The Hero and the Hacktivist

by Pippa Grant

  The Ass—which isn’t a bad nickname, I swear, I like asses—smells like he had street hot dogs for lunch, except somehow the smell on him makes me think of hot dogs that are made of ground bear meat if it was a bear he wrestled to death after it tried to eat his ice cream while he was camping, and he’s secretly a chef who put the right seasonings in the bear dog to make it taste like some kind of exotic delicacy that causes orgasms when it hits your tongue.

  I can’t exactly explain it. Let’s just go with he smells good. That’s easier.

  “You want to head back to my place and get some bang on?” I ask him.

  Loudly.

  And that I can explain.

  My friends think I’m an obnoxious hornball. I have a reputation to uphold.

  Rhett slides me a contemplative glance.

  I put a hand on his thigh.

  He doesn’t jerk back. Like maybe that wasn’t just a who-can-outlast-the-other game with him hitting on me. Maybe he is interested.

  Parker reaches around me and yanks on his ear. “Quit looking at my friend like that. You’re so gross.”

  “You’re the one who married a librarian.”

  He totally has a point.

  Not that I wouldn’t have banged Knox when he was single. He did strip his way through college, and he has a tat or two of his own, and I am good at getting myself turned on, even if that nice rotund pirate dude had a SEAL’s face in last night’s finger session, so even the unicorn blanket obsession wouldn’t have bothered me.

  “You eat bugs,” Parker points out to her brother.

  “Yeah?” Rhett replies.

  “I once licked a live chicken,” I offer.

  I totally didn’t, but it makes me sound cool.

  “Ugh, me too.” Sia shoves Chase. “Not by choice.”

  “Your brothers were shitheads as kids,” he replies with a grin.

  “That was your fault.”

  “Impossible.”

  They glare at each other a minute, then start tongue wrestling, which is my usual cue to go.

  They have freakier sex than I pretend to.

  I put my boobs right in Rhett’s face—not difficult, considering our height difference and the fact that he’s sitting down and I’m standing up—and give an exaggerated yawn-and-stretch. I won’t go to bed until like 4 AM, but they don’t know that. “Time to hit the sack.”

  Rhett stares at my boobs a minute before lifting his sharp eyes to mine. “Want me to call you a cab?”

  Am I totally lame if I admit I want him to check my place out, because I don’t actually want to die and the idea of going home is mildly freaky? “Depends. Do you call a cab the normal way, or do you go all Goat Man to get one?”

  “Goat Man?” murmurs go around the table.

  “Yeah, you bleat like a goat and try to eat the door handles. Whichever one you can open with your teeth, that’s the one you take.”

  I’m making this up as I go.

  “I freaking love you,” Willow tells me.

  Because she clearly has no taste. An idea which is reinforced by the fact that she’s snuggled up with Dax Gallagher.

  Okay, fine. Dax is hot. It’s his voice. And his body. And the way he’s gone full-on overprotective with Willow, and will basically never say no to her for anything, which is exactly what Willow deserves, because she never asks for anything.

  “Oh my god, it’s Dax Gallagher!” someone shrieks at the next table.

  All four of Parkers brothers stand up and growl.

  “Get your eyes checked,” Rhett growls.

  “Oh my god, it’s Brooks Elliott!” someone else shrieks.

  Rhett punches Brooks in the arm. “Didn’t I tell you to sit your ass down?”

  “No.”

  “Then you weren’t listening right.”

  “He sucks!” someone else yells.

  “Whoa,” the least hot brother says.

  “The fuck they say,” the second hottest brother protests.

  The Ass of Glory has leapt onto the table and is scanning the bar like he’s considering a good beatdown.

  “There’s nothing to see here,” he says in this authoritative, I’ll rip your throat out if you contradict me sort of way, and hello, nipples, you’re easy tonight.

  The manager starts to head our way, but everyone in the entire juice bar goes back to minding their own business.

  That was weird.

  And fucking hot.

  Rhett jumps back down. He points at Dax, then Brooks. “We’re leaving. Up. Now. March. Or you’re on your own.”

