CONCEPTION (The Others) (39 page)

She opened her fingers. The delicate chain dropped to the
bed, clinking lightly before slithering to the floor with a metallic hiss. “But
not mine.”

Deuce didn’t move for a minute, but she felt his power
build, bear down on her. He was not happy. She turned in his embrace, falling
backward onto the bed. He was going to have to adjust. The mattress bounced as
he propped himself on his elbows above her.

“You will explain.”

More power reached out to her, subtly probing her resolve.
His brows drew low over his eyes, red lights swirled in the black depths. He
wanted her. Wanted this. She put her hands on his shoulders. His skin was hot
and hard beneath her fingers, his scent a potent lure, the throb of his cock
against the inside of her thigh a metronome for her own desire to the point
that she wasn’t fighting just him, but herself. Sometimes he was too incredibly
masculine for either of their good. “It can’t be like that between us, Deuce.”

His frown deepened. “Is it because you fear to be taken that
way?”

She closed her eyes, shook her head, counted to three and
then opened them.

He traced the blush on her chest, dragged his finger up over
her breast, and flicked the hard nub cresting the tip before wandering over her
collarbone to settle against the pulse in the hollow of her throat. “I would
understand.”

She wrapped her legs around his hips and linked her ankles,
straining to keep her breathing even as her core pulsed a welcome to his. “I’ll
love you, wear your ring, submit to you any way you need, but I won’t be chained
like a dog or otherwise treated with disrespect.”

He frowned. “There is no disrespect. It is common for Chosen
to love their mates this way. Chosen women enjoy the feeling of helplessness.”

“I have enough areas of my life where I’m helpless.” She touched
the frown between his brows, smoothing it with a stroke, hoping he’d understand
and whispered, “I just don’t want to feel that way with you.”

He caught her hand in his. His frown disappeared to be
replaced by an intensity that drew her in. She couldn’t look away from his gaze
as he brought their linked hands to the bed beside her head. “Then you will
not.”

She couldn’t believe it. “Just like that?”

The corner of his mouth twitched. “Just like that.”

A featherlight brush of his lips over hers kick-started her
arousal.

“You don’t…need that?”

Intensity faded to gentleness. “I need you.”

The second brush of his lips closed her right eye. The
third, her left. “If you raise your legs, I would love you now. As you wish. No
chains. No restraints. Just the pleasure of my body joining with yours.”

“Uhm, about that…”

He worked his arm under her thigh and raised her ankle to
his shoulder. “You will like it, Edie mine.”

“I’m prepared to.”

“But?”

“I think you’re being very optimistic about the fit,” she
pointed out as he lifted her other ankle to his shoulder as he stood straight,
his height pulling her hips off the bed, the width of his shoulders stretching
her inner thighs.

He leaned forward again, letting her legs slide down his
arms until they hung up at his elbows. His hands came down over hers, his
fingers threading through hers, locking them together. “I will bring you great
joy.”

She squeezed her fingers around his as he brought his shaft
into alignment with a shift of his hips. “I’m holding you to that.”

Her body had none of her mind’s caution, rejoicing in the
dark possession, fighting at first, and then accepting the foreign invasion.
Deuce pushed and she surrendered, her body gradually opening under the
insistence of his. She shook her head. It was too fast. Too much. She pushed at
his hands, using the resistance to steady her panic.

“Slow down.” She needed time to adjust. Her heartbeat
thundered in her ears, her breath rasped in her lungs, stealing her voice. She
closed her eyes as he pierced her that first inch. Pain and pleasure blossomed
together.

“Open your eyes, Edie mine.”

It was incredibly hard to do so.

“Look at me.”

His “I wish to see you as you accept my cock this time” sent
a shot of white-hot desire straight to her womb. Her muscles clamped down hard
on his shaft, squeezing and releasing, milking tiny spurts of pleasure from his
thick length. He moaned and she clamped down harder holding him so tightly she
could feel the echo of his heartbeat, slower than hers, but harder. Much
harder.

“Relax.”

