Rapture's Edge (5 page)

Before things got dangerous.

He failed, though. Every day and every night for years he’d searched, all for naught. He scoured the city, the surrounding countryside, as far north as the Alps and as far south as the tiny island of Malta, but not a trace of her could be found. He knew there was the possibility she’d left the country, though he couldn’t really get himself to believe it. Like all predatory animals, the
Ikati
had a home range. He thought she’d stick close to hers.

Wrong. She was gone. And he had no idea where she went.

That and the dreams he’d been having about her were killing him.

“
Bonum vespere, Bellator
,” said a soft voice. D’s head jerked up.

On the smooth rock floor on the opposite side of the thermae pool stood a young woman, robed in red. Dark haired and dark eyed like all of their kind, she also was very young. And very lovely. In layer over pale, wavering layer, light from the moving waters danced over her face, her body, the walls of the room. He searched his memory for her name…Iris. Former member of the
Electi.
Celian had disbanded the harem when the old king had died, but the
Bellatorum
were still sought after by the unmated females for sexual partners and breeding studs; the warriors were the most Gifted, and their genes were in high demand.

Among other things.

D nodded a curt greeting.

Encouraged, she smiled at him shyly and walked around the ledge of the pool, gazing down into the bubbling pale green water, sending him an occasional glance as she moved toward him. He saw the curves of her body beneath the flowing robe as she walked and imagined she might be nude beneath it.

Eliana
.

His body responded. Naked in the hot water, he grew hard.

Iris stopped beside him. Silent, he looked up at her. She said, “May I join you?” Without waiting for a response, she opened her robe and slid it over her bare shoulders. It billowed into a pool of red silk around her ankles and settled against the wet stone.

Nude, she was more than pretty. She was ripe and perfect as a summer peach.

She crouched and swung her long legs over the side of the pool, and D watched with dark, gnawing need as she arched back and shook her hair from her face. She sat on the edge, leaning on her hands, her feet in the water, flat stomach and full breasts and a little smile as she looked down at him with an eyebrow raised like a cat with all the cream.

D stood abruptly. Water streamed from his naked body, and Iris lost her smile as her gaze traveled over his chest, down his abdomen, even lower…

Her eyes widened. Her mouth formed a startled O.

D grabbed Iris around her slender waist and dragged her into the hot water, holding her pinned against him. She was surprised but didn’t struggle; D knew he’d earned such a deserved reputation for brutality from his battles in and out of the ring that Iris would not be expecting gentleness from him. And maybe that’s what she hoped.

As he pulled her head back with a hand in her hair and lowered his mouth to hers, D idly wondered who’d sent her. Lix? Constantine?

When her tongue touched his, he decided it didn’t matter. He needed this. It had been so long, so long since he’d even touched a woman, and she felt so good. So plush…

Eliana
.

He pulled back from Iris’s soft mouth with a muttered oath. She looked up at him, confused. “
Bellator
?” she murmured hesitantly.

He didn’t bother with an answer. His body was still hard, aching for release, and now wasn’t the time to drown in memories of a lost love or think about his dreams that vividly depicted her in trouble, in pain…but never
where
. Holding Iris tight against his body, D sat on the submerged
rock ledge of the pool and pulled her down with him. He kissed her again, harder than before, desperate to block out everything but this moment.

Hot water swirled around their bodies. Her legs came around his waist. Her breasts pressed against his chest, and D let out a low groan as he felt her press against that throbbing ache between his legs. He needed this…he needed this so badly…

Eliana
.

This time his curse was nearly shouted. Iris pulled back, that sweet softness in her face hardening into something else altogether.

“
Bellator
,” she said in a businesslike tone. “How do I displease you? Tell me and I will change it.”

He wanted to laugh. He didn’t think asking her to change into another woman would go over so well. He brushed a strand of damp hair from her flushed cheek and said, “You don’t displease me, little one. You’re beautiful.” He tried out a smile. It felt strange on his face, alien, like it didn’t belong there. “You know that.”

The softness came back to her face, and she smiled. Her arms wound around his neck, and she began, slowly, to rock her pelvis against his. He felt her heat even in the hot water, and a growl rose in the back of his throat.

“Let me please you,
Bellator
,” she whispered, leaning close to stroke her tongue along his bottom lip. “Take what you need from me.” Taut nipples brushed his chest, and D lifted his hands to cup her full breasts, pinching those enticing nubs between his fingers. She gasped and tightened her legs around his waist and then kissed him, deep and demanding. His erection grew even bigger, aching for her, for release, for a moment of forgetting, for—

ELIANA!

D shoved Iris away with so much force it sent a wave of water splashing against the rock rim of the thermae behind her. She stood and cursed, sputtering in indignation, wet hair dripping into her face.

He leapt from the pool, grabbed a towel and his clothes, and with a murmured word of apology and shame like cold fingers wrapped around his heart, got the hell away from the alluring Iris and the demons she roused in what was left of his black, ragged soul.

Two days later and almost a thousand miles away, in a secret underground city much like the one in which she’d been born and raised, Eliana spun on the ball of one booted foot, snapped out the opposite leg, and landed a perfect, vicious kick to the jaw of her opponent.

It sent him staggering back across the dusty limestone floor into a sea of bodies crowded together in an irregular circle against the shadowed, graffitied rock walls of New Harmony.

The crowd roared its approval and flung him back toward her.

“Had enough yet, slick?” she murmured as he went down on one knee. Sweating and panting, he looked up at her through a thicket of tangled blond hair and grinned.

“Not even close, Butterfly. I’m just getting warmed up.”

