by Vremont, Ann
Get down, baby.
She obeyed instantly, hitting the ground and staying put as Cruz snatched a grenade off the belt of the man he’d just killed. One of his talons caught the grenade’s pin, popped it off and then he threw it at the fence. The fence crackled with electricity when the metal touched it and then the grenade blew a hole through it.
She felt a clawed hand grab her by the scruff of her neck and lift her back onto her feet. It was Dominic. He took the pillow case from her and pushed her towards the opening in the fence. She didn’t need him to tell her to run. She’d just seen two more shifters come through the open door.
Too bad for their would-be pursuers, the dead man had a second grenade on his belt. Cruz pitched it at them. They slowed, tried to scramble backwards, slammed into one another. The grenade went off a foot from them.
She heard Dominic’s grim humor inside her head.
Bye-bye doggies.
*****
When they reached the cover of foothills, Cruz stopped and cracked the laptop’s case. He pulled a card out, smashed it against the ground.
Tracker.
A long night passed, filled with climbing and evading. They slept through the day, walked through the next night until they came to a paved road.
Reading the road sign, Tamsyn chuckled. Extraterrestrial Highway? Are they fucking kidding?
Cruz stood next to her. Well, now we know where we’re at. Where they're at, too.
They waited alongside the road, hidden in the shadows. The brothers had pushed a sizeable rock -- almost a boulder -- near the center of the roadway. Dominic had the case slung over his shoulder. Cruz stayed close to Tamsyn. They were looking for the right rig to pass by -- a gravel truck, an empty cattle car, anything they could jump on and ride the hell out of there without the driver any wiser.
The first hint of morning was breaking at the horizon when it happened. The rock forced the driver to slow down, just enough for the three of them to make the jump.
When they rolled into a truck stop an hour later, Dominic slid from the rig and returned twenty minutes later with clothes he’d taken from an RV.
Dressed already, he tossed the clothes at them and stuffed some money in his pockets.
"Dominic?"
"Tam, they had a forty-two inch plasma TV in that RV. A couple hundred bucks isn’t going to hurt them."
She shut up immediately and slid on a pair of pants. Dressed, they stayed on the truck, huddled for warmth. They couldn’t risk going into the truck stop and having the owners of the clothes recognize them. At the next stop, they ate and found another truck to stow away on. When the next day rolled around, they had made it into California.
"We’ll hike into Yosemite." Dominic told them. "Lots of vacation homes around the park’s border are empty this time of year. We'll find one."
It was another three days before Tamsyn got to sink into a garden tub filled to the rim with hot water and bubbles. Dominic and Cruz were at the kitchen table of the home they’d broken into. They had Beemer’s laptop out, badly damaged but still running. They’d disconnected the wireless to it, Cruz warning that it could be programmed to report back to Sanctuary. Now Cruz was trying to break the password lock on Beemer’s files.
Finished with her bath, she raided the home’s pantry and cooked them dinner -- pork beans and corned beef from a can.
"At least the beer’s cold," Dominic laughed.
Tamsyn leaned into Cruz and whispered, "But the bed's warm."
"Uh-uh." Dominic waved his bottle at Cruz. "No warm bed for you, Manito, until you’ve cracked the password."
It was two in the morning when Cruz crawled into bed next to her. He came up from the bottom of the mattress, pushing the sheet up as he went, kissing the sides of her legs, caressing her hips.
Moonlight poured through a window, illuminating her with a silver glow. "You did it?"
"Mostly," he answered. "All but the oldest files."
"Lyrra?"
"In there -- like you said, date of capture and birth year."
She grabbed his shoulders, temporarily halting his kisses. "And?"
"Escaped four months after capture. Dominic’s hoping you can help him decode some of the medical notations."
She started to sit up but he pushed her back onto the mattress. "He specifically said in the morning."
"Oh." Relaxing, she smiled at him. "After a good night’s sleep, eh?"
He growled, pushed her night shirt up high enough to capture one of her nipples. Sliding a hand between Tamsyn’s thighs, Cruz eased a finger past her labia and into her pussy.
