by Sylvia Ryan
“God dammit, Laila. It’s my job to protect you, and that’s what I’m going to do.” He leaned in toward her, caging her even more. They were nose to nose. “Even if what I’m protecting you from is yourself.” He scowled over her as they squared off, his teeth grinding against each other.
She still looked him right in the eye then whispered faintly, “I gave my word to Jordan. I will not renege, and I will not name my contact.”
Then she put both hands on his chest and shoved hard. “Now, get away!”
Rock stepped back, and she immediately hopped off the counter and headed for the door.
“Fuck you!” she screamed over her shoulder as she left. The door slammed so hard, the house’s front windows rattled.
“She did not just…” He took a step toward the door then forced himself to stop. The instinct to follow her and spank her ass was nearly overwhelming. His fists balled as he reined in the impulse and took a deep breath, calming himself.
He needed to process.
Chapter 7
Laila stormed through her front door and slammed it shut. The quietness of her home slapped her in the face and her indignation fell away. For twenty-four hours, she’d been an optimist and thought Rock might fill some of the emptiness she carried around inside. He’d just crushed that hope to pieces. She knew better. Hope was a stupid notion in New Atlanta. She ran upstairs and collapsed on her bed.
The part of her that needed filling would always be there. Huddled in a ball, she hugged her legs and cried until she was damp from the heat in the stuffy room, and her hair stuck to the back of her neck. She’d learned years ago sleep was the only relief from overwhelming solitude so Laila gratefully gave herself to the exhaustion gripping her.
* * * *
She’d fallen asleep around dinnertime. Now, she lay awake in the middle of the night. The rest had altered her perspective. She wasn’t angry anymore. Even though what Rock had done was cruel, it was a powerful lesson that would never fade from her memory.
She tossed herself onto her back and released an exaggerated sigh into the darkness of her bedroom. She’d done it. A sense of pride in herself brought a small smile to her lips. She’d risked her life for freedom today. Laila pumped her fist in the air. She would never forget this day. Never. She’d run across a quote during her trip preparations. “Our country will remain the land of the free. Only so long as it is the home of the brave.” When she’d read it, she’d known bravery would be the only thing keeping her to her promise to help the Resistance instead of running in the opposite direction.
Ironically, she’d forgotten the most important part of the day because of the blow up with Rock. Being an Emerald meant she was no longer required to submit to mandatory birth control. With the removal of her implant, she was free to have children.
Plural.
Her chest tightened, and she laughed at herself. From celebration to near tears in four point two seconds. New record. Then, her thoughts ran full circle, landing on Rock again. That beautiful bastard was the only man she’d ever known who took her breath away.
Her reaction might have been an overreaction to the drama of the day. Rock was raised Amber, and had already been given the assignment of her protector. He expected to take care of her. To him, it didn’t matter that they weren’t actually on the mission yet.
She pulled her hand-held out of her deep skirt pocket, depressing the button to activate the screen. She spoke Rock’s name and waited for the results of her search. The first was a news feed video, detailing his capture of the first serial killer in New Atlanta since the pandemic. He’d killed the woman and received his Emerald designation because of it. The events were high profile, but she wasn’t surprised she hadn’t heard the story. During the past year, she’d been too engrossed in the final planning stage of the Fine Art and Artifacts mission.
She got out of bed, peeled a curtain back and peeked across the street. A low glow emanated from Rock’s front window.
They would be training in earnest tomorrow and would spend the next few months of their lives pretty much attached at the hip. So, avoiding him was out.
She slipped out of her skirt, let it fall in a pool at her feet, pulled on a lightweight pair of shorts and slid her toes into her flip-flops. She padded down the stairs and out the front door. Cricket sounds filled the night and her feet collected dew as she walked through the grass of his lawn. When she tried the knob to his front door, it turned, and she walked soundlessly into his home.
He sat on the couch watching the vid screen, and his gaze darted to her.
She smiled and tilted her head, trying to look cute and hoping to brush off the effects of their earlier clash. “Darn. I was hoping to catch you naked.” She waggled her eyebrows at him.
He displayed just the barest of smiles and then waved her over. “Come on.” His voice was rough. He’d been on the verge of sleep.
Instinctively, her Amber needs flared to life. The need to be smiled at, touched, hugged, fucked. This man triggered all of them. She plopped down next to him. Thigh to thigh.
Laila had dreamed about having the unconditional acceptance of a roommate relationship in Circle City. Through the years, she’d often wished she had a man watching over her, caring for her like all the other girls she’d grown up with in the Amber Zone.
Rock offered his hand, and she laced their fingers together.
“You have to tell me where you’re going before you go,” he said. “This is non-negotiable and not entirely because of what you did this afternoon. During your training, we’ll create routines that will keep both of us safer. Actions will speak louder than words between us. Sometimes the absence of a routine or a non-response to a normal everyday signal is the only warning you may be able to give. Do you understand?”
She sighed. “Yes.”
He shook his head and closed his eyes for a few seconds as if her simplistic view of the world tested him. When his gaze met hers again, it had softened. “Baby, you’re in the big leagues now. If he’d found that bug when he searched you, that guardsman wouldn’t have hesitated splattering your brains all over the walls.”
