by Joss Ware
“Did you hear from Theo?” he said, forcing the words out, using them as a much-needed barrier. His heart had begun to pound erratically.
Sage’s eyelids fluttered and he felt her subtle drawback. “No.”
“He’s in love with you, Sage,” he forced himself to say in a voice low and dark. Build that barrier. Set her back. Make Dragon Boy the elephant in the room. Or, better yet, the elephant in the bed. Right the hell between them.
Again her lids fluttered, and he swore her mouth tightened a bit. “I know. But I—”
“Sage, let’s get this over with,” he said quickly, forcing the words out. “Okay?”
And before she could respond, he did what he did yesterday—he lifted himself quickly, but very gingerly, and straddled her slender body beneath the sheets.
Settling himself over her, careful not to touch any skin, definitely not to let her feel the erection straining his briefs…fighting to ignore the warmth emanating from beneath him…oh so close…Simon tucked his head into the pillow next to her and began to move. Counting. Praying. Imagining a gun barrel pressed to the back of his skull.
But this time…this time, his face was buried in damp, sweet-scented hair, next to warm skin. And this time, he knew how those lips just beyond his jaw tasted. And how smooth was the cheek against his hair. And the blood pounded through his body, and she was so damn close…Simon squeezed his eyes closed, buried his face in a pillow that fucking smelled like her, and kept his mind blank.
And then, as he was just about ready to pull away, she arched her torso up beneath him, meeting one of his false thrusts. The contact with skin and warmth shocked him, and he faltered, realizing that, thank God, there was cotton at least, between them…but he was all too aware of the swell of her breasts against his bare chest and the movement of her hands, her body, sliding against his rigid one.
The next thing he knew, she was kissing his neck and jaw, tugging at him, pulling him closer until his trembling arms gave out and he collapsed to the side.
Taking her with him.
She found his mouth, or he found hers—he wasn’t certain which—and their lips melded, fitting together fiercely. Then he couldn’t stop, couldn’t keep the soft groan of surrender from the back of his throat as her mouth opened beneath his.
Sweet, slick and hot and deep…she tasted like mint and warmth and comfort, and he felt her body, now aligned next to his, her leg sliding along his thigh, one hand on his shoulder, smoothing along his arm. Her hair plastered to his face and the hand that had reached up to brush it away, and she gave a quiet little moan as his tongue thrust deep and long.
Thank God she still wore something—a tank top and panties from what he could tell—but it provided little barrier and Simon couldn’t keep his hands from sliding up beneath that stretchy top, over warm, taut skin and curling around her slender rib cage. Her breasts pressed into his chest, and he held on to her sides, trying to focus, to keep some semblance of control, knowing that this had to stop…soon.
But, just a little longer. Just…a little…
Her fingers combed into his hair, pulling it loose. “I’ve been wanting to do that,” she whispered against his jaw, her warm mouth nibbling there and to his ear. “You have such beautiful hair.” Her small hands moved over his head, warm and confident, sliding through his loosened queue and down over his shoulders.
“Sage,” he murmured. “We…this isn’t…” But the words evaporated when she lifted her face to kiss him again, and he took her mouth, and swiping long and deep, she smoothed her hands down over his shoulders to flatten them over his chest.
Their noses bumped and lips and tongues slid as he bent forward again, no longer able to fathom stopping, sooner or later. He filled his hands with her—her hips, her rear, her slender shoulders, and down to those beautiful breasts…now bare as he pulled her tank up and snapped it to the floor.
Heaven help me.
He bent beneath the sheets, somehow having the wherewithal to keep them in place and hide her from the camera even as he kissed one pretty pink nipple. Dusky with freckles, giving her skin a peachy glow, she was lush and curvy and when he drew the sensitive point into his mouth, gently, tenderly, she tightened and shivered beneath him.
He tasted her, using his tongue to flick lazily over her, she sighed and shifted and he felt a greater surge of desire, wanting to make her cry out and writhe with pleasure even more. Her eyes had closed and Simon watched her face, chin lifted, full, puffy lips parted as she sighed and shifted beneath his mouth.
