Fiona sat on a low, long sofa in the middle of the living room. She clutched a silver picture frame in her hands. Tears slid down her pink cheeks and evaporated off her flushed face.
“Um, Fiona? Can I talk to you a minute?”
“Get out,” Fiona snarled. “I don’t want you in here.”
I felt physically sick from the hurt and anger in her voice. I took a step back. I should go.
No...
Not yet...
Must explain...
My inner voice whispered, and I squared my shoulders. I walked over to the couch, sat down on the far end, and squinted at the picture in Fiona’s hands. Travis Teague beamed at her from beneath the glass.
“He seems like he was a nice man.”
Fiona stroked the picture with her fingertips. “He was a nice man, the best man there was, until you came along and ruined everything.”
I took a deep breath. “I don’t mean to intrude on your grief, but I want to explain to you why I did what I did. I’m not asking for your forgiveness. That’s too much to ask. But maybe if I tell you the reasons why, you might be able to at least understand.”
“Never. I’ll never understand you and your twisted obsession with us. You ruined our lives. And for what? To sell a few more thousand copies of that rag of a newspaper you work for?”
Fiona’s eyes burned into me. My temperature shot up about five degrees. Sweat trickled down my neck.
“Not exactly,” I replied.
Fiona’s hands gripped the picture frame so hard I thought it would crack. A diamond ring glowed like a white-hot star on her left hand. A diamond ring... An idea popped into my mind.
“You know, I was engaged at one time,” I said in a cautious voice.
“Good for you. What was he, blind? Or just deaf and dumb?”
I bit my tongue. Although I wanted to snap back at Fiona, I would say my piece and go. The rest was up to her.
“No, he wasn’t blind or deaf or dumb. His name was Matt. He was a very nice man. Loving, kind, considerate. He always remembered my birthday and never left the toilet seat up. We dated for a long time. The day he proposed to me was one of the happiest days of my life. I thought we would be together forever. Build a house with a white picket fence, have a couple of kids, get a dog. But things didn’t quite turn out that way.”
Fiona said nothing, but I could feel the other woman struggling to contain her curiosity. That was the thing about stories. You always wanted to know how they turned out, even if they ended badly. They hooked you like a fish, and you couldn’t wriggle away until you’d heard the whole thing.
“So what happened?” Fiona asked. “Where is this Matt character?”
“He’s back in Beginnings, my hometown, doing what he used to do.”
More silence.
“So why didn’t you marry him?”
I smiled. I’d hooked the superhero. “I was going to. It was our wedding day. I was in my dress, and the wedding was less than thirty minutes away. But I was having second thoughts. I felt as though Matt was keeping something from me. Something big. He’d been acting strangely, coming home at odd hours and whatnot.”
“What did you do?”
“I went to Matt’s room to ask him what was bothering him. I found him rolling around on the bed with Karen, my best friend and maid of honor.” The scene flashed through my mind. This time, though, it didn’t stir as much anger and hurt as it used to. I could look back on it calmly, rationally, and not turn into a jealous monster.
Fiona sniffed. “Must have sucked to have been you.”
“That wasn’t the worst part.”
“There’s something worse than catching your fiancé and your best friend together on your wedding day?”
“There’s always something worse. In my case, it was the discovery my beloved fiancé was actually the Machinator, the superhero. During all the rolling around, their clothes had come undone, and the costume peeked out from under his shirt.”
Fiona arched a blond eyebrow. “You were engaged to the Machinator? The guy who can control machines with his mind?”
“Yep. And my best friend was Crusher. You can imagine my shock, not just at finding the two of them together, but also at the fact they were a superhero and ubervillain. They were going at it like bunny rabbits. And do you know what they blamed their transgression on? The reason they told me they had to sleep together? Radioactive waste. Can you believe that?”
Fiona gave me a look that was almost pitying. Almost.
