7
PERIMETER BREACH; THE BONFIRE
“I have a surprise for you,” Roth said, after dinner the next night.
I glanced at him. “What’s that, babe?”
He checked his watch and, as if that was a cue, I heard the distant buzz of an approaching airplane. “Here they are.”
“They?” I asked.
“Harris and Layla…and your surprise.”
Harris and Layla had left together in the seaplane the night before, and I hadn’t gotten an explanation as to why. I’d assumed, at first, that maybe it was just a quick trip, a chance for Layla to practice her newfound love of flying. But then when they hadn’t returned that night or the next day, I realized it hadn’t just been a quick trip. I’d asked Roth, but he’d just shrugged and changed the subject, via the effective but unfair method of cunnilingus.
And now here they came, nearly twenty-four hours later, with a “surprise” for me.
I couldn’t begin to imagine what Roth had planned; he was far too adept at surprising me.
I went out to the beach, holding Roth’s hand, watching the evening sun glint golden on the wings of the approaching seaplane. The wings wobbled side to side, and the aircraft lowered itself toward the water with something less than Harris’s usual perfect economy of motion, making me wonder if in fact it was Layla attempting a landing.
Foot by foot, the pale blue twin-prop seaplane went lower and lower until the floats sliced through the water, sending spray up into the air to catch the setting sun like droplets of liquid gold. A bounce off the water, a wobble of the wings, and then another bounce, and then it touched water once more and this time stayed down, sending water sluicing away in arcs to either side. Then the noise of the propellers slacked off and the nose was settling forward and the airplane was gliding across the surface of the water toward us, cutting to the side at the last minute. The maneuver toward the dock was sharp and efficient, which meant it was likely Harris bringing it in the rest of the way.
“That was an ugly landing,” Roth muttered.
“I think it was Layla,” I said.
“Oh. I didn’t know she flew.”
“She doesn’t. Harris is teaching her.”
Roth glanced at me in shock. “Holy shit. Really?”
“Really. She took off when we all went to St. Thomas. You didn’t notice?”
He made a face. “No, I didn’t. I was following an auction of one of my companies. Robert was sending me the updates via email.”
“I thought you seemed preoccupied.”
He kissed my temple. “I have been, haven’t I? I’m sorry. Dismantling an international, multi-billion-dollar corporation with dozens of subsidiaries isn’t exactly a quick or easy process. I should be there, in person, handling it all. But I can’t be, so…” He shrugged. “I do what I can. The process is almost done, though. The new corporation is in place, and we’re down to the last few odds and ends. Hopefully by this time next week, VRI will be history, and St. Claire, Incorporated will be up and running.”
“I wish you could have been there, too,” I told him.
“This is good practice,” he said, as we moved toward the dock, where the floatplane’s props were slowing to a halt. “The new setup allows me to operate remotely one hundred percent of the time. It puts a lot on Robert’s plate, but then, I’ve given him a rather enormous raise to compensate. And he’s more than capable. He’s the only person other than Harris and you that I trust implicitly.”
“Does Harris have security on him?” I asked.
Roth laughed. “So much that it’s driving Robert batty. Harris has more security on him than the president, I’m pretty sure.”
“Yet we have just Harris?”
“Just Harris?” Roth said, eyebrows raised. “Are we talking about the same guy?”
“Yeah, but—”
“And no, it’s not just Harris. He’s got guys out there right now, protecting us. You just can’t see them. And, hopefully, you never will, which is the entire point.”
I glanced around, but all I could see was the forest, the house up on the hill behind us, the sea and, anchored out in the bay, the Eliza. “Where are they?”
Roth shrugged. “I don’t know for sure. There are some outbuildings hidden in the vegetation around the house, there are some guys out there. There’s a sniper on the Eliza. Alexei is on the grounds around here, somewhere, prowling. We have half a dozen pairs of eyes on us at all times. I assure you.”
“At all times?” I asked, a little disconcerted at the thought of eyes watching us at…certain intimate moments.
