“Why did he desert?” Josh asked sharply. “To join them?”
“Ultimately, yes, I believe that was his intention but Duardo outed him before he was ready.”
Calli’s eyes widened. “Duardo knew him?”
“They were both posted at Pascuallita,” Nick said. He sighed heavily. “I hate relating this story, you know,” he confessed to both of them, his expression sheepish. “Zalaya was inside our security systems, totally trusted with the most sensitive information because he had a brilliant mind for intrigue. What we didn’t know was that he was already working for the insurrectos and was systematically milking every vital drop of information from us and passing it along. I know Carmen likes to blame me for the three-day coup—”
“And me,” Calli said softly.
“Yes, but it was Zalaya’s leeching that weakened us. They knew exactly where to hit us—and when.”
“What did Duardo have to do with it?” Calli asked.
“He was the Officer of the Day that day and grew uneasy when the security courier from the city was ten minutes late. The courier was one of our most trusted and reliable and was usually early, not late. So Duardo investigated. He learned that the dispatches she carried included new security encryption codes. This had been something set up by Zalaya. As we had grown more aware of the major leaks in our security he had suggested that we use unexpected methods of sharing encryption codes, including sending them via human couriers. Zalaya’s idea had been hailed as brilliant in its simplicity. It was ironic that the man proposing the idea was doing so because that would make his job of stealing the codes so much easier.”
“But why steal them that way and tip off everyone that the enemy had them?” Josh asked. “They’d just get replaced with new codes.”
“Zalaya banked on no one knowing they had been stolen.” Nick shook his head. “He is the most audacious son of a bitch you’re likely to come across. He waylaid the courier as she arrived on base and somehow got her to his office, where there was a photocopier. It’s only because Duardo followed his hunch and acted so quickly that Zalaya’s plan failed. Duardo walked in on Zalaya as he was attempting to extract from the girl the combination for the lock on the diplomatic pouch. He had stripped her, tied her up and was using a scalpel and bleach.”
Calli moaned, covering her face with both hands. Josh’s face grew whiter, but he nodded. “Go on,” he said hoarsely.
“It was messy,” Nick finished. “Zalaya shot the girl through the temple, though the doctors say it would have been a mercy for her. Duardo was shot in the leg, but one of the rounds he fired as he was lying on the ground ricocheted and sliced open Zalaya’s back. Zalaya escaped off base, trailing blood, and disappeared into the mountains north of Pascuallita. That blood trail gave us our first solid lead into the location of the insurrectos’ base.”
Calli took a deep breath, calming herself. “That is the incident that got Duardo invited to General Blanco’s ball, which Minnie and I attended.”
“That’s right,” Nick confirmed.
“Duardo would not speak of it. He tried to pass it off as nothing, a small thing, he had simply helped defend Vistaria and the details would bore us.” She grimaced.
“I don’t understand. How did Duardo figure out it was Zalaya and so quickly?” Josh asked.
“Everyone entering or leaving the base after hours is supposed to report to the Officer of the Day. Zalaya did not and Duardo noted the omission. When the courier was late, he tried Zalaya first.”
“He must have been suspicious of him,” Calli said.
“He was following a hunch,” Nick agreed. “Duardo was a fine officer, honorable, supremely talented and with a shining future—he was everything that Zalaya was not and they both knew it. There was no love lost there and Duardo never trusted Zalaya the way the upper echelons did because Zalaya was careful to show his superiors only his good face.”
“And this man has my daughter?” Josh whispered hoarsely. “God, I don’t even know how to begin to brace myself for what may come.” He buried his head in his hands.
Nick studied the top of Josh’s head and glanced at Calli’s pale face. “You are right, both of you,” he said, throwing down his pen. “The time for waiting and bracing ourselves for what comes at us is over. Enough is enough.”
Josh looked up, hope in his eyes.
