Beta Read online

I shook all over, still trying to hold back, to be gentle, to fight the madness of this chemical rage. This was Kyrie. My Kyrie. I couldn’t—

  She broke through my thoughts. “Let go, Valentine. This is me. It’s okay. You can let go. ”

  The last vestige of my self-control was shattered totally by her words, by the absolute sincerity in her voice.

  I pulled out of her, breaking the hold of her heels around my waist. She planted her feet on the bed, staring up at me with emotion-fraught azure blue eyes tender and trusting, hands splayed on the sheet, fisting the jersey material, chest heaving, tits swaying with her breath. I let my eyes roam her body, head to toe, from the tangled mass of honey-blonde hair to the sex-smeared pink crevice of her pussy.

  And then I could hold back no more.

  I grabbed her by the hips, rolled her to her stomach. Kyrie knew me, knew what I wanted, and gave it to me. She drew her knees up beneath her belly, stretched her ass high in the air, thighs split as far apart as they would go, spine arched to press her chest to the mattress, arms out in front of her, fingers gripping the sheet. Her face turned to the side, watching me.

  Shivering violently as I fought the urge to slam into her with merciless abandon, I gripped my cock in one hand, the other palm resting on the wide round curve of her ass. Found the hot slick wetness of her cunt, breathing in the sweet aroma of her arousal, and guided the tip of my cock into her, slowly. Slowly. It took all I had to do this gently, to keep a rein on the insanity.

  “Oh—oh—oh god, Roth. Fuck. Yes, god yes. More. ” Her voice was muffled by the bed, her eyes scrunched closed tight, rapture on her face. “Harder, baby. FUCK ME. FUCK ME, Valentine. ”

  I fucked her. With total abandon I fucked her, drawing back my hips and driving in hard, my flesh slapping loudly against hers, the generous muscle and flesh of her glorious ass quivering and quivering and quivering as I fucked into her again and again, groaning with each crashing, grinding thrust. And she took it, my Kyrie took it, whimpering at first, whining in her throat, holding still and just taking what I gave her.

  She started shoving back into my thrusts, spine arched upward to draw her hips back in synch with my pulling out, and then she pushed with her hands and bowed her back to meet my driving cock. And now she was wailing with each meeting of our bodies, screaming into the mattress as my cock filled her, her pussy clenching around me, squeezing and gripping with involuntary spasms. I held her hips, my hands wrapped around the crease where hip met thigh and jerking her back into my thrusts, lifting her bodily off the bed to sit her on my cock, cramming myself deeper and deeper into her wet, pulsating core.

  “I’m—I’m coming, Roth. I’m coming. Oh god, oh jesusfuck I’m coming, Roth. Come with me. Please, baby. Come with me. Right now. Ohfuckfuckfuck!” She was crying, sobbing my name, trying to thrust back but losing all muscular control as her body detonated, shattered, going limp. “ROTH! ROTH! Oh my god, Valentine, oh-oh-oh…. ”

  I was absolutely mindless then, a rutting, ravenous beast of a man, pounding into Kyrie with reckless ferocity, grunting with each thrust, growling and cursing. I palmed her luscious, jiggling ass with both hands and spread her cheeks apart, sliding in even deeper yet, so deep it almost hurt, and she squealed in a kind of aching rapture as I held her like that, ass cheeks spread apart, her body bucked forward with the primal power of my thrusts.

  My stomach ached with the pressure of my impending release, and my balls throbbed, tight against my body and pulsing, thighs tensed and flexing and hurting with exertion. I shook, trembled, and felt a volcanic upwelling begin somewhere in my atoms, in the nuclei of my being. Kyrie sobbed, boneless with orgasmic ecstasy, held up only by my hands as I lost rhythm, and I was gasping for breath, making a sound that was frighteningly like a sob as I crashed into her, harder and harder and harder, her ass shaking with each slapping thrust, her sobs turning to a single drawn-out moan as she began to reach climax yet again. I felt her pussy spasming, her inner muscles beginning to squeeze around me as I felt my balls tighten until they hurt, my cock swelling and throbbing.

  Page 27

 

  And now I was incapable of even thrusting. All I could do was keep her ass gripped tight against my front and grind into her. My vision twisted and distorted. I saw white. My lungs swelled until I couldn’t breathe, and my vocal chords froze and my stomach lurched and flipped and sank, and my blood sang and my mind wheeled and all the earth spun around us and stopped, halted—

  “KYRIE!” I cried her name as I came, my entire being exploding, my heart stopping.

