He moaned and started to move like a great wave on top of her, that thick, hard part of him stroking the inside of her.
"Oh, shit" He dropped his head into her neck. His rhythm intensified, his breath shooting out of him, rushing into her ear. "Bella shit, I'm scared but I can't stop"
With a groan he propped himself up on his arms and let his hips swing freely, each thrust nailing against her, pushing her farther up on the bed. She grabbed for his wrists to hold her body in place under the onslaught. As he pounded, she could feel herself getting near the edge again, and the faster he went, the closer she got.
Her orgasm slammed into her core, then raced throughout her body, the force of it stretching her out so she was infinitely long and infinitely wide. The sensations lasted forever, the contractions of her inner muscles grabbing onto the part of him that penetrated her.
When she was back in her own skin again, she realized he was unmoving, completely frozen above her. Blinking away tears, she looked into his face. The hard angles of it were tense, and so was the rest of his body.
"Did I hurt you?" he asked tightly. "You cried out. Loudly."
She touched his face. "Not from pain."
"Thank God." His shoulders eased as he exhaled. "I couldn't bear to hurt you like this."
He kissed her softly. And then he withdrew and got off the bed, yanking up the shorts as he went into the bathroom and closed the door.
Bella frowned. Had he finished? He'd seemed fully erect as he'd withdrawn.
She slid out of bed and looked down. When there was nothing on the inside of her thighs, she drew on the robe and went after him, not even bothering to knock.
Zsadist's arms were propped on the sink, his head hanging low. He was breathing uneasily and looked fevered, his skin slick, his stance unnaturally stiff.
"What, nalla," he said in a hoarse whisper.
She stopped, unsure she'd heard him right. But she had Beloved. He'd called her beloved.
"Why didn't you" She couldn't seem to gel the rest of the words out. "Why did you stop before you"
When he just shook his head, she went over to him and turned him around. Through the shorts she could see that his arousal was throbbing, painfully rigid. In fact, he looked as if his whole body ached.
"Let me ease you," she said, reaching for him.
He backed up against the marble wall between the shower and the sink. "No, don't Bella"
She gathered the robe in her hands and started to kneel down at his feet.
"No!" He dragged her up his body.
She met him right in the eye and went for his waistband. "Let me do this for you."
He grabbed her hands and squeezed her wrists until they hurt.
"I want to do this, Zsadist," she said with strength. "Let me take care of you."
There was a long silence, and she spent the time measuring the sorrow and the yearning and the fear in his eyes. A chill shot through her. She couldn't believe the leap of logic her mind was taking, but she had a really vivid impression that he'd never let himself orgasm before. Or was she just jumping to conclusions?
Whatever. It wasn't like she was about to ask him. He was teetering on the brink of bolting, and if she said or did the wrong thing, he was going to tear out of the room.
"Zsadist, I won't hurt you. And you can be in control. We'll stop if it doesn't feel right. You can trust me."
It was a long time before his grip loosened on her wrists. And then finally he let go and set her back from his body. Haltingly, he pulled down the shorts.
That arousal shot out into the space between them.
"Just hold on to it," he said with a cracked voice.
"You. I'll hold on to you."
When she wrapped her palms around him he let out a moan, and his head fell back. God, he was hard. Hard as iron, yet surrounded by skin soft as his lips.
"You're"
"Shh," he cut in. "No talking. I can't No talking."
He began to move in her grip. Slowly at first, and then with increasing urgency. He took her face in his hands and kissed her, and then his body completely took over with a wild pumping. He was going crazy, shooting higher and higher, his chest and hips so beautiful as he moved in that ancient male surging motion. Paster faster jerking back and forth
Except then he reached some kind of plateau. He was straining, the cords of his neck nearly breaking through his skin, his body covered with sweat. But he couldn't seem to let go.
He stopped, panting. "This isn't going to work."
"Just relax. Relax and let it happen"
"No. I need" He took one of her hands and placed it on the sac below his arousal. "Squeeze. Squeeze hard."
