"Because life can really suck."
– =O=-***-=O=-
Yes, Eve thought when she was alone again, she supposed it could. Hers certainly had for long stretches of time. Now she was living in a mansion with a man who, for some reason, loved her. She didn't always understand her life or the man who now shared it, but she was adjusting. So well, in fact, that she decided not to go bury herself in work, but to go outside, into the golden autumn evening and take an hour for herself.
She was used to streets and sidewalks, crowded sky-glides, jammed people movers. The sheer space Roarke could command always astonished her. His grounds were like a well-tended park, quiet and lush, with the foliage of rich man's trees in the dazzling flame of fall. The scents were of spicy flowers, the faintly smoky fragrance of October in the country.
Overhead, the sky was nearly empty of traffic, and even that was a dignified hum. No rumbling airbuses or lumbering tourist blimps over Roarke's land.
And the world she knew, and that knew her, was beyond the gates and over the walls, in the seamy dark.
Here she could forget that for a short time. Forget New York existed with its death and its anger – and its perpetually appealing arrogance. She needed the quiet and the air. As she walked over thick, green grass, she worried the ring with its odd symbols on her finger.
On the north side of the house was an arbor of thin, somehow fluid iron. The vines twisting and tumbling over it were smothered with flowers wildly red. She had married him there, in an old, traditional ceremony where vows were exchanged and promises made. A ceremony, she thought now. A rite that included music, flowers, witnesses, words that were repeated time after time, place after place, century through century.
And so, she thought, other ceremonies were preserved and repeated and believed to hold power. Back to Cain and Abel, she mused. One had planted crops, the other tended a flock. And both had offered sacrifice. One had been accepted, the other dismissed. Thus, she imagined, some would say good and evil were born. Because each needed the balance and challenge of the other.
So it continued. Science and logic disproved, but the rites continued, incense and chanting, offerings and the drinking of wine that symbolized blood.
And the sacrifice of the innocent.
Annoyed with herself, she rubbed her hands over her face. Philosophizing was foolish and useless. Murder had been done by human force. And it was human force that would dispense justice. That was, after all, the ultimate balance of good and evil.
She sat on the ground under the arbor of bloodred blossoms and drew in the burning scent of evening.
"This isn't usual for you." Roarke came up quietly behind her – so quietly, her heart gave a quick trip before he settled on the grass beside her. "Communing with nature?"
"Maybe I spent too much time inside today." She had to smile when he handed her one of the red flowers. She twirled it in her fingers, watched it spin before she looked over at him.
He was relaxed, his dark hair skimming his shoulders, as he leaned back on his elbows, legs stretched out, feet crossed at the ankles. She imagined his pricey and beautiful suit would pick up grass stains that would horrify Summerset. He smelled male, and expensive. Lust curled comfortably in her stomach.
"Successful day?" she asked.
"We'll have bread on the table another day or two."
She flicked her fingers at the ends of his hair. "It's not the money, is it? It's the making it."
"Oh, it's the money." His eyes laughed at her. "And the making it." In a quick move she told herself she should have seen coming, he reached up, cupped the back of her neck, and overbalanced her onto him and into a hot kiss.
"Hold on."
She didn't squirm quickly enough and ended up under him.
"I am."
His mouth fastened greedily on her throat and sent little licks of heat straight down her body to her toes.
"I want to talk to you."
"Okay, you talk while I get you out of these clothes. Still wearing your weapon," he observed as he hit the release for the harness. "Thinking of zapping some wildlife?"
"That's against city ordinance. Roarke." She caught his wrist as his hand closed sneakily over her breast. "I want to talk to you."
"I want to make love with you. Let's see who wins."
It should have infuriated her, the fact that he already had her shirt open and her breasts aching. Then his mouth closed over that sensitive flesh and had her eyes all but crossing in pleasure. Still, it wouldn't do to let him win too easily.
She let her body go limp, moaned, and combed her fingers through his hair, ran them over his shoulders. "Your jacket," she murmured and tugged at it. When he shifted to shrug free, she had him.
It was a basic tenet of hand-to-hand. Never lower your guard. She scissored, shoved, and pinned him with a knee to the crotch and an elbow to the throat.
"You're tricky." He calculated he could dislodge the elbow, but the knee… There were some things a man didn't care to risk. He kept his eyes on hers and slowly, carefully skimmed his fingertips up her bare torso, circled her breast. "I admire that in a woman."
"You're easy." His thumb brushed lightly over her nipple, quickening her breath. "I admire that in a man."
"Well, you've got me now." He unsnapped her waistband, teased her stomach muscles to quiver. "Be kind."
She grinned, levered her elbow away to brace her hands on either side of his head. "I don't think so." Lowering her head, she caught his mouth with hers.
She heard his breath suck in, felt his arms come around her, fingers digging in. His groan thundered through her pulse.
"Your knee," he managed.
"Hmm?" Lust was full-blown now and raging. She shifted lips and teeth to his throat.
"Your knee, darling." She moved to attack his ear and nearly unmanned him. "It's very effective."
"Oh, sorry." Snorting, she lowered her knee, lowered her body, and let him roll her over. "Forgot."
"A likely story. You may have caused permanent damage."
"Aw." With a wicked grin, she tugged open his trousers. "I bet we can make it all better."
His eyes went dark when she stroked him, stayed open and on hers when their lips met again. This kiss, surprisingly tender, twined that terrifyingly strong emotion with the easy lust.
The lower edges of the sky were as wildly red as the blossoms arching over them. The shadows were long and soft. She could hear birdsong and the whisper of air through the dying leaves. The touch of his hands on her was like a miracle, chasing away all the ugliness and pain of the world she walked in.
She didn't even know she needed to be soothed, he thought as he stroked, and he soothed, so that arousal was slow and warm and liquid. Perhaps neither had he, until they held like this, touched like this. The romance of the air, the light, the gradual surrender of a strong woman was gloriously seductive.
He eased into her, watching her face as the first orgasm rolled through her, feeling her body clench, shudder, go pliant as his fueled it and filled it.
She kept her eyes open, as fascinated by the intensity of his stare as the silvery ripples of sensation that pumped through her. She matched his pace, silky and smooth even as her breath tore. And when she saw those dark Celtic eyes cloud, go opaque, she framed his face with her hands, pulled his mouth to hers to savor his long, long groan of release.
When his body was ranged weightily over hers, his face buried in her hair, she wrapped her arms companionably around him. "I let you seduce me."
"Uh-huh."
"I didn't want to hurt your feelings."
"Thank you. You tolerated it all so stoically, too."
"It's the training. Cops have to be stoic."
He reached out, ran a hand over the grass, and plucked up her shield. "Your badge, Lieutenant."
She snickered, slapped him on the ass. "Get off me. You weigh a ton."
"Keep sweet-talking me, and God knows what could happen." Lazily, he rolled aside, noted that the sky had gone from cloudy blue to pearl gray. "I'm starving. You distracted me, and now it's well past dinnertime."