Chapter Forty-Two
Out at the Sugar Loaf Scenic Lookout, Allhan’s view was restricted to the wheel well of the seat behind the driver’s, his face mashed into the tread on the contoured, hard plastic floor mat.
With his nose bending to meet his cheek, and one eyelid peeled so wide, it was nearly at his hairline, he was amazed that he could still breathe. Was he breathing? He didn’t know.
Didn’t care.
The single most incredible sensation in his whole miserable fucking life had just wiped his proverbial slate clean with a sandblast of pure pleasure. And in the floating aftermath, he could only think of two things: One, he wanted to do it again. Like now.
And two, he wanted Denne to feel this, too.
“Are you all right?” she asked from up front.
“Are you even kidding me.” As he swallowed, he tasted chemical lemon and thought of the man who had cleaned everything up. “You want to join me back here?”
Denne’s throaty laugh went straight into his bloodstream. “How about we help you up first so you don’t look like you were in a car crash?”
“I’m great.” He grunted and pushed something that had carpeting on it. “You should try this sometime.”
“Because lumbar support is overrated?”
“I mean, chairs are so confining.”
“I’m coming around to help you.” The door in front opened. “Hold on.”
“Don’t rush. This is really quite comfortable, actually.”
A fresh wash of cold air hit a certain very sensitive foot-long that was not deflating in the slightest. And as Allhan moaned at the tingling thrill that made the thing kick like a mule, the side panel next to him opened.
“Okay, so this is not the most dignified look,” he said with a grimace. “Especially given what…”
“We just did?” she murmured.
“To be fair, it was all you.” When there was a pause, he frowned. “Is there something wrong? Apart from the obvious.”
“I’m trying to figure out an approach.” She laughed. “I had no idea the male body could do that.”
Allhan raised his forefinger to make a point—and hoped he didn’t poke himself in the eye. Or the ass.
“It can’t.”
Denne laughed so hard she snorted, and then he felt her take one of his arms. Things got very pinchy from there.
As they both worked to reposition him, he was unaware of exactly how many nerve endings he had, but they were firing all at once.
What he was clear on? Between Denne’s scent in his nose, the remnants of the orgasm, and all of the weird nooks and crannies created by the truck’s foot-level profile, he couldn’t decide whether he was going through an obstacle course in zero gravity.
Or if he was the course.
But then he was upright and stuffing himself over to the passenger side in the back so Denne had room to join him. As she shut the door, they were both breathing hard, and then he was looking at her.
“Can I kiss you again?”
Her eyes dropped down to his lap, and that was when he saw himself.
His fly was not just totally open, the waistband of his jeans was down around his thighs—and talk about obscene. The erection sticking straight up from his hips was so thick and hard, it was almost like it was someone else’s.
“Sorry,” he said as he clamped his hands over the length.
Wrong idea. Not even his wide palms could cover things up properly, but also any contact made his cock jump like it was ready to shake hands with the world.
As he hissed through his teeth, Denne took his face in her hands and the kissing started up again. By this time, he knew just what she liked, the way she moaned when he nipped her lower lip with one of his fangs, how when he entered her with his tongue, she jolted against him. And he wanted more.
So did she.
With a lithe shift, she straddled him, and then eased back. God, he could look up at her forever—
Denne crisscrossed her arms and drew up her black button-down shirt, revealing smooth dark skin, and breasts that were tight from the cold.
His hands went to them by instinct, an awe that was nearly religious calling him to touch the soft skin and the peaked nipples.
The arch she gave him in response was epic, and the next thing he knew he was kissing her neck, her collarbone… and going farther.
He didn’t know what the hell he was doing, but as he brought his hands to the sides of her and gently moved in, he caressed one tip and then the other with his lips. Then he experimented with sucking on her—
The sound she made went right to his erection, and the damn thing started in with a heartbeat faster than the ticker in his chest. Pounding need was all he knew, to the point where he became possessed by a protective urge to defend, and feed, and service her with his body.
It was unlike any drive he’d ever felt, but he welcomed it home as if the bonding was as intrinsic to him as his pale blue eyes and his dark hair.
This was more than love.
It was elemental. Fundamental.
Utterly defining to him as a male.
With a curse, she was the one who backed off again and her heavy-lidded eyes flashed peridot, the green light draping him in mystery and beauty.
“I’m going to sit on your lap,” she told him.
“Sit on me anywhere.”
Splitting her thighs, she settled herself on his erection, and he bit down on his lower lip so he didn’t growl like a lion.
