Beyond Shame (14 page)

"Lex?" Noelle guessed.

"Rachel," Amira corrected. "Poor Ace. A woman who can drink him under the table. I think he lost his heart that day."

Ace huffed. "I think we all did, doll. O'Kane is liquor, and Rachel's our goddess."

"Then have a few for me tonight, huh?" Amira looked down at the swell of her belly, barely noticeable until she rubbed her hand across it.

Noelle expected another lewd comment, but Ace untangled himself from their embraces and crouched in front of Amira. Pulling the fabric taut across her belly, he leaned close. "Listen to your Uncle Ace, peanut. You come out gorgeous like your mama instead of ugly like your papa, all right?"

"Hate to interrupt a moment of Ace being adorable," Rachel said from behind them, her voice full of amusement. "But I've got to steal Noelle. Open bar time, honey."

"I'm always adorable," Ace retorted, and Noelle laughed as she turned to Rachel. Her gaze drifted over the crowd again, but Jasper still hadn't appeared.

It hurt. He'd stripped her bare that morning with Ace, not just her body but her
soul
. Nothing that intense could simply be sex, not when he'd held her and stroked her as she drifted in warm haze long past the point where Ace had finished and put away the needles.

Or maybe that was what Amira had been trying to tell her, that a girl from the city couldn't possibly understand the difference between
casual
and
more
after less than a week.

Wetting her lips, Noelle fell into step next to Rachel. "Ace said Dallas and Jasper were on their way. Should I wait?"

She shook her head. "They got hung up with work. They'll be along later."

The gang came first. That was the rule she'd tacitly accepted when she let Ace etch the O'Kane symbols into her skin, which meant facing the gathering group of too many smiling men with a stiff back and a raised chin. She would pretend she was Lex, unperturbed by their lecherous stares and the frank appreciation in their hungry gazes.

Hell, maybe she'd kiss one of them. Or more than one. She was a free woman now. She was an O'Kane. Her body belonged to her, and if Jasper wanted claim over it, he'd have to put his mark around her throat.

Jasper leaned against the wall and stared at the woman in the chair. She stared back, impassive, heedless of the heavy chains that bound her. "Is that necessary?" he asked. "We're smack in the center of Sector Four now. Where would she go?"

Bren mirrored Jasper's stance with a grin. "She wouldn't run. She would, however, bite your face off, given half a chance. Wouldn't you, sweetheart?"

"Why would I bite his face off when yours is right there?" Six bared her teeth and, judging by the focused fury in her eyes, her rage was for Bren alone.

Bren shrugged. "I don't know—variety?"

"Fuck variety." Her gaze slid to Jasper. "Are you here to hold me down while he fucks me? Or is that your job?"

Under the taunt lay a very real fear. Dismissing it would be cruel, but so would taunting her in return. Jasper settled for shaking his head.

His restraint didn't soothe her. Her hands fisted, and she jerked against the chains for the first time, like his unwillingness to abuse her frightened her more than the threat of violence could. "This is some sick shit. Why the hell are you—?"

"Enough," Dallas said from behind Jasper. "Lex?"

Lex's heels clicked on the floor as she walked to the center of the room. "Why bother? She's not going to believe me. Where she's from, there are plenty of women who'll sell each other out for a little security."

Dallas sighed. "Could you pretend for a fucking second that I'm the boss and
try
?"

"Words are just words. You can tell someone you're a saint while you're stabbing a kitten. Does saying it make it true?"

Six sneered at them, her lips twisted in disgust. "What, you haul some poor bitch in here to yell at you and I'm supposed to believe I'm in a fucking paradise because you don't beat her face in? Did you write all the lines for her, or does she come up with them on her own?"

"See?" Lex knelt and stared up at the new arrival. "They screwed her up so bad she doesn't know what to think."

"I'm not screwed up," Six snarled, but even Jasper could hear the desperation under the words. Her rough façade was cracking, and with it, her composure. "I'm one of the strong ones. I survived, and I don't need your pity."