“I get that. Your little drama drove the fact home loud and clear.”
“Good. Now, who is your contact?” His voice was gruff, but she didn’t feel any anger in him.
“If you’re Resistance, you know I can’t tell you.” Cells were made up of individuals who didn’t know the others in their cell, unless something occurred to make it absolutely necessary. Morgan interrogated with drugs. Many Sapphire Resistance members in drug-induced stupors gave up co-conspirators, decimating a substantial portion of the Resistance in that zone.
“Do you even know the name of your contact here in Emerald?”
“Yes. And if you knew it too, it could mean a death sentence. It’s not worth the risk.”
He responded with silence.
I’m right, and he knows it.
It didn’t seem like the subject was settled as he sat there, stiffly, a million miles away.
She experienced a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach.
His sinking feeling.
“What is it?” she asked.
Eyebrows furrowed, he looked down at her. “How did you know to ask what?”
“Huh?”
“What did I do that prompted you to ask what just now?” he asked, over-enunciating.
Avoiding his gaze, she shrugged. She’d almost given herself away.
He grabbed her chin and lifted her face to meet his gaze. It seemed like he inspected every nuance while their eyes were locked until, finally, he released her. “Your risk today has already paid off. Unfortunately, the news isn’t good. We won’t be any safer from the Gov when we’re out of the city. Morgan couldn’t let us go. Couldn’t let us out of his reach.”
“What are you talking about?”
“After you left his office, I got an earful of him getting his dick sucked by none o
ther than Sydney Parr.”
“Oh, no.” She groaned.
Rock raked his hand through his shaggy brown hair and focused on the vid screen. The flickering light tinted his face blue.
She laid her head against his arm and yawned.
“There’s something you need to know,” he said. “My father was one of the original Resistance members back when the Repopulation Laws were enacted. The history between Morgan’s father and mine seems to have aligned the stars to make us enemies. It’s like we were born to finish the struggle they started so long ago.”
“Except this Morgan is crazier than his father.”
“Yeah. And since he can’t outright murder me without severe retaliation, he placed me on the recovery team, hoping something or someone will do his dirty work for him. I’ve been on mission after mission outside the city walls. It has to be pissing him off I keep returning.
“Now you’re assigned to a mission traveling farther from the city than anyone’s gone since the pandemic.”
“Yeah.”
“He’s hoping you won’t come back.”
“His goal may be for neither of us to return, with Sydney on the mission to make sure of it. You have to be very careful with Garret. If Sydney’s being deployed on this mission to kill us, he probably is, too.”
Rock grabbed the remote off the table and flicked off the video, plunging them into darkness. “C’mere.” He shifted them around until he spooned her. With a heavy leg slung over hers, he enveloped her in solid muscle.
“So that’s it,” she said, “an old grudge started by your fathers? I had a sense something more personal was going on.”
“It’s not all, but enough of an explanation for tonight. Just be aware Morgan will never leave me alone. If I had the opportunity, I’d kill Conrad Morgan with my bare hands, and he knows it. So, he flexes and flaunts his power in my face every opportunity he gets, knowing I’ll never get close enough to make him pay for his actions.”
Laila closed her eyes and enjoyed his warm breath ruffling her hair. The slow expansion and release of his chest pressed at her back. His heavy arm slung over her waist cinched her close to him. She felt exceptionally small and perfectly safe.
“So, you can have babies now?” The rumble of his words vibrated against her back.
“Yes,” she whispered, feeling if she said it too loud, it wouldn’t be real.
“Are you going to run right out and fuck the first man you see?”
Something fluttered inside. You’re the first man I see. “If that’s your way of asking if I’m seeing someone, the answer is God no.”
“Not just no, but God no? Why so adamant?”
“Getting me pregnant is all sex with any of these boys outside Amber is good for. And, yes, I mean boys, because men should know how to give a woman an orgasm.”
He chuckled. “I’ve heard their skills are lacking.”
“You’re being kind. Not one man I’ve been with since I left Amber could get me off. Plus, every damn one of them treated me like a novelty. Brave men who took a walk on the wild side putting their dicks into an Amber. It didn’t take long to realize what was going on. Overall, it was too much effort to put in just to be disappointed once we got our clothes off.”
Rock laughed, shaking her body along with his. Laila loved the sound of it.
“How long has it been?”
She avoided the question by turning over so they lay face to face. His hard bicep was her pillow. Embarrassed, she shook her head.
One side of his mouth quirked up. “Come on. Out with it.”
“Years.”
The silence filling the inches between their faces was deafening.
“Jesus, Laila.”
She smiled. “We could be benefriends.” Immediately tensing, she prayed for the response she wanted. Putting herself out there wasn’t her style, especially when she was unsure if the interest was mutual. She’d felt his desire once, when he’d allowed his mind to wander. It had made him upset. She didn’t understand why, yet. “Don’t be scared, I won’t bite.” She snapped her teeth and laughed.
