Skin Heat

by Ava Gray

  “Different, as in you have an affinity for animals,” she said softly.

  God, he didn’t dare hope. He didn’t turn. It would kill him to see everything change between him, but how the hell could he expect her to accept this? He rubbed a hand over his chest, trying to soothe the pain building inside.

  “Yeah.”

  “That’s why you know what’s wrong with half my patients before I examine them.” She didn’t sound surprised.

  “Yeah.”

  “Zeke, look at me.”

  Taking a deep breath, he did.

  “ I believe you .” She felt slightly insane for saying those words, but hadn’t she already known he was different? His strength, his hearing, his instincts around animals, his sense of smell all bore out the story.

  And everyone knew he’d disappeared for months and nobody knew why. The part about him being locked up and people experimenting on him—that was the toughest to swallow. But how else to explain the unusual things he could do? The way he knew things he couldn’t possibly know. Like the dead girl in the trunk. If he had senses keen as a coyote, he might honestly have smelled the whispers of decomposition carried on the wind. Just as he’d claimed.

  “Really?” He took a step back, bracing a hand on the counter behind him, as if he hadn’t expected that, and relief left him weak.

  Or maybe she was reading too much into his reaction because she wanted him to care.

  “Do you know their names? Maybe we could figure out what y’all had in common? Why they took you there?”

  Anger flashed in his face, supplanting relief. “No. Soon as we got out of there, we ran. For our lives. Didn’t care why. Just wanted to be free.” He paced, his strides tight like the kitchen caged him.

  “Are you worried they’ll find you again?”

  The question hit him like a lash, and she was sorry she’d asked when she saw him flinch. His throat worked for a few seconds before he choked out a single word: “Yes.”

  This was so far beyond anything she’d ever dealt with—Neva tried to ask logical questions, but maybe that wasn’t what he needed. “Have you thought about leaving Harper Creek, so they can’t?”

  His blue eyes showed bleak, like a storm-tossed sea lashing an empty coastline. More secrets lurked there, toothed and threatening, like the broken mast of an ancient, sunken ship. “And go where? Do what?”

  God, she didn’t like seeing him so hopeless. “I don’t know. Sometimes I’ve considered taking off myself.”

  He mustered a hint of swagger, a smile curling the edges of his well-shaped mouth. Her gaze lingered on the pretty divot. So kissable. Lord help her, he was, even in pain, like this. Maybe especially in pain, because she was, by nature, a fixer, and wanted to kiss him better.

  “Asking me to run away with you, Dr. Harper?”

  She smiled back. “Maybe. Let’s keep the option open for the moment. But I’m here for you and I’m trying to understand what you went through. I’m . . . having a hard time with it.”

  Zeke gave a jerky nod, as if it were nothing more than he’d expected. “Think I’m a freak?”

  “I already knew you were special,” she said slowly. “I just didn’t know why.”

  “Look.” To her surprise, he skinned out of his jeans, leaving him clad in a pair of boxers and his T-shirt. But she didn’t think this was sexual, despite her attention to his mouth. “Closer.”

  Obediently, she knelt as he worked the leg up and lifted his testicles away from his inner thigh, soft skin, tender and sensitive. Or it should’ve been. Zeke was covered in tiny pin-prick scars, a whole network of them. Needles. Repeatedly, and over time. She knew he risked everything by showing her this. Someone else might take this for a junkie’s secret shooting site, well concealed from anyone looking for signs of his habit. But this wasn’t a good place for self-administered drugs. Most junkies used the arms or the femoral in the thigh. A few who had blown their veins used the feet, or even the penis, but never here. Zeke fit his underwear back into place, once he saw she’d gotten a good look. Now he wore a defiant expression, daring her to judge him.

  “It wasn’t your fault,” she said softly. “Someone did this to you. Medical research, maybe? But it wasn’t your fault. I’m surprised you let me . . . you know.”

  “Not scared of you.” Wild and wary he might be, but she believed him. He let her touch him when he flinched away from everyone else. For whatever reason, he’d dubbed her worthy of skin privileges.

