Skies of Fire: The Ether Chronicles

by Archer, Zoe

“Anything on the ship is available to you.”

  Her gaze held his as they both realized the implications of his words. It was too bloody close to the truth. He moved to the door, but her voice stopped him.

  “Kit.” Softly spoken, barely more than a whisper. The sound of his name, reserved only for intimacy, was a heated caress.

  He turned.

  She glanced down at the tray in his hands. “It just occurred to me that if we reach the munitions plant tomorrow, that might have been my last dinner.”

  They both knew that his denials would ring hollow. Death had always been a possibility with this mission. He could only give a brief, terse nod.

  “If that’s true,” she said quietly, her eyes dark and full, “then I’m glad it was spent with you.”

  He swallowed hard, throat tight. “Me, too.” Wanting to toss the tray to the floor and sweep her into his arms, but knowing that they hadn’t the time for any distractions, he forced himself to leave the magazine.

  Life truly is a son of a bitch. The thought echoed again in his head as he strode down the passageway, away from her.

  Chapter Eight

  LOUISA’S EYES FLEW open. Disorientation swirled as she stared up at an unfamiliar wooden ceiling. She turned her head and saw not racks of cannon shells or her worktable, but a bookcase and a desk. No quartz lamps burned. The only illumination in the cabin came from the star-strewn sky outside the window, turning the interior faintly ash-colored, with the heavy pieces of furniture forming dark but not threatening shapes. She knew this chamber. Where was she?

  She inhaled and caught the scent of hot metal and male flesh.

  Christopher’s quarters.

  And she lay in Christopher’s berth.

  Dim recollections filtered through her memory. She had finished the very last bomb around two in the morning, but exhaustion had overwhelmed her before she could make the long journey back to Christopher’s cabin, and bed. She had laid her head upon the table in the gunnery, promising herself that she’d just rest her eyes a moment, and then she’d get up and hie herself to bed. Clearly, her eyes had been closed longer than a moment. She must have fallen asleep.

  But how did she get all the way from the magazine to the cabin?

  Another image sieved through her mind. More remembered sensations than actual images. Iron-hard arms had enclosed her, lifting her as though she weighed less than ether. She’d been pressed against a warm, solid chest, and her arms had encircled someone’s neck. Her head had rested against a wide, unyielding shoulder, yet it had felt so comfortable, so secure.

  Perhaps she’d muttered something, an objection to being carried like an invalid, for a deep voice had rumbled, “Quiet, tyrannical woman.”

  Christopher, again. He’d carried her from the magazine to his cabin. And put her to bed.

  Pushing herself upright, she glanced beneath the covers and felt a curious stab of disappointment that she was still clothed. Her boots had been removed, however, and stood neatly by the side of the bed. Her hair fell about her shoulders. He’d taken the pins out.

  She wished she had been awake, or could recall seeing this powerful man tending to her so conscientiously. Almost tenderly. Even without remembering, she could picture it well. His big hands working at the laces of her boots, and picking out pins from her hair, one by one, to set them aside on a nearby nightstand. The pins themselves formed a tiny, glinting pile, like a miniature metallic haystack.

  This whole ship was his, all of her firepower, all of her might, and yet he looked after Louisa with patience and care. By rights, he could have simply left her in the magazine. He should have. He should have been in his own berth instead of taking care of her. They’d reach the munitions plant soon. He needed all the rest he could get in preparation for the task ahead.

  But no. He’d seen to her, instead.

  She rose and began to undress. Her garments for the field were far more practical than what she wore when back at home. Nothing laced or fastened up the back. She had to be able to take everything on and off without assistance.

  Rather like a whore, she thought with an inward smile.

  Her parents didn’t approve of her work. They had wanted her to join the family business translating legal documents. There was a clerk at the firm, Paul Lewis, whom she knew her parents favored for a possible husband. She could stay at home, translating liens from Hindi into English, with a baby perched on her knee and another en route. Or so her parents, and Paul, had wanted.

