Swallow (Kindred Book 2) (20 page)

“Come on, get on with it,” Rigor moaned.

Brodie wasn’t great at following orders, especially from people he didn’t like, and she didn’t need a PhD in criminal etiquette to know that Brodie didn’t like this guy. He needed something from him. But Brodie didn’t savor doing business with Rigor, which made her believe Brodie enjoyed the idea of her going with Rigor even less than she did—and that was saying something.

In his own good time, Brodie stopped kissing her and turned his attention to the cards. With one hand in hers and his eyes fixed on his enemy, Brodie reached for the cards and she chewed her bottom lip as she fixated on his turn. King.

Shrieking, she bounced up and locked both arms around his neck, but she didn’t get the pleasure of his mouth because he was still fixated on the man who had to be spitting fury. Tuck was already gathering everything from the center of the table into a backpack she hadn’t noticed before. Nuzzling against her love’s neck, she kissed his jaw.

“Nice doing business with you,” Brodie said, walking backwards toward the door as Tuck finished fastening the backpack. Brodie tucked her behind him, and she went after Tuck when he began to head for the door. Brodie didn’t turn his back on the room until they went through the curtain.

Then they started going faster to get through the main bar and out the front door. Tuck was already straddling a bike when she and Brodie exited. Tuck tossed keys at Brodie, then gunned his own bike out of the parking lot without looking back.

“What was that about?” she asked, when Brodie took her waist and lifted her onto the back of a bike.

“Keep it shut, we’re not out of danger yet,” he said, jumping onto the bike and starting the engine. She didn’t have to be told to hold on to him tight, she’d done this enough times already, and the relief at being out of that dangerous situation gave him a reprieve with regards to her wrath, for now at least.

Something popped and metal tinged, the shock of it made her cling tighter to him. Brodie sped away, hunkered low over the bike and when she glanced back, she saw the men from the back room aiming weapons at them and there was a spark, then another. Brodie revved through the gate and over the bumpy road onto the concrete, then they were gone, out of the range of fire, and on their way to God knew where.

The road was dark and there were no landmarks, but they ended up approaching civilization again and when they eventually stopped, they were in the parking lot of a single story sprawling motel.

Brodie parked and got off, then took her from the bike. “Where are we?”

“Stop asking questions,” he said, taking her arm to pull her toward the building.

Lifting her arm out of his hold, she took a step back. “You just bartered me away to another man,” she said. “How do I know that’s not going to happen again?” Art had been impressed by her vigilance, and she wasn’t going to retract her wariness until she knew what was going on.

“Because all the men in here would eat a bullet before they betrayed me,” he said, lunging forward to grab her again.

Trying to wrestle her arm away, she didn’t get far, especially when he snagged her other arm and pulled her body onto his. “I’ll scream,” she said, still trying to pull away from him. Glaring up at him, she dared him to test her.

Instead of answering her, he ducked and stole her mouth. When she tried to pull herself away, he grabbed her to force her to stay in his arms, to stay in his kiss, even when she didn’t respond to him. He shoved his tongue into her mouth, so she dug her teeth into him, but that only caused him to bend and pick her up from the ground. Pounding his shoulders with her fists, her bite became a suck and when her back hit cold concrete, she gasped to inhale the breath from his lungs.

Tearing his mouth away, he nipped her lower lip. “When the fuck are you gonna learn to trust me?” he snarled.

“You’re a fucking bastard,” she said, hitting his shoulders again, but instead of causing pain, it made him growl. The thick insistence of his dick throbbed against her dampening core when his body pressed her against the wall in this dark space that had to be a service alley for the motel or something. She could just make out a light somewhere behind him, but she was more interested in grabbing his face to pull his mouth onto hers again.

He was a bastard, but he had to have had a plan. She did have to learn to trust him. Sometimes she struggled to remember he cared for her as much as he did, especially when he so often seemed indifferent.

Spitting his mouth from hers, she scowled at his angry expression. “Get off me.”

“Too late for that,” he said and relaxed his hips enough that she thought he might put her down. But with one hand between them, he freed himself from his jeans and used his dick to hook the crotch of her panties aside.

“Don’t you even think about it,” she said when his blunt tip probed her entrance.

“Shut the fuck up,” he said and with one hard shunt, he filled her up.

With each advance, he jolted her body against the wall. This invasion was more welcome than any that had come before. His urgency and impatience to occupy her betrayed to her how he’d craved her and that admission by action only incensed her hormones into a deeper fury.