  “What were they like? The others.”

  He shrugged, halfway into pulling up his jeans. “Didn’t know ’em. Was in my cell, watching the light flicker, or in the big room, getting shocked and jabbed.”

  “I’m so sorry.” It killed her to hear it, made her hands furl into impotent fists. She wanted to hurt someone on his behalf, but there were no faces or names. Just anonymous evil.

  Neva had heard rumors that companies snatched the homeless off the streets for product testing and then dumped them back once they’d served their purpose. Many of them sickened and died and nobody cared. It broke her heart to think something similar might’ve been done to Zeke. Instead of his inexplicable Doctor Doolittling, he might’ve come back with a fatal illness. The very idea rocked her.

  He took a couple of steps and folded her into his arms. She could smell the night wind on him and an echo of the forest: pine and hickory and a whisper of cool wildness, nothing that could ever be bottled. It lingered, and she breathed him in, turning her cheek against his chest.

  “One girl had red hair,” he said, low. “She could heal people. Of anything. Tall guy had electricity in his hands. He busted us all out. Black-haired lady . . . don’t know about her. And a blond woman . . . I remember them saying she could walk in people’s dreams. Touch ’em. Change ’em.”

  “Counting you, that’s only five.”

  “Giant. Bald. Silas,” Zeke added, as if the name was a revelation to him, too. “Called him a failure but kept him locked up down there, too. Made him work.”

  There was no doubt in her. Something terrible had been done to him. Neva didn’t know why he trusted her with it, but she’d deal.

  “You did smell that girl, didn’t you?”

  His hands moved on her back: long, measured strokes, as if she were the one who needed comforting. “Yeah. Can hear stuff I’m not supposed to, too.”

  Her cheeks heated, remembering the nights she’d masturbated, thinking about him. Maybe she’d even whimpered his name, softly, behind the closed door. His sober expression melted into a heart-stopping grin. Nobody else ever saw this look, she realized. He saved it for her, and only when they were alone. The rest of the time, he offered the world a wounded wariness, like he was waiting for the next blow to land.

  “Oh God, you knew.”

  He nodded. “Changed everything.”

  “But you’re okay with it? I mean, you do want this? Us?”

  She hated the thought she might’ve pushed before he was ready. Maybe impulse had overcome him. If he was more in touch with his animal nature, he might not be able to resist temptation, no matter his emotional state. Might be that any warm body would do.

  “Want you more than I want to live,” he said quietly.

  He couldn’t mean that. Only she recognized the fervent sincerity in his stormy blue eyes. But it also hinted at darkness and desperation she hadn’t known he hid. Given what he’d gone through, then he might be damaged irrevocably. Beyond repair. A voice of self-preservation wondered if she wasn’t in over her head. How could he possibly be ready for a relationship? She needed to back away and suggest counseling, before she got in too deep.

  “Right.” He took a step back, pushing her away from him. “Knew it was too good to be true. Figured we’d end up here. S’fine for you to go. I get it.”

  “What—” And then she knew. “You can read my moods. How?”

  “Dunno.”

  He thought she was leaving him, so there was no point in talking more or explai
ning anything. That was so not fair. She hadn’t spoken her worries out loud; that meant he had no right to them. Anger sparked to life, edging out the uncertainty.

  “This is a lot to absorb,” she snapped. “Don’t you see that? I’m trying to parse everything.”

  His voice came bitter and low. “Why? What’s the point?”

  “Fine. I can’t make you talk to me. But I guess you don’t care as much as I thought you did.” Her heart ached. She didn’t want to argue, but she didn’t know how to shake him out of this terrible resignation, either.

  “Challenging me?” he demanded.

  Some dark emotion sparked to life, animating his face, a blend of possession and desire she’d never seen. His hands curled into fists at his sides, his breath coming in ragged rasps. Need rolled off him in white-hot waves. Even without any special abilities, she read his leashed longing; he wanted to settle the dispute in the most primitive of ways.

