Exquisite Possession: A Dark Scifi Romance (The Machinery of Desire Book 4)

by Cari Silverwood

  The next touch would be from him aiming to enter her and she could part her thighs but that would be too much of an invitation. Hands would arrive on her body, maybe him probing her below. Fern almost drooled at the prospect. Too long… It’d been too long.

  She wanted this but…

  She wanted some indication of dominance. To make him work for this.

  There was a broken part in her mind. The wall between a need for respectful dominance and even consensual sadism had been warped by the judge, but her libido, was back. JI had turned it on. One day off, next on.

  Come on. Please. Why was he waiting? She wanted to look but stopped herself, anchored her fingers in the sofa back.

  She’d hoped after what he’d done with the chain but maybe he wasn’t a fluffy bunny of a man?

  Fern ducked her head and closed her eyes, then gave in – she arched her butt the smallest amount, waggled it back and forth. The harsh intake of breath from behind her said he’d seen.

  Nothing, then finally there was a noise. He’d shuffled closer.

  Fuck me, she wanted to cry out. Dammit. Clearly, she’d found the one vanilla warrior on Aerthe. Even vanilla fucking would do her today.

  Anything.

  Unexpectedly, his belt arrived across her mouth. It was wriggled and edged between her teeth, gagging her as he pulled on it and drew her backward. His foot placed beside her knee on the sofa.

  She was still choking on surprise when his cock found her and pushed aside her pussy lips, and slid inside, seating itself to the hilt in one hard, long thrust that jammed her forward. Flutters of sensation. Scattered incandescence. She clawed at the sofa and waited for the next thrust.

  Waited. Full of Him, wanting, needing, so much need and she felt her intimate flesh crush down onto his cock and the trickle of wet lust spill.

  Chapter 8

  The belt had been impromptu. JI had been holding it and contemplating the slit waiting for him, glistening with evidence of her desire, when the idea arrived.

  Things went a little fuzzy but earnest.

  The mechling feedback told him or his instincts did, whatever those were, if he had any. He’d seated the belt between her teeth, reining her like a jagg mount in need of mastering.

  Yes. Her grunt. Her body accepting this. She liked the belt, liked that he did it suddenly and with force. A murmur sidled in – the nastier he was the more she’d like it…

  Nasty. Bad. Despicable. Up to a point.

  That point was negotiable.

  So he speared into her deep, squashed his balls into her ass, rammed in, then ceased all movement while his thoughts went round and round.

  Fern liked fear, but not too much. Pain, but not too much.

  When he wound the belt in tighter and reached a certain tension her gasp as well as the feedback whined into him, added hooks, yanked him back from…

  The abyss.

  Well, well. He had an abyss. Toes dangling. Belt in hand, fingers whitening. An abyss he had never teetered over before. Except with the one he’d strangled.

  Black memories there.

  Where these ideas arose from, he cared not, only that they lent fire to his fucking. His dick throbbed inside her, aching, waiting.

  He’d never ached like this.

  After this, after one more thrust, he would be past this crystalline second. To have not fucked Fern then to have fucked her.

  Alas poor Yoric, I fucked him well. Shakespeare had not experienced this – been an ex-mech having his first meaningful sex.

  Never had such a female acquiesced before him. Submitted. And that mechling echo ran delicious tentacles into his thoughts, fucking his mind with her wants.

  JI ran a finger down her spine. The sweeping contours his finger touched were as monumentally astounding to the eye as any perfection of nature. Beauty was not in the eye of a mech, nor in a stream of ones and zeros. He’d gained so much by taking Osta’s persona. Gained some organic thing he could never understand in full.

  Sound… He put his head down, kissed her nape, still seated deep within her. His fist wound in more of the belt.

  Her head pulled back, she gasped and whimpered, the belt cutting into her lips. Petite gasps past the restriction.

  Feel.... The clamp of her cunt and her shivers when he whispered threats in her ear. “I’m going to fuck you so hard.”

  She whimpered again, twitched her ass upward.

