The past month had been hard, grueling—she didn’t even know it was possible for a person to be beaten into the dirt as often as he had. It didn’t necessarily help that come morning, her body felt completely refreshed, completely revitalized…meaning he came at her just as hard, just as fast.
She’d rather they start a fresh bout of training all over again than to have any sort of…talk.
Especially something remotely personal.
After she laid the phone back in the cradle, she looked back at Silence.
The two of them, they hadn’t done much talking, at least not of a personal nature. Lots of training. He’d done a lot of explaining about what sort of demons they’d face—succubae, incubae, orin…others. How they traveled from a place called the netherplains to their world—most of them had to take over a human body in order to do much of anything.
Basically, she played student to his teacher—if there was a theme song for her new life, maybe it could be “Hot for Teacher”.
He made her heart race just looking at him.
He also made her belly clench, made her palms go damp, her knees go weak.
He made her ache.
In the worst possible way, in the sweetest way.
And now he wanted to talk about her gifts.
Hell. This was too damn personal.
What if he was like her?
She’d gotten pretty damn good at hiding how she felt over the past few years, but if he was anything like her…
Vanya blushed even thinking about it. Blushed furiously as she sat there with her chest tight, her palms sweaty, her breath lodged in her throat.
“You’ve got gifts, don’t you?” she blurted out.
Silence narrowed his eyes. We’re supposed to be talking about your gifts, he signed. He added emphasis by jabbing a finger at her after he’d finished. Yours.
“I know. I just…well, this is weird. I haven’t talked to anybody about what I can do. It’s…”
The hard line of his mouth softened and the aggravated look in his blue eyes faded. Not easy to talk about, is it? he signed.
“No.” She hitched a shoulder up, wondered how she could explain that she barely even needed him to sign when he was talking to her because she often heard his voice—low and deep—in the back of her mind. And if he was thinking about her, she heard him too.
How did she tell him that?
He sat down next to her. She had to check the impulse to scoot away—the long, hard length of his thigh against hers made her uneasy—made her want to climb into his lap, see if she couldn’t crack the polite, friendly mask he wore around her.
He held out a hand. Startled, she looked at it—stared at his broad, scarred palm. His hands were a mess—ridged with scars that looked like knife cuts, burns, other old injuries she couldn’t even indentify. So at odds with his perfect, angelic face. Looking from that scarred hand into ice-blue eyes, she said, “What?”
He grinned. And again she heard his thoughts. “You want to know about my gifts. I’ll show you.”
Nervously, she laid her hand in his. “You’re not a psychic, are you?”
He shook his head, and then with his free hand, gestured to the room.
Vanya looked around. “I don’t know what I’m looking for…”
He took his hand away.
The room fell into darkness. Darkness so complete, she couldn’t even see him, although he sat right next to her. She couldn’t feel him, and she’d gotten pretty damn good at that.
Then his hand was in hers again, and the darkness was gone.
“Oh—”
Once more he pulled his hand away.
The darkness returned.
“—shit.”
This time, the darkness didn’t disappear. It gradually bled away, like the night bled into day. Her heart banged hard against her ribs as she looked at him.
“What in the hell was that?”
He smiled and signed. She didn’t recognize it, though.
When he spoke into her mind, she stiffened. “It’s illusion. I can make you think you see darkness when there is none.”
She blinked. “You mean, it wasn’t really dark?” Scowling, she remembered the night at the warehouse—the night she died. “That night. At the warehouse.”
Absently, she reached up and touched her throat. She couldn’t remember much of anything beyond that first pain, the shock of it. But she remembered everything right up to that point…the fear, the terror. The helplessness—knowing she’d been alone.
But she hadn’t been.
He’d been there.
Waiting.
Part of her wanted to rebel at the thought—wanted to demand to know why he hadn’t done something—even though she already knew the answer. He’d done exactly what he’d been sent to do.
She couldn’t very well become one of them if she hadn’t died, could she?
And just as she’d been promised, she hadn’t been alone.
“That night at the warehouse,” she said again. “There was so much darkness. But it wasn’t darkness, was it? It was you.”
He nodded. A grim look entered his eyes. “You know that I couldn’t have stopped what happened—not if you’re meant to be one of us. But I cannot blame you if you are angry.”
“I know that.” She sighed and looked away. Bracing her elbows on her knees, she covered her face and said it again. “I know that. It doesn’t mean it’s easy to think about, although…well, it helps knowing I wasn’t alone.”
She shot him a faint smile. “I was terrified, thinking I was alone.”
“You weren’t.” He touched the back of her hand. His mouth twisted as he studied her face. “It wasn’t easy to simply stand there, either. Even knowing what was to come.”
She blew out a breath. “Well, it’s over and done, right?” Self-preservation had her forcing some distance between them. Sitting there, so close, was wreaking havoc on her state of mind, not to mention was it doing to her body. “So, the darkness in there that night—that was all you?”
Silence nodded and made that unusual sign, the one she didn’t recognize. As he did it, he said in her mind, “Illusion. Just illusion. It’s one of my gifts.”