"Sleep’s not on the agenda," he whispered in her ear. He pushed a second finger in, stroked the inside of her with slow, "come here" gestures. A quiver ran across her belly. His thumb brushed her clit and she moaned.
"You like that, baby?"
He knew she did. She answered with a whimper as he left a trail of kisses down her stomach. His tongue replaced his thumb. He added a third finger inside her tight pussy. Tamsyn clenched a handful of his thick black hair as his finger strokes built in speed and depth.
He licked the spine of her clit up and then back down, drawing the tip into his mouth and suckling at it. Tamsyn widened the spread of her legs, her bottom moving with little rhythmic pumps against his mouth.
Fuck. She knew she needed this. Hadn’t realized just how much.
"So wet, baby."
Yes.
"For me?"
Damn tease! She held his head down, her ass grinding in circles now.
Still, he took it slow, licking her at his leisure. Stopping to firmly lip the plump folds of her labia or run a slick finger across the tight star of her ass. He slicked his thumb with her cream, both hands working her as his fingers explored her cunt and his thumb penetrated her ass.
His tongue, noisy on her pussy as he sucked and slurped, drove her right up to the edge of her climax. He worked her hard, every bit of her clit, her pussy, her ass. She brought her legs up, criss-crossing them along his back. She grabbed her breasts, squeezing them hard, knowing that he watched her do it. She pinched her nipples, tugged at them.
Her ass was off the bed, pussy pumping his mouth as she rode his fingers and thumb until, at last, she froze. Cruz pulled out of her, let her drop to the mattress as he pushed her thighs farther apart and thrust into her with his hard cock. Inside, he started to instantly swell bigger.
She was still climaxing from his tongue and hands as he started to thrust.
"Medina...Cruz..."
"I’m right here, baby."
The center swell of his cock was like a ball that had been put inside her big, but still normal in its size, and then inflated, binding them tightly together. She locked her legs behind his ass. The pressure was intense, spreading beyond her cunt to her ass and clit. Each stroke inside her felt like three. She clamped down tighter, fighting the urge to claw at his back.
The bed creaked, the headboard slammed against the wall with each thrust Cruz took. He kissed her neck, sucked the sensitive flesh until she knew she would be bruised, if only for a few minutes before her body’s extraordinary new healing abilities took over.
He licked her neck, her ear. Lifting her, he reared back until he was sitting on his calves. Her weight rested on his lap, letting her sink fully onto his shaft. She trembled, moaning his name. Her knees touched the mattress and she shifted forward, in control now as she began to rock on the pivot of his cock, leaving him to moan her name.
Like this? She squeezed. He answered with a strangled, "yes" and the dig of his fingertips into her butt cheeks. They wrestled for control, her rocking, his pulling her down hard.
She was secreting again and she ran her fingers between them, brought the liquid up near his lips. Their tongues darted out, licking and tasting together until it was gone and they were kissing instead.
Tamsyn slowed, lifted herself almost all the way off his erection and then slammed back down. Again. This time she cried out at the pu
re intensity of the pleasure from his cock ramming through her hard and fast. Back up at the tip, she hesitated, made little dipping motions and then pushed quickly back down.
She moaned in his ear, "So thick, baby."
Cruz squeezed her tight to him, controlling her motion except for the desperate grind of her pussy at the base of his cock. He was breathless, biting his bottom lip to keep control. Her cunt fluttered around him, squeezing with its own will as her second climax rolled through her.
He came then, holding her tight, his face buried against her throat. She felt the moisture of tears on her neck and hugged him back. They both knew -- a few rooms over, Dominic was staring at a computer screen. He didn’t have this, hadn’t in a long time. It was fragile, this thing between them. Fragile but strong as steel. Somewhere out in the desert, people still plotted to rip it from them, as they had with Dominic and Lyrra.
"I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you," he whispered against her lips.
She kissed him, her tears mixing with his.
Don’t worry, she answered back, the tears and kisses sealing her promise. You never will.
Curve Muse
The knock on Bryce Schoene’s front door sounded tentative, as if the visitor questioned whether it was the right apartment. Bryce’s gaze dropped to the bottom right corner of her computer screen where the time showed a few minutes before five o’clock.
