Edge of Midnight (19 page)

“Oh, no. I hardly have any—”

“Shut up and get your ass over here.”

She jumped, stung by his drill sergeant voice. “I don’t have bad ones. Not like you.”

He ignored her, and started with her hands, smearing antibiotic ointment on the nicks and cuts. Then the marks on her wrists from the plastic strapping. The cut beneath her ear, the angry teeth marks. She had marks on her arms that were going to bruise. He should have asked for some ice. He contented himself with smoothing them with his hands. Her worst injuries were the ones in her head. Nightmares, anxiety. The shame, the fear. Injuries to the soul where the hardest ones to heal. He knew all about that. He wished she didn’t have to.

But Liv was tougher than he’d ever imagined. A freaking goddess.

“Any spots I missed?” he asked.

She shook her head, red-faced.

“I’d better do a more careful check.” He tugged the towel loose. She tried to hold it over herself, but he wrenched it away, ran his hands over her cool, trembling skin. Got lost staring at her naked body before he remembered the script. “Uh…let me check your ribs,” he said.

She closed her eyes tight as he touched her breasts. They had red marks from that filthy bastard’s squeezing fingers.

T-Rex was going to die for that. Squealing in pain.

He spun her around, raising up the heavy ropes of dripping hair, running his hands down the curve of her back, her waist. Drops of water dripped sensually down into the cleft of her ass. There were small blue marks on her thighs. He realized that he’d inflicted those himself.

He flushed with lust and shame, and sank to his knees behind her. He stroked them. “I gave you those, didn’t I?”

She nodded, mutely.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“It’s OK.” Her voice trembled. “I didn’t care. At the time.”

He slid his hand between her legs, the edge ever so slightly touching the tender hidden folds of her pussy. He kissed every mark, one by one. Then he kissed them all again. She swayed in his hands.

“Don’t you want me to, ah, deal with your cuts and scrapes?” she asked, her voice breathless and unsteady.

“Whatever,” he said. He sat back up onto the bed, and jerked her towel away when she started trying to wrap it around her body again.

“No way,” he said. “Do it naked.”

She made that breathless giggling snort that he loved. “That doesn’t sound like a practical idea. I’m not sure how far I’d get.”

“It’ll be therapeutic,” he assured her. “You’ll be amazed.”

“I don’t doubt that,” she murmured. “I always am.”

She started with his back. He scoped her with his peripheral vision, marveling at her flawless skin. Kissably smooth, fine grained as a baby’s. He hardly noticed the sting as she dabbed with cotton balls and gauze and butterfly bandages. “You should go to the emergency room,” she told him. “You need stitches. Some of these are deep.”

“Nah,” he said. “I’m not worried. I heal fast.”

“They’ll scar,” she warned.

He snorted. “So they’ll be in good company.”

Her cool, soft hands petted him tenderly. “You’ve got scratches and bruises all over.” She sounded adorably worried. It was cute.

“It’s been an intense couple of days,” he said. “Some are from TRex, some are from a fight I had with my brother—”

“Your brother? What on earth?”

“We had a knock-down, drag-out fight last night,” he admitted.

She peered around at him, fascinated. “Really? Why on earth?”

“Long, complicated story. I don’t have enough blood circulation going to my brain to tell it,” he hedged. “Some of them are from you.”

Her hands, wielding the cotton balls, stopped moving. “Me?”

He laughed at her horrified squeak. “Yeah. You,” he said softly. “You were a wild woman. I’m lucky I got out of there in one piece.”

She slid off the bed and tilted his face up. “Let me get this one.”

She worked, slowly and intently, on the scrape on his cheekbone, the split on his lip. Dabbity dab with the ointment, her eyes solemn and focused. Naked Nurse Liv. Her tits were right at eye level. Plump and full, with that ripe peach swell he lusted for, but all the jiggly, pointed softness of homegrown tits. Not the perfect round silicone variety.

Not that he’d ever been fussy about tits. Nosirree, he loved them all. Even the surgically enhanced ones had their place in his heart. Tits existed to be passionately appreciated, in all their wonderful varieties.

But when confronted with divine perfection, he could not but fall to his knees to worship. Or in this case, drag her forward so he could wallow in those soft hot curves, nuzzling like a man gone wild. He rubbed her nipples against his face, and drew one into his mouth.