  “The smell of you.” He licked her spine. “The taste.”

  “More?” she said, muffled by his belt.

  “When I want to.” He smacked her ass, gripped the fullness in one hand, and the echo of her approval and lust shot into his dick.

  JI played with her, hand on her tits, squeezing, pinching those succulent nipples, kissing and biting her neck. He drew back until almost out of her and rammed in then kept going, pistoning, slamming in and out. Her moans grew louder, and when he let her, she buried her face in the sofa. He began to use her properly, to use her like she was something to ride, to take. As if she was his.

  When she came, grunting, her body seizing up, she squeezed on his dick so hard as she orgasmed his eyes spun. Or they might’ve. JI wasn’t sure, but the sun had blacked out for a second when he jetted sperm into her tightening cunt. Sperm, I have sperm.

  I fuck therefore I am. He would rewrite Emery’s ideas on what made a self-aware AI.

  Chuckling, he collapsed onto the sofa, dragging Fern with him. The belt clinked and slid to the floor. His legs ended up past the length of the furniture and tangling with hers.

  Their breathing diminished, their body sweat mingling, her hair in his face, fingers intertwined and wrapped over her hip. All the fastenings on her shirt had opened, and the cloth barely covered any of her. Bare and fantastically female.

  JI nipped her shoulder and left his teeth buried for a moment, listening to her languid inhale. “You like?”

  “Mmm. I like…biting.”

  “And me fucking you?”

  “Mmm. That too. Very much.”

  There was something he would tell her now. Not purely as a simple beginning of truth between them. Nothing so wonderful. Fern loved a little fear mixed with her sexuality. A little pain.

  “I have to say this to you, Fern.”

  “What?” she mumbled, shifting her shoulder but not turning.

  “I’m not a humanoid exactly. I was a mech. A JI-mech 34 to be precise.”

  “A what?” Shock rumbled through her, as he’d known it would. She stiffened, drew a breath and held it. “How? I don’t understand.”

  She didn’t doubt what he’d said, and that reinforced the notion he’d had. The mechling echo subtly informed her of his emotions also.

  “A friend of yours, Emery, helped me on the path to this, as did a grounder woman called Ari. A JI-mech is huge, over two stories tall. I was dying inside a smaller mech; it had too little room for my mind. A creature called a mech wolf-spider showed me it was possible to migrate into a living organism.”

  “I see.” Then she ran the logic down to the obvious. Her question came out in a little voice. “But…how did you get a man, this Osta, to allow it?”

  “He was dead, brain dead, from an injury sustained in battle. I merely took the opportunity.”

  “Dead dead?”

  “Yes. Dead dead.”

  There was the lie. He, JI, had told an enormous lie.

  Was lying a prerequisite of humanity? He was beginning to think so. One thing led to another. If he told her he’d killed Osta he’d have gone too far. That murder would destroy any trust she had in him. He wanted truth but had to settle for a partial truth.

  Did this make him a bad person?

  He smoothed Fern’s hair. His cock had slipped from her. This sofa would need cleansing, or maybe he could go looking in the deserted buildings for another? With Fern following him. The history of this planet was written in the buildings found all over the surface. He loved learning. The database in a person’s head never grew too f
ull, it simply overwrote or lost a few details of past memories. That was novel.

  He imagined collecting things and making this building theirs, a nest such as birds and animals made, as if they could have young ones. Completely unrealistic.

  This was imaginary. Fern had caused this. Thinking on a future that might never be.

  He kissed her where he’d bitten.

  From the emotional turmoil he detected, she’d been thinking furiously. Now she seemed quieter, though still a little afraid.

  “I…” She wriggled and turned over, facing him. “I’m not sure how I feel about this. I’ve just fucked a mech or whatever you are now? You seem human.” She frowned. “I should be horrified. I’m not though.”

