Why did this man telling her to be a “good girl” and ordering her to put her hands back on the wall sound sexy, rather than insulting?
“Painless for you,” she ground out, clenching her teeth. “And I swear to you if I get even a hint of an idea you’re enjoying this, you’ll be sorry.” She cut her gaze to the wall and steeled herself for his exploration—the outcome. He was going to find her knife. “Do it, and get it over with.”
“Now there’s a line to break a man’s heart,” he said with a chuckle, wasting no time skimming her skirt upward, over her thighs, until he caressed her hips and then her backside. She squeezed her eyes shut as his fingers slid to the V of her legs.
Instinctively, she squeezed her legs shut, and what a mistake that was. “You’re pushing your luck,” she panted, his hand now firmly planted between her thighs.
“I never had any luck to start with,” he said, the fingers of his free hand splaying across her stomach. “Which is why I can’t leave any bit of tiny bikini cloth unexplored.” Before she could stop him, his hand slid between her breasts and pulled the blade free. A second later, her dress fell back into place, and he waved the leather-pouched knife between them. “Good thing I don’t believe in luck.” The knife disappeared.
“One last little inspection,” he said softly, and pressed her head forward, brushing the hair from her neck. She froze with the knowledge of what he was looking for, with the sudden spike in sexual energy between them, with the sensual feel of him stroking the delicate skin of her nape.
Seconds ticked by, silent seconds in which the air seemed to thicken, and her skin tingled. She was warm all over, aware of this GTECH on levels she shouldn’t be, and guilt twisted inside her. He was a GTECH, a Renegade, a betrayer and killer.
But when he turned her to face him, his hands going to the wall above her head, and she was captured in his downright scorching gaze, she was lost all over again.
“Just confirming you don’t wear a Lifebond mark,” he said.
The mention of the tattoo-like double circle that appeared on a woman’s neck the first time she had sex with her intended mate set her pulse racing, though she couldn’t say why. Of course, he wanted to check for the mark. If she had a Lifebond, he’d be hunting for her. He’d kill for her.
“I knew what you were looking for,” she said, her throat ridiculously dry. She was a GTECH. She should have better control than this. But when his gaze slid to her mouth and lingered, and she knew he was thinking of kissing her, Lara burned so badly for that kiss. Wanted it to the point where she could have justified it, could have told herself it was to manipulate him, to earn her freedom.
“It appears,” he said in a whisky-rough voice, “you belong to no one.”
When Lara normally would have snapped back some reply like, “I’ll never Lifebond with a GTECH,” instead, for some reason, she simply said, “I belong to myself.”
“Correction,” he said. A hint of a predatory gleam flickered in his eyes. “Right now, you belong to me.” He pushed off the wall. “Let’s get your wounds cleaned up.” He motioned her out the door and added, “Then we can talk.”
Reality, and her foolish hormonal reaction to this GTECH, slammed into her with that one word “talk,” a reminder that he was her enemy, who wanted information and would do anything to get it.
She straightened and gave her dress a tug downward. “No matter how much you mess with my head or use your seductive voodoo on me, I’m not talking.”
She didn’t wait for an answer. She stepped around him, exited the elevator, and then started down a narrow hallway to her right. She hoped like heck that letting him know she was onto his manipulation would shut him down.
She’d lost everything to the GTECHs, lost her family, her life, so this one—no matter how hot and sexy he might be—wasn’t taking her freedom, nor would he deny her the vengeance she intended to have. Before this was over, he’d know a piece of it himself. Right then, she vowed, before this was over, this GTECH would learn those lessons in a deeply intimate way.
Chapter 5
Voodoo? Did she really just accuse him of working seductive voodoo on her? Unable to help himself, he watched the sweet sway of her curvy hips, and grew hotter and harder with every move she made.
Jeezus, he was in some deep shit with this woman, and he didn’t even know her name. What he did know was that the chances were pretty damn high that she was baiting him, seducing him and trying to infiltrate the Renegades’ operation. It was working too, because she was already inside one of their facilities.
