Relentless

by Skye Jordan

  “So…fucking tight,” he rasped, pulling back, then working himself another inch deeper, and doing it all over again and again with unending patience. He didn't ask if she was okay, didn't rush it, didn't back off, just expertly maneuvered their bodies until he was balls-deep and Giselle swore she felt him in the back of her throat. She was trembling, panting, her fingers digging into the shirt at his shoulders.

  The sensation was delicious. Decadent. Intense. Extreme.

  Breathing hard, he released her hips, closed his fingers around her wrists, and pulled them behind her back. The pressure on her shoulders made her sit straighter, which also pushed him deeper.

  A growl rolled through him just before he rocked his hips back, then thrust hard. The pressure spread through her in the most delicious way. Her head fell back, her mouth dropped open, and a wild sound of pleasure rolled from her throat.

  This is insane.

  She would have said the words aloud, but he was deep, deep, so deep. All she could do was use her legs to lift her body and meet his thrusts. They immediately fell into a slow, perfect rhythm, the kind of rhythm she'd never found with anyone but Troy. And the thrill pulsing through her with each thrust gave her a glimmer of hope that this kind of fulfillment was still out there. That maybe she wasn't destined for a life of wanting something she couldn't have. That if she'd found it with this stranger, surely she could find it with someone else, someone she could build a life with.

  That realization alone had been worth the trip here.

  “Watch me fuck you,” he said, growing breathless.

  She opened her eyes to the sight of their perfect grind. His shirt had fallen open at his waist, and his abs rippled with each thrust. The sight had to be the hottest thing she'd ever seen.

  “Watch how you move,” he said, “match it with…how you feel, so you can…find the rhythm again…when you need it.”

  He transferred both her wrists into one big hand, pulling tight. But the stress was forgotten when his free hand cupped her breast and his head came forward, his mouth covering her nipple.

  Heat and suction filled her breast and pumped straight to her pussy. She dropped her head back, deepening the curve of her spine and forcing him deeper. So damn deep his cock hit some hot button of pleasure with every stroke. Her mouth dropped open on a cry, their rhythm picked up speed, and a deep, full-body orgasm spiraled toward her.

  And it was beautiful.

  Absolutely. Goddamn. Beautiful.

  “Ah God,” she cried.

  “Bring it, angel,” he rasped, and increased both his speed and the power of his thrust. “Bring it.”

  “Oh my G-” the intensity coalesced, her orgasm cutting off her cry as it peaked.

  She broke, splintering into heat and light and pleasure, rocked by wave after wave of wicked ecstasy that wiped her mind of everything but the intense fulfillment infusing every cell of her body.

  Only when the thrill quieted did he release her hands, grip her hips, and ride her to his own completion, first shouting pleasure, then pressing his face to the hollow between her neck and shoulder and growling like a deeply sated animal.

  Giselle let her fingers slide through his hair until their breathing regulated, and when her devil finally stirred, Giselle's mind floated back from fluffy clouds and white light and blissful perfection to her far harsher immediate reality, one she'd now have to find a way to live with-she'd just screwed a total stranger.

  Yet Troy continued to drift into her mind. To the way he'd called her angel. To the way he'd said, “Bring it, angel” during sex. To the way he'd loved to press his face to her neck and breathe her in after he'd come.

  A sudden and intense wave of profound sadness came out of nowhere, swamping Giselle with loss and regret, filling her mind with Troy while another man still filled her body.

  The wrongness of that only deepened Giselle's confusion. And the hope she'd experienced just moments before dimmed. It wouldn't matter if she found another man she could enjoy if she couldn't find a way to put Troy behind her.

  And when the devil finally leaned away, he dropped his head back against the lounge, flopped a forearm over his eyes, and muttered something that sounded a lot like, “Satan, here I come.”

  Troy hung midair in the largest cave at Red Rock Canyon just outside Las Vegas. Light from the crews above had faded soon after he descended into this cavern, and if it weren't for the headlamp on his helmet, he would be surrounded by a setting that mirrored the state of his soul-utter darkness.

  Now, his lamp illuminated the rusty hue of rock as sweat slid down this neck, his chest, and soaked into his tee. To think the caves were a dozen or more degrees cooler than the desert floor outside made him grateful, even if he did feel like he was basting in a giant oven.

