Killer Curves (Dangerous Curves Book 3) (14 page)

“You ready for me, baby?” He pulled out a bit, moved in again. “‘Cause I am
so
damn ready for you.”

“Yes,” she moaned. “Yes, I’m ready.”

Her words were what he’d been waiting for. He withdrew, slammed in, withdrew again; his rhythm was fast and wild, unforgiving and relentless. He took her hard, his chest plastered to her back, his hot mouth on her shoulder again. He needed to be sure that she was there with him, safe and in one piece and Aidan couldn’t get close enough. He fucked her as if he wanted to shatter her bones and enter her body for good, like he wanted to mark her in some way that could never be removed or damaged. Nobody would dare hurt her if he claimed her as his – his protection would never leave her body, his love would never be erased.

Mine. Mine. Mine.

Gabi was barely aware of what was happening to her. His strokes were so rough, so primal, and she could do nothing but hold on to his hands and thrust back on his cock as her pleasure spun out of control. The wave was building, building and she was drowning in sensation. Her breaths came in sharp cries, his were grunts, and the air filled with the sounds and scents of their arousal. He moved one hand down her straining body now. His fingers found her clit and squeezed gently, released, squeezed again.

“Come for me, baby.” He circled her clit once, twice, then pressed down. “I’m gonna come any second, but I can’t do that until you’re grabbing my cock with your sweet pussy… you need to take me with you.”

“Oh!” Gabi’s knees were crumbling under her as his words shoved her over the edge she’d been dancing on for the past few minutes. “
Oh!
”

Aidan’s arm wrapped around her waist and held her up as her climax broke over her, washed her away. Her spasms grasped at him like hands and Aidan gave a cry of relief as he finally allowed himself to let go of his control. He jerked hard against her bowed back, drove his hips in to her clutching sex one last time, held himself there, deep and still. His release burst out of him and he let his head fall forward on to Gabi’s back, his chest heaving, his heart beating furiously.

Still riding the ripples of her climax, the edges of her vision going black, Gabi’s arms were shaking violently. Her legs were jelly and she was honestly afraid she was going to fall. She dug her nails in to Aidan’s forearm, trying to find something to brace herself against, something to ground her.

“Aidan… I –”

Just then her legs gave out and she sagged, almost fell. He grabbed her, thank Christ, and her face flushed in embarrassment.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I just – my legs are shaking.”

Aidan eased out of her slowly. He’d taken her hard, he knew, and he wanted to be careful now.

“I’ve got you, baby,” he said. He turned her in his arms, pushed her back against the wall gently, followed her with his body. He held her close to his chest, feeling her slender frame trembling with aftershocks. “Stand still, OK? Take a minute.”

She nodded, closed her eyes. And there they stood, all wrapped around each other, silent and still, their breathing calming. Aidan ran his hands through her hair, over the curve of her lower back, kissed her forehead. Finally, he pulled back a bit and she raised her chin to meet his gaze.

“Was I too rough?” he said. “You doing alright?”

“Oh, God, babe.” She sounded amused. “What do
you
think?”

“I think I love you.”

She froze, peered up at him. Then a smile broke over her face, a pure, beautiful smile, so full of sunshine and joy it took his breath away all over again.

“You
think
?” she teased him. “You aren’t
sure
, darlin’?”

“Oh, I’m sure.” He kissed her again, tender and soft. “I love you.”

“I’m sure I love you too.”

“Yeah?”

“Oh, yeah.” She rested her hands on the broad, solid wall of his chest, felt his heart beating against her palm. “As sure as the sun will rise tomorrow.”

Chapter Ten
Three days later

They were in Aidan’s bed again, Gabi panting from yet another earthshattering climax on his wicked tongue. He crawled back up her quaking body and took her in his arms, holding her as she calmed and recovered.

She opened her eyes and gazed at him. “You are amazing. You may also be the death of me.”

“Sorry, darlin’.”

“You totally are not.”

“Yeah, OK. I’m not.” His kiss was slow and deep and totally unrepentant. “I can’t keep my hands off you and I don’t even want to try. You’d never leave this bed, if I had my way with you.”

