Chapter 17
Every reason except I love you.
She hadn't expected anything else.
What she didn't expect was for him to draw her to him and bite deep into her lower lip. The pain seared, agony at first, and she almost tried to beat him away from her except the pain was ebbing, running out fast, and pleasure taking its place.
When the orgasm hit from the bite alone, it almost dropped her off her feet. She clung to his neck, sucking, kissing, licking his salt-slick skin. "No fair. Using pheromones."
"I'm not."
She pulled back to look up at him but he wasn't smiling. He was serious, watching her, and when she looked up, he kissed her, his mouth awkward. Biting had to be more common.
"Do it again," she said, and when he did, she came again, seeing stars.
This time she dropped to her knees, clawing at the armor that covered him.
He reached behind him and undid the buckles and the body armor slid from him.
His shirt followed, his pants, and she thought that they were in city offices where there might be functioning cameras and there might be functioning Lucian and she couldn't bring herself to care.
When she licked at him, his huge length, his thickness, he pulled her to her feet. "Not this time."
He led her to one of the desks in the outer offices. Somewhere in her mind she understood anyone could walk in at any time and she didn't care.
She cared that he undressed her, shredding her clothes and she'd have to have something else to leave in or the other troops would be all over her.
She understood when he scratched her shoulder deep enough to draw blood, then bent his head to it and sucked the blood down, sighing in delight. The sensation was strange. It felt as if she became more clear at every moment but didn't care what was happening around her.
She wrapped her legs around his waist, scissored them behind his back, and tried to drag him down.
He laughed and easily lifted her in his arms, one hand going under her ass, the other exploring her mouth, her breasts, her cunt, pressing her clit and circling it, covering it with her own wet want, then sliding the finger deep inside her.
"Let me watch you," he said.
All she could think was, You already have, the bite, my lip — oh god!
But she could feel her body tightening already, waves of pleasure coming harder and centralizing, then radiating out from where his finger moved inside her, touching her slick, tight places, urging her higher and higher until she was panting and moaning, writhing in his arms and that's when he added a second long finger into the mix.
Mindy cried out and came and at that moment he repositioned her and thrust inside her, riding her hard and fast as Mindy's orgasm broke over her in waves.
When he came, she thought that was the sound she heard.
She was wrong.
In the stillness after, she became aware of small things.
His chest against her cheek. The sweat cooling on both of them.
Her own pulse, thick and slow, still working down from wherever he'd taken her.
He hadn't moved. Neither had she. His arms were still around her and his breath was even, but she could feel the tension in him — the part of him that was never really off, never really at rest, even now.
She thought: I don't know what this is. I don't know what to call it.
She thought: It doesn't matter.
His hand moved. Not to pull away. Just to press flat against her back, low, deliberate. Like he was making sure she was still there. Like he needed to verify it.
She didn't say anything. Neither did he.
That was the part she hadn't expected either.
And then she realized a bomb had gone off.
The sound hit her a half second after the pressure wave rattled the windows. Not close. Close enough. She jerked upright and Alek was already moving, already pulling her off the desk and behind him in the same motion, one arm sweeping her back as he scanned the room.
Nothing came through the door. No fire. No secondary.
He exhaled through his nose. Controlled. "Intentional."
It wasn't as huge as she'd thought. City Hall didn't come down. The men outside were out of range when it blew; that had been intentional.
She dressed in what she could find. He watched the door while she did it. That was its own kind of intimacy — the fact that he didn't make her feel hurried, didn't make her feel exposed, just stood between her and whatever might come through.
By the time they got outside the Lucian were in control, being transported inside the building where they'd be held. Details of men were either escorting the Lucian or going out onto patrol or securing the newly taken building.
Pan was near the front steps. He gave Alek a look Mindy couldn't read, then gave her a different one — shorter, less complicated. She filed it away. Pan had come back. That meant something.
She wore someone's abandoned sweater and a pair of very old and paint-stained sweat pants that had been used as a rag.
It didn't matter. Nothing mattered except Alek there with her.
He found her in the crowd. He didn't say anything. He just put his hand on the back of her neck, briefly, and then let go and walked toward Pan. She stood in the cold outside air and watched him go.
She thought: Every reason except I love you.
Maybe that was enough. Maybe it wasn't.
She didn't know yet.