Kevin folded Dani into his arms, stumbling a bit under the impact of her body with his. She was solid and warm and trembled so hard it scared him. He whispered in her ear, “What happened?”
“Nothing,” she said. “Let’s get out of here.” She pulled out of his embrace and took his hand, leading the way to the car.
A block from the shelter, he glanced at her and didn’t like the thousand yard stare and tense, withdrawn body language he saw. “Are you okay?”
It took just long enough for her to answer that he thought she’d either not heard him, or ignored him. “I don’t want to be a ghost.”
“It’s just something people came up with to call you. They had to call you something. It doesn’t mean anything.”
“But it does, doesn’t it? Ghosts aren’t real. And even if they are, there’s no point to them. They might be out in the world, but they’re not living in it.”
What had brought this on? “You’re a long way from pointless, Dani. You help people. That’s what got people talking about you in the first place.”
“Every night I would tell myself I was going to mind my own business. But then I’d hear someone screaming for help, or I’d hear about something going down. And I’d wind up right in the middle of it.”
“You’ve saved people’s lives,” he said. “You saved mine.”
“You say that, and maybe it’s even true. Those guys were pretty intent on hurting you that night. Do you think that it’s enough? I mean, maybe I did save your life. Maybe even the lives of a few more people. But nothing really changes down here in the South Side. In any place like this. There’s always corruption. So much violence, God, so much. People treated like they’re disposable. Women treated like property. None of that ever changes.”
Kevin pulled the car off the street and parked in a dark lot next to a boarded up building. “You’re talking about changing the world. Saving one person may not change the world, but so what? You save one life, you’re not just affecting that one person. There’s all the people who love that person, who will love that person in the future. All the people who will be affected by the loss of that one guy you saved. Family. Friends. You may have saved somebody with a child, Dani. That would mean you did save the world, for that child.”
“I never meant to save anybody. I just wanted out of the lab.” She stared out the car window into the dark.
Kevin unbuckled his seat belt and moved closer to her. “What’s wrong, Dani?”
For nearly a full minute she continued to stare out the window at nothing. He waited patiently, not wanting to push. He placed a hand on her shoulder, just to remind her that she wasn’t alone. Maybe to remind himself, too.
“People call me a ghost. And you know what?” She turned to face him, her eyes bright in the dim light. “I feel like one. Like I’m barely alive. Like I’m not even real.”
He moved closer still and cupped her cheek. “You’re alive.” A gravity that existed just between the two of them opened up and pulled him closer, so close he could taste the scent of her skin in the back of his throat. “Your heart beats and you’re breathing and you’re solid and very, very real.” Eyes half-closed, he traced her jawline with the tip of his nose, breathing her in deep.
“Prove it,” she whispered. “Make me believe it.”
In the space of a heartbeat he thought of all the reasons why he should back off and drive them home. So many reasons, all of them good and none of them convincing. He touched his lips to hers, a soft, barely-there caress. But the touch was a lit match and she exploded like wildfire. She wrapped her arms around him, fingers digging into his scalp and tugging on his hair as she deepened the kiss to something hot and carnal and exactly what he’d wanted since his first good look at her. She plunged her tongue into his mouth, her teeth nipping at his lips. Sharp little curls of pain from his lips and scalp bloomed into lust that roared through his body.
She left her seat and climbed into his lap. One sensation blurred into another. Hands everywhere, his and hers. If she had the presence of mind to hold back her enhanced strength, he couldn’t tell it. He’d have bruises tomorrow, on his arms where she squeezed, his back where her fingers stabbed and raked. His hips, where she ground herself against him. He rose to meet her, seeking her warmth and her strength and even her violence.
He was scared of her, and it turned him on like nothing ever had.
He bit her earlobe, tugging slightly. “I need to know you want this.”
“I do.” She shrugged out of the jacket of his she wore then slid her hands up his chest. “God, do I.”
He gentled her with soft, firm kisses. She responded with a frustrated groan. He gathered her hair in one hand then pulled, hard.
That earned him a gasp of pleasure.
He nipped her bared throat with his teeth then soothed the spot with a kiss. “Tell me to stop and I will.”
She pulled free of his grip and placed her hands on the seat back on either side of his head. “You haven’t even gotten started yet.” Then she did a nasty little bump and grind on his lap that made his entire body throb. He reached between them to fumble with her clothes.
She rose on her knees, hands at the fly of her jeans. “Condom?”
“Console.”
“You take care of that, I’ll take care of these pants.” She returned to her seat and began to remove her boots and jeans. He stared for a moment, not quite believing this was happening. Then he snapped back into the moment and retrieved a condom from the center console.
Her shirt was still on and hung too low and he wanted to touch her all over but couldn’t, because they were in the front seat of his freaking car. He wanted to see her but barely could, because they were parked in a dark lot in a dangerous part of town. He wanted to stretch her out on a bed and take his time learning her body, what she liked, what she needed. Shower her with tenderness and all the sensual pleasure she’d been denied. But he couldn’t because what he needed right then was to have her any way he could get her.
She straddled his lap, hands on either side of his head again. Their eyes met and even in the darkness the intensity of her gaze scorched him. Starting at where her knees met the leather seat, he traced his fingertips up her thighs. Her skin was soft and smooth and she shivered slightly at his touch. He opened his mouth to speak and she shook her head. Then she lowered herself on to him and he forgot what he was going to say.
Enveloped in the wet heat of her, all thoughts of tenderness were wiped out, replaced with a blazing white-hot need that had no words. She rose slightly and he gripped her hips and yanked her back down, eliciting a gasp from both of them. What little control he had left snapped. He bucked up into her, hard and fast and with absolutely no finesse. She met him thrust for rough, bruising thrust.
The grimy yellow headlights of a passing car illuminated her face. Eyes half closed. Lost in sensation. Alive. God, so alive. Beautiful in such a raw, wild way, like a flower blooming in the wrong place. Then it was dark again and the sound of her ragged breathing filled his ears.
He ran his hands up and down her thighs, inside her shirt, everywhere he could reach skin. He stroked her lips, groaning when she bit his thumb. Caressed her cheeks, the column of her throat, the nape of her neck. Wound the silk of her hair around his fingers. She kept her own hands on the back of the seat as she rose and fell and wouldn’t meet his gaze anymore. As if she needed some measure of distance. But that felt like pretense when she whispered his name as her body tensed.
Kevin slid one hand between their bodies, searching for just the right spot. When he found it she cried out louder, throwing her head back. Her body clenched around him and he shut his eyes against the intense onslaught of his own orgasm. Dani slumped against him, breathing hard. Both of them trembling. He held her, and it wasn’t a gentle embrace. He drew her tight to his chest and wrapped his arms around her. He might not have been as strong as she was, with all her enhancements, but he used his own strength now, trying to say things he was pretty sure she wouldn’t want to hear.
I don’t want to let you go.
I don’t want to let you go.