Roth just laughed again. “They are discreet, I promise. If we’re…intimate, shall we say, they keep their eyes on our location, but not on us directly, and any audio input is muted. Standard protocol, I’m told.”
“So Harris is…”
“The tip of the spear, you could say. The visible portion of the iceberg, with the real bulk hidden below the water. If you think Harris is frighteningly efficient, the rest of his men make him seem like a harmless kitten. He’s by far the most…personable…security expert I’ve ever met.”
“Harris is…personable?”
“Compared to the barely-reformed villains in his employ? Yes. I’ve met a lot of his men over the last few months. He chooses well. Let’s just say you don’t hire private security personnel based on their shining personalities.”
“I’m not sure I want to know what that means.”
“No, you don’t.”
“Are they like Vitaly’s men?”
“Hell no. Vitaly employs murderers and thugs. His men are little more than barbarians. The men closest to him, his personal security force, those men are a little more human, but the rest are monsters turned loose on the world. Harris’s men are competent, efficient, well-trained, and most of all…have at least a modicum of humanity. A spark of morality, I suppose you might say. They’re still mercenaries who fight for the highest bidder, but none of them will tolerate the kind of evil Vitaly propagates.”
“What about Alexei?” I asked. I’d met Alexei in the middle of the whole thing with Gina and Vitaly. He seemed nice enough, even if his eyes were a little hard and distant. Good-looking in a rough-hewn sort of way, he was also an accomplished musician, having played guitar and sung beautifully at the dinner at which Roth had proposed to me.
“Alexei was assigned to interact directly with us specifically because he can actually behave himself. But he’s still not a man I’d like to meet in a dark alley.”
By this time, the propellers were still and the door was opening, disgorging an exuberant Layla. “Did you see that? Holy shit! I landed a plane, bitches!”
Harris was next, a faint, amused smile on his face. “A plane which needs to be tied off so it doesn’t float away, Miss Campari.”
“Yes sir, right away sir!” Layla barked, with a sharp, dramatic salute. “And why is it whenever we get around other people you call me ‘Miss Campari’, but in private you’ll call me by my first name? I don’t get it.”
Harris’s face immediately wiped itself of expression. “I’ll get the bags.” And then he was back in the fuselage, out of sight.
Layla finished tying the rope around the dock pylon with a knot Harris had obviously shown her, and then straightened and stared after Harris. “Touchy little shit, ain’t he?”
“Wait, that wasn’t your first landing, was it, Layla?” came a familiar voice.
A voice I hadn’t heard in far, far too long.
“Cal?” My voice cracked.
“Yes, it was my first landing, Calvin,” Layla asked, her voice a little too formal. “Why do you ask?”
He emerged from the plane, all six foot three of him, blond hair cut short and spiked stiff, mirrored aviator shades on his face, tank top revealing muscled arms, bright pink floral print board shorts. God, my little brother had grown up.
Cal took one glance at Layla, and thought better of whatever he’d been about to say. “Just…that it was great. Great job. Glad those lessons are paying off. Awesome.”
She smirked at him. “Lessons? Oh, I haven’t taken any real lessons. Harris has been teaching me.”
“So…you don’t actually have a pilot’s license?” Cal asked, looking a little green.
“Pilot’s license?” Layla laughed. “Buddy, I barely got my driver’s license.”
Harris emerged with a suitcase in each hand. “Don’t worry, Mr. St. Claire. I was in control at all times. Miss Campari is a natural pilot, and very careful. I wouldn’t have allowed her to touch the controls of my aircraft if I didn’t have confidence in her. She just likes to tease you, it would seem.”
“Yeah, well, Layla’s been teasing me since I was fifteen. You’d think I’d be used to it by now.” He turned back to me, and his expression brightened. He rushed over to me, wrapped me up in a bear hug, lifting me clear off the dock. “Jesus, Kyrie. It’s so good to see you. I’ve missed you. I thought maybe you’d fallen off the face of the earth for good, this time.”