  “Zeke . . .” Neva didn’t even know what she was going to say.

  She wet her lips with her tongue. He seemed more imposing now, shoulders straight. Despite herself, her gaze went to his groin. His cock strained against the zipper of his jeans, telling her what he intended if she didn’t start running. Or maybe that would just make it worse. Maybe he’d like it better if she ran.

  A pulse of uncomfortable arousal surged through her. A modern woman shouldn’t admit that it turned her on, thinking about being chased by her man, and pinned down beneath him. But she liked that idea as much as she’d enjoyed having him helpless and yearning beneath her.

  “If you’re going, you should go,” he growled. “I can keep it together for another minute or two.”

  Complete sentences. But the snappish way he bit them off revealed the depth of his strain. Part of her wanted to flee. But the rest of her wanted to see what would happen if she stayed.

  “Take me,” she whispered.

  A shudder rolled through him. He pounced on her. That was the only word for it. In one graceful leap he had her in his arms. He ripped his own shirt off her back, tore the fabric with his hands. A low growl escaped him as he buried his face in the curve of her neck. This time he used his teeth on her, not hard enough to break the skin, but fierce animal nips that made her want to fall back and give him her throat.

  Zeke ran his hands down her back and cupped her bottom in his hands, drawing her up against his burning erection. He was so hard it almost hurt when he ground against her. She whimpered as her core went molten for him. He tore his own clothes off and they fell onto the kitchen floor as if the ruined clothes made up their nest, reinforcing her sense that he wasn’t in control.

  He pushed her down onto the fabric, demanding her submission. His silence, coupled with his intensity, ratcheted her own arousal up to flash-fire levels. Neva didn’t think he had any words left; he’d forgotten them for the moment. With brute strength, he rolled her onto her stomach and pulled her hips up.

  Oh God, like this?

  He entered her in one fierce thrust. Hard. Fast. His hands hurt a little, but it was a pain that made her lift up higher to push back against him. Her field of vision went white with the pleasure sparking through her. His low grunts of pleasure woke an answering atavistic need in her. Nothing mattered, nothing but this.

  Zeke ran his hands over her as he moved, possessive hands cupping her breasts and playing with her nipples. They skimmed down her belly and stroked between her legs, not expert but inexorable. The demand drove her higher, and she writhed, glorying in the feel of him filling her up.

  Hot. Hard. Hers.

  Their bodies made a sweet liquid sound as they strained together. And then, just as suddenly as he’d claimed her, he stopped, though it drew a powerful, anguished groan from him. Her whole body protested. He slid out of her and rolled away onto his back. His cock shone with her juices, still jerking with deferred pleasure. He was a raw, beautiful sight and her whole body protested his loss.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Can’t,” he snarled. “Remembered, just before . . .”

  Shit. Still no protection. That had been stupid and reckless of them. She should be grateful he hadn’t gone off inside her, but the lizard brain just wanted to climb on top of him and finish the job before she died of frustration.

  “This, then. We can do this.”

  She did crawl on top of him and framed his thighs with her own. Once before she’d done this, and she had secretly wanted to come all over his leg right then, marking him with her scent. Zeke should appreciate that urge, more than she’d first realized. He set his hands on her waist as if to pull her away, and then he seemed to realize what she intended. So instead he wrapped his arms around her.

  Neva lay down on him at an angle, her belly warm against his cock. He was slick from her body, and slipped against her as she circled her hips against his hard thigh. At this rate it wouldn’t take much; she just needed to get enough pressure on her clit. Tremors ran through her as the pleasure built. His muscles tensed beneath her, and he raised his leg to give her better purchase. She raised her head in arching her back to find him staring at her with a dazed hunger.

  “Come,” he demanded.

  She bore down, rubbing her belly against his iron-hard erection. “You, too.”

  He drew her up a little higher so that her pussy hit his hip, as close to his cock as she could be without taking him inside. He wanted it so bad he shook beneath her, rubbing against the side of her thigh in sweet, helpless friction. He hunched upward faster and faster, the quick motions telling her he was close.