“Simon,” she breathed blindly at the ceiling, her hips twitching next to him as if she didn’t know what she wanted.
He was out of breath himself, painfully hard and ready, yet unable to stop from kissing and touching, stroking and coaxing. He took his time, languorous and thorough, knowing in the recesses of his mind that this was an anomaly, that she wasn’t ready for this and that there’d be a time when he’d have to stop…but not yet.
Not until…ah. She arched toward him, her hand sliding down his belly. His skin leapt and jumped beneath her fingers—fingers that seemed to know exactly where they were going, what they wanted…and unaware that they weren’t about to get there.
Simon moved sleekly, shifting a bit so that he pressed her back into the bed, bending over her torso with his to cover her mouth once more, keeping his own straining equipment out of reach. No, my dear. And as he rose up over her, face angled above face, propped on an elbow, he slipped his other hand down, down over her belly, over the sensitive, trembling skin, beneath a bit of cotton, down to the warm nestle of the place he wanted to be…the current center of his world…and found what he was looking for.
Sage’s eyes flew open when he slipped into her moist warmth, his fingers gentle and instantly slick. “Oh,” she gasped, and he smiled against her luscious mouth, concentrating on the wonder in her eyes and the taste of her.
His fingers stroked and slid, slipped and entered and fluttered and tickled against her until she writhed and gasped beneath them. He watched the pleasure settle across her face, as her cheeks flushed and her body tightened and stretched and he felt her orgasm begin, rise…and then crest with a low erotic moan that nearly set him over the edge.
Overwhelmed with her scent, sounds, taste, warmth, Simon gritted his teeth, closed his eyes as she shuddered and trembled beneath him. He rested his forehead against hers, feeling the brush of her fluttering lashes and the warm puff of breath against his face.
His body pounded so hard, and before she even opened her eyes, he fell back from where he’d hovered over her, flat on his back, breathing as if he’d run a marathon. He was in pain, pulsating pain, but at the same time, rampant with exhilaration and deep pleasure. His fingers trembled and his mouth felt full and hot, and he could still taste her on his lips…but it was over.
“Simon.”
The breath of his name had him turning to look at her. Once again, there she was…close, too close, temptation and heaven rolled into one package of blue eyes and creamy skin, tousled peachy hair and lush red mouth. But this time, her lips were swollen and crinkled, and her eyes were lidded heavily—filled with knowledge and awareness. And something else he dared not try to define.
“Yes?” he managed to say without sounding like he was dying.
“Is that…I mean,” she closed her eyes, swallowed, caught her breath, and, reopening them, said, “Wow. Simon…I…my God, Simon…” It all came out on low, husky breaths.
She was babbling and if he hadn’t been in so much discomfort, so intent on keeping himself rigid and separate, he might have chuckled. Sage never babbled. But he didn’t allow himself even a smile, for that little bit of softening could lead to more.
“Thank you,” she managed. And then she moved, reaching for him and he had to react quickly to grab her wrist before she could touch him. No. No, we don’t need that.
Her eyes darkened in confusion, and he squeezed her wrist. “It’s fine. Just…that’s enough.”
“But…”
He shook his head sharply, knowing that the expression on his face was bordering on forbidding, but what else could he do?
“Don’t you need to—well, it has to look like we, uh—”
He couldn’t hold back a short laugh—half in frustration, half in amusement. “I think that what they saw will suffice just fine,” he said in his low, strained voice. “Now, please. Remember there is a man back in Envy who loves you, Sage.”
This time, he hardened his tone, keeping it quiet, but looking at her straight in the eyes. “Theo is waiting for you. And I promised him I’d bring you back. Whole. And safe.” There was that wall again.
Where the hell had it been five minutes ago?
