He was going to, just in a more private
setting.
With great effort, Caleb pulled his
mouth away from Simone’s. "I have a suite upstairs. And as soon as
we get there, I promise, I'm not going to stop kissing you," he
whispered, and drew back, only to take Simone’s hand and fold it in
the crook of his arm.
Neither of them noticed the almost too
intent stare of Kayla. Pausing mid-sentence in her conversation
with Dominic, Kayla took a step to the right and watched Caleb and
Simone walk over to the bank of elevators. Across the room,
standing at the bar behind Lucien—who was actively engaged in
talking to his “birthday presents”—Vasco noticed. It was the first
time that he had seen an openly predatory look in his aunt’s eyes.
It gave birth not to a sense of dread, but one of cold knowing. He
desperately hoped he was wrong.
§
December 1, 2012 - 10:33 PM
Loyalty Airlines International
Airport
Cargo Runway #17
Nicholas walked back to the Sedan,
tucking his hands into the pockets of his light coat. It never got
very cold on the island, even in the winter, just windy and rainy.
“It’s done,” he said when Olivia rolled down her window.
Olivia eyed him with patient amusement
over the rim of a raised glass. “Great job, Nicky.”
“
What did you tell them?”
Amadeo asked, leaning over to look up at Nicholas
“
I told them I had a
birthday present for the triplets on the plane, and since it had to
be taken out of the crate before it was delivered, I didn’t want
the potential for a leak. I said I needed fifteen minutes and that
Lieutenant General Terenzio was with me to ensure security while
communications was down.”
“
That’s very smart of you.”
Olivia winked at him, and then turned her head to watch as the big
cargo plane made a smooth landing on the runway. It taxied slowly
inside the hangar, and two outside guards pulled the big metal
doors shut.
“
What’s on the plane?”
Nicholas eyed the two of them.
The sound of fierce shouts and the dull
thud of gunfire tainted the air of the immediate vicinity. A dark
smile spread across Olivia’s mouth. “A present from the
Brotherhood.”
§
December 1, 2012 - 10:33 PM
Alcyone Island
Phoenix Resort Hotel
Caleb had Kyle's eyes. Simone felt him
in Caleb's touch. She saw the same humor glinting in the glances he
had cast her way. Their personalities weren't all that different,
but that was where the similarities ended. Caleb did not taste like
Kyle. He did not smell like Kyle. The angles of his body felt
foreign beneath her hands, but he was warm. He was reassuringly
solid, and she had wondered for some time now just what it would be
like to be pressed against him in a moment like this. It was
exquisite. Traces of the man he had been mingled with the man he
was, the man who had driven Simone quietly crazy the last five
months, and she was powerless against the pull of her body and the
call of her heart. Echoing the groan that escaped Caleb when she
yanked him into the elevator and kissed him, she ripped open his
shirt, heedless of their surroundings. Caleb gave a short, husky
laugh against her mouth. "If you keep that up—” He was forced to
hiss in a breath when Simone smoothed her hands over his chest.
“—we'll never make it to the room."
"That's never stopped us,” Simone
panted, lifting into Caleb to claim his mouth again. He did nothing
to help the matter by kissing her back, harder. Absently, he heard
the elevator ding and doors behind him open. At the last possible
second, he jerked his foot back, his heel catching the doors to
make them reopen. Caleb swept Simone into his arms, backing out of
the car.
Bumping their way down the hall, Simone
plied hot, open-mouthed kisses over the side of his neck and into
the hollow of his throat, and wrapped her legs around his waist.
Her shoulders barked up against a door. “Keycard,” Caleb mumbled
against the curve of her jaw. “Pocket.” Simone slipped a hand into
his pocket, seized the keycard, and reached behind her to slide it
into the lock.
"Doorknob," she murmured into the
underside of his chin. "Now."