He scrubbed his now lightly stubbled jaw and followed her down the hall. Either she was playing him, luring him into thinking he was doing the seducing, not her, or she really hated how much she wanted him. He wasn’t sure which he preferred. Yeah, he did. The one that didn’t include this woman conniving against him. If she hated him, at least that was honest, not some form of manipulation. He had no idea what it was about this woman, why he wanted to believe she was Adam’s victim rather than the man’s ally. All evidence, from the gun she’d been holding when he found her, to her very existence as a GTECH, said she was Adam’s creation. But there was something about her, something that didn’t ring true to the obvious. Something that made him want her in a bad way.
“What voodoo is it I’m supposed to be working?” he asked, catching up with her when she paused under the arch that led into a giant room divided into four sections.
She turned to confront him with a defiant lift of her chin. “I’m no fool,” she said. “I’ve studied the GTECHs. I am a GTECH. I know a good number of the GTECHs have developed special abilities beyond the basics. Like Adam can communicate with wolves. So I get that you can make yourself sexually appealing and climb inside my head and play around. Well stop. Just stop. Nothing you do is going to make me like you or talk to you.”
They were close, so close he could imagine pulling her against him, imagine her soft curves melting into his body.
He grinned at the intense look on her face. He couldn’t help himself. She was serious about the voodoo, and so furious at her reaction to him, she was fishing for an excuse to justify her desire. She wasn’t manipulating him as he’d feared, nor was she here because Adam had told her to seduce him. She hated the GTECHs too much to believe she could want one. It was probably nuts, but that made him really damn happy. His dick too, judging from the thick, uncomfortable bulge in his pants.
Her eyes blazed at his smile. “I’m glad I amuse you.”
“Sorry,” he said, trying to sound sincere, but it was hard because he was hard, and his male ego was buzzing with satisfaction.
“Right,” she said. “That’s why you’re smiling.”
“I am sorry,” he argued. “That is, sorry to disappoint you. But you can’t blame wanting me on some seductive power I possess, because it doesn’t exist. This thing between us, this relationship, or whatever you don’t want to call it—is pure chemistry, sweetheart. And yeah, I know it sucks to want someone you don’t trust. Believe me. I’m in the same boat with you and sinking fast.”
She glared a look at him that would have flattened a lesser man, but her feisty spirit only made him burn more for her, made him wonder, in fact, just how feisty she would be all hot and bothered and naked—in his bed. Oh yeah, she could seduce him all night long if she wanted to, and he wouldn’t regret it the next morning either.
“Right,” she said sarcastically. “It’s just chemistry. Just like you aren’t causing me to hallucinate any more than you stopped me from wind-walking outside the cabin, now are you?”
“Whoa,” he said with his hands up, stop-sign fashion. “You tried to wind-walk and couldn’t?”
She crossed her arms in front of her truly spectacular chest. “Like you don’t know.”
“I didn’t,” he said. “And I admit I was sure you would try. I was ready to yank you right back out of the wind, and yes, I could have. Time and practice breed skill.”
“I know yo
u’re doing this to me,” she insisted.
“Contrary to what you seem to believe, very few GTECHs have special abilities beyond the basic wind-walking, he-man super strength, and speed, and I’m not one of them. If you’re having hallucinations, you probably have a concussion. I’m sure that’s why you couldn’t wind-walk too.”
“Good try,” she said. “This all started by the pool before my injury, and as I figure it, about the time I must have hit your radar.”
He wasn’t so sure the knock on her head didn’t have her confused on the facts, but it was clear she believed what she said. “I know it means nothing to you, but my word is as good as gold. And I give you my word—I have nothing to do with what’s happening to you.” In the giant room divided by four partitions, he motioned toward the first that doubled as a bedroom and a treatment center. “Have a seat on the bed, and I’ll get that wound on your head cleaned up.”
She cast him a silent “you’re crazy if you think I’m sitting on that bed” look, walked to the big black chair next to it, and sat down.