"Oh, I don't pity you. I kinda think they shouldn't have brought you back here. You're trouble."

That brought the woman's teeth together with an audible clack. She studied Lex, as if trying to figure out how the words could be a trap. Next to Jasper, Dallas opened his mouth and then shut it again without saying a word, watching the two women instead.

After a long silence, Six tilted her head. "I can't tell if you're all damn good liars or just fucking crazy."

"See?" Bren straightened off the wall and walked around behind her. "Told you she was smart." The chain rattled as he unlocked it and then let it clatter to the floor.

Dallas tensed, and Jasper knew it was taking all of his self-control not to haul Lex away from potential danger. Six seemed to notice too. "He'd snap my neck if I laid a finger on you, wouldn't he?"

"Dallas? Probably." Lex smiled slowly. "Unless I got to you first."

Bren laid his hands on Six's shoulders. "You want to hurt Wilson Trent?"

She carefully untangled herself from the chains. "I want to hurt Wilson Trent. But I'm not going to spill my guts and trust you not to dump me in the river when I'm done."

Jasper couldn't fault her for that. "Fair enough. What do you know about the drop tomorrow? We figure Trent's got plans for us. Ugly ones."

She studied each of them before turning just enough to stare at Bren's hand resting on her shoulder. "I'll tell him."

Bren nodded slowly. "What do you say, Dallas?"

"We'll be in the hall," Dallas replied, inclining his head toward the door. "Talk fast, sweetheart. We're late to a party."

Jasper crossed his arms over his chest. "You sure you want to be alone with the face-biter, Bren?"

He made a dismissive noise and stroked the backs of his fingers absently down the length of Six's hair. "We're past that. If I piss her off, I think she'll at least give me a good warning punch first."

She jerked her head away from him. "Touch me again and I'll bite your fucking hand off."

"See? When she figures out I'm not going to maul her, we'll be fine."

Lex didn't move for a long moment, then rose. "Tread lightly, sweetheart. They're not going to hurt you unless they have to...but I'm not as nice as they are."

"That's enough, Lex," Dallas said, stepping forward to rest a hand on her hip. "You and Jasper go to the party. You shouldn't miss your girl's big moment."

She took a single step back, another, and then relented with an annoyed exhalation. "Yes, sir."

The door slammed behind her, and Jasper rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Her girl?"

Dallas snorted. "I was talking to both of you. If you plan on making any grand gestures, I suggest you get there before Lex does."

"She wouldn't." Not even someone with Lex's sexual appetites would try to snatch up Noelle when her attention was so obviously focused elsewhere.

"I give you five minutes, tops, before Noelle's drinking her shots straight from Lex's luscious lips."

That wouldn't do. Jasper headed for the door—and told himself he was rushing for Noelle's sake, not his own.

He didn't believe it either.

Chapter Ten

The process, as Rachel explained it, was simple—drink a shot, then celebrate with the other O'Kanes gathered around the makeshift bar. Eight shots, eight passes around the cheering crowd.

The liquor ranged from the really cheap moonshine apparently favored in the other sectors to an exquisite, high-end single malt whiskey—which explained how Dallas could afford to throw pre-Flare artwork at Lex like it was nothing.

The whiskey burned smooth all the way down, worth every penny Dallas charged, and Noelle barely had time to lift the empty glass triumphantly above her head before someone dragged her into the crowd. Lips landed on her cheek. Someone else swept her into a hug. The redheaded stranger from Dallas's party snatched her away from Amira and planted a kiss right on her lips before passing her on to the next person in the circle with a grin.

So it went, all the way around the circle. Kisses, hugs, a few pats on the shoulder and one or two on the hip, but all fond and good-natured instead of lascivious. Ace got her last and sent her back to Rachel with a swat on the ass.

