LustAfterDeath (11 page)

Connor’s fists clenched, and the biceps draped over Josie’s
torso bulged.

“This isn’t negotiable.” Frank swore he could hear the other
male’s teeth grinding from across the room. “It’s her life, Connor.”

Bane stood from the couch, stalking toward Frank. “You don’t
know what he did to her. What she’s been through!”

Frank schooled his expression to be neutral and leaned back
in his chair. “You’re talking about Josie here, or yourself?”

Connor’s hands landed on his desk. He opened his mouth to
talk, but Josie cut him off.

“I want to talk to Frank alone.” She rose to standing, her
eyes trained directly on Frank.

Bane’s head fell between his arms and Frank couldn’t help
feeling sorry for the guy. It hurt not to be in control of someone you loved,
even if you were misguided.

Frank observed the newborn. She jutted her chin forward in a
move at odds with her angelic appearance. “Let us be, Connor.”

A hand slammed down on the desk again before Bane stormed
out, but Frank let the tantrum slide. Ninety years of dealing with the newly
undead left Frank unsurprised by immature behavior.

Josie crossed her arms over what had to be Bane’s shirt. It
reached to her upper thighs and left a foot of space above her men’s boots. If
her nudity embarrassed her, Josie didn’t show it. “I want to keep my memories.”
She said it without hesitation.

Frank watched the shades of her expressions and thought
about what he’d read in her files, assessing her competence to make such a
statement. “And how does Bane feel about this?”

He didn’t miss the way her face tightened at the mention of
his name. It didn’t take a brain scan to realize how far their physical, and
possibly emotional, connection had reached. “Once his wipe is completed, he
won’t have an opinion, will he?” Her eyes took on a faraway look as Josie
twisted her body and sat on his desk, unaware that in lifer society, such a
move would be considered inappropriate.

“And would you want to continue with him as your husband
substitute? After his wipe, I mean? You don’t even know who he’ll become.”
Frank waited to read the expressions crossing her face.

The first was the pinched-lip curl of pain. The second, a
sad, faraway look in her eyes. “You could reset me as someone else’s bride…”

Frank couldn’t help the guffaw that escaped his lips at the
thought of how Bane would react to that suggestion. Though he expected Josie to
be hurt by his laughter, her cunning gaze scanned the upper right corner of her
line of sight. And a very wicked grin blossomed on her face.

* * * * *

“So, I bet you’re glad to be back.” Q-ter played his video
game on the right screen, while scanning data on the left. Only because Bane
knew him so well did he catch the relief in the kid’s voice.

“Yeah, well, it was a little hairy.”

Q-ter’s fingers flew, one hand on the mouse while the other
typed at a speed Bane’s vision struggled to follow. “Yeah, I’ll make sure Frank
downloads all the data before your wipe. In case you learned anything useful.”

The clicking slowed and Bane knew Q was listening to his
emotions, probably calculating the spaces between his breaths or some shit.

“I’m gonna head out.” Bane lifted his head from the
micro-office and surveyed the room. He took a few steps out of Q’s earshot,
though he almost felt the pulses of the kid’s questions inside his mind.

Frank’s door opened and Josie stepped out in front of his
boss. She surveyed the room and her gaze landed on him. She’d changed her
clothes, and was wearing something of Kuri’s. Thin straps of pale blue hung
from her shoulders. The sundress hugged her swaying breasts as she walked. Bane
yearned to press her close, to take her to his crappy little apartment…hell
no—to get a new apartment with a view of the whole city, and lay her on a fancy
king-sized bed surrounded by candles.

She walked right by him. “You must be Q-ter?”

Bane heard the kid gulp. His curly-haired head lifted above
his cubicle walls. His two pairs of glasses hung halfway down his nose, and Q-ter
jammed them higher with his forefinger, before snatching the front one off his
face and scrubbing the lenses on his shirt.

“I need your help, kid.” Frank’s gruff voice carried over
the walls, and Bane cocked his head to figure out what game everyone was
playing.

“Q’s going to help you with her wipe?” Bane’s fingers rubbed
at each other in his pockets. He rocked back on his heels. The need to get
Josie under him beat like a living thing in his chest, and he wasn’t sure how
he’d resist once she was back to her newborn state.

