Chapter 14
CHAPTER 14
Talk about dropping a bombshell. Rebecca could only gape as Scorpio admitted to enjoying having her nearby and then left.
Left to shower that naked hunky body. Not an image that helped.
What also didn’t aid? She kind of enjoyed his presence, too, and this despite him not being anything like the men she usually dated. She tended to veer toward intellectuals who enjoyed fine dining and wore button-up shirts, not a guy who could have been a Viking with his tall blond bulky build. At the same time, he wasn’t a dummy. Scorpio might not have a college degree—according to what she’d learned in his book—but the man possessed a brain and a sense of honor she admired. He chose to be a hero, not because he had to, but because he wanted to. Despite the fact Cetus tried to kill him, rather than be scared off, he appeared more determined than ever to go after them.
It was inexplicably hot.
Like her. She fanned herself as she waited, trying to not imagine the water sluicing over those toned muscles and slick skin. Failed, because when he emerged, she remained flushed and bothered.
“You okay?” he asked, towel-drying his hair while bare-chested and wearing hip-hugging combat pants.
“My body is still adjusting to the abrupt change in climate,” she lied.
“Give me a second to find a shirt and boots and we’ll head over to see Aquarius.”
Scorpio disappeared for a moment and emerged clothed, but it didn’t matter. She could still picture him in the buff.
“How many flights of stairs this time?” she asked for distraction.
“Not many,” he replied with a grin. “But say the word and I’ll carry you.”
“I can climb on my own,” she grumbled, ignoring the temptation to say yes.
As they exited his room, she asked, “Do you really think your friend will find anything about the orb and why they wanted it so badly?”
“Depends on how cocky they are about their server security. Many criminals don’t trust computers to keep their secrets, and at the same time, having information accessible via a network makes sharing simpler.”
“I am struggling to see how a metal ball can be so important.”
“I would imagine it’s what’s inside they’re after and, before you ask, no clue what that might be. All I know is Sage really thinks it’s important we be the ones to have it in custody instead of them.”
The floor he stopped climbing at proved more modern than she’d seen thus far. A copy machine sat against a wall. There were screens on the walls displaying news channels from around the world and clocks showing the various time zones.
She craned to look around. “Is this like Zodiac Command Control?”
“Yup. As our head dude, Aries has that big office over there.” Scorpio pointed to a closed door. “The computer lab is here as well.”
“If this tower isn’t visible or accessible to the outside, how do you get internet and electricity?” she asked.
“Space fairies,” he replied with a straight face.
She snorted. “You’ll never let me forget that term, will you?”
“Nope.” He laughed. “As with all other things, the tower gives what we need.”
“And that doesn’t bother you? Don’t you want to know why? Who made the tower? How does it work?”
“I don’t need to know how to make bread to enjoy eating it,” he replied, leading her into the computer lab, filled with, you guessed it, computers and screens and a thickly muscled fellow sitting in a chair that spun as he turned to greet them.
“Good timing. I was just about to buzz.” The man’s smile widened. “Oh, hello. You must be Dr. Guthrie.” He stood and held out his hand. “I’m Aquarius.”
“Nice to meet you. Call me Rebecca.” She shook his extended hand. “I hear you’re the tech guru.”
“Guilty as charged. And you’re a pretty well-known scientist.”
“I don’t know if I’d say that,” was her demure reply.
“I read some of your published papers. I can see why you graduated top of your class.”
Scorpio cleared his throat. “Sorry to interrupt, but hoping for good news. Did you get into Cetus’ server?”
“Yes and no.” Aquarius sat and spun back to his screen. “I’ve managed to get past the first few firewalls. I’ve currently got access to employee files and scheduling, lab results, purchasing orders, even a few of their current projects.”
“I hear a but,” Scorpio stated, leaning against a desk with arms crossed.
“I encountered another firewall, a good one, I might add.”
“Can you crack it?”
“Most likely, but it will take me a bit more time,” Aquarius stated.
“Any idea of what’s hiding behind?” Scorpio questioned.
“Could be something, could be nothing.” Aquarius shrugged. “Won’t know until I get past it.”
“Well, that fucking blows,” Scorpio grumbled.
Rebecca jumped in. “In the stuff you have access to, did you find anything about my trip to Antarctica?”
“Nope, and I’ve been looking.” Aquarius tapped at his keyboard. “Guess them keeping it a secret isn’t too surprising, given their true mission involved the orb. Oddly enough, while there is nothing about your work down there, you do exist on their payroll as a contracted employee.”