Noelle still held the shot glass in one hand, so she slammed it on the table upside down and laughed. "Do I do that every time?"

"Do what?" Rachel asked innocently as she handed over another shot. "Vodka's up. Next is the tequila, so pace yourself."

Sound advice, but Noelle downed the vodka and dropped the shot glass this time before she was whisked away by the revelers. Her skin tingled more this time around, and she was laughing by the time she reached the table again.

The tequila made her cough, but she drank all of that, too, before spinning into the crowd with a triumphant noise that felt right. Ace grinned and claimed his kiss before passing her along. It took longer, the hugs lingering and the kisses coming in twos and threes.

She was only halfway around the circle when the dizzy warmth crept from her stomach up into her chest, which was right about when the latest man relinquished her quickly.

To Jasper.

He looked down at her with a half-smile and rubbed her bare upper arms. "Sorry I'm late."

The warmth of his hands shot straight to her core, though that could have been the tequila, too. Or the vodka. Maybe the whiskey, making its presence known with a slow burn that turned her smile wickedly bold. "You missed two kisses. I gave them to Ace instead."

"Hell yeah, she did," Ace called from the opposite side of the circle. "You gonna come get them, brother?"

"Wouldn't be the first time." Jasper tilted her head back with his fingers under her chin. "Three shots. Still steady on your feet?"

"Steady enough," she lied, fidgeting under his unwavering gaze. He had a way of looking at her that made the rest of the room seem frozen, as if they couldn't possibly be interrupting anything because nothing important would dare happen while his attention was fixed on her.

"Good." He released her, but not before brushing his lips over hers. "Congratulations, sweetheart."

No, that warmth wasn't the liquor. It was all him, and it expanded to fill her as she leaned up to kiss him once more. "See you next time around," she whispered against his mouth, then laughed and spun into the arms of the grinning man next to him.

She
wasn't
steady on her feet by the time she came back around to Ace. He whirled her like a dancer, and the room kept on moving, dipping dizzily to the side before righting itself. She stumbled back toward Rachel and crashed into Jasper.

Again.

Blinking, Noelle pulled back to peer up at him. "Did you come to get your kisses from Ace?"

Jasper didn't answer. Instead, he picked up the next shot Rachel had poured and tipped it back. Then he slipped an arm around Noelle's waist, dragged her close, and bent his head to hers.

Liquor spilled across her tongue. Not the whole shot, not even most of it, but enough to give her the taste of it. His lips crushed against hers, hot and a little rough, the sensation a thousand times more intense with the entire gang forming a cheering, catcalling wall around them. She couldn't forget that everyone was watching as he chased the booze with his tongue, and then she couldn't care because he knew how to kiss her knees weak.

Lex's voice cut through the cheers, close and wry. "That's real subtle, Jas."

Jas released Noelle, and she swung around to face Rachel. "That has to be cheating."

"Not exactly," she hedged. "Technically, you don't have to
finish
every shot. Not by yourself, anyway."

"Jasper just hung a big ‘no trespassing' sign on you." Lex wound her arm around Noelle's shoulders. "Good thing I like to live dangerously."

Jasper glared, and it was hotter than it should have been. His furrowed brow and his tight expression, all of him poised as if he'd snatch her out of Lex's grip at a moment's notice.

Smiling slowly, Noelle leaned in to the other woman. "He didn't ask me if I wanted you to trespass."

"Do you?" A whisper, and Lex's breath stirred the hair curling against the side of Noelle's neck.

Noelle wasn't sure what made the decision for her. The vodka, maybe, or the tequila. Some bit of wildness buried deep inside her, only uncovered when liquor had burned everything else away.

The way Jasper's gaze all but dared her to do it.

She only had to turn her head a little bit, and then Lex's mouth was pressed against hers. Soft lips, more yielding than Jasper's, and gentler. It seemed that way, at least, in the moment where Noelle could only kiss the other woman awkwardly, terrified it might be a mistake after all.