by Robin Hale
“You feel so good,” Molly murmured against the sensitive skin of my neck. She nipped at my pulse point, and I bucked against her thigh helplessly.
“You’re killing me, Fawn,” I whimpered as my hips worked tight circles against her thigh. Desire licked up the length of my spine, and my mouth went dry beneath the flood of sensation she poured into my skin.
“I believe I’ve been pretty clear about how I feel about you dying,” Molly chuckled. “Lube?”
The question had me sitting up, propping myself up on my elbows and staring down at Fawn in painfully aroused confusion. “Lube? What are you…?” Even as I asked, I reached for the bedside table and I was rewarded with the possessive, pleased stroke of Molly’s hand down my side. I tossed the bottle to her and she caught it easily, cheeks going pink around her mischievous smile.
Those soft shoulders lifted in a shrug. “I spent an awful lot of time in med school. I know a few things about your nerve endings.” The glint in her warm brown eyes was wicked, and I shivered at the sight of it. How the hell had I gotten so lucky? “If you don’t like it, I’ll stop. But I think you’ll like it.”
Settling back against the pillows was like releasing Molly’s leash, and I felt the satin glide of her skin as she eased down my body and lifted my knees over her shoulders. I shuddered even before the first press of her mouth against me. It felt like I had been waiting for that touch for ages, since the first moment I’d crawled out of a ventilation duct and saw her sitting in a dim office, surprised and frightened and so fucking brave that I should’ve realized right then how thoroughly I would want to give myself to her.
Every sweep of Molly’s tongue against me ratcheted the tension in my body even tighter, so that in a handful of breaths my jaw was clenched so hard I was sure I would crack a molar.
She’d only touched me for a few minutes, and I was already chasing my peak like she’d been working me over for hours.
“Breathe, Lana,” Molly laughed as she lifted her head from between my legs.
I grumbled something unintelligible, arms lifting and dropping in a helpless, wordless gesture.
“Flatterer,” Molly said with a wink and bowed her head once more.
The first touch of a slick finger between the cheeks of my ass rocketed through me like a lightning strike. Molly’s lips were wrapped around my clit and she sucked like it was a damn lollipop, tongue lapping relentlessly at that bundle of nerves and the aching, almost itching, opening of my pussy. And her fingertip, that careful, delicate, clever fingertip smoothed over the pucker of my ass with just the slightest bit of pressure.
I felt like my heart was going to explode.
I’d never — no one had ever — it hadn’t ever even fucking occurred to me that I might want to be touched there. But I did. Oh god, I did.
If Molly hadn’t had my knees over her shoulders I would’ve dug my heels into the bedclothes, would’ve canted my hips and pushed back against her touch like I was in heat. As it was, I was too worried that I might hurt her, too afraid that I’d bruise all that soft, delicate skin because she was making me lose my mind.
Molly’s hand rocked, pushing against my ass, letting my body relax into her touch on its own even as her tongue lapped lightning and fire over the pleasure point at the apex of my thighs. My orgasm wound around my spine and pulled at my body like a fishing line perilously close to snapping.
“Molly,” I groaned and clenched my hands in the bedclothes.
“You’re so perfect like this,” she whispered, brown eyes practically glowing with lust as she watched me over the crest of my pubic bone. And then she was on me again, sucking almost viciously in counterpoint to the delicate laps of her tongue, pushing the tip of her finger inside the furl of my ass and oh god, that was it. It was too much.
“Molly!” I shouted, voice breaking, throat going tight and hoarse as my entire body clenched down and my pleasure crested in a wave that threatened to suck me under, black spots already filtering through the edges of my vision.
Molly rode me through it. Her fingertip against my ass, her mouth wrapped around my clit, she licked and sucked and rubbed with increasing gentleness until the shudders had all but passed and I sagged back into the sheets.
“Come here,” I growled, throat wrecked from the way I’d cried out for my gorgeous, perfect love.
Her laughter was bright and refreshing as she crawled up the bed to kiss me. I wrapped my leg around her hips and flipped the pair of us over, trapping her shoulders in the circle of my arm and grinning down at her in the diminishing moonlight.
“You’re fucking incredible,” I murmured against her lips in between slow, wet kisses. My right hand drifted down her body and dipped into the wet folds of her pussy.
“Oh god, Lana,” Molly whimpered as I opened her on two fingers. Her hips rolled in tight circles down onto my hand and I swept my thumb around the outside of her clit in light, maddening circles. She was so wet, so ready. Going down on me had evidently gotten her most of the way there, and fuck, just the thought of that was nearly enough to set me off again.
I swallowed all of her pretty cries, every whimper and gasp that she gave me as I touched her. I thrust my fingers deep inside and felt the way her body clung to me, the way she rocked into the press of my fingertips against that spot at the front wall of her body, the way she writhed and tried to drive my thumb harder against her clit. She didn’t need much, not really, not with how beautifully she’d responded to the orgasm she’d practically willed from my body.