  Somehow I get caught up in the shuffle, which is weirdly okay with me, because I get a cheap feel or two of the Ass of Glory’s other glorious parts—dude has a wicked solid chest, and then there’s the arm porn again, and I’m pretty sure his flagpole’s swinging at half-mast—at least—while he marches us all out of the juice bar.

  Parker’s two not-famous, not-badass brothers are with us, doing a good impersonation of security. Knox and Chase aren’t half-bad either, and it honestly surprises me that Chase doesn’t get recognized more often.

  Or maybe the paparazzi do have some taste and get tired of the idea of just posting pictures of the rags-to-riches billionaire always sucking face with his childhood nemesis.

  Soon we’re all rolling out of the elevator on the ground level, and I should call a cab before I double back and get my Hummer.

  Just slip away while everyone’s distracted.

  A finger hooks in the back of my shirt. “Where you going, Spikes?” the Ass of Glory mutters. “Your car’s here.”

  “Stalker much?”

  “Liar much?”

  “The truth’s boring.”

  “You’re in trouble, aren’t you?”

  The hairs on the back of my hairs stand up, and if you don’t think that’s possible, you’ve never had a SEAL breathing down your neck, and not in the kinky fun sexual way. “Yeah, baby. I’m trouble.”

  I’m suddenly being hustled into a closet that should’ve been locked.

  Wait.

  This isn’t a closet.

  It’s a server room. All those blue glowing lights flickering on control panels. It’s like he’s turning me on without even trying.

  “That door should’ve been locked,” I say, because otherwise I might ask him to put his one in my zero and do me like a motherboard—what? Binary’s hot—which isn’t unappealing, except for my rule about never banging the same guy twice.

  “It was,” he says, “and now it’s not. What are you into?”

  “Sometimes role-playing, sometimes public fornication. Usually anything that’ll get me to the big O.”

  Fuck rules. If they’re going to find my body squished into a supermodel-sized leg warmer, I might as well go out with a bang.

  Also, if I were really worried about my life being in danger, I’d be making plans to go visit my brother. Note I’m in a server closet asking my friend’s brother to bang me instead.

  Finding me online is only one step in locating me in real life, and the IP address I use on those servers—after rerouting my signal halfway across China, the Ukraine, New Mexico, and Senegal—has an actual location listed on the moon.

  “You’re twisted,” he says.

  “Fuckin’ right.” I bend over and stick my head through my legs until I’m staring up at him behind my own ass. “Bet you’ve never seen a girl do this in person. And you want to spank me now, don’t you?”

  His eyes don’t glaze over with lust, but they do keep snapping between my ass and my face. The one time I did this during band practice, Willow kept shrieking and covering her eyes, Parker kept yelping for me to stand up straight, and Sia started to take a picture, then threw her phone away and muttered something about a photo being worthless for blackmail against someone with as little shame as I had.

  I freaking love those women.

  They’re fun.

  “Ever give a blow job like that?” he asks.

  I contemplate the qu
estion for half a second, then stand back up straight. All the blood drains from my head, the room tilts back and forth all wonky, and I latch onto the steel beam also known as his forearm for support while the room spins back into focus.

  “Head rush,” I tell him with a grin. “You should try it.”

  The black dots clear out of my vision, and there’s only one of him again.

  He’s closer than I thought he was.

  He’s also not grinning back. And I can’t tell if that look is an I want to shake you for ignoring my questions look, or if it’s a bend over again with your pants off and let’s see where this goes look.

  Maybe both.

  I look down at my hand, gripping the end of a mermaid’s tail on his arm. Whoever did his tattoo made all the scales in the shape of upside-down hearts.

  Interesting.

  “I have a phoenix on my ribs,” I blurt.

  He backs me against the door.

  I let him, because he still smells like exotic bear hot dog, and if I’m in danger of dying, I wouldn’t mind doing the triple dick again.

  Okay, okay. Fine.