  JI let his fingers trail to her mouth to draw delicate lines around and over the prettiness there. To worm between her lips and onto her tongue. She let him. “It’s because you trust me. I’m nice. I’m far nicer than most people I’ve met. And I’m learning. I assure you I can be caring. I like humans, when they don’t lie.” Then he added in an amused yet steady voice, “Behave for me, and I will be a good master.”

  Oh, the pause that ensued in her breathing. The way her eyes stayed wide as she searched his face. If he didn’t have the echo, he’d still know how much his words and actions appealed to her.

  “You will sign a blood contract for me, and I will find a collar and put it on you.”

  “Heyyy. Wait. I said I’m not a thing.”

  “No, you’re my pet, and I want this pet on a leash and wearing my collar.”

  Her spark of excitement dwindled. Her mind turned cold. “You mean slave collar.” The mekker judge had caused this.

  “No, not slave. Pet.” He purred that out, quietly but with a harsh underline, placed his hand over her neck, caressed her softness with his thumb. “Here. I want to see it here. This isn’t negotiable, Fern. I said so before.”

  She raised her small hand and placed it over his. He watched her lips part, felt every uncertainty and the renewed surge of desire. “I need to think on this.”

  This turned her on. Even with him a mech and with this being forced on her, this turned her on. The human mind was fascinating, and he had an open door into hers.

  He hadn’t told her of how the mechlings informed him of her every emotion. Was that another lie? Perhaps. As long as he didn’t abuse this knowledge, what did it matter?

  He was definitely learning.

  Already his cock was filling with blood and rising. Fuck her again or get that contract signed? Actually, he didn’t have a contract written yet. There was a certain attraction in waiting and teasing her, doing her again after she signed.

  Because she would sign.

  Then he rose to sit on his haunches, straddling her legs and using his weight to keep her in place on her back. “You will agree.”

  Though she pinched her mouth flat while he explored between her legs, the first stroke of his finger along the line of hair to her clit had her sighing. When she tried to part her thighs to invite a deeper probe, he clamped his knees in and forced her to be still. “No. Not…yet.”

  What heights could he bring her to without letting her come?

  So many questions she could help him answer.

  * * * * *

  ABANDONED MEKKER COMPLEX

  The judge picked his teeth with the blade of a thin knife – using something so dangerous reminded him of life. There was always something that could go wrong, fatally wrong.

  The latest information lay before him on a sheet of brown-stained paper. Everything down here was ancient but mostly usable, even the paper,

  The KI-mech for one.

  Fifty paces from this thin-legged table he used as a desk, sat his precious mech. His creature. She, for he’d decided this was a she, had revealed perfect paintwork once scrubbed down. Red and black. No camouflage for his monstrous killing machine. What could possibly harm her? Her length was such that he needed a runner to reach anyone working on the tail end. Her mass so great if she collapsed, she’d flatten the crew under her belly and turn them into a smear of crushed flesh and bone.

  One worker had slipped and fallen from her top dome. He’d smashed into the floor and died instantly, his legs in fifty pieces.

  And her armaments…the charges were functioning again. He could rip open a landship with her.

  All he required was the brain. The information from a spy in New Hope, the city revived by mekkers, was promising.

  “So.” He tapped the piece of paper with the knife tip, and eyed Tygorn, where he stood at attention to the side. “We now know that the Osta who led the attack on the royal landship is accompanied by this mech he calls Aunt M. And Osta, this is the good part, used to be with the JI-mech also. That scav has all the luck.”

  “Yes sir, a somewhat extraordinary coincidence.”

  “Yes, almost too much of one.” He leaned into his chair back, twirled the knife in his fingers. “Whatever the reason, track them. Find them. I want them both. Even if this Aunt M is useless as a brain, we must be able to interrogate her fully. Have you sorted out the sun-mad problem yet? I assume she went sun-mad, so solving that problem will solve this one.” He poked the paper.

  “I think perhaps the locked code that enforces obedience to the king is our best avenue.”

  “You think it? I need to know. When we have them, I want control over that mech.”

  “Of course, sir. The mechlings, even when sun-mad will not kill or harm us, and that proves the locked codes still work. We caught a couple of the released sun-mad and tested this. Unfortunately, we don’t have the king to test my other theory.”

