Heart of Steel

by Meljean Brook

  He doused the light at the top of the tower, and they waited atop the wall. Fresh snow covered the flying machine in the courtyard, making it difficult to see even with her eyes. Terbish and Nergüi had agreed to their request to meet the airship alone; knowing that she and Archimedes had been friendly with two members of the Horde might raise suspicions against them, and she didn’t want to add to the crew’s tension.

  Farther up the valley, Ceres approached under full sail, her deck lanterns dark. Apparently they hadn’t mutinied yet.

  And Archimedes had nothing to show for this expedition thus far.

  “Are you worried because there was nothing to find?” she wondered.

  He shook his head. She couldn’t read him—only that something was wrong.

  “Have I already broken your heart?” She hoped not. She hoped she never did. She hoped that if he loved her, that he would go on, content to love her.

  “Not yet.” His gaze softened. He stroked his hand down her cheek, then suddenly cupped her jaw in both hands and his head fell, hovering, hovering just above her mouth. His ragged breath across her lips seemed to echo the shaking of her body.

  Her heart pounded. “Kiss me.”

  “Kiss me,” he said.

  Damn him. Why did he never follow orders? “I can’t. But I want to finish this, and I need you in my bed. How can your longing not be great enough, when I want you so much without love? When will you love me, long for me enough to kiss me?”

  “When will you?”

  Her chest ached suddenly, painful, deep. “That was not part of this. You know I cannot.”

  “I don’t know that anymore. Ah, God. And that makes the pain worse. If you can love me but won’t . . .”

  Torment filled his eyes, his voice. He clutched her against his lean body, face buried in her hair. She kissed his neck, jaw, wrapped her arms around his shoulders, holding him tight.

  And he said softly against her ear, “I saw gliders that night.”

  “What?” She drew back, looked up into his face. “What night?”

  “Just after I left you on Lady Corsair, while I was hiding from Nasrin behind the crates. I thought they were acrobats, practicing—as they sometimes do late.”

  “So?” They did practice late.

  He looked to the batwing gliders that Bigor had lent. “There were four of them.”

  Her stomach suddenly seemed filled with hot coals. He thought Bigor and his men had boarded her lady? But that was exactly the type of work they did in the war. Quiet, quick, and then erase the evidence.

  She remembered Bigor’s voice. Doing things I’d never want my wife and children to know. Had that been an apology? An explanation? An excuse?

  Just something said from one person who’d lost their brother to someone who’d lost their crew?

  “How can we know?” she whispered. “What happens if we ask them?”

  “I think they could very easily kill us.”

  “Not easily.”

  “No—the decision would be easy for them.”

  And so it would be. They didn’t leave evidence. “Who hired them before al-Amazigh did? Does Hassan know who recommended them, what contact they used? You can’t find a team like that in a tavern.”

  He nodded. “We’ll ask him.”

  “Yes.” By the lady, she could not imagine . . . And now she was sorry she’d saved any of them from the zombies.

  No. She was still glad she’d saved three of them. Not just because they might be innocent.

  But she’d rather kill them with full knowledge if they weren’t.

  Suspicion was like a toothed saw through her heart, rasping away. Ceres came in over the wall, dropped the rope ladder. Yasmeen reached for it, then glanced back, over the dark courtyard.

  “I think I will come back in five years, just to see whether it flies.”

  “And I will come with you.”

  Together? She held his gaze long enough to say it, but didn’t say it aloud. Turning away, she started up the ladder.

  No sign of Bigor and his marines on deck—just Captain Guillouet. Definitely no mutiny, then, but it had been a rough few days for some. Hassan stood next to the captain, face slightly pale, weary. “Did you find anything? Do we need to lower the cargo lift?”

  Archimedes came up behind her. “Those at the Horde outpost must have taken everything. There’s nothing left.”

  The old man gave a resounding sigh and nodded. “We will go south, then. It will be warmer, if nothing else.” He looked to Captain Guillouet. “We go to Italy.”

  The captain moved off to give the necessary orders, and Yasmeen was left, feeling more stupid than she’d ever felt. It was warmer on the boot of the Italian peninsula, though not significantly at this time of year and on an airship. Hassan might feel better.