“I have, for all intents and purposes.” I slapped his shoulder. “Now put me down, you ogre.”
He set me down, but kept a grip on my shoulders. “You owe me a shitload of explanations.”
I swallowed hard. “I know.”
“I mean, I haven’t seen you in, what, two years? You used to call me once in a while, at least, but then even that stopped. I mean, I get that you’re busy and whatever, and that I’m just your little brother, but—”
“Cal,” I snapped. “I said I know.”
He eyed me, and I saw that under the smiles and the hugs, he was pissed at me. I really did owe him a lot of explanations. “Sorry. I just—I woke up this morning and Layla was in my room, rifling through my magazines. It’s been a weird day, needless to say.”
“Your porn, you mean?” Layla said, with heavy emphasis on the “porn”. She raised an eyebrow at him. “I mean, for real. Who actually buys Juggs anymore? And where do you even get that shit?” A glance at me. “You know your brother has, like, hundreds of porno mags? Not just Juggs, but pretty much every other porno mag there is. Hundreds of them. I’m not kidding.”
I shook my head. “Jesus, Layla. I did not need to know that about my brother.”
Cal scratched his forehead with his middle finger. “It’s a collection, and it’s not all mine. My roommate and I have both been collecting for years.”
“Wow, so you both collect nudie mags?” Layla mimed male masturbation. “Do you whack off together too?”
“JESUS, LAYLA!” Cal and I shouted, simultaneously.
She shrugged and endeavored to look innocent. “It’s an honest question.”
I turned to him. “For real, though. Why do you collect porn?”
He pushed past me. “I’m not having this conversation with you, either of you. It’s not happening.” He paused as he passed Valentine. “Mr. Roth. Nice to meet you. I’m Cal.”
“Nice to meet you, Cal. Just call me Roth.” He shook Cal’s hand. “Welcome. Your room is the second on the right after you pass through the kitchen. Make yourself at home; grab a beer from the fridge on your way. I know you have a lot of questions, and I promise you we’ll answer as many as we can without risking your safety. In the meantime, why don’t you collect your bags from Harris? He’s not a butler, so he won’t be carrying your bags for you.”
Cal stalked back to Harris, grabbed his suitcases. “Thanks for the flight, Harris.”
“It was my pleasure, Mr. St. Claire. Although, in the interest of full disclosure, most of that was Layla.”
“Even the jet?”
Harris nodded. “I did the takeoff and landing, but Layla did the level flying.”
“Well…damn. I never noticed.” He glanced at Layla. “You didn’t kill us, so nice flying, I guess.”
She shoved his shoulder. “Go get a beer and decompress, jackass. You wouldn’t be here if we didn’t love you.”
“I know. Like I said, it’s just been a weird day.”
Layla laughed. “Dude, you have no fucking clue what a weird day even is. Wake up on a boat in the South China Sea and go to bed in the Indian Ocean, and then we can talk.”
He just shook his head and made his way up to the house. I heard a distant “holy shit” as he made his way through the kitchen and saw the courtyard beyond.
“You shouldn’t push his buttons, Layla,” I said.
She just eyed me. “Have you met me? That’s what I do. Buttons are meant to be pushed, and it’s so easy, with him. Seriously, though, Kyrie. You should have seen all the porn. It was a truly awe-inspiring collection, I will say that much.”
“Juggs? For real?” I asked.
“Juggs. For real. And Penthouse, Hustler, Playboy…if it had naked women in it, he had every single extant copy of it.”
I shook my head. “I don’t know, Layla. He’s a guy. Guys do weird things.”
Layla turned to Harris. “Do you collect porn?”
He just stared at her from behind his sunglasses. “The only thing I’ve ever collected is scars, Miss Campari. And the memories that go with them.”
“Well shit, Harris,” Layla said, “way to just take the fun right out of the conversation. Also, that was the most badass comeback I’ve ever heard.”
