“They didn’t.” Aidan’s countenance was grave. “They’ve been searching the area since you left. There’s no trace of her. Despite her injuries, she managed to escape.”
“Fuck!”
“Watch the language,” Stacey admonished.
He turned to look at her. She stared at him with glistening eyes and puckered her lips in a kissing gesture. A low sound of longing rumbled in his throat.
“I don’t know what to do,” he said, facing Aidan again. “I don’t know where I should go, or what I should do, or how I should feel.”
“You do what I did,” Aidan said. “You forget the ‘shoulds’ and you jump.”
Connor snorted. “Nothing is ever that easy when it comes to women.”
“I didn’t say it was easy. But if you want her, make it work. It’s worth it to be happy.”
Happiness. Connor wanted it. He wanted it with Stacey. “Right.” And just that quickly, he decided. “So, before McDougal’s men totally clear out, let’s get a security system out of them. They’ve got to have top-of-the-line shit. I want this house locked up so tight Ft. Knox will be jealous. I’ll be gone a lot. I need to know they’re protected.”
“Great idea.” Aidan smiled, opened the door, and gestured him out first. “Let’s get my money’s worth.”
Stacey woke with a violent, skull-crushing headache.
Both palms pressed flat to her temples, she rolled and writhed, groaning. She bumped into Justin and he mumbled a protest. Whispering an apology, she rolled the other way and fell off the side of her bed. She hit the floor on her knees and cried out, biting her lower lip to stem any more noises. A quick glance at the clock showed it was nearly three in the morning. The way her head felt, she doubted she’d live to see the sunrise.
She crawled a few feet, then rose by necessity. It was too jarring to move on her hands and knees. How she made it down the hall, she’d never know, but it was colder in the open space of the living room and the chill eased the burning of her skin.
“Stacey?”
Connor’s deep brogue curled around her spine and coursed down like warm honey. Relief flooded her and nearly brought her to the floor again.
“Where are you?” she gasped, afraid to open her eyes. The moonlight slanting upward to the ceiling from the shutters was too much light even from behind hastily closed lids. The full brunt would only increase the feeling of having an ice pick piercing straight through to her brain.
“Here,” he rumbled, “I’m right here.”
Warm arms wrapped around her, cradling her to a hard, nude chest lightly dusted with hair.
“I’m so glad you stayed.”
“I’m not leaving you, sweetheart. Even when I’m not here, I won’t really be gone.”
“My head hurts,” she whimpered, tears coursing down her cheeks.
“The doctor left some medicine for you. Let me—”
“No!” She clung to his waistband, recognizing by touch that he wore sweats. The thought of him here, sleeping on her couch, protecting her, made her feel loved and safe in a way nothing else in her life ever had. “Don’t leave me.”
“Sweetheart.” His lips pressed to her forehead and some of the pain eased. “It kills me to see you crying.”
“Do that again,” she begged. “Kiss me again.”
His mouth touched her skin, this time against her closed eyes and lashes, kissing away the tears. The throbbing in her head lessened.
Tilting her neck back, Stacey captured his lips with her own. The instant she tasted him, her blood heated and began to flow, her heart rate picked up. Miraculously, the debilitating pressure eased.
“Stace,” he mumbled into her mouth as she grew more fervent. “What are you doing?”
“I want you.”
She felt the surprise move through him, then the desire he couldn’t control.
“You’re nuts,” he said, but his hands were on her hips, his fingers sliding beneath her cotton shirt to touch the skin of her back. His touch was soothing, calming.
The more he touched her, the less her head hurt.
“Make love to me,” she pleaded.
“Justin…?”
“The laundry room has a door.”
“You shouldn’t—”
“Now, Connor!”
“Aw, fuck.” He picked her up and carried her to the back of the house. Stepping into the laundry room, he kicked aside the basket that held the door open and pushed the portal closed. He sat her down atop the old desk she used as a folding table and stared at her with a bemused smile and hot gaze. “Now what?”