§
December 1, 2012 - 10:35 PM
Loyalty Airlines International
Airport
Cargo Runway #17
The first version of Programmable Life
Forms were government sanctioned, genetically created grey aliens
designed to “abduct humans.” The first version allowed the
Roshaniya to test their mind control technology on unwitting
suspects as well as explore forms of genetic manipulation. The
newest version of the PLFs, as they were called, were actually
soldiers to use in combat. They were all six feet tall, thickly
muscular, with solid, soulless black eyes that had no irises. They
were dressed in Special Forces fatigues, with the All Seeing Eye
that was found on the back of the one dollar bill tattooed on their
left cheeks.
Nicholas stared in shock as they
marched out of the hanger. One PLF broke the rigid formation to
shoot both outside guards, then fell back into the marching line.
Amadeo got out of the car just as a line of SUVs came screeching to
a halt near his vehicle.
“
When the mafia is just not
enough.” Olivia was almost orgasmic. “Time to take this family
back.”
The PLFs stopped in front of the cars.
One broke formation again, coming from the far right side to meet
Amadeo’s approach. Amadeo shook the captain’s gloved hand. “You
were briefed?”
“
Yes, sir. On the plane.”
The PLF’s voice was low and creepily monotone.
“
I’m looking forward to
seeing your men in action, Captain.” Amadeo removed the keycard
from his pocket, passing it over to the PLF. “You’ll need that to
get into the security center.”
“
Yes, sir.” The captain
saluted Amadeo, and then turned on his heel and shouted a command.
The rest of his men fanned out and climbed into the SUVs. Amadeo
watched them move, a sense of finality sharpening the reality of
the moment.
“
We’re on a time table,
cousin!”
Olivia’s shout pulled Amadeo into
motion, and he got back into the sedan. “Meet us at the hotel,
Nicky,” Olivia said, rolling up her window. Their car led the
deadly entourage from the back roads and straight for
downtown.
Nicholas climbed back into his own
sporty vehicle and immediately pulled the cell from his pocket.
“Name dial, Leone Vaughn.”
§
December 1, 2012 - 10:44 PM
Alcyone Island
Phoenix Resort Hotel
Caleb twisted the knob,
uncharacteristically clumsy in his passion and haste. He kicked the
door shut and didn't bother with a light. He bumped into an end
table, which sent a lamp crashing to the floor, and Simone caught
them against the wall, distractedly hoping in that precarious
moment that they didn't fall. Heedless of the small destruction,
Caleb kept moving, until they tumbled over the arm of the couch. He
yanked out his earpiece, and quickly set his sidearm on the floor.
Once his hands were free, he impatiently pushed the beautiful dress
up Simone’s thighs and set his mouth open and warm against the
column of her throat, the tip of his tongue marking a damp path on
her skin.
Simone shuddered. Closing her eyes and
drawing a sharp breath, she arched into Caleb and tugged his
undershirt over his head, so that she could kiss the warm slope of
his shoulder and tease the tightly coiled muscles with the scrape
of her teeth. For a moment, Caleb savored the heated play of
Simone’s lips and teeth. In the next, her dress joined his shirt in
a pile on the floor. Intimate columns of moonlight gazed in through
the tall windows of the suite, exposing all of Simone’s sexy,
feminine curves to the natural light and Caleb’s heated, memorizing
gaze.
"Christ, you’re beautiful," Caleb
whispered as he cupped a strong hand around the curve of her breast
and lifted it to his eager mouth.
§
“
I think we have a problem.”
Vasco touched his brother’s shoulder.
Lucien set his empty glass on the bar,
excused himself from the women, and turned to his brother. “What’s
wrong?”
Vasco didn’t answer right away. He
watched Kayla pull her cell phone out of her pocket and step away
from the crowd to take a call.
“
V?”
“
Call Headquarters, tell
them to get our plane ready and have a team standing by. Operation
Ghost is a go, right now.”
Lucien’s brows shot up, but he didn’t
hesitate to pull the phone from his pocket, pressing the speed dial
button. “Talk to me, brother.”
