“I doubt they ever will. But there are only two choices in life when tragedy strikes. Move on or surrender. Both of them are survivors. Time will do its magic, and they will heal.”
“That they even have to is tragic.” She met his gaze, and her eyes prickled. “I cannot imagine the pain Xavier and Maria must be feeling.”
“There’s nothing you can do to speed their healing up.” He brushed his lips over the tip of her nose. “Come on. Let’s get a move on.”
It was midafternoon by the time they finally stepped into the air-conditioned comfort of the hotel room. Jacinta stood under a vent and let the cool air flow over her sweaty face and body.
“Don’t.” He hugged her from behind. “Surest way to catch a cold. Let’s get out of these clothes and have a long, hot shower. Then you can put on that red knit dress and those red high heels and we’ll order room service.”
“Room service?” Jacinta grinned at him. “I cannot believe you will allow it after that fiasco with Hugo. I have never had room service. It seems so wicked when we can just as easily go to a café.”
“Uh-uh. Not happening. No one sees you in that red dress but me.” He captured her wrist and tugged her in the direction of the bathroom.
They shed their clothes at the same time, Jacinta slower to undress than he—too fascinated with her first real sight of him in full light and the different angles revealed by the three mirrors on the walls.
When he peeled off his shirt, she frowned at the many scars on his back. Hundreds of tiny white lines, little x’s that crisscrossed his skin from his shoulders to his narrow waist.
“What? What fired your temper?” He gripped her chin.
She dislodged his hands and walked around to his back. “Who did this to you?”
“It’s not important, kitten.”
He made to face her, but she linked her fingers at his navel and pressed her lips to one scar, then another and another, not even realizing that tears flowed down her cheeks. “Who? Why?”
“Stop.” He loosed her hands and spun around, holding her wrists wide. “It happened a long time ago. Aw shit. You’re crying. Don’t.”
She buried her face in his chest. “How old were you?”
He sighed, and the deep exhale had the crisp hairs dotting his sternum tickling her nose. “You really are a kitten. Not going to let this go, are you?”
“No.” She liked the way he seemed to absorb different aromas, his scent a mixture of tang, sun, and sweat. “Tell me.”
“My mother sold me to a man who liked to inflict pain when I was a young boy.” His arms tightened around her. “It was a long time ago, and I got over it real fast.”
“Your
mother
sold you?” Jacinta couldn’t imagine how a mother could sell a child she had birthed. “Is she still alive?”
He shrugged. “Not to me. Look at me. I don’t want to talk about this right now. You can ask me about it all you want later. Right now I need to be inside you. To make love to you. To shower with you. Can we do that?”
Stroking his jaw, relishing the downy stubble feathering her fingertips, she nodded and held his gaze. “I need you too. I need to feel you. To feel life,
você entende
?”
Chapter Nine
Demon understood only too well. Every warrior had the driving compulsion to reaffirm life after surviving a battle. It worked the same way with tragedy. Face death and you had to do the ultimate procreative act—fuck.
“Yeah. I know.” He groaned. “I meant to stop at the pharmacy for condoms. Man, am I slipping up big-time.”
“I don’t like the condoms. Does it matter for this once?” That stubborn chin of hers jutted.
Temptation gnawed at his conscience. No. If they had a chance at a future, she
would
have a choice. Jaw set, he loosened his hold on her. “Yes. It matters. You go ahead and have your shower. I’ll be back in a flash.”
She caught his hand. “I will wait for you. There are all the clothes to unpack.”
“Thank you.” He kissed her forehead. “Rules apply. No answering the door. Come and lock it after I leave.”
Demon didn’t hesitate but stalked to the bedroom, knowing that if he held her a second longer, he was a goner. She followed in his wake, her steps slower, her movements cautious, and she shot him a whole flurry of sidelong glances with each stride.
“What’s wrong?”
“I should like to ask you something.”
What now
? “Go ahead.”
“I would like to do something to help Xavier and Maria. I will, of course, have many masses said in honor of everyone who perished, but I wish I could do more. Do you have any suggestions?”
She’d kill him. He wasn’t used to feelings welling up like this, wanting to burst out of his battered chest, drumming his sternum so his whole rib cage ached. “I’m going to set up a scholarship for the village and one for any children Xavier and Maria have. Maybe you and Sister Helen can offer meditation classes to the women? It might help them deal with their grief.”
