Keep Me Close (Lazarus Rising Book 2)

  He kissed her neck again. Feathered soft kisses against her skin. He wished her could take away all her pain.

  And only leave pleasure in its place.

  He kissed his way down her body, caressing her collar bone, pressing his lips to her sweet skin. Her nipples were tight, thrusting up toward him, and he teased them first with his fingertips and then with his mouth. Her heart beat faster, her breathing quickened, and still he used care with her. Teasing, stroking, licking her.

  His dick shoved against the front of his jeans. Desire pounded through him, but he didn’t let his control so much as crack.

  His hands stroked down her body. Her thighs opened for him, and he just…stared at her a moment. “You are so beautiful.”

  Soft skin. Silken woman. He moved on the bed, positioning himself between her spread legs. His fingers trailed up her thigh, and Cecelia quivered beneath his touch.

  He checked her gaze, making sure she was still with him, one hundred percent. “Is this good?”

  Cecelia nodded.

  His fingers slid into her sex. She was wet. Hot. He stroked into her, then out, and his thumb pushed over her clit. She’d liked it when he did that before, and she seemed to like it then, too. “Okay?” Flynn pushed. “Good?”

  She was biting her lip. Fisting the sheets. She nodded as her head tipped back.

  He loved tasting her. Did she know that? When his tongue slid over her skin, when her rich flavor filled his mouth, he got turned on even more. So fucking much. He could sample her forever.

  His mouth pressed to her sex. She gasped at the first lick of his tongue. He pushed his fingers into her as his mouth worked against her core. Her hips arched up, high and eager, toward his mouth. He gave her what she needed. He took what he wanted.

  He felt it when she came, a hard jerk of her body against his mouth, and he could have sworn that he tasted her pleasure. His mouth kept gliding over her, not driving her to a fever pitch now, but softer, tender, soothing her.

  Her fingers slid over his shoulders. His head lifted, and he stared at her.

  So freaking gorgeous.

  “What about…y-you?”

  “You weren’t supposed to talk, baby.” He was doing something new. Something he hadn’t done since Lazarus. He was taking care of someone else. Putting her first.

  Had he been a selfish bastard before Lazarus? Flynn didn’t know. He had no clue what type of man he’d been before he woke from the dead, but he knew what—who—he wanted to be now.

  He wanted to be the kind of man that Cecelia could love.

  “Just you,” he said. “Just for you.” He slid up into the bed beside her. He’d kicked off his shoes—hell, he didn’t even remember when he’d done that—but he still had on his jeans and shirt. The jeans would stay on. His dick felt like lead in his jeans, and if those jeans came off…

  This is only for her.

  Flynn pulled the covers up, and he wrapped his arms around Cecelia. She was soft and warm against him.

  “You’re safe,” he told her.

  Flynn just…held her. Held her until her breathing eased and her body grew limp. Held her until he knew sleep had claimed her.

  Then he stared up at the ceiling, comfortable in the darkness.

  And he plotted just how he was going to murder Bryce King.

  ***

  “What happened tonight?” Willow asked. Her voice, as always, was devoid of emotion. More often than not, the woman seemed like a robot to Bryce.

  Not that he really gave a shit about her feelings. He could make her feel anything he wanted. He could make anyone feel what he wanted.

  He gazed down at the city below him. They were on the rooftop of an abandoned warehouse, far from prying eyes. The city stretched in the dark. So many lights. So many lives.

  “Talk to me,” she ordered.

  Ah, yes, Willow wasn’t as good at the telepathic communication as he was. Probably because she hadn’t honed her talents the way he had. Back when he’d been at Lazarus, stuck with the other test subjects, they’d spent hours and hours communicating telepathically with each other.

  Sometimes, he missed the bond they’d seemed to form.

  Other times…

  Well, he just wanted to hunt down his old team-mates and gut them. Especially Flynn Haddox. The bastard had tried to take something important from Bryce. You tried to take Cecelia.

  “You met another member of Project Lazarus.” He turned to glance at Willow. “And he tried to kill us both. Hardly surprising.”