She ignored the knocking. Ninety to one odds, it was a stranger confused by the lack of apartment numbers. Squaring her shoulders, she focused on the blank Word file in front of her. It was Friday and—graduate degree hanging in the balance—she had a paper due Monday.
She sorted through the jumble of ideas she had brainstormed on the bus ride home from campus, their previous brilliance extinguished by more careful thought. The knock came again, more assured this time, and Bryce chewed at her bottom lip. She considered starting the story with a knock on the door. But who would be on the other side, and why?
The visitor spoke on the third round of knocking, both the words and raps coming sharp and fast. “I can hear you thinking in there. Open up!”
The odd choice of words broke her concentration.
Hear me thinking?
Bryce swiveled the office chair until she faced the door. Despite the heavy muffle of oak, she could tell the visitor was a woman, the voice feminine and totally unfamiliar.
“Yes, I said ‘thinking’. Open the door, Bryce,” the woman called again. “I certainly don’t have all weekend to stand around.”
She knows my name? The chair groaned in protest as Bryce rose, and she winced. She walked quietly to the door, hoping the visitor was only bluffing and hadn’t heard the chair’s squeak.
“Come on, doll baby, this won’t take long.”
Despite the endearment, the woman didn’t sound anything other than persistent—and likely to draw a crowd from among the many nosy neighbors whose apartments ringed the building’s courtyard. Just imagining a week or more worth of curious looks from her neighbors made Bryce’s skin crawl.
Approaching the door from the side, she reached up and slid the chain lock into place. Then she undid the top two deadbolts and slowly turned the doorknob. Nervous energy ran through her hand and arm, and it took her a few seconds to realize she had opened the door as wide as the chain allowed.
The two inch slice of open door revealed a petite blonde, with powder blue eyes and a slash of killer red lipstick slickening her wide mouth. Except for the peek of black boots from beneath her pants, red leather hugged her slim frame. The material’s shade, slightly darker than the lipstick, dipped toward a dried crimson.
She looked, Bryce thought, like she’d just finished a shift on the corner of Hooker and Vine.
“‘Hooker and Vine?’ Is this how you start all job interviews?” the woman asked.
Bryce jerked back from the door, and her brows knitted together over whether she’d actually voiced the insult. The question was abruptly pushed out of her mind as the woman’s second question sank in.
“Job interview?” It sounded like a sales pitch. Dressed like she was, the woman definitely had something to sell. Bryce put her palm flat on the door and started to push it shut, but the blonde wedged her black-booted foot between the door and its frame.
Oh, hell, no. She just didn’t. Did she?
Bryce cocked an eyebrow at the woman and slowly raised her bare foot, threatening to place it against the blonde’s twig of a leg. The woman sighed at the threat, the air leaving her in a long curling manner like spirals of smoke from a half-chewed cigar.
Like spirals of smoke…what the fuck?
“You’ll get used to it,” the blonde smiled. “And if you don’t, it’s just for the weekend.”
“Lady…” Bryce began and looked around for something else to force the woman’s foot back through the door, “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but you’ve got the wrong Bryce. Okay?”
“No, doll baby.” Her smile pulled the already wide mouth into a broad, thin line of determination. “Bryce Schoene, right? Bryce the Beautiful.”
Bryce the Beautiful. Well, that proved it—no one had ever called her beautiful.
“Lady, you’ve definitely got the wrong Bryce.”
Red-tipped fingers reached through the door and wrapped around the safety chain. The air surrounding the woman’s fist vibrated like a hummingbird’s wings and then the chain snapped. She swept past Bryce and into the room’s center.
She glanced at her watch. “It’s almost eight-fifteen in New York, doll baby,” She gave a casual flick of her wrist and the watch slid beneath the sleeve of her red leather jacket just as the apartment door slammed shut. “So here’s the quick and dirty version, alrighty?”
Bryce put her hand up, hoping the “stop” motion seemed both calm and in command. “Why don’t we discuss this out in the courtyard, La…Miss?”
