Chapter Ten Past and Present #2
Whether she wanted to or not.
His laughter was rich, deep, and booming, and it made her want to smile too, even in the midst of her despair.
“No, you’re not in hell, little human.” He looked up, as if scanning the ceiling of the cavern far overhead. “You could say that I am a personification – though it’s most certainly not of evil. I’m no Devil.”
“Capturing, binding, and fucking women against their will, notwithstanding.”
He drew closer, taking hold of her throat again, squeezing just a little. His voice grew very low, almost a murmur. “I’ve only begun to explore all three with you, human. And I know you want me to. To take you where you can never admit you long to go.”
She shivered, the feel of his strong hand about her throat making her belly stir again. Her traitorous body once more seemed intent on belying her defiant words, the denial in her own thoughts.
What if Malcolm knew her needs better than she did?
Just like Langley, remember?
They’d been the last words she’d ever heard out of the cruel Master Chief’s mouth, as he’d leaned over her open driver’s side window on that steaming August afternoon—just before she drove away and out of his life forever:
“I know you better than you do, slut. You deny it. But you’ll be back. That wet cunt of yours knows what it needs. And it knows where to find it.”
Her wet cunt seemed to have stumbled upon it once more.
Langley’s hateful parting words had never seemed so devastatingly on the money.
“I’m one half of a single consciousness.”
“What?”
Maybe he’s the one who’s crazy?
“You can think of me as a personification—to use your term—of a larger being. In this case, that being, that life force, is this planet. Amic-ral.”
“So, you’re telling me this planet is… a living thing? You expect me to believe that?”
“Of course I do—because it’s the truth.” Malcolm strolled back and forth through the water as he talked. It was only then that she wondered how it was he was barely knee deep in water that was far too deep for her to wade in out in the middle of the pool.
“How come you talk about this planet as if it’s distinct? Wouldn’t that make it you?”
“In a way, yes, but it’s not that simple. You can think of us as two entities inhabiting the same consciousness.”
“But you’re not the same consciousness.” She held up an arm. “You’re… you. Right here in front of me.”
“Yes, indeed, but there is more than me… which is all around us.”
The reality of it hit her, and her heart skipped a beat. “You mean… then the vines. The… moss. It’s all—”
“Alive.”
She swallowed down her fear, even as the curiosity in her was sparked. “You mean, you don’t control the vines, the plants… any of it?”
One eyebrow arched slightly. “Most of the time, no. But it’s more complicated than that. We perceive what the other perceives… so I have some influence. But Amic-ral… it does what it wants. Most of the time.”
“I… I don’t… it’s gonna take me some time to wrap my head around that.”
It did make a sort of twisted, bat-poop crazy sense. He clearly had some influence on the vines and plants—but they also seemed to have a mind of their own. Unless he had a kind of telepathic link to them, then that had to mean they’d been acting on their own much of the time.
If what he was saying was true.
Which is simply insane. You’re not really going along with this, are you?
She could just hear Lindemann’s measured voice though—it was one his favorite little sayings: “Out there, why can’t anything be possible? Perhaps not likely, but possible.”
It reminded her suddenly that hers wasn’t the only plight. It was absurd to play along, but maybe it would go some way to verifying whether or not Malcolm really was what he said he was.
“My crew—”
“The three others are safe.”
It was the first good news she’d had in much too long, and the tension in her chest eased just the tiniest bit at his words.
How does he know there were three others, Selena? What if he simply looked up and watched the reentry trails as the boats hit the upper atmosphere? He could still be deceiving you.
“You know this how?”
Malcolm just stared at her, his jaw tightening.
“Oh, right. You and the planet are… one.” She waved a hand. “Or something. Look, you have to understand, we were on a mission. A scientific mission. I need something other than your assertions that they’re safe.”
“All landed relatively unharmed.”
“Relatively?” Her heart began to beat faster.
Please let them be okay.
“The soldier—I believe you call her Richland—was knocked unconscious during reentry. The deceleration rockets fired too early, and she impacted the surface at a higher speed.”
Holy shit.
It simply was not possible he could have known that.
“So, you knew about the satellite. Did you know about the probes? The rovers, the aerial units?”
“Curious, the machines you humans create. Almost a form of life in themselves. I tolerated them until I felt the pull.”
“Pull?”
“We’ll talk about that when the time is right.” He sat down upon the rock next to her. She tried not to notice the curve of his powerful buttocks, the rippling slabs of muscle across his back.
She failed miserably.
“Sit.”
“I’ll stand, I think.”
In seconds, she was brought back down across his lap, his great hand cupping the entirety of one of her buttocks in warning. “You’ll do what you’re told, or you’ll be disciplined for it. And make no mistake, I will enjoy meting out your discipline.”
“Let me go… goddammit!” She struggled in vain against the implacable strength of his hands. His penis moved beneath her, hardening against her belly. “I… I’ll sit! I’ll sit!”
“Two smacks should do it. As a warning, of course.”
“What, you don’t—” She cried out then, as the great palm cracked down upon her already very sore bottom, the pain exploding, searing. His hands were so hard!
Another smack, even harsher, had her hitching her breath, tears back in her eyes again. She couldn’t believe how swiftly he’d reawakened the ache in her flesh.
Taking her by the neck, he yanked her up, holding her firmly under the chin as she scrambled to find purchase with her legs, her feet sliding into the cool water.
“Are you ready to sit quietly and obey, little human?” He was close enough for her to feel his breath upon her cheek, and her body was filled with a contradictory fear and a deep, deep need for what he was doing.
How could she be responding to being manhandled like a little doll?
But she was, right or wrong be damned. It didn’t make sense—like everything else about this situation.
“You need to calm yourself.” His lips brushed her ear, his grip still firm about her throat.
“I can feel the conflict and the confusion. Let it go, human. It doesn’t matter anymore.
It won’t help you here.” He pressed a kiss to her cheek, the tip of his hot, soft tongue just touching her skin, tasting her.
“But surrendering to me, now that… will take you far. To that dark place in your mind, the part of you that you deny. The part of you crying out to be brought into the light. The true you.”
The part that makes your pussy start to drip when he seems about to take you.
How could he have known this about her? Was he reading her thoughts too?
At that moment, anything seemed possible.
Especially if he really is the Devil.
Which meant this place… might just be Hell after all.
But rather than take her, he tucked her against his side, folding her legs under her across the stony, massive slabs of his thighs. Incredibly, his fingers stroked her hair, even as his other hand hefted and squeezed one of her breasts and then the other.
She breathed in sharply as he gave her nipple a long, slow twisting pull, the burn making her wince.