She stared at him, and he saw a myriad of emotions flash through her eyes. Her mouth tightened, her chin, even on its side, lifted in stubbornness. “That’s fine. I love being treated like a damn doll that has to be protected and accounted for,” she said in a louder voice than she should have. It sounded as if it were about to crack. “Don’t think I haven’t noticed that you keep bringing him up like some sort of damn talisman.” She blinked rapidly.
“Sage—” What the hell could he say? He sure as fuck couldn’t tell her that if he had his way, he’d tell her to forget about Dragon Boy and run off with him…even though he already knew he couldn’t run off with anyone. Even Sage.
Then suddenly, she flung the covers back with a great, chilly whoosh, leaving him half covered. Simon gaped as she stalked across the room to the bathroom, completely naked, in all peachy-skinned, curvaceous glory, bouncing and swaying and with a toss of her hair.
She didn’t slam the door, but she might as well have.
The short, sharp click said it all.
It was just as well that Sage didn’t see Simon for the rest of the day.
As it was, by the time she sat down next to him at dinner, she’d worked herself into a ball of nerves. After what had happened in their room, beneath those hot sheets, she took care not to do as much as brush against him. For fear she might send him scuttling off in terror.
Because she’d finally realized what it was that shone in his eyes when he looked at her. Fear. Bald-faced, flat-out fear.
And she didn’t quite understand why.
“When will the Strangers arrive?” he asked, leaning toward her, bringing with him what had become a familiar feeling…his warmth, proximity, and subtle masculine scent, all wrapped up in one package. He’d pulled his hair back into its short club, sleek and dark—but that didn’t keep her from remembering how thick and heavy and sexy it had looked, falling in his face and over her hands.
“Any time,” she replied coolly. She didn’t look at him, for fear he’d see what was in her eyes.
“Everything go all right today?” he asked.
Was he trying to drive her crazy?
“I’m just a little tired,” she replied, noticing that Dawn, one of Sharon’s friends, seemed to be fascinated by their low-toned conversation. “Maybe your sperm’s already in action,” she added, loudly enough for the other woman to hear. He flashed her a look that would have been amusing in its acute discomfort if she hadn’t been so annoyed with him.
Even though all she could think about was twining her body with his, and kissing him, touching him…at the same time, she wanted to string him up by his toes and swat the hell out of him.
Or hide in a corner and cry from shame and frustration.
For the time, she opted to feel annoyed rather than rejected and hurt, because it was easier. But sooner or later, she was going to have to examine those feelings and figure out what it was.
Instead of looking at Simon, she engaged herself in conversation with Dawn, and Sharon, who’d arrived late. She tried not to notice every time he bumped against her thigh—which wasn’t often—and attempted to block out the deep timbre of his voice as he chatted or laughed with the others at their table. Why, though she was angry with him, did the mere sound of it make her want to cuddle in next to him?
The meal was interminable, yet the expectations were palpable. As Sage looked around the large community, the entire settlement—not a portion of it—that had gathered here in the dining area filled with tables and spilling outside through the open walls, and she remembered other times with the same sort of feel to them.
The whispers, the watching, the anticipation. The joviality that nevertheless seemed a bit forced. Beneath the revelry, Sage sensed something else. Fear? Trepidation? As if the people of Falling Creek knew the arrival of the Strangers would be exciting, yet horrifying.
Or was she simply making all of this up?
Sage had never credited herself with an overly active imagination, but now as she thought about it, she realized she’d been wrong. After all, someone who researched and investigated information the way she did, in a cobbled-together Internet, had to be creative to find ways to do it.
Then finally, it happened. The wave of whispers rose followed by the sounds—unfamiliar to the residents of Falling Creek—of a vehicle’s engine approach, heralding the arrival of the Strangers.
Sage found herself sitting up expectantly, her heart thumping in her chest. She might have seen them before, years ago when she lived here as a girl—her memory was foggy—but she hadn’t seen one of the immortals since then. She knew they looked like any other human, except for the powerful crystals they wore embedded in their skin.
