Cipher (16 page)

Bare arms. He should always have bare arms. She caught the cloth and moved where he’d directed, but couldn’t resist the urge to peek at him again.

He was beautiful.

If life was fair, she’d be able to savor touching him. Instead of awkward, jumbled encounters, there could be slow seduction. Kissing. God, she wanted to
kiss
him, just feel his mouth on hers and enjoy a growing urgency that didn’t swallow them both whole. To have an orgasm that was more than misfiring synapses and emotional overload. She wouldn’t have the knot of worry in her gut, the fear that needing him had so badly damaged the foundations of her control that she’d never master her gifts when he was there to make the world fuzzy.

The damp rag left wet streaks on the wall as she swiped it in slow, aimless circles. If life was fair, it would just be the two of them in the room. So easy to picture Andrew as he was now, sweaty and covered in plaster dust, muscles flexing, eyes dark… The way he looked at her before empathy exploded, like he wanted to touch every inch of her.

They’d never been naked. He’d never even gotten a hand into her pants, or under her shirt. She’d never felt that beard against her breasts, or her stomach, or—God help her—her
thighs
, and the mental image of Andrew coaxing her knees apart threatened to blow her brain into little pieces.

She wanted life to be fair.

His hand closed over hers as he corrected her technique. “Straight lines down the wall.”

He was breathing too hard. So was she, but oxygen couldn’t be making it to her head, because the world was fuzzy around the edges. All she could see was her hand, trapped under his. If she eased her other hand up the wall, would he catch that one too? Pin her to the wall and skate along the darker edge of the fantasies she tried to pretend she’d never had?

His fingers slid down to her wrist, closed around it firmly for a moment—and let go.

In a second, she’d be panting. This arousal might be in her head, but it still twisted up her body. Tightened her nipples, made her ache. Made her wet. She rocked back and found Andrew still behind her, and arousal had curled around him too.

His erection pressed against her, and she could see the dizzy, frantic series of events unfolding before her as if she had Julio’s precognition. His hips rocking against her ass, maybe one hand drifting around her body, into her pants, pressing between her legs until the rough touch of his fingers sent her—

Julio.
Oh Christ, if Andrew’s touch shattered her control, her projection wouldn’t just affect him.

Kat tore away from his body with a whimper, stumbling so hard she slammed into the opposite wall.

Julio jumped back and plucked one of the buds from his ear. “Kat, what the hell?”

Air whistled through her teeth as she stared at him, taking in confusion in upraised brows and a hint of concern in his widened eyes—

And nothing else. No arousal. No desire—thank
God
, no lust—and relief weakened Kat’s knees until she slid to the floor with a soft
thump
. “You can’t feel it.”

“Uh, feel what?”

Adrenaline was making it worse. Her heart pounded until the world throbbed with it, and she couldn’t make herself look at Julio. Not with Andrew a few feet away, intense and barely contained. She had to wet her lips twice to speak. “Andrew?”

His answer shouldn’t have been an answer at all. “Julio, get out.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Kat caught a glimpse of Julio scrambling toward the door. A moment later it slammed shut, and she sucked in a breath. No, panted. She was panting, tiny hitching breaths as the intensity of the need between them twisted again. “He couldn’t feel it.” It was important. She
knew
it was important.

Andrew closed the distance between them, towering over her in a way that sent her base instincts wild. “I feel it,” he said, and Kat forgot why anything else could possibly be important as he lifted her, pinned her to the sheetrock with his hips and groaned.

For a terrifying second, Kat thought she might come from the sound alone.

The sheer insanity of her response woke reason. They couldn’t do this. His skin was hot under her hands, arms bare, muscles flexing as he held her up, but they
couldn’t do this
, couldn’t fall into each other like helpless, rutting fools every time a stray fantasy caught either of them. It was absurd. Untenable. Like living the porno version of their lives, where every situation dissolved into impractical sex.

It was getting worse. She hadn’t even touched him this time, not until he was already hard, caught in the grip of whatever made her dig her fingernails into his shoulders and whimper every time he ground against her. Lust. Blind lust, and not romantic at all when they didn’t have a choice.