Aidan rolled off her and pulled her head down on his chest. As good as the sex and orgasms were –
and they are fucking spectacular
– this was pretty damn good, too. This time
after
the sex and the orgasms, after all the crying out and groaning and clenching hard. He held her like she was the only thing he’d ever need and in so many ways, that’s exactly what he thought she was.

Gabi was silent now, too silent. When she turned her back to him and curled up facing the wall, he spooned her, melding the front of his body to her back. She didn’t respond and he kissed along her shoulders, felt the tension in them.

“What?” he said quietly. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” Her voice was emotionless.

“Don’t you dare do that.”

“What?”

“Shut me out.” He stroked her hair. “Talk to me, Gabriela.”

“I don’t want to – to upset you.”

“Hey.” He kissed the back of her neck. “Don’t worry about upsetting me, OK? Just stay with me, baby. Open up.”

“OK,” she said, but still hesitated. He waited. “The thing is, Aidan, I’m… I’m going stir-crazy.”

He sighed. He’d been waiting for this conversation; it was a long time in coming.

“I just bet you are," he said. "You haven’t left this apartment for over a week.”

She turned over to face him now and he draped his arm over her hip, tugging her closer.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m not ungrateful, I swear. I know what you’re keeping me safe from, and I love being with you like this, and I adore living with you… but I kind of miss the sun on my skin.”

“I get it,” Aidan said gently.

“I mean, I’m not working. I’m not grocery shopping or bitching about rush-hour traffic or getting takeaway coffee. I’m kind of – disconnected from the rest of the world. I see you and I see an assembly line of people who guard me while you’re at work or out for a run and I talk to Maria every other day… and that’s it, you know?”

“Yeah. I know.”

“I’m not used to this,” she said. “Being taken care of by everybody else and just moving between your bed and the shower and the sofa.” She bit her lip. “I just feel like I want this to end soon so I can get back to my life.”

“Two days more.” Aidan tried to keep his voice steady, despite his worry. “You and King meet with Trigger the day after tomorrow and hopefully after that, the end will be in sight.”

She nodded and drew patterns on his chest. “I know.”

“You worried?”

“Yeah. You?”

“No.”

She raised her eyebrows. “You trying to convince me or yourself?”

Aidan paused. “Both of us?”

She laughed now and he relaxed. “And how’s that going?”

“Not awesome,” he admitted. “I hate these fuckers, Gabriela.
Hate
‘em. Hate what they do, hate how they get away with all of it all the time. Hate that they’re so close to Kirk Jensen, hate that he protects them.”

Gabi nodded.

“But if there’s one man on the planet I’d send you in to that lion’s den with – besides me, I mean – it’s Matt Kingston.”

“King’s really that… that bad-ass?”

“Yeah. He is. He’d snap Trigger MacGee's neck with his bare hands, baby, I swear it.”

Gabi swallowed. “Really?”

“No lie, no exaggeration, no bullshit. Believe me when I say that King’s the kind of man we want on our side.”

“But he’s so… kind. Even gentle.”

“You’ve never seen him angry, never seen him on a job that’s going sideways.”

“True.”

“And I hope you never do.” Aidan sighed, thinking of all those times at Curves that King had beaten some fucker’s head in to the floor with barely any effort at all. “Listen, if something happens at that meeting, you just get the hell out of King’s way and let him deal with whatever it is. You get me? Get your back up against a wall, take cover, let King do what he does best.”

“And what’s that?” Gabi said, afraid of the answer. “What
does
he do best?”

Aidan’s golden eyes were flat. “Neutralizes threats. Eliminates problems with no solution.”

She understood. “And Trigger is both a threat
and
an unsolvable problem, right?”

“Yeah. He is. And if King thinks he’s ramping either one of those things up, his only concern will be for you to walk out of that meeting in one piece. You let him take Trigger down however he sees fit and you don’t second-guess anything. Nothing you could have said or done would have changed anything that may have gone down, believe me. I’ve been in hundreds of hostage situations and hostile stand-offs and I know that the day after tomorrow’s gonna be a little of both of both of those things.”

