10 Fatal Strike

by Shannon McKenna

  And there she was. A light, blazing on inside him. Her radiant presence. He didn’t see the images, because his eyes were too busy with the visual stimuli coming from her physical body, and he couldn’t be bothered to look inside at a waking dream. But the inner contact felt as great as it always did. That glow. So close. So intimate.

  The words scrolled, on the screen in his head. happy now?

  getting there, he replied. i go 4 this. u inside. makes me hot.

  She vibrated with laughter. ur hot already. like a kiln.

  He wound his hand full of her hair, and forced her to lift her face away from his chest.

  She was smiling, eyes lit up. Crazy beautiful.

  He kissed her. Ravenously, like it was life or death, and that inner place where they were linked went off like fireworks blasting. Color, heat, noise, and movement, like a dancing, singing flash mob. She made a shocked sound and kissed him back. Opening to him.

  She tasted so good. His tongue in her mouth, hers in his, dancing, melding. She squirmed against his hand, which was slippery with lube, softening against the onslaught of that devouring kiss.

  They came up gasping for air a time or two, but dove back into the kiss as soon as they replenished their oxygen stores. After a few breathless, desperate minutes of that, he was seriously in danger of losing control and coming all over her. She worked herself against his hand, desperate jerking thrusts. His hand shone, wet and hot. He thrust two fingers in, following the trembling, the gasps, the heat. Urgency built in both of them. He drove her like he was driving for his own release.

  And off they went, straight into it. Oh, fuck, yeah.

  Her pleasure throbbed through his mind and body, echoing. Lighting up his head, his chest, his cock.

  He lifted his head, at great length. Rolling her up on top of him, so that she was sprawled over his body.

  “That’s more like it,” he said. Trying not to feel smug.

  She was glowing pink, dewy with sweat. Eyes dazzled and dilated. “I never knew it could feel like that. Not even from the dreams.”

  “We’ve barely even started,” he said.

  They gazed at each other, for seconds that ticked slowly into minutes, but time ran differently now, and the silences were not empty. They were eloquent, charged with poignant meaning.

  She shifted, so she could stroke his stiff, longsuffering cockhead which had been trapped between them. Beet purple, shiny with precome that had left a gleaming slick on her pale skin.

  He helped her position herself, because she seemed awkward and unsure of herself. He draped her legs where they needed to be, adjusted her knees. Lifted her up to the perfect angle, so he could slide his cockhead tenderly against those slippery folds.

  No hurry, he told himself, grimly. No fucking hurry in the world. With lots of wiggling and squirming, he wedged himself a little deeper. So hot and slick. She sank down, and he slid slowly, inexorably inside her . . . into total fucking heaven on earth.

  Now it was a brand new challenge. It had been hard enough not to come when it was just his finger in that tight clutching hole, but now, oh God, it felt like his entire self being bathed in scalding perfection.

  She arched, forcing him deeper. Hugging and squeezing his whole length. A little deeper, another shove and sigh and delicious squirm, and he was all inside.

  He held his breath, shaking on the edge. So good.

  The deed was done, right or wrong, and he was not sorry. He felt defiant. After all she’d been through, she actually trusted him with her body. It was a fucking miracle, and he was not, by God, going to fumble it by coming too soon. No, and no, and no.

  Her hair had almost dried. Undulating dark locks draped over both of them, a ticklish, caressing cloud. She gazed down, with that soft, dazzled look that made his chest ache and his throat twist and his eyes sting, but now was no time to get weepy, for fuck’s sake.

  He had to make damn sure she did not regret this.

  The world flipped. He’d rolled her over onto her back, was pushing her down into the mattress. “Is this OK? Am I squishing you?” he demanded. “Scaring you?”

  She slid her hands up and around, to clutch at the thick muscles bunched in his back. “I love it,” she said, slowly and clearly.

  They stared into each others’ eyes as he established the rhythm. Their bodies were so attuned, every movement was a caressing call and response, each slow, rhythmic plunge and slide. Each individual stroke felt so achingly perfect, she couldn’t imagine anything sweeter, until the next one, and the next.

