"Someone want to spell it out for me?” Donny mused.
"The codes used to manipulate the VFR and kill Trista Locke were Tribunal Space Elite codes.” Jenia led them down the corridor as she explained. “There are only two on Asberek. You and Paul."
"Where are we going?” he asked in a whisper.
"To the Temple,” Elise answered. “Until we can find a way to prove you're innocent. Meiner said the General was on his way down, but when I checked with The Zenith, he didn't even know about the murder."
Paul cursed under his breath.
"Give me a blaster,” Donny hissed.
"No. Do this our way, Pasquel.” Elise glared at him over her shoulder. “Quiet. We have to be quiet."
"I've got an ATHV waiting,” Jenia whispered.
The All Terrain Hover Vehicles were the best thing for jungle travel, and the Temple was in the thickest part of the Asberekian forest. They escaped the building, but just as they piled into the ATHV the alarms started screaming. “Floor it!” Donny yelled, and Paul slammed the vehicle into start mode and squealed out of the area.
"Head east first.” Jenia gripped the handle on the door. “Make them think we're going to Old City."
As Paul followed her instructions, Donny huddled in the corner of the backseat to avoid any physical contact with Elise. Though she'd help save him, he was terrified of the feelings she brought out in him. All the cold distance he kept with others disappeared when he dealt with her.
"Is the General coming to Asberek then?” Donny focused on Jenia.
Elise answered him. “He is. He was coming down anyway because the Dormrelian ambassador is here."
Donny and Paul exchanged a glance. “It won't take the General long to find me.” Donny spoke low.
"When I talked to Jake,” Jenia added, “he was completely shocked."
"I don't understand.” Donny frowned.
"Dr. Meiner lied. We don't know why, but the General was never informed of the murder.” Jenia clicked buttons on a handheld. “The security tapes show both you and Paul were not near the crime scene, but Carl believes you've altered them.” She showed him the computer coding for the security cams on her screen. “Someone did alter them. A backdoor access was used to change the code. Carl doesn't know who did it, but he can't trust the security video. It's been compromised."
"I had a phone call.” Donny frowned and tried to think. The phone call with his therapist was only thirty minutes. He'd spent the other three and half hours alone. With no witnesses. Despair spread through his chest.
"What's wrong with you?” she snapped. Her grey eyes shimmered as she glared at him.
"Nothing at all. I'm accused of murder, was arrested, and thrown in a cell. I'm peachy.” He glared back.
"I'm fine, by the way.” Her lips tightened. “After four hours of interrogation where they couldn't shake my story that you were with me when that girl was murdered, I was just a little shaken."
As he stared at her angry expression, he wondered if she believed he'd done it. The altered security footage, his history, their adversarial relationship were all good reasons she might think he was a killer.
They questioned her for that long? His fist clenched, and a haze of red curtained his eyes for a moment. He would kill them. He'd rip them limb from limb for touching her, hurting her.
"Donny? Donny? Are you okay?” Elise slid closer and snapped her fingers in front of his face. “You looked like you were going to murder me for a minute."
"Not you. Never you."
"There has to be a way to prove you didn't do it.” Her brow furrowed, and she bit her lip.
"How do you know I didn't do it?"
She contemplated him, and cocked her head to the side. “For about five minutes, I considered the possibility you might be guilty.” He held his breath and waited. “But then I realized you would never be so messy.” She wrinkled her nose. “That crime scene was ... untidy. You would not have killed her like that."
Something in his belly unraveled, and his breath whooshed out. She didn't believe it. All reason pointed to him as the killer, but she didn't believe it. He was able to smile a little. “Oh? How would I have killed her then?"
Elise shrugged. “Like you killed those other women. I've seen the reports. Clean, quick, assassination. Not like this murder."
"Maybe I lost my mind."
She smirked. “I might have gone with that too except for one thing."
"What's that?"
