Breaking Loose

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Well, that had gone well, Dax thought, pulling up in front of the Posada Plaza and throwing the Land Cruiser into park.

He looked over at Suzi, who was just sitting there in the passenger seat. She hadn’t said a word, not one word since he’d kept her from jumping Levi Asher and hauled her out of El Caribe.

Geezus.

The girl had been ready to rumble. She actually had a little muscle action in her arms, some biceps business, and some deltoid business. He didn’t doubt for a minute that she could have done some damage.

Of course, he would have had to take Gervais out, and then the other bodyguard would have shown up, and on and on. In a social situation like that, the best fight was no fight, every time.

He put his hand over his mouth and looked out the windshield, thinking, but all he could think was Three years old.

He’d known-he was damn good at his job-but reading it in a pile of documents and hearing it bandied about in a damn casino restaurant by some drunk were two different things, and he couldn’t let it stand, not like it was, with her shell-shocked and silent, and definitely exhausted, emotionally and physically.

Geezus. Levi Asher might be the stupidest bastard on the planet.

“Tell me your daughter’s name.” It wasn’t a request, no matter how careful he was to keep his tone neutral.

When she didn’t answer, he slanted his gaze across the front seat. There weren’t many streetlights in Ciudad del Este, but the Posada Plaza had a big pink neon sign on the front of the building, and the light shone down on her, limning her profile, softening the garish colors of her bustier, and turning her skin into a silken wash of rose and pale peach.

Her eyes were dark, the downward cast of her gaze making it hard to discern her mood. She was so quiet.

Too quiet.

“Your daughter’s name,” he said. “I need to know.”

And he waited, watching the slow rise and fall of her chest.

“Here,” he said, opening one of the bottles of water they’d left in the Cruiser and handing it over. “Take a drink.”

He was being very deliberate with his words, keeping everything simple and direct.

With the water bottle half in her lap, she went ahead and took it from his hand. A small drink later, she gave him what he’d asked for.

“Adriana,” she said, her voice not very loud but very distinct. “Adriana Louise Weymouth.”

“Thank you.” It hurt hearing it, because he hurt for her. He wasn’t going to tell her he was sorry, though. There wasn’t enough sorry in the world to cover this.

“It was an accident,” she said, and he nodded silently over on his side of the car.

An accidental shooting. Man, that was a nightmare.

“It wasn’t me who had the gun,” she said, “and sometimes I think if I went back and shot Nathan, killed him, like he killed our baby, that maybe it would help.”

Nathan had been her first husband, back when she’d been in her early twenties.

“Probably not.” He told her the truth. He wasn’t against revenge for people who had the stomach for it, but he knew it was a dangerous indulgence for those who didn’t. “Come on. Let’s get you inside.”

She let him help her out of the car and hold on to her through the whole elevator ride. He hadn’t thought either of them had the strength for the stairs, and it didn’t take more than one look at her for Marcella and Marceline to call a temporary truce on the action in the lift.

Inside the room, he turned the radio on low to have something to break the quiet, and he opened the doors onto the balcony to let the moonlight and the sounds of the city night in.

While he set out the food he’d gotten for her before he’d gone to El Caribe, she stayed next to the closed door to the hall, her back literally up against the wall.

“Do you want to eat something?” he asked.

She shook her head, standing in Marcella’s too-high platform heels, looking like she could either collapse or bolt-and he’d be damned if he let her bolt.

“You might feel better.” He opened the room’s small refrigerator again and pulled out a beer.

She let out a short laugh. “You don’t know anything about it.”

“So tell me.” He sat down at the table and popped the top off the beer.

He saw her sigh, and he took a drink-and from across the room, she met his gaze.

“That’s a nice wooden shipping crate you’ve got there on the table.”

Yes, it was, or it would have been if it had still had its contents.

“Thank you.” He wasn’t going to deny anything.

“It wasn’t in the room when I left for El Caribe.”