“I aim to please, Miss Campari.”
She stared at him. “I swear to god, you call me that just because you know it irritates me.”
“Buttons are meant to be pushed,” Harris said.
“I feel like maybe you understand me on a spiritual level, Harry.”
“And I feel like maybe I heard a slight flutter in one of the engines, and if you fly prop planes, you should have a basic understanding of how to fix them.”
“I better not get any grease under my fingernails.”
“Haven’t you heard? Engine grease is the newest thing in beauty care.”
“Wait? Was that a joke?” Layla laughed. “You’d better be careful, Harry, or I might start thinking you’re a human after all.”
“As opposed to what, exactly?”
“Um. A Terminator?”
Harris actually laughed, a smile cracking his features. And even with the black Oakleys hiding his eyes, his features were transformed by the smile. “You haven’t met Thresh yet. He’s a real-life Terminator.”
And then, to my intense surprise, Harris helped Layla climb up onto the wing, showed her how to open the cowl over the engine, and pointed at various parts of the engine with a wrench, explaining while Layla watched and listened carefully, asking questions every now and then.
Layla, working on an airplane engine?
Would wonders never cease?
* * *
It was well past midnight. We had a bonfire going on the beach, lighting up a circle of sand and dimming some of the stars directly overhead. Beyond the firelight, however, the night was huge and dark, the moon new, a black circle visible only by its absence, stars scattered overhead in countless millions, a glittering, winking, twinkling, scintillating fall of silver light arcing from horizon to horizon and down to the edge of the sea.
I was drunk.
Valentine was drunk, and I was on his lap, wrapped up in his arms.
Harris was…well, not drunk, but loose. Telling stories, laughing at jokes, sunglasses gone, wearing black board shorts and a white short-sleeve button-down, unbuttoned to show a hard, lean, well-muscled torso with a scattering of dark hair. He had a beer in one hand and a long stick in the other with which he ceaselessly poked at the fire, stirring it, moving the logs around, turning them, prodding the coals.
Cal was on the sand beside Valentine and me, and he too was drunk, and god, he was hysterical. He was, honestly, the life of our little party, making us all laugh with stories of his and his friends’ ridiculous antics as wild college boys cut loose on unsuspecting Chicago. It struck me how little I knew about Cal, about the twenty-one-year-old man he was now. He’d been so young when Dad was killed, and I’d been responsible for him. I took care of him, made his lunches and got him to school and made sure he did his homework, made him dinner when he got home, made sure he had clean clothes. Gave him money when I had some to spare. Dropped him off at the mall with friends, sniffed his breath for pot and alcohol when he got home. But then he graduated at seventeen and got a scholarship to Columbia College, and I’d made sure to keep tabs on him. I’d paid for the tuition his scholarship didn’t cover, and we got together for Christmas and Thanksgiving, visited Mom together.
At least until everything with Valentine happened. And then I’d sort of, as Cal had insinuated, fallen off the face of the earth. Valentine had made sure both Cal and Mom were taken care of, financially, and I’d sent an email to Cal explaining that I’d started dating a guy who was “well off”, as I’d put it. Just to throw him off the scent, I guess. I mean, how do you explain a man like Valentine Roth to a nineteen-year-old kid? And, since then, I’d called Cal every once in a while.
Mom? Not so much. Mom didn’t talk on the phone. Didn’t send or receive letters or email. I’m not sure Mom ever even noticed that I’d stopped visiting. I still felt guilty, though. But…I couldn’t exactly visit her, for her own sake. If I showed up at her hospice, it would have given Vitaly a bullseye to aim for. Harris had people checking in on her, making sure no one bothered her. But that was about all I could do.
I tuned back in to the story Cal was telling that involved his roommate, a two-hundred-pound potbelly pig, and the last day of classes at Columbia last year.
“…And I swear to god, that pig was faster than a damn cheetah! You should have seen the security guard trying to catch it! Funniest thing I’ve ever fucking seen.”
