Super Trouble (7 page)

“How
about when
I
say we’re done?”

The
metal of the gun was easy to flash to sub-zero temperatures. Kim hissed out a
curse and dropped the weapon before the ice could burn her fingers. Frost
caught it one-handed as it fell from her grip, his other arm wrapping around
her waist as he hijacked her TK and teleported them both away.

He
released her waist, her power, and her gun as soon as they arrived, stumbling a
little with the landing as he dropped the revolver on the sofa. He’d taken them
to his place this time—and he had every intention of keeping her here if that
was what it took to keep her out of trouble.

“Damn
it, Frost! He was talking!” she shouted, swinging at him as soon as she caught
her footing. “Another five minutes and he would have told me.”

“I’m
not going to let you shoot him on national television, Kim.”

“Oh
please, the gun wasn’t even loaded.”

Irrational
anger surged through him as he snatched up the gun and checked the chamber. Sure
enough. Not a single round. He spun back to Kim, waving the empty gun. “What
the fuck are you thinking, waving an unloaded gun around?”

“You’d
rather I wave a loaded gun around?”

“Yes!
I’d rather you didn’t wave guns at all, but this isn’t a symbol or a scare
tactic. It’s a weapon. You don’t draw until you’re ready to use it. How is it
going to do you any good without bullets?”

“It’s
not like I need the gun to be dangerous,” she scoffed, pulling a handful of
bullets from her pocket. “I can launch these with my mind almost as fast as a
gun can anyway. And even if I pulled the trigger, I could stop the bullet
before it exited the barrel, bend the trajectory, send it anywhere I want. A
gun is just another projectile for me now, but people respond to the threat of
the weapon. They’re conditioned to it. Little Vic was folding—”

“You
can’t just pull guns on people. Even if you’re just as dangerous unarmed and
even if the gun isn’t loaded. It’s
illegal
to threaten someone with a
firearm, Trouble.”

She
folded her arms—only Kim would pout when he scolded her for waving a deadly
weapon around. “I can’t stalk him. I can’t threaten him. What am I allowed to
do?”

“
Legal
things,” he growled.

“Legal
things like teleporting a girl against her will halfway across the city? Not
that I don’t appreciate the dramatic exit, but your timing left something to be
desired.” She frowned, looking out the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the
city skyline. The view from the forty-seventh floor was quite a change from her
own cozy little townhome. “Where are we?”

“My
place.”

Her
eyes flicked over the clean, designer lines of the condo before she shot him an
inscrutable look. “Why?”

“Because
apparently you need a keeper.”

“And
that’s you, is it? I thought you didn’t want a partner.”

“This
isn’t a partnership.”

“Then
what is it? A kidnapping? Oh goodie. Number twenty-six. I should have you punch
my frequent hostage card.”

“I’m
not going to keep you here against your will.” Though technically he could. She
was a super who’d broken the law. Having witnessed it, it was his duty as a
hero to contain her and bring her to the North Courthouse for booking. “You’ll be
lucky if Little Vic doesn’t press charges for tonight.”

“If
he does I’ll just be sure to hire the same lawyer who got him off for my
kidnapping. That seems fair.”

“Look,
I understand that you’re angry—” He took a step toward her, but she backpedaled,
arms still folded tight.

“Do
you? Gosh, that’s comforting. You
understand
. Well, that makes it all
better then. There’s some unknown asshole out there who’s been rewarding
lowlifes for kidnapping me for
years
without anyone ever investigating
it and he might still be after me and I’m completely on my own because no one
will help me find him, but hey, Frost understands so that’s okay. Yippee.”

“You
aren’t alone.”

“Oh?
Because you’re here, is that it?” She flung her arms out and the furniture
shuddered, though Frost didn’t think she was aware of the TK ripple that
buffeted his chest. “You don’t get to be the hero here, Frost. You left me. You
washed your hands of me. So stay gone, damn it! Stop jumping into my life and
making it impossible to get over you!”

He blinked,
suddenly not sure whether they were talking about recent events or ancient
history. “I had to—”

“You
chose to,” she cut him off, the words brutal and sharp. “You chose to ignore
what we both wanted so you could be the noble one. But you know what, Frost? Leaving
the woman you love
isn’t heroic
. It didn’t create some magic bubble
around me so nothing could ever touch me. I was just as vulnerable as ever and
you
weren’t there to protect me
. So, no, you don’t get to waltz into my life
now with your goddamn hero rules and your goddamn hero superiority and yell at
me for finally being able to protect myself.”

Chapter
Nine: The Ice Man Cometh

Frost
watched her, taking every shouted word without flinching, his expression as
frigidly controlled as ever, muscular arms folded beneath the soft grey hoodie.
“You finished?” he asked, his voice a rocky growl, when she ran out of steam.

Shit
. She hadn’t meant to say that. Hadn’t
meant to say half of it. But damn, it had felt good. All those things she’d
wanted to scream at him for years and she’d finally done it.
Take that,
Iceman
. It was amazing how much anger you could build up over five years of
might-have-beens. She hadn’t been aware of it burning a hole inside her until
she let it out. She felt cleaner, clearer, as if a two ton weight had been
lifted off her sternum and she could breathe again.

Was
she finished?

“Yes.
I think I am.”

“Good.”

He crossed
the room in two long strides, wrapped one hand around her nape, hauled her
forward and kissed her.

Oh
mercy.

The
contact exploded through her, melting her on a wave of lust from the lips down.
He hadn’t admitted he was wrong to leave her. He hadn’t sworn never to do it
again. Hell, he hadn’t even apologized for hurting her all those years ago, but
right now she didn’t care. All that mattered in this moment was his mouth
moving expertly over hers, his hand a brand of ownership at the back of her
neck, and the electric shock of achy rightness that streaked through her blood.