“No,” he agreed. “At that point, it was still hidden in the cistern at Beranger’s.” He reached inside, took out the top half of the foam core, and showed it to her. The cut-out area for the Sphinx was very clear. “And for all the trouble I went to, I got nothing.”

Suzi tilted her head back against the wall, exposing the slender column of her throat, and he felt the first coiling promise of desire come to life deep inside his body. Inappropriate, yeah, but undeniable. She was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen, and he’d been chasing her for six long months, even if it had only been the facts of her life he’d been getting.

Denver-that’s where he’d been heading as soon as he’d finished his business with Erich Warner. He would have been there a long time before now if this deal hadn’t come up.

“As bad as it’s been for me, as bad as it is,” she said, her voice so low he could barely hear her, “I know it’s worse for Nathan, and… sometimes… that’s the only thing that keeps me going, knowing he’s suffering even more than me and still living, day after day.”

He took another long swallow off his beer. Suzanna Royale Toussi, Suzi Q with her lush body and sophisticated style, with her designer clothes and highbrow art, living in the wasteland. He knew what it was like. He’d seen it. He’d felt it. He’d been there.

But he’d never lost a child, and he knew that place was different from all the others.

Inconsolable.

She started to tremble over on her side of the room. He saw it in her shoulders and in the way she wrapped her arms around herself, like she was trying to hold herself together.

Before the first sob broke free from her lips, he was there, holding her.

“No,” she said, covering her face with her hand. “Don’t touch me.”

She was still backed up against the wall, her body so stiff, and yet shaking-everywhere, all over.

“D-don’t,” she repeated, not looking at him, keeping her hand over her face.

“Suzi,” he said, wanting to help and yet feeling so helpless.

“No.” Another sob broke free, and then another, and she dropped her hand, looking at him, everything awful showing in her stricken gaze.

He moved in closer. This was going bad fast, and there wasn’t any help for it.

Tears started running down her face in dark tracks of smudged makeup, and inch by inch, he felt her crumple and begin to slide down the wall, her knees weakening. He tightened his grip, with predictable results.

She sobbed and slapped him, and he let it happen. He could have stopped her. He’d seen it coming.

Oh, hell yeah. He’d seen it coming from a mile off, the flash of fear and anger and anguish in her eyes, the tension holding her on the edge of an abyss. Hell, for what she needed, he’d have let her hit him twice.

Not that it didn’t hurt. The side of his face stung like hell, but he couldn’t have cared less about getting his face slapped. Not when everything was welling up inside her and getting ready to break her the hard way.

“You… y-you bastard.”

That’s right, baby. That was him, the bastard.

He kept her backed up against the wall, and he didn’t have a regret in the world about using his physical advantage against her.

She lifted her hand again, but instead of slapping him, she made a fist and hit him on the shoulder-and he let her.

Life was complicated, a real fucking mess most of the time.

She hit him again. “How dare y-you…you…”

He had his hands on her waist, holding on to her, but she wasn’t fighting to get away from him. She was fighting for the sake of it, and she was fighting herself far more than she was fighting him. She was hitting him, yeah, but she was the one who was hurting. Oh, baby, she was hurting bad.

“You sonuvabitching bastard.”

All day, every day. She could count on it.

She twisted against him, but not to get away, just to twist and squirm and ache with the pain.

He was no rocket scientist, never had been. He’d been damn lucky to have even graduated from good old East High in Denver. School had not been his strong suit, despite his half a moment of brilliance in calculus, before it had all gone to hell. He’d never actually seen a point in it, not from kindergarten on, not until he’d joined the Army and started learning stuff that counted. So, yeah, the sheer, cosmic expanse of all the things he didn’t know was pretty damn vast-but give him a compass, a map, a weapon, and a target, and he was the fucking valedictorian of that class. It didn’t matter how complex the problem was, how many countries he had to cross, how many enemies he had to vanquish, he knew how to come out on top-and he knew her. He knew this, where she was in her head, what was driving her, and where she was going to end up, which was the abyss-and he knew how to save her. He knew what she needed, and he knew he was the only guy in the whole world who did-because what she needed was him.