Layla was—I wasn’t really sure what she was. She was drinking, but slowly, and I would guess that she’d nursed one drink all night. She was laughing at the stories, but there was something subdued about her. But the thing I noticed most was that she was watching Harris’s every move. Hanging onto his every word. It was weird. Beyond weird. She had very little to say, occasionally offering a comment or cracking a joke, but she was mostly quiet—which was entirely unlike her. At any party, any gathering of people where alcohol was involved, Layla was usually in the thick of it, driving the energy, and typically getting, as she puts it, naked-wasted.
I tried to keep up with Cal’s story, which had morphed from something about the pig prank to an adventure he and his roommate had experienced involving a misplaced bag of pot and an undercover narc. It sounded like the kind of story that was funny now, but wasn’t all that funny while it was happening.
Okay, maybe I was nodding off. I tuned into every fifth word, smiling lazily against Roth’s chest. Layla was sitting in the sand right beside Harris; both of them back in the shadows away from the fire. Just their faces were visible, turned toward each other. Harris was saying something I couldn’t hear, and Layla was nodding and smiling. And shit, that smile? It was…I had to search for a word. Intimate. Private.
My heart melted. God, if Layla and Harris ended up together, things would be just about perfect.
But then something truly odd happened. A patch of shadows near the waterline detached itself from the shifting glint of the ocean and the gleam of starlight and the darkness of night, resolved itself into the shape of a man. Alexei. Tall and broad, hard and lean, a wicked, gnarled scar running down his face from forehead to his chin. He was dressed in shades of gray and black: BDU pants tucked into calf-high combat boots, a short-sleeve gray shirt with a black bulletproof vest, a gray ball cap on his head decorated with a black patch that had “A1S” embroidered in scarlet letters. He had a compact assault rifle hanging barrel-down across his chest, the strap clipped to his vest rather than hanging over his shoulder. He had a pistol at his side, a knife handle in a sheath on his vest, and several other accouterments on his belt I couldn’t identify.
He stopped in the shadows well outside the circle of the firelight, crouched near Harris and murmured in low tones in what sounded like it may have been Russian. Harris nodded twice, muttered something back, and then stood up, setting his half-consumed beer bottle in the sand.
“Harris.” It was a statement from Roth, low, a command.
“Possible perimeter breach,” Harris said as he vanished into the shadows, reaching behind his back and producing a black handgun, checking the clip, and returning it. “Probably nothing, but I’m going to check it out anyway.”
“Should we stay here?” Roth asked.
“No. Alexei will escort you to your rooms.” Harris glanced at Layla. “There’s nothing to worry about. Just being cautious.”
“I’ll trust you on this, Harris,” Roth said. “It goes without saying that I want you or Alexei to inform me the moment you have discovered the exact nature of the breach.”
Then Roth stood up without letting go of me, an arm under my legs and the other around my shoulders, taking the lead behind Alexei, who moved in a swift, silent prowl across the sand toward the staircase leading up to the house. His weapon was held low, barrel still down, but his head was constantly swiveling from side to side, and every few steps he would pivot and walk backward, checking our rear and making sure we were all together.
We stopped at Cal’s room first and Alexei entered the room alone, ensuring that it was secure. When he was satisfied, he allowed Cal to enter with instructions not to leave, informing him that a security detail would be patrolling the area.
Next we stopped at Layla’s room and Alexei repeated the protocol, this time taking time to ensure that Layla had everything she needed.
Just as she was about to close the door to her room, Layla looked at me questioningly, not saying a word. I could tell she was a little unnerved.
Seeing the expression on her face, Roth said, “Layla, please don’t worry. It’s better to be safe than to take chances. Harris has us covered. There will be a security detail right outside your door.”
Layla just nodded, not looking convinced, and we continued through the house. Alexei preceded Roth and I into our room, sweeping the bedroom and the bathroom before leaving.
