In My Skin

by Shannon McKenna

  Dani held out a smartphone from the electronics box. “He raced down from Seattle to talk to some glue-sniffing butthead in Goforth just on the off chance that the guy might have seen you? He’d follow any lead, even a stupid one. I love him for that. Call him.”

  “Yeah.” Luke took the phone, but his fingers shook, and his eyes blurred as he stared at the touchscreen. He had to enter the number twice. It rang only once before the line opened up.

  “Yeah?” Zade’s voice, tense and wary. “Who’s this?”

  Luke tried to speak but his voice failed him. He let out a rasping croak.

  “Don’t fuck with me,” Zade growled. “Who are you? Is this…?”

  “Yeah.” Luke coughed the words out. “Yeah. It’s me.”

  For a few seconds, he couldn’t hear at all. His ASP was nuts. His heartbeat roared in his ears. Waves of hot and cold, waves of random data scrolling frantically down his processor feed. He pushed it away, desperate to hear his brother’s voice.

  “… fuck have you been since you got away from Braxton?”

  “I lost you.” Luke’s voice broke. “I lost you guys. I blocked you out so Braxton couldn’t get at you. When I escaped, I couldn’t get back in. Just did tonight, finally. Saw your message. Picked up the contact info. So you’re in California?”

  “Yeah. I happened to see a police report about some numbnuts remote-driving a Porsche Cayenne. That’s you, right? Made a real big impression on that dumbass convenience store clerk. Jesus, Luke. You’re being sloppier ’n all shit.”

  “My bad. Sorry I couldn’t call you. It was just, you know. Brain damage. You know how it is.”

  “Yeah, whatever.” Zade understood. “Crazy ass son of a bitch.”

  “I know, I know. Good to hear your voice.”

  “Yeah. You too.”

  The silence that followed was heavy with emotion. Zade finally broke it. “So, uh, what’s your deal? Are you well? Hurt? In trouble?”

  “On the run,” Luke admitted. “I intercepted a Manticore shipment. Turns out Obsidian placed the order.”

  “OK. They on your tail? You need backup?”

  “Backup would not suck,” Luke said. “And I want to see you.”

  “Fuck yeah. Give me the coordinates. How did you get your memory back?”

  “Manticore gear,” Luke said. “Threaded one of Braxton’s probes into one of the holes in my head and zapped myself to hell and gone. But it worked. I remembered you.”

  “What? Jesus, Luke, you could’ve killed yourself!”

  “I know. I had help.” His eyes flicked to Dani. “She saved my life.”

  “Who?”

  “Dani. This woman I met. The Manticore courier, Naldo, he was a friend of hers. He broke free somehow and ran to her instead of going to the meeting with the buyer. That’s how I met her.”

  “Ah. OK. Is she, like…” Zade’s voice trailed off suggestively. “Are you…?”

  “Yeah, we are. She’s incredible. Gorgeous. Brilliant.”

  “Oh, shut up,” Dani snapped under her breath.

  “Moving on. Is the group OK?” Luke asked. “Everyone still under the radar?”

  “Pretty much. We’ve had some incidents,” Zade said. “We got into a brawl with Mark a couple months ago, but he’s dead now. Guess you must have figured that out when he stopped coming down to feed you at that fucking hell-hive of his in Wyoming.”

  “Yeah, that was bad,” Luke admitted.

  “We finally tracked you all the way there and ran into Braxton. Must have been right after you bolted. Maybe only a day or two later, no more.”

  “Braxton? How the fuck did you not get coded if he saw you?”

  “I did get coded,” Zade said. “Simone saved me.”

  Luke sucked in a startled breath. “So what’s up with Simone?”

  “Everything. She’s my bride. She’s amazing. You’ll like her.”

  “Bride?” Luke’s mouth sagged. “Holy fucking shit. You?”

  “I know, right? But it’s not just me. Noah got married, too. Off on a honeymoon in Europe that just won’t quit.”

  “I saw on the map that he was in Austria,” Luke said. “Seemed weird.”

  “Yeah. His new wife, Caro, she’s heavy into art so they’re doing this art extravaganza wedding trip. He’s crazy in love. You wouldn’t recognize him. All starry-eyed. But Caro’s cool. She has nerve. We approve.”