She arched in his arms. “Sean! I’m not done with you yet!”

“No?” He leaned away from her and wiped his mouth. “Sorry.”

She sank down to her knees in front of him. Fabulous scenarios spun through his head. She started dabbing at a long scrape on his thigh with the ointment. His heart sank. Huh. Whatever.

She wiped her fingers with gauze, and gazed earnestly into his face, like she wanted to say something that he wouldn’t want to hear.

Like that she wanted him to stop bothering her, probably.

He braced himself to put his dick in a cage and leave her the hell alone. She’d had a terrible experience of assault, and here he was, slobbering all over her tits like a teenage boy in the backseat of a car.

“What?” His voice was harsher than he meant it to. “Spit it out.”

She leaned forward, giving him just enough time to wonder if this was really happening before she took his cock right into her hot mouth.

Hot, wet, gliding pleasure caressed him, enveloped him. He panted, red-faced, speechless. He who always had a smart, funny, seductive line of patter to turn a girl on, or soothe, or zing, or titillate.

Without it, he was a blank, grunting idiot, just hoping not to do anything clumsy or rough that might make her change her mind.

It started torturously slow, as she got used to his size. She licked his glans, bathing him until he gleamed while she figured out what to do with all of him. Didn’t take her long. She loosened up into the sensuous, red-hot sex kitten that she was, using those cool, soft hands on the part of his cock that wouldn’t fit, petting and squeezing.

She deepened her stroke, taking him deeper into her mouth than he’d ever dreamed she could, and then doing a tight, tongue-swirling clutch and suck and pull on the outstroke. Again, the gliding plunge, again the long pull, her pink lips distended around his shiny cock, her face pink and dewy, her eyes so dilated, heavy-lidded, and again, that long, hot, wet pull—oh, God. Again, again, again. Please. Forever.

But it wasn’t going to be long at all. He was going to explode.

He didn’t have enough self-control to live up to the question, but it was still good form to ask it. “Can I come in your mouth?”

She did another mind-blowing suck-n-swirl, and nodded, rubbing the tip of his cock against her cheek. “Wouldn’t miss it.”

“Are you sure you don’t want me to—oh, fuck…”

The words broke off as she sucked him into her mouth again.

He sagged forward, hair dangling around his face, breathing in the sweet scent of shampoo. Racked by shudders of pleasure. God, she was good. She brought him so close, and then eased him down again.

Then she started stroking his balls with her fingertips. Little, ticklish caresses. Flower petals. Butterfly wings. That was it. That did it.

A herd of wild horses was stampeding towards him, thundering across the plains. Tossing their heads, snorting. Knife-sharp hooves churning, mud and turf flying. He waited, body straining, taut as steel cable, and waited for those suckers to mow him down. They did.

His eyes flickered open some time later. He’d tumbled back onto the bed. Boxes, tubes, plastic packaging crinkled, jabbing his sore back.

He heard the sink running in the bathroom. His limbs were made of lead. The bed shifted. Things slid around, rearranged themselves as Liv sat down beside him. The give of the mattress beneath her made his head flop bonelessly to the side. She fished a comb out of Miles’s bounty, and worked it through her hair. She looked like a sixteenth-century painting. The alabaster-skinned mythical goddess at her toilette.

“That’s my job,” he said softly. “Stop it. I wanted to do that.”

Her lips curved. “It’ll get tangled again. You’ll get your chance.”

He subsided, reassured, and lay there marveling at her beauty. Enjoying his floating, empty state. It didn’t last long, though. It came rushing back all too soon, the anger and the ugliness and the mind-fucking incomprehensible mystery of it all. Kev, T-Rex, Liv.

He couldn’t deal with it, and there was only one thing in the world compelling enough to drag his mind down another track. He slid off the bed and onto his knees, and pushed her perfect white thighs apart.

She blinked. “Sean?”

“Just let me look,” he begged. “I need it. I need you.”

She laid down the comb and touched his face with her hand. Made a soft, sighing sound, but she didn’t resist as he pushed her open.

God, she was beautiful. That long pink secret slit, the shiny folds of silky girl flesh. Little puffy bits that pouted out. Her pussy was hot and bright and swollen. Glistening with lube. Sucking him off had excited her. Awesome. His mouth watered. His cock sprang to attention, ready for action and adventure, after less than, what, ten minutes?