“After that, I snapped,” I continued. “I took pictures of the two of them in their costumes right there on the bed. The pictures ran in the newspaper the next day. But exposing the two of them wasn’t enough for me. It didn’t take the hurt away. It didn’t ease my pain. So I made a vow to myself, to the whole world. Nobody was going to be fooled like I was ever again. Nobody. I went from town to town, newspaper to newspaper, exposing superheroes and ubervillains. Finally, I wound up in Bigtime. You know the rest.”
Fiona stared at the picture in her hands.
“Funny, isn’t it?” I let out a bitter laugh. “How one event can affect the lives of so many. But that’s karma for you.”
“Karma?”
“Destiny. Fate. Kismet. What goes around comes around. Karma.”
Fiona didn’t reply.
I stood. My time with the superhero was up. I’d said what I needed to. “I wanted you to hear my side of the story, and now you have. You can hate me if you want to. Avoid me, berate me, whatever. I deserve all that and more. No matter what the others say, it’s my fault that Travis is dead. If I could take it back, I would. But I can’t. That’s the really bad thing about karma. You don’t get any second chances. At least, not in this lifetime.”
Chapter Twenty
After that, my relationship with Fiona changed. She no longer disparaged or mocked every single thing I did. Just every other thing. It was a truce. Of sorts.
Another day passed. I stared at my papers and graphs and flowcharts. I was no closer to uncovering Malefica’s identity. I snatched the paper in front of me, wadded it up into a tight ball and tossed it at the trash can. It bounced off the top of the massive pile and landed on the floor. I glared at it, wishing I had Fiona’s ability to make it burst into flames.
I’d spent the past three hours poring over a variety of documents relating to the Terrible Triad and had gotten absolutely nowhere. I rolled my neck around to relieve some of the tension and looked at one of the clocks on the walls. Nine-thirty. Quitting time.
I pulled open the door to the library and ambled down the hall. A loud scuffle up ahead caught my attention. Who could that be? The others were all taking a rare night off so they could catch up on their other lives. Sam was plotting his next business takeover. Henry was at work writing about the latest, greatest computer advancements. Chief Newman was hot on the trail of a group of thieves who’d hit three banks in the past two days. And Fiona was busy coming up with new color combinations that would make a flamingo neon pink with envy. Or just give the poor creature a massive headache.
I reached one of the training rooms. Inside, Striker jousted with invisible enemies. His swords zipped through the air, and he moved with the easy grace of a dancer. My eyes traced over him, especially because he was clothed in his black leather costume. My heart fluttered, and my hormones kicked into high gear. Oh, the things that man did for a leather suit. It was practically criminal.
I hadn’t seen much of Sam. We had been avoiding each other since that night in the kitchen, when we’d almost made love. It was for the best, but still... There was something about him that made me weak in the knees. And it didn’t have anything to do with radioactive waste. At least, I didn’t think it did.
I knocked on the window, and Striker waved me in. I pushed open the door.
“Hey, I thought you had a business meeting tonight.”
“It got moved to next week.”
“Oh.” I shifted from one foot to the oth
er. “Care if I watch you? I need to unwind before I go to bed.”
“Help yourself.”
I settled on the padded floor in a corner of the room. Striker resumed his stance. He dodged and darted like a panther on the prowl, and his swords sliced through the air as he cut down enemy after enemy. Suddenly, he turned and threw one of the swords behind him. It landed in the middle of a target. He made a strange motion with his wrist. The sword flew back out of the target and landed in his hands. Striker went through another series of attacks before landing in a low crouch.
I clapped. Striker straightened and bowed to me.
“Very impressive. I think you killed everything in your way.”
“Thanks. That’s the plan.” He wiped the glistening sweat from his forehead.
I glanced at the two swords dangling from his hands. “How do they work? I’ve always wondered.”
“Get up, and I’ll show you.”
Striker put one of the swords on a nearby rack, then offered his hand to me. I took it, and he pulled me up. My body brushed against his, and his musky scent filled my nose. A warm sensation flooded my veins, and my whole body tingled. I stepped back.