“For your sake, Josh,” Nick said. “For Minnie and Carmen. For General Blanco and for Vistaria. Let’s do something about it. I’m damned if I’ll sit and wait for Zalaya to call the shots. Not anymore.”
“But, the money. Resources....” Calli breathed.
Nick smiled. “It’s a matter of scale,” he said. “We’ve been thinking in the wrong scale. We don’t need an army. We just need us.”
Chapter Eighteen
When Duardo slipped into the darkened room, Minnie was awake and waiting for him, but there was no whisper of cloth as he undressed. No silent pause as he prepared to enter the bed. He came straight to her side and his hand curled over her shoulder, as if to rouse her.
His fingers moved restlessly, stroking the flesh over her collarbone with unexpected gentleness and sending ripples down her spine.
“You are awake,” he said. It wasn’t a question.
Her awareness of their invisible watchers made her answer Zalaya. “I wasn’t waiting for you, so don’t get your hopes up.”
He gave a low laugh. “I know what drives men and women. You lie here wrestling with your guilt over your lost soldier.”
She had been grappling with guilt. “How did you know that?” she said, surprised into it.
“I have listened to your dreams as you whispered them into the night. You regret that you were never given the chance to say goodbye properly. You despair that you were cheated of one last moment with him when you might have sealed your relationship for all time.”
She shuddered. He had touched upon the seed of her dreams, yes. This was the unnamed ghost that had driven her to Vistaria. Then Duardo knew. If he knew and was speaking of it now it meant he must have forgiven her.
She blinked away her tears. “That is something you could never understand,” she said, speaking to Zalaya.
“I understand more than you believe. You think it is your fault he died.”
She could not stop the fall of her tears and was beyond caring. She stared at his silhouette. “Yes,” she whispered. “Goddamn you, yes.”
“Then pretend that he sits before you now. Take the last moment that was stolen from you.”
“Is this another game you are playing? Messing with my head?”
“What would be the value in that?” he asked, leaning on the chain at her wrist, reminding her of it. “I can already take what I want.”
“Then why? What do you get out of it?”
His silence stretched before he stirred. “Time has run out,” he said at last. His voice was barely audible. She knew he did not want the unseen watchers to hear this. “I would like to know what it might feel like once more.”
The fatalistic words spoke of an impending doom, one that he had warned her of that morning, of an unraveling and of brewing storms. He moved and she did not know what he was doing until she felt his hands at her wrist, lifting the cuff. There was a tiny snick as the key turned and the chain fell to the sheet. He pushed it away until it slithered off the end of the bed. He got to his feet, stood beside the mattress and held his hands out from his sides, almost like a man would if he was showing he was unarmed and harmless. “I await your pleasure.”
Her heart hammering unsteadily, Minnie got to her knees. “Mind games,” she whispered.
“You want. I want. Where is the game in that?” he asked. “Tonight, I will not take.”
It was an echo of a previous night, but this time he had laid it out before her so that she understood that he was coming to her as Duardo, with no taint of Zalaya or regard for those who watched.
She moved across the bed slowly, sizing him up. Her taxed he
art scurried, skipping beats and hurting with the pace it worked. Her whole body throbbed and it was not all because of her heart.
She climbed from the bed and he turned to face her, watching passively. She took a step toward him. Another one. And another, so that there were only a few inches between them.
She raised her hands to his shirt and slipped the buttons undone. She pulled the tails free so that the shirt hung loose and open, revealing the flesh beneath. With a deep breath, she slid her hands inside and rested them against his chest. Heat and warmth and yielding softness impressed themselves upon her. Then she felt the rapid beat of his heart and the shallow lift and fall of his chest and knew she was affecting him.
She pushed the shirt over his shoulders so that it slid down his arms and fluttered to the floor around his feet. His bare torso gleamed in the filtered moonlight and she leaned forward to touch it with her lips. To taste him. To kiss his flesh.