  Though numerous other women worked for Naval Intelligence, her parents still thought it scandalous that she would involve herself in such a vocation. They would have approved of her more had she decided to become a journalist. She wasn’t invited home at Christmas nor to celebrate the Mechanical 20th. To Mr. and Mrs. Shaw, she might as well be a whore.

  As she pulled off her blouse and stepped out of her skirt, she decided the sacrifice was worth it. She loved her work and had no regrets.

  Only one, she thought.

  She tugged harder than necessary on the fastenings of her corset. Though she wore a short, lightly boned corset, she still exhaled in relief when it came away from her body.

  Now wearing only her chemise and pantalets, she sat down on the bed. She moved her hands back and forth over the clean but plain blanket. Standard naval issue. Woven on giant looms by clockwork millworkers. It could not be more common. Yet because it was Christopher’s blanket, and had covered him for countless nights, significance had been woven in with the wool.

  She lay herself down, preparing to sleep, but a moment after her head hit the pillow, her eyes were wide open.

  How could she sleep? Knowing that at some point during the next twenty-four hours, she might meet her death? She’d never feared it—every time she went out on assignment, there was always the possibility she might not come back. But that same regret continued to burn at the back of her mind, her heart.

  Three years. They’d been apart three years, and all because she’d been afraid.

  The thought made her heart pound. It seemed so foolish now, her flight. She had taken a chance at happiness and tossed it into the incinerator. Her only consolation—and it was a paltry one—was that she’d believed at the time that she had acted in the right.

  Would he have become a Man O’ War had she not fled? Would their lives have taken very different paths?

  She ground her fists into her eyes. An exercise in futility, these questions. They could never be answered. The only certainty lay ahead, in the form of a munitions plant dug into the side of a mountain. Between now and then was a blank. No, not a blank, but an unwritten page. The pen was poised in her hand. It was up to her as to how to fill that page.

  Abruptly, she sat up again.

  Three years. Three years without him. Oh, she’d been busy. Running from mission to mission. London to Stockholm to New Constantinople to Bucharest. Never a moment’s rest. And she’d done good work. Important work. Thousands of civilians, sailors, and soldiers owed their lives to the intelligence she’d gathered. She had no misgivings about those years.

  But they’d been empty. She had no one to come home to. No one to dream of. She’d often caught herself thinking, Oh, Kit will laugh to hear this, or, Kit won’t believe it when I tell him. A trove of stories and anecdotes and images that he’d never hear.

  How hollow she’d been after she left him. How she missed sharing with him. She hadn’t truly realized it until these past few days, with his laughter and his strength so near.

  “I love him,” she said aloud. Again, with more volume, “I love him.”

  And the hell of it was, she always had.

  She threw aside the blanket and stood.

  She was done with fear. Though she did not believe in predestination, she’d been given a rare chance. Something, some force greater than human understanding had put her in that barn and Christopher’s ship nearby. Perhaps it was fate. Perhaps it was electromagnetic frequencies. The cause didn’t matter. The most im
portant thing was for Christopher to learn how she felt about him.

  This couldn’t wait for the morning. The morning would be too late. Glancing around the cabin, she looked for a robe to throw over her chemise. Trained though the crew might be, the sight of a woman in her underclothes running through the ship might prove disruptive.

  Her borrowed coat would have to suffice. She pulled it on and moved toward the door. Her steps slowed, then stopped. She didn’t know where Christopher slept while she was in his quarters. Could she bang on doors up and down the ship, looking for him? She’d look like an asylum escapee. It didn’t matter. She could always explain that it had to do with the mission.

  She walked quickly to the door and threw it open.

  Christopher stood in the passageway outside.

  He wore his shirtsleeves, breeches, and boots. He wasn’t a captain in his uniform, but a man. A man with hunger in his eyes.