Desperation seized her, and she squeezed her eyes shut and ignored her body, shut it out with discipline borne of training under Callum’s strict tutelage. He’d put her through hell, but nothing so hard as this. Nothing like trying to ignore the sweet, dark thrill of her back against the wall and Andrew’s hips redefining the meaning of bliss with every perfectly timed rock.

Finding a half-trance was damn near impossible. Stretchy yoga pants were faint protection from the jean-covered erection grinding between her thighs, and Andrew liked grinding into her too much. Throbbing heat gave way to little bursts of sensation, pleasure thick with the anticipation of release, and Kat fought for the will to continue. She wanted this, wanted every second he touched her, every scrap of emotion that bled from him, even the feral possession,
especially
the ravenous, animal need—

—but she wanted more. More than lust. She wanted him to
choose
her.

Whispering his name, she twisted the power flooding her and let it go, invoking the filter that bled feeling into color.

With her eyes closed, she couldn’t see the effects, but she could
feel
them. The emotional silence echoed, like the quiet after a violent explosion. It took a moment for her to connect to her own body again, to find the physical sensations that had seemed pale compared to the psychic maelstrom.

Or maybe not so pale. Warm tension pooled between her legs, and she moaned when the tiniest shift of her hips rubbed her against Andrew. “Oh…”

Instead of backing away or putting her down, he groaned again and caught her mouth in a blistering, hungry kiss. Teeth scraped her lower lip, and the growling noise he made in his throat drove her mouth open on an answering gasp. Then it was his tongue, hot and dangerously intent, and by the time she found the willpower to tear away, she couldn’t think.

Hell, she couldn’t
breathe
.

It made her words come out husky and halting. “Did it—I tried to stop it—”

“Open your eyes, Kat,” he rasped. “Look at me.”

So much color.

She had to squint until the first flare faded into a brilliant aura of greens and blues and silvers and golds. He glowed when he looked at her, and it wasn’t the usual reds of lust and love, because what he felt for her wasn’t a clean human emotion.

Andrew was the colors of the wild edged in passion and jagged pieces of pain and need sharp enough to cut, and it stole her breath when she realized it was all real. Not a product of her empathy, not a passing affection magnified a thousandfold by an endless loop.

He loved her, even with the rough edges scratching away at his soul.

His brows drew together in a frown. “You look like you can’t believe I haven’t stomped off yet.”

“It’s…” Words failed her, as she watched the colors tremble in the air between them. “You’re like the aurora borealis. On acid. I could get drunk on you.”

His frown faded into confusion. “The synesthesia again?”

When she touched his cheek, this time, she felt it all. Warm skin. The scratch of his beard. Giddy pleasure at such a simple feeling sent laughter bubbling up. “It’s not a perfect solution, but I thought…I thought without the backlash, and the feedback loop, that you wouldn’t be so out of control. That you could choose.”

“Choose what, you?” He rubbed his face against her hand. “I did. I
would
. It’s not about me being out of control, not like that.”

“I don’t think you’d usually choose against the wall, in front of Julio.”

“No,” he admitted, “but it’s not the end of the world, either. Julio understands.”

She stroked his cheek again, thrilling at the quiet intimacy in the gesture that stood in such stark contrast to the sheer sexuality of their position. “I’m only good at understanding feelings in a vacuum. When they’re clear and external and not terribly personal. It’s messy, when they’re mine. Or about me. And after everything…it’s so easy to worry that maybe you didn’t want me like that. That I’d…I’d forced you to want me.”

Andrew laughed and shook his head. “
That’s
what you worry about? That I wouldn’t want you if you weren’t getting your horny feelings all over me?”

Her cheeks warmed, accompanied by the bite of embarrassment. “If you’ve been having horny feelings about me all this time, you’ve been keeping them nice and bottled up. For all I knew, I was just turning you into a deviant with me.”

“That’s bullshit. And completely hilarious.” He glided his thumbs over her heated cheeks and smiled. “You’re not a deviant. And me wanting you isn’t dependent on the empathic feedback you’re throwing at me. It’s there all the time.”