  She wrapped her arms around her waist.

  “I’m not like him,” Bryce told her softly. He sent out waves of reassurance and warmth to her. “I found you, didn’t I? I knew that you’d been locked away.” Yeah, he knew…because Landon Meyer had spilled his secrets to Bryce. “I came to find you. I freed you.” He lifted his hand and the back of his fingers stroked over her cheek.

  Willow flinched.

  His jaw hardened as he dropped his hand. “You still don’t believe me. After all I’ve done, you think I’m bad?”

  “He could have killed me.” Her voice was gentle, almost musical. Sweet Willow. She looked sweet, but he knew just how deadly she was. “Why didn’t he? Instead of snapping my neck, he ran away. No, not away…to someone.”

  He glanced away from her. “Maybe he was just scared. Even soldiers get scared.”

  “He went to the woman in the alley.”

  His shoulders stiffened.

  “I watched him from the rooftop.”

  She did love her rooftops.

  “She’d almost been killed.”

  Almost…I would have stopped the agent before it was too late. He’d never planned for Cecelia to die that night. After all, he wanted to be the one to take the life from sweet Cecelia.

  “He was careful with her. Tender.” She sounded confused. Not surprising really. She knew practically zero about human interactions. She’d been the control model—the one who hadn’t been allowed to interact with any of the other test subjects. She’d been isolated.

  Forgotten.

  According to Landon, she’d also been defective.

  Bryce didn’t happen to think that was a bad thing.

  “But I saw the way he went after the other men in that alley…he was brutal. Savage.”

  “Yes, that’s exactly what Flynn Haddox is, at his core. He’s a savage.” Bryce pushed his emotions at her, wanting her to latch onto his fury at Flynn. Wanting her to know that Flynn had to be stopped.

  Attack. Destroy. Kill.

  Those orders had been given to him, by Landon Meyer. Landon had understood his darkness. Only fair, really, since Landon had carried the same darkness within himself. It was a pity Landon was dead. Bryce rather missed the bastard.

  “Stop it,” Willow gasped.

  He slanted a glance her way and saw that she’d put her hands to her temples.

  “I feel you in my head! I know it’s you!”

  “I told you, we can communicate this way.” He kept his voice calm. “You just have to practice—”

  Her shoulders hunched. “This isn’t…how I feel—”

  “Of course, it is. Don’t be afraid of the darkness inside. Don’t be—”

  She leapt off the side of the building, just plummeted straight down with only a whisper of sound.

  “Fucking bitch,” he muttered, and then he fell, too.

  Chapter Nine

  “You’re going to die.” The man with the dark, shaggy, black hair ran the tip of his knife over Cecelia’s face. “No one will find you. No one will ever know what happened to you.”

  She was tied to a chair, her wrists were bound to the stiff, wooden arms of the chair, and her ankles were roped to the long, curving chair legs. A gag was stuffed in her mouth, a dirty, thick cloth that had made her choke. He’d shoved the cloth into her mouth, then sealed a piece of duct tape over her lips.

  He smiled at her, and the knife continued to trail over her face. The sharp tip didn’t brea
k the skin, not yet.

  “You’re a pretty girl. I’ve watched you.”

  She was crying. She hated crying before him, but she couldn’t help it.

  “Every day, back and forth…taking the bus to school, then coming right home in the afternoon. A good girl. You’re a good girl, aren’t you, Cecelia?”

  Now the knife was gliding down her body, sliding over her shirt. Cutting into the buttons. Exposing her skin. Then he was moving that knife down, down her body.

  He pressed the knife between her legs. Right at the crotch of her jeans, and her tears just flowed harder.

  “I like good girls.” His smile broadened. His front two teeth were crooked. “You aren’t my first good girl, and you won’t be my last.”

  He’d done this before. He’d hurt others. And when he was done with her, he’d hurt someone else, too. She jerked hard at the ropes around her wrists. Her wrists were bleeding, she knew that. The blood was slippery against her skin. Was the rope giving way? It felt like it.

