Chapter 27 #2
Full terrified consciousness in the dark, a sleeping weight on the mattress right next to her.
For one vertiginous moment she thought she was strapped back in the chair, Jilssen tightening the restraints as he leered and cupped his crotch.
Anton leaned on his cane in the background, the lab stretching and distorting like a funhouse mirror.
A scream tore at her throat; when Justin lunged into wakefulness and grabbed her wrists she thrashed blindly.
But his hands were gentle; he held her while she sobbed, the borders of her mind clean and intact.
Even so, he reached through the link, his steadiness reassuring and the last fading burn of Zed withdrawal skittering insect-feet she felt against her own flesh.
He flicked the cheap green-glass bedside lamp on before he pulled her into his lap, rocked her while she shuddered and sobbed.
She finally quieted, his fingers stroking her back. She sighed, though the shivers coming through in waves didn’t halt. The naked feeling of dampers soaked over her, familiar, helping to dispel the nightmare.
“Better?” he asked finally, his lips against her temple. He didn’t sound sleepy at all.
No, I’m not. “Better,” she whispered, then a deep hitching breath. “My God. I could have given away Headquarters. If they’d tortured me—”
“You wouldn’t have. You’re stronger than you think.
” The headboard, bolted to the wall, creaked as he leaned back.
If he was uncomfortable with her in his lap, he gave no sign.
As a matter of fact, when she tried to wriggle away he tightened his hold, and an almost-contest ensued, her attempting to squirm free and Justin almost negligently keeping her still.
They were both breathing hard by the time she froze, leaning her head against his shoulder, cuddled into his chest. His heartbeat thudded under her ear.
“It’s not ever going to stop,” she whispered. “What are we going to do? When we get old, or if…” Stop it, Rowan. Just stop it.
“Old age and treachery will always win out over youth and inexperience. That’s a direct quote, by the way.” He actually sounded amused. He touched her shoulder; lifted a slippery strand of pale hair.
“Not what I meant.” Her head was muzzy, but the pain of a compulsion buried below the surface of her conscious mind had ceased. “I can’t do this.” It was a soft, despairing moan.
The volcanic anger had extinguished itself, leaving only a howling emptiness. The rage that had possessed her in Zero-Fifteen was gone, replaced by ashes and smoke drifting through her mental landscape—wrecked, smoldering trauma.
“Give yourself a little time,” he said, into her hair.
“Don’t worry so much. Even if it is a losing goddamn fight, at least we’re on the right side.
That’s worth something, don’t you think?
Look.” He shifted, as if his legs had started to go to sleep, but his arms turned to iron when she tried to slide away.
“One day, sometime, somewhere, they’re going to lose. They can’t keep it up forever.”
She let out a choked half-sob. “You know what Jilssen said? He wanted to breed us. He said if he could breed out the stubbornness, it would make a good soldier.”
Her lips moved against the bare skin of his shoulder; he took a soft, deep breath. She shifted her weight, feeling a familiar insistent hardness pressing against the outside of her hip, and a wild panicked laugh rose behind her teeth.
Well, at least I know he’s still interested. Guilt slammed through her again. How could she even think about sex at a time like this?
“He’s probably right.” Justin paused. “Of course, I can’t see any child of yours lacking for stubbornness.” He continued stroking her hair, untangling with infinite gentleness.
The laugh finally jolted its way free. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be,” he whispered back. “Take your time, angel. I’m not going anywhere.”
“I want to forget.” She somehow, somewhere, found the courage to lift her head, the heavy weight of her hair sliding against her shoulders.
She was finally going to cut it, dye it somehow.
Too distinctive, even for a psion practiced at blending in.
Thinking of expending the energy to redirect attention away from her hair made her even more tired. “I wish I could forget everything.”
“Everything.” He watched her face, mouth soft and somehow amused, cheekbones perfect in their arched severity, one eyebrow slightly lifted in unconscious imitation of Henderson.
I wonder if he knows how much he copies the old man. It felt odd to smile, but also a relief. “Everything except you.”
That made the faint shadow of amusement leave his expression. His face turned solemn. “Missed you too.” He let go of her, a sliding touch down her arms, callused palms gentle. “And here we are.”
“Alone. Nobody chasing us.”
“Yet.” Now he reached up, skated his fingertips over her cheekbone.