Bella's eyes flashed up to his face. "What? I don't want to hurt you"
He wrapped his hand around hers like a vise and twisted their grips until he cried out. Then he held her other wrist, keeping her palm against his erection.
She struggled against him, fighting to stop the pain he was inflicting on himself, but he was pumping again. And the harder she tried to pull away, the more he crushed her hand to that most tender place on a male. Her eyes went wide and unblinking at the pain of the act, the agony he must be
Zsadist shouted, his loud bark ricocheting around the marble until she was sure everyone in the mansion must have heard him. Then she felt the mighty jerks of his release, hot pulses dampening her hands and the front of her robe.
He sagged onto her shoulders, his massive body falling all over her. He was breathing like a freight train, his muscles quivering, his big body trembling with aftershocks. When he released his hand from hers, she had to peel her palm from his testicles.
Bella was cold to the bone as she bore the weight of him.
Something ugly had sprouted between them just now, some kind of sexual evil that blurred the distinction between pleasure and pain. And though it made her cruel, she wanted to get away from him. She wanted to run from the cringing awareness that she had hurt him because he'd made her and he had orgasmed because of it.
Except then his breath caught on a sob. Or at least seemed to.
She held her breath, listening. The soft sound came again, and she felt his shoulders quake.
Oh, my God. He was crying
She wrapped her arms around him, reminding herself that he hadn't asked to be tortured as he'd been. Nor had he volunteered for the aftereffects.
She tried to lift his head to kiss him, but he fought against her, drawing her close, hiding in her hair. She cradled him, holding him and soothing him as he struggled to mask the fact that he wept. Eventually he pulled back and scrubbed his face with his palms. He refused to meet her eyes as he reached over and turned the shower on.
With a quick yank he stripped the robe from her body, then wadded it up and threw it into the trash.
"Wait, I like that robe"
"I'll buy you a new one."
He urged her under the water. When she fought him he picked her up easily, put her in the spray, and began to soap her hands with undisguised panic.
"Zsadist, stop it." She pulled away, but he caught her. "I'm not dirtyZsadist, stop. I don't need to be cleaned because you"
He closed his eyes. "Please I have to do this. I can't leave you all covered with that stuff."
"Zsadist," she snapped. "Look at me." When he did, she said, "This is not necessary."
"I don't know what else to do."
"Come back to bed with me." She shut off the water. "Hold me. Let me hold you. That's the only thing you need to do."
And frankly, she needed it, too. She was rattled to the core.
She put a towel around herself and pulled him into the bedroom. When they were under the covers together, she curled herself around him, but she was as stiff as he was. She'd thought proximity would help. It didn't.
After a long while his voice came through the darkness. "If I had known how it had to be, I never would have allowed that to happen."
She turned her face up to his. "Was that the first time you ever came?"
The silence wasn't a surprise. That he eventually answered her was.
"Yeah."
"You've never pleasured yourself?" she whispered, even though she knew the answer. God What those years as a blood slave must have been like. All that abuse She wanted to weep for him but knew he would feel awkward about it.
He exhaled. "I don't like to touch it at all. Frankly, I hate the fact that it was inside of you. I want you to be in a tub right now, surrounded by bleach."
"I loved being with you. I'm glad we laid together." It was only what had come later that she'd had difficulty with. "But about what happened in the bathroom"
"I don't want you to be a part of that. I don't want you doing that to me so I do that all over you."
"I liked giving you an orgasm. It's just I care for you too much to hurt you. Maybe we could try"
He pulled away. "I'm sorry I have to I'm going to V's. I've got some work to do."
She grabbed his arm. "What if I told you I thought you were beautiful?"
"I'd say you were riding a pity wave and it would piss me off."
"I'm not feeling sorry for you. I wish you'd finished inside of me, and I think you're gorgeous when you're aroused. You're thick and long, and I was dying to touch you. I still am. And I want to take you in my mouth. How about that?"
