Quick and hard and not in any way romantic, that kiss. A tangle of tongue and teeth and desperation and please and don’t you dare. Basically, the sort of kiss she’d been deserving for some time.
When he pulled back, she was panting, and her sharp fingernails had pressed divots between his knuckles. Not a shred of sarcasm remained on her face, just raw desire.
He pinned her with a look. “Don’t finish that sentence. I did—and I do—want you. Naked, upside down, howling, every day and twice on Tuesdays. But tonight is not the best time. For me, I mean. I’m…broken. My body isn’t responding to commands the way it ought. Those mercenaries not only implanted the transmitter but also messed up my control. Over myself.”
He could have phrased that better. Her eyes lit up with pure minx, and he didn’t need to read her thoughts to know exactly what sweet filth was dancing through her brain.
“Feh. Self-control is overrated.” She brought their knotted clasp to the neckline of her slinky orange dress. If he opened his palms flat here, his thumbs would dip beneath the silk. Her pulse pounded against his knuckles. “I might just like you better without it.”
On fire. His blood was on fire and gathering in the expected places. If she looked down at all right now, she’d see how fucking hard he was for her. But her gaze stayed locked with his.
Chalk-dry mouth made speaking tough, but he could still form the shapes of words. She wore her com. The voice piece winked at her throat in rhythm with her pulse. He didn’t need to speak for her to hear him. “But you see, I might not like myself. Or what I might…do to you. My resistance calculations are all off, and I don’t have the processing power to compensate. Fail-safes aren’t dependable without neural oversight. What if the muscle regulators misfire? I could…”
“Fuck a duck, Heron, stop worrying yourself raw.” She squeezed his hands. “How about you just let me do it?”
“Mari…”
“No, listen. I know what you signed Kellen up to do tomorrow. He’s gonna poke around in your skull, mess with things that ought never get messed with. And last time somebody did that, it fucked you up bad, and this is the result. So what happens if Kellen breaks you even more? What if we’re not talking about a spliced wire here or a wad of gauze there? What if more than your control goes dark? What if this is the last night for us, ever?”
“It isn’t.”
“But what if it is?”
“Mari, you’re just trying to seduce me.”
She huffed out a breath that wrapped hot and tight against his throat. “Damn skippy. And you’re makin’ it real hard.”
In his defense, there really was only one way to respond to that without fibbing. “So are you.”
She looked down. Well, of course she did. The pink velvet tip of her tongue peeked out, moistened her lips. And then those lips moved. He heard her voice inside his head, deep. “Fuck yeah.”
Fuck. Yeah.
Except, no.
True, he’d fantasized about this for ten years. True, she was his ideal, and he wanted her with every cell in his body. But not like this. Not when he could only give her part of his attention and didn’t have the energy or focus to resolve their other issues. She deserved better.
But then she looked up, trusting. Open. Asking. And he didn’t have the will to deny her.
“I know you always set stuff up when we’re on jobs,” she said in a voice of pure temptation. “You like being in charge, and I get that, but don’t you ever think what it would be like to just lay back? Let me take point on this. You don’t have to plan anything. I can take care of you.”
Tension knotted his body, and when she raised their tangled hands to her mouth, he flinched.
But he didn’t tell her to stop. He didn’t say no.
She pressed her lips to his sense-tipped fingers and hummed against the tingle of implanted electrodes. He’d kept the scars on his hands on purpose, to remind him what he was. Now, beneath her breath, the spider-thin lines got brighter, whiter. “They go all over, these scars?”
“No.” Hardest word ever, but he pushed it out. His body hurtled out of control, senses firing all over, nucleus accumbens and endocrines and muscles and God, please don’t let her stop now. Please let this be real.
“Lemme see?” Her voice made it a question, but it wasn’t. Not really. It was a command, and he took it as such. When she disengaged their hands, he let his fall slack against his sides. And just stood there amid the sensory and emotional storm.
Letting her.