“What about their second facility?” Scorpio asked.
“Wait, what second facility?” Rebecca exclaimed. “I thought they had only the one office.”
Scorpio glanced at her. “Turns out they’ve got some kind of hush-hush location in Area 51, on loan to them from the government.”
“Area 51? You’re kidding, right? I thought that place was a hyped-up myth.”
“It exists, although they no longer have any alien organic samples or equipment to test. We cleared them out in the seventies,” Scorpio replied.
So matter of fact, Rebecca blurted out, “Why would the Zodiacs do that?””
“Sage saw bad shit happening if humanity copied the tech.” Aquarius waved his hands. “Something about us not being ready for advanced alien technology.”
“The Area 51 aliens actually existed,” Rebecca mused aloud. “Were they super tall and gray like the rumors claims?”
“Not quite. The aliens started out as larvae. Once they attached and gained control of their host, their feeding and growth process shifted the appearance of the person they leeched onto.”
“You’re saying the gray men I’ve seen portrayed were human?”
“Yup.” Aquarius nodded. “That’s what they end up looking like after a while.”
“If there’s nothing alien there, why would Cetus want to use the Area 51 facility?” she wondered aloud.
“Privacy? Labs?” Aquarius rolled his shoulders. “Who knows? I’m going to assume info on it, as well as your mission, are behind the mega firewall. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“Fucking computers,” Scorpio complained once more.
“Give me a day or two. I’ve yet to meet a…” Aquarius trailed off as his gaze returned to his screen. His fingers began tapping rapidly but not as quickly as the screen rolling gibberish in front of them.
“What’s happening?” Rebecca asked, recognizing the numbers and letters as lines of code.
“Someone’s trying to hack the tower mainframe,” Aquarius exclaimed, sounding incredulous. “That should be impossible. I’ve got safeguards in place to ensure no one can back-trace.” Aquarius’ fingers flew on his keyboard.
“You must have triggered something,” Rebecca murmured, the lines of text moving too fast, not that it would have mattered. She couldn’t read computer code.
“It must have been subtle as fuck,” Aquarius exclaimed. “I’m going to sever their access.”
A tense silence descended, broken only by Aquarius’ furious typing.
Then the screen went dark.
“Did you stop them?” Scorpio asked.
“No.” Aquarius looked pissed. The Cetus logo suddenly popping into view on all the monitors didn’t help.
“Fuck me, they’re in.” Aquarius swore a second time before all the screens went dark. The humming machines all died at once.
“What just happened?” Scorpio asked.
Aquarius leaned back in his chair with downturned lips. “I was out-hacked.”
“Are you saying they stole our information?”
“Nothing important. As a precaution, we don’t keep any Zodiac stuff on any computers with outside access. Not that it would have mattered. They didn’t even try to copy or download the files I did have. Whoever hacked us wiped my hard drives clean. Sorry, bro. I won’t be much help until I get my shit formatted and loaded.”
“Meaning we’re fucked,” Scorpio huffed.
“Yeah, at least for a day or more. Luckily, I’ve got backups that aren’t connected, so I should be able to restore, but it won’t have the access I hacked into Cetus.”
“Bloody hell,” Scorpio paced, his body tense with agitation.
“One thing’s for sure, this Cetus isn’t some do-good climate group. That was some slick work, the kind that takes big bucks.”
Scorpio rubbed his chin. “I hate having to enter blind. Not to mention, where do I go? Office building or secret facility?”
Rebecca chewed the end of her thumb. “There must be another way to find out where they took it.”
“The longer we take, the more time they have to secure the orb, or hide it.”
Scorpio ranted the entire trip back to his suite. He paced, bristling with anger. “Fuck. I can’t believe they caught Aquarius poking. That’s never happened before. But even worse, they apparently know a little too much about us.”
“How would they have found out? I thought the whole Zodiac Warrior thing was a secret?” Rebecca flopped onto his couch.
“Who knows? Maybe they found an ancient text. Or someone broke their oath and opened their big yapper.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know, but they’re aware we’re onto them so their guard will be up. I should have hit them yesterday before they had a chance to beef up their security.”
“Um, unless they’re beaming across the planet, you do realize it’s something like twenty-plus hours to fly from Antarctica to the USA. More if there’s layovers. The relic is still most likely in transit.”
His lips pursed. “I hadn’t thought of that. But it gives me an idea.” He pulled out his phone, and his fingers flew.
“Who are you texting?” she asked.