Unreal. He was prodigiously oversexed, for sure, no arguments there, but even he had his limits. Just not when it came to Liv.

Liv reached down and parted her labia, sliding two fingers down on either side of her clit and pressed so it popped out of its hood, pink and taut and shiny. He put his mouth to her, suckling gently. She jerked in protest, supersensitive. He softened up the contact, licking tenderly, circling it with his lips, trilling at it with his tongue.

He stiffened his tongue and thrust it deep into her pussy. She flopped down on the bed in her turn for the long, lavish tongue-fucking.

He pushed her up, up, eased her down, just as she’d done to him, on and on. When she was on the rise again, he slid two fingers into her cunt to find that melting hot place just inside, freeing up his tongue to do a delicate, fluttering tremolo across her clit. It was like flashbulbs popping in his face when she came. She writhed, clutching at his delving fingers with her cunt. Her pleasure nourished him, and at the same time, created an insatiable craving for more.

He reached for the condoms.

“Hey!” She shoved at his chest. “I didn’t say you could do this!”

He fitted the broad, blunt head of his sheathed penis to her opening, and nudged it inside. “Nope,” he said. “You didn’t. So?”

“What do you mean, so? So stop it!”

“No.” He shoved himself inside her, wedging deep. His body pinned her to the crumpled bedclothes, breathlessly big and hot and heavy. His chest pressed against her breasts, squishing them flat.

He just went at her, that huge thing of his plunging and sliding, making her hot and frantic. His hard, heavy strokes jarred her across the bed, jolting her up until she was crammed against the headboard and had to reach up and brace herself. “Stop it,” she hissed, wiggling and squirming. “Get out of me. You’re making me crazy.”

“Yeah, I know,” he said. “You love it.”

Relax. Hah. She wrenched her hands free, swatting at his face.

Sean caught her arms again, and pinned them to her chest, hips pulsing sensuously against her. “What the hell is the matter with you?” he demanded. “Is it the position? Do you need to be on top?”

“No!” she yelled. “It’s the look on your face that I can’t stand!”

He looked startled, and stopped moving, staring down at her with a frown. “Uh, that’s a tough one,” he said warily. “I don’t even know what look was on my face, baby. Being as how I’m behind my face.”

“Do not smart-mouth me.” Her voice shook. “It’s that ‘I’m entitled to this’ look. Like, you saved me from T-Rex, so now it’s your God-given right to fuck me, however, wherever, whenever you want, right?”

He looked horrified, and withdrew instantly. “Whoa.” He rolled to the side, still holding her. “I didn’t mean to make you think about him. I’m sorry.”

Her face dissolved. She covered it with her hands.

Sean leaned closer and nuzzled her, kissing the side of her face over and over with soft, pleading kisses. They stayed that way for a long time, silently cuddling, until she managed to speak.

“He was going to cut me,” she whispered. “He was going to do horrible things to me, and then stick my dead body in the ground.”

His arm slid around her. “Yeah, but he didn’t. Because you’re strong and brave and quick. He’s in my sights, believe me. I’m sorry he got near you. I’m sorry he breathed the same air as you.”

“No.” She shook her head violently. “Don’t make me out to be some big heroine. I’m only alive because you came after me. Not because I’m so great or smart or brave. That’s bullshit.”

He petted her hair. “Wrong. I saw you bite that guy when he was holding a gun to your head. You don’t fool me for a second.”

“You don’t understand.” Her voice quavered, broke. “I was so scared. I would have told him anything. Anything, you get me? I told him I brought Kev’s note to you. I could have killed you by doing that.”

He pried her hand off her wet eyes and frowned, earnestly. “Babe. Everyone breaks under torture. Read my lips. Everyone. Human beings are not designed to withstand that kind of abuse. Don’t bother feeling guilty about it. It’s a big waste of time.”

She yanked her hand back, hid her face again, shook her head.

“I caved, when it happened to me,” he said. “In a nanosecond.”

She jerked up onto her elbow, startled. “You? What? How?”

“See these?” He lifted his arm, and pointed at the silvery lines slashing along his ribs. “That was in Sierra Leone. I had a job guarding a diamond mine. There was this rival warlord who wanted to…well, to make a long, boring story short, this was done with electrical wire.”

She gasped. “Oh, God. Oh, that’s horrible.”

