Night Beyond The Night (25 page)

The murkiness that pushed at him waned at bit as he focused on her. The green eyes, the lush mouth, her lifted chin. Elliott closed his fingers around her arm as he said, “I need to speak with you.” He thought his voice sounded normal and calm, but he was in no state to be objective.

This isn’t me.
His inner voice tapped weakly at him, and Elliott, sloshing through the murky place his world had become, ignored it. “Now,” he added, when she didn’t leap to his command.

There was a door. He found it, hell, he didn’t shove her, he knew that much, but he propelled, directed,
firmly escorted
her toward it, still calm, still in control, still damned foggy and lost . . . but focused. On her.

“Elliott,” she began when they were inside whatever room it was, the door safely closed, the others on the other side. She looked up at him, her eyes wide but not frightened.

She said something else, maybe . . . but he didn’t hear her. He didn’t speak, he couldn’t. Something rushed, filling his ears, his fingers moved to the tops of her arms, curling around her bare skin . . . he felt as if he were removed, as if he were observing himself . . . and then it all slid away as he settled into her, backing her sharply against the wall.

Warm, soft, lemon and woman, sleek and silky and sweet. The sluggishness, the tension evaporated into a blaze of heat and breathlessness.

Mine
.

From the moment she saw Elliott striding down the hall, pushing his way to her, Jade’s breathing fairly stopped. Her stomach slipped and slid and her palms dampened even as she pressed them against her slacks.

His blue eyes, dark and pinpointed on her, his face set, his broad, powerful shoulders parting a path between Flo and her teen-aged son Jason, coming to her.

For
her.

She couldn’t speak, she was simply shocked silent by his sudden appearance, the wildness edging his eyes. When he took her arm, not angrily, not painfully—but clearly willing to brook no argument—she could have been frightened or alarmed . . . but she wasn’t.

She was . . . was. . . .

A door opened, closed, the crowd and Flo’s fascinated expression faded away, replaced by Elliott’s face, dark and shadowed, looming over her in some random room. The wall rose up behind her, chill and smooth against her bare back, and his lips moved, pressing together, as he said something soft, sharp, under his breath.

And then he bent to her and she lifted her face, her head bumping against the wall as he covered her mouth, covered any protest she might have made, drawing her up and into him, against his long, powerful body.

Oh God
.

Jade closed her eyes, met his mouth, tried to keep up with the kiss as he drew deeply from her, pulled and demanded and coaxed . . . seduced and teased. What had begun as a claiming eased into a long, languorous temptation, hot and sleek and smooth. His hands moved up into her hair, sliding from shoulders bared by her halter, cupping the back of her skull, lifting the heavy weight from her damp neck.

She felt the unmistakable bulge behind the zipper of his jeans, and a blaze of heat and desire rushed over her, tingling down between her legs.

“Elliott. . . .” She twisted her face from his mouth long enough to draw in a rough breath, curling her fingers into the belt loops at his waist, pulling him closer, pressing her hips into him. He was warm, so warm, so tall and broad . . . and she realized vaguely that it didn’t alarm her as he bent over her, his large, powerful body grinding her against the wall as if he needed to absorb her.

Overwhelming? No. Not at all.

She sighed, whispering his name, twisting her face away just to catch a breath. Why had she tried to ignore him? She felt so lightheaded, warm, sleek . . . alive. His hands . . . everywhere. . . .

Then, he stepped back, taking that powerful comfort away, his hands pushing her back against the wall, shoving himself away. Jade realized belatedly that they were in her dressing room, such as it was, and that the light had been left on.

“Jade,” he managed to say. His voice sounded different: tight, breathless, bewildered. “I. . . .”

He stepped back, swiping a hand over his mouth, his eyes large and deep and blue. A little shocked, even. That anguish was there again, that and something else. Heat, yes. Want, desire . . . and something fierce.

His face darkened, as though some other thought had occurred to him—an unpleasant one. “I’m not going to fight through the crowd again, Jade.”

She shook her head, realizing her breathing had just begun to catch up with her racing heart. “What?”