“Aquarius and copying in Aries. Telling them to check for any planes registered under Cetus. Flight plans have to be registered, and something coming from Antarctica will stand out. If we can see where the plane goes, then we might still be able to intercept the orb.”
“Assuming they don’t offload it beforehand.”
He cast her a glare. “Not helping, Doc.”
“Sorry. Just pointing out possible outcomes. It’s a science thing.”
“You’re right. They could very well dump it to throw us off the scent, but finding their plane is the only possible clue I have right now.”
Only following up on it proved difficult. The computers remained inoperative, with Aquarius predicting at least twelve hours or more before he had them up and running again.
Scorpio didn’t handle the delay well. He wouldn’t stop pacing. A man too agitated to relax. It proved contagious, leading Rebecca to gnaw her thumb and tap her foot.
When his phone dinged, he read the text and smiled. “Bingo. Cancer called in some favors and might have found the plane. A private jet registered to Cetus left Ushuaia, which is on the tip of South America, and is heading to Maine, with three stops to refuel. We just missed the last one. According to its flight plan, it’s going to land at a private airfield in the next couple of hours.”
“Are you going to intercept it there?”
“Where they’re likely to have heavy security?” He shook his head. “Nope. We’re going to have it come down before that.”
She gasped. “You’re going to crash it?”
“No. But it’s going to need to do an unscheduled landing.”
“How?”
“They’re not the only ones with drones.” He grinned.
“How is a drone going to stop a plane?”
“Easy. By smashing into its engine.”
“Will that work? Drones aren’t that big. Won’t it mash it up and chew it out?”
“It will work. It has to, and when it does, we’ll be on the ground waiting for it to emergency land.”
“I guess you’ll be starbeaming to get there in time.”
“Yeah, but not the kind that needs math, thank fuck. There’s a portal near their route. We beam in with the toys, get them in the sky, sabotage the engines, force them to the ground, and bam, the orb is ours again.”
“You make it sound so easy.”
“In theory it should be.”
“You won’t go alone, right?” She couldn’t help but sound worried.
“Nah. I’ll bring a few of the bros with me. Rather have too much firepower than too little.”
“Be careful,” she murmured.
“As if,” he scoffed but then more softly, “Don’t worry about me, Doc. This isn’t the most dangerous thing I’ve done.”
“When do you leave?”
“Soon.” He tapped on his phone. “Just putting a message out to the crew to pack up their gear and be ready to go within the hour. That should give us at least another hour before the plane enters the target zone.”
An hour before he left and, while he appeared confident, she couldn’t help her fear. What if he miscalculated and didn’t come back? What if the last time they’d kissed was because of a nightmare? What if they never got another chance?
Rebecca wasn’t one for brash and bold action.
Until now.
She launched herself from the couch and stood in front of him, staring up. “How much of that hour do you need to get ready?”
“Not much. My gear’s pretty much packed already. Why?”
Rather than reply, she grabbed his head and yanked him down to press her mouth against his, murmuring, “Got ten minutes to spare so we can have a proper goodbye?”
“Ten’s kind of rushing it,” he replied as he kissed her back. “But I think we can make it work.”
His hands spanned her waist and lifted her. He kept his lips locked to hers as he strode for the bedroom.
Her heart raced, anticipation and desire filling her. She could honestly say she’d never desired a man as much as him. Still almost a stranger, and yet he attracted her on a primal level that didn’t require a prerequisite number of dates. Wanted him despite the fact she didn’t even know if they had a future.
Needed him.
And for once in her life, she was going to be bold and throw caution and reason out the window and indulge in pleasure.
Scorpio lay her on the bed, but before he joined her, he stripped, revealing that sexy body of his, the muscles tempting enough her mouth watered. Her lower lips also got slick with anticipation.
He leaned down and undid the button to her khakis then the zipper. She lifted her hips to make it easier for him to tug them from her legs. She yanked at her shirt, pulling it off so she lay there only in a sports bra and panties.
“Damn, Doc,” he said, his voice low and growly.
She’d never felt sexier. A frisson went through her, not of cold but arousal. Blame the smoldering intensity of his gaze.
“I hate we have so little time. I want nothing more than to explore your body. Learn every inch of it. What makes you moan. What makes you wet,” he stated as he slid his hand up her calf.
“Guess you’d better come back in one piece, then,” she quipped, feeling her breath catch as he stroked over the crotch of her panties.
Did he feel the dampness?
His fingers twisted in the fabric, and she gasped as he tore them from her and tossed them aside.
She should have felt shy at being exposed to his gaze. She’d never been one to flaunt her body, yet under his avid stare, she writhed.