My heart was pounding. “You think there’s anyone out there?” I asked. “For real?”
Roth shook his head. “No. If Alexei thought there was a real danger, we would have been taken to the ship, rather than to the house. There’s a Zodiac on shore at all times, ready to take us to the Eliza in the event of an emergency. As Harris said, they’re just being cautious.”
“What did Harris mean by perimeter breach?”
“There are hidden motion detectors running around the perimeter of the property, including along the water line. There are also buoys in the water out about five hundred yards, with line-of-sight lasers connecting them to the shore, so if anyone approaches from the sea, we’ll be alerted. The crew on the Eliza has the radar active at all times as well. Plus, there’s another motion-sensor perimeter immediately around the house itself. So, to answer your question, a perimeter breach could be a fishing boat that wandered into our waters. The ocean-side crew would hail them and send them on their way. Or it could be some animal in the forest that set off the motion detectors. There’s nothing to worry about, sweetheart.”
“I had no idea there were so many different security features in place.”
Roth laughed. “You think I’d bring you ashore anywhere on the planet without making sure it was as safe as humanly possible? When we went ashore on St. Thomas, Harris’s men were there an hour ahead of us, sweeping everything. They poked into every building, every rooftop, every bathroom and rental counter. They were there when we landed, sweeping ahead of us, and they followed behind us. There was a sniper in place following our every move, as well. Up on a rooftop somewhere, I guess.”
“A sniper?”
Roth nodded. “Andrei, I think his name is. Alexei’s cousin. There’s Sasha out there somewhere too, who is Alexei’s brother. I guess when Harris and company stormed the island to get you out, Andrei’s brother—Alexei’s cousin—was killed. So they all three signed on with Harris, for a chance to get even with the Karahalios clan. Good men to have on our side, but really, really scary fuckers. Men I would not want to have as enemies. Ex-Spetsnaz, I guess.”
“Spetz-what?” I asked. I’d heard of it, but I was fuzzy enough to not be able to remember.
“Russian special forces. Like the Navy SEALs.”
“I’m glad they’re out there, then.”
“Me too.” He brushed a thumb across my cheekbone. “You should sleep. Ella is bringing your dress tomorrow for the final fitting.”
“I haven’t made any plans,” I said, leaning against his chest.
“I know. I have, though.”
I peered up at him, smiling, surprised. “You have?”
He sounded very pleased with himself. “I have. Some very special plans. Which is why you’d better get some sleep, because tomorrow is going to be a long day. Lots to do.”
“Like each other?”
He lifted an eyebrow. “If you’re good.”
I tried to look innocent, the whole wide-eyed blinking look. “And if I’m bad?”
“Don’t tempt me, Kyrie. You’re too cute to handle when you’re this drunk.”
“I’m not that drunk,” I protested.
He let go of me, and I promptly stumbled. “Oh no?” He turned me around, faced me toward the bed. “I bet you can’t make it to the bed without falling.”
“And if I do, I get to tie you up and have my way with you. I never got you back for Vancouver, if you remember.”
His eyes went hungry. “Ah, Vancouver. A delightful night. I think I still have marks on my back from your fingernails.” He bit my earlobe, whispering. “If you make it to the bed without stumbling even once, I will allow you to tie me and do as you wish.”
“I’m going to have you tied up for hours.” I twisted to glance at him, and somehow ended up sideways, his hands holding me upright. “I’m gonna keep you on the edge of orgasm for so long you’ll beg me to let you come.”
“You don’t have to tie me up to make me beg for you, Kyrie.” He unzipped my shorts, letting them fall to the floor. He stripped off my T-shirt, unhooked my bra, and tossed both aside. “All you have to do is get naked and I’ll be ready to beg.”
Clad in nothing but my underwear, I forced myself upright, focused on the bed, which suddenly seemed to have propagated into more than one bed. Stupid multiplying Tempur-Pedic. Focus. Focus.