The touch was so gentle it made the tears rise again.
The fading echo of Anton’s voice—go ahead, Price, pull the trigger—finally receded into the place nightmares hid during daylight.
He tensed slowly, muscle by muscle, as she memorized his face over and over again.
“Don’t ever do that to me again. You hear me? ”
Relief made her loose, liquid. It was the closest to a statement of need she’d ever heard from him. “I love you too.”
“Christ.” Was he actually sweating? He was trying to stay still as she moved in his lap again, deliberately teasing. It had been a long, long time for both of them. “Rowan…”
“Turn the light out,” she said, and he reached slowly as she found the hem of her tank top with trembling fingers, pulled the fabric over her head.
His hand never found the lamp, because he traced the lowest curve of her ribs with shaking fingers. Their mouths met, and from there it was easy, natural.
He pulled her down into the tangled covers, his mouth on her throat and breasts until she made a soft pleading sound, his fingers hooking in the waistband of her panties.
She had to lift her hips, for once not worrying about getting dressed if there was an emergency, only wanting to banish the confining material from between them.
He tossed them over the side of the bed; she kissed along his jaw as he struggled with his boxers, muttering a curse she laughed at before he finally kicked offending material away and slid his knee between hers.
She felt the sensations spilling through his nerves acutely as her own; the rougher silk of his skin against hers was exquisite torture magnified by the link.
Rowan. Christ, Rowan… The words faded under the onslaught of pleasure echoing inside her head, cleaning away the fear and pain and hatred. The edges of his hipbones dug into the soft flesh of her inner thighs; he shoved the pillow away and wound his fingers in her hair.
He didn’t want to hurt her, struggled to retain his control, but she pulled his mouth to hers, tasted the faint fading echo of toothpaste and the spice of him. She arched her back and rocked her hips, pleading, fingers tangling in his hair, his mouth exploring hers.
Still, he sought to hold back, fear and caution warring with need.
He was being so damn careful she almost exploded with frustration before he gave up, bracing himself on his elbows and easing himself slowly, so slowly, into her.
She closed her eyes, linking her ankles at the small of his back, and sighed as he moved, settling in, the hard length pulsing as she shifted, a small sound of satisfaction caught deep in her throat.
Finally, the moment of absolute connection. Her mind sank into his like water meeting itself. He shuddered in her arms, on the fine edge of losing control, one thought beating through the red haze of pleasure his mind had become.
Home. I’m home.
So am I, she thought before all words were lost in sensation.
He moved and she rose to meet him, relief and arousal and sheer heat blurring the borders.
No longer two separate beings, she felt her own hand sliding down his back, tasted her own mouth through his.
Two short, hard thrusts settled into a longer one.
Faint stubble on his chin rasped against her cheek; she kissed under his jaw, catching the hollow of this throat where the pulse beat and fastening on, wanting to leave a mark on him.
She felt the sharp point of almost-pain in her own throat, and when he moved again, thrusting deep, she felt her fingers driving into his shoulders, hard ridges of muscle tensing in his back, sweat stinging someone’s eyes, hers or his?
She no longer knew.
Rhythm caught her. Her body knew what to do, shifted instinctively to catch the feedback of pleasure from his. He whispered something broken in her ear as Rowan gasped, curiously calm amid her body’s frenzied need to prove that yes, she was still alive.
More, she thought, the word becoming his, the need becoming shared. More, for God’s sake, don’t slow down—
Speeding up, he was no longer so careful, plunging into her like a drowning man.
A cry caught in her throat; he took her mouth and swallowed it.
His voice, echoing hers, was lost in the connection between their hungry tongues.
Volcanic heat spilled through her, tightening every muscle and nerve. She let it happen, wanting the release.
Then came the brief moment their psyches overlapped, white-hot silence exploding.
He stiffened in her arms, a low, hoarse sound of agonizing pleasure as her release tore through his nervous system, his crisis slammed through her in concentric rings of scarlet spurring flame.
And if he used his talent gently, very gently, a featherlight brush of pressure against the surface of her mind to help her forget some of the horror and shock and guilt, it was no less an act of love.
One she welcomed even as she forgot for a brief moment why it was necessary.
He never did get around to turning the lamp off that night, and when Rowan finally fell asleep there were no more nightmares.