“Lana,” she gasped, and I felt the sound of her voice like fingernails dragging down the over-sensitized skin of my back. “Please —”
“I’ve got you, baby,” I murmured into her hair. I dragged in lungfuls of her scent and pressed harder against her. “Come on, gorgeous. Let me feel you. So perfect when you come for me.” I was rambling, lost in the feeling of her body growing tense, the slick slide of my fingers in her body, the wash of the scent of her arousal as she chased that feeling. My whispered encouragement seemed to help Molly let go, seemed to help her find that entirely-at-odds relaxed and tense posture that heralded an orgasm. Her shoulders went lax and her hips bucked up against my hand insistently — and then her face morphed into the perfect image of her pleasure.
I stroked her through the aftershocks, painting her neck and cheeks with kisses as she fought to regain her breath.
“That’s it, baby. That’s it,” I whispered. “God, I love you.”
“I love you too,” Molly said as she finally opened her eyes again. Her fingers tangled with mine as I clasped her shoulder and held her as close to me as I could get her.
“I know it won’t be easy,” I murmured against her soft skin. “But I’m going to do whatever it takes to build a life with you.”
A shiver rolled through Molly’s body and she pressed her lips against mine. “You’re worth whatever it takes.”
Far from the blistering heat of the desire I felt whenever I so much as thought of Fawn, the promise, the vow in those words filled me with the most incredible warmth that I’d ever known. In that moment, I knew that she loved me. I didn’t worry that she was hoping I would change, or that she’d decide she’d rather have a hero after all. She loved me. I was enough for her. And I would do whatever it took to make sure she knew that she was everything I had ever hoped to find.
After all, I was a thief. And what was a thief but someone who knew the true value of something rare?
EPILOGUE
MOLLY
“It should be a right at that next junction.”
The feed from the Silhouette’s goggles was strangely tinted but perfectly crisp, and I spared a moment of pride for myself at the upgrades she had let me make. In the next go-around, I intended to color-correct the feed as far as was possible through software enhancements on my end of things.
Of course, it was only habit that had me giving her directions over the comm in her ear. Unlike the Captain, the Silhouette would’ve memori
zed the layout of the building well before stepping foot inside, right down to the maintenance access points and the ventilation ducts.
“Roger that, darling,” the Silhouette answered breezily as she crawled along.
To listen to her, no one would think that she was infiltrating what was probably the most secure privately owned location in the entirety of Opal City. And it wasn’t enough that they had cameras, laser tripwires, doors more appropriate for a vault at Fort Knox than for a normal building, and more alarms than any twelve companies ought to have. No, they also employed armed security. Guards with guns, just the thing to make everyone feel safer.
I could feel the tension growing between my shoulders and in my hands as I dug my fingernails into my palms.
“Are you — Molly, my love, are you holding your breath?” The Silhouette’s voice was the perfect embodiment of her amusement. A fond, almost condescending laugh hid in that tone, but I couldn’t really blame her. She’d been doing things exactly like this since she was a teenager, and there was no reason to think that holding my breath would do anything to help.
“I can’t help it,” I groaned and scrubbed a hand down my face. “The Captain — when he goes in places it’s very ‘kick down the door and start taking prisoners’. He doesn’t even attempt stealth. I feel like I’m watching a horror movie right now, waiting for the jump scare.”
“You don’t have to tell me about Colossal’s complete absence of stealth,” she drawled, but then her voice went warmer. More reassuring. I felt like an idiot that I needed it. “I’m really just fine, Molly. Now, close your eyes. I’m about to do that thing you hate.”
The grate of the ventilation duct moved out of the way and the video feed had just begun its disorienting spin when I looked away from the screen, waiting for the softly murmured ‘done’ to let me know it was safe to look back. That thing I hated, that move the Silhouette used to get down from tightly enclosed, high spaces was beautiful to watch in person. She held her hands at the edge of an opening and unfurled her body in a graceful bit of gymnastics I have never had the strength or flexibility to pull off. She’s incredible to watch, like a professional diver that knows just precisely where her body is at all times.
On the video feed, however, it’s an incomprehensible swirl and it feels like I’ve gone seven rides on a carnival attraction that ought to be closed for safety violations.
“Done.” There was the sound of her soft breath and the touch of her leather-soled boots on the ground.
The room was dark, red, but that was mostly the filter on the goggles. It was almost like a…like a museum gallery, the way it was set up. There were objects on pedestals surrounded by what appeared to be bulletproof glass and more security measures than I would know how to deal with, which was why I wasn’t there and the Silhouette was. I’d never seen a system that Lana couldn’t get around. I smiled as a rush of pride swelled in my chest, just in time for that jump scare I’d been worrying about.
The guard came out of nowhere, even though I knew that it was the Silhouette who had come upon him and not the other way around. Her arms flashed in front of the video feed and came down on the guard’s neck, pressing on the artery that was delivering oxygen to his brain. I knew, medically, that it wasn’t oxygen deprivation that had him slumping in the Silhouette’s arms. It took no more than ten seconds, and there was no way for oxygen to be the cause that quickly. I knew that it was a blood pressure trigger, but the function of that artery was still foremost in my mind and it was chilling to watch the fragility of the human body exploited so easily.
