Dark Abyss

by Kaitlyn O’Connor

  “Tell me about it,” Caleb muttered, realizing there wasn’t much point in trying to deny it. Not that he saw any point to it at this juncture. They all knew the game was on—except it was on hold until they tied up the damned case.

  The sooner the better, as far as he was concerned. It wasn’t just sleeping alone that was bugging him. No romance meant no romance! They couldn’t speak to her, couldn’t even approach her about moving to the colony, let alone attempt to try to negotiate any kind of agreement.

  And, as loathe as he was to admit it, that worried the hell out of him, having her in the colony and available. Of course, they had to keep her close since she was in protective custody, which meant keeping everybody else away from her, but he still didn’t like it worth a fuck!

  That hadn’t stopped the rest of the bastards down at the center from plying her with every enticement they could think of! And it wasn’t likely to stop any of the others in the market for a woman either! The bastards were probably plotting some way to cut them out right now!

  He didn’t know why Ian was complaining any damned way! They’d agreed he could be lead man! So he’d jumped the gun a little! It wasn’t as if there was anything typical about this courtship—starting and ending with the fact that they couldn’t even openly court her!

  He supposed, upon consideration, that it might have been worse if she was on the market, but it wasn’t much of an edge when they still didn’t know that she would consider moving to Atlantis, let alone consider their suit!

  What they needed, he decided, was an enticement that nobody else would think of. It had to be something beyond the ordinary, something that might get Anna to thinking along the lines of taking up permanent residence when they couldn’t actually ask her to consider it.

  The germ of an idea came to him while he listened absently to Joshua and Ian discussing possibilities for getting Anna’s data chip back.

  She’d lost everything in the explosion. He supposed just about anything they could think up in the way of a gift would be good, but they didn’t really know what Anna liked. That was the catch.

  He sure as hell hadn’t been able to tell from the junk the bastards at the center had piled on her. She’d seemed pretty damned pleased with all of it, and he knew she couldn’t be. She’d just been happy to get presents.

  She liked music, he thought abruptly—the classical stuff. She’d had something playing just about all the time he’d been on watch.

  The problem with that was that he hadn’t actually recognized anything by name.

  He’d realized it was classical, but he wasn’t a big music buff.

  Chapter Eleven

  “Back so soon?” Joshua asked cheerfully when Simon returned about an hour later.

  Simon’s face darkened. “I didn’t actually have that much to take care of at the office.”

  “Oh. I thought maybe you’d remembered it was your day off.”

  Simon’s face grew darker. “I’m High Guardian. I don’t actually have days off,”

  he muttered, searching the kitchen cabinets a little absently and finally pulling out something to cook. He was starving. He hadn’t realized he hadn’t gotten around to eating anything before he left. He’d missed breakfast and noon had come and gone.

  “What was that music Anna was playing at her place all the time?” Caleb asked, joining Simon and Joshua in the kitchen and settling at the table.

  Simon flicked a blank look at him. “Classics.”

  Caleb rolled his eyes. “I know that. I just wondered if you recognized any of it.”

  Simon frowned thoughtfully. “I know I heard at least one piece that was Beethoven—Chopin. It seemed like there was more Tchaikovsky, though. Why?”

  “I was just thinking about our situation and it occurred to me that we might convince Anna to move here without actually asking her outright just by making her feel at home, you know? It’s going to take us weeks to get to trial no matter how fucking hard we work to put the case together. And, until then, our hands are tied.

  “She’s going to be bored out of her mind in a little while, though, if she doesn’t have anything to do that she’s used to. So, we produce them. It makes her a lot happier about being caged, and maybe she gets to thinking this wouldn’t be a bad place to settle once it’s all over.

  “If you think about it, it might not be such a bad thing for us either. Assuming we can convince her, we’re going to have to make some adjustments anyway. And it would give us something to do to keep from going off the deep end.”

  Simon frowned at him. “I see one problem with that.”

  “What?”

  “We’re all going to look, and feel, pretty fucking stupid if we get everything all cozy and comfortable and she lights out for land again,” he said dryly.

  Caleb felt his belly tighten uncomfortably. He glared at Simon in annoyance. “I still think we have a better chance of preventing that if we get her used to the idea first.”

  Ian joined them in the kitchen. “He’s right. We have to think about the practical side of forming a pod anyway. This is a bachelor household. We’re either going to have to look for another place, or remodel this one. Having only four bedrooms is going to get damned uncomfortable damned fast.”

  Simon sent him a sour look, but frowned thoughtfully. “We need a lab and greenhouse. She spent ninety percent of her time in one or the other.”

  Caleb stared at him blankly for a moment. “God damn it! You just had to suggest that before I could get it out! I was thinking the same thing!”

  “What difference does it make?” Ian asked sardonically. “He’s right. It’s the one thing most likely to work.”

  “Exactly!” Caleb snarled. “And it was my fucking idea to start with and now he gets the credit!”

  “It’s going to take all of us chipping in to pay for it,” Joshua pointed out, “unless you guys have more credits than I do … or it’s cheaper than it sounds like to me.”