  Maybe…

  “I’ll make the cuts light at first. Just so you can get used to the blade.” And the blade’s tip was on her arm now. The tip cut through the soft cotton and sliced into her skin. She saw the red bloom of her blood. She twisted and jerked and the blade cut over her skin.

  And the ropes…loosened?

  “Stings, doesn’t it? But it’s fast. A sting and the blood slides out. I’ll stay light for a while.” His words came faster. “And then the cuts will get deeper and deeper. I’ll sink the blade all the way to the hilt, and you’ll be desperate then. I’ll take out your gag, but I won’t do it so I can hear your screams. I don’t really care much for screams. I’ll do it so that you’ll beg. I like it when they beg. You’ll beg, and you’ll promise me anything.”

  Cecelia shook her head. No. She wouldn’t do that. She would never beg him.

  He laughed. “Oh, sweet girl, I know you better than you know yourself. Always rushing home. Always so good. Because someone is at home waiting, right? A mother who loves you? A father who dotes on you? What will happen to them when you don’t come home?”

  Her tongue shoved against the gag.

  “Will it destroy them, do you think? Their only daughter. Lost. They’ll imagine so many terrible things.” He leaned over her. “But what they imagine will never be as bad as what happens to you.” His face was right in front of hers. “I am going to hurt you so much—”

  She slammed her head into his. Slammed it as hard as she could. Bones crunched. Blood spurted onto her face as he swore and automatically lifted his hand—the hand with the knife. He touched his nose, the nose she’d just smashed, and he howled in pain.

  The ropes had loosened. Just enough for her to get her right hand loose. Her right hand flew up, and she yanked the knife from his fingers.

  He lunged at her. “You little—”

  Her fingers were tight around the handle of the knife. She shoved it forward, and the blade sank into his throat. His eyes widened. He gurgled. He stared at her in absolute shock as the blood poured from his throat.

  He stumbled back. No, he just took one step back, then he fell. He was gurgling and jerking, and the blood was soaking his shirt. He clawed at the knife, but the wound just got bigger as he wrenched the blade.

  She tore the tape from her mouth and spat out the cloth that had been choking her. “Help me!” Cecelia screamed. “Someone…help me!”

  ***

  Flynn bolted upright in bed as the dream faded. His heart was racing in his chest, and he could still taste the bitterness of that damn dirty cloth in his mouth.

  As a rule, he didn’t usually have dreams. Or at least, he couldn’t remember them if he did.

  But that shit he’d just experienced…the images had been too vivid. The terror too real. And…

  And it wasn’t my dream.

  His head turned. Cecelia was tossing beside him in the bed, her body twitching. As he stared at her, Cecelia’s face tightened in fear. Her lips parted, and she mouthed the words, Help me.

  Her right hand flew out, as if she were fighting someone in her sleep. Fighting… stabbing?

  He caught her wrist, held her carefully, and his fingers slid up her arm. He felt the rise of skin on her forearm—a long, thin scar. A scar she’d gotten from a knife attack.

  He swallowed to clear the heavy lump in his throat. “Cecelia.” He didn’t want to scare her—

  Her eyes flew open. He could see her perfectly in the dark, and there was no mistaking her fear.

  “He’s not here, baby.” He lifted her arm and pressed a kiss to the scar. “You killed him, baby. He’s gone. He can’t hurt you, and he can’t hurt anyone else ever again.”

  Her breath heaved in and out. “H-how?”

  How? How did he know what nightmare had just ripped into her world? Because he’d slipped into her head. He’d gone into her dreams, and he’d never done anything like that before. He was confused as all hell, but instead of telling her that, he just slid back down into the bed. He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her against his heart. “You’re strong.”

  He’d known that, always. Since the first moment he’d met her.

  “You stopped him, and we will stop Bryce. I swear it.”

  She gave a little shiver.

  He stroked her hair and just held her. Held her until she slipped into sleep once more.

  She hadn’t just experienced a bad dream. She’d relived a bad memory.

  Maybe it wasn’t such a terrible thing that he’d lost his own memories. Flynn knew that he’d done dangerous things for the government, that he’d fought in so many battles. Had he ever had nightmares like Cecelia? Dreams that haunted him? Tortured memories that wouldn’t let him rest?