“I don’t share. I won’t. I . . . want . . .” His voice trailed off as if he could make no sense of it either, but then his expression settled. His eyes sharpened, the ocean blue flattening into cold steel. “I don’t know what’s going on in that head of yours, but I’m not playing. You’re
mine
, Jade, and—”

“Are you
crazy
?” She drew herself up. She couldn’t have been more shocked at this totally out-of-the-blue pronouncement.
Mine?
“I thought you were from the twenty-first century, not the Middle Ages. I don’t belong to anyone. Never again will I
belong
to anyone. You can’t—”

“So do you kiss everyone like you just kissed me? Vaughn and Luke and all of your groupies?” He stepped toward her again, grimacing, almost as if he were fighting some magnetic pull. His words were furious, but they came out low, steady, unrelenting. His eyes bored into hers. “You tell them all—Luke of the fucking mega crystal, the cowboy mayor, all of them—that you’re done with them.”

Jade could hardly comprehend that this man, this man she hardly knew, whom she’d kissed a total of three times and had known for as many days, was hammering her with these demands. Without warning, he’d changed from the respectful, kind, sexy-as-hell Elliott, to this . . . alpha man who slammed her up against the wall.

The exact kind of man she despised.

But . . . holy crap. She’d liked it. She’d kissed him, pressed into him, moaned beneath him . . . and would have taken more.

What the hell was wrong with her?

“I,” she said, drawing herself up, making her own voice calm and steely too, “do not answer to you. Or anyone. You’re
insane
.”

All of the heat and ferocity seemed to drain from his face. “Maybe I am,” he whispered. “Maybe I am.”

He drew himself up, stiffly, his gaze blank and emotionless, his face like stone. “I’m sorry if I offended you.” His words were just as stiff as his persona. “But I meant what I said, Jade. You’re mine. You know it. And the sooner you admit it, the better off we’ll both be.”

Before she could assimilate this sudden change, he spun and was gone.

And no more than a second later the door flew open again.

Jade’s heart leapt, but then she saw that it was Flo. Her eyes wide, her freckles standing out in dark relief against her flushed face, the older woman burst into the room and shut the door.

“What happened?
” she demanded, her voice an excited hush that Jade assumed she thought was a whisper. “Oh my saints, it was just like Rhett sweeping Scarlett up into his arms and carrying her up the stairs!” Flo clasped her hand to her pillowy breasts and pretended to swoon. “Jade, he is
mad
about you.”

“Yeah, mad is the right word,” Jade said, glancing at the door as if it would provide some answer to this tailspin she’d been in for the last few minutes. “He’s crazy.”

“What happened? What did he say? Tell me!” Flo swept over to the raggedy sofa and settled her round bottom right on the edge of its cushion, looking up expectantly.

Jade tried to explain, but even she wasn’t certain what had happened. She did her best.

But apparently, Flo had all the answers. And it began with her lip color. “See, I told you it would make him notice,” she said. “But it’s your fault, you know.”

Jade gaped at her. “My fault that he dragged me off like some Neanderthal cavewoman into a room and slammed me up against the wall?” She shivered. It seemed like every time she thought about that whole slamming-up-against-the-wall thing, her belly flipped and squished. Not in an unpleasant way either.

What the
hell
was wrong with her? She’d been manhandled enough in the past. She wasn’t the kind of woman that would ever be weak enough to let that happen again. She’d grown so strong since those days.

And she’d really had no intention of having a man in her life, except for the safe and strong Vaughn Rogan. No one would mess with the mayor of Envy.

Except maybe Elliott Drake.

Tell your cowboy boyfriend you’re done with him
.

She couldn’t help the little squiggly shiver deep in her belly, but she ignored it.

“I don’t want some guy ordering me around, pretending he owns me, Flo. I’ve been there, done that, and bought the T-shirt,” she said, quoting an old cliché that she didn’t quite understand. “And that’s what he wants.”

“You didn’t tell him about Luke. He thinks the worst, and you know what happens whenever you sing, Jade. You know how it looks.” The excited glint in Flo’s eyes had given way to a steely one. The one where she moved from fairy godmother to mentor. Or motherly lecturer.