Her bra joined the panties on the floor, and her nipples puckered, and he growled. “Tasty.”
He covered her body with his, skin to skin, the coolness of him a perfect complement to her feverish flesh.
Trapped between their bodies, his erection pulsed. He shifted his body until the tip of his cock rubbed against her clit, the simple touch enough to have her arch against him, thrusting her breasts against his chest.
Braced on a forearm, he leaned back and captured an erect nipple, his teeth lightly grazing, before he latched on and sucked.
A jolt shot through her, and she moaned as she grabbed for his head, her fingers gripping his hair, pushing his mouth against her breast. He opened wide and sucked even more of her erect nub, tugging at her flesh before unlatching enough he could swirl his tongue around the tip. She whimpered at the sensations he roused, which doubled when he switched his attention to the other breast, paying it the same erotic attention.
While he sucked and teased, the head of his cock slid slickly back and forth across her clit, a pleasure that had her tensing her pussy, feeling herself close to orgasm. And with only foreplay!
She whispered, “I want you inside me when I come.”
His turn to groan. “Just be warned, I don’t think I’m going to last long. You’re too damned sexy, Doc.”
She almost came at his words.
The engorged tip of his shaft parted her nether lips, nudging at the entrance to her sex. Her hips wiggled and lifted, until the head of him was engulfed.
He leaned his forehead against hers and shuddered as he slowly slid the rest of his cock into her pussy, sheathing himself fully. And she loved it. Her channel clenched around him, vibrating with a mini climax at the sensation.
He began to move, grinding deep, pushing and teasing her G-spot. She clung to his shoulders, her nails digging in while her legs locked around his waist. She squeezed him tight, tight enough he moaned. She rocked in motion with his short thrusts, her breathing ragged as pleasure overwhelmed.
“Fuck me, I don’t think I can hold on,” he gasped.
“Then don’t.”
He pulled back, and her pussy clenched at the loss of his cock then pulsed as he slammed back in. A quiver went through her. He retreated again before thrusting back in, hard and deep. He did that over and over. His strokes fast, his cock hitting her sweet spot over and over.
And…
Rebecca screamed as she climaxed. Screamed and arched as she exploded. But she wasn’t the only one who went supernova. He joined her, grunting and going stiff, their bodies locked in a moment of pure pleasurable perfection.
Rather than collapse on her as the waves subsided, he rolled to the side and dragged her with him so she lay atop him, nestled on his wide chest.
He growled, “I swear I won’t be so quick next time.”
“Mmm, I don’t think I would have lasted had you tried. That was…” She lacked a word, so he supplied some.
“Amazing. Stupendous. Holy fucking incredible.”
She laughed. “Yes, it was. At least for me.”
His hand stroked down her back. “You might not believe this, but that was the most satisfying sex I’ve ever had.”
“Oh, and what makes it different?” she asked, propping herself up to see his face.
“Because I want to do it again. And again.” His hand reached to cup her cheek, his thumb lightly brushing it. “You’re something special, Doc.”
“Careful, you’re starting to sound like a man falling in love.” Lightly said, and yet her pulse pounded.
“I’m starting to think that might not be so bad.”
Her heart stopped. She might have replied eventually, but a voice emerged from the speaker.
“Hey, Scorpio, I know you said we’re using drones, but should I bring my rocket launcher too?” asked a male.
He sighed. “Guess our ten minutes is up.”
She kissed him lightly. “When your mission is done, we’ll try for twenty.”
“How about hours?”
“I doubt it will take that long for me to climax.” She chuckled.
His lips curved, and he purred, “Why have one O when you could have multiples?”
“That’s a myth.”
“I can’t wait to show you scientific proof, Doc.” He kissed her hard and hugged her even tighter before groaning, “Fuck, I better get going, or I’ll never leave this bed.”
A part of her almost asked him to stay. He was going off into danger and might never come back.
She had to remind herself he was a warrior. The same way she didn’t want to change for someone, he shouldn’t have to give up who he was either.
Holding in her anxiety, she watched him gear up and kissed him extra fiercely before whispering, “Don’t die.”
His reply? “That’s the plan. Keep the sheets warm for my return.”
Then he was gone.
Gone, leaving Rebecca stuck waiting.
To distract, she went to the library, but she hadn’t even started browsing the shelves when Sage entered.
“Hey, Sage. You okay? You’re looking pale.”
The other woman’s expression held a haunted look that went well with her chilling statement. “You shouldn’t be here. Without you, Scorpio will fail.”