  “That mech from the king’s residence has killed – the one they call Aunt M.”

  “That’s the flaw in my reasoning. There’s no way to tell what it will decide when challenged, until we try this.”

  “I have to take that risk.” The judge unleashed a view of his teeth. “All we need is them. Or it.”

  Chapter 9

  Being sweaty and dirty early in the morning meant sluicing oneself down with buckets of water painstakingly carried to the tower ground floor the day prior. It was a lesson in surely not having sex with strangers. He’d threatened to heave her sofa out the window too.

  Dripping and utterly naked, her nipples pointing the way, she watched JI also bathe as well as he could. Here in the foyer, the puddled mess from the water would evaporate eventually.

  Those muscles…and he was a mech? From what he’d said, only inside his head was the original JI.

  Muscles that shone as the bucket load waterfalled down him, splashing over his abdominals and slightly erect cock, past the bullet graze, and down his immense legs. She might’ve been drooling, but he’d left her wanting when they woke. This mech-made-humanoid had a way with dominance most men could learn from. She liked…make that loved being teased then left needy.

  Fuck though, if on Earth her behavior would have her committed.

  A mechanoid, even a smart one, fucking him…it…no, him, was not a healthy choice.

  And on Aerthe? Aerthe was full of unhealthy, violent, horrible people and events. She’d barely spent a day not seeing something that made her feel sick. Why then should being with him be wrong?

  Because he might hurt me? She watched, lip half caught in teeth, as he paced to her, fetching one of the old towels to dry himself.

  And she didn’t believe he ever would. Hurt her. Concrete certainty. Had he hypnotized her?

  “You were looking at me?” He tossed aside the towel then inspected Fern from her toes to her mons, where he paused long enough to have her feel the gathering wetness and the parting of her pussy lips as they swelled, then he raked up her body to breasts. Finally he reached her face.

  His cock was rising.

  She backed, rasping, “What are you doing to me? Are mechs made into men always this horny?”

  “Not that I’m aware of, but, I’m the only one that exists. That I know of.” Having forced her into a c
orner with musty decrepit boxes either side of her legs, he planted his hands on the wall and leaned in. His cock came close to touching her belly. “Shall I hoist you up then fuck you?”

  Gods, yes.

  Fern gulped. “My question?”

  “It’s you. We have a connection that makes me want you. Just you.” Then he dipped his head and made as if to kiss her.

  When she raised her mouth to meet his, he grasped her neck and kissed her forehead instead. “Not yet. You need to earn my kisses.”

  She thought of kicking his shin, for a second. Tempting, yet she wasn’t sure what he’d do. If he would even understand the humor as well as the challenge in that.

  The doorway light stuttered with spidery movement and the clattering told her the Aunt M mech had arrived.

  “He’s here?” he asked, his hold on her neck not lessening.

  Fern strained to get free, only to have him smile down at her and tsk. Fuuuuck. Not fair.

  “Aunt M? Yes. He’s here.”

  “Good. You will get dressed. I will write out this contract. I have an old diary in my bag. We will both sign in blood. Aunt M will…” He turned to speak over his shoulder. “Aunt M?”

  “Yes. I see you have been playing with your human.”

  “I have. I find it interesting to own one.”

  The objectiveness in that statement bothered Fern and turned her on.

  There was something wrong here.

  She loved dominance but –

  “She wishes to help the mechlings to exchange power cells, and I told her you can get them open.”

  “I can. Each of them owns its own encryption.”

  What?

  She tuned in to the exchange, though JI still distracted her. He’d said it was her that made him horny. Flattering? Maybe. If she liked him too, it was.

  Fern frowned and thought. She only half-saw his chest, that nipple, the dribbles of meandering water on his skin. Only vaguely took in his male scent.

  She liked him. Even with his hand keeping her at the wall, with her back hurting from the small imperfections. Wait. She liked him more because of what he did. He was her perfect lover.