He stood and paused just long enough for her—and all the other women in the crowd—to admire his toned physique: tight muscles in tight jeans and a tight black T-shirt, all of it theatrically showcased by candlelight from hundreds of votives tucked into niches in the rounded walls that spilled a warm, flickering glow over the cavernous room. Golden blond as an angel, he had a dimpled smile to match, warm chocolate eyes, and a laugh that could melt an iceberg.

What was it she’d heard the catagirls—the groupies of the underground fight scene—call Alexi? Oh yes.
Ripped
. Also
fine
and
ohmyGodsohotithurts
.

He didn’t hold back as he leapt forward with a roar, arms outstretched, teeth bared, intent. She admired him fleetingly again—such animal grace and ferocity, almost like one of her kind—and then snapped into focus as instinct took over and a ripple of power shuddered down her spine.

Sensual and delicious, it sent goose bumps crawling along her skin.

She crouched into it, coiling, drawing down close to the ground, her eyes and ears and nose wide open and focused on him as he neared, seeking, calculating every nuance of his expression, every twitch of muscle and nerve that broadcasted his intent as clearly as a loudspeaker.

He was almost on her, reaching out, almost had a hand fisted in her hair—

—but she dodged his grip in one lightning-fast move and twisted away, smiling.

He skidded to a stop and swung around, growling his frustration, gravel grinding and spitting chunks beneath his heels. He whipped around and then lunged at her again, this time diving low to try and kick her legs out from under
her with a sweep of his powerful legs. She leapt clear, executed a somersault in the cool air high above his head, and landed in a perfect three-point crouch, one hand and knee balancing her weight, one leg stretched out, her other arm held aloft behind her as counterweight, disturbing not even a single mote of dust as she settled silently on the ground.

Collectively, the gathered crowd gasped.

“Showoff,” Alexi muttered, glowering, but Eliana could tell by his tone and the gleam in his eyes that he wasn’t really annoyed.

He lived for this.

A successful man in the real world aboveground, Alexi was also one of the smartest people Eliana had ever met. He held postgraduate degrees in electrochemistry, applied mathematics, and computer science. By the age of twenty-one, he’d bought and sold his first company. By twenty-eight, he held patents in robotics, augmented reality and holographic technologies, and cryopreservation. And now, at thirty-two, he was CEO of an international conglomerate that was pursuing, among other things, the key to cold fusion.

Like most people of genius intellect, he was drawn to the odd and the eccentric, the unexplained and the unexplainable. So naturally he was drawn to the catacombs, and to Eliana, a riddle he was determined to solve.

Fight Club
was his favorite movie, and fighting in the catacombs fed the highly competitive, thrill-seeking side of his personality. Eliana suspected he fancied himself the better-educated, European version of Brad Pitt.

He was. His combination of looks, smarts, and brawn was devastating.

“Five hundred says she pins you in sixty seconds,” Melliane called out from somewhere in the crowd behind
her. A chorus of voices chimed in, arguing and yelling over one another, clamoring for a piece of the action. Eliana smiled; tonight the take would be good.

“A thousand if she does it in ten!” an anonymous man with a whiskey-soaked voice shouted above the noise, and that’s what finally decided it for her.

She rose to her feet in a single, fluid unbending of limbs and felt the animal rise to an almost unbearable peak within her, sinking tooth and claw into her muscles, her nerves, straining against her skin, hissing out with her own exhalation, writhing to be set free. Her eyes fixed on Alexi’s, and for a moment she was sure he saw it, too, the beast that lived ever long just beneath her skin. His brown eyes widened for a moment and then narrowed, preparing.

Finish it!
the beast hissed. Without hesitation, Eliana obeyed.

One long stride, two, three…a sudden rush of cool wind as she moved, the blur of bodies in her peripheral vision, the bulk of Alexi ahead of her, the muffled roar of voices from all sides, the smell of hot wax, damp rock, and humans. In a heartbeat she was on him, heat and muscle and the heady scent of clean skin and cologne and sweat, his hard arms tightening around her back as she slammed against him and knocked them both to the ground.

His breath huffed out on impact, but he didn’t loosen his grip. She gave him bonus points for that.

“Sorry, slick,” she whispered against his ear, “but playtime’s over.”

Then she flipped onto her back, dragged him along with her, threw her legs around his neck, and squeezed.

The roar of the crowd was deafening.

He tried with all his considerable might to pry open her thighs, but his face got redder and redder by the second, and then veins began to bulge in his forehead and neck. Beneath him she mouthed it again—
sorry
—and gave him a little apologetic shrug.

Finally he tapped out, and she released him. He fell back against the dusty limestone, coughing and laughing at the same time, brown eyes watering, both hands at his throat.

“Hellcat!” he rasped.

If he only knew.
Eliana glanced to her right and saw Mel—a dark-haired sylph sandwiched between two hooting, fist-pumping men—her arms crossed over her chest, nodding in satisfaction. She winked at her, and Mel’s face split into a grin. She danced over in a few swift strides and offered her hand. Eliana took it, stood, and brushed the fine limestone dust off the back of her favorite black leather pants and out of her hair.

“Took you long enough,” Mel murmured with a quick glance at Alexi. Two of his friends were helping him from the floor, but he pushed them away, cursing loudly, preferring to get to his feet under his own power.

“Just long enough to let him save face,” Eliana murmured back as Alexi shot her a penetrating sideways glance and then turned away to slap one of his friends on the back.

“Somebody buy me a drink—I just got my ass kicked by a girl!” he shouted.

“Again!” someone shouted back, and he hollered a good-natured curse at the man. Eliana was the only one who ever beat Alexi in the weekly matches, but she beat everyone else, too, even the monstrous MMA cage fighter who’d once come to test her skills, so it almost didn’t count.