by Kit Rocha
She cried out, as sharp and sweet as her nails digging into his back. Her legs locked around his hips, and she shivered against him.
"You've always been mine," he said, rasping the words in her ear. They felt almost as good as the slick tightness of her pussy as it clenched around him. "Always."
"Say it--" The words melted into a shudder as she arched off the wall. "Say it again."
Not just accepting. Encouraging, and he was lost, driving into her again and again, because he wouldn't be deep enough until she felt as desperate and helpless as he did. "Always mine, sunshine. Your mind and your heart--" He rolled into her, tilting her hips until he could grind against her clit. "Your perfect fucking body. Mine."
Her whimpers turned into choked moans and then into incoherent pleas. "You have to--please. Please, Noah--God, you have to--" She clamped even tighter around him, her whole body poised and trembling on the edge of ecstasy.
Getting a hand between them meant losing the press of her skin against his. Instead, he thrust harder, rolling his hips in tiny circles that worked her clit, and trusted his words to shove her over the brink. "Tell me I can keep you, and I'll stay."
"Yes." She ground out the word between clenched teeth as her trembling turned to a full-body shudder. "Yes--fuck, Noah--"
She came, gasping his name for everyone to hear, and the knowledge that they could twisted pleasure into something hot and dangerous as he resumed his quick, hard pace. He wasn't just riding her orgasm to his own. He was claiming her in the most primal way possible, marking his ownership like a rutting fucking beast with the blood and sweat from the cage still slicking his skin.
And she clung to him, moaning and whimpering as each thrust pushed her back toward the precipice. Her nails raked his back as she came again, quieter but more intense, her pussy drawing him deeper with every rippling wave of pleasure.
He gave in, gave her everything, driving home one last time as he buried his face in her neck. "Christ, Em."
"I love you." She said it with her mouth close to his ear, a whisper just for him, and he didn't deserve any of this. Not her body or her mind--and especially not her perfect fucking heart.
"Emmy likes you. She really, really likes you, man. Hell. I think she might love you."
Just a ghost, a nightmare, and Dallas was right. If he couldn't carry the weight of the past for both of them, he would never be worthy of her.
He wanted to be worthy. But wanting didn't make it effortless, and the words stuck in his throat, came out cracked and raw. "I love you, too."
She heard the lie. Not his emotions--loving her was the only thing that had ever come easy--but the one he'd sworn never to tell. It was the only explanation for the way her smile faltered, for the gentle hand on his cheek and her dark, questing gaze.
I'm sorry. "I never thought I'd say that to anyone," he whispered, covering the lie with more truth. "I never thought I'd want to."
That brought back a smile that lit her whole face. "Practice," she murmured. "That's all you need."
If the guilt didn't eat him alive first.
Chapter Seven
Emma woke from a dreamless sleep to the soft rasp of paper sliding over carpet. She saw it instantly, a vague square of white against the darkness--a note, slipped under her door. A summons, maybe, some directive from Dallas or Lex.
She closed her eyes again and snuggled deeper under the covers. Noah's arm was draped across her waist, heavy and comforting, and he'd nestled his face against her shoulder. She wanted to roll on top of him and wake him with a kiss, not climb out of bed and read her note. But it might be important--vital, even--so she groaned softly and swung her feet to the floor.
Noah grumbled behind her, but she'd swept up the paper and turned before his eyes cracked open. "What's that?"
Noah's name was written across the outside in Dallas's bold script. "It's for you."
He blinked. "A note? A goddamn treasure trove of tech sitting above his storage room, and Dallas O'Kane passes notes?"
She switched on the dimmest lamp at her bedside, dropped to sit beside him, and handed him the folded paper. "Can't hack a note."
Judging by the perplexed look on his face, it had never occurred to him. He snorted as he rolled to his back. "I guess not, but most people are lazy. They'll take the chance if it saves a minute or two."
"Not Dallas. He's traditional." She sang the word as she walked two fingers teasingly up Noah's chest. "What does he want?"