  She abandoned herself to the sway, the surge, the rocking blissful perfection. After some time, the pace quickened, but she could not tell who was driving it, whether it was her urgency or his that swept them helplessly along.

  He made a rough sound, and pressed his face against her shoulder. “Shit,” he ground out. “I’m sorry.”

  “For what?” She nuzzled his hair, inhaling his scent hungrily.

  “For this.” He drove inside her, deep and hard, jarring against her hips. “I’m sorry. I’m not going to be able to control . . . oh, fuck . . .

  His voice broke, gave way to pants. Her own gasps were a rhythmic counterpoint. The pace grew frenzied, his strokes deeper. Such sweet relief, to have her mind razed clear, steamrolled by giddy excitement, mounting tension, by each hot lick of pleasure, by each heavy jolt of his body against hers.

  She was opening, like a flower. Amazed that there was so much still inside. It had been locked down, hidden away, but now it was sprawling open, air and light flooding in. She lifted herself to meet every stroke, clawing to get closer. Pleasure swelled, crested . . . tipping her over and into the deep, throbbing darkness.

  She floated back to consciousness, pinned beneath him. His chest still heaved. He’d hidden his face against the pillow. His damp shoulders shook. She hugged him. Tears leaked out of her eyes. Feeling all of it, so keenly. The helplessness, the hugeness.

  He lifted himself out and off her body, and spun around to sit on the edge of the bed. Facing away from her.

  “Miles?” she whispered, sitting up.

  His hand jerked up, an imperative gesture that choked off the question she’d been trying to frame.

  She touched his shoulder. He flinched. “Don’t.”

  She curled in on herself, startled. “Sorry,” she whispered.

  “No,” he said. “I’m the one who’s sorry.”

  “Are you okay?”

  “No.” He got up, strode over to the dresser, displaying the amazing muscles of his back, ass, hips. He grabbed the knife and fork, and attacked the steak, carving it into chunks. “I can’t believe myself. I pull you out of a stinking hole where they’ve been starving you to death, and end up fucking you before I even feed you. What a prince.”

  That made her smile. “It’s not your fault.”

  “The hell it isn’t.” His eyes snagged on her naked body, and his penis swelled. He gestured at it, bobbing before him. “See? My priorities are perfectly straight, even now.” He walked over to the bed, brandishing the plate and fork. “Eat, Lara.”

  She held up her hand. “I’m not sure how much I can—”

  “Eat.” The bed rocked and swayed as he knelt.

  She stared into his narrowed eyes, and sighed. He’d throw a fit if she defied him. She took the fork, which held an overlarge chunk of steak, nibbled off a bit. The grilled meat was delicious, but too rich to endure. “I’m only going to be able to eat a few bites,” she warned him. “I’m not doing this to bug you, I promise. I’ve just got to take it slow.”

  “Two more,” he said, his voice steely.

  She accepted another bite. Managed a third, a small one. He scooped up some rice. “Carbs.” His tone dared her to argue with him.

  A few bites of rice, a few rounds of sautéed zuccini, and she was done. He slapped the nearly untouched plate down onto the bedside table, disgusted. “Jesus, Lara. You hardly touched it. You need food.”

  “Leave it. I’
ll try again later, I promise,” she assured him. “Have you eaten anything yourself?”

  He looked shocked at the idea. “Fuck, no! I brought the first steak Davy cooked up here to you.” He frowned at the plate. “And then forgot all about it while nailing you to the bed.”

  “Stop scolding yourself,” she told him. “You must be ravenous. Go downstairs, for God’s sake. Get something to eat!”

  “Need a shower,” he muttered, and stalked into the bathroom.

  Lara pressed her hand against the inert lump of food that sat there in her bewildered stomach as the shower began to hiss.

  She’d messed it up. Come on too strong. She was going to freak him out. Scare him off. He was so tense and twitchy. Too bad he hadn’t invited her into the shower, but enough, already. She’d been more forward with him than she’d ever been in her life. Granted, they had their red hot dream history, but dreams were not something one could build expectations upon. She had to give him space.