In the back of her mind a sharp squealing noise resembled tires burning rubber. “Don’t stop touching me.”
Setting his hands on either side of her hips, Connor caged her to the desk and nuzzled his lips against her neck. “Tell me what you need, sweetheart.”
She reached for him, embraced him. Beneath her palms she felt hot, silken skin stretched over rippling, flexing muscle and she melted inside. She moaned when his teeth nipped her earlobe. “I need you.”
“You’ve got me.” He pressed her back onto the desk and his hand slipped between her legs. Even through the thick camouflage, his fingertips had no trouble giving her what she wanted. “I’m not going anywhere. We’ll make this work.”
“Yes…oh that feels good…”
“Hmmm,” he agreed, deftly freeing the button at her waistband before pulling the zipper down. The whole time his lips, tongue, and teeth were doing something wonderful to the tender skin of her throat and his other hand cushioned the back of her head so that his big, hard body was literally wrapped around hers. The noises in her head fell silent. Or else they were drowned out by the rushing of blood in her ears.
“Connor.” Her nostrils filled with his scent. There was no other scent in the world like his—spicy and exotic. Foreign. She loved it. Her very own man of her dreams.
He was right; time didn’t matter. What mattered was the way she felt when they were together. He had been a rock of stability when she needed him and she knew he always would be. That was just his way.
She gasped as his hand slipped beneath the waistband of her panties.
“How does your head feel?” His voice was dark as sin, his accent thick and dripping with lust.
“I-I…”
“Does your head still hurt?” Connor kissed her with fervent passion, his tongue gliding along hers expertly, taking her mind off everything but him. A rough, edgy growl rumbled in his chest as she grew wet against his fingertips.
“Oh god.” Stacey moaned, her eyes clenching shut as he slid a finger inside her. “Fuck me, please! Hurry.”
He hushed her frantic cries with his mouth and gently cradled her descent as he laid her flat atop the desk. He tugged her pants down to her knees, lifted her joined legs into air, and set them against his shoulder. When she felt the warm, silky smooth head of his cock, Stacey writhed with hunger, needing him inside her.
“Shh…Here you go, sweetheart,” he purred.
Her hands wrapped around the curved edges of the desktop as his thick cock pushed into her. She cried out, arching in pleasure. She was tight in this position, forcing him to work his way into her with short, fierce digs.
Mewling with pleasure, she struggled to take all that he had. “You’re too big like this,” she gasped.
“You’ll take me.” He rolled his hips and slid deeper. Advancing. Retreating. Claiming her body inch by tortuously good inch.
Her nails dug crescents into the wood as he stroked deeper, massaging the broad head of his cock across that greedy spot inside her that could never get enough of him.
“Stacey,” he breathed roughly, pumping his hips. “Your pussy is so damn tight like this. Like a hot, wet fist. So fucking good. I think I might come before I get all the way inside you.”
“Don’t you dare!” She cupped her aching breasts and squeezed. “You started this. You better finish.”
“Oh, I’ll finish.” His
gorgeous face was flushed, his eyes dark, his forehead misted with sweat. “Fuck…yeah…I’m going to finish. Deep inside you.”
Dear god, would she survive it?
He was working her into a frenzy, thrusting harder and faster. The waistband of his sweats, lowered just to his hips, rubbed against her thighs. The sight was intensely erotic, as was her position, bound and positioned for his pleasure. His hips swiveled and thrust, in and out. Her cunt rippled along his cock, on the verge of orgasm.
Stacey’s back arched, her entire body tense and expectant. This was what she needed, what she wanted. To be connected to him, wanted by him. “Yes…”
Connor stroked deeper, his heavy testicles slapping rhythmically against the curve of her ass, making her pussy clench tight around him. She watched him with heavy-lidded eyes, taking in his passion-flushed features and the lock of golden hair that fell over his brow. His biceps and pectorals were defined by the effortless hold he had on her. His abdomen flexed as he fucked her, the golden skin glistening with sweat.