I maybe possibly spread my arms out like a tightrope walker, much to Roth’s amusement. And then I took a step. A single, very wobbly step. And then another. My arms windmilled, and the world tipped sideways, but I managed to remain upright and take another step. I really wanted to tie up Roth. Dear Jesus, to have him spread-eagled on the bed, hands bound, feet bound, big juicy cock bared and begging for me to play with…? I was all wet just thinking about all the various ways I could torture him. The more I focused on what I could do to Roth, the closer I made it to the bed without stumbling. But shit, when had this room gotten so big?
I could fellate him until he was ready to come, and then stop. And then I could kiss him all over, everywhere except his cock, until he was starting to lose his hard-on, and then I could lick him like an ice cream cone but never actually put my mouth on him. Oh god, that would drive him absolutely nuts. Ha. See what I did there? It’d drive him…nuts? I’m so funny.
And then I was at the bed, triumphant, spinning in place to gloat—which, it turned out, was my downfall. Literally. I fell over and landed sideways on the bed.
“That counts! I made it!” I shouted.
Roth was there, standing beside me, lifting me upright. “You fell, darling. It doesn’t count.”
“I made it to the bed first!”
He squeezed my nipple between a thumb and forefinger until I gasped. “You fell without touching the bed first. It does not count.”
I pouted. “But I want to tie you up.”
“Why?” He pinched the other nipple, and then bent to take it in his mouth, suckling until my nipples were both rigid and hypersensitive.
“Because I want to.”
“But why do you want to, Kyrie? You know my history regarding being bound.”
I let my head tip backward as he sank to his knees, sucking hard on one nipple and then the other, drawing my panties down as he went. I gasped when his tongue touched my clit, momentarily lost my train of thought. “I—um. Because…” I glanced down at him, at his head, blond hair longer than it had ever been, curling around his collar, caressing his temple, brushing over his forehead and in his eyes. He’d grown out a beard, too, which I really liked. It tickled, but it was soft, now. At first it was scratchy—which led to a few weeks of a no-pussy diet for Valentine, but when he insisted it was grown out enough to be soft I let him go down on me again, and Jesus, it was amazing. The tickling made it all the more intense, because it was a counterpoint to the ecstasy of his talented tongue. So now he was long-haired, bearded, rugged. And I liked it. I didn’t usually go for the rugged look, but with Roth, anything was sexy as hell.
But looking down at him, I had a memory of him on the old boat, somewhere in the Mediterranean, handcuffed to the bed, naked, crazed, bruised, bloody, wild. And I remembered.
“Because you’re mine,” I growled. “And I won’t let her have any part of you. I want to tie you up so I can take the experience away from her.”
I was airborne, twisted, and I bounced down on the bed in a sitting position. He undid his khaki cargo shorts with one hand, and I helped him with his underwear while he peeled off his shirt. I groaned at the sight of his cock, waiting for me. Hard, veined, thick, balls heavy and straining with come, belly flat and grooved with chiseled abs.
He gripped my hips and pulled me closer to him; I wrapped my legs around his waist and gazed up at him as he drove into me. No warning, no gentility. Just one hard thrust and he was balls-deep in me, vivid, piercing cerulean eyes hot as blue flame.
My tits jounced as he fucked me, wordless. He was wild, suddenly. Feral. Primal.
I knew I’d said the right thing.
“You’re mine, goddamnit,” I hissed. “I’m going to tie you up and I’m going to tease you until you beg me. And then—”
“What?” he demanded, pulling out of me, grabbing me by the hips and twisting me, shoving me with delicious roughness to the bed, pushing me to lean forward, spreading my thighs apart and driving into my pussy from behind. “What are you going to do to me then, Kyrie my love?”
“When you’re desperate to come, I’m going to ride you like a fucking wild stallion until you fill my tight wet pussy with your come. And I’m going to leave you tied up, get you hard again, and I’m going to ride you and ride you and ride you. I’m gonna fuck you raw, Valentine. I won’t let you touch me even once. Because I’m going to prove to you all over again that you belong to me as much as I belong to you.”
