The grip of her sheath around his cock was just as tight as ever but far more giving as he eased inside in a long, slow glide, an example of how her body already accepted his possession. They moved as one as he thrust and withdrew, her hips rising and falling in syncopation, prolonging the friction. A low flame blazed down his spine and settled in his balls as the pressure built, urging him to take her faster, harder, but he pushed the impulse aside. He had already taken her hard and rough. Now was the time for gentle, sweet. The intensity was still there. The same need to see her come undone and follow her into the mindless oblivion of release pounded in his blood as strongly as ever, but this was their time. Their time to forge that connection he desperately wanted.
He hooked her legs over his arms and pushed as deep into her core as possible. Her eyes widened and her fingers clutched his shoulders. “Oh, Bale. Ah. God. That’s incredible.”
The squeeze of her cunt made his eyes roll back and he fought to keep them open and focused on her flushed face. Tears of ecstasy made the light-blue flecks in her irises shimmer and the swollen pout of her lips formed a little heart as she panted and gasped beneath him. Oh, if only he could pause this perfect moment of pure sensuality in time forever.
“Ari,” he groaned as her hands smoothed over the sweat-slick skin of his back and sides. The bite of her nails digging into the muscles wreaked havoc with his concentration. “Gods, woman. I’m trying to make this last.”
“I don’t think I’ll survive.” Her head thrashed against the pillow.
“Look at me, Ari.” It took a few moments for her feverish gaze to meet his. “I’m right there with you. If only you knew how much of you I can feel. Right now.” He punctuated his words with swivels of his hips and erupted into her depths.
“Bale.” She arched her back and the black circles of her pupils dilated a split second before her pussy clamped down around his cock. Tremors rolled out from her core in long, undulating waves that lapped at his body as if she were the ocean and he stood on shore. Like a riptide she sucked him under to surf the rolling sea of their release before tossing him onto the rocks when he had nothing left to give. Through it all, their gazes remained locked, all her emotions flickering in those luminous eyes that held nothing back.
“Ah, Ariel.” He pressed his forehead to hers. “Ariel.”
“I know.” A tear slipped down her cheek.
He rolled to his side and held her quaking body close and savored the feeling of her in his arms. Before they were ready the real world was going to barge in with guns blazing, as life was wont to do. Too few times were there these moments of perfection. Each one needed to be cherished.
Def Leppard’s Rocket tore into the quiet with all of the subtlety of a chainsaw cutting through a textbook.
Son of a bitch.
Bale cracked open an eye and glared at the cellphone that pealed from the pocket of his jeans beside the bed.
Only four people knew his number, but only two ever called with any regularity.
“I’m sorry, Ari. I must take this call.” He kissed her shoulder and reached for the offending object. “Ya.”
“I apologize for disturbing you, Bale,” Lucian said. “You are needed in my office. Immediately.”
“For what purpose?”
“As they say around here, the shit is a hitting the fan. Come now.”
The Bale he had been a year prior would have told Lucian to fuck off, followed with a right hook to the jaw, but the Bale he was now understood his former commander wouldn’t have contacted him unless it was of utmost urgency.
“I’m on my way.”
He quelled the urge to crush the phone and set it gently on the side table.
“Ari, I am sorry.”
“I heard.” She hugged him from behind. The soft cushion of her breasts against his back made him curse the intrusion all the more. “Is there something wrong? You got so tense.”
“I do not know, but Lucian has called a meeting.” He reached around and pinched her chin between his thumb and forefinger. “I may be gone all night.”
“I understand. Really, Bale. You don’t have to answer to me.”
But he wanted to.
“Breakfast?” he offered. “I cannot cook, but I can bring something.”
She smiled and kissed his lips. “Breakfast sounds nice.”
He risked Lucian’s ire by taking the time to kiss her properly goodbye then dressed quickly.
Ari followed him to the door. Wrapped in the sheet, she made it all too tempting to say, “Fuck it,” and pull her back into bed.
“Be careful,” she said. “With whatever it is you have to do. Stay safe.”
“I will.” He cupped her cheek. “You stay safe too.”
“Don’t worry about me. I’m going to pass out as soon as the door closes.” She winked.
After another quick kiss, he was in the hall and Ari was on the other side of the closed door. Physically they were separated, yet he felt her take up residence in his hearts. For the first time in a long while he prayed to the Gods for his safe return.
* * * * *
“Come in,” Lucian’s deep voice ordered from behind the door before Bale lifted his hand to knock.
The general stood before his desk with his arms crossed in a deceptively casual pose as he leaned against the dark wood.
Bale closed the door then stood at attention with shoulders back and spine straight and waited. Nothing was said for several minutes as the men eyed each other—the general clearly expecting answers to unasked questions, and the solider not willing to incriminate himself.
Lucian arched a dark brow and tapped his long forefinger on the newspaper laying on the desk by his hip. “Did you read the paper today?”
“No sir.”
“Here. Have a look.” He stepped to the side and gestured with a grand sweep of his arm.