Noah unfolded the note and studied it, his brow furrowing. "Information."
"What kind?"
Still frowning, he showed her the words.
Lennox,
I need the Council's file on illegal bootlegging inside of Eden.
If you can get it.
Dallas had scrawled O'Kane at the bottom, and Emma snorted. Perfectly worded as a challenge more than anything else, and guaranteed to elicit a reaction. "You can get it...but will you?"
"Do you know why he wants it?"
There was no point in hiding the truth. "Someone's been selling counterfeit O'Kane liquor. It has to be someone with the experience to distill, so Dallas probably figures whoever it is has had run-ins with the military police."
Noah nodded. "And finding out whether I can get onto Eden's servers would be a bonus."
"Mmm, undoubtedly."
He plucked the note from her hands and tumbled her back to the bed, stretching out above her with a too-serious expression. "It's a test. Are you still sure you want me to pass it?"
There it was again, the same flash of hesitation she'd seen in the fight warehouse. A cold knot coalesced in her stomach, and she swallowed hard before asking carefully, "Is something wrong, Noah?"
"Trust is hard." He traced a fingertip over her brow before sweeping a strand of hair from her forehead. "How much do you trust Dallas?"
She stared down at the O'Kane cuffs encircling her wrists. "I wouldn't have these if I didn't trust him more than damn near anyone else."
He followed her gaze. "Good enough," he said after a moment, then dropped a kiss to her forehead before rolling away. "I can get what he needs, but I'll have to go to Three."
"I'll go with you." The words escaped without thought, instinctive and automatic.
Noah froze on the edge of the bed, his shoulders tense. "It's dangerous, Em. I know O'Kane's starting to clean the place up, but it still isn't safe."
"All the more reason you need someone to watch your back."
He turned to study her wrists, lingering on the ink. "You've got a weapon?"
She kept her pistol in her nightstand, so it took her only seconds to retrieve it. "We don't go out unarmed, not anymore."
"Smart." Noah capitulated with another smile, leaning in to touch her chin. "Dress in something sturdy. We're going underground."
He wasn't fucking kidding.
At first it was a regular trip through Three--navigating broken streets and dodging piles of trash, though the mess had been cleaned up considerably since Dallas's takeover. But then Noah led her into a crumbling building with only half a roof, and Emma started to wonder whether the dangers of the trip had anything to do with other people at all.
They climbed down a broken staircase that had been patched together with what looked like a ladder from a fire escape, and Noah handed her a small flashlight. It was the only way to see, because the boarded-up windows had vanished, leaving only brick, concrete, and earth to line the walls.
They were underground.
Noah shoved a desk and a few rusty folding chairs aside, revealing a heavy steel door with an inactive control pad next to it. While she held the flashlight, he popped open a switchblade and pried off the cover. "This is the scenic route," he said, pulling a miniature solar battery pack from his pocket. "But it bypasses the sewers, and trust me. You want to avoid those."
"Yeah, no shit." She'd worn the sturdiest clothes she owned--jeans, boots, and a duster made of heavy leather--but even those wouldn't stand up to a tr
aipse through sewage.
The wires inside the control panel had already been stripped. Noah fiddled for a moment, twisting them with the wires from the battery pack. The face of the panel lit up, illuminating his furrowed brow and narrowed eyes as the door squealed open. "Welcome to my neighborhood."
Emma stepped into the tunnel and stared at the seemingly impenetrable darkness until the clang of the steel door swinging shut startled her.
She'd heard rumors about these tunnels. Hardly a month went by without a new story of some treasure hunter getting caught in a cave-in, sometimes whole goddamn groups of them. Dead in an instant.
But Noah wouldn't have brought her here if he didn't think he could get her out again, so she tightened her grip around her flashlight and followed him down the endless tunnel.
"Here." He grasped her free hand and tugged her to the left, and when she swung the flashlight around, she caught sight of another steel door and a block-letter sign.