“You’ve proved it, my love.” He was moving slowly now. Making love to me with aching, tender gentility. I loved the juxtaposition. Usually from behind he was crazed and primal, and slow and gentle face to face. But this time he was caressing my spine, my shoulders, brushing my blond hair out of the way, cupping my ass cheeks and gripping my hips, his cock gliding in and out of me with a slow, deliberate slide.
Oh fuck, I was close.
He was, too. I stretched out, pushed back into his thrusts. Felt him take my hips at the creases, pulled me into him, my ass crushing against him, providing a thick, bouncy cushion. God, yes. Yes. I knew I was being loud, and I buried my face in the mattress and let myself scream into the comforter as he made sweet slow love to me until I came.
And god, did I come.
But he held out. He waited until I was gasping and trembling before pulling out.
I twisted in place and lay back on the bed, wrapped my legs around him, reached between us and guided him back in. I knew his needs, his rhythms; he needed to look at me when he came, knew that’s what I needed too.
I was almost hanging off the bed, just my upper spine and shoulders still supported by the mattress, the rest of my weight held up by my Valentine. He drove into me now in slow hard thrusts, his eyes on mine. I felt him thicken with each thrust as he drew closer and closer to the edge, and when I knew he was right there, I reached up, grabbed him by the neck and pulled him down to me, crushed my lips to his and kissed him with all that I had.
He lost it then. He groaned into the kiss, broke it to rest his forehead between my breasts and thrust into me wildly, all control abandoned.
“I love you,” I whispered as he pushed into me again and again. I made it a chant, clutching his head and writhing against him. “IloveyouIloveyouILOVEyou—”
And then he was emptying himself into me with a shout against my skin, sweat slicking his hard flesh, his hot wet seed gushing into me in wave after wave, thrust after thrust. When he was finally spent, he lay on me for a long moment, gasping. I loved the weight of him against me. I caressed his scalp, his neck, his shoulders, his arms, feathered my fingers through his hair and listened to him breathing.
“I’m sober, now,” I said, when he lifted up to gaze down at me.
“How do you always know exactly what I need to hear the most, Kyrie?” he whispered, thumbing a stray lock of hair away from my face.
“Because we’re one person split into two bodies, Valentine. I know what you need to hear because it’s what I need to make you understand, what I need to say to you.”
“I love you more than I know how to express, Kyrie.”
“You should marry me,” I said with a grin. “That will express it pretty damn well.”
“Then you’d better get some sleep,” he said, his expression going serious. “Because that’s happening tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?”
He nodded, then leaned down and kissed me. “Tomorrow.”
I reached up and clung to his neck, squealing in happiness. “I can’t wait to be Mrs. Kyrie Roth.”
“You want to take my name?” he asked, sounding pleased.
“Well…yeah. Of course I do. I want to be yours in every way there is.”
“I know this is a strange time to ask, probably, but…what about children? When this is all sorted, when we can relax and be somewhere permanent, would you consider having children with me?”
I had to swallow hard against a thick hot knot of emotion. He wanted kids? Roth? My Valentine, my sexy, reclusive, billionaire fiancé wanted to have children with me?
“When we can be somewhere safe and permanent and there’s no threat,” I said, blinking against the welling tears in my eyes, “then yes, Valentine, I will have your children.”
“Then I have all the more reason to settle this than ever.” He scooped me up and set me at the head of the bed with a kiss. He fetched a towel and cleaned his seed away with gentle, loving strokes, and then lay beside me, wrapping me up in his arms.
“Kyrie Abigail Roth.”
“That’s me,” I murmured sleepily, realizing I wasn’t quite as sober as I’d thought.
“Tomorrow you become my wife.” He sounded as if he couldn’t quite believe it.
I felt the same way, but I was too near to sleep to form words. “Mmmm-hmmm,” was all I could manage.
His breathing matched mine, and then we slept.