“You’re mine,” he gritted out. “I’m keeping you.”
His possessiveness thrilled her, pushing her that last little bit she needed to climax. Stacey bit her lip to keep from crying out as the orgasm tightened her entire body.
Connor grunted and fucked through her spasms, increasing his pace until she thought she would scream with the pleasure. It was only the nearby door and their need for privacy that forced her to silence.
She felt him swell, grow impossibly harder, and then he groaned, “Stacey…”
His hips jack hammered against hers, rocking the old desk, his fingers digging into the flesh of her thighs. His cock jerked, then spurted, filling her in a thick rush of heat. He continued to take her, stroking through her clenching pussy, emptying his lust and love at the deepest point of her.
“Fuck,” he gasped when it was over, resting his cheek against her calf. “You’ll kill me.”
“My head doesn’t hurt anymore,” she said in breathless wonder.
“I can’t even feel my head,” Connor replied. “I think you blew it off.”
She laughed with pure feminine triumph.
Stepping back, Connor withdrew from her body. He dried his cock with a nearby towel and tugged up his sweats, then he took care of cleaning and dressing her.
“Come here, baby.” Connor’s voice was filled with tenderness as he collected her in his arms.
Stacey held on tight. “I think I’m falling love with you,” she admitted shyly. “I hope that doesn’t freak you out. I have a tendency to jump into things and with you—”
His lips pressed against hers, halting the spill of words. “Go ahead and jump,” he urged hoarsely. “I’ll jump with you.”
Chapter 16
Philip Wager stared at the data on the screen with wide eyes, his heart thumping in a desperate, frantic tempo. His fingers clung to the edge of the console with white-knuckled force and he forced himself to release his grip. He pushed the chair back and rose to his feet.
“Fuck,” he whispered, his brain scrambling to comprehend the information in front of him. “That’s impossible.”
“Obviously not,” murmured a voice behind him.
He spun and faced his visitor, wincing inwardly at the sight of the man who stood there. His glaive was out of reach behind him, leaving him completely vulnerable to the tip of the blade leveled at his chest. “Elder Sheron,” he replied, glancing over the gray-robed shoulder to the cavern hallway beyond. He searched for both a means of entry and a source of assistance. Neither was readily visible.
“Wager,” Sheron greeted in a conversational tone.
“How did you get in here?”
“I can gain entry to anywhere. I had no part in the building of the Twilight, but every upgrade and enhancement made to the matrix in the last several centuries came from me.”
Philip’s heart stuttered as he considered the value of such knowledge.
“I can see you appreciate the possibilities.” Sheron’s voice was filled with a mentor’s pride. “Most of the Elders chose to concentrate their attentions on making rules. They believe that is the source of our authority. I, however, knew our true power came from our ability to create the Twilight. Therefore, I wanted to know everything about it. It was considered the least desirable of tasks, so I was free to do as I wished.”
“You planted the bug.” There were hundreds of questions in Philip’s mind, but he knew the answer to that query for a certainty.
“Yes, and I always knew you would be the one who would dig deep enough to find it. I tried to have you eliminated, but the others would not hear of it. They did not know my reasons, you see. They felt denying you advancement was punishment enough for your perceived offenses, which I exaggerated, of course.” The Elder waved one hand dismissively. “Since you did not have access to the equipment required to find me out, I let it go. But I was aware that someday it would come to this.”
“What are you doing?” Philip asked, backing toward his glaive, which rested in its scabbard atop a table in the corner. “You must have been planning this for centuries.”
Sheron reached up and pushed back his cowl, revealing a chilling smile. “Yes. I have. Which is why I cannot allow you to ruin everything. All these eons of biding my time, moving my pieces across the board slowly but surely. Can you imagine how much patience has been required? I am so close now. But you could ruin everything in a moment.”