A tear trickled down one cheek, and he gritted his teeth. The last thing he wanted was to make her cry. Demon made it to her side in record time. “Don’t cry, kitten. What did I say wrong?”
“I love you. You are the kindest man.” She kissed the hand caressing her cheek. “That is a wonderful suggestion.”
He swallowed around his clogged throat. “Glad to help. Now come and lock me out.”
Waiting for the lock to click shut, he stared at the streaky gray paint on the door and wondered how he’d survive without Jacinta. In less than three days, she’d become essential. He needed to smell her nape in the morning, feel her in his arms, and watch that smile lift her succulent lips. And she was so going to hate him in less than twenty-four hours. The lock clicked, and he did an about-face before he surrendered to the need to be inside her hot pussy.
Shaking his head as he took the emergency stairs two steps at a time, Demon realized he hadn’t done his usual survey of all exits. Might as well kill two birds on this trip.
The hotel had four floors, and they had a room on the second by his request. He didn’t like wooden buildings in the tropics, and if he had to stay in one, he always took a room within jumping distance of the street.
San Carlos, established during the Brazilian rubber monopoly circa 1879, had never experienced the wealth of the city named after the mother of the gods, its closest neighbor, Manaus. When the citizens of Manaus were building their publicly funded opulent opera house—Teatro Amazonas—the citizens of San Carlos had been embroiled in a down-and-dirty hillbilly-style feud between two different Yanomami tribes.
Combine that history with the modern battles between gold and diamond miners, drug lords, factions like FARC squads, and the natives and you had a town that reeked of the Wild, Wild West. He’d chosen the city because someone like him would blend in seamlessly and no one would take notice of his movements.
The rescue had fucked that scenario off the planet. Demon’s mouth flattened. After he’d finished escorting the last group of the wedding party to the medical center, he’d made a detour to the local newspaper offices, found the idiot reporter who’d taken his picture, and exposed the film in the camera. Las Vegas luck had shined on him, and no one else had been present. He’d soothed the reporter’s ruffled feathers with a hundred dollar bribe and left.
Demon finished walking the square block housing the hotel. Three concrete structures and six wooden buildings made up the block, and every single one of the wooden edifices were in danger of falling apart. What a fucking fire hazard. But because the hotel occupied the middle of the block, ambush would take some doing. Satisfied the architecture posed no real threat, he made his way to the pharmacy, bought two dozen boxes of rubbers, headed to the stairs, and took them two at a time.
The second floor hallway was deserted, and nothing appeared askance. When he reached their door, the strand of hair that he’d placed between the door and frame remained in place. His bunched neck muscles relaxed, and he knocked. “Jacinta?”
“Coming.” The thin walls allowed him to track her footsteps to the door. No roaring his climax in this place. An image of Jacinta gagged and bound and a sweet little pirate-wench role-play had his dick hard and aching in a blink. Walking the plank had a whole bunch of appeal if she was the one guiding him—by the prick.
The door opened, and he scanned from her plump bare toes to the cute dry, inky spikes of hair. She hadn’t showered. Fucking great. Soapy foam and her olive skin was an image more mouthwatering than any Michelin-rated five-star meal.
“I like your outfit.” He gestured to his T-shirt.
She waved him in and glanced at his empty hand. “Didn’t they have any?”
“Two dozen.” He held up the bag he’d tucked into a belt loop.
“Twenty-four?” She opened the bag and flashed him a wide grin. “Boxes. Now that I comprehend. I put the condom on this time.”
Demon slid the chain into place, locked the door, and placed the key on the far side of the dresser. “You can put the rubber on every time, kitten. Let’s get wet.”
He’d never survive her putting a rubber on his dick.
It had taken him less than two minutes to get them naked and under a hot stream of water. Then she’d knelt to put on the condom, and the damn thing kept curling in on itself and she went into a fit of the cutest giggles in the universe. Five minutes; he’d counted each agonizing nanosecond. No rubber, Jacinta’s nose brushing his dick, her fingers grazing his balls, cupping the base, and holding the skin tight.
“Kitten.” He dropped to his knees. “Give me that rubber.”