  But he shouldn’t have been feeling poorly at all. Older men and women felt their age, just as Nergüi did . . . unless they were infected with nanoagents. Except for a fever now and again as the nanoagents fought off severe sickness or attempted to heal a badly injured body, the infected were almost always healthy. Thousands of people in England had lived their lives without so much as a sniffle, and Yasmeen would have wagered anything that the same was true in Morocco.

  Yet if it was poison, no one else was suffering from it. The other men who’d been eating at the captain’s table showed no sign of sickness . . . and they would have exhibited symptoms faster, because they weren’t infected. But Hassan consumed one thing that no one else did.

  “Hassan,” she said quietly. “No more tea. Drinking nothing is better than that.”

  He frowned, and then understanding came over his features. “Who?”

  “We will speak in your—”

  Near the rail behind her, one of the crew called out, “Zombie on the tower wall, Captain! May I fire?”

  Her breath caught. There were no zombies in the fortress. Oh, no.

  “No!” Yasmeen said sharply. “Hold your fire.”

  Quiet fell over the ship. Guillouet stared at her, face darkening in fury.

  Oh, by the lady. She had not even thought—hadn’t checked herself. Opening her mouth was the hardest damn thing she’d ever done. “My apologies, Captain, but—”

  “You’re giving orders on my ship? Fire, Mr. Simon.”

  Yasmeen turned, but Archimedes had already whipped around. His foot struck the back of Simon’s knee as he pulled the trigger. The gun bucked upward, bullet whizzing past the envelope.

  Yasmeen faced Guillouet again, hands outspread to placate. “Please understand, Captain. It’s not a zombie. It’s a boy.”

  Shock registered on his features. “A boy?”

  “From the outpost.”

  “From the Horde?” Shock became distaste. “And yet you stopped my man from shooting it.”

  It? Rage swept through her. Archimedes tackled her from behind, wrapped his arms around her stomach, pinning her hands to her sides. Quickly, he said, “Apologies, Captain. I’m sure this is only a misunderstanding.”

  “Captain,” Hassan said easily. “The shot might have alerted the outpost.”

  A shout came from the starboard side. “They’re lighting up across the valley, Captain!”

  “Fire the engines!” Guillouet called out, and stepped forward. “Mr. Fox. You will keep your wife in her place and her mouth closed or I will do it for you.”

  Yasmeen felt Archimedes’ nod.

  “She’s to be confined to your cabin. She is not to speak to any man aboard this ship. When her meals are brought to her, she will face away from the door so that my men do not even look upon her.”

  “I’ll beat her, too,” Archimedes said.

  Guillouet was not amused. “Frankly, Mr. Fox, it would not be amiss.”

  “A war machine, Captain!” The shout sent a hail of responding cries through the crew, panic as sails were drawn in, orders yelled down brass tubes. “They’ve lit it up! One of the tentacle machines that rip airships from the sky!” />
  The captain gave a final look to Yasmeen. “Get her below.”

  Then he was off, and over the starboard side Yasmeen caught a glimpse of the gigantic machine, body rising like a cone as high as the citadel, illuminated by the tall acetylene lamps that lit the outpost walls.

  “Should we tell them that there aren’t any soldiers to man it?” Archimedes said against her ear, and without waiting for her to answer, “No, I don’t think so, either.”

  Still holding in her fury, Yasmeen shook her head—and walked quietly to the ladder while the crew panicked around them.

  Keep your wife in her place.

  It echoed in Yasmeen’s head until she couldn’t shake the rage. Not at Archimedes—she knew it wasn’t at him. But as soon as they entered their cabin, she couldn’t keep herself from rounding on him with a snarl. “You stopped me!”

  His eyes were suddenly bright, hard emerald. “And you let me! I couldn’t have held you back if you hadn’t allowed it—and that couldn’t have ended until one of you was dead.”

  “It would have been him!”

  “I know.”