“Explain to me what you’re up to,” Philip coaxed, still retreating, hoping to get near enough to his glaive to lunge for it and defend himself. “I can help you.”
“You assume my motives are altruistic and you would want to help me. Or perhaps you are simply hoping to distract me from noticing how you move toward your weapon.”
Philip stilled and shrugged. Sheron laughed.
“If it consoles you any,” the Elder said, “your sacrifice will serve the greater good.”
“Oh really?” Philip drawled. “And here I thought you just wanted to prevent me from telling anyone you have a half-mortal daughter.”
“There is that, too. There are only two people who know, and that is one person too many.”
“She is partnered with a Guardian.” Perhaps his mind was more devious, but for Philip, the possibilities inherent in that mating were both plentiful and terrifying. “Was that your intent all along?”
Sheron gripped his glaive more securely. “My apologies, lieutenant. Time is of the essence. I must kill you now. I cannot stay and chat.”
Philip crouched, prepared.
The Elder thrust forward in a fatal lunge.
Chapter 17
Stacey eased her foot off the gas pedal as her car approached her house, enjoying the view of her family from a distance. Connor stood in the light of the setting sun like a golden god, his bare back glistening with the sweat from his exertions, his powerful biceps flexing as he drilled another screw into the white picket fence that was quickly replacing her old chain link.
From the moment the realtor had shown her the house, she’d thought its quaint charm was lessened by the modern barrier. Connor, knowing her so well, had surprised her by beginning the project while she was at work yesterday. He was constantly doing stuff like that—sensing her desires and working to make them reality. It was one of many, many things she loved about him.
As she watched, Justin came into view, also shirtless. He handed Connor another screw and then Connor handed him the drill. With endless patience, her dream lover slipped safety glasses over her son’s eyes and taught him how to use the cordless drill. Justin finished securing the rest of the board by himself. Then he stepped back to admire his handiwork with pride, transforming his youthful features.
Stacey’s chest tightened with the effort required to contain her love. Her eyes watered and her nose began to run. She reached for a tissue and forced herself to take deep, even breaths. If she got too upset, her nose would bleed, a side effect of the mind-infusion that
she didn’t want Connor to worry about.
As if he sensed the weight of her stare, Connor lifted his head and caught sight of her. He grinned and waved. Collecting herself, Stacey stepped on the accelerator and approached the house, turning into the driveway and shutting off the engine. He was opening the door and helping her out before she even had time to get the keys out of the ignition.
“I missed you,” he rumbled, tugging with just enough force to bring her flush against him. “And I love these scrubs.”
She laughed, thinking he was silly but glad that he was. Personally, she thought she was a bit nutty herself, and it was fabulous to share her life with a man who complimented that part of her. “You say that about all my scrubs.”
“Yeah, but these are my favorite. They’re sexy.”
With both brows raised, she glanced down at her clothing. “I’m doing something wrong if your idea of sexy is two cartoon dogs.”
“Ah, but look at how the girl dog is batting those long lashes at the boy dog. That’s romance.”
Stacey shook her head and glanced up at him, basking in the warm, affectionate glow in his eyes. “Romance is sexy?”
“Damn straight,” he murmured, before taking her mouth in a hard quick kiss. When he pulled away, his gaze was dark with desire. “I can’t do more than kiss you with Justin around. Even that makes him queasy, he says.”
“Tonight, you’re mine,” she said, swatting his ass.
“You betcha.” Connor caught her hand and pulled her toward the house. “I have something to show you.”
“Oh, yeah?”
Every time he “showed” her something, it blew her away. His search for the artifacts forced him to travel a lot, but he was always thinking of her while he was gone. She knew it because of how often he called and by how many gifts he brought back for her. She didn’t know how he did it, but he managed to dole out his presents here and there over the far-too-short trips home. Stacey knew she wouldn’t have the patience. But, she had to admit, his way was far more fun.
He led her through the living room and into the bedroom, closing the door behind them.