She slid her tongue over the warm mound of pectoral muscle, slipping over the tiny nub of nipple and heard his quick intake of breath. She wound her arms around his neck and trailed her mouth higher, to the hollow at the base of his neck where his pulse throbbed hard, up the line of his throat to the indentation at the corner of his jaw, where she revisited his frenetic pulse.
His hands settled on her waist then and it seemed to her it was almost an involuntary grasping, a need to reach for her. He would not take. She believed him in that.
She buried her fingers in his hair and felt the short ends tickle her palms where she had expected long glossy locks. Her thumb rested against the band of his eye patch which was another reminder. But she pushed the reminder aside and instead concentrated on exploring the corner of his jaw, her tongue and lips sliding over the curves. Up higher to the lobe of his ear. On tiptoe, she breathed into his ear and thrust her tongue inside.
She was rewarded with a ripple of muscle and tendon as he shuddered and his hands tightened around her. His breath grew choppy.
She followed the distinct line of his jaw around to his strong chin. His hands around her waist drew her in and held her against him. She could feel his heart pounding against her and the unsteady draw of his breath.
He pressed her against him and she felt his hands spread against her back as if they were sampling the feel of her. One slipped lower to curve over her buttock and pressed her mons against him. Delicious pressure.
His other hand slid up to her head and gently pressed it against his shoulder.
She let her head rest against his shoulder and wound her arms around his neck once more. She could feel his warmth radiating against her face. The position was an achingly familiar one. She closed her eyes and inhaled his scent, listening to the frenetic beat of his pulse.
He stroked her cheek, her neck. The oversized shirt she wore exposed most of her shoulder and his fingers explored the dips and lines there, fluttering at the upper swell of her breast. Hungry need stirred in her and she moved restlessly against him, coaxing.
I will not take, he’d said. She knew he meant that literally and reached for the buttons on her shirt, slipping them undone swiftly. The shirt sagged, barely sitting on her shoulder. She reached for his hand where it rested against her throat and brought it down to her breast, placing it firmly against the swell. She closed her eyes as the warm shot of pleasure arrowed through her at the touch of his hand and allowed the soft moan to emerge.
His fingers slid over the warm globe, exploring the shape and spending minutes outlining her hard, erect nipple until his thumb brushed over the tip, making her moan again. The surges of excitement were fizzing through her, moving to her genitals. Her clitoris throbbed and she could feel herself growing slick and hot with moisture. The whole saddle of flesh between her legs throbbed and swelled. She wanted his hand there. Better, his mouth. But not yet, not yet....
His hand slipped from her breast and caressed the flesh of her torso, then slid down to her hip. He turned her so her hip was pressed against him. It exposed the other breast, which he cupped, but his fingers did not tease her nipple or slide near it. Instead his head lowered and she held her breath as his lips touched her cheek and trailed lower, down the column of her throat, to lick at the hollow, then down lower still. She could feel the warmth of his breath bathe the nipple, but his lips hovered over it for what seemed an age before he delicately caressed it with his tongue.
She groaned and clutched at his head, pressing herself to him, encouraging him. He took her nipple into his mouth and nipped it with his teeth, drawing the tip out with his teeth even as his tongue battered it.
Minnie heard herself groan again. It was a guttural, wanton sound that left her panting and trembling. She realized that somewhere in the last few minutes her shirt had fallen from her arms and lay at her feet, just as his did. His hand over her buttock curled over bare flesh and his fingertips fluttered between the cheeks at the junction of her thighs, promising delights.
Her legs trembled so badly she was afraid she would fall and she clutched at him for essential support. He leaned down a few degrees more, his hand falling from her cheek so that his arm could sweep behind her knees. She was picked up and with extraordinary gentleness laid upon the bed. Her arms were still about his shoulders and she pulled his head down to her. His mouth touched not her lips, but her shoulder, and caressed her there. His lips and tongue were hot against her and they laid a moist path down to her breast again.