With one eye on Lucian, he crossed to the desk then glanced down at the paper. In bold ink the headline screamed, The Claymore Strikes Again. He did a double take as he saw the black-and-white photos of a hooded man gripping a large sword. Although the face was concealed, Bale knew it was him in the photo.
Even more damning, Lucian knew it as well. “What do you have to say?”
He shrugged. “The Claymore? Isn’t that a long broadsword used in medieval Scotland? That’s not what I use at all.”
“Bale—”
“I understand,” he interrupted as Lucian’s face turned red and his chest rose as he gathered steam. “This is not good.”
“Oh, we’ve only begun to breach not good.” He turned the computer monitor to face them. “This man was at the club this evening asking questions about a sword-carrying vigilante.”
On the screen was footage captured from the club’s surveillance cameras of a dark-haired man dressed rather plainly in a blazer and jeans. By the set of his shoulders and the way his eyes constantly scanned the area, Bale could tell he had some sort of military training.
“Who is he?”
“Police Captain Marco DeWinter. He’s been tasked with apprehending, well, you. He’s also a former coworker of Brett’s from when she was on the force. And DeWinter and his team were the men who helped retrieve Fiona when she was kidnapped by that crime lord.”
“Meaning I can’t hurt him.”
“Meaning,” Lucian frowned and shook his head, “he’s met the Chameleon. Meaning, he knows there is at least one person on this planet who has extraordinary powers so it would be safe for him to assume there may be more. Meaning he now suspects that one of our family members is, or knows who, this Claymore is.”
“Then I will take extra care to not be discovered.”
“You still have a lot to learn about this world, Bale.” Lucian sighed then sat behind his desk and furiously began to type on the keyboard. “Now that you have a moniker, you have an official fan club. Postings of your exploits are cropping up across all of the social media sites. Anyone with a camera is a potential threat to exposing
your identity and broadcasting your face to the world. It’s not about being careful around DeWinter or the police. You, as the Claymore, cannot be seen by anyone.”
“Why not? The Chameleon is seen all over Cedar.”
“Cedar is not the city, as you might have noticed. Most of the citizens there want to protect the Chameleon, while here you may be a hero one day and villain the next. And the Chameleon leaves police work to the police. At times I think you like to rub their failures in their face.”
His spine straightened with indignation and he sputtered, “I take no pride when they fail, for it means someone needlessly suffered.”
“Nonetheless, you have to do more than lie low.” He drew in a deep breath through his nose and Bale felt as if the hammer were about to be dropped. “I’m sorry, Bale. You have to stop fighting crime.”
Red filled his vision. He slapped his hands on the desk in a burst of anger that cracked the legs and shouted, “Who are you to tell me what I can and cannot do? You are not my superior.”
“I am your friend,” Lucian replied, barely registering the flare of anger. “I cannot let you put yourself or this family at risk.”
“Then I’ll leave.” He shoved at the broken desk and turned on his heel.
“What about Ari?”
Lucian might as well have thrown up a brick wall directly in his path, he stopped so fast.
Ari.
If his identity as the vigilante became known, she’d discover exactly what type of man she had given her trust and love to. Learn that the darkness that lived inside him extended beyond a taste for kink.
She’ll find out about the evil he had committed.
“I know you care for her, Bale. By the Gods, I can show you security footage of the club right now where practically everyone is engaged is some sort of carnal activity. When you two came together earlier this evening, you generated so much sexual energy, I was half-convinced you had bonded.”
Another punch to the solar plexus. With all the secrets between them, he could never bond with Ari. He hadn’t the guts to do so with Natalia, and since then he’d done so many terrible things. Even with Ari’s ready acceptance of his hungers, there was no way she’d be as forgiving of the rest of his nature.
Lucian had been right. The shit was hitting the fan.
“Ariel will not be touched by my actions. This, I vow,” he said without turning around.
“How do you—”
“Message received, General.”
Before Lucian could say another word, Bale was out of the room and racing out the front door and down the fire stairs.
This was unfair. It was all unfair. Millions of miles and several planets away, the Gods still had the power to fuck with him. To give him a taste of paradise before wrenching it out of his desperate grasp. What more did they want from him? Hadn’t he sacrificed enough? He’d lost his home, his family, his honor. Was nothing ever to be his?
He burst through a side door out onto the empty sidewalk. The clouds had opened up and released a steady drizzle that quickly soaked the shoulders of his sweatshirt. He stood with his face raised to the sky, his eyes shut tight to withhold tears of frustration. The few that escaped his tightly closed lids mingled with the chilly rain and ran down his neck to tickle his frantic pulse.
To continue seeing Ari meant to risk her finding out his secrets. To stay away would mean breaking her heart. No matter what course of action he chose, Ari was going to be hurt.
Unless he stopped being a vigilante.
If the Claymore disappeared, then there was no fear of his identity being discovered. He could still be with Ari. Crisis averted.
But what of his vow? The only thing of value he possessed was his word. Without it, he had nothing. Dare he break a promise sealed with blood?
A spiky tightness wrapped around his chest as the bitter tang of fear coated the back of his tongue. He glanced around the alley and drew in one breath, then another. Mixed in with the heart-pounding panic was the icy-cold squirming of malice slithering down his back. The sensations were sharp, fresh, definitely coming from outside and not within the building.
