Chapter 24 Mia
MIA
You are such a bloody slag.
The thought drifts through my mind, but I feel zero shame. Not enough to stop me, anyway. My robe is already undone. My hand is sliding beneath the sheets, my knickers pushed to the side.
Somewhere in Midtown, Kat is waiting for me to review her intel.
My laptop sits open on the desk, the article cursor blinking impatiently.
Countless responsible choices exist between me and this moment, and I’m ignoring every single one of them, because right now, tonight, my body has taken control—and it’s horny as hell.
Because my body remembers his hands. His mouth. The way he looked at me like I was something wondrous and devastating all at once. And now, alone in the dark, I can’t stop the memories of the last few days from flooding in, the dam of reason completely broken.
I close my eyes and let my hand move in slow circles, chasing the ghost of his touch. It’s not the same—nothing could be the same—but my imagination is vivid enough to make my breath catch, to make my hips lift slightly off the mattress.
I want him.
Nate.
His name in my head, his face behind my closed eyes.
I picture him above me, that predatory focus in his gaze, the way his impossible muscles flex when he’s holding himself back, the ridges of his abs straining.
I picture his mouth trailing down my body, his stubble scraping my inner thighs, his tongue—
A sound escapes me, soft and needy enough to embarrass myself, even though I’m all alone. My free hand releases the sheets and slides up to cup my breast through my open robe, thumb brushing my nipple the way he did.
I’m close, so close, embarrassingly fast, because apparently, just thinking about Nate ‘Vanguard’ Whitaker is enough to wind me tight as a spring.
My fingers move faster, pressing harder against my clit, and I feel the orgasm building, that familiar pressure gathering low in my belly, ready to crest—
The bed dips.
My eyes fly open.
There’s nothing there. The room is empty, the door still closed, the balcony door—
Was that open before?
I freeze, my hand still between my legs, my heart suddenly hammering for an entirely different reason. Every instinct I have is screaming something’s wrong, someone’s here, I’m not alone. I can feel it—a presence, a displacement of air, a weight on the mattress that shouldn’t exist.
Please don’t let it be a motherfucking ghost.
“Hello?” My voice comes out tight. I sit up slightly, pulling my hand free, reaching for the lamp—
Fingers close around my wrist.
A scream chokes in my throat.
What the actual fuck?
I jerk back, but the grip is gentle. Firm but not painful. And then a voice, low and rough and achingly familiar, speaks from the empty air beside me.
“Don’t stop on my account.”
Vanguard.
My brain short-circuits. He’s here. He’s here, in my room, and he’s invisible, he’s bloody invisible, and he was watching me…
“How long have you been…” I ask, sounding squeaky.
“Long enough.” His voice is closer now, right beside my ear, and I feel the mattress shift as he moves. “Long enough to know exactly what you were thinking about.”
Oh God.
Heat floods my face. “That’s—you can’t just—”
“Can’t just what?” Something brushes my cheek—his knuckles, maybe, tracing down to my jaw.
I can’t see him, but I can feel him, the warmth of his body, the displacement of air as he breathes.
I feel like I’m losing my mind. “Can’t watch the woman I can’t stop thinking about touch herself?
Can’t wonder if she’s thinking about me while she’s doing it? ”
I shake my head at nothing. “You’re insufferable. Invisible and insufferable.”
“And you’re wet.” His invisible hand slides down my throat, over my collarbone, between my breasts. “Aren’t you, darlin’? Wet and desperate and thinking about me while you fucked yourself with those pretty little fingers?”
I should be angry, or at least disturbed. I should shove him away, demand to know how he got in, remind him breaking into someone’s hotel room is several kinds of illegal, even if you are America’s superhero.
Instead, I’m more turned on than I’ve ever been.
“Yes,” I whisper, admitting it with absolutely no shame. I’m such a hussy.
His breath catches. I feel it more than hear it—a hitch in the air beside me.
“Say it again.”
God, he’s bossy.
“Yes.” My voice is steadier now, bolder. “I was thinking about you. About your hands. Your mouth.” I turn my head toward where I think he is, speaking to empty air. “About how you made me come so hard, I forgot my own name.”
A growl. Low, rough, almost animal-like. And then, his mouth is on mine—appearing from nowhere, hot and demanding—and I’m kissing him back before my brain can catch up.
This is insane, kissing a man I can’t see, feeling hands I can’t watch as they push aside my robe, shivering under a touch that seems to come from the air itself. It’s disorienting and terrifying and so fucking hot, I can barely breathe.
