Diamond Soldiers

by Pinki Parks

  Brushing her hair over her shoulder she took a look at the kitchen and grimaced, “Want to order some Chinese?”

  Hunter looked at her for a moment then the TV, “Sure, just let me change and grab a shower. Order orange chicken for me, shredded broccoli and brown rice, thanks.”

  She nodded and went to get her phone. After calling the local P.F. Chang’s she settled back into her seat and went back to watch the romance movie with her face towards TV but with her legs up to her side.

  Hunter now dressed casually in a dark tank top and sweatpants sat at the very edge of the couch her which fitted his body perfectly. Her eyes trailed from his chest to his middle and then down to his bare feet, which, strangely sparked her arousal.

  After three minutes of the movie, he scowled at the TV. "See, this is why all you females want the guy with the Brad Pitt looks, the Vin Diesel attitude and the Bill Gates riches. Prince-goddamn-Charming, Hollywood has brainwashed you." Hunter scoffed.

  Keisha playfully aimed a kick at him, “Oh shut up, like all you men don’t want the chic that has the Halle Berry body, Angelina Jolie lips and the class of the Duchess of Cambridge.”

  Hunter’s face twisted when the doorbell came and Keisha made to get up, “That’s our Chinese.”

  A broad had pushed her back down, “I’ve got it.”

  As he walked off Keisha turned on her belly and put her feet up while resting her head on her long-sleeved clothed arms. She wasn’t going to deprive herself of watching Hunter move.

  The man moved like prowling tiger, and even though it was just a few feet to the door his confident stride was nothing less than a turn on. In less than twenty seconds he was back with the plastic bag of aromatic food.

  Hunter rested the bag on the coffee table and reached in. Taking a container up he lifted the corner off and handed it over to her, “Shrimp Lo-Mein for you with extra soy sauce and egg rolls on the side and orange chicken, shredded broccoli and brown rice for me.”

  Sitting up Keisha took the plastic container from him not shying away from letting their fingers touch. “To refute your point, we have not been brainwashed, we just have standards.”

  While snapping his chopsticks open Hunter drawled, “Standards which fall short of ninety-nine percent of the testosterone species.”

  “True,” Keisha replied while pouring more sauce over her noodles. “That’s probably why man was the guinea pig and woman was perfection.”

  “Really,” Hunter mused while spearing a chicken piece, “Then why does every mythology on the planet place a woman as the cause of all our evil?”

  “Because mythology was written by men,” Keisha grinned, “Jealous and inferior men.”

  “If that’s the case,” Hunter replied not even looking at the TV anymore, “How come you perfect women need men to reproduce?”

  Keisha shrugged while twisting her noodles, “We need a tool here and there.”

  A look twisted Hunter's face and his fingers tightened around chopsticks, "Tools... that really is what some women take us for?"

  Sensing the bitterness in his voice Keisha paused while eating and asked, “What happened?”

  Hunter the continued eating, “This girl I was really into a few years ago. I swore we had something and that every time we had sex, to me it was making love but it turned out that for her it was only stress relief.”

  "Ouch, that's horrible." Keisha commiserated while twirling her noodles. Hunter had shared something private with her and knowing how guarded the man was it had to be a hard thing to do. She debated with this idea but decided that it was only fair to share something with him too. "If it's any consolation, I've been burned too… there was a time in my life where I swore I was in love… and I was even going to marry him…until his wife showed up.”

  "God," Hunter added dropping his chopsticks into the empty container, "What an asshole."

  “That’s exactly what I said,” Keisha murmured taking the last bite of her food, “Never spoke to Bryce again.”

  Hunter didn’t give any noticeable reaction to her frank admission but filed that tidbit of info in the back of his mind. “Are you done?”

  "Yes, thanks," Keisha said handing the empty plastic over and curled up on the couch. When Hunter came back she had placed her foot on her lap and started to rub it.

  Hunter frowned, “Are you okay?”

