Embrace The Night (35 page)

But the gritty substance chafed the sensitive skin inside his wrist, and that’s when Simon realized—too late—what she was doing. He yanked his hand away, but the coursing sensation of pleasure and heat was already streaming through his body.

“Crystal dust,” he said, trying to brush it off his skin, but it did nothing to alleviate the sensations. In fact, the brushing only ground it in more deeply. God, it was
fast
. He felt dizzy and light-headed and…
fuck it
…instantly, violently aroused. He grabbed her arm and looked, and there was the telltale sign—the red rash on the same place on her arm. “What are you trying to do, Florita?”

“This is so much better than the stuff you used to use,” she said. He realized belatedly that the gleam in her eyes was from an artificial high, not merely the triumph and excitement he’d assumed. “It makes everything so much…better.”

Simon pushed away from her, settling back into his corner of the couch, fighting the sensations rushing through him, the coursing blood.
God, help me.
But he couldn’t shake off the familiar edge, the lightness and energy, and the deep, insistent tug at his hormones. Everything became clearer, cleaner, sharper…more urgent and frenetic.

He knew a little about crystal dust, or grit, as it was also called—the drug of choice for post-apocalyptic users—but he hadn’t known that it was rubbed into the skin, or she would never have gotten so close to him.
Dammit
.

Simon closed his eyes as his veins jumped and his heart rate climbed, and the next thing he knew, Florita was in his lap. Settling her perky ass there right on his shifting cock, her long fingers capturing his face and jaw as she bent forward for a long, deep kiss.

He opened his mouth, he couldn’t stop it—she was insistent, and he’d fallen off the wagon so fucking hard he’d landed on his head and was still rolling. Her tongue was sleek and insistent, hungry, and yet, his stomach revolted. His skin crawled even as his fingers itched for something…to touch her.

Not her. Christ, not this woman.

Her hands slipped under his shirt, and Simon dragged his mouth away, placing his hands on her shoulders, holding her back. His thumb bumped her crystal. It felt rough and hot under the pad of his finger, and he focused on that for a moment, pushing away the sensations of her hands sliding over his chest, trying to forget that the last woman who’d touched him like that had been Sage.

Sage
.

If she could see him now, hot and sweaty, fucked up and high—just the same as he’d always been. His thoughts whirled, his breathing kicked up, and he struggled to concentrate, to focus on something other than his frenetic mind.
Steady.

Across the room was a window, and beyond it, darkening blue sky. It felt like he was flying, high above the ground…hell, he
was
flying.

How long does this shit last?

He counted his breaths, felt Florita’s hands moving to the fly of his jeans, the familiar little jerking motions as each of the six buttons popped open. “Ahh,” she sighed in his ear, her hands thrusting down into the heat concentrated there.

Simon closed his eyes, gathered his strength, fighting the pleasurable sensations and focusing on the revulsion, centering on the disgust and loathing…only that gave him the ability to wrap his fingers around her wrists and pull them out.

“No,” he said, focusing as steady a look as he could muster into her glittery eyes. “Not until you tell me more about how you did this. I want to know…all about it.”

He replaced her hands onto his thighs, and as a consolation prize, so to speak, he rubbed his hands up along her shoulders like a lover would. Trying to keep the loathing from his eyes, trying to appear as if he weren’t ready to throw her across the room.

Or out the damned window. The only thing that kept him from doing that was the uncertainty as to whether it would actually kill her or not.

And because he hoped crystal dust made people chatty.

“About what?” she asked, her voice easing into a little purr, leaning toward him as he stroked her chilled arms. Her eyes had become more heavily lidded and her mouth open, glistening and full from the frantic kissing.

Simon rubbed her arms, stroking them gently, forcing himself not to think about what he was doing, how soft her skin was, how her odd scent seemed to curl into his nose…how her ass settled and shifted against his cock, now freed from its confines, and with a mind of its own. “This,” he said, rubbing his thumb over her crystal.

Florita sighed and gave a little groan as he did so, arching toward him again. Fuck, was it an erogenous zone too?

“How did you do it? What did you do?” he asked again, pressing a reluctant kiss to her jaw.