  Neva came in a cascade of heat. Moaning, she swept a hand beneath and wet her fingers, riding them as she flicked her clit to another orgasm. Then she eased it outward and encircled his throbbing shaft. Squeezed.

  “Mine,” she whispered. “I marked you. You smell like me.”

  He gave a possessive growl and went with a raw groan, spurting hot from her hand all over her thigh. As if he couldn’t help himself, his hands slid down and stroked it into her skin. Making her smell like him. It would linger too. Maybe not for anyone else, but his heightened senses would always detect it.

  “Christ.” His head fell back onto the floor.

  A devil took hold of her then. Instead of letting him pull her into his arms, as he clearly intended, she nuzzled a path down his body and studied his softening sex. His penis gave a half hearted jerk when she put her face near, but it didn’t have the resolve again so soon. That wasn’t what she wanted anyway.

  “I want to taste us,” she breathed.

  He groaned as she licked, dainty, delicate licks that sampled their flavor. His and hers, and oh, it was good. Arousal whispered through her as if she could come again but she damped it down. This was something else, tenderness and care she sensed he’d never known. His hands threaded through her hair, still unsteady as aftershocks rippled through him.

  By the time she finished, he was half hard again, but the initial insanity had passed. She let him pull her up and into his embrace. Neva nestled her head on his chest and listened to his heart. The kitchen floor had to be hurting his back, but he didn’t complain.

  “What was that?” he asked.

  A smile started at the bottom of her and worked its way up. She felt fearless and joyous and perfectly desirable. There would never be another man who fit her better, even with his strangeness. She went for it.

  “Love.”

  His breath rushed out like she’d hit him. “That mean what I think it does?”

  “Yeah. I love you.” It felt good to say it, like she could stop being afraid.

  “Glad you’re not just using me for my body.”

  “Oh.”

  Not the reaction she’d hoped for. But maybe it was too soon. Maybe she’d let endorphins from spectacular sex push her toward a precipitous declaration. She started to roll away, but he held her fast and tilted her face to his.

  “Never had a woman say that to me before,” he said, eyes intent on hers. “Never
said it to anybody myself, either. So not sure I even know what it is. But you make me feel like I did when I was small and Ma would have one of her spells and there’d be no supper that night: cold, hungry, and empty. Only with you there’s this hope I won’t always be, like you could be the light to warm me.”

  It was, without a doubt, the longest speech she’d ever heard from him. And those words told her so much about him, maybe more than he’d meant for her to know. She melted.

  “It’s okay. You don’t have to say it until you’re sure.”

  He shook his head, blue eyes brimming with desperate sweetness. “Still don’t get it. Been loving a dream of you since I was sixteen. Can’t believe this is real. You’re here, saying these things to me, and I’m scared if I say it, too, I’ll find I never did get away from that place. ’Cos you’re just too good to be true.”

  Nobody had ever, ever felt that way about her. They might want something from her or want to use her, but not this. Never this. Neva wanted to laugh and cry at the same time and ask him what he meant about loving her so long. Only the words wouldn’t come past the tears streaming down her face.

  “Oh, hey,” he protested. “Don’t, sweet girl. Please don’t.”

  “I’m fine. Don’t worry.”

  “Can tell that just by looking.” His dry tone summoned a watery smile. “Shower?”

  She became aware they were still on the kitchen floor on the pile of destroyed clothes. The kittens would need to eat soon, and she felt like she could, too. Once he’d stormed out, she hadn’t wanted much dinner. With his uncanny strength, he brought them both to their feet in one motion.

  “Sounds good.”

  CHAPTER 15

  Monday was a bitch. No wonder people hated them, Zeke thought. He wasn’t ready to return to the real world. He feared he couldn’t be part of her real world, only a shadow on its fringes. They had gone to bed together, but after the wildness in the kitchen, he had just been content to hold her.