“No.” Her voice was so chipper Bane wondered what Frank must
have said to turn her opinion around. “He’s going to be my new husband.”

Behind him, Q-ter yelped.

Bane stared into Josie’s guileless eyes, though he noticed
the corner of her mouth twitch. “You’re bluffing.” He stood stock still.

Josie squared her shoulders and let her cool smile widen.
“No, I’m not. I don’t want a reset. If you don’t want to play the role, I
understand.”

He turned to his boss, whose poker face betrayed nothing.
Bane crossed to Josie, grabbing her hand. “I’m taking her home.” He caught the
flash of triumph on Josie’s face, but she quickly schooled her features back to
impassive. Gripping her upper arm in his fist, Bane leaned into her ear and
spoke in a low and threatening growl. “We
are
discussing this again.”

She shivered and Bane hoped he’d gotten through to her, but
when he met her gaze he found lust burning in her eyes. “Let’s go,” she
breathed.

And dammit if he didn’t get hard on the spot. “Come on.” Bane
dragged Josie through the office, down the hall and out onto the street. The
sun break from earlier had passed, returning the sky to cold and gray. He
marched her up the hill.

Josie wrapped her free arm around herself against the chill.
“Where are we going?” Her voice trembled, but Josie kept pace behind him, never
breaking the connection of their hands.

“To my place.” He didn’t elaborate and she didn’t ask. He
hauled her to the bus stop on Second. A couple of homeless guys huddled nearby,
shifting something between their hands. A heavyset woman in nurses’ scrubs and
a thick jacket rolled her gaze over them. Josie stepped closer.

Embarrassment crept up his neck. “I don’t have the car. We
have to bus it.” He pointed down the street to where the next bus rolled toward
them.

“We’re taking that?” She sounded so hopeful, he felt like
crap for having to tell her no.

“Ours is the 2.” He didn’t say anything more, just watched
out of the corner of his eye as Josie took in the wet streets. Bits of paper
and abandoned coffee cups cluttered the odd doorway. Lines of cars sputtered
exhaust.

“There it is!” Josie pointed down the road to where the bus
stopped at another location. “Come on!” She grabbed a handful of his shirt and
tried to set off running in the bus’s direction.

Against every impulse he had, Bane started laughing. “It’ll
come here next.”

With wide eyes, Josie watched as the bus lumbered down
Second Avenue and stopped in front of them. When the door folded open, she
turned to Bane with a huge grin on her face. “That is so cool!”

All around them, the folks getting on the bus shook their
heads and muttered to themselves, some in amusement and others in concern
depending on whether they thought her ignorant or high. Bane found himself
stepping between Josie and the other passengers, shielding her body from
brushing into anyone else’s.

“Let’s sit here.” He backed her into a bench.

The bus pulled away from the curve and a few curious riders
craned their heads. Bane shifted in his seat to block their view.

Josie didn’t speak as the bus rolled up First Hill. She kept
hold on his hand and watched the city go by out the window. Bane wondered what
it might be like to take this ride with her every day.

Honestly, Bane had decided not to go through with his reset
a day or two ago—maybe when Josie rode herself to orgasm on his lap, or maybe
even the first time he saw her watching him from out the window. In the last
five years, he’d collected over thirty steins for the ZU, but she was the first
one who made him feel like a hero.

They rolled into his neighborhood and Bane wondered what she
thought of the hoodlums standing at every street corner and the homeless camped
in an empty lot. They got off the bus and walked up to his apartment building.
Bane worried she’d go running back to Q-ter and Frank, beg them to go through
with the previous plan.

He led her through the lobby and into the urine-scented
elevator. When he finally dared lift his face, Josie’s fierce gaze bore into
him. She placed her hands on his shoulders, and with an agile hop, she wrapped
her legs around his waist. Her tongue was in his mouth before their lips even
touched. He strode off the elevator and to his front door, where he leaned her
against the wood while he twisted the key in all three locks.

She broke contact only long enough to whisper, “Bedroom.
Now!”

Chapter Twelve

He carried her past shelves built from wood beams and
concrete blocks and a tiny kitchenette with dishes piled in the sink. A
bathroom door opened to the right, but Bane swung in the opposite direction and
kicked forward through a door and released his grip on her side to turn on a
light.

