Lupi move really fast when they want to.
She didn’t notice any buttons go flying, so maybe he’d unfastened her pants before sliding his hand inside. But then, she didn’t notice much at all except his fingers sliding, parting, moving. She forgot what she’d meant to do to him and grabbed onto his shoulders for balance—then, because her hands were right there, grabbed his head and pulled it down.
No more nibbling. This kiss was hot and deep, and she twisted against him, reveling in the flood of feeling. Wanting him to be flooded, too—to turn loose, pop the clutch, let go of that fearsome control he used and needed everywhere else in his life and go flying with her.
The flying buttons came from his shirt. It took her two tugs because he bought quality, and the thread didn’t break easily.
He laughed. His eyes were on fire and he laughed, full and delighted, and he jerked her tank up over her head and lowered his head and…
And she remembered something. “The door,” she said, as he traced a hot, wet path with his mouth along her collarbone and down.
“What door?” He hadn’t removed her bra. He didn’t let that stop him.
“The…ah, ah…” She had to pause and gulp in a breath. “The door to the bedroom. It’s open.”
He paused ever so briefly to glance that way. “But so very far away.” He resumed what he’d been doing.
Which was incredibly distracting, but she choked on a laugh and grabbed his head and said as firmly as she could, “Rule. The door.”
He flashed her a grin as impish and delighted as that of any little boy with a frog he meant to present to the girliest girl in class. He was thinking about making her forget the damn door, she knew it, and she wasn’t sure she’d be able to stop him, but the guards—they could hear too much. Even if they didn’t come out of their bedroom—and they wouldn’t. He’d sent them there and they wouldn’t come out until shift change, but even so—
“The door,” he agreed, and straightened and drew her hand to his lips again, but this kiss was placed softly on the back of her hand—a knight’s salute to his lady, not a seduction.
She used those few seconds to get rid of the bra and everything else, too. She might not be as fast as a lupus, but she was motivated.
He closed the damn door and turned and stopped, looking at her. “Sometimes,” he said softly, and stopped, then started again, “I often wonder why human men are so fixated on how a woman looks when there’s so much more to explore, and so many kinds of beauty—why obsess over one particular version? But sometimes, when I look at you, I understand.”
And sometimes, when he looked at her the way he was now, she was beautiful. Not just okay. Not even really pretty. Beautiful.
“And you’re mine.” He sounded smug as he slipped off the shirt she’d ripped open and reached for the zipper on his slacks. “Not theirs. Mine.”
That smugness made her want to laugh because it was so innocent. Possessiveness was a forbidden delight for lupi, not one Rule was used to, and most of the time he was wary about indulging in it.
“And you’re mine,” she agreed when he came to her, and she put her hands on his wonderfully bare shoulders while down lower another part of his body said hello to her stomach. “The Lady says so.”
“As do I.” He kissed her lightly…then again…and again…and they were gasping and clutching and stroking all the delicious bare skin they could find, and stumbling in mutual haste to the bed, and when he slid inside her she felt jolted by reality—felt suddenly twice as real as usual, brimming with more than sensation. Full. So full.
He started to move and reality shimmered, breaking up into shards of need and demand. Rule!
Here. He moved smooth and fast. I’m here, right here with you, nadia, my love, my Lily…
It may have been pure startlement that broke the connection—his or hers or both. Certainly it broke their rhythm. She stared up into his astonished face. “Well,” she said, and gripped his waist and pushed up against him. “Well, that’s interesting, but so’s this.”
He grinned and followed her lead.
LILY lay sprawled on her back amid a tangle of bedclothes and Rule, breathing hard and frowning at the lovely but too-bright chandelier. “That’s stupid.”
Rule turned his face on the pillow—how had he ended up with a pillow, and where was hers?—to smile at her. “What is?”
“Most hotels don’t have ceiling lights. Why does this one? And the switch is all the way over there by the door. Why didn’t they put a switch by the bed? Stupid.”
Rule looked up at the light. After a moment he nodded. “You’re right. It shows a sad lack of planning.” He paused. “I can wiggle my toes again, however, so I’m sure I’ll soon be up to the challenge of sitting. No doubt walking will be possible soon after that.”
She smiled and snuggled closer. No matter how enthusiastic the sex, Rule recovered quickly, and in every way. It was nice to think she’d wrecked him for a little while, though. “You heard me. Earlier, I mean.”
“And you heard me.”
He didn’t sound sure. She nodded. “Does that freak you out?”
“A little. And yet…it was lovely, too.”
She propped herself up on an elbow so she could see him. “I didn’t do it on purpose.”
He smiled and toyed with a strand of her hair. “That much I knew.”
Since Lily had discovered her capability for mindspeech and began the sessions with Sam, she’d accidentally mindspoken Rule a few times. The first time was right after she nearly died. The others had been more random, in perfectly ordinary situations, like when she’d been trying to reach a bowl he’d put on the top shelf in the kitchen and was annoyed because it was supposed to be on the second shelf, where she could get it. That time, she remembered, the communication had been along the lines of, “Why can’t you remember to put things where they belong?”
It had never happened during sex, and she’d never “heard” Rule in return.
Eavesdropping on him that way him was intrusive and freaky and just as he’d said. Quite lovely. “I forgot to tell you, but earlier this evening I thought I had a breakthrough. Drummond was talking at me during the briefing with Bergman, and I told him to shut up. I mindspoke it,” she added, to be clear. “And he heard me, and I did it again later.”
Rule’s brows pulled together. He didn’t speak.
That made her frown, too. “What?”
“It bothers me, that’s all. You and Drummond seem to be getting downright chummy.”
Disconcerted, she swallowed her first retort. “You’re jealous. Of Al Drummond.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
Someone here was being ridiculous. She didn’t think it was her. “I don’t even like him, Rule.”
“You never wear the necklace. You could keep him away, and you don’t. It’s not a matter of him being potentially useful. There’s something else going on. I don’t understand.”
“I don’t know if I do, either, except that he has nothing. Literally nothing and no one, not even a body. It’s not just that he can’t move so much as a paper clip. He can’t touch the paper clip. When I make it so he can’t manifest, he can’t even see it.”
“You feel sorry for him.”
Yeah, she did, and that was kind of weird, considering what Drummond had done. But it wasn’t the whole story. “Maybe it’s some random roll of the dice that got him tied to me. Maybe there’s actually someone in charge who did this on purpose. I don’t know, but either way, it’s up to me to do the right thing. I’m not sure what that is, but making it so he can’t see the damn paper clip can’t be right.”
Rule sifted a hand through her hair. “You’re trying to do the right thing. That I understand. But I can’t help thinking he’s using this tie. Using you. In life, Drummond was a betrayer. He betrayed you and the Bureau. Do you really think dying changed him that much?”