“You promised.”
Water plastered her spiky hair, and his prick went ape shit at the sight of her. Cheeks flushed to a delicious pink by the spray and steam, eyes all natural, the mesmerizing color of her irises more blue than green, he had never seen anyone, anything, more beautiful. He fumbled with the rubber, and she gave a delighted shout when it flew across the stall.
Demon grabbed for the condom, rolled over, and jammed the sheath down his cock.
“I have you at my mercy.” She looked like a pagan goddess, and he knew in that moment that they’d fuck in the backyard of his cottage during storms. Setting her hands on his belly, she clambered over him and straddled his thighs, kneeling on the wet tiles.
He circled her waist.
She batted at his hands. “My turn. Let me. Put your hands above your head.”
His stones did a couple of somersaults. Nothing he liked more than a bound-and-tied role-play. Even if he wasn’t in charge. Demon couldn’t take his focus off her face.
She slid him a peek and took his cock in a firm grip, sliding her hands up and down his on-fire erection. “Next time. No rubber until the last second. I want to feel you. To smell you. To taste you.”
“Honey. Mount me fast. You’re dirty talking me into a hard-rock place.” He clasped his twined fingers so hard that the palms burned.
He prayed for mercy. She positioned his throbbing prick at her core, and he bit his tongue when the crown slowly, millimeter by millimeter, disappeared into the honeyed heat of her pussy. His throat went dry, and his pulse jumped and spiked higher and higher until he couldn’t hear the drumming of the shower for the blood thundering in his ears.
She had the bluest-black pubes, and the contrast between the rose of her labia and the inky curls had his lungs straining. Halfway to paradise. He growled when her fiery sheath squeezed him, once, twice. On the third contraction, she moaned and let her full weight bear down on his dick, impaling him to the hilt.
His groin, every single muscle below his waist tautened to the point of pain. “Ride me, Jacinta. Ride me hard.”
Their gazes met. She licked her lips, braced her hands on the tiles, and never looked away as she slid up and down his length. He ground his teeth, and the tic under his eye twitched as she gained momentum, fucking him now, mouth set, eyes glazed. Her breathing hitched. Her walls clamped him like a vise, and she whimpered and threw her head back. His balls blued when her muscled fisted his cock, sharp, short contractions that had him grinding his teeth till even the gums ached. She dropped her head and stilled, palms on his ribs. He wanted to shout in frustration, grasped her hip, and started thrusting, driving up into her heat.
The release hit him like an electric shock. A sizzling explosion that had him arching and clamping his hands around her waist, ramming higher and higher until they were both suspended off the floor. Her climax sent him skyrocketing, the fierce, fast, squeezebox clenching of her tight pussy draining him dry.
She collapsed onto his chest.
He wrapped his arms around her.
And never realized that the shower spray had ceased until she shivered.
Cupping her ass, he levered to his elbow and kissed her temple. “Water’s gone.”
“We didn’t soap.” Her lips brushed his chest.
Demon chortled and sat up against the wall. “Guess we’ll just have to do it all over again.”
“I should like to know something.”
The phrase didn’t raise a neck hair, he was so replete. “Hmm?”
“How do lovers ever really shower?” She drew back to stare at him.
“Separately.” He chucked her chin. “Let’s get dry.”
Toweling off Jacinta proved sheer torture. She was so ticklish that they ended up tussling on the bed, and his prick had never been able to disassociate being on a mattress with a warm, curvy woman from an incoming fucking, and gallantly rose to the occasion. One thing led to another, and they needed to shower again.
Turned out the shower was on a timer—a quick phone call to the front desk restored the hot water—and Jacinta insisted on showering separately. Demon wanted to program the cell phones and activate them anyway, so he lost that battle before it even began. He’d almost finished with the phones when she opened the bathroom door.
“I should like to place the room service order.”
Demon looked up to find her dressed in a skimpy tank top. Fuck, he’d had her twice in less than three hours, and his cock had gone hard with one glance. The wide white straps of her bra were clearly visible.
Shit
. Old-lady panties and bras turned him on big-time. What in piss would a sexy Fredericks of Hollywood number do? He didn’t have the time for distraction of any kind. Giving himself a mental uppercut, Demon refocused. “By all means. What happened to the red number?”