Desperate for more of him, Josie tugged his shirt up from
his waistband, running her hands over the scars on his abdomen. Her teeth
scraped his and he bit her lip. In response, she scored her fingernail over the
tiny knot of his nipple. He made a sexy hissing sound and lifted her off his
body.

She straightened her legs and slid down. When her feet
reached the floor, Josie assessed the space. A bed covered in tangled sheets
dominated the room. A stereo system filled one corner.

“Um, I'm sorry,” Bane muttered, obviously embarrassed. He
yanked the sheets off the bed and tossed them to the side on top of a pile of
clothes. Then he disappeared through the door and came back with his arms full
of a different set of crumpled sheets. When she raised her eyebrows in
question, he shrugged. “I don’t like folding things.”

He stretched the linens over the bed and then turned to her
and frowned. “Man, I’m sorry this place is such a shithole.” When their eyes
met, her pulse sped up. She’d never lain with Bane in a real bed.

“Take your clothes off.” He spoke it as an order that made
Josie jump, but she did as he said. He stared at her with glass-blue eyes, his
palm absently rubbing at the erection straining his trousers. “You know what I
want, babe.” His tone chilled her, but she wouldn’t take the bait and cower.

She knew he was trying to frighten her, make her change her
mind. Josie’s mouth curled up in a smile. As if he could scare her when she saw
inside his mind! She clasped his belt in her hand and unfastened it. With a
quick swipe, she tugged it free and unzipped the front of his pants. His cock
sprang into her waiting hands—at least that part of him was happy she hadn’t gotten
a reset.

Bane lifted his shirt over his head so that the gorgeous
expanse of his torso stretched bare before her. She bent onto her knees, and
then Josie laid her hands, flat palmed, on his abdomen and surrounded his
purpled head with her lips.

Salty fluid drenched his cap, the flavor filling her mouth.
Bane’s hand fisted in her hair. She knew how he was playing, and felt no
surprise when he fed himself more deeply over her tongue, until the blunt tip
rested snug at the back of her throat.

She pulled back then plunged forward on him again. From the
angle of Bane’s hips, Josie knew he leaned back to watch her, and she spread
her hands over his hip bones and then around to the swells of muscle on his
rear end, thrilled to put on a good show. She squeezed the hard globes of flesh
and pulled to seat his cock deeper. He whispered guttural curses and groaned,
his fingers playing along the tendrils of her hair.

With a slow smile, she pulled her lips from his length and
grinned up at his shocked expression. She turned on her knees, and then lowered
her face slowly to the floor, stretching her arms over her head.

Josie swerved her hips to one side then another, swaying
before him. Behind her, she heard Bane fall to his knees. The scratchy hairs of
his thighs touched the insides of her legs, and Josie tilted her pelvis higher,
in a move so profane it felt sacred.

“We don’t have to do it like this.” Bane’s voice was thick
with lust.

Josie looked over her shoulder. “I want to. It sounded like
fun when you thought it.” She teased her hips back, stroking at his erection
with her dampening center. Her head dropped between her arms and she groaned as
his fingers found her core, and instead of petting her or inserting them, Bane
stretched her wide and fit the cap of his sex to her opening.

Yes, yes, yes.
A chorus took up in her mind and he
plowed slowly into her. Not fully prepared, her delicate membranes caught and
scraped at his entry, adding a delicious friction that had her twisting her
hips to accommodate him. Bane held her steady and drew out along her moist
passage, before driving home in a brutal stroke.

He fell over her back, and he curled his body, working her
passage hard. She felt his need, his lust, his emotions dancing as if they were
her own.

Josie arched and bucked to meet him, and his kisses peppered
her shoulder and back. He plundered farther, so that Josie fell forward, Bane
atop her. He pushed one of her knees up to her armpit, never slowing his
rhythm, and then reached under her body to cup her mound as if he owned it.

“Fuck, I love you.”

She knew it to be true, had seen it in his mind already. But
still, Bane’s growled admission sparked a desperate frenzy of want. Josie
shouted his name with abandon, rocking on his searching fingers. The rough
carpeting abraded her nipples and her elbows. Bane powered harder, shoving her
forward with each stroke, so that she couldn’t meet him, and her hands searched
for purchase on the floor to stop their journey across the room.