  Without taking his gaze from hers, he stepped inside. Shut the door behind him. They stood only inches apart. Shadows were thick in the cabin, yet she could see the rapid rise and fall of his chest, the flare of his nostrils. Tremendous heat poured from his body, penetrating her heavy coat, soaking into her body.

  For a moment, they simply stared at one another. Poised on the edge of a precipitous fall.

  Then—they crashed together.

  He cradled her head in his hands, angling her mouth to his, as she wrapped her arms around him. Their lips met in reckless desire. She tumbled into the kiss, its hot need, tasting him with both long familiarity and a sense of discovery.

  For he was stronger now. Power radiated from him. She felt it in his thick, bunching muscles, in the press of his body to hers. The vast potential of him—barely contained.

  She strained against him, wanting to feel more.

  With a growl, he broke the kiss long enough to pull off her coat. Then she wore only her thin chemise and pantalets, and when she pressed close she gave a soft moan. The fine cotton of his shirt provided almost no barrier to the feel of him, hard and sinewy, and he possessed the heat of an engine. She arched into the thick length of his cock, snug against the front of his breeches. He growled again and took her mouth.

  The world spun as he turned them around, and she found herself between two solid surfaces—Christopher and the door.

  He leaned into her, enfolding her with his arms, his kiss. It was almost painful, the way he held her so tightly against the door and his body. The ferocity of his kiss left her breathless and shaking, damp with need. There was an animal hunger in him, a beast unleashed that both frightened and aroused her.

  She must have made some small noise of distress, because her front was suddenly chilled as he tore himself away. Dazed, she could only lean against the door and watch him standing in the middle of the cabin. His breathing sounded like a freight train, rough and loud. Fists curled at his sides, he turned away.

  “Kit,” she whispered. “Come back.”

  “Want you too much.” His voice was a low rasp. “Both the man and the Man O’ War.”

  She took a step toward him.

  “Don’t,” he flung over his shoulder. In the dimness of his quarters, his shirt gleamed, the braces he wore forming a Y across his back and emphasizing the triangular shape of his torso. “So close to . . . losing control.”

  “You won’t hurt me.” She took another step.

  He still would not look at her. “You don’t know that. I don’t know that. If I did anything, if I caused you any pain . . .” He snarled. “No.”

  “Because of the implants?”

  “Them, and my own need for you.”

  “Has it always been like this, since the implants? When you . . .” She struggled to get the words out, hating the images they brought into her mind. “When you make love?”

  “Wouldn’t know.” He turned to face her, his expression stark.

  The truth struck her like a blow to her chest. “You haven’t been with anyone else.”

  “Not since that November morning.” His look turned dark. “Don’t tell me if you have. I’d tear the ship apart if I knew.”

  “I haven’t.” She answered this readily.

  “No need to tell me lies, just don’t tell me the truth.”

  A flare of anger whipped through her. “I have never lied to you. I might have run away, but I’ve always been honest.”

  “You’re right.” He scrubbed his hand over his closely-shorn hair, and pain etched into his face. “I’m not . . . thinking clearly. I can’t.”

  She moved closer. “The only man I yearned for was you. You’re all I want. Kit. Please.” She reached for him. “The dawn will come too soon.”

  She closed the distance between them, running her hands up his chest. His heart thundered beneath her palms. It matched the drumming of her own pulse.

  For half a second he was still. Then, with a growl, he brought his arms around her, his hands cupping her behind, and hauled her close. He kissed her savagely. And when she met his wildness with her own, his approval was a tangible thing. Sound reverberated low in his chest. His cock thickened further, a column of steel against her belly.

  Good god, had he actually grown bigger . . . there?

  He moved his lips across her jaw, down along her neck. She shivered when his teeth scraped over her tender skin, his breath hot, and when he bit lightly on the curve of her shoulder, she moaned.

  Impatient to feel more of him, she tugged at her chemise. He made faster work of her minimal clothing, whipping off her chemise and breaking the ribbon fastening of her pantalets so the fabric pooled at her feet. She kicked her pantalets away, and then she stood naked before him.