He shrugged out of her hold and got to his feet. With quick, jabbing motions, he got dressed. "If you need to cast that sex in a different light so you can deal with it, that's fine. But you're lying to yourself right now. In no time at all you're going to wake up to the fact that you're still a female of worth. And then you're going to regret the shit out of laying with me."
"I will not."
"Wait for it."
He was out the door before she could find the proper words to throw back at him.
Bella crossed her arms over her chest and seethed with frustration. Then she kicked off the covers. Damn, but it was hot in this room. Or maybe she was so worked up, she'd screwed with her internal chemistry.
Unable to stay in bed, she dressed and went down the hall of statues. She didn't care where she ended up; she just had to get out and walk off some of this heat.
CHAPTER 28
Zsadist stopped in the underground tunnel, halfway between the main house and Vishous and Butch's place.
When he looked behind himself there was nothing but a row of ceiling lights. In front of him there was more of the same, a strip of glowing patches that went on and on. The door he'd entered from and the door he would exit out of were both unseen to him.
Well, wasn't this a perfect fucking metaphor for life.
He settled against the steel wall of the tunnel, feeling trapped in spite of the fact that he was held by nothing and no one.
Oh, but that was bullshit. Bella was trapping him. Chaining him. Tying him up with her beautiful body and her kind heart and that misplaced chimera of love that glowed in her sapphire eyes. Trapped He was so trapped.
With a sudden shift, his mind latched onto the night Phury finally got him away from the slavery.
When the Mistress had shown up with yet another male, the slave had been disinterested. After ten decades the eyes of other males no longer bothered him, and the rapes and the invasions had no new horrors to teach him. His existence was an even-keeled stretch of hell, the only real torture resting in the infinite nature of his captivity.
But then he'd sensed something odd. Something different. He'd turned his head and looked at the stranger. His first thought was that the male was huge and dressed with expense, so he had to be a warrior. His next was that the yellow eyes staring at him held a shocking misery. Verily, the stranger standing in the doorway had paled until his skin was waxy.
When the smell of the salve assaulted the slave's nose, he went back to looking at the ceiling, uninterested in what would happen next. Yet as his manhood was manipulated, a wave of emotion surged in the room. He looked back to the male who was standing just inside the cell. The slave frowned. The warrior was reaching for a dagger and looking at the Mistress as if he were going to kill
The other door burst open and one of the courtmen spoke with panic. Suddenly the cell was filled with guards and weapons and anger. The Mistress was grabbed roughly by the male at the front of the group and slapped so hard she hit the stone wall. Then the male went for the slave, unsheathing a knife. The slave screamed as he saw the blade come at his face. A searing pain cut through his forehead and nose and cheek; then blackness claimed him.
When the slave came to consciousness, he was hanging by his neck, the weight of his arms and legs and torso choking the life right out of him. His mental reappearance was as if his body knew his last breath was coming and had awoken him on the off chance his brain could help. A sorry attempt at rescue, he thought.
Dear Virgin, shouldn't he feel pain? And he wondered if he had been splashed with water, for his skin was wet. Then he realized something thick was dripping into his eyes. His blood. He was covered in his own blood.
And what was all that noise around him? Swords? Fighting?
While choking he lifted his eyes, and for a split second all manner of suffocation left him. The sea. He was looking out at the vast sea. Joy soared for a moment and then his vision swam from lack of air. His lids flickered and he sagged, though he was grateful that he'd seen the ocean once more before he died. He pondered vaguely whether the Fade would be anything like that vast horizon, an infinite expanse that was both unknowable and a home.
Just as he saw a shining white light before him, the pressure at his throat ceased and his body was handled roughly. There were shouts and jerky movements, then a jarring, bouncing ride that ended abruptly. Along the way, agony bloomed all over him, rushing into his bones, beating at him with dull, pounding fists.