God,
I missed this
.

He
waited only long enough to make sure she was with him, kissing him back just as
hungrily, then he released her neck, gripping her jacket by both lapels and peeling
it back over her shoulders. It tangled around her arms, effectively handcuffing
her as the kiss stretched on, deepening and dragging her farther and farther
from rational thought. She struggled to free herself from the jacket, wanting
to be closer to him, to touch all that delicious muscle, but it seemed to have
twisted even more securely around her wrists. Frost cursed against her lips and
yanked at the knotted fabric as well—
not helping
.

How
many supers does it take to remove a jacket?
Kim barely stopped herself from laughing, not
wanting to shatter the gorgeous, searing intensity of the moment. But then she
realized Frost was shaking, his entire body trembling—Frost, who never showed
emotion, finally broke the kiss to drop his forehead onto her shoulder and let
loose a guffaw. Her own giggles escaped.

“I’ve
been defeated by a coat,” he grumbled adorably.

Crap.
She was a goner if even his grumbles were adorable. “It’s a pretty fierce
coat.”

He
snorted and lifted his head. He brushed her hair away from her face, something
strangely tender in his eyes. She didn’t want tender. She wasn’t ready for
tender. Not from him. Luckily, at that moment he was distracted by the way her
pinned arms thrust her breasts forward, arching her back. His gaze veered south,
those glacier blue eyes lighting lustfully. “This position does have
potential,” he murmured approvingly.

A
delicate trail of frost teased her overheated skin along the path of his gaze. Down
the column of her throat, over the knot of her clavicle and into the valley
between her breasts—just barely visible in the V of her button down shirt. Kim
shivered at the delicious sensation—both of his heated gaze and that cool
phantom touch—and flicked open another button on her shirt with her TK. Who
needed hands? A shimmy of her shoulders widened the gap as the shirt strained
over her swollen breasts.

He
hummed his approval, his hands gliding over her shoulders—but instead of going
where she wanted them, cupping her breasts or better yet stripping her to her
skin, they skated down her sides, missing all the good stuff and framing her
waist until his hand bumped up against the holster slung around her hips.

His
gaze finally dipped below the girls and he homed in on the gun belt with a
frown. “Is that a Taser?”

“I
call her Betty.”

“You
named your Taser. Of course you did.”

“She’s
very reliable.”

“And
yet you’ve still been kidnapped twenty-four times.”

“Twenty-five.
And don’t blame Betty. It isn’t her fault I’ve never really liked the idea of
frying someone first and asking questions later—especially since a super
strength Taser can kill a non-super person.”

His
frown grew even more ferocious. “How did you get a super strength Taser? You
need a permit and a sponsor to even buy one.”

“Justice
got it for me after kidnapping number five. It was sort of romantic, actually.”

Frost
growled, his hands tightening momentarily on her waist before he quickly stripped
off the gun belt and Taser. “New rule. No more talking about Justice. Especially
not in the context of romance.”

A
secret pleasure gathered in her stomach at his jealousy, but she bit back her
smile and just shrugged. Like magic, the movement released the knots of her
jacket and it slithered off her wrists to pool on the floor. Freed, Kim brought
her hands up to paint the muscles of Frost’s shoulders. He was bigger than he’d
been five years ago—the promise of a young man developing into the firm,
unyielding strength of a man in his prime. And damn if he wasn’t a prime
specimen.

Would
it hurt even more when he walked away this time?

Shit.
She almost drew
back her hands, her better judgment getting the better of her. How had they
even gotten here? One second she was screaming at him and the next this?
Bad
idea, Kim
.
Really bad idea
.

But
Frost chose that moment to bend his face next to hers, his lips brushing
against the shell of her ear as he whispered, “Damn, I’ve missed you.” And her best
intentions melted away.

He
caught her mouth again, quick, rough and perfect.

There
was no thought of putting on the brakes from that point on. Their clothes fell
away in a frenzy until she was in only her bra and panties and he in his
briefs. He lifted her then, his strong, dark hands framing her waist, and she
wrapped her arms and legs around him eagerly. His skin had that strange, tingling
coolness he’d once confessed he couldn’t control when he was turned on and the
contrast was insanely erotic against the burning flesh of her inner thighs, her
breasts, the insides of her arms where she clung to him. He shouldn’t have
seemed more alive, more searingly vital when he was iced like this, but damn if
it wasn’t the sexiest thing she’d ever felt. She arched her back so their
stomachs brushed and the jolt of sensual awareness that ripped through her was
almost enough to make her come right there.

They
were moving, crossing the apartment, and then she was falling back on a fluffy
duvet and he loomed over her from the side of the bed, his hands going to the
waistband of his briefs. She wet her lips and stretched for him against the
sheets, rubbing her thighs together as she unfastened her bra and flung it
aside. She ran her hands over her own curves, lifting and caressing them for
his hungry gaze.

He
drank in the sight of her, groaning her name in what could have been praise or
gratitude or just plain worship. Then he hurriedly shucked his drawers, his
erection rising in a proud curve toward his stomach, and Kim’s mouth went dry. Damn.
Her memory hadn’t embellished that.

She
reached for him and he tensed, but he didn’t pull away as she wrapped her hand
around his shaft. It was warmer than the rest of his skin, but still held that
unique coolness. Both of them stared at her pale hand, working slowly over his
dark, blood-flushed erection. Coming up on her knees, she bent to lick the head
into her mouth and his hands fisted hard in her hair. “
Fuck
, that’s
hot.”