  * * * *

  Ian was sure he had himself well in hand right up until the moment he walked into the bathroom just as Anna stepped out of the shower. He halted as abruptly as if he’d hit a brick wall, too stunned to find her there, at first, to think at all.

  It was his shower time. Everybody in the household knew he was always the first to hit the showers in the morning and it flickered through his mind, briefly, that Anna was there because she’d intended the encounter.

  Even as the hopeful thought flickered through his mind, though, Anna, who was clearly as stunned as he was, sucked in a sharp breath, clutched the towel she had around her in white knuckled fists, and gaped at him with her eyes as wide as saucers. A red tide appeared at the tops of her breasts above the towel and slowly climbed all the way up to her hairline.

  Turn around, Ian told himself. Just turn around and walk out.

  His feet seemed glued to the floor, though.

  Move or say something!

  He swallowed convulsively several times, but to save his life all he could think about was the fact that everyone else was still asleep and Anna was standing in front of him warm, wet, and naked. “How are your ribs?” he asked a little hoarsely.

  Anna blinked at him several times, like someone waking. She felt like she’d just awakened in a sense. Her mind tumbled the words around in slow motion as if she’d never heard them before. The air in the bathroom seemed super charged, electric. Her skin prickled all over.

  He’d asked about her ribs. “Better,” she mumbled. Even as the response leapt into her mind, the inspiration to show him flickered through her mind, as well. She hesitated, struggled with her excruciating modesty, and forced her fingers to uncurl from the towel. He was naked. They didn’t think anything about strolling around completely naked, she reminded herself. She could always pretend she hadn’t done it in the hope of seducing him if he seemed appalled. “Still bruised,” she managed to say, “but it look
s worse than it feels.”

  His gaze followed the towel down to her ankles and climbed back up so slowly that she thought her knees would give out or she might pass out from lack of oxygen. He paused when he reached the juncture of her thighs, hesitating there so long that she felt her sex begin to spasm a little frantically, felt hot moisture seep from the walls. She began to feel embarrassment and uncertainty creeping in to her. The desperation to retrieve the towel she’d dropped had just hit her when he moved toward her, effectively preventing any possibility of retrieving it.

  He stepped closer, almost like a sleepwalker and lifted his hand, lightly tracing the bruise along her ribs before his gaze moved to her breasts. Anna studied his face with a mixture of hope, desire, and sheer terror, both at her action and the possible consequences and the animal lust she felt radiating from him as he finally lifted his head and met her gaze.

  She’d never seen that look on a man’s face before, let alone felt it directed at her and she was almost equal parts thrilled and terrified by what she might’ve unleashed. He slid his hand slowly from her ribs to frame her breast within the crook of his thumb and hand.

  He swallowed audibly, his gaze flickering over her face. “I won’t hurt you, Anna,” he said hoarsely.

  “I know,” she responded shakily.

  He lifted his hands slowly, settling them on her shoulders and stroking her collar bone with his thumbs as if trying to sooth her. Just as slowly, he lifted them a moment later and stroked his hands along the sides of her hair. His hands shook. She felt the tremors when he finally settled them and slowly applied just enough pressure to urge her to move closer.

  Still unnerved but eager, she swayed toward him, lifting her face hopefully. He released a ragged breath. The heat of it as it touched her skin, lifted goosebumps all over her. Her nipples, erect already, tightened almost painfully.

  “Jesus, baby! I shouldn’t be doing this,” he muttered absently even as he drew her up and bent his head towards hers.

  But he was going to, she thought dreamily, and that was all that mattered at the moment. She could worry about why he didn’t think it was a good idea later. She knew she would, but she was too thrilled with his attention at the moment to worry about later.

  He seemed to forget his qualms and his anxieties about scaring her the instant their mouths connected. There was no slow building to explosion. She thought if he hadn’t reassured her, at first, by approaching her slowly, she might’ve taken flight instead of meeting him with eagerness. Even so, she was almost equal parts unnerved and thrilled by the hungry demand of his touch. Her heart rate sped up, making her lungs work harder for air and adding to the drunken euphoria that inundated her the moment she took his taste and scent inside her.

  He explored her restlessly with his hands while he kissed her, sending a constant flow of pleasurable signals to her brain to complete the chaos there. She couldn’t seem to manage more than clinging to him weakly to keep from sliding down him. She felt a bump and the coldness of the wall against her back without ever having realized they’d moved.

  He used the barricade to press his lower body against hers rhythmically, directing her scattered wits to the answer to the need that had begun to drum through her. The kiss was wonderful, but it wasn’t enough. She wanted him inside of her.

  Her mind struggled with the logistics of mounting him. She dismissed the idea of enticing him into her bed when it occurred to her that they might have to run a disapproving gauntlet along the way and pushed herself upward. Locking her arms more tightly around his shoulders, she pushed up on her tiptoes and lifted the thigh his cock was bruising, coiling that leg around his hips. His cock obligingly slipped between her legs, bumping along her cleft just enough to set her teeth on edge when he curled his hips again.

  He dropped his hands to her buttocks, digging his fingers into her and trying to spear the mouth of her sex. Apparently, he realized that wasn’t going to work the same moment she did. Tearing his mouth from hers, he shifted his hands to her thighs, hoisted her up the wall and braced her there. She peered down between them dizzily, watching as he grasped his shaft and guided it by feel until he rang the spot.