  Voices and movement from the crew above echoed down to him. Lifehouse's Smoke & Mirrors album bounced through the cavern. Normally, the music would have layered a light atmosphere to the set, but again, he wasn't in a normal state of mind. And as Jason Wade sang “All That I'm Asking For,” Troy felt the lyrics heavily in his heart. Wishing, more than anything, for the chance to go back in time and do things over with Giselle all those years ago. But based on what he'd done only two nights ago with her, he knew nothing would change, because, where that woman was concerned, he always seemed to make the shittiest decisions.

  Raucous laughter overhead forced Troy's mind back to the job. Keaton and Duke had been in rare form on this trip. And Zahara's famed pranks had been instigating one hilarious incident after another, often to the detriment of filming. No one could act when they were laughing their asses off, and this movie had more retakes than any he'd ever been involved in.

  Every movie had a feel of its own. An atmosphere, a cohesiveness, a personality that developed from the combination of cast, crew, and location. Under normal circumstances, this film would go down in Troy's book as one of his top ten favorites, but from the moment he'd stepped off the plane to Giselle's face on a billboard, he'd been a flaming pile of shit.

  He pulled a bottle of water from his harness, downing half. Then pulled out the radio and asked the engineer on the other end, “How deep is this thing?”

  “Looks like…” Paper rustled over the line as Ed Miller turned pages of the map graphing the cave. “Sixty feet.”

  “Nope. I'm at sixty now.” He tilted his lamp to shine below him where the shaft narrowed like an ice-cream cone. But the bottom of this thing dropped out of sight. “Doesn't matter. I'm going to take some measurements.”

  He traded his radio for his tape measure, stretching it toward the wall, but the space was too wide and the metal bent, falling away. He reeled it back to try again.

  He could guess at the distance, but he wasn't the estimator type. He was a perfectionist. He had to get all the numbers out on paper, had to do the math, then put that math through the app Rubi, the genius girlfriend of another Renegade, created for the same purpose-to keep them all safe.

  Too bad he didn't plan out all his decisions this carefully. If he did, he wouldn't have a knife of guilt through his gut now.

  Easing the tape toward the wall again, he rehearsed an explanation for his impulsive and degenerate behavior at the club with Giselle. Only no excuse he'd created over the last two days justified the way he'd pushed her. And pushed her. And pushed her.

  None other than the fact that he'd been expecting her to break and back out.

  But that wouldn't go over well with Giselle when he faced her.

  If he faced her.

  The tape snapped down again. Troy swore and reeled it in. This was a shitty measuring method, but it was all he had. So he started over. He wished he had Josh on the job. Unfortunately, Renegades' risk assessment manager of choice, was on his honeymoon. But if Troy couldn't shore up some of the structural issues he was finding in this cave related to the stunt the filmmakers wanted, he might just interrupt the couple's blissful retreat. Because Troy didn't trust the engineer Paramount was using to ass
ist in the stunts as far as Troy could throw him. And Troy preferred safety over regret.

  At least in stunts.

  Obviously, when it came to Giselle, he just couldn't keep himself from fucking up.

  His self-disgust deepened, making his gut ache. He should have listened to Zahara and contacted Giselle like a normal person. But he'd never been normal. Nothing about his life had ever been normal. Which was exactly why he was hanging in a cave trying to measure the diameter of a cavern so he could dive into it headfirst at full speed.

  Evidently, some people could overcome their screwed-up beginnings. Giselle and Ryker had both broken out of the self-destructive mold. Giselle had made her deepest dream of becoming a country music star a reality. Ryker had decades of success in the army, and a great relationship with an awesome girl.

  Sure, Troy had found success. At twenty-nine, Troy had more money than he'd ever believed he'd see in a lifetime, and more work than he could handle. He'd even extended his stunt work into successful bit acting parts when the need arose. And he had a hell of a lot of fun looking invincible, skilled, talented, sexy, bad-ass, and fearless with his stunts.