  I felt the relentless gush of seed shoot out of me in spurt after spurt, and now I was pulling out and thrusting in, coming still, coming again, and she was pushing back into me and whimpering my name, and I was coming again, fires of orgasm raging unquenchable inside me, white-hot and catalytic. Those fires congealed and coalesced and turned liquid, rocketed out of my cock and into Kyrie in yet another wracking spasm.

  The white-out distortion of my vision cleared, and I was finally able to let Kyrie go. She collapsed forward, rolled to her back, and caught me as I fell, cradled my head against her breast.

  I heard her heartbeat, frantic and pattering wildly.

  Yet, even as we gasped together for breath, I knew the monster was not yet sated.

  9

  ICARUS

  Roth and I tended to get pretty wild in bed. It was just how we were. He was a powerful man with an insatiable appetite for sex, and I was a young woman nearing her sexual prime, my appetite every bit as ravenous as his. In the months since he’d first sent for me, we’d had all kinds of incredible sex. We’d fucked in every conceivable position, in beds and on the floor and against the wall and just literally everywhere. We’d fucked sober, fucked drunk, fucked angry at each other.

  That was pretty epic, actually. I don’t even remember what we were angry about. One of those long frustrated days where every little thing went wrong and built up and culminated in a shouting match. I shouted “FUCK YOU!” and he’d just growled at me. And then, just like that, he was slamming me up against the sliding glass door of the hotel balcony, ripping my clothes off and thrusting into me. I’d screamed in rage, yet as he’d pulled out and pushed back into me, I’d had no choice but to wrap my legs around his waist and hold on, digging my nails into his shoulders, slamming my ass down as hard as I could in an attempt to hurt him. By the time we’d both finished, neither of us could remember what we we’d been arguing about.

  All the ways we’d fucked each other, and yet none of them could even come close to the mad ferocity of what had just happened.

  I’d be really, really sore later. And I knew we had a long, painful talk coming. Nothing had been solved. Nothing was okay yet. Roth wasn’t okay.

  And we weren’t done yet. I could tell by the way he was still tensed, his breathing not ragged anymore but coming in long, deep pulls.

  “Roth, listen—”

  “Kyrie, I’m sorry—”

  I put my palm over his mouth. “No. That’s what I was about to say. Don’t apologize. Just don’t. ” I made sure he saw me, made sure he was looking into my eyes. I could see the wildness still lurking there, and it scared me a little. I wasn’t sure even I could take another pounding like that. Not yet, at least. “Roth, baby. I love you. You think I didn’t know what would happen when I uncuffed you? I knew. Okay? I knew. And it’s fine. ”

  “Did I hurt you?”

  I shook my head. He hadn’t. Not really. I’d be sore later, and would probably be walking funny, but it was worth it. I needed Valentine to know it was me. To know I was with him. And, honestly, I’d been worried he’d literally go crazy if I didn’t do something. He’d been given an experimental libido drug, and who knew how it would affect him. He’d been in pain, literally tortured by need, and I was unable to let him remain in such wracking agony.

  I collected my emotions, my worries, my thoughts, and pushed them down,
pushed them away. I couldn’t deal with all that, not yet. I couldn’t deal with the rage I felt against the woman who’d done that to Valentine. She’d tortured the man I loved in who knew how many different ways, and the hate I felt for her was too potent to handle right then, not with Valentine in the state he was in.

  “Kyrie, you should know now that when this drug wears off, I’m going to be sick. I mean it. Violently ill. Like the flu and drug withdrawal at the same time. It’s—it’s horrible, Kyrie. ”

  “We’ll deal with that when it comes, Roth. I’ll be here. Okay? I won’t leave your side, no matter what. ”

  He clung to me, shaking. “Swear?”

  “I swear, Valentine. I swear. ”

  He rolled off me, onto his back beside me. “God, it’s relentless. ”

  “What?”

  “The drug. ” He put a hand over his crotch and cupped himself, gripped his hardening dick. “It’s crazy. I feel crazy. Literally, like I’ve gone mad. I can’t control it, Kyrie. I can’t. I can’t. ”

  I pushed his hand aside and saw that he was hardening again already. Roth had a pretty short refractory period, but this was fast even for him. “Roth. Look at me. ” He fixed his pale blue eyes on mine. “Just be still. Let me take care of you, okay?”