  I’m really intrigued by a guy who’s not freaked out by my normal tactics, and who still keeps coming back for more. All this love in the air—Sia, Parker, Willow, my doorman, the guy who owns the falafel shop across the street, my tattoo artist—it’s everywhere.

  And I’m getting too old to keep bouncing around the city looking for new singles groups. Pretty soon I’ll be hanging with the widows and widowers. Knox’s granny could be my new BFF, except I’m pretty sure she’s getting it on with that guy who smelled like fish that she brought to book club a few weeks back. She said he was the programs coordinator at her senior center, but I think he was really coordinating her program, if you know what I mean.

  “Do I even want to know what’s going on in your brain?” he asks while he lowers his face to my level, arms braced over my head against the door.

  “It’s a terrifying place. Not suitable for SEALs under sixty.”

  “Then you probably shouldn’t spend a lot of time there either.”

  His irises have these intriguing green flecks in them, and they’re ringed in gold, which is super disconcerting, mostly because I’m close enough to notice the nuances in his eyes.

  Also, he’s probably not wrong about my brain. “You’re just jealous you’re not as horny as I am,” I tell him.

  He snorts derisively. “You’re not horny.”

  “Yeah? How’s this for horny?” I thrust my hips, banging them into nothing but the air, because he’s apparently a face crowder, not a body crowder, and I can’t thrust my hips forward enough to hit his.

  And if I were really horny, I’d be disappointed.

  Instead, I’m conflicted. Because Rhett might actually be a nice guy, despite his weird obsession with me.

  “Do you need help?” he asks.

  “Most people think so.”

  He doesn’t blink. Or laugh. Or nod vehemently in agreement.

  I suddenly feel naked. In the not-good way. “Is this some kinky role-playing foreplay where you pretend to be a hot military dude who’s going to save me from a bad dude obsessed with making me the next featured girl in his harem?”

  “Sure. Let’s go with that.” His left eye twitches. His lashes aren’t long, but they’re not short either. They’re mostly just manly. “Let’s go check your truck for explosive devices.”

  “Oh, baby, that’s so sexy.” I drape my arms around his neck, which is also more like a tree trunk than an actual neck, and since my hands are already there, I drag my fingers over the short, stiff hairs at the back of his head.

  His pupils dilate, and his nostrils flare like my touch is turning him on.

  “Why do you have moving boxes in your truck?” he asks while his gaze drifts to my mouth.

  Him looking at my lips is making my muff hot and tingly. “How do I know I can trust you?” I say in a breathy voice that’s supposed to sound like a terrified woman in danger.

  “You don’t.” A half-smirk lifts his firm lips, and there goes another shot of caffeinated lust warming up my lady oven.

  Somebody should tell the building that their control room is overheating.

  Or maybe that’s just me.

  He shifts his stance and traces a finger down my face, my neck, over my shoulder, and up my arm.

  I fight the heady shivers every step of the way, and I’m parting my legs without even realizing it.

  Not because I’m as easy as I pretend to be. Although, I was pretty fucking easy at Parker’s wedding. But more because I just have to.

  “You like that?” he breathes.

  “Yes,” I confess.

  “Want more?”

  “Maybe from your short brother. He looks like he knows what to do with his stubby fingers.” He doesn’t have a short brother, and none of them have stubby fingers.

  Rhett strokes back up my arm, then lets his fingers drift down my ribs. “Why do you have moving boxes in your truck, Eloise?”

  I arch into his touch and twist my body, hoping he’ll take the hint to go lower and more to the center.

  I shouldn’t be doing this, but then, neither should he, yet here we are.

  “To see if you’d spy on me and ask why there are moving boxes in my—oh, fuck, yeah.”

  He’s toying with the waistband on my pants now, dipping a finger under the low-slung poly-cotton blend to stroke my hip.

  “Are you moving?” he breathes.

  I know what he’s doing. Interrogation by seduction. I’ve seen this in movies and really bad porn.

  This is not really bad porn. It’s actually really fucking unreal.

  “Eloise?” His callused finger goes lower, and I arch shamelessly into his touch. “Tell me the truth.”