Yeah, good choice, he thought. He could still feel her soft skin beneath his hands, her long legs aligned with his. His cock thickened, his zipper stretched. Oh yeah. A bed and this woman were just too tempting to be safe.
Damion claimed a rolling chair and eased across the concrete floor to the medical cabinet at the foot of the bed, next to a vitals monitor.
With peroxide and gauze, he rolled back to her chair. “Why don’t you put your head in your lap so I can see the wound?”
“I’ll heal from the physical wound without you doing this,” she said. “I’m GTECH. Remember?”
“I remember,” he said. “Do you remember? Because you act like all of us are assholes and bastards, and simply tolerate being like us. Physiologically, GTECHs are different from humans, but we choose right from wrong. Good from bad. All of us, including you.”
“That’s like comparing humans to butterflies, GTECHs to lions, and saying both are as likely to attack and kill their prey.”
“Humans are far from butterflies,” he said. “And if I’m a lion, so are you.”
“It takes a lion to kill a lion.”
“Is that what you want?” he asked. “To kill me?”
“Like you don’t intend to kill me when you’re done with me,” she accused.
“I want to save you from Adam,” he assured her. “But you have to want to be saved. And you have to talk to me. Make me understand why you would work for a man who’s a seed of destruction. If you truly hate all GTECHs, then I have to assume you were forced into becoming one and forced into fighting as one. Do you hate all GTECHs? Or do you just hate the Renegades?”
“I know what Adam is,” she said, cutting her gaze. She pulled her feet into the chair, with her dress and arms over her knees, giving him a glimpse of the fast-healing bruise smudging the pale ivory of her cheek.
She hadn’t given him a direct answer, but then, he didn’t need one. Emotions rolled off of her and slammed into him. Pain. Resentment. No one faked this kind of raw hurt. The soldier in him—who did everything by the book, who had no room for emotions—urged him to use this moment of weakness in her to push her for more, but he found the man in him could not. She’d shut down anyway, he could see that, and done so in a way that screamed insurmountable wall. She was angry and with reason, if she’d been abused in Adam’s sex camps, and then forced to fight for him when she didn’t find a Lifebond.
“Let me look at your head,” he urged softly.
Her gaze shifted to his, eyes flashing stubbornly, a bit of that fight of hers returning. “I’m fine.”
He rolled his chair closer. “You’re not fine.”
“I am,” she argued.
Before she could stop him, he pulled her legs to the floor, not allowing himself to think about the short, tempting path up her tiny dress. She was hurt, physically and emotionally. He knew that now, and it changed everything, even if it should not. He could have her, he knew, and she’d willingly give herself without much encouragement. But he was pretty sure she’d feel raped in the aftermath, which meant that right now, he couldn’t have her, no matter how tempting she might be. Still, holding her knees steady, he ached to touch her, to allow his fingers to caress the smooth skin of her leg beneath his palm. “Put your hard head in your lap, so I can see,” he ordered. “I’m checking your wound one way or the other.”
Rebellion flashed in her bright green eyes, and her gaze collided with his in a silent clash of wills, a battle she simply wasn’t going to win.
Charged seconds ticked by until her lips thinned, her expression shifted. There was a tiny flash of vulnerability in her face—a hint of what was beneath her façade of toughness—before she bent her head to her lap and allowed him to see her wound. With gentle fingers, he brushed her hair away from her scalp and studied the six-inch cut that would be gushing blood if not for her GTECH healing abilities. “Now that’s what I call a gouge,” he said with a whistle. “And despite your claim of being ‘fine,’ you aren’t. You’re going to need several hours of sleep to heal this one.”
He rolled his chair back. “You can lift your head.”
She peered through the mass of dark brown hair covering her face. “What happened to your cleaning my wound,” she lowered her voice to imitate him, “‘one way or another’?”
Though being mocked wasn’t something he enjoyed, her attempt to make her distinctively feminine, almost youthful voice, deep and masculine, was fairly entertaining.
“Your hair’s matted inside the cut,” he said, watching as she straightened fully and shoved that mass of gorgeous hair from her face. “We may need to throw a few stitches in it to speed the healing.” He motioned to the right. “You can use the shower in the back of the facility, and then I’ll have another look. I need to check on my team anyway.