  She reached for the buttons of his shirt, but he held her back gently. “Too soon. I need . . . yes.” He brought her close again, one hand on her bare buttocks, the other cupping her breast.

  He caressed her, his fingers circling her nipple, and it felt as though electricity fired through her, sparking in her breasts and lower, between her legs. Her nipples tightened into firm points. When he tugged on them, she gasped. Her pussy grew slick, aching. She ground against him. He was still fully clothed, while she was completely nude, and her arousal climbed higher from the contrast.

  He moved his hand from her buttocks, stroking over her hip, over the curve of her belly. She couldn’t hold back a long, low moan when his fingers dipped lower, and, when he discovered how wet she was, he growled.

  She writhed against him as he continued to tease and pinch her nipples while his other hand stroked through the folds of her pussy. Each caress sent streaks of pleasure through her. His fingers were broad and calloused, his skin rough. Awareness dimmed. She knew only where he touched her, where he drew forth such fathomless pleasure.

  He touched her with an expertise born from familiarity. He knew her body. Knew what she wanted, what she craved. He knew that pressing his thumb just there on her clit made her gasp, and he knew that sinking two fingers into her passage made her scream. And when he worked her, thumb on her clit, fingers thrusting in and out and pressing against that one exquisitely sensitive spot within, she felt his claim.

  “Only I know you like this,” he rumbled against her throat. “This is what I give you, Lulu. Me, and no one else.”

  “Kit, yes.” Control burned away. She abandoned herself to pleasure, the pleasure he created.

  The orgasm hit her with a tidal force. She threw her head back to scream her release, but his mouth on hers swallowed the sound. Surge after surge crashed over her, and he drove them on relentlessly, release after release, his hand locked intimately against and within her.

  Finally, as her limbs shook and sweat coated her body, he took his hand away. One by one, he licked his fingers.

  “As delicious as ever,” he murmured.

  Heavy lidded, she watched him, and it amazed her that, after so many climaxes, her desire burned just as bright.

  “I need to know if you taste the same, too,” she whispered.

&nbs
p; His jaw looked made of stone as she slid down his body, then knelt before him, their gazes locked all the while. He moved just enough to grab the pillow from the berth and slide it under her knees.

  “Always so considerate,” she said with a wicked smile.

  He seemed incapable of speech—a very good thing. He did growl, however, when she unfastened the buttons on his breeches. And when she reached in his drawers and pulled out his cock, the rough sounds he made were inhuman.

  She took her gaze from his to stare at his cock. Her guess had been correct. His transformation had affected all parts of him. He was most assuredly bigger. Not that she’d had any cause for complaint before, but . . . well . . .

  The wonders of science.

  Hands clenched at his sides, he strained toward her. Yet she merely let her breath mist over him. She licked her lips, then rubbed them against the head of his cock. Moisture beaded at the tip, and when she licked her lips again, she tasted its saltiness.

  “Lulu, damn it.” His voice was a rumble.

  It was time to end her play. She leaned closer and took him into her mouth.

  Words that were half swears, half prayers tumbled from him.

  The head was broad, and she ran her tongue around it before taking him deeper. She couldn’t fit all of him in her mouth, so she gripped his shaft, pumping, as she sucked him. Oh, he tasted the same, male flesh and musk, and the feel and flavor of him stoked her excitement.

  Tension vibrated through him. She felt him holding back, fighting to keep himself under control. Glancing up, she saw his eyes were tightly shut and the cords of his neck stood out as he struggled.

  She pulled back. “Let go.”

  “I can’t,” he ground out.

  “Kit. Look at me.” When he pried his eyes open, blue fire in the darkness, she said, “I’m on my knees for you. I’m giving you everything. And I want you to do the same for me.”

  He was still for a moment. Then, as though his bones had rusted, his hands slowly came up to cradle the back of her head.

  “Yes,” she whispered.

  He guided her. She opened her lips, and his cock slid into her mouth. Yet she did not move. Simply waited.