His voice joined the wild rhythm strumming through her body,
the burning ache in her rear transcending pain to something more primitive,
more elemental, threading between her caution and her need, creating a quilt of
desire so complex that she couldn’t sort passion from pain, desire from fear.
She just knew she needed him to feel whole. All of him. As much as he could
give her for as long as he could.

“Love me, Deuce.”

“I do.” The burn dissipated to an ache as her body adjusted
to his size. “Better?”

“Yes.”

With a squeeze of his fingers, he freed his hand and bent
over her, his cock inching deeper as he did. “Good.”

Moist and hot, his tongue traced the whorl of her ear,
sending shivers down her spine. Shivers that promptly shattered into long,
streaking sparkles of delight. Sparkles that exploded like the Fourth of July
as he slipped his finger inside the hoop and tugged. She lunged upward as her
muscles surrendered in defeat and his cock head shot into her ass, yanking to a
stop as his knuckle pressed down into her engorged clit, the tension prolonging
the sharp stab of sensation, holding it centered on her core, giving her time
to get past the surprise, to the delight. Above her, Deuce continued his
assault, pressing steadily inward, not giving her time to adjust or protest,
keeping her in an agony of suspense, filling her with his passion until she
couldn’t tell where his left off and hers began.

“Push out, Edie.”

She did, but only because the strain on her clit was too
much. “Oh God, Deuce.” She wrapped her fingers around his wrist, digging her
nails in as the ring heated and vibrated. “I can’t take this.”

It hurt so much, but it wasn’t enough. None of it was
enough. She leaned forward as he pulled back, finding the searing bite of the
hoop instead of respite. She twisted against him as her womb clenched and her
pussy grasped at air. She was helpless, a prisoner to her own needs and the
desire he raised in her so effortlessly. He forged back in. Too fast. Too hard.
She couldn’t control it. She curled away into the mattress. He didn’t back off,
just kept coming, tugging the hoop, stroking her clitoris, keeping her pressed
between reality and threat. No matter what she did, she couldn’t escape the
desire winding tighter, coiling deeper. She held on, waiting for a reprieve,
needing it. When it came, it wasn’t what she expected. Deuce’s withdrawal
didn’t give her pleasure, just left her aching and empty with nowhere to go
with the emotion surging inside. She needed Deuce. His direction. His passion.
His power.

“Oh God, Deuce, I need you.”

He growled into her ear, “Where?”

She leaned forward into the ring, the symbolism in the
piercing catching on her passion and dragging it out into the open as she
answered, “In my ass. My pussy. Just you. Wherever you want.”

He released
the ring. The mattress dipped as he shifted his weight to the other side. “You
hunger.”

“Yes.” She did. So desperately. For him. His fingers
untangled from hers, trailing steadily up her arm, down over her breasts and
belly, following her curves until he came to the top of her mound. There he
lingered, playing in her damp curls, sliding his fingers between the hoop and
her flesh, cupping her intimately. Protectively.

“I have you.”

She needed more than his protection. She needed his
possession.

“I don’t want you to have me. I need you to take me. Make me
so much yours that I can’t see myself as anything else
but
yours.”

Against her cheek, she felt his smile. In her mind, she felt
his surprise and satisfaction. In her body, the hard thrust of his cock as he
gave her what she asked for. All of him, all the way, until there was nothing
between them except the strength of their love.

Chapter Twenty-One

Deuce awoke for the first time in his
six-hundred-fifty-eight years with a sense of pleasure. Exhausted from his
demands, Edie sprawled over him, her moist breath caressing his skin, one thigh
thrown over his, her arm stretched across his chest. As if she feared he would
disappear. In time, she would lose that fear. Until then, he would hold her as
close as she needed, for as long as she needed.

One of her wild curls tickled his chin. He caught it between
his fingers, rubbing the thick silken strands against each other. She was doing
better, responding properly to the rituals. Her cheeks were flushed and a small
smile curved the fullness of her lips. Beneath the fan of her lashes, faint
dark circles marred the perfection of her face. Those were his fault.