Fighting his mouth with her own kiss. He pressed harder and thrust deeper. Grinding her fingernails into the sinew of his neck, she surrendered to her gratitude.

So often with Brodie, her emotions were sent from one extreme to the other. She’d been so glad to hear from him and exalted that he wanted her with him and then so nervous to go into that bar. Her emotions were all over the place, the only thing she was a hundred percent certain of was her desire to be fucked and hard by her guy.

His kiss drew back and when their eyes met, she pressed her palms to his cheeks. Her rhythmic whimpers were punctuated by the rush of air leaving her lungs each time he drove himself into her.

The friction of their rutting bodies stimulated her into a climax that made her head scrape on the structure behind her as she bucked into the bliss of his body.

Increasing his pace was a signal to her that he was building to his own release. Her slick passage burned in reaction to the abrasion caused by his bulk expanding her swollen tissues as they consumed his onslaught.

Pushing up, she caught his lip in her teeth. “Don’t swear,” she panted. “We have to be quiet.”

His sense was lost in the flood of their endorphins, but he surged forward and bared his teeth as air hissed out of him.

Their huffing breath merged between their lips that hung only a few millimeters apart. He squeezed her ass so hard that she squirmed against the pain. But his dick was still wedged in her, so he blew out a sharp breath at her movement.

Reconnecting reminded her of their dedication and she was sorry that she’d ever doubted his commitment to her. “I missed you,” she whispered, kissing him quick. “I missed you so much, baby.”

“I should’ve said it,” he returned in a similar tone while examining the lips she smudged onto his. “Before we left the manor… I don’t know why I didn’t.”

Skimming her hands down to his chest, she kissed him again. He might not be declaring his love now, but that he was acknowledging how he’d ignored her ‘I love you’ was as close as he’d come to saying the words himself. For months, she’d wanted to hear him admit his feelings, but this moment of vulnerability and the truth of his own frustration put his hesitation into perspective for her enough that she could enlighten him.

“Because everyone you’ve ever trusted enough to love has left you,” she explained, understanding the cause of his reluctance meant she could no longer be offended by it. “Your parents, your brother, your uncle, you lost them all and you don’t want to lose me.”

His pelvis crushed hers to the wall so he could keep her pinned with her legs locked around him. But he freed his hands to touch her cheeks and skim them down to seize her shoulders.

The vehemence of his words made her shiver. “I’ll never let another guy lay his hands on you. For the ops, we might come close, but… I’ll never—“

He’d been offended by her doubt and she was sorry she’d hurt him. “I know.”

“No, you don’t,” he said, giving her a shake. “You don’t understand. I’m your guy. You’ll always be safe. Always belong to me.”

Any panic she’d felt in that bar had upset him because he’d sensed that her faith in him had faltered. “Should we go inside and finish this?” she smiled, rubbing her hands over him.

That they hadn’t been able to contain themselves for long enough to get inside to the bed he must have been using this last week aroused her all over again. He’d wanted her so bad that he couldn’t wait those extra few seconds to get inside her.

“We can go inside,” he said, backing up half a step. She tugged her skirt down as he fastened his jeans and took her hand. “But we can’t finish anything.”

Leading her around to the front of the building, he went to a door and knocked on it, which was odd if this was his room. “You don’t have a key?” she asked.

The door opened and as Brodie took her inside, Tuck walked away from the door. The motel room was large, it had two double beds and a pulled out sofa bed in the far corner beside a narrow hallway that had to lead to the bathroom. A large table in the middle of the room was covered with papers that Zave seemed to be reading. Tuck went over to a seat at the same table in front of two open laptops. Brodie was busy behind her doing something with the door, but she crept closer to the table and saw that there was a map taped down to the table surface.

“What is all this?” she asked.

Brodie came up and with a hand on the back of her neck, he urged her up to the table. “This is what we’ve been doing all week,” he said. “That’s a plan of the area.”

There were stickers and Post-its on the table that said various things. She had no time to read anything, because Brodie snagged her wrist and pulled her over to seat her in a dining chair near the sofa bed. He backed up to perch himself on the end of the table and Zave rose to take up place beside Brodie. She shrank under the scrutiny of the men, Zave made eye contact and she shuddered.

Tuck finished typing on one of the laptops, then closed both the lids and came over to perch at Brodie’s other side.

“Ok, I feel like I’m in the principal’s office… times three,” she said, tucking her hands under her thighs. “Three incredibly hot and panty-melting principals, but still… what’s going on?”