Vasco took a step away from the bar as
a line of SUVs came screeching to a halt on the sandy beach,
earning angry shouts from the party goers. “The Brotherhood’s
calling check.”
§
“
Me?" Simone looked down at
Caleb, lightly shivering as he set his mouth on her and flushed her
with heat. "Look at you." Pressed over her body and with cool
moonlight slanting down his back, he could have been a Grecian
statue, hewn out of marble and exquisitely detailed. Simone had
seen him—Kyle—from this angle countless times, and the sight still
sent a peal of sensation right through the middle of her, down to
the damp heat growing between her thighs.
Caleb laughed huskily against her skin.
He lifted his head, and his humor faded in the darkened, passionate
glow of Simone’s gray eyes. He captured her mouth, got rid of his
pants, and then he rose over her, to position himself between her
thighs.
Simone cupped Caleb’s face between her
hands, holding him against her as she kissed him slowly and deeply,
over and over, and grazed his hips with her thighs. "Don't stop."
Soft pleading limned the edges of her murmur. "Caleb, don't ever
stop."
§
“
Goddammit, Amadeo, stop!”
Christopher shout¬ed furiously.
The party had been over run. One
moment, there was celebration, family and friends. Now, dead bodies
littered the floor. Most were security. The ballroom doors that
faced the beach had been yanked shut and were guarded by the
PLFs.
Those still alive were being held at
gun point, by their own family. Nicholas had looked briefly
surprised to discover that his father was actually part of all of
this, and immediately wonder if the old man had known about his
family.
Once some measure of order was
attained, Amadeo went over to Lucien and struck him.
Lucien grunted, blood trickling from
the corner of his mouth. He worked his jaw back and forth, wincing
slightly, and leveled his gaze on Amadeo. “Your uniform shouldn’t
read Lieutenant General. We’re going to give you a new special
title: Olivia’s bitch.”
Amadeo hit him again, viciously. When
Lucien fell to the floor, he began kicking him. Stopping at
Christopher’s shout, Amadeo smirked coldly. “He’s not going to be
alive much longer to protect you, Lucien. Don’t feel too secure,
all right?”
“
Go fuck yourself, Amadeo,”
Lucien wheezed.
It was difficult to watch his brother
get beaten and not lose face. But, he managed. “How do you intend
to get away with this?” Vasco asked nonchalantly.
Olivia set a calming hand on Amadeo’s
shoulder and looked pointedly at Vasco. “When you’re all dead, the
army will have no choice but to follow our orders. And there are
more of us on the way.” Her smile was razor sharp. “Where’s your
sister?”
When Kayla finished giving an order to
PLFs’ captain, she walked over to Isabella and Christopher. “I know
where they are.”
§
Don't
stop
. As if he ever could. Neither could he
make them wait any longer. Caleb curved his hand around Simone’s
hip, stilling her for the slow penetration that took his breath
away.
This was what love felt like, Simone
thought. The faint stirrings of affection that she had felt for
Victor, once upon a time, were like tiny sparks flickering in the
dark. They were nothing compared to this consuming blaze of
emotion. She lifted into Caleb, reaching for him with her hips, and
moaned into his shoulder as he slid home.
Caleb’s eyes snapped shut as Simone
closed around him, pulling him deeper. She felt so good, he thought
it impossible that he could spend any lifetime without her. Struck
with the blissful weight of emotion and the nerve blazing passion
that wracked him, he lifted his head just to press his cheek
against hers and breathed into her ear, "I love you. I know I
do."
Shuddering under the sweet torture of
Caleb’s words and the delicious friction of their bodies, Simone
pressed a hand to his cheek and held him close, committing to
memory the way the light played over his shoulders and silvered the
fine hairs on his arms. This would be a moment she would remember
for ages. "I love you," she murmured with breathless intensity. How
could she not love the man who she had loved countless times
before? "I always have. I always will."
"Show me.” Caleb demanded huskily, a
second before his mouth smothered hers.