He’d meant to be easier with her, but she made it very
difficult to remember her frailty. As difficult as she made it for him to take
care of her properly. He could feel the soreness in her muscles, the rawness
between her legs. Everything in him demanded he soothe her pain, but he could
not. His little mate forbade it, claiming she liked the physical reminder of
what was between them.

He carefully pulled her into his shoulder, kissing the top
of her head. There was so little he could give her right now that he was unable
to deny her request, no matter how illogical. He eased her down onto the
pillows. The little smile that accompanied her sigh of satisfaction tugged an
answering one from within.

The Chosen were not prone to high emotion, but Edie made him
want to laugh and cry and roar with the pure male satisfaction of having her in
his arms, his bed. She snuggled her face into the palm of his hand in a purely
unconscious gesture. If this were any other time, he’d slide back into bed and
hold her while she slept, cherishing the peace she brought, but tonight there
was no time. Bohdan had risen, and the enemy was near.

* * * * *

He found Bohdan near the pass, a dark shadow in a darker
night. His energy was not what it should be, but not as erratic as when he’d
first risen. “It is good to see you.”

Bohdan glanced up from the young man he was feeding from. He
closed the wounds on his prey’s neck before letting him drop unceremoniously
into the snow. He inclined his head. “And to see you. Eden survived intact?”

“Yes.”

“You are mated?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

It was very good. Deuce motioned to the man sprawled in the
snow. “He was not to your liking?”

Bohdan didn’t spare the man a glance. “He is one of them.”

Deuce had known Bohdan was going to say that. The compound
was too remote for tourists and the winter too severe for recreational skiers.
“Did you get anything from him?”

His brother shook his head. “What he knows is the story they
have concocted.”

“Which is?”

“You kidnapped the woman and child. Lavery is simply trying
to get her back since the police have bungled the recovery. He has been hired
to accomplish that goal.”

“He is what they call a mercenary?”

“Yes.”

Deuce glanced at the man. He was not one of the men from
Eden’s memories. “I would not say a very good one.”

“Lavery would not want someone too smart involved. They
might ask questions.”

“I did not think mercenaries asked questions.”

Bohdan stepped away. “It would be a mistake to think all
humans lack honor.”

He knew that, but lately, it had been getting hard to
remember. “I know.”

Bohdan walked around the camp. “This pass is one of the few
alternate routes off the mountain.”

Deuce crossed to the small orange tent. He sliced through
the side and looked within. Supplies were meager. Only enough for a couple of
days.

“He was not planning on staying long.” Cold prickled up his spine
as he looked across the barren, snow-covered land. “One man could not hope to
block the pass.”

Bohdan motioned to the crushed communications device
attached to the man’s shoulder. “But he could serve as an alert.”

“In case a human woman and child chose to leave,” Deuce
finished the thought. A gust of wind blew Bohdan’s hair across his face. Deuce
reached in his pocket and handed his brother a leather tie.

“Thank you.” With the efficiency that marked everything
Bohdan did, he tied his hair back, the severe style highlighting the strain of
his ordeal. “Is your mate still planning on leaving?”

“I have convinced her of the benefits of staying.”

Bohdan raised a brow, the doubt in his expression a
reflection of what he’d felt previously in Eden. “You are sure?”

Deuce heard again Edie’s sweet cries, felt again her body’s
demands on his. She might be scared and uncertain, but she was trying. “Yes.”

“If they are not planning on her leaving voluntarily,”
Bohdan said as he leaned down to check the pulse of the human he’d fed on,
“they have something else in mind.”

If they were, they were doomed to failure. “They will not
breach the compound.”

Bohdan straightened. “You have given the alert?”

“Yes. Others and Chosen are prepared.”

Bohdan brushed off his hands and frowned. “It does not make
sense that they would try and take her from the compound. It is too heavily
guarded.”

“That occurred to me.” Deuce stepped back from the tent,
restraining the urge to deliver a death blow to the unconscious human lying
outside it. The Chosen did not kill without reason. “The Coalition is devious
and cunning, but never stupid.”