  She tried to smile, "Mostly, I call it hells feet, sometimes my heels, even with insoles give me problems."

  "Let me help," Hunter said reaching out for her foot. "My mom had the same problem."

  Silently dumbstruck Keisha extended her foot to him in wariness, but when Hunter dug into her insole she almost uttered a deep moan of pleasure. Clearly, there was much more to Hunter than what meets the eye. This was another side to him; another piece of the puzzle of Hunter to put in place.

  As the rubs continued it was a hard battle to hold the sound in but the look on her face didn’t escape Hunter though and a pleased and cocky smile crossed his face.

  The movie continued but she was only paying half attention to it. The other half of her mind was solely occupied with enjoying the sensations from the foot rub. God, if Hunter was this good with her feet, what would he do to her body?

  It was just cruel to think of it but her traitorous mind pictured him caressing her body into a mindless ball of pleasure. How she would lay, shivering and wanton, needing him to soothe the fire inside her.

  She was so mired in her mind she barely noticed the movie was over and the credits were scrolling on the screen. Keisha carefully reached over and held his hand and uttered a small thank you.

  Hunter twisted his head and in the dimness of the room, his eyes still seemed to glimmer. He then bent her leg up and slipped his hand to her ankle and framed it, "You're welcome."

  Then the air changed once more it went still and hummed with silent want. Keisha gently extracted her foot from him and smiled, though every bone in her body wanted to lean forward and kiss him.

  “Goodnight Hunter.” She said softly while getting up. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “Same to you,” Hunter replied so just as softly.

  Her room was both a sanctuary and a prison, it was free from Hunter’s presence but it wasn’t free from his memory and her cruel imagination.

  Keisha slowly stripped out of her clothes and allowing her mind to take over she ran her hand over her neck imagining that it was Hunter’s hand trailing over it, then down between her breast to her stomach and pressed it there.

  She wanted to imagine him dipping down to her core but she managed to drag her mind back to reality.

  This wasn't healthy to think of or even sane to hope for but still, she wanted it; she wanted him.

  Chapter 7

  Going to sleep after being in such close contact with Hunter and with her fantasy about him dancing in her had been a really bad idea. Her dreams, just like the myriad ones before them, had thrown the enigmatic cop in as the focus point.

  She had tossed and turned and sighed and moaned in her sleep as her mind pictured detailed fantasies of their mouths trapped in a heated kiss. Their hands roaming over the other’s warm skin and their bare bodies slickly sliding against each other in enraptured bliss.

  Keisha had woken in a haze of arousal, and unconsciously she had reached over to the other side of the bed only to grasp empty sheets.

  “Damn it.” She had cursed quietly as her fist clenched.

  Falling on her back she pressed her hands to her eyes and tried hard to get herself under control. It was immeasurably hard to do as the object of her fantasies was just in the other room.

  The small trembles in her stomach weren't lessening and the more she tried to dismiss them the more they strengthened. It was futile lying in her bed with her subconscious on the verge of torturing her.

  She needed something to occupy mind more than the haunting dreams. So, she got out of the comfortable bed and on the edg
e, ruffled her hair. She didn't bother dragging a robe over her body and left the room in her soft shirt and loose shorts.

  The living room was dark but she knew her way to the kitchen. She stepped forward only to feel her arm heard the sharp and alarming scrape of metal on metal.

  “Ah! Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!" Keisha gasped in fright as she made out a shadowed form sitting in a corner of her living room and the glint of silver steel in his hand, “Don’t do that shit, Hunter!”

  The small smooth scrape of metal on metal continued as Hunter kept sharpening his knife. “What are you doing up?”

  Keisha bristled for a moment and narrowed her eyes, “What are you doing up? Shouldn’t you be resting?”

  She couldn't really make it out but from what she saw Hunter was giving her a look that sympathizers would give a mental patient, but his derisive tone made it more apparent. "I'm on guard duty, which guard do you know of sleep on the job?"