“It pretty much sucked,” he agreed. “I’m not much of a stoic, to tell the truth. I was crying for Mama in no time. I fucking hate pain.”

That was so ironic, after having witnessed his outrageous heroism in action, that she started to shake with laughter, eyes watering.

“Gee. I’m glad that my heart-wrenching tale of physical and mental anguish is so amusing for you,” he said dryly.

“Shut up, you idiot,” she wheezed, between peals of laughter.

His smile creased the sexy crinkles around his eyes. “That’s much better,” he said. “You’re scolding me. It’s kind of comforting.”

She laughed herself right back into tears again and rolled onto her stomach, burying her face in the covers. The storm moved through her, leaving her exhausted, but somehow cleaner. She lifted her head.

The white-hot anger in his eyes chilled her to the bone.

“I’m going to hunt down that sadistic piece of shit and rip him to pieces for doing that to you,” he said evenly.

She was unnerved. “Um, isn’t that vigilante justice?”

“Yeah.” His eyebrows quirked up. “So?”

“It has no place in a civilized society,” she said.

He leaned back and folded his muscular arms behind his head. “If civilization is civil to me, I’m civil to it.”

She thought for a moment. “I’d rather kill the bastard myself.”

He gave her a wary, sidelong glance. “Ah. I’m afraid I can’t make any promises about that, babe. We’ll see how it goes, OK?”

She snorted. “See how it goes, my ass.”

He smooched her butt. “It’s a wonderful ass,” he said.

“Don’t try to distract me with sex.” A fresh blaze of anger flared up, and she rolled over and lashed out at him, swatting at his face.

He parried the blow easily, and all the ones that came after it. She lost it completely, and flung herself at him, in a frenzy of frustration.

He pinned her onto the bed and held her squirming body down.

“You want me to teach you to fight? For real?”

“Yes!” she shouted, writhing. “You bastard! Get off me!”

“It’s a long, slow process,” he warned. “I’m a tough teacher. I kick ass. Just ask Miles. I taught him. Me and my brothers.”

She heaved and bucked beneath his weight. “I said get off!”

“You’ll always be at a disadvantage in a fight with a man,” he went on. “No matter how hard you train, no matter how good you get. It’s a fact of biology, muscle mass, upper body strength. The one thing I can promise is that you’ll have more of a chance than you had before.”

She collapsed, panting. Tears of frustration leaked out of her eyes. “Yes,” she said, swallowing hard. “Yes. I want more chances.”

“Done,” he said.

“Guns and knives, too,” she added.

He looked alarmed. “Uh, OK,” he said. “If you say so.”

“Bombs, too. They say you know all about bombs. I want to know everything that you know. Everything.”

He stared at her, wide-eyed. “You’re scaring me, baby.”

“Good. Be scared.” Her eyes dropped to his erection. “I see fear doesn’t affect your sexual enthusiasm.”

He glanced down at himself. “Right,” he agreed. “Do you want me to fuck you now, Liv?”

She stared up into his face, and tugged, in vain, at her hands, still pinned against the bed. “No,” she said. “I want to fuck you.”

“Uh…what exactly do you mean by that?”

“I want something I can’t have!” she yelled. “I’m sick of being tied up and jerked around. I want to throw you on the bed and show you who’s boss. I want to fuck you until you learn some goddamn manners!”

He looked perplexed. “So does this mean you want to be the boy? Or what?”

“Don’t be so damned literal about it,” she grumbled.

“You want to strap on a big, scary dildo, and bend me over and—”

“No!” She jerked up on to her elbows, her face going hot. “For God’s sake. I told you I wasn’t into that kinky weird stuff. Ick!”

“Just trying to get the parameters straight.” The dimple flickered in his lean cheek. “You just told me you wanted to kill a man, and learn how to build bombs. What’s a strap-on dildo compared to that?”

“Stop teasing me,” she snapped. “I imagine you’ve done it all?”

“No,” he admitted. “I like being on top. But when it comes to you, I’m flexible. I’ll take turns. I’ll submit, to a sublime sex goddess like you. Maybe not all the time, maybe not for very long, but…sometimes.”

“Oh. I see.” Her face felt like it was on fire.

“I would go to incredible lengths to satisfy you,” he said, his voice silky. “I would bend over backwards. Or even frontwards.”