Mari tugged his shirt out of his waistband and walked it up his chest. Touch by excruciating touch. Unveiling him. She nudged beneath his arms, and he lifted them, letting her pull the shirt over his head. She followed his biceps back down, skating them with her hands, as if memorizing the texture and shape.
Against her palms, his chest surged. Sharp breath, and then he held it. Closed his eyes.
He knew what she saw. He’d snagged glances in the mirror a few times before he could look past. The initial alts had all been internal, courtesy of the queen’s injection while Austin was burning. Those nanos had rebuilt him from the inside out, utterly transforming how his body operated, connecting it to his already amalgamated brain/neural network. The nanocytes had repaired the extensive damage to his tissues, but at significant cost. Not pain, but excruciating, constant awareness. He had known every second that his body was afire in pain, or should have been, and only his deliberate control, sustained consciousness, had kept the transformative fury at bay. During the worst of his recovery, he had not slept for seven months.
The body she saw bore no trace of the process, no scars showing the torment he had endured. It was a lie, that body. And he hated it.
Not because it was ugly, but because of what it represented. He had changed, become something completely other. Underneath the unmarred skin, it would be difficult to find a single system that hadn’t been altered in the scourge of nanocytes.
He wasn’t really human anymore. He was…what? Post-human? Robot? Cyborg. Monster.
He squeezed his eyes shut against her inspection.
“Hmm. See, you got these marks on your knuckles from when you had the sense-tips put in? I sort of expected scars in other places, too.” Her voice was low, husky, rubbing over his skin like thousand-count bedsheets. “But I don’t see any scars here.” She brushed a thumb over his nipple. “Or here.” The other one. “That mean nobody’s fucked with these parts?”
All those sensations went live, all the connections fired. As if the nanocytes had run a triangle of wires down the center of his body, clamped two ends on his nipples and the third to his prick, and then flooded him with current. His cock stiffened, pushed against his trousers. “In recent memory? Ah, just you.”
She moved close and let out a slow breath. It eddied over his sternum. He kept his eyes shut tight, but he knew she was looking down again. Point of the triangle. Nobody had fucked with that in a long time either.
Her breath, humid and warm, painted a trail down the slope of his abdomen, past his navel, and then she was undoing the buttons on his trousers. She fanned her fingers inside the open placket, parting fabric from skin and continuing round, over his hips, over his rear.
The tips of her middle fingers teased the cleft, dipping briefly before she moved downward, pulling the trousers down his legs. The cloth shushed around his ankles, and he willed himself to be still and endure her merciless attention.
Not that will served him much right now. He couldn’t look at her. He couldn’t move. Couldn’t stop her. Couldn’t mitigate the shame or desire or desperation. Couldn’t be what she deserved, but neither could he back away.
“You’re gonna have to walk me through the tricky parts.” She wrapped one hand around his leg, teasing her thumb behind his knee. His prick swelled at her touch. Getting hard all on its own. Because he wanted her, not because he willed it. “For
instance, you got any exposed electrical ports? Spots I oughtn’t get wet?”
He looked down at her. Agony. Blissful, sharp, buttered agony. “Only in my head and hands, and even there, nanocoated seams make the electronics waterp—fuck.” Her unspoken question hit him in the gut. “Yes, Mari, you may put your mouth all over me.”
“Goody.”
She sat back on her feet, rocked, and shifted. Sighed. Looked uncomfortable… No wait, not uncomfortable. Euphoric. It took Heron a moment to realize what she was doing, but once he did, he couldn’t look away. She was nuzzling her slit against the curve of one heel. And by the look on her face, it was getting her hot.
Um, not just her.
She hadn’t been lying when she offered to take charge, to do it all. She intended to bring both of them to orgasm. And he was going to let her.
Oh yes, he was.
Something in his psyche lit up at that thought. Expanded. Freed him. Complicated feeling—he would need to parse it later. But not now. This wasn’t a moment for thought. It was a moment simply to be.
He didn’t move, but he did release the tension in his hands. Or they did it themselves. He hardly breathed as Mari aimed her first kiss at his thigh, on the outside, along the curve of muscle. It bunched beneath her mouth.