  But deep down, he was a coward, plain and simple. His personal life was nothing but meaningless hookups, and his close friends included only a handful of people. Because, while he might freely risk life and limb professionally, personally he couldn't face any risk. Not after losing Giselle. The truth was, he was just enough of a coward to find a way to get out of facing Giselle, because he hated what he'd done with her at the club. Loved it and hated it. That depraved behavior was reserved for strangers who sought it out for their own dark purposes-purposes Troy didn't want to know about-not for someone like Giselle. Someone he'd cared about. Someone he would always care about.

  He'd tried to soothe his conscience by telling himself he hadn't come anywhere close to demonstrating the debauchery a club like Rendezvous had to offer, but that wasn't helping. Even what little he'd done had been too much. He'd lost control. He'd taken advantage. And he hated himself for it.

  The familiar whir of cable sounded overhead, signaling incoming company just as Troy's tape touched the wall.

  He glanced at the measurement and doubled the distance since he was positioned at the center of the shaft, then winced.

  Whoever had come down came to a slow stop ten feet to his right. “How does it look, boss?”

  The eerie, smooth, radio-crackled voice just feet away startled Troy, and he jerked his head that direction. Instead of one of his fellow stunt people, he faced the goddamned stunt dummy they'd collectively named Skip.

  “Holy fuck.” Troy's body released the sudden tension, but his heart still hammered beneath his ribs, and the tape measure fumbled in his grip. He tilted his head back and yelled, “You assholes!”

  A chorus of cackles, laughter, shouts, and high fives resonated above, where the entire crew lined the lip of the shaft, watching. Troy couldn't help but smile. He shook his head, laughing with relief, then cued his mic. “Laugh while you can. Payback's a bitch on crack.”

  Grinning, Troy looked over the stunt dummy. The guys had made Skip themselves from various movie props. He had the head and torso of a CPR dummy, the legs, arms, hands, and feet from a mishmash of soft mannequins from a long-ago zombie movie. Today, they'd dressed him in a Grateful Dead T-shirt, ripped jeans, and, of all things, a cowboy hat.

  “Dude,” he told Skip as he reeled in the tape. “You scared me.”

  “Sir,” Skip's “voice,” courtesy of Keaton impersonating an English butler, came from the radio duct-taped to one of the dummy's hands. “I must say, we are collectively a tad worried about you. You seem unusually blue this trip. Worse over the past few days. I'm not sure if the others have mentioned it, but I did earn my psychology degree at Yale, sir. If I can be of any assistance, I'd be happy to lend an ear.”

  Troy cued his mic. “I don't want to offend you or anything, Skip, but…you don't have ears.”

  “Oh dear.” Pause. “Oh my.” Pause. “That's quite beastly, isn't it? All right, then. I'll see what I can do about that. As far as the cave goes, how may I be of assistance, oh great one?”

  “You can give me about five more feet of mobility in here.”

  “I'm afraid I can't accommodate you there, sir. Seems as you have a nasty little problem on your hands.”

  Troy had more than one nasty little problem. “You're incredibly unhelpful today, Skip.”

  “Hold on, I may have a jolly good idea, sir.”

  “Since you have more brains than my collective coworkers, lay it on me.”

  “Indeed. What might you say to allowing me to attempt the stunt prior to your swift and elegant descent into this dirty little shaft, sir? I believe I may be able to save you…well…an intense headache, as it were.”

  “Very gracious of you, Skip. But you're too valuable to lose. You and I both know Keaton is our true stunt dummy.”

  More laughter echoed above.

  “Ed,” Troy said into the radio, “Skip and I are ready to come up.”

  “You got it,” Ed said, laughter in his voice. “Coming up.”

  Above, the whir of machinery sounded. Skip ascended first, solidifying Troy's intention to get creative with payback for his stunt comrades. Once they'd pulled Skip over the edge, Troy slowly rose through the shaft.

  Feeling a little lighter, he dragged his phone from his pocket to check for missed calls or messages-the service down here was spotty but surprisingly decent if he caught a signal just right-but found neither. He was both relieved and frustrated that Ryker hadn't called him back yet. On the one hand, Troy wasn't looking forward to the lecture he'd get from his best friend when he asked for Giselle's cell number. On the other, he wanted this guilt monkey off his back, and he'd already tried a dozen different ways to get ahold of Giselle at the Mirage. The woman had remarkable security.

