Vasic ran the pad of his thumb over her lower lip. “We’re in the desert,” he said, and dipped his head again.
When he licked his tongue over hers, she licked back. She had no idea if they were doing this “right,” but oh, it felt goooood. Sex was the best hobby, she decided, as Vasic began to lave his tongue over her collarbone after nudging aside the strap of her camisole. “I want to do that.” She tugged at the raw silk of his hair.
He grazed the ball of her shoulder with his teeth. “Later.”
Brain hazy at best, she decided she could wait her turn since his turn was making her blood transform to honey . . . until an icy chill penetrated her back. “Vasic!”
Lifting his head, he said, “Alaska,” and then they were back in her bed, his hands braced on either side of her and his gorgeous chest rising and falling in harsh breaths above her.
She went to touch him, caught the shake of his head. It took almost a minute for her brain cells to start working again. “So,” she gasped. “Slight technical glitch.”
Silver-frost eyes locked with hers. A heartbeat later, they were kissing again, wet and hot and so good . . . until Ivy yelped, the earth hard and cold beneath her thinly clad form. At least it wasn’t snow, she thought, looking around at the tall green grasses that created a cocoon around them. Then the first fat droplet of rain hit Vasic’s naked shoulder.
The bed was below her the next second, the air warm.
Pushing away, Vasic fell onto his back beside her, his gauntleted arm above his head. She rose on her elbow, and though it took teeth-gritting control, didn’t immediately pounce on the beautiful, beautiful man in bed with her. The one who’d just kissed and nibbled on her like she was the most delicious thing he’d ever tasted.
He could devour her as often as he liked.
“What about you?” A piercing gray-eyed glance. “Your shields?”
Not shifting her gaze from her very private, very gorgeous view, Ivy accessed her empathic senses. “My abilities seem heightened, but I’m not reading you, not consciously.” She bit her kiss-swollen lower lip. “I suppose I could’ve been doing it subconsciously, but if I was, I was too in the moment to know it.”
“I don’t mind, Ivy,” he said, clearly hearing her worry. “It’s not as if my desires were unclear.” He ran one hand over the erection pushing at his jeans.
Ivy’s mouth dried up, her eyes locked on that spot even after he dropped his hand aside. “Why,” she said, voice hoarse, “is that so erotic?”
“Is it?” His gaze dipped. “Touch one of your nipples for me.”
As breathless as if she’d been running, Ivy lifted her hand, blushed, but bracketed the tight, pouting tip between her fingertips through the camisole. It was her own body, and she’d touched it thousands of times as she showered and dressed, but this time it was different—because Vasic was watching her, his eyes heavy-lidded.
Turning her lips inward to lick them wet, she rolled the taut nub between her fingertips . . . and almost fell when the bed turned to sand, her hand dropping to dig into the porous softness. The displacement only lasted a second, then the mattress was firm beneath them once more.
“Verdict?” she asked, playing her finger through a tiny river of sand caught in the sheet.
“Highly erotic.” Vasic reached down to undo the top button of his jeans, lower the zipper a fraction.
Ivy whimpered when he stopped. “That’s not going to ease the pressure,” she said, her breasts pushing against the delicate fabric of the camisole.
Reaching out, Vasic just barely brushed the back of his hand over her swollen flesh. It shot a bolt of intense sensation right to her core, her panties beyond damp. Rubbing her thighs together only made the frustration worse. “The desert’s nice,” she began in a cajoling tone, creeping her hand toward him. “We—”
“Will probably end up in a Siberian prison the next time.” Gripping her hand on that dark warning, he returned it to her side of the invisible line in the bed. “Do you know what I want?”
Ivy ran her foot over his jean-clad leg. “What?”
“To watch you touch yourself between your thighs as you tug on your nipples,” he said, the frank sexual request ratcheting up her need to a fever, “but we’ll have to wait until I have the ‘slight technical glitch’”—a silver-eyed glance, his thumb stroking over her lip—“under control.”
Ivy bit at the firm flesh, frustrated and playful both. “Your voice should be illegal.” Sucking at his thumb when he didn’t immediately withdraw it, she saw his lashes come down, his breathing alter . . . and sand all around them.
To her toe-curling delight, though he broke the intimate contact after they were back in the apartment, he began to twine one of her curls loosely around his finger. “I hope you really do like the desert. Because it looks like we’ll be visiting it on a regular basis.”
She giggled and snuggled a tiny bit closer. “I do.”
“I have one advantage over other Tks.” His abdomen flexed under her touch, but he didn’t tell her to keep her distance this time. “My primary power is teleportation, and it appears that’s what my brain defaults to when I lose control—otherwise, I might cause serious damage.”
Ivy thought of the sand, the snow, the grasses. “Well, as long as your brain picks isolated locations, I don’t care.” All she cared about was being with him. “Though,” she teased, “I think you should be on the bottom next time.”
“We’ll negotiate that after I can keep us in one place.”
Ivy drew a design on his abdomen, her head nicely cushioned on his shoulder. “The places we went, you recognized them in a glance.”
“They were all locations I choose to go to when I’m not on assignment.” Releasing her hair, he tumbled her onto her back again, his expression altering to the cool remoteness she knew so well, but his hand, it gently collared her throat. “Are you sure, Ivy?”
It was a potent, quiet question, one for which she didn’t need an explanation. “Yes,” she answered without hesitation. “I’m sure.”
Vasic nodded and returned them to their former positions, Ivy cradled against his chest. She released a shuddering breath. She was where she was meant to be, and she would fight to hold on to the wild beauty of it with everything she had.
“Woof!” Scrabbling paws, then a small weight jumping onto the bed.
“Rabbit,” she chastised with a laugh.
Padding over, he looked at how she lay in Vasic’s arms, huffed, then curled up on Vasic’s other side. It made her smile. “I like that you two are friends now.”
Vasic said nothing, but he cupped the back of her head with one hand and rubbed Rabbit’s back with the other, the black sheen of his gauntlet gleaming in the light. It was a moment as perfect as it was heartbreaking.
Chapter 41
Silent Voices continues to be anything but silent. The Ruling Coalition has not yet made a public statement regarding their demands. More importantly, neither has Kaleb Krychek.PsyNet Beacon DEMOCRACY, AS THE humans understood it, didn’t work in the PsyNet. It was populated by too many powerful minds that could careen out of control if not kept in strict check—which meant the people at the helm had to be ruthless and powerful themselves. Orders were given and followed, any revolt dealt with quickly and quietly before it could impact the Net.
Which was why Kaleb found it surprising that he was about to have a meeting with the woman behind the formation of Silent Voices.
You know how to be charming, Sahara ’pathed as he teleported into the woman’s home. Charm. Smile. Don’t make this a clash but a discussion.