“Back to my walkthrough,” she murmured against the point of his hip. “Describe the internals. You got a circuit? Transistors.” Hot breath on the bone. “Inductors.” Nipping in on that crease leading inward. “Capacitors.” Her mouth found the center line beneath his navel and kissed its way down. She nudged his cock aside with her chin, circling the base with her breath. When her tongue unfurled beneath his testicles, he groaned.
He could have used some resistors right then. He might have even said so out loud.
“No resistance,” she growled. “Not this time, partner.”
She kissed her way up the length of him, her mouth sparking like lightning every place it touched. Pain or pleasure? He couldn’t discern one from the other, but holy hell, it felt good.
When she got to the tip, she glanced up, shaking her hair back over one shoulder. She winked. “No scars here, neither. You reckon I ought to test sensation throughout?”
Brown, callused fingers spidered over his hips, holding him steady as she bent and lowered her mouth over him, swallowing him deep.
Holy fuck. His mouth opened, and before he could restrain himself, he uttered something completely incomprehensible. Maybe “Gah.”
Not his proudest moment. Not that he gave a flying shit.
She drew him out. And plunged over him again. The rough of her tongue rippled beneath; white-hot teeth caged each stroke. She didn’t suck so much as she applied pressure, varying the loose space of her throat and the taut ring of her lips, pulsing as she tasted him. Gorged on him.
She moved away slightly, but her hot breath painted his tip when she said, “Tell me. Tell me it’s good.”
Good? Enveloping, excruciating, impossible, perfect. “Not the word I’d use.”
She laughed, a low, sultry sound. A shish of skin against his thigh: her cheek as she smiled? “You got a better one?”
Mari.
But he couldn’t talk. His mouth wasn’t obeying, and neither was the rest of him. All he could do was feel. Input, input, input, yes.
Of their own accord, his hands grazed her hair, fingers flexed like they would wind themselves in it, tangle and pull, but they retreated in the end and returned to his sides.
She, on the other hand, had no trouble chatting. Damn her. She sat back on that heel, grinding the curve and ringing his cock with lazy fists, one after the other, mimicking endless penetration. “You remember Miami? Cracked rib, busted kneecap, and so many bruises, I looked like an eggplant? But when I saw you riding in with your med wagon, all those hurts felt better. Instantly.” Her chin tipped back, and she looked up at him. “Heron, you don’t need to worry ’bout hurting me. You’ve only ever done the opposite. And I’m tougher than I look.”
A surge of something warm and wet and precious forked through his chest. She was. Tough. She didn’t even know how much. “Well, that’s fortunate. You, on the other hand, are an expert at torment.”
Mari let out a groan that cracked on the end, and she squeezed his cock. Hard. He sucked in a ragged breath.
As if she couldn’t endure it any longer, she braced her cheek against his thigh, still with her face tipped up, and moved one hand down, shoved it beneath the orange silk. She knuckled something there. Probably her clit. Her…aaah.
It all hit him, right at that moment. Sex with Mari. Not just a fantasy, but right here, happening.
And damn it, if he was going to watch her come, he was going to be her partner in it. Not a bystander. No matter that his systems weren’t responding, no matter that he couldn’t give her the sort of sensory buffet she deserved, no matter that they still needed to talk about so many things and sort out so many others. He couldn’t just watch.
He bent and stroked her hair, swallowed a groan when his cock slipped free of her grasp. He pointed a look at her lap. “I can help with that.”
She mewled on the edge of orgasm but let him raise her to her feet. She wobbled. The hand that grasped his was damp and slick, and before he even knew what he was about, he drew it to his mouth. Held her gaze with his. Licked the backs of her knuckles. Tart, sweet, thick, glazing his tongue like fortified wine. Invading his nostrils and his soul.
Her dark eyes were huge, and her mouth rounded to an O.