She exploded into shaking giggles. “Gee, thanks. I doubt I’ll take you up on it, but I appreciate the sentiment.”

“Just be gentle with me, princess. Go easy, OK? Take it slow.” He shot her a sideways look. “I hate pain, remember?”

“Shut up, you clown.” She grabbed the pillow and swatted him.

He grabbed it back from her. “The problem is right now.”

“And why is now a problem?” She tried to yank it back, in vain.

“Because after that fight, and that suckfest, and this incredibly weird conversation, my cock is about to explode. And I’m not feeling submissive. At all. I know you want to fuck me, but I want to fuck you first. And I’m bigger.” He flipped her onto her belly. “So deal with it.”

She wriggled. “That’s not fair!”

He knocked her thighs apart, fitted his penis to her, and drove inside, with a deep, jarring thrust. “No, it isn’t,” he said. “Try to buck me off, if you can. It’ll be fun.”

She did, and it was. He pounded into her, deep and hard. She struggled against him, her hot face pressed hard into the pillow to muffle the shrieks that jerked out of her with each heavy, slapping lunge. He rubbed over a secret spot deep inside her that bloomed hotter and brighter with each stroke. She shoved back to meet him, reaching.

The climax was long and wrenching. He nuzzled her ear as it jerked through her, endlessly. “I want to try something,” he whispered.

She was barely able to turn her head. “What?”

“Something I’ve never tried before.” He eased out of her and rolled her over, pulling her up. No small task, she was such a wobbly rag doll.

“Come on, babe,” he coaxed. “Just one little thing. Just for fun.”

She squinted at him, suspicious. “What could you possibly have never tried that I would be willing to do?”

“You gave me the idea yourself. Being as how you’re a dominating bitch goddess who wants to fuck good manners into me. Thing is, I’d have to take off the condom, and we haven’t had that conversation yet.”

“What conversation? Oh, wait. You mean—”

“The safe sex conversation,” he supplied. “So let’s get that part of it over with. I’ve been very sexually active, no denying that.”

“That’s for sure,” she muttered sourly.

“But I’ve always been safe. I swear, I shrinkwrap myself every time. Religiously. Never done it without latex. Never done IV drugs. Rigorously hetero. Always tested negative for HIV, and everything else floating around out there. Plus, I don’t propose coming inside you—”

“So what the hell are you proposing?” she demanded.

“Let’s finish the tough, awkward part of this conversation first, and then move on to the fun, sexy, erotic part. Your turn, sweetheart.”

“Oh. I’m fine,” she admitted. “I haven’t been with anyone for two years. I’ve had bloodwork since then, for my annual exam. Negative.”

“Great.” He rolled the condom off, tossing it into the trash beside the bed. “Then do that excellent thing you were doing before. Put your hand on your pussy, and press your fingers down so your clit pokes out. Wow! You’ve got such a gorgeous, aggressive looking clit.”

She did as he asked, struggling not to giggle. “So? And?”

“A clit is like a vestigial cock, you know?” he said. “And yours has got a hard-on right now. So fuck me with it.”

She still didn’t understand, until he slid his hand the length of his penis, letting just the broad flared tip poke out of his clutching fist. The slit at the end glistened with a shining, slippery drop of pre-come.

Her neck, her face, all went even redder and damper than they already were. She swallowed, tried to get a grip on herself. “What makes you think this is a vestigial penis?” she demanded. “It depends on your point of view. We could as easily say that you’ve got a ridiculously oversized clitoris bouncing around in front of you.”

A slow, delighted grin spread lazily over his face. “So this is, like, a lesbo fantasy? Wonderful. Girl on girl—I go for that.”

“Shut up, you dog. I do not want to hear about your depraved previous sexual adventures. They make me want to beat you.”

His eyes widened. “Mmm. Scold me,” he murmured. “Show me who’s boss.” He grabbed her free hand, wrapped it around his thick shaft, and brought it up, presenting it with an exaggerated sigh of surrender. “Go for it. Teach me some manners, sweetheart.”

She pressed the tip of her clit against his penis, slid it inside.

They both gasped. It was a tiny movement. Intensely erotic and tightly focused. Their bodies shook. The stimulation was almost too intense to bear, but Sean was groaning, his big shoulders shaking. He liked it. So did she. She ground his glans harder against herself. Her excitement coiled up, tightening to a sharp, shivering point.