His hands were on her thighs. “Maybe not,” he said, flexing under her, giving her a thumb to rub against, just the way she liked it. “Too good to be true.”
Too beautiful when he pinched her nipples, when she arched and took him inside and he pulled her down to his chest. Too incredible when they kissed and held each other tight, and when he cried out and his orgasm triggered hers, it was too wonderful not to believe it would be forever.
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In the aftermath, he closed his eyes and she found the arnica and completed her circuit of his body, focusing on the torn skin over his heart and his face. She felt calm now, for the first time since he was brought in to Orrin’s apartment, and the calmness brought questions.
“You drove through the gate. What were you thinking?” It wasn’t anything she’d had cause to expect.
“I couldn’t leave Mike exposed. I traded his chance at treatment for information, on its own enough to shut this place down. I miscalculated the reaction from Orrin. Maybe not my smartest move, given how things unfolded.”
The calmness brought clarity? She leaned over his chest and kissed him. He wanted to save everyone here, even if he had to do it one at a time. “It might not have gone so badly if I’d not just pulled the pregnancy stunt.”
He grunted assent, his hand tangling in her hair to keep her close. “The way Orrin had hold of you. What the guys who took me said would be done to you.” He squeezed her closer still. “That kept playing in my head while I was out there. How much danger you were in.”
I kept thinking you might be dead before I found you. She didn’t say it aloud, but he read it anyway. “We’re all right. Both of us. We survived and so will everyone here. No austerity measures, no being forced into relationships, no slavery, sexual or otherwise. No doomsday anytime yet.”
Between lazy kisses and not so lazy caresses they dozed and woke, to turn to each other again, this time with no crazed haste or awkwardness. They weren’t fucking, they weren’t celebrating surviving. Zeke touched her with such tenderness and reverence, he had her blissed out in a haze she’d never expected to feel. Seeing her effect on him was another shot of delight. She could unravel him, make him greedy, a desperation that made her feel both powerful and powerfully desired.
Hours later, when Tresna called to check in and they were bathed and dressed, and in the truck ready to head back to Abundance, she was still feeling safe, loved and cherished.
Zeke sat in the passenger seat, barefoot, because she hadn’t thought to bring shoes. His bruised eye was almost closed up, and his hair all tousled from her hands and the last-minute making out they’d done before getting in the truck. God, she loved him, it was so right and easy, and knowing it gave her the confidence and strength for anything.
They were mostly bystanders now. The authorities Tres called in had a procedure to raid the place, secure it and everyone in it, making arrests as needed, and bringing counselors in to begin deprogramming the Continuers. Apart from an illegal weapons cache, it looked like Orrin intended to starve the settlement while raising more money for his own purposes. And then there was the need to discover who else had the met the fate designed for Zeke.
There was a pesky deprogramming of their own to get through before she could go home to her e-reader stacked with books she longed to read. To her apartment and gym and nails that weren’t chipped and torn, skin that didn’t have stress breakouts and her favorite bookshop that had to still be there. To having proven to the family she was reliable again, to herself she could be trusted.
They’d planned separate breaks by design. R&Rs to ease the transition between Abundance and home. Now it’d be a toss-up whether Zeke came with her to her spa retreat or she went with him wherever he’d planned to go.
She didn’t get a chance to have that conversation because almost as soon as they were moving, he was asleep.
By the time they arrived back, the local sheriff was installed in a command tent in the town square and there was a solid presence of outsiders clearly identified as law enforcement, medical staff or social welfare workers. Orrin, Spencer and others in the leadership circle were being held for questioning while a full investigation unfolded.
There was a series of briefings scheduled in the community hall and an internet hub had been established with PCs available for people who wanted to log on to news sites and discover the truth.
Over the next week, every Continuer would be interviewed, debriefed, assigned a permanent counselor, provided with an advance of cash and a cell phone and helped to re-enter the world they’d given up for dead.
They located Tres with the ease of a phone call. Her purple hair was causing a good few stares.
“What the hell happened to you?” she said to Zeke. And to Rory, “What happened to sticking together? You let him get drugged and beaten up?”
Oh shit. Maybe she wasn’t so ready to join the world after all.
“No. I let me get drugged and beaten up. Rory saved my ass, and I’m fine by the way,” Zeke said, giving Tres a hug that lifted her off her feet.
Rory got hers from Tres then. “You did it. You broke this place. You’re amazing. Is he really okay? Are you?”
“He needs to sleep for a week. He needs to put what happened to him on record, but he’ll be fine. We both are.”
There were introductions then, hands shaken, explanations given. A doctor took a quick look at Zeke, pronounced him lucky and prescribed rest. A team was dispatched to search the caves for weapons. Another to secure the money. A cabin door-to-door check and vehicle inventory was underway.
It surprised no one on the raid team that the semitrailer was missing and neither Orrin or Spencer knew anything about it. That pissed Rory off. She had to hope the information she provided would help the authorities track it down before it disappeared.
While Zeke told his story to a couple of agents and identified his would-be assassins, she snuck away to check on Cadence and rustle up a pair of shoes for him. She ran into Shavonne first.
“Jessica Jones my ass. You’re one of them cops, right?” Shavonne said, shaking her head so her beaded braids whipped about. “I knew you were a piece of work. You might have told me I was living a lie. I just logged on to one of those PCs. It’s not all good out there, but it’s not all bad either. Nothing like they kept telling us. I feel like a damn fool.”
“You were conned. Gaslit. Fed lies. It’s not your fault.”