  Ian’s face was a harsh mask of need when he lifted his head to look at her. It sent an answering shaft of need through her. Her kegels responded by clamping around the head of his cock in a chokehold that frustrated both of them. She couldn’t seem to command the muscles to let go or ease up long enough for him to penetrate her more fully and the moisture her body had produced wasn’t helping with the vice-like grip her muscles had on him.

  He distracted her by clamping his mouth over one of her nipples. The minute he did, the muscles in her sex began to spasm madly and her weight carried her down his shaft a little further with each fluctuation.

  He let go of her breast, panting hoarsely, and nuzzled his face against her neck.

  “Tell me you’re close, baby,” he muttered raggedly. “This is going to be a rough, fast ride.”

  Close to what, she thought, vaguely confused? But his husky voice and the promise of a rough ride made her quake with the first tremors of her climax. Dismay flickered through her. “I think I’m coming,” she gasped.

  “Jesus, baby!” Ian growled, tightening his hold on her and driving deep.

  She groaned, squeezing her eyes and trying to hold on to the pleasure, but it was a losing battle—a lost battle. The first quake hadn’t been a warning that she was close.

  She was there, and there was no stopping it. And then she didn’t want to stop it. Every thrust sent exquisite waves of the most glorious rapture through her. She gasped, held her breath, tried to keep the glory of it bottled inside, but she couldn’t seem to prevent the little moans of pleasure from escaping.

  He drove them from her with his near frenzied pumping in and out of her. She was still enjoying the delightful aftershocks when he stopped, panting raggedly, jerking against her.

  A sublime sense of peace washed over her as she clung to him limply and then a flicker of uneasiness wafted through her. “Was it good for you?” she asked a little anxiously, a little drunkenly.

  He uttered a shaky chuckle. “Baby, if it had been any better, I think my heart would’ve exploded,” he murmured, gnawing along the side of her neck and lifting a rash of pebbled skin that sent a shudder through her.

  Dragging in a deep breath, he eased away from her and allowed her to slide to the floor. He leaned toward her, nibbling lazily at her lips when she lifted her head. “We need to get you out of here before the others wake up,” he muttered.

  She grimaced, feeling semen beginning to slide down her thigh. “I need to wash up,” she said uncomfortably.

  “Make it quick. I thought I heard somebody stirring.”

  She wobbled as quickly as she could toward the lavatory and rinsed off. Ian wrapped her towel around her just as she shut the water off and all but shoved her out the door as soon as he’d taken a quick look down the hall.

  She stared at the door a little blankly when he’d shut it, but a sound from the nearest room galvanized her. Whirling, she sprinted for the room she was occupying and dashed inside.

  Her heart was beating unpleasantly fast when she leaned back against the door and that was just the beginning. By the time she’d dried off and pulled her robe on, all sorts of unpleasant, if unnamed, feelings were rambling around inside of her.

  The almost … clandestine nature of their interlude made guilt begin to creep through her. She had no reason to feel it that she knew of and yet that alone wasn’t enough to banish it.

  Why had he said he shouldn’t do it? Why had he practically shoved her out the door?

  Well, that was easy. He was done and he obviously didn’t want the others to know. Was that to keep her from being embarrassed and uncomfortable, though, or to keep himself from being embarrassed and uncomfortable?

  Moving to the bed, she plopped down on it, trying to
remember if she’d read anything about their customs that might help her understand what was going on. The little she’d found hadn’t really gone into that much depth, though. Apparently, land dwellers found the sea folk’s marriage practices so titillating that they didn’t actually put any effort into discovering how they went about making those arrangements.

  She distinctly remembered it had said that it was usually men that were already partners of some kind—quite often miners that shared a claim who would then extend that claim to their woman and ‘co-own’ her in a sense since they all pitched in to pay the bride’s family.

  She realized uncomfortably that she hadn’t actually gotten any sort of indication from any of them that they even had an interest in that direction. Not that she was sure herself that she was interested. She was in a way and she wasn’t. It was hard to look at them and be around them and not covet them, but there was no getting around the ‘big problem’. They were water people and she was a land dweller, and the sea unnerved her.

  She hadn’t honestly gotten much beyond lusting after them. She hadn’t even put a lot of thought into that. She’d just let them do whatever they wanted, because that was the only thing she harbored no doubts at all about. She wanted them and she wasn’t about to put up a fight if they showed any interest in that direction.

  Was it completely against their customs, though? As weird as it seemed to her that it would be given their marriage practices, she didn’t know how they felt about sex outside of commitment. Nobody where she came from worried about it. They were probably a hundred times more likely to commit themselves to a roll just for fun, and maybe only the one time, than they were to consider a longer term commitment. It would be bizarre if the sea folk were just the opposite regarding sex outside of marriage, but it wasn’t inconceivable.

  So maybe what they’d done was taboo? Maybe that was why Ian had been so anxious to shove her out the door?

  Or maybe Caleb had made some kind of claim on her and he’d wanted to avoid conflict?