  Hard to do, when she wanted to cling to him like a kudzu vine.

  He came out a minute later in a cloud of steam, and jerked on his jeans without looking at her. He found his shirt hidden beneath a fold of the comforter. He shrugged it on, buttoned it.

  “You’re angry?” she asked.

  “At myself, not you. Get some rest.” The door swung shut behind him with a decisive click.

  She tried, she really did, but the meltdown happened anyway. At least she was alone with it this time, under the covers. Hidden.

  Seducing him had seemed like such a good idea. So perfect, to latch onto something exciting and beautiful. Something to cling to while the rest of the world went to shit.

  But she was laying too much on him. He’d given her protection with his mind. He’d risked his life to save her miserable ass. Now she expected him to lift the darkness in her soul, too? Already? With sex?

  Good luck with that, airhead. Sex happened, and maybe it was good, or great, even transcendent, but afterward, there you were, in the bathroom, cleaning up the mess. Still alone, and staring into the mirror at the same screwed-up, ambivalent person you’d been before.

  Pain cramped her inside. She missed their magic connection, craved it like a crack addict, but she would not give in to the temptation to crawl back inside that guy’s mind just because she could.

  Just because it felt so damned good in there.

  That wasn’t a good enough reason. She lectured herself in the harshest possible terms. It would be childish, rude. Creepy, even.

  It was time to grow the fuck up, and leave his mind alone.

  14

  The low murmur in the kitchen subsided into ominous silence when Miles walked into the room. Their ranks had grown while he’d been closeted upstairs with Lara. Kev McCloud had arrived, and Val with him, Tam’s super-spy lover, and the father of her baby.

  They all watched as Miles grabbed himself a plate from the stack on the counter and pulled the heels of the loaf of Italian bread out of the paper bag, heels being all that were left. He scraped the dregs out of the rice pot. Snagged the last smallish steak, its juices congealed on the bloody serving plate. He tossed the final shreds of vegetables that clung to the sides of the skillet over the meager heap of rice, surprised at how hungry he was. He’d gotten out of the habit of food.

  He sat down at a stool at the kitchen bar, since all the places at the kitchen table were taken, and attacked the small plateful of food.

  Everyone was staring. He ignored them, concentrating on getting fuel into himself. He had an uneasy sensation that he was in for an ass-kicking. He was bracing for it. Fueling for it.

  To their credit, they waited until he mopped up the last bits of steak and grains of rice with the last lonely chunk of bread. Trying not to look around pathetically for more.

  Sean made the opening gambit. “So. How was it?”

  Miles counted slowly down from ten before daring to raise his eyes from the plate. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

  “It means, don’t insult our intelligence,” Connor said.

  “I don’t know what you—”

  “Oh, shut up.” Sean’s voice was thick with disgust. “You come down to eat an hour and a half after we cook dinner. That’s your second shower, less than two hours after the first, you dirty, dirty boy. And when you put on Connor’s shirt before you went upstairs, it wasn’t off by two buttonholes, dick-for-brains. Wake up, already. Can’t you at least try to cover your own ass? You’re embarrassing me.”

  Miles looked down at the shirt, appalled. “Aw, fuck.”

  “But the biggest clue is that guilty, dog-on-the-furniture look in your eyes,” Connor said. “If we took you outside and all took turns kicking the shit out of you, would it make you feel better?”

  Miles considered his various responses in the split second that followed, among which was killing every guy in the room. A tall order, considering who they were. It would be quicker and more streamlined to just kill himself. Throw himself into the chasm that should be opening up in front of his feet right . . . about . . . now. Please, God.

  But the chasm didn’t materialize, so he muscled himself past it.

  “Fuck off, all of you,” he muttered.

  “I can’t believe this,” Aaro said. “You extracted her from that fucking snake-pit, and for what? To be your bed toy?”

  “No! I do not have to justify myself to any of you!”

  “No, you do not seem to feel that need anymore,” Sean said.

  “I know it’s been hard on all of you, lately, not having your errand boy at the ready to jump and fetch and carry,” Miles said.