Two shots from a gun. Grunts of pain that were not his own. And then a scream and a blast of wind on his back. Falling he was in the air, falling
Oh, God, the ocean. Panic spread through him. The salt
He felt the hard cushion of the water for only a moment before the sensation of the sea hitting his raw skin overloaded his mind. He blacked out.
When he came to once more, his body was nothing more than a loose sack holding in aches. He realized dimly that he was freezing cold on one side, moderately warm on the other, and he moved to see if he could. As soon as he did, he felt the warmth against him shift in response He was in an embrace. A male was against the back of him.
The slave shoved the hard body away from his own and dragged himself through the dirt. His blurry vision showed him the way, pulling a boulder out of the blackness, giving him something to hide behind. When he was sheltered he breathed through the discomfort of his vitals, smelling the brine of the sea and the wretched decay of dead fish.
And as well a tinny scent. A sharp, tinny
He peered around the edge of the rock. Though his eyes were weak, he was able to pick out the form of the male who had come into the cell with the Mistress. The warrior was sitting up against the wall now, his long hair hanging in strings down his thick shoulders. His fancy clothes were torn, and his yellow stare aglow with sorrow.
That was the other smell, the slave thought. That sad emotion the male was feeling had a scent.
As the slave sniffed again he felt an odd pulling in his face, and he lifted his fingertips up to his cheek. There was a groove, a rigid line in his skin He followed it up to his forehead. Then down to his lip. And remembered the knife blade coming at him. Remembered screaming as it cut.
The slave started to shiver and wrapped his arms around himself.
"We should warm each other," the warrior said. "Truly, that is all I was doing. I have no designs upon you. I would but ease you if I could."
Except all the Mistress's males had wanted to be with the slave. That was why she brought them. She liked to watch, too
Yet then the slave remembered the warrior raising that dagger, looking as if he were going to gut the Mistress like a pig.
The slave opened his mouth and asked hoarsely, "Who are you, sire?"
His mouth didn't work as it had before, and his words were garbled. He tried again, but the warrior cut him off.
"I heard your inquiry." The tinny smell of sadness got stronger until it overrode even the fishy stench. "I am Phury. I am your brother."
"Nay." The slave shook his head. "Verily, I have no family. Sire."
"No, I'm not" The male cleared his throat. "I am not sire to you. And you have always had a family. You were taken from us. I have searched for you for a century."
"I fear you wrong."
The warrior shifted as if he were going to get up, and the slave jerked back, dropping his eyes and covering his head with his arms. He couldn't bear to be beaten again, even if he deserved it for his insubordination.
Quickly, he said in his now messy way, "I mean not to offend, sire. I offer only my respect to your better station."
"Sweet Virgin above." A strangled noise came from across the cave. "I will not strike you. You are safe With me, you are safe. You are found, my brother."
The slave shook his head again, unable to hear any of it, because he suddenly realized what was going to happen at nightfall, what had to happen. He was the property of the Mistress, which meant he would have to be given back.
"I beg of you," he moaned, "do not return me unto her. Kill me now Do not render me returned to her."
"I shall kill us both before I allow you to tarry there once more."
The slave looked up. The warrior's yellow eyes were burning through the darkness.
The slave stared into the glow for a passing time. And then he remembered, long, long ago, when he'd first awoken from his transition in capture. The Mistress had told him she loved his eyeshis canary yellow eyes.
Among his species, there were very few with irises of bright gold.
The words and the actions of the warrior began to penetrate. Why ever would a stranger fight to get him free?
The warrior shifted, winced, and picked up one of his thighs.
The male's lower leg was gone.
The slave's eyes grew wide at the lost limb. How had the warrior saved them both in the water with that injury? He must have struggled simply to keep himself afloat. Why had he not just let the slave go?
Only a blood tie could engender that kind of selflessness.
"You are my brother?" the slave mumbled through his ruined lip. "Verily, I am blood to you?"
"Aye. I am your twin."
The slave started to shake. "Untruth."
"Truth."