“That’s pretty cool,” she murmured, smiling.
He shrugged. Then he reached up, tapped her brow, waiting with a lifted brow.
She grimaced. Standing, she moved away from him, slicking her damp palms down the front of her pants. They were snug-fitting black yoga pants—something Silence had picked up for her. Along with several other changes of clothes—more yoga pants, close-fitting sport bras, the sort of clothes she could maneuver in while he pounded her into the floor.
“I’m psychic,” she said, keeping her back to him, staring out the window into the night. “It’s not exactly reliable, and usually I’ve never gotten anything more than the odd random thought here and there. It was strongest with my sister. After she died, it got more erratic—more like a radio station I couldn’t quite get to tune in. It was awful when I was in crowds—like I was hearing all these screaming voices and I couldn’t focus on any of them.”
The muscles at the base of her neck were tight. Reaching up, she cupped a hand over it, rolled her head first one way then the other, trying to ease the tension there, but it didn’t help.
She was still a mess of nerves.
A mess of need.
She didn’t hear him—
She felt him.
He was there, that big, powerful body heating hers through and through. His hand came up, lightly brushed hers. As if asking permission.
Get the hell away from him before you do something really, really stupid, Van, she told herself. Like throw yourself at him.
But when he gently nudged her hand out of the way, she couldn’t find the strength to do anything but stand there.
“And the gift is different now, isn’t it? Is more powerful? Other changes since you came back?”
She shivered at the low, velvety rumble
of his voice echoing through her mind. Or maybe it was the way his roughened skin rasped over her neck as he dug his thumbs into her skin and started to massage away the tension there. Heat blossomed inside and she swallowed the moan before it could escape.
“Yeah,” she said, surprised at how steady, how calm her voice sounded. “It’s changed, although I don’t know if I can say it’s more powerful exactly. Most of the change seems to be related to you—I can hear your voice, and you sound clearer than anybody else ever did. The few times we’ve been around other people…well, there’s not much change there. Although that could be because I’m not around them much. There are times when I hear your voice as clearly as if you’re talking to me, and the more time that passes, the clearer it gets.”
His hands never stilled, and although she couldn’t pick apart the individual thoughts, they were in the back of her head, like the dull hum of a conversation she could barely hear.
Finally, he asked, “When does it seem to be the most clear?”
“When you’re thinking about me. Or like now—if you’re talking to me.” His thumb hit a particularly tight spot to the right of her neck, and despite herself, she groaned. Then, as he focused on that knot of tension, she let her head fall forward, all but sagging against the cool, glass window.
“But not all the time?”
“No. And I think if you try to keep me from hearing you, I wouldn’t hear you,” she said, frowning as she focused and tried to pick up the trail of his thoughts and discovered she couldn’t.
She could still hear that dull roar of his thoughts, but nothing she could pick apart and focus on.
“This is interesting. We should see who else it works on,” he said.
Absently, she murmured, “I told you, I don’t hear others this clearly.” But she was too focused on what else she was picking up from him…something warm, bright…an oddly shimmering thing. Emotion, she realized. One she could only describe as pleasure. Happiness, even.
Without understanding why, she somehow knew he was…happy. Pleased. Slipping away from his hands, she turned around and stared up at him, studying him. “You’re happy about this,” she said, frowning.
Something akin to surprise flashed through his eyes. Then he shut it down and that odd warmth she’d been feeling was abruptly cut off. He lifted a brow and signed, What makes you think that?
“The fact that I was feeling it from you?” she said, shrugging. “It doesn’t make much sense to me—if somebody told me they were hearing my thoughts, I think I’d be pissed.”
She went to edge around him, but he caught her arm.
“You haven’t been locked in silence for hundreds of years, Vanya. I have. Having somebody who can hear me at all, well, it’s not unpleasant. It isn’t as though I cannot block you out, as you’ve already pointed out. I imagine it’s somewhat discomfiting for you, however.”
His pale blue eyes held hers. There was something so raw in that look—so intimate, so unsettling.
Without realizing what she planned to do, she reached up and touched a hand to his throat, felt the warmth of his skin, the slow, steady beat of his pulse under her thumb.
“It’s not discomfiting,” she said quietly, stroking her thumb over his skin.
“This doesn’t bother you?”
His eyes…damn it, she was getting lost in his eyes…
Vanya’s dark gaze locked with his.
He could hear her heart racing.
Could hear the slight hitch in her breathing.
And when she reached up and touched his skin, her palm against his neck, he watched the brown of her eyes darken to black.
“No,” she said quietly, her voice husky. “It doesn’t bother me.”
Careful to keep up a mental shield, he thought, Let her go now. Put some distance between you…
This was his student. Just a month past her death. Just a child.
No, she wasn’t a child.
Despite her youth—she was twenty-three, young even by mortal standards—there was a wisdom in her eyes. But still, he couldn’t be doing this.
She went to withdraw her hand, but suddenly, Silence couldn’t stand for her not to be touching him. He needed her hands on him, needed her to touch him.
Need…one he’d ignored for far too long.
He caught her hand, pressed it back to his neck.