  Her teeth clenched. That wasn’t enough. She screamed, whipped toward the bunk. The upper mattress shredded to pieces under her claws. It still wasn’t enough. She whirled back to Archimedes, who watched her with lifted brows.

  “Now we both have to sleep on yours.”

  Yes. That would be enough.

  “Come on,” she said, chest heaving. “Now. No more nonsense about kissing. I want to be fucked.”

  His gaze flattened at nonsense. “Not like this, Yasmeen.”

  “This is how I want it. Angry, hard, rough. If you can’t do it, I’ll find someone else. On a ship full of men, it’ll be no problem.”

  His jaw hardened. “You will not.”

  “Why? Will it hurt you? Oh, tenderhearted Archimedes Fox.” Mouth curling into a sneer, she put her face to his. “You say you want to feel everything. Do you want to feel what it’s like to watch me fuck someone else?”

  “Do it, then,” he said through clenched teeth. “Do it.”

  Idiot. Did he think he was calling her bluff? She didn’t want anyone else, but she’d fucked without caring about the man she was with before. Did he truly think she couldn’t do it again? Just bodies fucking, it didn’t matter.

  And she could end all of this now, she realized. This nonsense about falling in love with her, about longing and waiting to break his heart. She could do it now, and no matter what else Archimedes was, no matter what foolish ideas he had about feeling everything, she knew he wouldn’t keep on this path after she went to someone else. Hell, she wouldn’t even have to fuck anyone to do it. She could leave, wait, make him think she had. She’d break his heart, and that would be the end of it. He wouldn’t try to win her love or even a kiss after that.

  Two steps carried her to the cabin door. She opened it.

  And like a fool, looked back.

  Archimedes wasn’t angry anymore. His face had whitened, skin taut with shock and hurt, eyes bleak as if he were already watching her with another man. Pain slashed across her chest. She’d done that. She’d deliberately done that to him, hacking away at the bond that had formed between them. And if she stepped out of the cabin, she’d break it. Maybe she already had.

  That wasn’t what she wanted. That was not what she needed. Bodies fucking didn’t matter . . . and Archimedes Fox did.

  Yasmeen closed the door. “I can’t,” she said. “I’m confined.”

  She smiled, and his laugh sounded, short with disbelief and relief. She went to him, slipped her arms around his waist. His hands were shaking as he pushed them into her hair, but so was she. She recalled his face as she’d opened the door. His pain. Tears started to her eyes, the ache growing inside her chest, as if it were about to rip apart.

  Closing her eyes, she pressed her face into his neck. “Lady Lynx also does some very stupid things.”

  “I won’t tell Zenobia,” he said, his voice rough. “And I can’t seem to get enough, either.”

  “Then take more,” she said. “Please.”

  Still holding her against him, he backed to the bunk. Her fingers found the buckles of his shoulder harness. He shrugged it off, then reached for her heavy coat. Her hat. She unfastened the leather guard around his neck. The knives at her thighs. His holsters. The guns at her belt. She began to laugh when she started on the guards at his forearms at the same time he dropped to his knee, fingers searching out the fastenings to her boots.

  He looked up at her, pressed a kiss to her inner thigh. The warmth of his lips penetrated through to her skin, and she shuddered, her laugh dying.

  “You can take the top, Yasmeen,” he said. “I’ll take the bottom.”

  By the lady. She ripped her shirt over her head, stood bare before he’d unbuckled her right boot down to her knee. Biting her bottom lip, she watched him, the cold frame of the upper bunk pressing into her back. Her dark nipples hardened to small bullets, and to make him hurry, she cupped her breasts, fingers playing with their stiffened tips, craving his fingers, his mouth.

  Oh, but it only slowed him. He watched her hands instead of his own, and when she slipped her hand into her breeches, his fingers fumbled on the buckle at her ankle. He groaned.

  Yasmeen slid her hand deeper, lightly pinched her clitoris and imagined his lips, his teeth. Her knees almost folded. She gripped the bunk for support. “Hurry, Mr. Fox. I’d hate to do the job myself.”

  With a sound almost like a growl, he gripped her hips, tipped her back onto the lower bunk, ass barely supported by the edge of the mattress.