I buried my face in my hands and tried to get my breathing under control.
“Why did I agree to help you with this?” I grumbled. “The Captain would skin me alive if he knew what I was helping you do.”
“Colossal suffers from a distinct lack of fun,” the Silhouette remarked a bit breathlessly over the comms. “But since you are helping, would you please trigger the first charge? I’d do it myself, darling, but my hands are full at the moment.”
I lifted my head to see that the Silhouette was grappling with another guard. Oh hell. There wasn’t anything I could do, really, other than trigger the remote charge she’d placed near the front of the building, and my fingers flew over the keys to do just that. Moments later — moments in which my heart took up residence in my throat — the Silhouette had the second guard in position for the same artery pinch that had taken down his colleague, and the sound of a truly staggering number of alarms filled the audio feed on my earpiece.
“Thank you, doctor,” the Silhouette breathed as she backed into a corner of the room I had no reference for. Presumably, it was a darker shadow than the place she’d been standing, and I listened and watched with bated breath as the sound of heavy boots grew louder. Three of my adrenaline-enhanced heartbeats later, a handful of guards jogged past the video feed without sparing so much as a glance Lana’s way.
I waited until they were out of earshot before I spoke, even though I had tested the sound containment on the Silhouette’s earpiece myself and I knew it would be safe. “Why didn’t they see you?”
“They expect someone to be at the front, not back here. I find that these sorts of rent-a-goons don’t see things they don’t expect.” The video shifted again, and I followed Lana’s field of vision as she did a quick sweep and then approached one of the pedestals.
The frame filled with the small mechanical object enclosed in the glass case. I didn’t have a clear idea of what it was for, really. Just that it was valuable and potentially dangerous. Lana’s hands lifted into view and she began the careful, delicate work of unraveling the tightly knit web of security that surrounded the device. She’d be doing that for at least a minute, and in the meantime, I intended to keep an eye on her surroundings.
I brought up another terminal window and initiated the tracing protocol to connect to the receiver Lana had left on a router near a maintenance access point. With luck, the local security team would’ve found the complete isolation from an outwardly exposed network to be secure enough, and I wouldn’t need to get around any additional security checks now that I had direct physical access, even remotely.
The window split into six different feeds that cycled through the closed-circuit cameras, and I was satisfied to see that the guards were still investigating the small explosion at the front. At least for now.
“How’s that coming, Silhouette?” I asked as I watched a guard motion for the others to follow him further back into the complex. “Looks like you might have company soon.”
I put it at two minutes at most before she had guards in the room with her again, and the gallery was positioned such that there would be at least five of them passing through even if all they were doing was returning to their posts. But that wasn’t what they would do. They would be looking for whoever had set off the explosion. The muscles in my back started going tight once more.
This was the last time I was going to help the Silhouette do something like this. My nerves just couldn’t take it. Of course, the thought of her out there alone didn’t feel any better, and I scowled as I realized that I would run her tactical comms just as many times as she asked.
I was so far gone.
“Just a couple of minutes, I think.” The Silhouette’s voice was calm, her fingers steady in the video feed from her goggles. “Trigger the second charge for me, darling?”
The key sequence to trigger the second charge was quick, and I switched focus to the security feed that was trained on the side door across the building from Lana’s current position. It should draw the guards’ attention and give her enough time to disable the alarms, grab the device, and get out without being found.
Except the trigger had fired but the charge hadn’t exploded.
“Any time now, Molly,” Lana said, still breezily but with a hint of urgency running through the words.
“I signaled the charge, but it didn’t go off.” I wanted to fret at her, wanted to tell her to get
out. I watched as the guards moved through the building in attack formations that would result in at least one new bullet wound if Lana was lucky. Might take her life if she wasn’t. But there wasn’t time for crowding the comms with my worried chatter.
“Understood. I think I can get this out. I am continuing on with the job as planned.” Her voice had lost that flirtatious purr and was instead the hardline tone I’d only ever heard from her when she thought my life was in danger. It worried me to hear her so serious.
The guards moved forward along disorienting paths, connecting hallways that weren’t obviously continuous from the way the cameras were laid out.
“Silhouette.” My voice was sharp. “Incoming from the east hallway. You have twenty seconds at their current rate.”
I watched her fingers dancing over the brightly colored wires in the unit in front of her like I was sitting in a theater watching a thriller. But I had no reason to believe that our protagonist would get out of this safely; Lana had no narrative armor that would make sure that she came home to me.
The lights on the unit went out, and Lana lifted the glass off the pedestal with five seconds remaining. I was starting to hear the guards’ footfalls through the comms instead of just in my own imagination.
The device was in Lana’s gloved hands, and the world whirled again when she did something incomprehensibly acrobatic before the video feed relaxed into the image of the ventilation ducts once more. My breath caught in my chest as the sound of shouts and heavy footsteps echoed in the comm feed. They knew it was gone. They knew there was someone inside. Oh god.