  “How?” He arched his back and flexed his hips. “Take care of me how?”

  “However I need to. ”

  “You can’t take any more, Kyrie. I know you. I won’t let myself do that to you again. I’ll hurt you for real, and I’d never—I’d never—”

  I leaned in and kissed him to silence him. “I know. You’re right, I can’t. But there are other things, baby. ”

  He was fully engorged by then, and I took him in my hand. I watched his face twist in pained pleasure as I slid my fingers down his length. There was no drawing it out, no making him wait for the payoff. My only goal was to bring Valentine to release as quickly as possible. I spat onto my hand and smeared my saliva onto my palms, and then wrapped both hands around his thick cock, stroking him hand over hand. He groaned, thrust up into my fists, curled his fingers into the sheets.

  “Look at me, Valentine. ” I slowed my strokes until he opened his eyes and met my gaze. “Don’t take your eyes off me, okay? Watch me. Watch me do this. ”

  His eyes, tortured, conflicted, agonized, fixed on mine. I didn’t try to smile for him, didn’t try to hide my own inner turmoil. He was covered in sweat, chest heaving as he gasped raggedly, hips grinding relentlessly. His feet scrabbled at the sheet, heels digging in to push his entire torso off the bed as his cock throbbed and thickened and pulsated in my hands.

  Page 28

 

  “Jesus, it hurts. I’m close, Kyrie. ”

  “I know, baby. I know. I can feel it. ”

  I kept stroking him faster and faster, until he was frantic with the impending climax. Wrapping my fist low around his base, I continued the hard and fast pumping, cupped my upper hand around the head of his cock and spat onto him again, providing more lubrication, and then squeezed my fist around him and stroked him hand over hand the way I knew drove him craziest. He groaned and growled and thrust into my strokes, and I knew by the way his rhythm faltered how close he was to exploding.

  I leaned over him and suctioned my lips around his soft, broad mushroom head, stroking hard at his base, both hands grinding up and down his length, working with my tongue and throat.

  “Kyrie, god, Kyrie…I’m gonna come—”

  I moaned, humming around his cock, stroking and pumping and sucking until he was crazed and maddened, grinding hard into my mouth. I followed his thrusts, keeping my lips around his tip until I felt his stomach tense and his body arched. At the moment of his climax, I bobbed my head down to take him toward my throat, pulling his cock away from his body and angling myself to open my throat so I could take him deeper, pumping my fist around his base, working my throat muscles around his head and stroking him with my tongue. He was groaning and cursing, making incoherent sounds, gasping, and I felt the hot gush of come hit the back of my throat and I backed away, swallowing. He lowered his body to the bed, hands fisting in the sheet as he fought for control. I knew what he wanted to do.

  I let go of his dick long enough to move his hands to my hair, and he immediately gripped at the roots and gently but insistently pushed my head down. I went with it, resuming my hold on the base of his cock to stroke him, bobbing my head in quick dips, sucking, taking the next warm, salty wash of come down my throat.

  He groaned and pulled me up, thrust shallowly so the tip glided through my lips, and I moved my hands on him in long, soft squeezes, smearing my palms around him, and then I felt him tense in my hands and thrust hard. Opening my throat, I took him as deep as I could and felt the final spurt of his seed sluice down my esophagus, and backed away to swallow it.

  Valentine went limp on the bed, and I sat up, wiping at my mouth with the back of my wrist, still squeezing and stroking his throbbing cock to milk every last spasm of his release. I watched as film of whitish come oozed from his tip and used it to smear down his length, and he groaned, gasping brokenly for breath.

  “Enough…enough, Kyrie,” he rasped. I let go, sat beside him, and watched as his breathing slowed. Gradually, he seemed to return to something like normal. “Stay here with me. I’m tired, Kyrie. So tired. ”

  “Rest, Valentine. I’m here, and I’m not going anywhere. ”

  He rolled to his left side, and I spooned up behind him, held him close and felt him drift to sleep. Uneasily, heart aching with love, mind buckling from the weight of unanswered questions, I slipped into sleep myself.

  * * *

  I woke to the sound of Roth gagging, heaving. The bed was empty, and he was on his hands and knees in the tiny bathroom, puking. My bag of clothing was on the floor near the bed, so I dressed quickly, hating the feeling of putting on clean clothes when I knew I was desperately in need of a shower. There wasn’t any other option, though. I moved to stand by the doorway of the bathroom, bending over to rest my palm on Roth’s bare back. He was still naked, and his entire body was dripping sweat. His skin was hot to the touch, his hair wet and tangled and pasted to his skull.

