Runner: The Fringe, Book 3 (17 page)

Turning, she cut off his babbling by pressing a finger to his lips. “The cell room is fine if you’ll just stop locking me in.”

“That’s not it, Jynx.” He swallowed hard. “I’m not locking you in so much as I’m locking myself out.”

“Why? I don’t want you to.” She seemed more frustrated by him than she had been at the game. “Do you think I’m lying to you about that?”

“No. You’re interested in me. I’m interested in you. Only an idiot would doubt that. Thing is, your options are rather limited. You don’t have much of a choice. I’m probably not the guy you would pick if you had your choice.”

A light flashed. He flicked his gaze and spun sharply to the right as he held her close. He tapped the main console. First perimeter breach. He swiveled left, scanned the ship and relaxed. Pathetic 2xBasic with no upgrades.

“A woman like you, Jynx, should have a lot of choices.”

Chapter Fifteen

Jynx sat in his lap, snug and safe, then turned to the main console. “What just happened?”

“That light? First perimeter breach by a 2xBasic with no upgrades. They won’t see us until they hit the fourth perimeter.” He relayed the information to her with a confident, matter-of-fact tone.

“How far away is the first perimeter?”

“Edge of the quadrant.”

“How far is that?”

“Too far to describe. Best ship in the Void? Forty-eight hours. That thing? Don’t make me laugh.” After a chuckle, he pointed to the sensors. “That guy won’t even
see
us unless I want him to.”

She watched and listened as Foster pointed out the various readings. What a day ago seemed impossibly complicated began to make sense to her untrained eyes. Still, she wouldn’t want to have to even think about flying his ship. Somehow, thinking of his ship without him to pilot the craft saddened her. He’d been the ship’s pilot for so long, she had a feeling the controls would respond only to him.

“Thing is, we’re safe, and for the most part, we’re utterly alone out here. That’s why I think we should try a bit harder to just be friends because, well, it’s just us out here. Thing is, you and I—”

“If only there were a thousand men, I wouldn’t be attracted to you.”

“Something like that, I guess.”

“Throw a thousand choices in my face, and you think I’d never choose you.”

“No, just that—”

“I should have a choice.”

“Yeah.”

“I do have a choice, Mr. Nash.” She sat forward and flipped a switch, plummeting the bridge into blackness. Having observed him hitting that switch several times, she knew just what button to push. “You have a choice too.”

She stood away from him, pulled off her borrowed socks, then slipped her feet under the armrests of his chair so she could straddle his lap. Lifting her skirt so that her white lace panties pressed against the now straining bulge in his faded jeans, she sighed when they touched. In this moment, he wasn’t the triple-platinum Runner, not the man of the dangerous reputation or dubious honor, but just a man. Foster Nash. A man in the dark just as she was only a woman in the dark.

Timeless erotic need compelled her to find his ear and whisper, “Had I a thousand men to choose from, I would still pick you.” Trailing her lips down his neck, rubbing against him like an alley cat in heat, she breathed, “If you had a thousand women to choose from, would you pick me?”

When she felt him reach for the light switch, she captured his wrist. She realized her folly in trying to restrain him when her tiny fingers barely encircled half.

“Don’t. Foster, please, don’t.” She realized her aggressiveness repulsed him. “If you don’t want me, please tell me in the dark where it won’t hurt so much.”

When he didn’t move and didn’t answer, she slid up his lap with a passionate gladness for the shame-hiding dark.

Groaning low and deep in his chest, he hauled her back down by gripping her hips with his massive hands. His sudden forceful move made her whole body shiver as she crushed against him.

“I just wanted to see you in the light.” On the edge of a deep breath, he pressed her gently to him. “I want to see you and that glow in your eyes. Watch the colors change along the strands of your hair.” He nuzzled her neck. “I like seeing my lover in the light.”

Curling herself to him in velvet thick shadows, she tilted her mouth to his ear. “I’ve never known darkness like this, privacy like this.” Soaking white lace slid smoothly along the rough edge of his button fly. “We’re alone out here, and that’s exactly what I want.” She rubbed her clit hard against the thick seam of his jeans as she lifted her face along his. “Don’t turn on the lights. Don’t see. Feel.” Taking her own advice, she felt the harsh rasp of his well-after-five shadow against her cheek. “Just stop thinking so much about everything and
be
with me.”

