Authors: Lauren Dane
Tags: #Fiction, #Romance, #Erotic fiction, #General, #Adult, #Erotica, #Mercenary troops
Mesmerized (16 page)
Good thing he already wore his so she wouldn’t see his annoyance.
He fell into the run, his footsteps pounding the sand below. They had a few hours, maximum, before a storm came up, and that didn’t take into account the very real fact that random storms happened all the time out here, which was why it was pretty much deserted. Still, there had been a smattering of the low, curved abodes the settlers had lived in out this way. They dug into the rock foundation below the sand, keeping the abode in place in heavy winds. Still, it had to be a fairly hair-raising experience with the winds and sand trying to get inside to slice a body to pieces.
As they ran he planned his trip to Mirage. It would be better to just go without word. Cleaner. He’d come back most likely, at least to be sure they were all safe. But he thought of her face as she’d told him how it had felt when he’d gone without a word eleven years before, and he knew he wouldn’t be able to do it to her again. It wouldn’t be right. Her whole family had been good to him. Had helped him with this mission, and it wouldn’t be fair.
So he’d tell them all right before he left for the Portal. That would work.
S
he tapped on his door, impatient, but set on her goals.
he tapped on his door, impatient, but set on her goals.
“We don’t need to leave for some time yet,” he murmured when he answered.
“I know. Come with me.” She held out a hand. “Bring everything we’ll need for the run. We’ll leave directly from where I’m taking you.”
He narrowed his gaze a moment.
“Trust me.”
He snorted but reached down to grab his duffel with his free hand. The other remained in hers.
Expertly, she flew past the closer canyons and toward the caldera. When she reached the spot, she landed on an outcropping she’d have been nervous about only a few years before.
“Nice flying.”
She didn’t hide her smile at his compliment. “Thanks. Took me about a thousand tries to get it right. But it’s worth it. Follow me, and watch your step.”
The blast of heat wore away as she drew him through the narrow, sloped passage. And the dry was replaced by moist air. She broke some glow sticks and tossed them near the water to reflect the light.
“Pools?”
So very glad she’d brought him, she nodded. “Fed by underground springs. The saline is high here, so it’s easy to float. The dark blue ones just beyond”—she indicated three small pools to the southern end of the cavernous space—“are cool.”
She began to strip, leaving her things in a neat, folded pile. “Brought some drying cloths. These here”—she dipped a toe into the nearest pool—“are warm. Not too warm. Just right.”
When she turned to face him, she found him partially unclothed, his gaze snagged on her body.
Flattered, she smiled and moved to him, making quick work of getting him all the way naked.
Andrei couldn’t say why, not totally, but emotion flooded him when he saw the space. Water bubbled slowly up, seeping into the pools, lending a tranquil air. All his worries ebbed, and he grasped this moment. Just the two of them.
He watched her as she stepped into the largest pool. Everything in his body tightened at her groan of delight. Even more when her breasts floated so prettily.
“I’m liking the high saline in the water right about now,” he murmured as he swam lazily toward her.
Her laugh was easy as she came to him, her arms around him, lips pressed against his throat.
“Do you like the pools?”
He ducked under the water, kissing a trail up her belly and neck. “Yes.”
Laughing, she swam away, flipping to her back in a most alluring fashion. “I’m glad. I found this place a few years ago. Got caught out in a storm, and I needed the cover of the canyon. It’s my secret place.”
He smiled, swimming after her like a predator. “Thank you for sharing it with me.”
She splashed him, scooting just out of his reach, teasing. “There’s a story. About your hair. You said something about not cutting it unless you had to. Your face says more to me than you do with words. There’s something there. I want to know it. Will you share it with me?”
He paused, and she moved past him, a phantom touch of her fingertips against his shoulder. “I want to know you. Fill in those spaces in my head.”
What else could he do but give her what she’d asked for so honestly? “In my first year, during training for Phantom Corps, I got into a lot of fights. Stupid, insignificant stuff I wouldn’t blink at today. But I wasn’t the same then.”
He’d been nearly feral. Away from everything he knew. At first he trusted no one. Then slowly he’d built a kinship with Daniel. A bond he felt to that very day.
“All of us, all the operatives in Phantom Corps come from tumultuous backgrounds. We lacked discipline. Lacked self-respect.” He did a backstroke, trying to pretend it wasn’t a problem to tell this story.
“I got into one too many brawls.” An understatement. He’d nearly killed another trainee. The boy, now one of the few people Andrei could always count on to get his back, had nearly lost an eye.
She never said a word, just treaded water, moving her gaze with him as he continued to swim.
“My punishment was to tend to the soldier I’d wounded.” He’d gone to his barracks every day, three times a day, to help administer medications and to change the bandages. Had seen, firsthand, just how much damage could be done with his fists. Every day, over and over, he was confronted with the hurt he’d caused.
“Ellis had been off-’Verse at the time. He called me to his office.” His gut clenched at the memory of Wilhelm’s face, so full of disappointment. That had shaken Andrei more than anything else. He wanted Ellis’s respect, and he’d only earned his disdain.
“He said I had too much pride for all the wrong reasons.” Said Andrei had no self-respect or understanding of how teamwork could save a life. “My hair was part of it. So he had it shaved off.”
She gasped, unable to stop herself. She knew he didn’t want pity, but it was there in her belly. What would it have been like for him so far from everything he knew? Cutting all his glorious hair would have left him utterly exposed, body and sprit.
“Don’t. I deserved it.” He flipped to his back, cradling her against him as he swam them to the ledge.
“And you grew it all back to prove you could have both.” And, she’d wager, the first step he’d taken to controlling his anger.
The hands he’d had roving all over her body paused a brief moment. His way of agreeing with what she said, she imagined.