“And just so we’re clear. If you get any ideas about an escape, don’t bother. You’re in here until I say you’re out.”
“Until I steal your gun, and make you let me out,” she said matter-of-factly.
“Good luck with that,” he said. “Why don’t you wait until that head wound heals, and you’re feeling feisty again?” He wiggled his eyebrows and grinned. “We’ll have more fun that way.”
“Fine then,” she agreed. “That gives me time to plan the moment of revenge, when I turn you upside down like you did to me.” She pushed to her feet and wobbled, reaching for the chair.
He rolled his chair forward and caught her, wrapped his arms around her—holding her steady, holding her close. She was tiny and soft and yielded to his touch—as if her subconscious trusted him, even if she did not. “Easy, sweetheart,” he said softly. “I wasn’t joking about how bad that head wound is.”
She grabbed his arms and steadied herself, her eyes fluttering as if she were light-headed. “Thank you.”
He narrowed a probing look at her. “You really are a contradiction, aren’t you? One minute you have the vocabulary of a sailor, cursing up a storm, and the next, automatically saying ‘thank you’ and ‘please.’”
“I don’t curse like a sailor,” she argued, and when he arched a brow, she indignantly added, “If you had your bikini-clad backside hiked in the air, in a strange man’s face, I bet you’d discover a few four-letter words too.”
“If I was wearing bikini bottoms, I hope and pray someone would kill me long before my butt was hiked in the air and in some man’s face.”
She laughed, her expression shifting to quick surprise, as if she couldn’t believe she was sharing such a moment with him. “I’m trying to imagine you, the big, macho Renegade—in bikini bottoms.” Her eyes actually twinkled as she added, “Maybe a pink pair with flowers.”
“I’m going to take the big, macho Renegade comment as a compliment, but then again, with you, I’m not sure it is. And for the record, I’m not the pink flower type. I’m the American Flag type.” And then, because he had the undeniable urge to hear that soft, sweet l
augh of hers again, because laughter bred trust, he added, “Or Spider-Man. Nothing like a good pair of Spidey boxers.” She rewarded him with a soft musical laugh, and he wondered if she realized she was still holding onto him, because he did. Every damn inch of him was alive with that little piece of awareness.
“You wear Spider-Man underwear?” she asked.
“You got a problem with Spider-Man?”
“No,” she said, a smile lingering behind her laughter. “There’s nothing wrong with Spider-Man. You’re pretty funny. For a GTECH.”
“You’re pretty funny too,” he said. “For a GTECH.”
The smile on her lips faded into the crackle of spiking sexual energy arcing between them. She drew a ragged breath, and he knew then, she was aware of their nearness, of his hands on her hips.
She pressed out of his arms and took several steps to her right, out of his reach. “Where can I find that shower?” she asked.
With the discomfort of his bulging zipper, and a mass of frustration over her withdrawal, Damion ran his hands down his knees and stood, motioning for her to follow him. “This way.” He started walking, letting her follow, giving her his back and his trust in doing so, even though she wouldn’t give him hers. It was trust she didn’t deserve when she wouldn’t tell him her name… and swore she wanted to kill him.
In his head he heard Kid Rock shouting the lyrics of “American Warrior” from his tribute song to the soldiers, but he was thinking “American Fool” might suit him better. A fool for a woman.
***
Lara followed Damion toward the back of the facility, passing a tech center that would rival anything Serenity had and then some, on the way to what she assumed was a bathroom. His name repeated in her mind, and she stopped walking, flustered that she’d thought of him as “Damion.” Don’t give a GTECH a name. He doesn’t deserve a name—a warning that had her gaze lingering, not where it should be, on the rows of monitors on the wall that might hold clues to escape, but on the man—the way his T-shirt stretched across impressively broad shoulders, and how his jeans hugged a hard, firm backside. She shook her head, a mistake she paid for when stars exploded in front of her eyes and set her to swaying.