The woman held one slim hand in front of her mouth, just far enough away to avoid smudging her lipstick. A giggle erupted from her and she dropped the hand to clutch at her stomach, the laugh growing in volume. “First, I’m in your head, so don’t waste time trying to trick me into the courtyard or anywhere else. Second, you can call me Percy for now.”
“Percy…well, that’s a start, I guess—”
“A damn slow one,” Percy interrupted. “Now where’s the uniform? You have to wear it, you know, for this to work.”
Bryce stared at her for a moment. A joke. It had to be a joke, even if she couldn’t think of anyone who would bother to play one on her. Or maybe it was some new television show? Had the L.A. producers actually stooped so low they were invading people’s homes now?
While Bryce’s mind raced through the possibilities, Percy’s hand looped circles in the air, her whole body conveying the need to speed things up. “Right, okay. A TV show. That sounds good.” The words came out rapid fire as Percy scanned the room. “But shows need costumes, right? I know I sent it ahead—so where did you put it?”
Had Bryce just mentioned the possibility of a show out loud? “Put wh—”
“A-ha! Gotcha!” Percy headed in a straight line for the computer chair where a tall package waited wrapped in cream-colored tissue paper and tied off with a crimson ribbon.
The paper rustled when Percy lifted it from the chair. Spinning on the heels of her shiny black boots, she presented it to Bryce with a curtsy. “If you’d be so kind as to strip and put this on?”
She waited while Bryce stared open-mouthed. With an exaggerated sigh, she offered the package a second time.
“I…w-was just…sit-sitting…there.” The protest left her in a slow and broken string of words. A trickle of dread dripped down her spine. She’d come straight home from school and plopped down in front of her laptop.
She had only briefly stepped out onto the patio after the first hour to water her plants. She looked to the glass window that led on to the patio. It was shut. There was no way in hell someone had come through it while sh
e was at the front door. But that left the bedroom and bathroom; she hadn’t visited either yet. Could someone have been hiding, waiting for Percy to show up?
Percy held the package forward, the paper making a whispered crackle as she did so. “Are you going to put it on, or do I have to do that, too?”
Percy plucked the ribbon’s knot loose and let it fall to the floor along with the tissue paper. In her hand remained a charm bracelet and a dazzling white bundle of linen.
“It’s an amulet chain,” Percy sighed out and held it up. “Not a ‘charm bracelet’.” She plucked through the small figures. “Silver and gold laced together for the chain. Pegasus in ivory, a skull in, well, bone, of course.” Fingering past more figures, she held up an ass carved in brown agate and a gryphon in topaz. “My favorites, but you don’t need to worry about what’s on it. So long as it’s on you—and you’re wearing the sheet.”
“Look, I don’t care what show you’re working for or who put you up to this.” Bryce backed toward the door, one hand searching for the doorknob, the other ready to swipe at Percy if she decided to charge. Man, does L.A. have its whack jobs. “It isn’t at all amusing.”
“But it is a-musing,” Percy answered.
A glow that Bryce would have readily characterized as insane lit the woman’s gaze, and the smile she wore stretched her mouth to a point that convinced Bryce this nutcase meant to swallow her whole.
“In fact,” Percy continued pressing. “A-musing we will go…well, just you, actually. Me, I haven’t had a vacation since Chaucer died. And you’re helping me get one this weekend, whether you want to or not, doll baby.”
Raising the charm bracelet in one hand, she let the linen partially unfold to the floor. It was a single swath of fabric that looked over a dozen feet long. She gave the bracelet a shake and the linen turned into a very plus-sized pair of jeans and UCLA school sweatshirt.
My jeans and UCLA sweatshirt! Bryce froze in her backward retreat. The chill of the apartment’s air conditioning made the hair on her suddenly bare arms stand up. The linen draped her body, curling and knotting around her. She looked at Percy, and then shut her eyes when the woman’s blonde hair ran long and green. Starbursts patterned Bryce’s closed eyelids in a psychedelic strobe and she forced her eyes back open. Percy stalked her, now looking as if someone had drawn her in the dark outline of an uncolored comic. She held the charm bracelet in front of her as she moved, her attempts to catch one of Bryce’s wrists unsuccessful.