“Nate—” I gasp against his mouth.
“Shh.” His lips trail down my jaw, my throat, my collarbone. “Let me take care of you.”
His invisible hands find my breasts, cupping them, thumbs circling my nipples until they’re hard as pebbles and aching.
I arch into the torturous touch, moaning at the strangeness of it, this pleasure without source, sensation without sight.
My brain keeps trying to reconcile what I’m feeling with what I’m seeing (or failing to see), and somehow, that makes it more intense, every nerve ending heightened, every touch magnified.
“I’ve been thinking about this all day,” he murmurs against my skin, his mouth moving lower. “Flying around the city, pretending to be a hero, and all I could think about was you. The sounds you make. The way you taste. You, you, you, my darlin’.”
His hands slide down my stomach, fingers hooking in the waistband of my knickers, and then he’s pulling them down my legs, and I’m bare to him. He moves further down, underneath the sheets now, and that’s when I can finally see him, or at least his outline.
His strong fingers grip my thighs, spreading them, the heat from his breath making me shiver.
The first stroke of his tongue makes me cry out.
It’s like I have my eyes closed when I don’t, like I’m blindfolded and not at the same time.
That’s what makes it so overwhelming, the disconnect between sight and sensation, the way pleasure seems to bloom from nothing at all.
I stare at the empty space between my spread thighs, the way half the sheet seems to hover in the air, and I feel him there.
His tongue circling my clit, his fingers sliding inside me, his stubble scraping my sensitive skin.
Too much. It’s too damn much.
“Oh God…” My hands fly out, searching for something to hold onto, but I find nothing but sheets. “Oh fuck—”
He groans against me, the vibration shooting sparks up my spine, and then he’s devouring me in earnest, licking, sucking, fucking me with his fingers while his tongue works my clit with devastating precision.
I’m writhing on the bed, making sounds I don’t recognize, and I can’t watch it happen, can only feel it, the pleasure building and building with nowhere to go but up.
“Please—” I’m not even sure what I’m begging for, but it’s something. “Please, I need—”
He pulls back. Just enough to speak, his breath hot against my soaked skin. “What do you need?”
Everything. Nothing. I don’t know.
“You. I need to see you. Please, I—”
The air shimmers.
And then, he’s there, between my thighs, his blue eyes dark with want, his mouth wet and swollen. He’s fully dressed in his Vanguard suit, and there’s something obscene about that, about him being clothed in his uniform, as the superhero, while I’m spread naked before him.
“Better?” he asks roughly, my wetness glistening on his beard.
What a fucking sight.
I nod, feeling breathless, speechless, even.
He smiles—that dangerous, wolfish smile I’ve come to love—and dips his head back down.
Watching him is almost worse than not; the way his tongue circles my clit, watching as his fingers disappear inside me, the way his eyes flutter closed like I’m the best thing he’s ever tasted. I thread my fingers through his silky soft hair, anchoring myself to something real, something solid.
“You taste incredible.” He punctuates the words with a hard suck that makes me keen. “Could eat this pussy for days.”
“Nate…”
“That’s the one.” Another devastating lick. “That’s what I want to hear. Say it again.”
“Nate—”
The orgasm crashes into me without warning.
One moment, I’m climbing, and the next, I’m shattering, my back arching off the bed as wave after wave of pleasure tears through me.
I’m dimly aware I’m screaming his name, that my thighs are clamped around his head as if I’m trying to squeeze the life out of him, that my fingers are yanking his hair hard enough to hurt anyone else but him.
He works me through it, every tremor, every aftershock, his mouth never stopping until I’m boneless and gasping and shoving weakly at his shoulders because it’s too much. I can’t…
He pulls back, licking his lips, and the sight of him—flushed and hungry and so fucking pleased with himself—makes my spent body clench all over again.
“I’m not done with you,” he says, rising over me like a god.
“I don’t doubt it,” I manage to say, my heart filling my throat.
He kisses me, and I taste myself on his tongue, something so primal, it makes me moan into his mouth. His clothed body presses against my naked one, the fabric rough against my oversensitive skin.
“I want to try something,” he murmurs against my lips.
“What kind of something?” I ask, wondering what else there could possibly be.
Instead of answering, he scoops me up off the bed. I yelp, grabbing his shoulders, and then we’re moving toward the balcony, toward the glass door that’s still cracked open from his entrance.
Oh no. This can’t be good.
“Nate, what—”