For long minutes he bent over her and teased her with nothing but his tongue and teeth and lips upon her breasts. It was such a delicious, mind-numbing thrill that she was left writhing upon the bed, her thoughts scattered and her breath an uneven pant. She was driven by the need to be possessed.
She reached for him, her hand falling against the hard plane of his stomach and sliding down to the belt. “Now,” she murmured. “I want you now.” She fumbled at the belt, but her fingers felt thick and clumsy and she could not manipulate the buckle.
He picked up her hand and kissed her fingers then put her hand back on the bed. He shed himself of the last of his clothing, climbed onto the bed beside her and took her into his arms.
She held him against her, again feeling the ridge of scar on his back, the curve of his spine, the hard muscle of his buttocks. Between them, his cock beat, large and quivering, pressing against her mons.
She pulled him over her and wrapped her legs around his hips, opening herself to him. “Come to me,” she murmured. “Come.”
He slid into her and as his full length came to rest inside her, his fingers threaded through hers and gripped hard. His lips grazed her jaw. “But you must come with me,” he whispered and arched over her so that he could capture her breast in his mouth once more.
Her back and hips tightened in a bow, which pushed her mons against his thrusting pelvis. With each pulsing stroke, her clitoris was kissed by his flesh. His hand lifted her buttocks so that the contact was kept and Minnie could feel her control jittering apart. Even her breathing was abandoned and became gasping pants. She could only focus on the overwhelming frenzy looming larger and larger, until it bloomed and spilled over her, a silvery explosion that made her cry aloud, her whole body bending into the hard curve, every tendon locked.
As she came, she heard him groan as he shuddered massively against her, his cock jerking hard inside her.
They fell like stringless puppets and lay entwined together as she listened to his heart slow. His cock was still buried inside her. She hooked her leg over his hip so that she could accommodate him more comfortably and discovered that he was still solidly erect within her.
His hand stirred and brushed against her hip, making the nerves quiver. He grasped her thigh and pulled it higher, working his way deeper inside her.
“Mm....” she murmured, her muscles clamping around him in appreciation.
He gave a small hiss in reaction and let it go with a sigh. His hand on her thigh slid down to her hip, brushing the small thatch of hair and slipping between the fleshy li
ps to rest against her clitoris. She caught her breath in anticipation and her clitoris throbbed against him, but his hand remained still.
“You’re teasing,” she scolded.
“Of course.” His fingers nudged. Once. She gasped as her whole body clenched in reaction.
“Mi dios....” he said, inhaling sharply.
“Again,” she begged.
His fingers stroked her again and this time her shudder left her breathless and clenching around him in a series of subterranean spasms.
“Again,” she whispered without strength. “Please...”
He began to caress her clitoris in a slow rhythm that swiftly had her shuddering on the bed, clutching at him helplessly. When he took her breast with his mouth, thought scattered once more and she became a slave to the pleasure. She called his name and he answered with his lips on her temple before rolling onto his back and bringing her with him. As she straddled his hips and felt his cock slide even more deeply inside her, his hand captured hers and brought it to her clitoris.
She hungrily masturbated as his hands gripped her hips and guided her as he thrust into her. The climb was longer this time, but her climax and his coincided, for each coaxed the other.
She fell against him, her head on his shoulder, and he held her to him until their breathing slowed.
After an eon had passed, his hands began to lazily circle patterns on her back, stirring the nerves back to life. Minnie moaned and nuzzled deeper into his shoulder, but she could not ignore the fizzing twitch of her nerves or the messages they sent to her genitals. His touch was electric.
He slipped out from beneath her, leaving her lying face down on the sheet. Both his hands resumed their petting and teasing, swooping down to tickle the side swells of her breasts and making her gasp, then up again to the bottom of her spine and the highly sensitive dip between her buttocks. She found she was wriggling against the sheet, aroused by nothing more than this simple caressing. Her legs parted invitingly and that was when he gripped her hips and lifted her to her knees.
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