  The past was over, he’d tried to come to terms with that. Tried to move the hell on and focus on his future.

  But as Cecelia had just shown him…sometimes the past just wouldn’t let go.

  ***

  “A woman?” Jay Maverick repeated as he sat perfectly still behind his desk. Shock had turned him immobile.

  Elizabeth lifted her brows. “Yes, a woman. That’s what I just said. A female test subject. Flynn was certain she was part of Lazarus, and he said that Bryce called her Willow.”

  Jay rose. “There were no references to a female test subject on Landon’s laptop.” He knew—he’d scanned every inch of that computer.

  Elizabeth had stolen the laptop from Lazarus and brought it to him. But after her escape from Lazarus, Landon had come searching for his laptop. The dick had also come with murder on his mind, but, in the end, Landon had been the one to die.

  “Are you sure you didn’t miss a file?” Sawyer demanded from his position near the door. His arms were crossed over his chest, and his gaze was glacial.

  The very idea was insulting. “I don’t miss files.” Jay began stalking around the room.

  West stepped in front of him. “Are you sure?”

  He would have been pissed as hell if the question had come from anyone else. Computers were his world. His escape. He’d grown up in the foster system—with West—and he’d hated the nightmare he’d found himself in. He’d gone from absolute poverty to being one of the richest men in the whole world, all because of tech. Computers held no secrets from him. He was—

  “Slow your mind down,” West told him, voice calm. “Are you certain you didn’t miss any files?”

  “I’ll check again.” And he would. “But it’s possible Landon just didn’t have a record of her on his laptop,” Now he considered this from all angles. “Or maybe he wasn’t in charge of her case. That would explain why there was no mention of a female test subject. Maybe someone else gave her the formula.” He whirled to focus on Elizabeth.

  She held up her hands. “I only knew about Landon and Wyman Wright. After they took my research, I thought Landon was the only one doing the experiments.”

  “But he experimented on himself. He took the formula.” And the guy couldn’t very
well have administered the formula on his own. “What did he tell us? When that bastard came here thinking he’d kill us all?”

  “He said a ‘trusted associate’ had helped him,” West replied curtly. “But you know you remember that shit. You remember everything.”

  Yeah, okay, fine. He did. He’d just asked the question so they’d all get on the freaking same page. Now energy was humming through Jay. His fingers tapped against the side of his jean-clad leg. “We need the associate. I have to dig deeper into Landon’s past. See just who the bastard would have trusted with his own life.”

  “I thought you’d already looked into his past,” Sawyer rumbled, a dangerous glint in the guy’s eyes.

  He had. “I just haven’t looked in the right place. I will. I will find the person.”

  “And meanwhile, I’ll try to find Willow.” Sawyer gave a grim nod. “And you use those hacking skills of yours to dig into government files, military records.”

  “Lazarus always used former military personnel.” Elizabeth rubbed the back of her neck. “This Willow…she could have a record in the system.”

  “Tell me what she looks like,” Jay demanded. He went back to his desk and started typing. His fingers flew over the keyboard.

  “Dark hair, not black but more brown, blue eyes, heart-shaped face.” Sawyer rolled off the description flatly, without any emotion. “About five-foot-eight, one-hundred-forty or forty-five pounds.”

  He nodded. “You got a good look at her.”

  “No, Flynn did. And he didn’t like the fact that she was with Bryce.”

  Elizabeth cleared her throat. “Bryce could be controlling her. We need to find this woman. See if she’s like him or—”

  “Or if she’s like the true-blue SEAL at your side. Got it. Don’t worry.” Jay kept typing. “If she’s former military, I’ll find her.”

  West propped his hip on the edge of Jay’s desk. “Even if Wright made her disappear? Because the guy had a ton of power. It would be easy enough for someone like him to make a person vanish.”

  “Wright made a lot of people vanish.” Pain whispered in Elizabeth’s voice. “Maybe it’s only fitting that, in the end, he vanished, too.”