"The Gershon murders. It's exactly the same. Precise cuts, but random. The limbs ripped from the body. You didn't do that murder. I don't think you did this one either."
"So, you don't think I did it because I'd kill her, but I'd be a good housekeeper."
Something soft flitted across her face, but it passed and her professional mask was back in place. “Plus, anyone named ‘Adonis’ just couldn't be a murderer. That's a good enough reason, don't you think?"
He gave up the fight, and hauled her into his arms. “Good enough for me. For now."
She struggled for a bit, but he wouldn't let go. “Caveman."
"You like it."
"I'm not going to follow your orders.” She leaned back and gazed at him. Something in his belly tightened and snapped.
"But I can give you everything you want.” He almost purred the words. She felt right, good, perfect in his arms, and he knew he shouldn't hold on to her. But the decision was made before he even knew it. It was made back in the Asberek Forest six months earlier, when he'd been under the haze of the chemical, S.E.X. It was made when she fucked Jonah in front of him, and he had wanted to tear the barrier between them down to stake his claim. It was made when he got Jonah off but could only stare at her.
She was his.
"Everything?” She blinked and widened her eyes.
"Don't try the innocent act with me.” His tone was sharp. “I can take you to that place, Elise. The one where pain and pleasure are the same.” He leaned his head close to hers and whispered in her ear. “And best of all, I love to do it. Do you know what you're doing to me right now? How much I want to fuck you here in this back seat?"
She shivered, and his lips were a whisper from hers when Jenia cleared her throat. “Do we need to stop?” She said it casually, but Elise's face flushed with color and she jerked out of his arms.
He didn't care. He yanked her back.
Jenia's eyebrows shot up. “I wouldn't push her around too much, Pasquel. She's no submissive, and she might just kick you between the legs."
"Been there, done that. I survived.” He glanced at Elise and smirked.
Her lips twitched and she laughed. “You're impossible, caveman."
He leaned close and whispered, “But I'm your caveman."
Jenia sighed. “Paul, we'd better stop. It's been too long for them. Can you smell it?"
Donny's nostrils flared. He caught the scent of Elise's arousal and hummed his approval. Yes. They needed to stop.
* * * *
"I'm so embarrassed,” Elise moaned.
"Don't be.” Jenia shook her head. “I don't know what you see in the brute, but I'm not going to judge you."
They stopped in a clearing by the same lake where, only six months earlier, Elise had collapsed from an overdose of the drug in the atmosphere. Then, Jenia had to inject Elise with a hormone suppressant to keep her from dying. And she'd warned Elise to take care of the problem and not be embarrassed by it, just as she did now.
Elise sighed.
"Is it really so terrible?” Donny asked her, his tone light.
She gazed closer and realized his tone belied the dark bitterness in his eyes. “Are you crazy? Sex with you is fabulous.” But terrifying. She loved him. Every part of him. But having great sex with a guy out of convenience to stave off death from some fucking chemical was no party.
"Then what's the problem?” He really seemed puzzled.
Jenia gazed at him incredulously. “Pasquel, you're an idiot.” She shook her head
and faced the front.
Donny frowned. “What the hell is going on? Elise, why am I an idiot?"
Elise sat up straight and patted him on the arm. “If you can't figure it out, I am not telling you."
They piled out of the vehicle and Jenia and Paul strolled into the trees hand in hand. Elise watched them with envy. Donny gripped her arm and dragged her off the track. “We need to get out of sight."
He led her to a small clearing surrounded by a clump of tall trees. Evening had begun to dim the light around them, and Elise knew they only had a short time. It just seemed cold, calculated.
She'd done it many times before, with Jonah, with others, to relieve the buildup of the chemical. Always, it had been strictly physical. “Friends who fuck,” is what Jonah called it. She enjoyed the easy relationship she had with those men.
But Donny—he was different.
Her heart was involved, and she was going to get hurt if she kept fucking him. To Donny, she was a means to an end. A great lay. To her, every encounter made the hole she was falling into a little deeper.