  Security who'd let her go unescorted to a sex club.

  What the hell was that about?

  By the time he reached the lip of the cavern and climbed out, the guys had Breaking Benjamin's “The Diary of Jane” playing at one hundred decibels. Keaton, the doof, held Skip like a human female, twirling around the dingy cave as if it were a dance floor. Duke and Zahara danced alongside, all three of them singing along with Ben. The crew looked on, laughing.

  Troy chuckled, relieving another sliver of stress. “You guys are idiots.”

  “We're practicing for tonight,” Duke called back before he dipped Zahara, who squealed and laughed, her dark hair brushing the cave floor.

  Troy turned down the music and pulled a fresh water bottle from the cooler. “What's tonight?”

  Duke pulled Z upright, only to have Keaton dip Skip, then pretend to make out with him.

  Troy sat on the cooler and uncapped the water with a roll of his eyes. “I knew you were off, dude, but not that off.”

  Keaton pulled Skip upright and danced cheek to cheek. “Don't listen to him, darling. He's just jealous.” Obviously in a dramatic mood, Keaton caressed Skip's bald head. “We'll be the cat's meow on the dance floor tonight, you and me.”

  Duke pushed Z's shoulder, and she made a triple spin, ending with a flourish only to spin back to Duke and pick up the tango, imitating Keaton and Skip.

  “Good Lord, did someone leave the catnip out again?” Troy drank the rest of his water. “What the hell is tonight?”

  The song ended, and both Duke and Keaton finished out the dance by dramatically dipping their partners.

  “The mixer,” Keaton said, back to his normal self as he sat Skip in a row of chairs, then crossed the dummy's legs and laid one arm over the back of the neighboring seat. “The one they told us about- Oh.” He looked at Duke and Zahara. “He wasn't here.” Then to Troy. “While you were out picking up cable, Karen from publicity came by, said there's a title song mixer tonight. You know, a swanky-dank, meet-the-singer-type gig. It's in one of the small banquet rooms at the Mirage.”

  The sting of somet
hing like fear streaked down his spine. It could have been excitement. It could have been shock. It could have been all of them combined, because this meant he could meet Giselle face-to-face without the need to utilize any middleman.

  Keaton took the seat next to Skip. “They even invited us stunt grunts-go figure.” He looked at Skip. “We're coming up in the world, buddy. Bet there will be some fine ass there tonight, maybe even a mannequin or two. Okay.” He sat back and spoke to the crew. “What's for lunch today? I vote Cabo Wabo.”

  “We went there yesterday,” Brianna, one of the crew, complained.

  “And we should go again,” Keaton said, “because it's just that good.”

  As the others argued over a lunch spot, Zahara bumped Troy's hip with hers. “Scoot over.”

  He moved and lowered his head. “You didn't think to tell me this?”

  “I forgot all about it until these guys started messing around,” she said, keeping her voice low. “It might be a good opportunity to reconnect with her.”

  Oh no. They'd already reconnected-on the most intimate level.

  Yet, they hadn't.

  What a mess.

  He wiped sweat from his brow with a shrug of his shoulder. A huge part of him considered ignorance bliss in this situation. Over the past two days, he'd been having a tug-of-war with his conscience, one side sure it would be better to let her go on thinking she'd fucked a stranger, the other…

  God, he didn't know if it was a good thing or a bad thing, but he had an overwhelming need to confess. Something he'd never experienced before. And he still couldn't tell if it was the right thing to do or not.

  Z's hand covered his forearm, her hold firm. “I know you probably don't want to talk about it, but just let me say one thing, and I'll drop it. You're a guy who goes after what you want. I've known you for three years, and you've always gone all out for every part, always been there for every friend. You live your life balls to the wall. And all I keep thinking is, why stop now?

  “The reality is, the chances of you two ending up in the same place at the same time again with the opportunity to talk to each other is pretty damn slim. Even if there's no chance of getting back together, I think you should at least take this chance to show her your face, say hello, and put yourself back on her radar. At best, sparks will fly. At worst, you got the chance to say, 'Hey, look. I didn't crumble to dust when you left.'