Biting his ear, she gasped when he gripped her hips and pulled her hard against his body as he bucked up between her legs. Friction made a hot, hard swipe against her clit. She arched back as his hands cupped her bottom and pulled her even tighter.

“This is getting very close to critical mass.”

His voice sounded strained, harsh and yet almost pleading.

“I know, Mr. Nash.” She tried not to moan, but she did when he molded her body to his with possessive intensity.

“No, I don’t think you do.” He grasped her shoulders, pressed her back, and dragged his new beard down her face and her throat. He yanked down the zipper of her dress so he could force the scoop neck aside to rub his rough whiskers against the sensitive flesh of her breasts.

She pulled her dress lower, exposing her lace-clad breasts to him. He couldn’t see what she did in the dark, but he knew, and he groaned, the low rumbling a call of encouragement.

After sliding the dress off her arms, she angled his head to her breasts. “Tell me about critical mass, Mr. Nash.”

“It’s too late.” Using his chin, he forced one cup down, drew her nipple into his mouth and nibbled the oh-so-tender flesh to a hard bud. He did the same to her other breast, then drew back.

Waiting, she arched when he blew across her straining nipples. The icy wind contracted her skin and sent a sharp tingle down her body. Pulling back, she fumbled at the waist of his jeans. Even with her short nails, she couldn’t grasp the tab that would pop his straining top button.

Thoroughly frustrated, he pushed her hand aside, grabbed the top of his pants then yanked hard, down and right. Every button popped apart with a smart
thwhap
that echoed in the dark of the bridge.

“Can’t be so gentle all the time, Sweets.”

Excited by the sheer physical prowess of his movement, she lowered her hand to the silk-covered heat of his erection. “I wouldn’t want to hurt you.” She stroked him through the fabric as she pressed her mouth to his ear. “I want to please you, Mr. Nash.”

His body lifted up with his growl and she pressed her lace against his silk. Sliding against him, burning wet, soaking the fabric of his boxers, she said, “More than anything, I want you inside me, Foster.”

He never let anyone call him Foster. His hatred for his given name bordered on pathological loathing. Yet from her mouth, her bold, direct and insistent mouth, suddenly his name didn’t sound so horrible.

“I want you, Foster.” She took a deep breath that pressed her breasts against his chest and rubbed her hardened nipples against him. “I don’t think I’ve ever wanted anyone the way I want you.”

Rocking her hips, her body a graceful torture, he tried once again to stop what seemed inevitable.

“You don’t have to do this. I’ll protect you even if—”

“I want to do this.” Jynx wrapped her arms around his shoulders and continued to slide her body along his. “Please tell me the truth that you do too.”

“I want, Jynx. I want you. But—”

“No buts.” With a sigh, she kissed him. “You want. Me too. That’s enough for now.” The wetness between her wantonly spread legs slid her along his silk-clad cock. Hot honey wet stroking him with maddening grace. All those fantasies of his youth were suddenly alive and in his arms.

Jynx teased him with a small scrap of lace that would be so easy for him to yank away. If he could just plunge himself inside, one thrust into her tight heat, he’d know her body in every way that mattered. All he had to do was pull away his boxers and her saturated panties, and they would both scream with the pleasure of connection, in the dark, on the
Damn You
bridge, in the throne of his empire.

“Wait.” When he pushed her away, she growled like an animal.

“Wait for what?” His refined IWOG lady snarled at having her pleasure thwarted. What he wouldn’t give to see her blazing violet eyes right now.

Maneuvering her up and off his lap, he lifted her dress over her head. “Do you mind?”

“Not at all.”

He could hear her lift her hands to remove her bra.

“No. Leave it.” Finding her breasts in the dark with an accuracy that startled them both, he stroked his fingers across her exposed peaks. “Just like that.” It excited him more to imagine her nipples exposed with tawdry pride over the cups of her bra than the actual vision of it would. “Covered yet exposed.”

She surrendered with a moan. “Take off your shirt.”

He whipped the blue motton over his head and tossed the shirt aside. He couldn’t see her hand, but he felt her body heat as she cautiously sought his chest. Trailing her finger from the soft edge of his bellybutton up, she flattened her palms until she stroked him, possessive and exuberant, all the way to his face. Her small greedy hands encompassed his shoulders as she pressed her pointed breasts to his chest.

