve gotten the fuck out of this cabin, but greedy bastard that he was, he’d reached for her and now he held her, his sun—the singular point he’d lazily orbited his whole life—tight enough to make her gasp; to make him tremble.
This was a cataclysm, and he’d be sucked into a black hole of oblivion if he let this go on, but magnetic forces he couldn’t name and would never understand made her wrap her arms and legs around him and bite his lip.
That bite, sharp, stinging; the way she pulled on his bottom lip and pressed on his cock; the grind she set up. It made his head spin. There’s no up or down in space, no way to tell which way you’re headed and nothing to hold you down. He anchored all of himself in the kiss, in the angle of their faces and the silk of her skin, the full, plump draw of her lips and the taste of her mouth. He couldn’t contain all of her, capture enough of her light and warmth, her life-giving force. The risk of her was more than any big wave surfed, mountain climbed, parachute jump. Rory was his endgame and he didn’t know how to pull up, drift through and avoid the insanity.
He was halfway across the room, trying to stop his brain leaking out of his eyes and she was sprawled on her ass before he knew what he’d done.
“We can’t do that.”
“Zeke.” His one-syllable name rattled on her breath, drawn out with longing that made him bend forward and cover his head with his arms. He could not make sense of this. It was an illusion. Some kind of lust bends brought on by deep immersion in this off-kilter world. It was a way of grasping the familiar when everything was shifting and uncertain.
“We can’t. We fucking can’t.”
“You want this as much as I do.”
He straightened up and paced the room. Keep moving, keep away from her, don’t look at her. If you look at her, you asshole, you are lost forever. “We can get ourselves killed this way.”
She knew that was the truth. He heard her stand. “I’m sorry,” she said, voice so small and fragile he couldn’t not turn to her. He’d knocked her down. He’d made her sorry. Fuck, she was beautiful, standing there her hair loose from its band. He’d done that, pulled it out so he could have its inky length in his fingers. Her face was swathed in moonlight and her eyes glittered, seeing what in him after this? Misguided friend, enemy, betrayer.
Ticking fucking time bomb.
“I didn’t mean to upset you,” she said.
Upset him? She thought he was angry with her.
She reached for the door. “I thought...I thought you wanted that as much as I did.”
He was there to stop her leaving, to prove her wrong. To lift her, spin her, put her back against the cabin wall and kiss her hard enough to brand the truth into her.
He’d wanted her since he understood what desire was. Everything he was as an adult, as a lover, came from loving Rory and not being able to show it, for pride, for fear, for knowledge that he had never been her choice. All of that on top of the belief that Cal was the better man for her.
But he was her choice now and that meant everything.
“Aurora.” Her name thundered through him and spilled out in a frenzy of touch that overloaded his senses. Her face, her neck, her throat, the inside of her wrist, the crook of her elbow. The sweep of her rib cage, the weight of her breast. His hands and his lips rejoiced in her but under his skin his body shook like his bones might disconnect. His eyes watered, and his heartbeat tried to choke him. He held Rory in his arms and it wasn’t fantasy.
“Slow down, slow down. I’m here. I’m not leaving.”
She whispered against his lips and through his lust-drugged haze he heard her in the deepest recesses of his brain where this was impossible, only a dream on its way to a nightmare.
He dropped his face into the crook of her neck, and as she raked her fingers through his hair, his heartbeat slowed, his breathing settled, his greed grew from the small, tamped down, manageable force he lived with every day to an immense beast he had no desire to contain.
“Tell me you want this,” he said, lifting his head to see the miracle.
She put her finger to his cheekbone, traced it down his face over his scruff to his lips where he tasted salt. “I want this so bad, I’m burning up.”
“It’s dangerous.”
She kissed the tear track on his face, muttered, “Unprofessional,” and slanted her lips possessively over his.
Between softer, less frenzied kisses he said, “Shocking.”
And she said, “Inevitable.”
That was the right of it. Inevitable because of who they were to each other, where they we
re. He wasn’t strong enough to fight it even though the wrongness of it was a pixelated prism at the edge of his vision, calling for his attention. He forced it out by filling his sight with her. Kiss reddened lips and wild tangle of hair, eyes diamond bright, seeing everything he was.
If there was a new life protected from the raw injustices of the world, it was in the curve of Rory’s cheek and the fine arch of her brows. It was in the hands that gripped his arms and her wrecked little murmurs.
He carried her from the door to the kitchen table where he hooked a chair and sat with her straddling his lap. He would kiss her, hold her till his heart gave out from the beauty of it and nothing would matter because she was the last mountain he’d ever climb, the largest wave he’d ever surf.
Where he’d been frenzied, now he was easier, making his lips gentler and his hands softer, touching her places never meant for him, in ways he never had. It was all the more exciting for what it did to her. She shivered and twitched, pushing into his hands and using her own to explore his body.
Time slowed, fell away, the world ended, there was only this sinking into the forbidden pleasure of her and being irrevocably changed by it. And they were both still completely dressed. If he had her naked, if he could lick the private parts of her, he would be reborn.
When she pulled at his shirt and put her lips to his collar bone he remembered how filthy he was, that his hands where grimy and rough, his nails blackened, his face scratchy, body too long unwashed and not fit for her.
A hand to her shoulder, he separated them.
“No,” she said. “Don’t make me stop.”
“Only till I can get clean.”
She dug her fingers into his arm. “I’m scared to let you go.”
“You’re never scared.”
“I didn’t know there was this to lose.”
He suspended time again with another decade of kissing her until they were both overheated and frantic.
She groaned when he pulled away again. The top of her head dropping to his chest. “I can’t stand. You’ve made my legs into noodles.”
The Mysterious Stranger (The Confidence Game Book 3) Page 15