  “Now, wait.” He finally pulled off her right boot, pressed a hot kiss to her ankle. His jaw rasped up the length of her calf. His fingers tugged the waist of her breeches.

  She laughed. “My boot—”

  “I don’t care.” He stripped her breeches fully down her right leg, lifting her knee to maneuver them off. The left leg, he simply pulled down as far as he could. “My God, I forgot there’s more.”

  Just the small, loose pants that fell to mid-thigh—and then she’d be open to him. Yasmeen lifted her hips, pushing them down, the same way he had her breeches: off her right leg, just as far as she could on her left. “Hurry.”

  “Oh, no. None of that here.” Still fully clothed, he pushed her legs apart, strong fingers pressing into her thighs. “You like to be tortured, Mrs. Fox. You like to be stroked, to go slow.”

  She loved all of that. Anticipation wound through her, tightening her muscles, building the hollow ache at her core into agony. He wasn’t going to fill that completely, she realized. Not tonight.

  “This isn’t the kiss I expected,” she panted. Though she wasn’t about to complain.

  His handsome features stark with need, Archimedes bent his head. “I’ve wanted this almost as long.”

  And he definitely wasn’t in a hurry now. He began with a slow, broad lick up her center. Yasmeen gasped, her back arching. Another slow lick, his tongue spreading her slick folds, the tip flicking against her clit. She cried out, and barely had time to catch her breath before he was there again, his tongue pushing into her with a leisurely thrust and then sliding up, slow, thorough. He didn’t stop, didn’t stop, thrusting and licking so slowly, her clit aching for release but he kept that slow, even pace, lapping at her until she was so wet that even with his continual licking she could feel the slickness on her inner thighs, sliding along the curve of her ass. Her body writhed, as she tried to find another angle, another pressure, but his tongue swept through again, that devastating flick at the end that brought her so close, so close. She screamed his name, begged. His tongue came up and swirled, and she bucked against his mouth, sobbing. His long fingers pressed into her, and she couldn’t take any more. His lips closed over her clit and his tongue ran over her like a succulent kiss and she was over, broken. Her body clenched, again, again.

  She finally fell back, sweating, her body still shuddering. Then Archimedes climbed
into the bunk, and she was wrecked.

  Lying on his back, he hauled her over his chest, her limp legs straddling his thighs. His hand swept her body, soothing, pleasing. He kissed the wet from her eyes, but he didn’t kiss her mouth, didn’t fuck her, he simply stroked her skin until sweet lethargy weighed her down like opium.

  “You’re an idiot to love me,” she whispered.

  “Am I?” He didn’t sound convinced.

  “Yes.” She drew in his scent, so strong and warm. “But, still—it is a fine thing, to be loved.”

  And tucking her face against his shoulder, she slept.

  Yes. It would be a fine thing, to be loved.

  When they’d made their agreement in the Charging Bull, Archimedes hadn’t lied when he’d told Yasmeen that falling in love with her wasn’t a game. But until now, he didn’t know how wrong he’d been.

  He had been playing a game. A game of luck, a game of chance, with his heart as the stakes, deep emotion and heartbreak the prize—and he hadn’t known what any of that meant. But he’d had the smallest taste of it when she’d opened that door, and he never, ever wanted to feel like that again. So he could continue on, trying to feel every single emotion, and finish the game broken and poor.

  But now that he was in love with her, Archimedes simply wasn’t playing anymore.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Yasmeen stirred when Archimedes slipped out of bed, but she didn’t lift her head. He didn’t bother with his boots or a jacket, and picked up his dagger from the cabin floor. Silently, he made his way to Ollivier’s door and inside.

  With a single bunk and room for a small desk, Ollivier’s cabin was more spacious than theirs. The man slept on his side, facing away from the door. Archimedes slid his dagger against the man’s neck, nudged him awake. Ollivier opened his eyes, his hand moving beneath his pillow. Archimedes let him feel the blade. He froze.

  “Put your hands on your head, Mr. Ollivier. Very good. Now, stand up—Nuh-uh! Hands still on your head. There you go. Let’s take a walk, have a little drink together.”