Off toward the edge of the wood-slat hilltop canopy was a bank of holographic wildflowers, and even as he led her to it, the free-fae darkled their projection and revealed a regular room, a regular futon: soft, wide, silver-patterned with scrolling black kanjis.
Heron sat on its edge and drew Mari nearer until she stood right in front him. He rolled up the hem of her dress, exposing in turn sharp knees, cinnamon-skinned thighs, and…oh. She went commando. Chloe hadn’t supplied underthings, indeed. More likely, Mari hadn’t asked for them. Hadn’t seen a need.
Also, she wasn’t depilated like most women. That was something of a surprise, but a good one. His senses feasted, and his mouth flooded. Moist, humid, spice-and-caramel Mari. He wanted to bury his face there, to inhale and consume.
He held her dress up with one hand and stroked down with the other. Sense-tips were still measuring her temperature and pulse, but he wasn’t running that data anymore. He was soaking it in, responding on the fly and without any precision planning. Fingers delved, explored. Discovered the distended spike of her clit, and he pressed his middle finger down. Hard. Too hard?
“Ohmygod.” Keened all as one word, forced out from a tension-taut jaw. She grabbed his shoulders with both hands and dug her nails in, as if she thought her legs would wilt.
He didn’t even signal the sense-tip to hum. It just did. Extensible motor adaptations with full neural integration: fuck yeah.
“Holy shit, Heron, if you don’t want me to come all over your hand, you’d better back off right now.”
“But I do.”
“Back. Off.”
He ground his molars but did as she instructed. She was clearly getting off on being in charge, and he didn’t mind it.
Trust. He was trusting her. Had been doing that a lot today, and it hadn’t hurt yet.
Mari snagged his gaze with hers and didn’t let go. Fierce. Woman. His. She came up close, swung one leg over his lap, and balanced with her knees on either side of his thighs, her body poised right above his cock. And then she lowered herself. Slow. Patient. Holding his gaze the whole way down.
When she’d connected their bodies as completely as two people could, she stilled, face-to-face. And kissed him. Chaste, soft, on the mouth. “Fuck, you’re gorgeous,” she murmured against his chin. When he didn’t say anything in reply, she raised her brows. “And obedient
.”
Her muscles fluttered over him, stroking his cock deep. Now, that was deliberate. He could hear the minx in her voice, could feel it in her body. Goading, but sweet. How could anyone be so very both?
“Not really.” He was straining. Holding back, but only just. She really oughtn’t tempt him like this. “If you’re going to come, you’d better be quick.”
“Oh yes, really. And gimme just a sec.” She moved, rocking her hips, not rising so far that his cock slipped free. More grind than thrust. The silk of her dress stroked his chest, pooled between them, slippy and cool. And inside…God. He felt every contour of her body, roughs and cenotes and sweet, sweet grottoes. No way he was first to survey this territory, but it still felt special, like she didn’t give this tour to just anybody.
Unworthy. Unworthy of this woman. But still here, enduring her. Logic and causality fractured. Wasn’t about who deserved what anymore.
Her head tipped back, and her lips parted. The ends of her dark hair kissed his wrists against her spine. Part of him wanted to take over and do it for her. With a complete complement of his faculties, he could have stroked her to orgasm within moments. His fingers would be on her clit, pulsing pressure at perfectly timed intervals, emitting strategic bursts of vibration. His brain would be interfacing with the chamber, altering the chemical mix of the air and the tactile density of the ambient nanos, intensifying her experience from every angle.
But she didn’t need that. Apparently, she already had everything she needed. Her mouth opened, her face strained in rictus. Grunt of breath, wordless.
She held on, first to his arms, then to his shoulders, dug her fingernails into that deceptively smooth skin, and released the tether that bound her voice to her chest. Mari howled.
He felt her climax, her release, and he held steady through it, let her ride it and come down the other side. When her onslaught eased, she sagged against him, leaning her forehead to his, petting the welts on his shoulders and upper arms. She closed her eyes, melting, coating him in her peace.
Mari, sated. Because of him.
Wanted and Wired Page 17