“Oh, I might be a little deviant.” Turning her head, she caught his thumb between her teeth for a heartbeat before releasing him. “You just don’t know because you haven’t managed to get naked with me yet.”

His voice dropped to a murmur. “It means a lot to you, doesn’t it? Both of us being in control?”

“Maybe not both of us. But one of us. One of us
has
to be in control.” She nipped at his thumb again. “Maybe not always the same person…but we’re too dangerous to both just let everything go.”

“Are we?” His lips skimmed her collarbone, and oh God, she felt it this time, felt it like a full-body shock, like touching a doorknob after dragging her feet across her living room carpet. Her head thumped against the wall as she tried to push closer to his mouth, wanting more. Everything.

He danced kisses up her throat and jaw, and his mouth met hers again, this time in a slow exploration that was everything she’d ever imagined in her hazy, girlish daydreams. Intense and careful, and going on and on until her lips felt too sensitive and growing urgency forced tiny whimpers from her as she squirmed closer.

He lifted his head finally, his jaw clenched, his throat working. “Control.” He touched her mouth again and squeezed his eyes shut. “You’re right. One of us has to have it.”

Color flared with the wild intensity of a star going nova, and Kat framed his face and kissed his chin as his love for her danced through the air. “Me. I can have it right now. Put me down, Andrew, and trust me.”

He groaned, but did as she asked. “I trust you.”

Oh, the power. Her hands shook with it as she spread both hands against his chest and urged him backwards. Not so far, just until his shoulders hit the wall he’d been sanding.

Then she smoothed her hands down and hooked them in his belt as she dropped to her knees.

Strong hands gathered her hair, tangled in the locks. “This is what you want to do?”

“Yes.” She eased his belt open, then tugged at the zipper, shivering as the teeth parted. “Next time, you can be in control.”

“Never,” he rasped. “I’ll never be in control with you looking at me like that.”

Her own control was under full-scale assault, but she clung to it by a thread as she eased down his boxers and freed his erection.

With the synesthesia, teasing him was as easy as painting by the numbers. Touch here for need, stroke there for blind lust, mix them together and hear him groan as the air danced in brilliantly colored fractals. Surely stuffy, proper Callum had never imagined such a use for it. But it was effortless and
perfect
, and when she smiled up at him and applied her tongue to all of those newly discovered sensitive spots, the way he groaned and tensed made her reevaluate her list of favorite hobbies. Surely this should find a place near the top—watching the colors flare as Andrew came to pieces under her mouth and hands.

She loved it when his fingers tightened, pulling at her hair as he guided her movements, showing her what he liked. Still a dominant wolf, under the skin, and it drove her determination to higher levels. Even on her knees, she could bring him to his.

Maybe she lacked the technical proficiency to go down on him in deep-throating style, but she followed the eddies of his emotions until she found the perfect balance of stroking hands and tongue, unable to tear her gaze from his face as he dropped his head back and whispered her name.

Then his hips began to move, tiny thrusts that took him a bit deeper into her mouth.

He couldn’t stop himself. He was helpless. Putty in her hands.

She loved it.

Andrew started to talk—soft, sweet words interspersed with expletives, dirty pleas that fell just short of being commands. He tensed, moaned, and finally pulled her hair painfully. “Kat, holy
fuck
.”

For the first time she wished for telepathy. She couldn’t reply, couldn’t whisper that she was dying to see him come. To see ecstasy steal over his face as he came undone under her touch. To speak she’d have to stop, and nothing was worth that.

Instead she applied her mouth with increased fervor, moaning her encouragement as she tried to put all the things she couldn’t say into her eyes.
Come
and
now
and maybe even
I love you.

He came with a shout and a thud as his head banged back against the wall, not once but twice. A shudder ran through him, and he clutched her hair even tighter.

Every sense was alive. Filled with him—the taste of his release on her tongue, the smell of his aftershave, his panting moans and the grip of his fingers tugging helplessly at loose strands of her hair. And the sight of him…open and overwhelmed, sated by her touch and alive with light and colors only she could see.