“We have your first official assignment,” Tuck said, all business.

“Ok,” she said, scrutinizing the expressions looming over her for some clue as to what they were going to ask of her. “What is it?”

Tuck twisted to reach behind him, he shunted something aside then turned back to her and held up a glossy eight by ten inch sheet. A picture. Of a man. And one she recognized as Benedict Leatt. She glanced at Brodie, but his expression didn’t change.

“What am I supposed to do with him?” she asked, reaching up to take the picture so that she could look at it more closely.

There was nothing particularly striking about the image. Ben had brown hair, blue eyes, and dimples that made him appear more cute than threatening. Wearing blue jeans and a flannel shirt, he was just as she remembered him.

“Get close to him,” Zave said.

That could mean any of a number of things. She needed clarity and tried to be calm as the possibilities flitted through her mind. “To what end?” she asked, making eye contact with Brodie. “He has information we need?”

“Access,” Brodie said and his stoic form was a world away from the impassioned lover who’d just taken her against the wall outside. “The number one thing we have to find out is where they hoard their hardware, their weapons and explosives.”

“And you think he’ll know?” she asked, glancing at the picture.

“His name is Benedict Leatt,” Tuck said. “He’s the guy you met at Sutcliffe’s compound.”

“I know who he is,” she said.

“Sutcliffe left the country on Monday,” Brodie said. “He left his deputies in charge and we need to know what’s going on in that house. Sutcliffe’s compound is constantly occupied. We can get onto the land, but the house is too risky for us to bust into. There are proximity alarms and video surveillance.”

“Not to mention the number of people he has roaming around,” Tuck said, reaching back to pick up another stack of pictures, which he handed over to her. “The main house is in the center of the land. Sutcliffe’s closest associates live there. But there’s at least another two hundred people living on the land in trailers, barracks, and cabins.”

“We can only know what they’re planning if we can get some tech into that house.”

“Cameras?” she asked, scanning each picture. They reminded her of the tour she’d received, though there were some images of areas she hadn’t visited, such as the shot of a long single-story wooden building that looked like it could be the barracks Tuck had mentioned. The setting was unfamiliar too, so she guessed she’d been kept away from it on purpose.

“Audio would be a start,” Tuck said.

She would do what they asked of her. She’d taken part in Kindred operations before and had faith that these men would keep a close eye on her. Adrenaline was beginning to seep into her system though, it was natural to be nervous, and she didn’t want to let her cohorts down. “And we can’t bug one of the followers?” she asked.

Brodie shook his head. “Besides the fact that the majority of his followers don’t go into the main house, they don’t have the access to get close enough to the conversations we need to hear. His deputies are vigilant to the point of paranoia, and they rarely leave the property.”

“And Sutcliffe doesn’t allow phones or internet access,” Tuck said. “He has a cell phone that travels with him. So right now, there’s no way for us to get in there, physically or digitally.”

“But Ben has access?” she asked, returning to the first picture Tuck had handed her. “He can come and go.”

“He’s a level below Sutcliffe’s most trusted deputies,” Brodie said. “With Sutcliffe out of the country, his involvement has increased. He’s only been with the group for a few months.”

“Sutcliffe still doesn’t trust him all the way,” Tuck said. “But he likes the guy and you were right about what you said when you were talking to Ben, he is unthreatening and ignorant to most of what goes on. He’s a nice guy, which was why he was the best bet to tempt you into joining Sutcliffe’s cause.”

Brodie nodded. “Sutcliffe enjoys making people dance before he lets them into his inner circle.”

“And…” Tuck and Brodie made eye contact then glanced to Zave.

“And what?” she asked.

“Ben was tasked with tempting you, that means he’ll be open to developing a relationship with you. He’s still trying to impress Sutcliffe, to prove his own ability and loyalty.”

Being a prize for Ben would make it easier for her to get inside. But it also meant that being inside was riskier if Ben got the wrong idea about her interest. “So Ben wants to be a part of Sutcliffe’s cult and they’re making him jump through hoops,” she asked.

“Right,” Tuck said, nodding once.

Her eyes drifted to the picture. “And so you want me to…” Horror made her thrust to her feet when she replayed what they’d said about getting close to him and developing a relationship. Could it be that the Kindred meant close in the personal sense? “What do you mean by relationship? You want me to seduce him?”

Tuck laughed and stood up to rest his hands on her shoulders. “Yeah, ‘cause that sounds like something Rave would subscribe to.”