Striker held out a sword, and I took it. Although it was made out of some silver metal, the weapon was surprisingly lightweight. It curved a bit at the end, like a scimitar, and the simple, unadorned pommel fit nicely into my hand. I swung the sword back and forth a few times. It felt as light as a pencil.
Striker reached for the sword, and I gave it back to him. Our fingers touched for a brief moment. A jolt of electricity zinged through me. The air between us hummed, sparked, and snapped. Striker cleared his throat and pointed to the pommel. He slid open a small compartment.
“The swords each contain a microchip in the hilt, along with a propulsion motor,” he explained. “These microchips are linked to the one in the insignia on my costume.” He pointed to the F5 shape stitched across his leather-bound chest. “I control the swords with nerve impulses. In other words, I move my hand a certain way, and the swords automatically come back to me. It’s something Henry and I dreamed up.”
“Amazing,” I said. “I always thought they were magical or something.”
Striker laughed. The warm, husky sound made tingles shoot through my body. “Not quite.”
I stared at him, curious to know more about the sexy superhero. “So, how did you get your powers? If you don’t mind my asking.”
“I don’t mind. My father’s construction company was erecting a building near the Bigtime Nuclear Power Plant. Travis and I decided to go down to the site one night and goof off, ride our skateboards and bikes around, things like that. We were thirteen.” Striker’s eyes grew dark and gray with memories.
“My father warned us not to get too close to the edge of the site that bordered the power plant. There were all kinds of pools of radioactive waste and other nasty things there. Of course, we did get too close. I rode my bike down a hill, lost control, and fell into one of the pools. It looked like green sludge, only it glowed. I couldn’t swim very well then. The sludge was thick and heavy, and I thought I was going to drown. Travis didn’t hesitate. He dove in and pulled me out. We crawled back up the hill.”
“I don’t remember much after that, just lying there and feeling things happen in my body. I passed out. When I came to, my senses were heightened. Even though it was after midnight, I could see in the dark. I could smell things better, hear better. Everything seemed amped up, magnified. I stumbled around in the dark for a few minutes, trying to get my bearings. I fell and cut my hand. I looked at it, and the skin began to...move. The wound sewed itself shut. Later, I realized I had the ability to regenerate or heal quickly.”
“What about Travis?”
“He’d been affected by whatever was in that pool too. He eventually woke up. When he did, the wind picked up. It howled around us like a tornado. I was scared to death, but Travis never moved a muscle. He seemed...comforted by the wind somehow.”
“You know the rest of the story. He became Tornado, and I became Striker. Eventually, we hooked up with Fiera and Mr. Sage. Hermit joined the group later. The Fearless Five were born. But no more. Now, Tornado’s gone. My best friend is gone. Forever.” His voice ended with a whisper.
And it’s all my fault. I put a hand on his arm, wanting to comfort the superhero. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”
Striker stared into my face. His eyes burned as bright as two silver stars. I moved closer to him, drawn by his hypnotic gaze.
“Carmen,” he whispered.
Striker leaned down and kissed me. A thousand things sprang to life inside me. Guilt, desire, heat, longing, more desire. I wrapped my arms around his neck and drew him closer. Striker growled in response. This felt good—right somehow. For once, the voice inside my head didn’t chatter at me to stop or keep my distance from the hunky superhero. Maybe I just couldn’t hear it over the rapid thumping of my heart. Maybe I didn’t want to hear it.
The kiss deepened. Our tongues dueled. Teasing. Tasting. Tempting. Striker picked me up as though I weighed nothing and pulled me closer. I wrapped my legs around his waist, feeling his hard body flex beneath my own. Striker’s hands moved to cup my bottom, and a low growl escaped his throat.
“I want you, Carmen. Heaven help me, but tonight, I need you.”
I pulled back and stared into his eyes. Guilt, desire, longing. All those emotions and more swirled in the silvery depths. The same emotions reflected in my own eyes. The safe thing to do, the sane thing to do, would have been to stop. To walk away. To pretend this never happened. To pretend there was nothing between us.