  “Wild,” Luke said. “How about you? Where did you go on your honeymoon?”

  Zade laughed. “Nowhere yet. I couldn’t go lie on a beach while you were still lost. But now maybe I can. After we get you someplace safe and catch up for a while. Holy shit, Luke. Holy shit. You’re fucking found, for real. I can’t believe it.”

  “Same here,” Luke said. “But listen. I’ve got business to finish up and I could use help with it before you and Simone hit that beach.”

  “Anything you need, brother. Where are you?”

  Luke gave their position, and quickly explained about the Manticore slave soldier Obsidian had ordered. The tiny girl in a hibernation tank in a container in San Francisco.

  “Dani and I have to pick up Ivy before anything else,” he said.

  “Ivy? She has a name?”

  “Her file number is I89VY262. Dani’s friend Naldo called her Ivy.”

  “Got it. Standing by for your orders.”

  “Cool. Oh, and tell Zoe when you call them that I saw Jada.”

  Zade was startled into silence for a few seconds. “No shit,” he said quietly. “Was she…OK?”

  “Hard to say. She almost killed me. But she choked for a fraction of a second when she looked me in the eye, so I think she recognized me. On some level.”

  “Fuck,” Zade muttered. “That’s gonna blow Zoe’s mind, and she’s hard enough to deal with as it is. Sit tight until we can get to you. The others can drive down in less than a day. I’ll call everyone and they’ll gather up some gear and get rolling right away. We’ll all go pick up Ivy together. I can be at your location in about three hours. Maybe less.”

  “Got you. We’ll catch up then.”

  A few more gruff and inadequate words and Luke closed the call, his throat too tight to speak.

  Dani put her hand on his shoulder. “You good?”

  “I want to take a shower,” he muttered.

  He went in, got started, and stood there for a very long time with the hot water pounding down on his face.

  * * * *

  “What’s that I smell? Bacon?”

  Dani turned to see Luke slouched against the kitchen entrance wearing nothing but his jeans, just as she put the platter of sizzling, thick-cut hickory smoked bacon on the huge table next to the tower of buttered toast slices.

  A glance at his face showed that he still felt shaky and raw and guarded, but sheer hunger had drawn him out of his hiding place. The smell of frying bacon was a potent lure. It had been a long time since those raggedy prime rib sandwiches she’d cobbled together during their drive up to Serrati Flats. So much had happened since then.

  “Sit down,” she told him. “Get going on some bacon while I do your eggs. How many do you want?”

  “How many do you have?”

  She was nonplussed. “Ah…a dozen, I guess.”

  “Give me whatever you don’t want.”

  “For real? You can eat ten eggs?”

  “If that’s all there are, yeah,” he said around his first mouthful of bacon and toast.

  She’d never seen anything like the way he ate. He devoured everything she’d cooked, and then toasted up more slices from the second loaf of bread, and then ate the berries, bananas and pears. A healthy appetite was always a good sign, but holy flipping crap.

  Dani sipped her coffee as he polished off a tub of yogurt, admiring the broad flare of h
is shoulders, the thick ropy muscles in his forearms.

  “Are you ever going to put a shirt on again?” she asked. “Not that I’m complaining.”

  “It smells bad,” he said ruefully. “Combat sweat. I gotta buy fresh clothes or do some laundry. But that’s not happening anytime soon, the way our lives are going.”

  “True enough.”

  Their eyes locked, and heat leaped between them. It made her blush. Her gaze fell.

  “We have time before my brother gets here,” Luke’s voice was a seductive rumble. “Let’s go upstairs. Lie down for a while.”

  “Hmmm.” She studied him carefully. “Are you coming on to me, buddy?”

  He gave her an innocent smile. “Just to chill. After all the drama.”

  Sounded sensible. It also sounded fabulous. “There’s a bedroom I like at the other end of the house,” she told him. “The one with the lake view. I’m not going anywhere near the evil shackles and the brain-zapper.”