  The silence that followed was flat and cold.

  “Nobody expects anything from you anymore,” Davy announced. “At this point, we know better.”

  “Cut out the guilt trip,” Miles said. “I’m doing the best I can.”

  “Oh, I just bet you did, loverboy,” Aaro said, his voice taunting. “I bet you gave her your all. What, was the dungeon thing a turn-on?”

  He didn’t even remember moving. Just landing with a crash, sprawled on the detritus of plates, food, silverware, paper goods. Pinned flat to the table by four very big guys.

  He’d lunged across the table for Aaro’s throat. Without thought or hesitation, or even the faintest, most remote hint of ingrained socialization making a play to stop him. Like, what the fuck?

  So much for his unshakable calm, his emotional distance. It had gotten all burned up in the past hour, writhing in bed with Lara Kirk.

  Aaro sat just out of reach, eyeing Miles over the rim of his coffee cup. He grabbed a paper plate, cut a big, gooey slice of German chocolate cake from a white bakery box and stuck a plastic fork into it. “Bring the chick some dessert. She needs the calories, now that servicing you sexually has just become part of her job description.”

  Miles convulsed against the eight ruthless hands that shoved him down against the table again. “You’re a fine one to talk,” he retorted. “I don’t remember you holding back with Nina.”

  “I hadn’t just rescued Nina from months of incarceration in a fucking black pit of hell,” Aaro shot back.

  “Calm down, both of you.” It was Kev.

  Something about Kev’s voice always mellowed everybody down a notch. Some magic glitch of his personality. Miles had always envied the guy that trick. It would come in handy, with all the hotheads in his life.

  “You did good, today,” Kev went on. “Nobody’s questioning that—”

  “I just did,” Aaro snarled.

  “Shut up,” Kev said calmly. “I’m talking about the extraction. You improvised the whole damn thing, on the fly. Blew everybody’s minds. That was good work.”

  “You don’t need to stroke my ego,” he muttered. “I’m not an idiot.”

  “Could have fooled us,” Connor muttered, but he and the other guys cautiously loosened their grip on him and allowed him to stand. He brushed splotches of food from his shirt.

  “Totally
aside from the opinions flying around about how you spent the last two hours, we need more info to proceed,” Kev went on. “Because, despite what you seem to think, we do actually give a shit about you. And we still want to help. So what’s your plan?”

  Miles stared at the mess he’d made on the table, abashed at Kev’s words. “I don’t have a plan,” he admitted. “I pulled her out, but she’s not safe. There’s nowhere on earth she could be safe from that guy. You saw what he can do. I have no idea what to do with her.”

  Davy’s voice was quiet but clear in the silence that followed.

  “Keep her,” he said.

  Miles stared at him. Davy took a pull on his beer and stared back, straight on and unapologetic. “You know you want to,” he said.

  Miles opened his mouth, and closed it before something stupid and inane could fall out. His brain was wiped clean.

  Seconds passed. Sean started to nod, enthusiastically. “Yeah, that works. That girl is not the fuck buddy type, my friend. That’s the only way to make it right. Otherwise, you’re just an opportunistic dickhead.”

  “Shut up, Sean,” Davy said. “You’ll scare him.”

  Miles just stood there, like an idiot, a buzz running through his body. A subtle electrical current, tingling. Like fear, but brighter.

  “That’s Neanderthal, Davy,” he said.

  Davy grunted, untroubled by that assessment.

  “She’s a grown woman,” Miles said. “She might have plans. She might not want to be kept.”

  “Who asked her?” Davy said.

  Miles blinked. Whoa. That was a level of self-confidence to which he could scarcely dream to aspire. “It’s not as easy as that.”

  “I never meant to imply that it’s easy,” Davy replied. “It’s not easy at all. It’s a total mind-twisting clusterfuck, trying to figure a woman out. But what the fuck else do you have to do with your life? You’ve got all those brains coming out of your ears. Use them for something useful. Blow her mind. Be irresistible. So it’s hard. Big fucking deal.”

  “Do the hard thing?” Miles said.