He slid off her white lace thong. She kicked them aside as she pushed at his jeans. He stepped back, practically yanked them off, then tossed them somewhere in the dark.

“What about my boxers?”

“Leave them on.” She settled him back into his chair and straddled his hips. His boxers became slick within two trips of her rocking hips. As she pushed his boxers down and away, exposing his throbbing cock to her equally throbbing heat, she said, “I can use your boxers for balance.” Forcing them down around his hips, she lifted her body, poised to pull him inside.

“Not so fast.” He grasped her hips, holding her at bay, and turned his chair. With a flick of his finger, a slow pulsing beat filled the ship, vibrating the walls with a pounding, insistent low bass roll of music that rocked the dark. He pulled her tight, angling his body until his cock waited at the entrance of her passage.

“Ride me,” he begged breathlessly, his lips curved to her ear. “Ride me like a wicked promise.” Coaxing her hips to lower against his, he demanded, “Ride me all slow and wanton like the lady you are.”

Carefully, seductively, she impaled herself on him.

“Dear God.”

He couldn’t remember if he said it or she did. It didn’t matter, because words became pointless as her slick heat rode down his shaft, engulfing and cradling his cock. When she took him fully deep, his head involuntarily went back.

For a stunned second, he stopped to feel that moment of their bodies meshed in the most intimate way possible, here in the black where usually only nightmares rested. But this time the sweet shadows brought his dream to life. He was so fully inside her, she’d hurt them both if she tried to get away.

Jynx clearly had no such thought. Using her arms against the hand rests, her legs against the edges of his pilot chair, she danced her body against his to the slowly swelling music until he thought he would go mad with pleasure.

“Foster.” She moaned his name on a breath of passion.

“Jynx.” He growled her name as he held tight to her bottom. The velvet dark around them was so thick, he could smell her and feel her, but he couldn’t see her. Rocking up, he mimicked her dance. Entranced and mesmerized and just ensnared by the reality of what had been a fantasy his whole career, he surrendered himself completely to the moment.

Cupping his hands to her hips, he lifted her up, gently at first, matching the beat of music, helping her to ride him. As her dance against him went on, he found himself digging his fingertips into her bottom. No longer did he help her ride; no, now he forced her to increase her pace.

A sudden burst compelled him to grip her flesh and slam her down as he rocked his body up. His big hands gave her no choice but to do as he wanted. Sudden and hard and damn, she just grasped the headrest of his chair with a growl as she strapped herself to him, letting him do as he pleased.

“Yes,” she moaned, tightening her body for the ride.

“Critical mass.” He tried to slow down. With a hesitant push, he drew Jynx away as if he could actually stop now.

“Show me critical mass, Mr. Nash.”

“I don’t want to hurt you.”

“I’ll tell you if you do.”

He lifted her up, slammed her down, over and over, matching the swelling beat of music. Each time he plunged into her, she let out a cross between a growl and a scream. She clutched the headrest and encouraged him with gasping moans of
yes
and
please
and
oh-my-god why don’t you just—

“Am I hurting you?”

“Show me critical—”

He cut her off with a rough kiss. As the pace increased, she gripped his shoulders and hung on to him as he thrust ever harder and deeper. Afraid of his darkest desires hurting her, he tried to slow down, to be gentle, but he couldn’t. The power in his arms and hips rocking in tandem bent her lovely body to his wicked needs.

Critical mass.

Possessed by a base animal force, he snarled as he slammed her tightly against him, then gripped her shoulders, pulling her hard to him, bucking against her in a barely controlled frenzy. In the back of his mind, he thanked the dark for hiding his vulgar animal lust. He thought of backing off again, but she bit his neck, encouraging the beast within to push his humanity aside. He gave a series of pounding strokes; then he came deep inside her with gasps of consuming need that matched hers.

Shaking, groaning with release, he lowered her back so he could rub his thumb across her clit.

“Come for me, Jynx. I want to feel you.” It didn’t take long. She constricted around him, sending another wave of pleasure through his body. Panting, she rose up, kissed him, then collapsed against his chest.