He repeated the trick with the battery pack, muttering curses under his breath until the panel flared to life. He pressed his palm to a screen beneath, and the door whispered open. Lights flickered on in the hallway beyond, and Noah grinned. "That was the hardest part, after finding the damn place. Figuring out how to steal power without tipping Eden off to it."
"How did you?"
"I tricked their computers into thinking this bunker was part of Sector Five." He retrieved the battery pack and ushered her through the door before closing it from the inside, leaving no trace of them behind. "Figured it was only fair for Fleming to pay for my resources."
Another door lay in front of them, this one with a round handle that looked like a steering wheel. A blast door, the kind Emma had seen in pre-Flare movies about wars and fallout shelters. The handle creaked with a metallic shriek as Noah turned it, and he pulled it open to reveal a row of metal rungs set into the concrete--a ladder, leading down into another corridor, brightly lit and far more inviting than the last dozen.
She climbed down and then stopped awkwardly. It felt like trespassing, so she waited until he joined her. "This is it?" she asked softly. "Your home?"
"Yeah." He settled his hand at the small of her back and prodded her around the corner, into a tiny kitchen. It was open to the rest of the room, which held more furniture--a couch, a couple of plush chairs, and a dining room table covered in partially assembled electronics and scattered scraps of paper. "It took me almost a year to find it. I was starting to think my father had made the whole thing up."
"Guess not." She shoved her hands in her back pockets and looked around. "It's like it was built for the end of the world."
Warm arms slid around her, and Noah buried his face in her hair. "It was, in a way. But the world ended a little ahead of schedule."
Second-guessing the past was a quick trip to crazy town, but just this once, she couldn't help wondering how different things might have been if she'd stayed with him. "If you had known how to find this place, would you have brought me here with you?" She turned, because she had to see his face when he answered. "Did you want to?"
He framed her face, his touch gentle. Reverent. "Yes. I was too old and you were too young and there were a million reasons it was selfish and stupid, but sometimes I'm selfish and stupid."
A different life--and a different Emma. Aside from the four years they'd lost, she didn't want that. "It doesn't matter. I love who I am. I love being an O'Kane. And as long as you're with me now, that's all I care about."
"I wanted you," he repeated in a softer voice, touching his thumb to her lower lip. "But I like you better like this. I never wanted you to need me, and now you don't."
"Not like you mean." Being this close to him was sparking the now-familiar buzz, arousal flowing through her, and she wrapped her arms around his neck. "I need you in better ways."
"The best ones," he agreed, and kissed her.
He started slow, but every stroke of his tongue was deeper, hotter, than the last. Emma fell into him, and the room fell away--until she realized they were moving, and the backs of her legs hit something soft.
The couch.
But he didn't stop kissing her. Not as his hands slid up her body and under her coat, urging it off her shoulders and down her arms. Not as he skated those clever fingers under her shirt, warm and tauntingly gentle on her sides, her belly, her breasts.
Too gentle. She tried to kiss him harder, but he lifted one iron hand to her jaw and held her still while he started all over again.
Emma whimpered.
"Shh." He raised his head far enough to meet her eyes as his free hand drew circles across her skin, inching closer and closer to her breast. "Do you trust me?"
The question brought a laugh bubbling up, disbelief and amusement. "Of course I do. I'm just really fucking turned on." His shirt was in the way, so she reached for it.
He closed his fingers around her wrist, as unyielding as steel. "Emma. Do you trust me?"
She stopped and swallowed--hard. Not an idle question, or even a reassurance, but the first step down a path they'd only flirted with up until now. A little hair pulling, a command here and there--
This was different. A serious question that deserved a serious answer.
"You said last night that I'm yours, all of me." She nodded slowly. "I am. I trust you."
He smiled and kissed her one last time, a quick brush of lips and a stinging tease of teeth before he stepped back and dropped his hands to his belt. "Take off your clothes. All of them."
Shoes first, then she stripped off her shirt so she could watch him unbuckle his belt. "Is this some alpha-bastard thing? Because I'm in your domain now?"