  He had a point but she wasn’t going to concede to it. The tense mood she was in especially after that dream she had woken up from, wouldn’t allow her to do so. And he didn’t need to know that she had dreamt of him sucking her breast till she cried out either.

  “Whatever,” Keisha mumbled and raked a hand through her hair, “I couldn’t sleep. I’m going to make some warm milk, want any tea or something?”

  “No,” Hunter said before standing up.

  It was still dark but the little light coming from the hallway's nightlight was enough for her to see that he was shirtless and the lines of corded muscles of his chest and abdomen were more than enough to make her mind spin. The dark stylistic tribal tattoo on his chest and upper arm only made him look more feral.

  Gathering the iron-clad control she prided herself on Keisha nonchalantly shrugged. "Suit yourself."

  She softly padded into the kitchen and dialed the lights overhead into a soft golden haze. She was insanely attuned to Hunter right behind her as she opened the fridge and took out the jug of milk.

  “Do you always wear a t-shirt and boxers to bed?”

  Grabbing a mug and pouring some of the liquid into it she shrugged, “When it suits me, yeah.”

  Putting the cup in the microwave she pressed in the time and then braced herself to face the half-naked man whose eyes had never left her from the moment she had stumbled into the living room.

  She made sure to look into his eyes instead of the washboard abs and defined pectorals of his chest. “That look of yours in unnerving, you know. I feel like you’re flaying me alive.”

  “Really,” Hunter smirked and deliberately ran his eyes over her from the crown of her head to her toes. “That’s a… interesting choice of words.”

  Forcing her eyes to the slowly spinning cup inside the microwave Keisha felt her palm go damp. She didn’t dare admit that his gaze also felt like he was undressing her too.

  The silence between them was deafening but the welcoming beep from the machine gave Keisha a well-needed distraction as she took the warm cup out, moved to the table and sat down. Hunter was still leaning on with the waist of his plain cargo pants slipping dangerously low on his pelvis the wall while slowly twirling his knife.

  “Oh god,” Keisha groaned with her hands around the cup, “Will you just sit down, you and that goddamn knife are making me nervous.”

  A low husky chuckle came from the bare-chested man but he still moved over, “Didn’t think the unflappable Keisha had it in her to get nervous.”

  "Well she does," Keisha replied purposely terming herself in the third person before sipping her milk, "When a trained assassin is in my house with a field knife longer than my arm."

  Hunter tilted the weapon to the light and Keisha noted the glint of the light over the wicked steel edge. “It’s a beauty, isn’t it?”

  It was absurd but the way Hunter held the blade and the flex of his muscles with every small motion made the want in her body flare. Unconsciously, she clenched her legs under the table.

  “Hm,” Keisha answered noncommittally while sipping her milk.

  The air settled for a moment before Hunter braced his arms on the table and slowly asked, "Why couldn't you sleep?"

  She blew a soft breath over the warm milk while shifted under the table, “Bad dreams.”

  “As in nightmares?”

  Keisha laughed quietly and shot a look out the window to the dark skies outside, “You could say that, if the one thing you wanted was just dancing in front of you and you can’t have it, was a nightmare.”

  She didn’t have the strength to look at him and focused on the thin almost invisible hairs on his minutely flexing forearms. Her eyes dipped to his hands, his broad hands with the rough calluses from years of training and felt the acute longing of them running over her skin. Stroking and caressing her needy self to the begging and breaking point.

  “And what would that be?”

  At the sound of his low voice, she blinked the fantasy away and looked up into his shadowed eyes.

  He was just an arm's length away but it felt like a mile was between them. A strong fantasy of Hunter dragging his lips down her body, of him using his lips and teeth in a primal way of marking and claiming her as his territory. She felt the phantom pleasure of his fiery kiss, igniting every part of her while her hand was buried in his hair.

  She felt the absent pleasure of him slowly tugging her shirt over her head and tracing his rough hands down her stomach. She acutely felt the missing feel of his hands on her hip and squeezed her backside. The ache for him to be over her and in her was swamping her mind and it was too much for her to handle now.