And then she started moving. Leaning back, she sprawled her arms out and rode him with her hips, the undulations right over his arousal, the way her breasts bumped, and the smooth coiling and releasing of her abdomen, utterly hypnotic.
He ran his hands all over her breasts—except then he noticed the goosebumps.
“You must be cold,” he said in a guttural voice.
“You’re fucking kidding, right. Undo my pants.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
As she shifted off him, he expected his hands to be sloppy. They were not. His fingers zeroed in on the button and zipper like they were locks he could pick in his sleep. The pants were black and loose, and he thought of her at the restaurant, serving food—
No, she worked in the office.
As he edited in an old-fashioned calculator because he’d never been out in the real world and he’d only watched old school TV, the two sides of her fly gave way.
Her panties were black.
He must have made a face because she laughed in that way she did, and somehow managed to pull everything down. A quick hop into the other seat, and a shuck down her smooth, elegant legs, and she was naked.
Well, wasn’t this a trend he was getting on.
Too bad as he reached for the bottom of his hoodie and shirt, he could only yank and twist and get things crammed up under his pits.
“Here, I’ll help,” she said.
He stilled. Especially because she got back on him.
With the curling ends of her hair falling around her bare shoulders like a shawl, and her hands drawing down the zipper on his chest, he had a moment of eternity.
“I was right,” he said. “This is the best night of my life.”
She stopped, her shining green eyes locking on his. And then a piercing sadness replaced the hunger on her face, the light draining out of her eyes.
“Mine, too,” she whispered.
He wanted to ask her what she meant, what was wrong, what he could do to help. But her face closed off from him, a mask settling over her features.
Allhan stroked her cheek. “I wish…”
“I know.”
As she leaned in and pressed her lips against his, he felt like they were making a vow that was strong in this moment, but nothing that could last outside of this hungry, heady privacy they’d artificially created by coming out to this faraway place.
And in an insane emotional surge, he wanted to tell her he loved her.
Because that was what he was feeling.
He wasn’t looking to ruin this fleeting time they had together, though.
“I’m really glad I met you,” he said, tracing her face with trembling fingertips. “And this is a good way…”
“To what?”
End things, he thought sadly.
That was what this was, what this had to be.
And it was weird. He hadn’t known how suicidal he’d been until he found something worth living for. Too bad it was way too late. His grand plan with the Brotherhood? There was a reason he hadn’t really sketched out anything past setting up that lesser.
They were going to find him and kill him. And he was going to deserve it.
“Stop thinking,” she said in a soft voice. “Come back to me.”
His eyes brought her into sharp, painful focus. “I am never going to forget you.”
“Me, either, Al.”
With that, Denne stripped his hoodie off his shoulders and arms, and then she peeled his Hanes undershirt up and over his head.
As she tossed both aside, he loved the way she looked at his new muscles with a greed that was altogether female.
And he especially loved the fact that the green glow returned.
Why couldn’t they have met under different circumstances—
“Where have you gone again, Al.”
His hands returned to her waist, and he absorbed the warmth of her dark skin, the feel of her ribs expanding as she breathed, the promise of what was going to happen if he touched her breasts again.
“Wherever it is,” she said, “don’t go there. We’ve got to make this time last.”
“Where are you heading to,” he asked. “After we…”
He already knew the answer: It was someplace he couldn’t follow.
And that had nothing to do with whatever reasons were on his side.
When he brought her back to his mouth, she came to him like water, flowing over him, capsizing him so that he could drown in her. Her hands went to his arousal, and he felt her reposition him so that he was angled up—
His head jerked back so hard, he nearly knocked himself out on the back headrest, and the hiss that sizzled through his locked teeth was loud as a firecracker.
Her sex engulfed his arousal in a hot, wet hold that shorted his brain out completely, and that was exactly what he needed. She was right. No more thinking. There would be time for that later, too much time.
Denne rode him nice and slow at first, but then she got fucking serious about it.
Dizzy yet grounded, hungry yet hoping they could stay in this heady anticipation forever, he held on to her loosely so she had all the freedom to move however the hell she wanted to—and it was incredible.
Harder, faster, until they were both panting and it might as well have been July instead of the depths of winter.
As he started to come inside of her, Allhan knew that summer was the best way to describe everything she brought to him. He had been alone in his lies for so long, imprisoned by what he had done and who he was deceiving now, that he hadn’t noticed the cold that was in his soul.
Denne was his January thaw.
A blessing that warmed him.
But was not going to last.