  Gasping, Roth straightened slightly, pushing up with one hand on the rim of the toilet, visibly shaking. “Help me—help me lie down. ” He struggled to get his feet under him, and I supported him, helping him stumble to the bed. He covered his eyes with his forearm, chest rising and falling. “Bucket. Need a—need a bucket. ”

  I went topside, found a big plastic bucket in a storage closet near the cockpit, and placed it on the floor beside Roth. He flung a hand out, reaching for me. I knelt on the floor, took his hand in mine, and placed his palm on my cheek. “I’m here, Valentine. I’m here. ”

  “I don’t know what I’d do without you,” he murmured.

  “You don’t have to find out. ”

  His stomach heaved, his Adam’s apple bobbed, and I brought the bucket closer to him. He grabbed the side of the bucket, leaned into it, and gagged, dragged in a shuddering breath, and then vomited. I held the bucket in one hand and brushed the hair away from his temples with the other. When the wave passed, he rested his forehead on the rim of the bucket, gasping for breath, his stomach still heaving. He gagged again, coughed, spat, drooling, and then vomited again. Nothing came up this time but bile.

  He rolled away, letting me take the bucket. “I don’t have anything left to bring up,” he said.

  “I’ll see if I can find something. Some water, at least,” I said, setting the bucket on the floor beside him. “Here’s the bucket in case you need it. ”

  “Just…hurry. ”

  I scurried into the galley, where I found Harris making coffee.

  He lifted his chin at me. “How’s he doing?”

  “Not good. ” I rummaged in the small refrigerator for a bottle of water, found a package of Saltines in a cupboard. “She gave him some kind o
f experimental drug. Side effects are nasty. He’s sicker than a dog. ”

  Judging by the carefully blank expression on Harris’s face, he’d heard us. “Should we find a doctor?”

  I shook my head. “Not yet. Hopefully, he can ride it out. We’ll have to see, I guess. ” I paused in the doorway. “Where are we right now?”

  “A few miles off the coast of Crete. ”

  I tried to pull up a map of the Mediterranean in my head. “Wait, Crete? Isn’t that in opposite direction of where we came from?”

  Harris nodded. “Yeah. But going back the way we came is probably the worst thing we could do. We’re headed to Alexandria. ”

  “Alexandria? As in Africa?”

  He nodded. “Last place they’d expect us to go. Mr. Roth has no business contacts there, no friends. So it’s a perfect place to go for that reason. We can hide out until Mr. Roth is feeling better and we have a chance to make a plan. ” He twisted the lid on his Thermos of coffee. “We’re stopping in Crete to refuel. Little place called Sitia. We can get some fuel and food, and hopefully weather out the storm that’s headed our way. ”

  Page 29

 

  “There’s a storm coming?”

  Harris nodded, tapping a thumb against the side of the Thermos. His eyes wouldn’t quite meet mine, a faint blush tingeing his cheeks. “Yeah. Big one, coming in from the west. Heavy wind and rains. It’ll make some pretty scary waves, I’m thinking. Best to take shelter. We’re really not big enough to tackle a storm, especially if Mr. Roth is sick. ”

  I never saw Sitia. I didn’t sleep. I didn’t leave the room except to empty the bucket and bring him more water to drink. He spent three days vomiting, three days during which the boat rocked and pitched under the deluge of rain, three days of hell.

  The passage of the storm coincided, ironically, perhaps, with the subsiding of Roth’s illness. Anger boiled deep inside me, buried way down beneath the concern and the love.

  After he was able to keep down some water and crackers, he fell into the sleep of the dead, and didn’t so much as stir the entire trip from Sitia to Alexandria.

  10

  CONSEQUENCES

  I was on the bow of the yacht, a blanket wrapped around my shoulders. Dawn. The sun was rising up over the alien silhouette of Alexandria. Spires, tall and thin, pierced the cityscape, next to rounded towers and twisting cupolas. A high, thin, wavering voice broke the silence, calling out in a strange, chanting song.

  I heard his shuffling footsteps behind me, and didn’t have to turn to know who it was. “That’s a muezzin. ”

  “The singing?” I turned and glanced at him.

  He had a towel wrapped around his waist, naked but for that. He nodded. “Yeah. He’s calling the faithful to prayer. Five times a day you’ll hear that. ”