  They gulped the last of their coffee. Luke seized her hand and led her through the big, dim chalet, all the way up to the bedroom Dani had indicated, a light, peach-toned room. A soft mohair throw covered the bed, which had a lacy wicker headboard. The big window showed mist rising off the mirror-glass of the lake.

  Luke shucked his jeans and stood there, buck-naked. That gorgeous, teasing smile on his face. He was being actually playful, after a night like that. The guy was so strange and unexpected. Chock full of complicated issues, but screw it. She loved him that way.

  Loved him.

  Yeah, she had to admit it. It wasn’t a crush. It wasn’t just her hormones. It wasn’t because he’d rescued her so many times. The look in his eyes made her heart melt into hot syrupy goop, and her brain wasn’t far behind. Total slop. Then tears.

  Shit. Nonononono. She wasn’t doing that right now. No more tears.

  She drew in an uneven breath at the sight of his outsized erect cock, and lunged for the en suite bathroom. “Hold that thought,” she mumbled. “Grabbing a shower.”

  Maybe the pounding hot water could wash off the lingering fear. The dread and the guilt and the grief. It clung to her like a stain.

  Goddamn it. She should be glad. They’d come through the darkness and back out into the light. She’d lived, against all odds, and Luke was reuniting with his family. That was cause for celebration.

  But part of her didn’t dare relax, not even for a second. Didn’t dare congratulate herself. It was tempting the gods.

  She didn’t bother to dress again as she dried off. She just laid her clothes on the wicker chair. Luke seemed fast asleep, and she slid naked into the crisp sheets next to him. The fog was so ghostly outside, wisps of vapor tangling in the dark pine boughs.

  She cuddled up to the huge cloud of heat his body threw off. She felt warmed by it and she wasn’t even touching him. She examined the sores around his wrists. They were scabbed over as if they’d already been healing up for a week. Wow. Her magic man.

  She just couldn’t stop staring at his stark male beauty. That rugged face plus a sexy hint of dark beard shadow did her in.

  His eyes opened, as if he could feel her gaze. The look on his face was too much for her lacerated nerves to bear. “Don’t,” she whispered. “Please.”

  He frowned. “Don’t what?”

  “The lovey-dovey look. I can’t take it.”

  “It’s your own fault for rocking my world. Don’t blame me.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Oh, Luke.”

  “Get used to it,” he advised her solemnly. “A lot of things I can control, but the look on my face when I stare at you? Not so much.”

  She bit her lip, trying to think of something smart-assed to say.

  “It scares me,” she blurted. Lame comeback, she thought, but it was true.

  He nodded gravely. “Yeah. Me too. So let’s be brave.”

  She laughed, breaking off into a gasp as he pulled her close to him. It felt amazing, yielding to the gentleness of a man who was fully in control of his own strength. The delicious sensation of relaxing into his sensual heat. Feeling it ripple through her whole body. She smiled in spite of herself as she opened up to tender, exploring kisses. So sweet.

  His hands on her body, between her legs, made her whimper. His fingers probed and stroked her, slipping inside her with a slow, pulsing rhythm that made her gasp and clench around him.

  A rush of cold air, and suddenly his heat shifted, sliding down her body, exposing her to the chill. The he moved her and himself, settling between her parted legs, about to taste her. Kissing and licking and lapping, thrusting his tongue inside.

  His way of doing it. Insisting on making her come before he would give her that gorgeous cock. As if at least one glorious oral orgasm was his entry fee.

  Come on in.

  Her pleasure intensified as he licked and suckled with intuitive skill, sliding his fingers inside her pussy as he fluttered his tongue across her clit. Dani suddenly couldn’t think at all. Her body shuddered as she lifted herself against his face, pleading, then demanding that he…oh yes …

  Erotic bliss reverberated through her whole being.

  Her eyes opened as he shifted, climbing up over her body, lifting her legs up high. Gazing down at her body beneath him, soft and yielding and open. He caressed her clit as he nudged his thick, blunt cockhead against her slick pussy lips.

  They groaned at the sweet perfection of joining. She moved against him, taking him deep.

  She grabbed his upper arms, but she couldn’t get much of a grip on him, his muscles were so steely thick.