A curious dread set upon the slave, chilling him. He curled up into himself in spite of the raw flesh that covered him from head to foot. It had never occurred to him that he was other than a slave, that he might have had a chance to live differently live as a male, not as property.
The slave rocked back and forth in the dirt. When he stopped, he looked once again at the warrior. What of his family? Why had this happened? Who was he? And
"Do you know if I had a name?" the slave whispered. "Was I ever given a name?"
The warrior drew a ragged breath, as if every one of his ribs were broken.
"Your name is Zsadist." The warrior's breathing shortened and shortened until he choked out his words. "You are the son of Ahgony, a great warrior. You are the beloved of our mother, Naseen."
The warrior let out a wretched sob and dropped his head into his hands.
While he wept, the slave watched.
Zsadist shook his head, remembering those silent hours that had followed. Phury and he had spent most of the time just staring at each other. They'd both been in rough shape, but Phury was the stronger of them even with his missing limb. He'd gathered driftwood and strands of seaweed and cobbled the stuff together into a rickety, unreliable raft. When the sun had gone down they had dragged themselves into the ocean and had floated down the coastline to freedom.
Freedom.
Yeah, right. He wasn't free; never had been. Those lost years had stayed with him, the anger over what he'd been cheated of and what had been done to him more alive than he was.
He heard Bella saying that she loved him. And he wanted to scream at something.
Instead, he started for the Pit. He had nothing worthy of her except his vengeance, so he was damn well going to get back to work. He would see all the lessers crushed before him, stacked in the snow like logs, a testament to the only thing he could offer her.
And as for the one who had taken her, the one who had hurt her, there was a special death waiting for him. Z had no love to give anyone. But the hatred he had he would channel for Bella until the last breath left his lungs.
CHAPTER 29
Phury lit a blunt and eyed the sixteen cans of Aqua Net that were lined up on Butch and V's coffee table. "What's doing with the hair spray? You boys going drag on us?"
Butch held up the length of PVC pipe he was punching a hole in. "Potato launcher, my man. Big fun."
"Excuse me?"
"Didn't you ever go to summer camp?"
"Basket weaving and woodcarving are for humans. No offense, but we have better things to teach our youngs."
"Ha! You haven't lived until you've gone on a midnight panty raid. Anyway, you put the potato in this end, you fill up the bottom with spray"
"And then you light it," V cut in from his bedroom. He came out in a robe, rubbing a towel on his wet hair. "Makes a great noise."
"Great noise," Butch echoed.
Phury looked at his brother. "V, you've done this before?"
"Yeah, last night. But the launcher jammed up."
Butch cursed. "Potato was too big. Damn Idaho bakers. We're leading with red skins tonight. It's going to be great. Of course, trajectory can be a bitch"
"But it's really just like golf," V said, dropping the towel across a chair. He pulled a glove over his right hand, covering the sacred tattoos that marked the thing from palm to fingertip and all across the back. "I mean, you gotta think of your arc in the air"
Butch nodded up a storm. "Yeah, it's just like golf. Wind plays a big role"
"Huge."
Phury smoked along as they finished each other's sentences for another couple minutes. After a while he felt compelled to mention, "The two of you are spending way too much time together, you feel me?"
V shook his head at the cop. "The brother has no appreciation for this kind of thing. Never has."
"Then we aim for his room."
"True that. And it faces the garden"
"So we don't have to work around the cars in the courtyard. Excellent."
The door from the tunnel swung open, and all three of them turned around.
Zsadist was in the doorway and Bella's scent was all over him. Along with the sultry spice of sex. As well as the faintest hint of the bonding mark.
Phury stiffened and took a deep drag. Oh, God They'd been together.
Man, the urge to race up to the house and check that she was still breathing was nearly irresistible. So was the desire to rub his chest until the aching hole in it disappeared.
His twin had had the very thing Phury was yearning for.
"Has that SUV moved?" Z said to Vishous.
V went around to the computers and punched a few keys. "Nope."
"Show me."