“I don’t know,” she said on a little sigh. Her breasts had come out of the dress, and pressed against his shirt, naked and full, nipple-hard and hot. “They did it all, Fielding and Truth and the others. We just helped prepare.”

“Prepare?” Hard enough for a guy to ignore breasts crushing against him, harder when they were naked and she was grinding her ass into his crotch and he was flying higher than he’d ever flown.

Sage. Think of Sage.

And her lovely, innocent face, freckled lip and all, slid into his mind…centered him. Her klutziness…her brilliant mind, with the secret pages in the back of that book, her trusting gaze. She’d
trusted
him.

He felt the spiking in his body calm, the tension ebb…and Simon accepted, at that moment, when the mere thought of Sage became his refuge, when she became his talisman…that there would never be anyone else for him.

“Money. Funds. Information.” Florita pulled away, this time arching back so that he had a full view of the breasts half the world had seen on the big screen—she had a ring in one nipple; that was new. At least, from the last time she’d flashed them at him.

“Money?” He looked away from her offerings, a bitter taste in the back of his throat.

“The buy-in was fifty million American dollars,” she bragged. “Just to get into the club. And it was only by invitation.”

“And your goons, your other friends below? Did they have fifty mill each too?” he said.

Florita laughed. “Oh, no, no…they’re my pets. I created them about thirty years ago. But I’d throw them both over for you, Simon.”

She shifted on his lap and her fingers began to slip lower again, her lips coming closer. Simon tensed, the room spinning a bit and the colors in this pale chamber turning deeper and more vibrant as he tried to concentrate.
Fuck, is it getting stronger?

“Who was the leader? Of the club?” he managed to say as she closed around him again. His breath caught and he felt a trickle of sweat run down his spine, and another one gathering at the back of his neck. “Truth? Fielding?”

“Oh, it was Truth…until he betrayed everyone.” She covered his mouth with a sloppy kiss that helped distract him from what her hands were trying to do…and he pulled away from her lips, yanking her hands up once again.

“Florita,” he said, half groaning, half warning.

“Stop calling me that,” she ordered. “I’m Tatiana!”

“Truth betrayed everyone?” he asked, trying to get her back on track, trying to hold her off until the grit wore off…however long that would be. “What happened?”

“I dunno,” she murmured, her voice thick and her hands tugging at his shirt. “I want to see you without this on, Simon. There’s no need to be shy. Leonide is long gone. There’s no one between us now.”

There’s never going to be anyone between us because there will never be an
us.

“So you bought in with fifty million, and then what? Immortality after all hell breaks loose? Where did the crystals come from? Are they electronic?”

She laughed uproariously, as if he’d said the most amusing thing, tipping her head back to show a long, white throat that, instead of being sexually inviting made him want to snap it in payment for all her sins. But even now…he didn’t. “Not electronic. They were payment to us, the cult. For helping.”

“Helping what?” he pressed when she suddenly stopped.

Her gaze turned crafty. “I can’t tell you that.” She giggled. “Or I could, but I’d have to kill you if I did.”

Her eyes had turned wild and dark, and she was panting by now. She’d become more sloppy and slappy in her movements than sleek and controlled.

“How about something to drink?” he suggested desperately. Anything to get her off his lap, to give him a chance to fight off the hold of the crystal grit.

“Old habits, hmm, Simon?” she said, staggering a bit as she pulled to her feet.

“Right,” he agreed, drawing in a deep breath, trying to break his mind through the sparkly fog that had gripped him.
Get the fuck out of here.

He looked around the room, seeking something he could use to slice the crystal out of her skin. No knives in sight. He wondered if she still wore the one she’d had on her body earlier, when she’d slit the Sage look-alike’s throat.

But he couldn’t. He couldn’t do it. There had to be another way.

The clink of a bottle and glasses drew his attention, and he saw that she’d poured two short drinks of a rich golden color. To his horror, saliva sprang to his mouth and the desire flashed through him like a runaway train. His fingers trembled as he curled them into his lap.

He
needed
it. He needed that so badly…to take the edge off.

No…steady, Simon. You’re already on the edge.