He turned to face her, his face the epitome of lustful intent. Why wasn't that enough for her? Why was it necessary for her to fuck the one man she wanted so much more from?
Something must have shown on her face because he frowned. “What is it?"
It was impossible for her to meet his intense stare. The plant life at his feet was fascinating at that moment.
But Donny wasn't stupid.
And he had enough control, even with the chemical's affects, that he stopped his advance towards her. He said nothing, but his fists clenched and his face twisted in a bitter mask. “I take it you're regretting our earlier encounter."
Encounter? Is that what they called it? That explosion of sex and need that swept her out into a quivering mass of insanity? Encounter. Right.
To gain her composure, she whirled around, her back to him. She heard him sigh—a frustrated sound.
"I'm certainly not going to impose anything on you.” His tone was cold, arctic.
Her stomach churned. How did she explain this to him? “Donny—” she started.
"No.” The word was sharp, and she whipped around to face him. He stepped back when she reached out a hand and glared at her. “I told you. I don't play games."
Her arm slumped and her eyes narrowed. “Of course you do. This is all about a game. It's not like we're fucking because we like each other,” she lied.
If anything, he seemed colder. For a moment, she thought he wouldn't say anything. But he surprised her as his hand snaked out and gripped her arm. “That mouth of yours is going a bit too much again,” he snapped as he yanked her closer to him. “You may not like me, but you like what I do to you.” With his mouth a whisper away from hers, his tone softened to a silky purr. “And I love what you do to me."
He plundered without waiting for any response. Helpless, she succumbed to the need that boiled in her body and returned his kiss with enthusiasm. The grasp of his hands on her arms kept her hands shackled to her sides, restrained, captured. His lips mesmerized her as he twisted his tongue around hers and bit her lower lip with his teeth.
Her body heated, betrayed her every emotional doubt to the overwhelming passion of the moment. “Now” was all there needed to be.
With one hand, he gripped her wrists behind her back and her breasts thrust out and brushed his chest. She groaned as her nipples tightened and ached for his touch. Yet he did nothing more than kiss her over and over as if he couldn't get enough of that one bond between them.
She lost her mind.
With his free hand, he stroked her cheek and played with the strands of her hair. Her inner voice screamed, "Harder! Bruise me! Take me! I don't want tender touches!"
It was a punishment.
His kiss was a drug, and she was the addict that whimpered for more when he lifted his head. Her arms were banded behind her and, though she struggled to free her hands, he wouldn't let them go. Every other slide of his fingers and press of his body was gentle, insistent, slow, but she would have blessed marks on her wrists from his restraint.
Step by step, he backed her towards the edge of the clearing until her spine was flattened along a tree trunk. It wasn't a very thick tree and he allowed her hands free only long enough to restrain them on either side of the trunk. With one hand, he undid his leather belt and used it to tie her hands together.
He lifted her t-shirt and hauled her bra up so her breasts spilled into his free hands. His fingers were excruciatingly gentle, and she growled deep in her throat. Where were the pinches, the roll of her nipples between his fingers that made her wet and needy? Not that these gentle strokes of his fingers weren't making her crazy.
They were.
Something in the way his gaze focused on her hardened tips made her pussy clench. She opened her mouth to tell him to stop wasting time on sweet caresses when he glanced at her face. Her breath stopped at the way tenderness and violence warred on his features.
The dichotomy was so evident, so clear, yet seconds later her thoughts spun away as he teased her mouth with his tongue. He ran the tip of it over her lips, and she moaned, unable to move closer to him, to drive him to fuck her the way she needed.
He tortured her with his teeth and gave her only nips instead of sinking them into her skin the way she liked him to.
It was a challenge to remain silent. Her body thrummed with desire, but she would not beg him for the thing he knew she needed.
The pain.