  Marshalling every shred of strength, she had she took a last drink of the milk and flit her tongue out to snag the last drop that was in the corner of her mouth. She was so conflicted trying to control herself she didn’t see a dark look deepen in his eyes.

  She couldn’t take it anymore; every night she dreamt of him and every morning she woke up with the bereft loss. During the day it was inevitable that her thoughts strayed to him which made the night cycle worse.

  And now, this, being so close to him was nothing but torture.

  Looking at him she said a bit tightly, “Nothing for you to worry about, goodnight Hunter.”

  She stood up and after placing the cup in the sink and turned around fully prepared to pass lonely and longing night only to feel Hunter push her face forward into the wall.

  She gasped deeply when his body pressed into her and through the cloth of his pants, she felt a generous and growing erection against her backside. Every muscle in her body went tight and her breath stopped in her lungs.

  “Hunter,” she said carefully, even though her voice was on the verge of breaking. “What are you doing?”

  Her answer was the detective pressing his face into the crook of her neck and running his nose over the skin there. He then pressed his mouth to her ear, "You're wet, aren't you?"

  Keisha went cold as her eyes widened in stunned fright, “What makes you think that?”

  Hunter's hands caged her hips, "Your body betrayed you. You were flushed and your breathing changed. The tablecloth shifted and the muscles in your shoulders tensed while you were clenching your legs together. I'm right, aren't I?"

  With her face twisted to the left of the cold wall and heat behind her, Keisha didn't have the presence of mind to utter anything, especially since he was right. She could only swallow heavily.

  Hunted nosed as her jaw, "Would you like me to test that theory, Keisha? Would you like me to touch you?"

  Solidly believing this was out of reality Keisha nodded and felt Hunter's right-hand curve over her bottom and slip between her legs. His hand pressed right against the wet spot of her shorts his fingers slipped under the loose shorts and pressed right up against her panties.

  The trace of his fingers over her sex was soft but managed to kindle a fire into her. “I was right Keisha, you’re soaking.”

  He then started to s
troke her through the cloth and a deep shudder ran through her whole body. It didn't surprise her then after a few more stokes his fingers had bypassed her panties and move to run over her wet flesh directly.

  Keisha's breath was nonexistent as every pass of his fingers robbed her of the life-giving element. Her eyes were closed as her head arched back to his chest. Hunter then sank two fingers deep inside her and Keisha cried out.

  “Are you burning Keisha?”

  "You have no idea how hard," she barely managed to say with the feel of his fingers inside her.

  "Good," Hunter growled in her ear and started to move his fingers. "God, you're tight."

  Stars were behind her eyes as he fingered her. Her legs widened even more and her hand reached up to grab his hair. Hunter's mouth was on her neck, nibbling at her heated skin while his hands stroked the fire beneath into furnace.

  His left hand then moved from her hip up under her t-shirt and to pinch her nipple before closing over the rounded breast.

  Keisha was insensate to anything outside of Hunter now. It was all him, all she could feel, see or smell was him. She felt his rough fingers stroking her tender walls, felt the small stubble on his chin and smelled the woody cologne on his skin.

  His thumb then started to circle her clit and Keisha felt that deep sensation or orgasm climbing in her body. Her belly and legs started shivering as the sensation rose and overcame her mind and she came with a gasping cry.

  Hunter’s movement didn’t stop as he stroked her thoroughly wet passage through her release and was still kneading her breast.

  Coming down from the high Keisha was about to say something when Hunter took his hand from inside her and placed both wet digits before them.

  “I wonder what you taste like…” Hunter murmured before he sucked both wet fingers into his mouth. Keisha felt arousal run through her like a river at that simple act before Hunter dipped and lifted her bridal style.

  “What are you doing?” she barely could ask.

  “Taking you to your bed so I can take you properly,” Hunter said tightly as he entered the shadowed bedroom. He sat her on the bed and grasped the hem of her t-shirt and pulled it off.