In breathless wonder, she said, “Holy shit, Luther.” She kept her eyes closed and she didn’t smile. “That rocked.”
Outside the wind whistled, but inside, warmth generated by their bodies, scented by their lust, filled the room. Need, satisfaction, rose up to glut Luther. Emotion permeated his soul. He stroked Gaby’s calf, over the arch of her foot.
He’d never really noticed before, but she had narrow feet with a delicate arch. Graceful feet—feet that could deliver a kick deadly in intent.
“Hey.” She remained still, her chest barely rising with her slow, even breaths. Luther kissed her ankle, just to get her attention. “You’re not going to sleep on me, are you?” He had a boner that demanded immediate attention. He would never rush her, but he hoped Gaby’s natural curiosity would see their relationship finally, fully, consummated.
“I’m not tired.”
Of course she wasn’t. Gaby never seemed to show the same weaknesses as others. “Then why so quiet?”
Her sigh was part repletion, part frustration. “Just thinking.”
That worried him. “About what?”
Capable hands rested loosely over her pale belly. Baby-fine, tangled hair fanned out behind her head. She shifted one shoulder and didn’t quite look at him. “About how much I detest cowards.”
She meant herself, and Luther knew it. As the need to reassure her crowded in, sexual urgency took a backseat.
For now.
But it wasn’t easy with her lying there nude, relaxed, soft and feminine. Using one finger, he drew a circle on her inner thigh. “People can’t help the things that scare them, Gaby.”
“Nothing scares you.”
His short, sharp laugh corrected her error. “Losing you terrifies me.” He bent and kissed her belly. “Too much.”
“I don’t know why.” She tangled her fingers in his hair and brought his head up so she could look him in the eyes. “I’m fucking pathetic.”
“No.”
“You don’t need me.”
“But I want you.” He thought about that, before adding, “And I do need you.” He pulled her fingers from his hair and, moving up and over her, pressed her hand above her head. The full-body contact almost stole his thoughts, but this was too important to sidestep. “You, Gabrielle Cody, are intriguing, and frustrating, and sometimes foolhardy. You’re an enigma, and an angel on earth.”
“An angel?” She made a rude sound—and stared at his mouth. “Sex must fuck with your head if you believe that crap.”
He hushed her with a quick, soft kiss. “You care more than anyone I’ve ever known. Despite what you do or how you do it—”
Her eyes narrowed, but she didn’t verify the many ways she served her unique brand of justice.
“—it’s always out of caring. I know that.”
With her free hand kneading his shoulder, she shifted under him. “There’s a world of difference between what you think you know, and the bloody truth.” Before he could reply to that, she wrapped her legs around him. “We’re naked, Luther.”
“Believe me, I’m well aware of that.” He caught her other wrist and brought that hand above her head, too. “I want to be inside you, Gaby.”
“I’m not stopping you.”
Tacit in her statement was the fact that she could stop him if she wanted to, and they both knew it. Gaby was more capable, more physical, than any person—male or female—that he knew.
Bypassing that truth, he kissed her again, light and easy and full of hunger. “Knowing it’ll be your first time, that you’ll only be with me, is making me nuts.” He drew in a big breath. “But I need to know that you’re okay now. It’s still storming—”
“Is it?”
Her teasing made him smile. It was so unique for her to show any lightness at all. She never laughed, never joked, and only at the rarest of times had he ever seen her smile.
That she’d tease now gave Luther hope for progress. “It is. And the way that it affects you breaks my damn heart.”
“I won’t whimper like a baby, if that’s what you’re worried about.” She pressed her hips up and gave a grudging truth. “Having you close blunts a lot of extraneous influences.”
Sometimes the things she said boggled his mind. But she’d said it before, crediting him with the power to soften the harshness of her life. “I’d love it if you told me exactly what that means.”
Her brows scrunched as she pondered her explanation. “It’s a little weird—but then everything about me is, right?” She didn’t give him a chance to correct or reassure her. “Somehow, Luther, you filter the call to duty, and in the process, my neuroses. They’re still there like a live beat inside my bloodstream, but your nearness keeps them tamped down and . . . manageable.”
Hope, and guilt, stirred in Luther’s heart. If he could give her any relief, he’d be thrilled. But at the same time he knew that what she did—and why—was important. The most important thing, at least to her.
“The calling, too?” Was he keeping her from tracking down a bloodthirsty psycho?
At the moment, did he care?
She gave a tentative tug on her wrists, and when he didn’t release her, she relaxed again, her expression lazy, cocky as only Gaby could be. “I can get free anytime I want, you know.”
Rather than acknowledge that claim, he said, “I would let you—if I thought getting free of me was what you really wanted.”
She considered that, and let it go. “He’s out there, Luther. A monster in our midst. A sickness of humanity. He’ll torture, bleed, and kill innocent people, again and again. He won’t care how they scream or beg. He enjoys that. Catching him won’t be easy.”
Luther sighed. In his line of work, he’d dealt with the criminally insane, and the just plain evil, many times. “It never is.”
“It’s easier if you don’t interfere with me doing my duty.”
Not her job, but her duty. How burdensome it must be to feel that the safety of others relied on how well you performed your duty—a duty that involved heinous, bloody deaths?
For him, it was different. He was a cop who took great pleasure in seeing justice served. But Gaby’s form of justice would never fly in a court of law.
She didn’t apprehend evildoers; she eradicated them.
Using that awesome blade, and miraculous speed, agility, and cunning, she wasted the bogeymen.
“I don’t want to get in your way, Gaby. I only want to help you.” And protect you, as much from yourself as from a society that would condemn you.
She tilted her head to study him. “Are you going to fuck me?”
Though he was used to her coarse language, Luther’s brain almost exploded. It was damned difficult, but he managed to say “No.”
Anger flashed in her eyes, and she started to pull away in earnest. “Jerk.”
He fought to hold her still. “I want to make love to you, Gaby.” A soft kiss to her pinched mouth stilled her struggles. “I’m going to show you that there’s a difference.”
Curiosity lit her eyes. “Yeah?” Her chin jutted. “Tell me, but do it fast. Having you like this makes me achy. Inside, I mean. I feel almost . . . liquid.” Some of the antagonism faded as she admitted, “I’m not used to this stuff yet.”
No, as a pariah to society, an outcast in her own mind, Gaby wasn’t used to any affection at all. In twenty-one years of life, she’d managed to isolate herself so thoroughly that she was by far the most innocent woman he knew.
Until very recently, Gaby had never allowed others to touch her: emotionally, mentally, physically.
Definitely not in sexual exploration.
But now, with him, her life was changing. Luther remembered when he first saw her, how something about her had struck him hard, laid him low, and drawn him to her irrevocably. After that meeting, he would never be the same.
And he planned to see to it that she wasn’t either.
Now he only had to ease Gaby into that reality.
With her pinned beneath him asking for sex, he was off to a good start.
It was so novel to see Gaby like this, sexually aroused, disgruntled with physical need. Her normal demeanor was balls-to-the-wall brazen, gutsy beyond common sense, so daring and determined that she risked her life without reserve.