And now that Quent had identified one of the Stranger leaders as his father, Parris Fielding, they had all come to the conclusion that the Strangers were humans who had lived before the Change, and had taken on the crystals of immortality. And, according to Lou and Theo, had somehow caused—or at least enabled—the Change.
Because of their relation to the Cult of Atlantis, and the fact that crystals were widely believed to be part of the Atlantean legend—along with the fact that a continental-sized landmass had appeared in the Pacific Ocean, possibly risen from the depths—the Strangers were thought to have some connection to Atlantis. Either they were looking for the lost continent, or had somehow found it, and its powerful, life-force crystals.
The Strangers were greeted by the two eldest Corrigan men, and brought to the front of the room, not far from where Sage and Simon were sitting. She watched, waiting for a wave of recognition to sweep over her—but when she saw the two men and one woman, Sage wasn’t prepared for the shock of that identification.
“Oh my God,” she breathed, reaching automatically for Simon’s arm. “That woman…that’s Tatiana. The actress! Isn’t it?”
His arm was solid and taut beneath her fingers, and she felt waves of tension rolling from him. Instead of watching the Strangers and gaping at them as the rest of the room was doing, he was looking slightly down and off into the distance.
“Do you see her?” she whispered, looking at the woman.
“Shh,” Simon growled behind a tight jaw, and Sage tried to relax, even as she stared at the three immortals.
The woman seemed to be in charge, and Sage definitely remembered seeing her before, when she was younger. But at that time, she had not recognized her as the actress famous for her real-life rags-to-riches story, and the sharp, seductive roles she played in films. Perhaps the leaders of Falling Creek had made certain there were no Tatiana movies available in the settlement.
Tatiana stood at the front, speaking with the community leaders. Her two companions, the very faint glow of crystals showing through their shirts, stood deferentially behind her. While Sage vaguely remembered seeing them as well from the Strangers’ previous visits, she didn’t recognize them. She memorized their faces now, though, so she could search through the list of Cult of Atlantis members and try to identify them when she returned to Envy.
Tatiana, of course, as an immortal, had not changed since her films. She wasn’t tall, but she had a commanding presence and what Lou would call a killer body. Ink black hair cascaded down in a straight waterfall around her shoulders, nearly t
o her hips, causing Sage to wonder if the hair and nails grew on Strangers. And if they could bear children.
Maybe that was why they liked to take young women from Falling Creek…to use them for procreation purposes?
Sage shook her head to clear the morbid thoughts. Simon was going to help keep them from taking any young women this time, if that was indeed what they’d come for. She found herself reaching automatically toward him, wanting desperately to touch him—for stability, strength, and comfort…
Certainly she wouldn’t be a candidate for the Strangers to take—she was too old, and was presumably already married—and even if she were, she knew Simon would never let it happen.
But something unsettled her, and that feeling of trepidation grew as Tatiana spoke congenially with the leaders, who fairly slathered over her hands, they were so reverent. The room had fallen completely silent except for the low hum of their voices. As she conversed with her hosts, Tatiana scanned the room, and even from where she was sitting, Sage could feel the chill of her gaze. She knew from the films that the actress’s eyes were brown, but they’d been warm and sparkling in movies like The Girl Can’t Go Home and Stand Down or Die. Now, she recognized flat chilliness that made her distinctly uncomfortable.
Tatiana finished her conversation abruptly, and the settlement leaders seemed to be surprised, for she was walking away from them, and coming down into the rows of tables.
Sage didn’t remember that happening before, and from the expressions on the faces of her fellow diners, neither could they. The settlement leaders appeared confused as well.
Every eye was on the woman as she walked through the room, moving with a purpose, her long hair shining and shifting, her eyes focused…on Sage? No, not on her. But…
Sage felt Simon’s entire body tighten next to her, the tension pouring from him, yet he didn’t move.
Tatiana came to a stop right in front of their table, and now Sage could see the brilliant glow of a pale blue crystal from beneath the woman’s sheer white shirt. Heart slamming in her chest, palms damp, she looked up into those eyes, and found them trained not on her, but on the man next to her.