“God, Solace—I…” He let out a frustrated breath, thrusting again. “You feel so good. This feels so fucking good.”
I lifted my hips, grinding against him until he slid deeper inside me. My stomach tightened as he rose to cupmy breasts in his hands. He pinched one nipple, twisting it lightly before covering it with his mouth. The sudden heat of his tongue made my back bow off the sheets.
“We shouldn’t have waited,” I admitted breathlessly.
“I’d wait forever for you—” a thrust “—just to have you like this. Even once.” He shifted to the other, taking the stiff peak into his mouth. I melted into the sensation—tongue hot against my skin, the steady rhythm of his body moving in time with mine.
His pace faltered and I thought he might be close— but instead he pulled me upright, arms around my waist, until I was seated in his lap, his knees beneath us both. I rose and fell against him, glancing down where our bodies met. His hands found my waist, my breasts flush against his chest. Then one hand slid into my hair, threading through before tugging gently, tilting my mouth up to his.
“I am going to fuck you all night.”
A shiver ran down my spine.Please, I wanted to beg. “As long as the spell lasts,” I murmured, brushing a kiss along his jaw.
He caught my lips again, teeth tugging lightly at my lower lip before consuming me entirely.
But the universe was cruel, and I woke drenched in sweat, fingers slipping between my thighs and an alarm blaring through the bunker.
19
The Burn Path
Jude
Something was wrong. I could feel it in my chest—almost as strongly as I could still feel her sliding up and down on my cock. The dreams had gotten so far out of hand that lately I’d been convinced they were real. I should have said something to her earlier over the radio. Asked if she’d been having the same strange dreams because I swore I could still feel her—the same despondency that was lodged between my ribs.
Every dream we raced against a ticking clock, clinging to a life raft already taking on water.
Something else lived there now too. Terror.
I grabbed the first pair of pants from the pile on the floor and shoved my legs in—and stopped. My hand closed around something in the pocket before I even pulled it free.
Lace.
I held them up in the dim light of my quarters, my brain refusing to process what my eyes were seeing. Black lace, small enough to fit in my fist. I knew exactly what they were because I was the one who'd taken them off her, sliding them down her thighs in a dream I could still feel in my hands. I'd pocketed them, some half-conscious act of wanting to keep something of her.
But that had been a dream.
I turned them over in my fingers. My mouth had gone dry.
That had been a dream.
I stood there for a long moment, the lace caught between my fingers, trying to find a single explanation that didn't make the air vacuum out of the room. There wasn't one. There wasn't a version of this that made sense, except the one I couldn't bring myself to say out loud. Let alone believe.
I shoved them into my pocket, dragged on my boots and uniform as fast as my hands would move, and ran.
When I burst into the command center, I found it empty. There were no alarms blaring, no lights flashing, even though a siren sounded in my head.
My hand flew to my chest.Something was wrong.I glanced at my watch, scrolling through the screen for any messages I might have missed, but there was nothing to be found. Nothing.
Something is really fucking wrong.
Solace.
I powered up the system and grabbed the first pair of headphones I could find, twisting dials and adjusting frequencies until the signal was right. Only, I was met with the thin, hollow hiss of empty airwaves. The pressure in my head sharpened and my lungs burned raggedly. “Fuck!” Solace was in trouble. I couldn’t explain how I knew, but I knew.
Timewasup and I had to get to her.
For days I’d sat through meetings and assemblies of officials explaining why I couldn’t go to Earth. I’d pressed that she was the only survivor we knew of who was completely and utterly alone. I’d made the case that thetrip could double as reconnaissance—data collection, radiation verification, atmospheric scans. SOLs readings were the first meager sliver of hope we’d had. From the beginning it was never the plan to stay up here, lodged between metal. It wasn’t sustainable—it was a fucking hail mary. Despite the Order’s plea that those of us who survived refrain from bringing new lives into our messed up world, it still happened. Elias and Kit were only a few months away from becoming parents themselves.