His soft touches set fires over her skin as he slid his fingers down her trousers and eased them down her legs. She wanted to shout at him, rail at him. Yet, her body craved him any way he chose to give himself to her. He lulled her with the tender flick of his finger on her clit. She arched her back to increase the pressure, drive her body into his hand, but he maintained a feather-like flutter on her erect nub until she was so frustrated she wanted to bite.
In fact, she did bite. His attention was focused on the movement of her breasts as she panted, so he got close enough for her to sink her teeth in him. She managed to find his earlobe and sucked on it hard before she let him know she was done with playing around.
The feral sound he made probably should have scared her, but it only made her hotter. Her gaze was a challenge as he glared at her. His hands clenched around her hips so hard the pain shot through her spine which made her smile.
That smile set a bomb off in him.
He gripped a handful of her hair and yanked her head back until she banged it on the tree trunk. He devoured her without ceremony and slammed his body against hers until his cock bit into her hip through his pants. She reveled in it.
The tingle in her scalp, the ache in her neck from his violence and the scrape of the trunk on her back all made her senses reel with pleasure. She hummed her approval and he growled again. They were both beyond words. His touch, no longer gentle or tender, demanded and got her response.
He thrust two fingers in her slick channel and pumped her viciously until she splintered into pieces. When she cried out, he sank his teeth into her shoulder, adding to the marks he'd already put there. She twisted until she could twist one leg around his waist and press his penis near her core.
Frustrated because he was still clothed and her hands were tied, she slid her pussy along the hard length of him to drive him to finish it. She dampened the outside of his trousers and he moaned against her breast as he sucked each nipple but this time his teeth made sharp pinpricks of pain careen through her. “Yesss.” The word slipped out as her pussy vibrated.
It seemed like an eternity before he ripped his clothes off and pressed his naked chest to her aching breasts. When he did she arched and strained, and the bark of the tree bit into her skin, adding to the heady sensations that slammed into her. He grabbed her hips and hauled her legs up until her ankles were at his ears and her pussy was exposed to his gaze as he looked down.
She watched his face as he watched his cock sli
de inside her waiting, slick channel. Her orgasm punched through her and caught her by surprise. She thrashed and twisted her hips to increase the depth of his thrust, but he restrained her with his body as he held his penis deep inside but didn't move. He was fascinated by their connection and stared at the way her pussy swallowed him and clenched around him.
The erotic sight of his obsessive gaze made her whimper with need and she bathed his cock with fresh cum. He groaned, but his eyes stayed open, his gaze riveted by the view.
Then he glanced at her face and the intensity on his increased. As fascinated as he had been by her pussy, the expression of desperation on her face seemed to turn him on even more. His cock pulsed within her. She felt it as he throbbed, the vein along his length pressed against the walls of her pussy.
"Please!” She hadn't meant to beg him, but she needed him to finish it, finish her.
The word unleashed the tornado she wanted, and he thrust inside her again and again until she lost count of the times he sent her to the oblivion of pleasure.
When his fingers found her tight anus and rubbed around the rim, she slipped into a convulsion that tightened her entire body.
She opened her eyes that had slammed shut as she had climax after climax, and found his open and staring at her. It both embarrassed her and titillated her that he watched every twitch, every roll of her orgasms.
"Give it to me, Donny. Come inside me.” Her voice was hoarse and strained.
His finger entered her ass and his cock slammed deep in her pussy. She screamed with pleasure and shook as an intense peak forced every muscle to contract. The force of his release a second later prolonged her convulsion until she was a mindless heap of trembling.
Tears wet her cheeks and her body ached.
She became aware that Donny was kissing every tear on her face as if he absorbed them. As he released her hands, he murmured such beautiful lies. She was so sexy, so hot. He wanted her every second of the day. He couldn't keep his hands off her and it had nothing to do with the damn drug in the air.
God, she wanted to believe him.
She choked back the tears and slid her legs down his body. He didn't move, still intimately connected to her, still plying her with soft, gentle kisses.
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