She froze. “It is?”

“Yeah. That’s why you follow King’s lead. I don’t care if you don’t understand it – you do what he says.” The vehemence in his voice took her aback. “You promise me that, right here and now.”

“I promise.”

“Good.” His kiss was harsh, intense, almost angry, but when he pulled back, all she saw was worry.

“I trust King,” she said softly. “I know that whatever he decides to do, it’ll be the right thing. Probably the
only
thing.”

Aidan kissed her again, his lips lingering sweetly this time. “Get some sleep, OK? You’re going to have one hell of a day tomorrow with Jackson prepping you for the meeting.”

Despite his closeness and reassurance, Gabi still lay awake for several hours, staring in to the darkness. Scared about what the next few days would bring, worried about King getting hurt, terrified about actually seeing Trigger with her own eyes.

Aidan’s husky voice came out of the dark, startling her. “Sleep, baby.” He ran his hand up and down her shoulders and back and she relaxed at his touch. “I love you. Sleep now.”

And unbelievably, she did.

**

Gabi sat in the back of the van, her teeth chattering. She felt so stupid to be so nervous, especially since everyone else present looked cool and collected as they checked their weapons and strapped on bullet-proof vests. They were almost bored, even.

Just another day at the office for these folks, I guess.

She stared at the one man named Tank with a combination of fascination and fear. He was, quite simply, the hugest man she’d ever laid eyes on. God, he even had a few inches on King and his shoulders and hands were larger than King’s by miles. He’d been on guard duty twice while Aidan was at work and she knew him to actually be a good man but still… right in this moment, as she watched his hands move over his shotgun, he looked like nothing but death incarnate.

Next to him sat another one of King’s team. Knox was all dark hair and dark eyes, silent and watchful. He had a quick grin that would appear suddenly and rarely, and every time it did, Gabi found herself smiling back at him. But there was no cocky grin today: the man was focused on the parking lot outside, his broad back tense.

Finally, there was Lilly. She fascinated Gabi for a whole different reason, namely, that she was as beautiful and willowy and busty as any bikini super-model that had ever graced a catwalk. The fact that she was the team’s expert in hand-to-hand combat blew Gabi away, especially since Aidan told her that Lilly had to be able to kick ass in high heels. Gabi could barely
walk
in high heels and she still remembered Kenleigh’s sexy shoes pinching her toes. The thought that Lilly went undercover in stilettos and then nailed bad guys to the ground with them made Gabi feel inadequate and weak. Thank God today the woman was wearing lace-on boots and jeans.

Lilly smiled at her now, her green eyes warm. “You good, Gabi?”

“Yeah.” Her voice came out as a squeak and she cleared her throat. “Yeah, I’m good.”

“It’s going to be OK,” Lilly said. “We’ve all got your back… you just breathe and stay calm and don’t let that fucker get in to your head.”

Gabi nodded. She’d spent the whole of the day before with Jackson, the guy on King’s team who was most specialized in psychological profiling. He’d prepared Gabi for what Trigger might get up to in terms of mind games and it had been nothing short of brutal.

Jack had actually climbed in to her head and walked around in there, messed around with her psyche, been harsh and then kind in turns. King’s opinion was that Trigger wasn’t anywhere as smart as Jack and his cruelty wouldn’t be anywhere as effective, but he’d wanted Gabi to be ready.

“You need to know what it feels like, to face someone whose sole intention is to scare and hurt you without laying a finger on you,” King had explained. “Trigger wants you there, in his space and on his turf, to remind you that he wants you dead. He wants you to understand his dominance, his power.”

“He wants me to know that I’ll only be safe if he
lets
me be safe,” Gabi had whispered. “Right?”

“Exactly.” King’s gray eyes had been hard. “He’s making this all about his munificence.”

“His what?”

“His generosity, his big-heartedness. Like a king pardoning a subject for some crime, sparing them execution.”