  He responded with swiveling moves that made her clench and writhe against him. “I could keep fucking you forever,” he said roughly. “It’s so good. You’re so sweet and hot and tight. I love to watch my cock going into you. I love watching your face, your mouth, your eyes. Your tits shaking.”

  She braced her hands against his chest, feeling the rough texture of his scarring, his chest hair. Digging in her nails as he pumped his cock into her. No words, just breathless, heaving pants as the pace quickened. Hard and frantic, driven by raw need.

  The storm broke, shattering them both.

  The afterglow was intense. Astonished joy, and all around it, sheer fear.

  His arms tightened around her. “Got you right where I want you,” he murmured in her ear. “Safe.”

  “Am I?” she asked dreamily.

  “Yeah. With me. And the rest of us now, too.”

  “Oh, right.”

  “Zade’s on the way, and the rest of my people. Once they’re here, we’ll come up with a good, solid plan. And do what needs doing before we move on.”

  “To what?”

  “A real life. With everything you want in it.”

  “What I want?” She grinned. “You mean, besides you?”

  He kissed her again, with an ardor that left her breathless, and smoothly finished his thought. “Like med school.”

  She was taken aback. “Seriously?”

  “Damn straight. If that’s what you want to do.”

  “I’ve thought about it,” she admitted.

  “Good. Glad to hear it. All of us Midlanders found ways to do stuff we like. My brother makes bank on his consulting business. Noah has a hot biotech company. Zoe’s a researcher with multiple degrees in chemistry and pharmacology. We’ve all got a thing. None of that is fake. And the new names are nothing new for us. You just compensate by being the hands-down fucking best in your field. Which would be no big deal for you.”

  She felt bewildered. “Whoa. You don’t know me that well.”

  “I intend to.”

  “Luke…”

  “Let it sit. It’s not for right now. But you’ll have a life. I’ll bet my own life on it.”

  She sat up, alarmed. “Do not bet your life on anything, Luke R
yan!”

  He let go of her and slid out of bed. “Whatever you say. Time’s up. Zade should be here soon. I gotta pack the gear. We’ll need it for Ivy.”

  * * * *

  Dani got up, put on fresh clothes and headed downstairs. She felt restless and for some reason, uneasy. She got herself more coffee before sliding open a massive glass door, then stepped out onto a huge terrace furnished with outdoor stuff, benches, a barbecue.

  Overlooking the lake, every vantage point was beautiful. She was surrounded by the grandeur of nature but her feet never even had to touch any dirt. Weird.

  She looked up as the shadow of a bird sliced across the white sky.

  It left her field of vision quickly but she replayed the image in her mind. Maybe not a bird. Too smooth. No swooping or fluttering or flapping of wings.

  Fear seized her, deep and cold. “Luke!” she called in a strangled whisper.

  Seconds later he’d stepped out onto the patio, gun in hand. “What?”

  “Drone.” She indicated the direction she’d seen it disappear. “Very low.”

  “Shit,” he muttered. “I hear it now. Stealth drone. Sneaky motherfuckers. Get inside.”

  “Luke—”

  “Get inside!”

  The tone of his voice jolted her into movement.

  Everything happened at once. The drone appeared, floating like a huge buzzing insect around the corner of the house. Luke swung up his gun to take aim just as a loud, amplified voice spoke.

  “Calliope! Banner! Ibex!”

  Luke was frozen in place, gun hand held high, his suddenly halted motion leaving him off center.

  A moment of shocked disbelief. His eyes met hers, full of mute desperation.

  Then he fell. Hard.

  Chapter 23

  Couldn’t…see. Fuck. Luke fought to breathe. Eyes straining to take in more.

  He’d fallen on his side, in the exact position he’d been in when the control code blared out of that fucking drone. His ASP was nuts, churning useless data across his screen, but he was powerless to act on any of it.

  Dani was bent over him, yelling something as she felt for his pulse, but he couldn’t focus on her words over the roar in his head. The shiny black cover of the fallen barbecue reflected the scene behind him. Operatives were boiling out of the woods. They’d stayed far enough away to not trip his sensors and they wore thermal shield gear, so they were fucking invisible, heat-wise. He wouldn’t have seen their body warmth even if he had been looking. Which he hadn’t been. Like an asshole.