He hooked the nape of her neck and pulled her head closer to his. They were nose to nose. His eyes glittered “You’re the one who should be scared, because I do.”
He seemed surprised she didn’t try to get out of his grip. Her empathic gift flared as he channeled his pent-up sexual desire.
“Trust me, baby, you don’t want anything to do with my twisted version of sex.”
She wasn’t intimidated by his warning. She was intrigued.
He shook his head slightly. “No. No benefriends.” Between his grip on her neck, that dark sexy voice, and the fire burning so hot inside him her panties were damp, she’d almost missed his rejection. She waited for more of an explanation, but that was all she got.
He closed his eyes, shutting her out. He was done talking.
She stuck out her bottom lip and poked the hard spot at his sternum. “You’re not very nice. In fact, I’m starting to think you’re kind of mean.”
When he focused on her again, he’d donned a mask of cool indifference. “Baby, I never claimed to be nice.”
“Good, because sometimes I don’t want nice,” she whispered. His clean scent filled her nostrils. His touch nourished her, rebuilt a part that had been broken. The air was charged with her anticipation and his lust. His cock was hard and wedged between them, pressing against her belly.
On impulse, she clutched both sides of his face and kissed him.
Chapter 8
A rough, playful action, the kiss took Rock by surprise, and before he had the chance to react, it was over. She carelessly poked a stick at the beast he’d chained, with no idea what was inside. Even Amber women found his proclivity for extreme sex more kinky than they desired. He relished the challenge presented by this impulsive and unpredictable woman who zigged when he expected her to zag.
The lone fixture burning in the kitchen provided enough shadowy light to see the lovely sight before him. He focused his attention, seeking to read what wasn’t said with words. In a flash, he flipped them until Laila was on the couch beneath him.
She gasped. Her cheeks were flushed, and her eyes danced. She was playing with him.
“Yeah, I’m mean.” The gravel in his voice was as menacing as he could make it. “And depraved.”
Her breaths came faster.
“Demanding.”
Her pupils dilated.
“Controlling.”
The pulse at the side of her neck quickened underneath his index finger. She hung on every syllable, unblinking.
He leaned in closer. “Domineering.”
Her lush lips parted, and displayed the barest peek of her sweet tongue.
“And strict.”
Her pupils swallowed up the deep brown of her irises, and her peaked nipples hardened against his chest. He shifted slightly, positioning his lips next to her ear, and whispered, “I’m the kind of man your mama told you to stay away from.”
He finished the sentence, and she’d stopped breathing. Their faces were mere inches apart again. “Breathe,” he whispered.
Wide-eyed, she inhaled a hearty gulp of air.
Breathing heavily himself, Rock was a hair trigger away from unleashing his lust. “Now, I’m tired. Didn’t sleep well last night. Let’s go to bed.” He sat, bringing her with him.
She squealed.
“To sleep.”
She frowned and pouted. He lifted her until they were chest to chest. She wrapped her legs around him, and cupping her cute little bottom, he carried her up the stairs.
He set her on her feet next to the bed and took a knee in front of her. Hooking his fingers at the waistband of her shorts, he slid the material down and lifted each of her feet to free her of the garment. “Lie down.” He turned away from her while he folded her shorts and placed them in one of the dresser drawers he’d emptied that afternoon. He removed hi
s T-shirt and jeans, stowed those away as well.
Laila spread out under the top sheet.
He shut off the light and slid in next to her. Covering the ache in the middle of his chest with his palm, he allowed himself to feel more in that moment than he had in a year. His defenses were gone, with this Amber woman, and he was about as wide open to an onslaught of emotions as he’d ever been. He’d always known someday he wouldn’t be able to contain them any longer. He’d expected he’d end up murdering someone when they broke free, but this was bearable.
Laila scooted close, burrowing into his side until he turned toward her and completely surrounded her with himself. Her slow, regular breathing followed, and didn’t it just figure, he was wide fucking awake.
She’d surprised him today. He didn’t surprise easily or often. He prided himself on that. Her courage with Morgan, her reactions to his words—breathtaking.
She needed more than benefriends.
So did he.
The possibility she might be able to give all of herself to him, hand everything over completely and trust, made anticipation thrum through him.
Rock hovered on the threshold of sleep, his thoughts roaming in a lucid dream while his consciousness was completely aware of the woman who slept next to him.
He dozed for a few hours but was fully awake earlier than normal. Above him, high windows displayed the slight fade from black to navy blue in the eastern sky. He’d be generous and call it five thirty in the morning, but just barely.
Laila was beside him, her hair partially covering her face. Her light breaths fanned his chest. Their legs were entwined, his dick hard and demanding attention. Throwing an arm over his eyes, he groaned. He was screwed.
Rock gingerly slid out of bed and padded downstairs. The house hadn’t cooled much overnight, and it was going to be another hot one today. Not ideal for Laila’s first day of real training, but this would be the first of many hot days of exertion for her. She might as well know what she was getting into.
The lone light burning over the center island in the kitchen beckoned. He sat at one of the high stools and put his earbud in his ear. “Call Dad.”