“I don’t answer to Elliott. I don’t have to tell him about Luke. And I’m sorry if he didn’t like the way I look when I sing. I can’t help it, and you know I can’t see anything in the audience anyway.”

“When you sing, you have every single man in the room on his knees. It’s that low voice combined with the way you look. And then they all flock to see you afterward. You know that’s part of the reason you let Vaughn hang around—to scare them off.”

“They all flock? What . . . the three guys who play backup for me sometimes, and you and Jason and Tiger? I hardly call that flocking. Besides, the guys only come backstage to tell me if my guitar is out of tune, or whether the amp was up high enough.”

Flo was shaking her head. “To a man blinded by love”—at which Jade snorted; Elliott had never said anything about
love
—“it looks like you’ve got a bunch of groupies hanging on you.”

“Whatever.” Jade shook her head, suddenly weary. “I’m tired, Flo. I’m going to go to bed before Vaughn shows up and really complicates my life.”

Flo tsked, shaking her head, but Jade ignored it. Sometimes that was the only way to handle her.

Six months After

There are monsters here. They call for someone named Ruth, and they have orange eyes. Come out only at night. Saw them for the first time two weeks ago. They look just like I always pictured the blood-sucking, flesh-eating
jiang shi
monsters from China my granddad told us stories about. The
jiangs
move like they’ve had the crap beaten out of them. But they’re huge, larger than humans, and strong and they tear people apart. We saw them. Leonard Glover went out and never came back. But we heard him scream.

Staying inside at night for damn sure.

Theo has found an intact satellite station he thinks he can hack into. Have told him he’s no Torvalds, but he laughs and tells me to fuck off. He’ll do it.

The crew we sent has returned from Hoover Dam. It’s intact, but the power plant and generator aren’t functioning well. We don’t have the manpower to maintain it, so are looking for other options. Windmills. Water. Ethanol. There’s a fucking ocean here, so of course we’re also going to look at algae and other possibilities.

Have decided to create a governing council and elect a mayor. Rowe wants to be mayor, but Marck will fight him for it. Rowe’s a better choice in my opinion—he’s fair and pragmatic and reminds me a lot of Jack from
LOST
. Marck is too controlling, and he wants to enforce things like breeding plans and schedules. The man gives me a twitch.

Think I’m in love, btw. Her name is Elsie.

—from the journal of Lou Waxnicki

Crap
.

And holy hot damn
.

Zoë’s world had become heat and sleek muscle, warm and strong against her, around her, taking, pulling, demanding. Holy shit, the man had a set of lips on him. And he damn well knew how to use them.

She couldn’t get enough of touching this man, this Quent . . . devouring his mouth, tasting the warmth and salt on his skin, the unfamiliar sensation of closeness, of strength, of comfort. She wanted to fucking crawl inside him.

And though it scared the shit out of her, she didn’t give a good damn at the moment. All she wanted was skin to skin, hot and damp and hard.

And apparently, so did he.

Somehow, they’d made their way inside . . . somewhere . . . and up some stairs; she remembered little but bumping against the wall and being kissed breathless every time they went around a corner, or grabbing his shirt and yanking him to her, just to taste him again, bodies crashing against the plaster in low thuds, sagging together, knee to knee, hip to hip.

Lips, teeth, hands . . . every damn where.

At last, she heard a quiet jingle, the clink against metal, and pulled away from his throat enough to register that he was opening a door. She tugged free of his grip, wiped her mouth, wondered briefly what the hell had gotten into her, then rejected the thought and turned to pull him through the door.

They stumbled, their feet catching and he gave a deep little laugh that sent a renewed sizzle through her, she felt something bump her from behind and realized it was the doorframe. Extricating herself, she slid one hand along the smooth wall and turned to look.

Heart pounding, mouth throbbing, fingers shaking. What the fuck? She drew in a deep breath, tried to settle.

Zoë had never been in one of these rooms, but it took only a brief glance to see that it was small, furnished with an actual bed and a table and chair, and that there was a massive window. The glass was still intact. That was pretty much all she needed to know. Other than where her arrow was . . . but that could wait.

That could damn well wait.

But . . . hell, she almost forgot. There was something else she had to take care of. She felt in her pocket. The paper was still there.