"Maybe." He tugged at the buckle, leather hissing over denim as he freed it from one loop at a time. "Did the girls in Five tell you that I like to be methodical?"
"Intense is usually how they put it."
His lips quirked. "That wasn't intense," he murmured, catching her arm. He spun her so fast she stumbled, and he steadied her against his chest as his lips brushed her temple. "That was just sex and control. But I've never had any fucking self-control when it comes to you. I want everything."
Warmth from his body--and his words--suffused her skin, sliding down her spine to join the wet heat already gathering in her pussy. "What does that mean? Everything?"
Instead of responding, he guided her hands behind her back. And he was methodical, repositioning her until her arms were folded on top of each other, the fingers of each hand brushing the opposite wrist.
The belt was cool compared to his touch, smooth leather bearing down into her skin as he looped it around. "Tell me if it's too tight."
Her voice came out breathless, feathery. "No, it's--" A shiver knocked her teeth together. "It's all right."
She heard the soft click of the buckle and the rustle of fabric. He pressed against her again, his chest bare this time. One warm hand splayed large across her abdomen as the other slid under her chin, angling her head back toward his. "Trust and love. That's everything."
Even in her most self-indulgent fantasies, he'd never looked at her like this, like trust and love were words that only meant Emma. "Noah..."
He tugged open the button on her jeans. "Yeah?"
She couldn't remember what she'd planned to say, but that was okay. It couldn't be more important than his hand slipping into her pants, or his mouth so close to hers. "Please."
His lips brushed hers. Lingered. He traced the edge of her panties with one fingertip. "Are you wet?"
She fought the urge to stretch up on her tiptoes, to arch closer to his hand. "Yes."
"Good." It was almost a groan, and her world upended. He lifted her, spinning them both in a dizzy circle before dropping her to the couch on her back. His tense, precise calm shattered as he hooked his hands in her jeans and underwear and dragged them free of her body in a tangle that ended up flung across the kitchen counter.
Before she could draw in a breath he hauled her upright, shoved her thighs w
ide, and sank to the floor between them. The belt around her wrists snagged on the bottom of the cushioned back of the couch, leaving her immobilized, her back arched.
She tried to shift position, but Noah gripped her waist, his thumbs moving in soothing circles. "I like you like this, with your tits thrust out and your legs spread wide. I can see all the ways you're hungry for me. Your hard nipples and your slick pussy."
She was acutely aware of all the ways she was exposed, and it took superhuman effort not to fidget or close her eyes to block out the intensity of his stare. Instead, she watched him as she rocked her hips experimentally, and moaned when she slid a few inches across the now-wet, slippery surface.
Groaning, Noah gripped her thighs, pushing them wider. "Stay like this," he warned as he stroked his fingers over her pussy. "If you move too much, I'll have to stop licking your clit and find some rope."
She froze, her heart pounding.
"That's right." So soft, so warm. It was Noah's smile, the one he saved for her, but so much rawer like this, with his thumbs spreading her outer lips, baring her completely.
Then he bent his mouth to her pussy, his tongue swiping a hot, merciless line straight to her clit. The breath she'd been holding exploded out of her on a helpless cry. And helpless, that's exactly what she was--bound and trapped by his hands and his mouth, by his desire.
She never wanted to be anywhere else.
He repeated the motion, his gaze lifting to catch hers as he lingered this time, flicking the tip of his tongue across her clit. "What part got you this hot, this fast? Tell me."
Oh God. "The way--" The words wobbled, and she steadied herself. "The way you kiss me."
Another groan, one that rumbled against her as he licked his way lower. "Because you're mine."
"Yes." She had to move somehow, so she braced her clenched hands on the couch and arched her hips more fully against his mouth.
If he noticed, he didn't say anything. He was too busy working his way back up to tongue her piercing. "You're mine, but that's not why you sucked my cock in front of half the sector last night, is it? You wanted them to know I'm yours."