“Love me,” she murmured as she turned to face him.
He swam them over to the shallows, his palms sliding over every part of her he could reach. The silk of the water created delicious friction. Weightless and caressed, she let him carry her, gave herself to him, willingly going wherever he wanted.
Slow and sexy, he glided around to face her once her feet touched the smooth rocks. He kissed each eyelid, over the bridge of her nose, across her cheeks. Feather-light touches that echoed through her like an earthquake.
He devastated with tenderness, surprising her when she’d expected ferocity. He had a way of doing that. Of sneaking past her expectations and touching her when she least anticipated it.
The pad of her thumb brushed over his lips, against the soft bristle of the scruff on his face. “What a glorious sight you are, your hair slicked back away from your face.” He turned his face into her hand, first kissing and then catching her thumb between his teeth, licking and then sucking.
An echo tugged at her nipples, around her clit, and she took a deep breath, relaxing in the warmth around them, letting herself give over fully to this moment between them.
He dipped just a bit, licking across her collarbone. “I just had you a few hours ago.”
Her head fell back as she let herself float, boneless. “I’m always happy to be had again, you know.”
Instead of speaking, he let his hands and mouth do the work. A tug of teeth on a nipple peeking just above the waterline. The tease of fingertips along the seam of her labia and then a tickle against her clit.
He drew her to the farthest end of the shallows, so that she rested on her back, reclining on rocks warmed by the water. Only her calves and fingertips remained immersed.
Taking her foot in his hands, he kneaded her instep, giving a hot, openmouthed kiss at her arch and then just behind her anklebone. So tender it brought a strangled sigh from her lips. Gentle, but firm hands continued to massage up each leg, his thumbs sliding along the place where thigh met body.
Such a tease.
She loved every moment of it. Every bit of time they could steal, just the two of them like this, sharing and growing, was a gift. A secret side of him she was thrilled to be shown. Made her feel special to be part of it.
His finger made a swirl around her gate, just barely dipping inside. “Tender?” He bent his head, reverent, to place a kiss on her belly, just below her navel.
“I want you.”
He laughed, the sound tight with need. “You’ll get yours, greedy girl.”
Tugging on his hair, she brought his gaze to hers, searing her to her bones. “I want all of you.”
He settled between her thighs, kissing up her belly and to her nipples, teasing the already stiff nipples to throbbing.
She couldn’t tear her gaze from the flash of his teeth as he nipped the sides of her breasts and then back down her belly, settling between her thighs long enough to take a nice leisurely lick.
“So much talent.” She sighed happily as he licked and sucked, his tongue, teeth and lips all working in concert to blow her apart.
His knuckles brushed against her rear passage just right, with just enough pressure to spark her nerve endings, the water barely lapping against it. But when he dipped his mouth to her, his tongue replacing his knuckles, she nearly hit the rocky ceiling above them.
The shock of not only how naughty it felt, but the pleasure he brought with it, made her stomach muscles tremble as she gasped.
His fingers fucked into her cunt as he licked at her rear passage. So much she nearly came until he held back and made his way to her clit again. Over and over until she was senseless, needing so badly to come, and yet never wanting this delicious tension to end.
When he pushed her over, her clit between his lips, two fingers hooked and stroking against her sweet spot, it was a long groan of his name.
“Gods,” she managed to say around her tongue, “that was some of your best work. What next?” She used her elbow to prop herself up to see him properly. He flipped around, like an ocean creature, swimming out, submerging and coming right back to her after a nibble of her toes.
“Next, I do believe I’m going to fuck these and come on you.” He said this as he heaped her breasts together, sliding a thumb over her nipples.
He straddled her body as she held her breasts for him to slide his cock between. He made a sound, a grunt, a growl, an entreaty. Whatever it was, all that it was exploded, sending shards of the need to please him all through her system.
Each time he thrust all the way, she managed to lick the head and crown of his cock.
Such a bounty to look at she wished she had brought more glow sticks. His muscles and the wet strands of his hair stood in shadow, his features cast in the blue-green glow.
Above her he was a demigod. Strong. His thigh muscles bunched against her sides as he fucked the fleshy space she’d made for him.
Though if it had been bright or they’d been anywhere else, it wouldn’t feel so very intimate. Just a place for them alone.
She licked across his cock again, tasting the spice of his semen. Knowing he was close, even after they’d been together at her house, knowing he’d have her again when the situation presented itself. This knowing, the power of it, humbled her even as it titillated.
“So fucking good to see my cock between your tits. Your nipples so hard.” He nearly stuttered the last bit and pushed hard, his hands on hers to hold her breasts tight.
When he came, his head didn’t fall back; instead, his half-closed eyes snapped open, gaze locked on hers. She saw it come over him, the exact moment when desire took over, glossing and blurring the sharp warrior’s eyes, and orgasm held tight.
He pulled back, fisting his cock, coming on her breasts. The heat of each pulse of his seed sliding over her nipples and chest was a shock and yet ridiculously arousing.
After running his fingers through it, teasing her nipples for a few moments, he pulled her back into the water.
“Let’s get cleaned up and try the cool water next.”
She smiled, throwing her arms around him.
T
wo hours later, they finally approached the rise, beyond which the open pit mine lay. He slowed down and used a hand signal to get her to do the same. Crouching behind an outcropping of rocks, he pulled out his field glasses and surveyed the area. Three guard towers to the east. Stupid to only guard one side, but they must have figured only crazy people would come from the direction they came.
wo hours later, they finally approached the rise, beyond which the open pit mine lay. He slowed down and used a hand signal to get her to do the same. Crouching behind an outcropping of rocks, he pulled out his field glasses and surveyed the area. Three guard towers to the east. Stupid to only guard one side, but they must have figured only crazy people would come from the direction they came.
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