“Ah.” Gabi had twisted her fingers around. “I get it.”

“That’s how it’ll begin, I bet,” Jack had said. “With him making you feel grateful to him for not killing you the second you walked in the door. Right away, he’ll want you in a position of being at the mercy of his whims, his moods. Don’t give it to him, Gabi, OK? Don’t thank him, not for anything. Don’t beg him, not once. Say nothing and if you have to talk, say as little as possible. He doesn’t like silence, so use it. Let it make him uncomfortable so he starts to babble and shoot his mouth off.”

And on and on it had gone, with Jack running scenario after scenario by her, casually calling her degrading names, stopping to correct her responses, her facial expressions, her body language. It had been shattering but after nine hours, she’d been able to handle any taunt, any attack without reacting. Jack had nodded at King and Aidan, who’d been sitting there watching the whole day, and then he and King had gone.

Aidan had held her for a long time after, then run a hot bath. He’d undressed both of them, pulled her back against his broad chest, stroked her cheek. She’d rested on him, her fingers trailing in the bubbles and just breathed. They’d stayed there, mostly silent, for an hour and then he’d taken her to bed. They hadn’t made love; he’d just held her until she’d finally fallen asleep and she’d woken up that morning to find those golden eyes watching her.

“I love you,” he’d said the second her eyes opened. “So much, baby. It’s you, you know. It’s all
you
.”

“I love you too,” she’d replied, fighting down her fear.

Then they got up and started to prepare themselves for what could no longer be avoided. And now here they were, in a dark van with a bunch of trained-up killers loading their guns and glaring at the group of armed MC thugs standing between them and the clubhouse.

The back door of the van opened and there King stood. He was wearing jeans and a t-shirt and he looked for all the world like he was heading off to a picnic. He totally ignored the guys with guns behind him, didn’t even glance at the King’s Men holding their guns loosely pointed towards the floor. All he had eyes for was Gabi, who was holding Aidan’s hand in a death grip.

“OK, let’s go,” he said quietly.

Gabi nodded since her voice seemed to have stopped working and stood up on shaky legs. Aidan stopped her, kissed her cold hands.

“It’s going to be OK,” he murmured. “I’m right here and I love you. I’m not going anywhere, angel.”

She nodded again and tried to smile.

King extended his hand and helped her climb out of the van. She took a deep breath and pulled it away, wanting to stand on her own two feet. He grinned down at her.

“That’s it, hon,” he muttered. “Chin up now.”

She heard Lilly, Tank and Aidan climb out behind her, saw Knox slam the front door on the passenger side. She glanced over her shoulder now, saw Aidan checking his gun too. The sight simultaneously comforted her and worried her: she now knew, beyond any doubt, that if there was any trouble at all, Aidan would throw himself headlong in to it and come looking for her.

No way he’s staying in the van. That gun’s not for show.

She and King passed the men holding guns. They were wearing the same leather vest in red, white and blue, all sporting a skeleton with angel’s wings and a ‘1%’ patch on the shoulders. She’d barely taken all that in before she and King had stepped inside the clubhouse. It was quiet and dark and she paused, feeling like she’d just walked in to a cave.

“King.”

The voice made her jump and she cursed under her breath.

A man was standing there, staring at her with naked hatred in his black eyes. She remembered Jack’s lessons in ignoring intimidation and she gazed back, focused on a point in the middle of the man’s forehead. He shifted a bit, turned.

“Trigger’s waiting.”

King nodded and they followed the man down a long hallway, past what looked like bedrooms. They made Gabi think of the crash rooms at Curves; God knows, they smelled the same.

The man stopped in front of a door and tapped on it twice. A voice inside answered and the man swung it open, stepped aside. Gabi followed King in and the man shut the door behind them. She heard him shuffling around outside and assumed he was the guard.

“Good to see you, King.”

Yes,
that
was the voice from her nightmares. Lazy, amused, almost kind. But it had an undertone, a dark wave that would break over you the second you turned your back to the ocean and scanned the beach. She wasn’t about to turn her back on this man.