But I’d never been one to play it safe. I didn’t care about the past or the future or my own bad karma with men. All that mattered was the two of us and this moment, these feelings between us.
“Then take me to your room,” I whispered. “Take me there. Now.”
Striker didn’t have to be told twice. We were outside the door to his suite before I knew exactly how we’d gotten there. I twisted the knob open. Striker carried me inside and kicked the door shut with his heavy boot. He set me down in front of him, and I moved back into his arms. I drew his head down to mine, delving into the hot, moist depths of his welcoming mouth. Striker’s hands roamed up and down my back, kneading, caressing, sculpting. His erection pressed into my thigh, letting me know he wanted me as much as I wanted him. It was nice to be wanted. Very, very nice.
He walked me backward until my legs hit the edge of the bed. Striker leaned over me, and I let gravity do the rest. I sank onto the bed and pulled Striker down on top of me. The weight of his hard body on mine only fueled my desire.
Striker rained hungry kisses down my neck. Cold chills swept through my hot, aching body. I tangled my fingers in his thick, black hair. It felt smoother than satin. Striker moved back to my mouth, and we exchanged another long, heated kiss that left me panting for breath. We broke apart for a moment. Striker’s eyes glowed like white-hot coals, contrasting with the black mask that covered his chiseled face.
I tugged off his mask and threw it aside. “I want Sam Sloane to make love to me tonight. Not Striker.”
“You’ve got us both, Carmen. You’ve got us both,” he whispered before capturing my mouth with his.
*
We lay there on the bed kissing for a long time. Slow kisses, deep kisses, lingering kisses.
Sam sat up and pulled me onto his lap. “I want to taste you, Carmen. All of you.”
He drew my T-shirt up over my head. I shivered as the cool air hit my bare skin. We kissed once more, and then he reached around my back and undid the clasp on my bra. My breasts spilled into his smooth, waiting hands. I gasped at his firm touch.
“You’re so beautiful,” Sam whispered.
He leaned down and took my nipple into his hot, wet mouth. I arched my back, letting out little moans of pleasure. His other hand moved to the clasp of my jeans and farther on into my panties. I rose up on my knees and parted
my legs. He plunged his fingers inside me. Sam stroked me, slow at first, drawing lazy circles and figure eights with his nimble fingers. I whimpered. It was so pleasurable it was almost painful. I felt like a champagne cork about to pop from the built-up pressure. Finally, I did.
“Sam!” I screamed and shuddered my release.
As I lay there, spent and euphoric, Sam continued on with his explorations. The rest of my clothes followed my T-shirt and bra and sailed to the floor. I gave myself over to Sam’s masterful touch. Kissing. Licking. Caressing. From head to toe, he explored my body as if I were some unknown continent he’d just discovered and was eager to conquer.
I happily surrendered.
But I burned for him, yearned to touch him the way he was touching me, longed to feel him inside me. My fingers probed and prodded and plucked, but I couldn’t quite find a way to get through the thick leather that covered his body.
“Damn superhero suit,” I muttered.
Sam laughed. “Let me.”
He stood up. Sam grabbed some sort of zipper or toggle and yanked off the top part of the suit, exposing his perfect chest. He peeled off his pants, shucked off his boots, and stood there, naked before me.
I eyed his sculpted chest, his rippling six-pack abs, his long, hard erection. My mouth went as dry as a cotton field in summertime. The man was beautiful, perfect, gorgeous. A true Adonis come to life. And he wanted me. I still couldn’t believe it.
Sam came back to bed and reached for me. I pushed him onto his back, avoiding his seeking hands.
“Oh no,” I said in wicked voice. “It’s my turn to play.”
So I did. Teasing. Tasting. Tempting. Tormenting him just the way he had done to me. I ran my tongue down his chest, following the trail of dark hair that led south. Sam smelled of musk and tasted of salty sweat. The combination was more intoxicating than any drug I’d ever had. I closed my hand around him, stroking his hard, swollen shaft.
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