Then he caught the back of her head.
Watching her eyes, watching for any sign that this was unwelcome, unwanted, he slowly lowered his head.
Vanya’s eyes went wide.
Her tongue slid out, trailing across her lower lip, and Silence dipped his head, followed that path with his own tongue. Her nails curled into his neck, bit into his skin, and he shuddered. Wrapping an arm around her, he stroked a hand down her back, palmed her ass and brought her hips against his.
She groaned into his mouth, and he swallowed the sound down, used his tongue to tease her lips apart, desperate to see what other sounds he could coax from her. Would she whimper, would she sigh, would she scream…?
Desperate to find out, he lifted his head and stared at her.
Holding her gaze, he reached for the zipper that held the snug-fitting jacket she wore closed over her lithe torso. As he tugged it down, he lowered the shields on his mind and focused his thoughts, “Do I stop?”
A faint flush turned her cheeks pink.
“Stop?” she whispered.
“Yes…stop. I shouldn’t do this—I know I shouldn’t. But I’m having a hard time convincing myself of that. Do you want me to stop?”
Vanya whispered, “No.” Her teeth caught her lower lip as she lowered her head, staring at his hand as he dragged the zipper all the way down.
When he went to push the short black jacket back off her shoulders, she looked back up at him, her hands coming up, curling in the material of his white T-shirt.
Silence held still as she pushed it up as high as she could then he stripped it the rest of the way off.
The silver medallion he wore caught briefly in the shirt before falling to rest on his chest. Vanya leaned against him, her hands stroking down over his sides, up over his chest. Her fingers tangled in the light dusting of hair over his chest, tugged.
Silence gritted his teeth against the sweet pleasure and then caught her wrists, eased them down.
His blood burned hot—need was a scream in his head. Had to slow down—had to. Catching the thick band at the bottom of her sports bra, he slowly peeled the sturdy material away. Then he went to his knees, pressed his lips to the faint red marks it had left behind on her narrow rib cage.
A sigh escaped her. She curled an arm around his head, bent hers low over him.
This was happening—really happening.
Too fast—way too fast.
Yet still not fast enough, she thought as he slowly peeled her out of her pants. Each move so slow, so deliberate, as though he was either giving her plenty of time to change her mind…or plenty of time to think about what was coming.
Change her mind—not possible, because that would require thought and she couldn’t think when he was around.
He was still wearing the sturdy black fatigues that seemed to be his standard uniform, kneeling in front of her as he eased her feet out of the puddle of stretchy black cloth.
Kneeling…that blond hair spilling over his broad shoulders, his head bent, his hands now resting on her ankles.
When he started to stroke up, her breath caught in her throat.
As his fingers brushed over the backs of her thighs, she shivered.
When he reached her knees, he nudged her legs wider. Bracing her hands on his shoulders, she let him guide her feet to where he wanted. But as he leaned in, pressed his face to her, she still wasn’t prepared.
Not for the rough-velvet rasp of his tongue over her flesh, and not for the blistering heat of hunger that shuddered out of him, breaking over her—too much—
“Vanya…”
She sobbed, and if he hadn
’t been holding her, she would have fallen. Only the solid, unrelenting grip of his hands at her hips, the cool glass of the window at her back kept her upright.
His nose brushed against her clit just before his tongue speared through her folds, licking, stroking.
“Silence…” she whimpered, fisting a hand in his hair.
He shifted slightly, curled his tongue around her clit and started to suck on it. She felt each rhythmic pull in her very center, felt the heat building.
Silence stroked a hand up her thigh—she felt the ridges of his scars, felt the rasping over her flesh, another sensation over too many sensations. Lightly, he teased her entrance with a fingertip, teased her, stroked her…and when he slowly pushed two fingers inside, she slammed her head back against the window and came with a sob.
His voice was a muted rumble in her mind, one she could barely understand as she shuddered through the climax, shuddered, shook and tried to breathe. Just when she thought she’d be able to manage one decent breath of air, Silence stood, wrapped one arm around her waist, pulling her against him.
Belatedly, she realized they’d been pressed against the window—where anybody could see. She couldn’t quite work up the interest to care, though, not when his mouth was teasing hers again, not when he was kissing her, his teeth nibbling at her lower lip tauntingly, then his tongue was sliding over hers, stroking and twining and teasing…
With awkward, shaking hands, she reached between them and fumbled for his zipper. She finally managed to get her fingers to cooperate and she dragged it down, shaking as her fingers brushed against him—thick, hard, throbbing under the restraint of his pants.
When she shoved a hand inside and closed her fingers around him, she felt and heard his reaction—blistering-hot want exploded through a mental connection, followed closely by, “Stop or this will end before we even start.”
Tearing her mouth away from his, she whispered against his lips, “Then we just start all over again…”
He caught her hands, jerking them up over her head. “Stop.”
As he lifted his head, their gazes locked and he stared down at her, stroked a hand down, lightly rubbed the heel of his palm against her mound. “Don’t worry…I have plans to do this many times tonight,” he told her.
Locked in Silence: Grimm's Circle, Book 5 Page 6