Without a moment’s hesitation he flipped his hood over his wet head and followed the trial of emotions like a bloodhound after a fox. As he neared the source of the turmoil, he paused and crouched behind a Dumpster to better survey the scene.
A man had a woman pinned beneath him to the hood of a car. The pair created an obscene hood ornament as her stocking-clad legs flailed in the air. Her tiny clenched fists pummeled his shoulders and head as she screamed out in terror.
Adrenaline shot through Bale’s veins, propelling him to move but he tempered the urge and took precious seconds to mentally feel for anyone who might also be lurking in the dark. For all he knew, this could be a setup. A sting intending to draw out the vigilante and he could be walking right into their trap.
The need to hesitate made him nauseated. A woman was in danger. A cause for immediate action. Period. As a warrior and former guard for the king, a moment’s pause meant the difference between life and death.
“Enough,” he grumbled, pissed over having to second-guess his actions for one moment.
He traced to the couple and grabbed the man by the back of his neck, lifting him high into the air with one hand. The man wiggled and clawed at Bale’s unyielding grip as he gurgled with fear.
“Quiet! When I set you upon your feet, you will have five seconds to disappear. If I am able to see you at all, even the ends of your shoelaces, I will take you down and rip your cock off and shove it down your throat. And do not think that once you are out of my sight you are absolved of your crimes. Think about harming another human again, I will find you and carry out your punishment. Do you understand?” He punctuated his question by shaking the terrified man.
“Y-yes.”
“Five. Four…” he began the countdown without setting the man down and smiled as the familiar scent of urine reached his nose. By the Gods, he did love it when they pissed their pants. Rubber soles scrapped asphalt as Bale slowly lowered his arm and the man’s feet made contact with the road before he beat tracks.
As the assailant rounded the corner, Bale turned back to the girl. She had slid to the wet pavement and sat huddled in a sobbing heap. Her nylons were torn over both knees and the sleeve of her jacket was ripped at the shoulder. Since there were other holes in her clothing, he wasn’t positive if they were caused by the attack or part of a fashion statement. Through the streaks of eyeliner and rouge, he recognized her as a frequent patron of the nightclub.
He kept a respectful distance and knelt on the wet pavement. “Do you require medical attention, little one?”
The cap of her short black hair sprayed water droplets in every direction as she shook her head. She began to hiccup as she struggled to control her tears.
“Are you positive? I can get help.”
“I’m—I’m okay. I think. I don’t know.” She hiccupped. “I just wanna be home.”
“Do you have a way home?”
“Yeah.” She jerked her thumb at the sedan at her back. With a shuddering breath she glanced up at him and her eyes widened. “Hey. You’re that guy. The superhero.”
“I’m just a fellow who was in the right place at the right time. Are you able to drive yourself, or will you require assistance?”
“I can drive. I don’t live too far away.” She took his offered hand and swayed on her heels. “Oh, I don’t feel so good.”
“Let’s get you a taxi.”
“No. I just want to go home.” In the dark he heard her sobs begin again. “I didn’t ask for this, you know. My clothes might say otherwise, but I didn’t ask for this. That creep followed me. After I told him no, he followed me to my car. He kept coming at me—”
“You don’t need to explain. I know none of this was your fault. There will always be assholes around who feast on preying on those they think are weaker, and I will always be there to stop them.”
“Thank you. Thank you.” She offered him a watery smile then dashed to the door of her car and quickly jumped inside.
He waited until she maneuvered the car safely to the corner and made a right turn without incident before he lifted his face to the rain and waited for the rush of adrenaline to abate.
Society could call him what they wanted—hero, Claymore, villain—it didn’t matter. This was his destiny. The world needed his strength, his sword and his courage to step between good and evil. If his identity was discovered, so be it. The reward was far greater than the risk. Lucian, Amaryllis, all of them, would just have to understand.
And maybe one day Ari too, if she cared for him as he did for her.
He had made a vow on his wife’s and daughter’s lives, and he would see it through until the day he died.
Chapter Ten
“What’s with the traffic jam, ladies?” Ari scooted around the three waitresses blocking the service station and stepped behind the bar. She tried to use her boss voice, but she couldn’t keep the smile out of her tone. Licking maple syrup and whipped cream off a man’s abs for breakfast, and lunch, did that to a woman. “We’re not that busy and there aren’t any drinks in the queue.”
“We, um… We had a question on the new wine list.”
While the comment was directed at her, Ari noticed all three gazes were focused over her shoulder. Following the line of sight, she spotted the handsome gentleman seated at the end of the bar chatting with Ted.
He was pretty dishy, she had to admit, in a very Pierce Brosnan/James Bond-ish sort of way. Nice build, not too buff or too lean in his black-blazer-white-button-down combo. With the little bit of evening scruff on his cheeks, his style said he cared about his appearance, but not too much. He had dark hair with a touch of gray at the temples that leant him just enough credibility to be the scholarly type, but she recognized the twinkle in his eyes that indicated he could be a total badass if given a chance. Her ex had that same twinkle. A real charmer. Dangerous.
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