But when she brought the glasses over, and he smelled the Scotch, his heart began to slam in his chest and his mouth watered even more. Swallowing hard, he closed his eyes, lifting the glass to slam it down his throat, already relishing the heat, the golden feeling that would fill him…

He tightened his fingers around the glass and slowly dragged it away from the temptation of his nose and mouth, eyes opening and fastened on it as if they had the strength to bring it back. Somehow, somehow, he managed to set it on the table next to him. But he couldn’t make his fingers relinquish the glass, the smooth, cool object that held his desire.

This was it. It was all he could take.

Still gripping the glass, he looked around the room, desperate for a weapon that could hold her off. He was done with her, done with the games. He had to get the hell out of here before she completely destroyed him.

Then she leaned forward, forcing a kiss once again, but this time, she tasted of ambrosia, of manna…of Scotch…dark and heavy and smooth…he tasted it, inhaled it, felt the wave of desire again, and pulled her close to get every bit of it from her mouth, her tongue…the room closed in on him and he lifted the glass in his hand, bringing it closer even as he knew nothing but the feel of his own breath, the measure of his own pulse.

And then, with a sharp, violent movement, he gave it up, slammed the glass back down on the table, hard enough to shatter it in his palm, sending shards digging into his skin and clattering onto the floor.

Out of breath, but in control, he opened his eyes and pulled away from Florita, and realized dimly that he held half the glass in his hand. Broken in half, edges jagged, the thick bottom cracked too…it was the weapon he’d been looking for.

He had it in his hand. All he had to do was bring it down, slam the curved, jagged edges into her skin and cut out the crystal…

All he had to do to end this…was to kill her. In cold blood. Right here. Now.

No remorse. No second thoughts. No regrets.

But
no
.
No.
That was no longer him.

Simon pulled away, shoving her off his lap. Stumbling to his feet, he banged against the table. Glasses clinked and crashed.

With a shriek of fury, she lunged after him, and he spun her from his side, pushed at those clawing hands. He dropped the broken glass and backed away. “Don’t touch me,” he growled, meeting her eyes, steadying himself. The pleasure still trammeled through his veins, and his heart beat erratically. The room tilted, shimmered.

Florita’s face turned dark, her eyes still lit with false light from the grit. “You have no choice, Simon,” she said. The purr was gone from her voice; it was as ragged as the glass that lay at his feet.

“Keep your murderous hands away from me.”

“People who live in glass houses…” Florita replied, breathing heavily. She moved suddenly, whirling away toward the wall, and the next thing he knew, she had a blade in her hand again. Her eyes glowed brightly with possession and greed. She smiled. “If I can’t have you, no one will.”

Simon stood there, breathing heavily as she lunged toward him. He stumbled out of the way, still slow and unsteady, the room expanding and contracting at the edges of his vision. He felt the slice of the blade on his arm, the heat bursting over his skin.

Whirling, staggering he whipped his arm around, catching her off balance. But she was strong and somehow steadier, and the long blade scored the back of his shoulder. He roared in pain and anger and whipped around, hands grasping, closing over her throat in a heartbeat.

She looked up at him as he fought to catch his breath. The point of the sword rested against his belly. “You can’t kill me,” Florita reminded him with that sly smile.

“I wouldn’t be so certain of that,” he replied, tightening his fingers and looking at her crystal.

She edged the point deeper against his shirt, through to his skin. A simple thrust, and it would be over. “Come now, Simon. You’ll enjoy it. I promise. You and me.” She reached up and stroked his damp cheek.

Simon closed his eyes, focusing on the metal pricking his belly, not on her poisonous touch. Over at last. Freedom.
Do it. Put me out of my fucking misery.

Then…
Sage.
Her face blossomed in his mind, her sun-bright hair and gentle, freckled smile, pragmatic expression.

If there was a chance…any chance at all…

Galvanized, strengthened, he shoved Florita away with every bit of strength he had. She flew through the air, crashing against the wall, settling half onto the water trough like a broken doll.

He knew she wasn’t dead, but he didn’t wait, wasn’t about to find out. Gathering every bit of his composure, pulling his strength and fighting off the high, he shimmered into nothing.