As Zsadist walked over and bent down, V pointed at a screen. "There it is. If it hits the road, I can track the path."
"Do you know how to break into one of those Explorers without setting off the alarm?"
"Please. It's just a car. If it's still there at nightfall, I'll get you in like Flynn."
Z straightened. "I need a new phone."
Vishous opened a desk drawer, took one out, and double-checked it. "You're good to go. I'll text-message everyone your new number."
"Call me if that thing moves."
As Zsadist turned his back on them, Phury took another drag and held the breath in tight. The door to the tunnel shut solidly.
Without even realizing what he was doing, Phury stabbed out the hand-rolled and went after his twin.
In the tunnel, Z halted when he heard another set of footsteps. As the male pivoted around, the light overhead picked out the hollows under his cheekbones and the blunt cut of his jaw and the line of the scar.
"What?" he asked, his deep voice echoing. Then he frowned. "Let me guess. This is about Bella."
Phury stopped. "Maybe."
"Definitely." Z's eyes flicked downward and stayed on the tunnel's floor. "You can smell her on me, can't you."
In the long silence between them, Phury wished desperately that he had a blunt between his lips.
"I just need to know is she all right after you laid with her?"
Z crossed his arms over his chest. "Yeah. And don't worry, she's not going to want to do that again."
OK God. "Why?"
"I made her" Z's distorted lip thinned. "Whatever."
"What? What did you do?"
"I made her hurt me." As Phury recoiled, Z laughed with a low, sad sound. "Yeah, you don't need to get all protective. She's not coming near me again."
"How What happened?"
"UAH-Hugh, right. Let me count all the ways you and I aren't going there."
Suddenly, without any warning, Z focused on Phury's face. The force of the stare was a surprise, because the male rarely looked anyone in the eye. "Straight up, my brother, I know how you're feeling her and I ah, I hope that when things cool out a little, maybe you can be with her or something."
Was he insane? Phury thought. Was he fucking insane?
"How the hell would that work, Z? You've bonded with her."
Zsadist rubbed his skull trim. "Not really."
"Bullshit."
"It doesn't matter, how about that? Pretty damn soon she's going to snap out of this post-traumatic whatever she's got going on and she's going to want someone real."
Phury shook his head, knowing damn well that a bonded male didn't give up his feelings for his female. Not unless he died.
"Z, you're crazy. How can you say you want me to be with her? It'll kill you."
Zsadist's face changed and the expression was a shocker. Such sorrow, Phury thought. Of a depth that seemed impossible.
And then the male came forward. Phury braced himself for God, he had no idea what was coming at him.
When Z's hand lifted, it was not in anger or with violence. And as Phury felt his twin's palm land lightly on his face, he couldn't remember the last time Z had touched him with any gentleness. Or touched him at all.
Zsadist's voice was low and quiet as his thumb went back and forth on an unmarred cheek.
"You are the male I might have been. You are the potential I had and lost. You are the honor and the strength and the kindness she needs. You'll take care of her. I want you to take care of her." Zsadist dropped his hand. "It will be a good mating for her. With you as her hellren, she can hold her head up high. She can be proud to be seen with you at her side. She'll be socially invincible. The glymera won't be able to touch her."
Temptation swirled and condensed and became instinct in Phury. But what about his twin?
"Oh, God Z. How could you stomach the idea that I was with her?"
Instantly all the softness was gone. "Whether it's you or someone else, the pain is the same. Besides, you think I'm not used to hurting?" Z's lips curled into a nasty little smile. "For me, it's home sweet home, my brother."
Phury thought of Bella and how she'd refused his vein. "But don't you think she gets a vote in all this?"
"She'll see the light. She's not stupid. Not by a long shot." Z turned away and started walking. Then he stopped. Without looking back he said, "There's another reason I want you to have her."
"Is this one going to make sense?"
"You should be happy." Phury stopped breathing while Zsadist murmured, "You live less than half a life. You always have. She would care for you, and that that would be good. I would like that for you."