  “Maybe,” I gasp.

  He works my pants lower, his fingers getting closer to the magic button between my legs. “You don’t know?”

  “The truth is buried deep,” I say. “So deep.”

  “You’re a bad, bad girl,” he mutters.

  “So, so bad,” I agree, even though I don’t think that was a compliment or role-playing dirty talk.

  His sandpaper cheek brushes mine while he leans close to my ear. “I’ll stroke your pussy if you tell me you need my help.”

  He’s so close. So close. I’m squeezing my eyes shut and offering him a free pass to the merry-go-round currently throbbing in my pants. “Even if it’s a lie?”

  “Is it a lie?”

  He brushes my clit, and I almost spontaneously combust. “No.”

  Fuck. Did I just—oh, holy mother of cream, he’s flicking my clit now, my pants are falling down my thighs, and he’s gliding a finger down my seam, parting me, nipping at my ear with his teeth.

  “Is it bad?” he asks, his voice thick and husky and urgent.

  I purse my lips, squeeze my eyes shut, and spread my legs wider. I pump my hips in time with his finger teasing my entrance. My pulse is pounding in my nipples, and my vag is beating out a drumbeat too.

  “Do you need a fucking hero?” he growls in my ear.

  I whimper.

  He gives me an inch of finger, slipping it up there and pulling it back out just as quick. “Do you, Eloise? Do you need help?”

  “Mm-hmm,” I whimper through clenched lips.

  “Help getting off? Or with more?”

  He pushes two fingers in, spreading me and going only a wee bit deeper. “More,” I moan, shamelessly humping his hand. “More.”

  “Truth first, Spikes.” He hits my button and swirls a finger around my opening. Fuck. Guys don’t normally play with me. They bend me over, hammer it in, I get me off, I get him off, and we go our separate ways.

  Rhett’s all up in my playground, trying out every piece of equipment in the rain.

  He dips three fingers in, wiggling them around, stroking my insides, building that hot, thick, throbbing dam that’s going to—

  Motherfucker.

&n
bsp; I moan as his fingers disappear again.

  “Do you need a hero?” he growls.

  “Yes! Yes, okay? I fucked up and I don’t know if I should go home!”

  And oh god yes, there are his fingers again, thrusting deep inside me, so deep, in and out, stretching me wide, while he bites my neck and growls an order for me to come for me, you sexy animal, and I’m riding his fingers like I’m galloping across the desert in search of water, pumping my hips into his hand, gripping his ears until the earth splits in two and my knees give out and everything inside me clenches so hard it goes inside out.

  His fingers are buried so deep, and he’s still crooking them, stroking me while my pussy tries to cut off circulation to his digits, because fuck, I can’t stop.

  I can’t stop coming.

  The light behind my eyelids is a glorious blue-black, Rhett’s sandpaper skin on my neck is electrifying, and my cooch is still spasming like it’s been hit with a bug zapper, except way better, because every orgasm I’ve had in my entire life has been a baby orgasm, whereas this one is a full-grown beast of an orgasm that could probably tear a small car in two.

  And he did it with his fingers.

  God only knows what could happen if I let his mouth loose on Puss McGroodle down there.

  Holy hell.

  He’s like the climax whisperer.

  It’s not until I’m coming down that I realize two things.

  One, I didn’t fantasize about my fantasy pirate lover at all to get my engines firing.

  And two, I think I told Rhett I’m in trouble.

  Whoops.

  10

  Rhett

  A woman will say anything you want her to say if she’s chasing the big O, so I still don’t know if it’s just my imagination, or if Eloise has actually gotten herself into something. What I get for thinking with my dick.

  So after I preen some about her post-orgasm jellyfish impersonation, help her get her pants back up, and slap her on the ass—“Good game, kid.”—I walk her to her beast and give her a half-hearted salute.

  “See you ‘round, Spikes.”

  Her nose twitches like she’s a baby bunny smelling a bad batch of lettuce. She flips me off, and a minute later, she’s roaring out of the parking garage.