No one else.

Only him.

He pressed closer to her and lowered his head to hers, resting his forehead on her brow, and he let her rant at him, let her vent her anger and her pain, let her pound on his chest until she was clutching his shirt in her hands and just holding on.

“Dax… “ she whispered his name, burying her face in the curve of his neck. “Oh, Dax.”

Yeah, baby. Oh, Dax was here for her.

He kissed the top of her head, let his lips slide over the silken strands of her hair-and he pulled her closer. Even at midnight, it was a hundred degrees in this town, but he was offering her his warmth. He was the man for her.

“Dax… “ She gripped him tighter, buried herself deeper, clinging to him. “Dax. Oh, Dax.” She loosened her hold on his shirt, and her arms came up and around his neck.

Yeah, that was right-and so were the tears. She wasn’t sobbing. She was just crying silently, nearly immobile in his arms now. He felt the wetness on his neck, and it broke his heart. God, life could be so fucking hard, harder than a person could bear.

And yet it had to be borne, every day, in every way, over and over again until the end, and if a guy was lucky, every now and then, he’d end up with a complicated woman in his arms, somebody who could turn him inside out.

“Suzi,” he spoke her name, grounding her with it, bringing her back to him.

She slid her arms farther around his neck, and he kissed her cheek.

“I’m sorry, so sorry, sugar,” he whispered in her ear and kissed her again, and he felt her soften against him.

Sex was a funny thing, and he was thinking about it, but it was all up to her. He wanted to make love with her, to ease her pain, to remind her there was life, always, the flame of it burning deep inside, to give her pleasure and ease her mind.

Yeah, he was such a great, selfless guy.

He wanted to fuck her so sweet, to make her come apart in his arms, to make her his. He wanted to come so deep inside her, to claim her.

Suzi, Suzi Q… sugar baby-he wanted to taste her, make her.

He opened his mouth on her neck and slid one hand down over the curve of her hip to pull her closer, to bring her up against him, and she turned her face into his neck and softly brushed her lips across the skin she’d made wet with her tears.

It was enough.

He kissed her neck, using his teeth so gently, licking her with his tongue and then sliding his mouth to hers and kissing her deep, angling his head to get more of her. Handful by handful, he dragged her skirt up over her ass, giving himself the access he needed. When he had the skirt up around her waist, he slid his hand underneath her white organic cotton panties, over the softest skin he’d ever touched, over the perfect curves of her derriere.

And he fell in love all over again, with the sweet softness between her legs, with the promise of her body.

You and me, babe. Just the two of us in the whole world. Right here. Right now.

Her hands were on his belt, but before he shucked out of his pants, he knelt down and unlaced his boots. Then he reached up, one-handed, and pulled her panties down around her ankles and helped her step out of them.

Moonlight had never looked so pretty as it did on her bare skin and the soft curls between her legs.

He was smitten, the scent and loveliness of her going straight to his head and messing with it. Nothing was better. Leaning forward, he pressed his tongue to the hot, sweet center of her desire, and he teased her, licked her, felt her softly grind her hips against him and tunnel her fingers through his hair.

“Dax… “ His name was a sigh on her lips, her body a silken, tangible force in his arms.

She spread her legs wider, and he slipped his fingers up inside her. She was so soft, so wet, such a gift-electrifying, turning him on, getting him so hot and hard. He plied her with his tongue, loving the taste of her, the little catches in her breath, and the way she was holding him to her, tighter and tighter.

“Dax…”

Come for me, baby. He wanted it so badly, to make her come undone, to make her feel so good. He wanted her to know he was her man, the one she needed, the one who could take her higher.

Her sighs grew rougher, more guttural, and he kept on-on and on and on, endlessly pleasuring her-sliding his fingers in and out of her, teasing her with his tongue, over and over again, until her soft cries became a moan, until she pressed herself against his mouth and held herself there, until he felt the contractions of her release rippling through her.

When she collapsed against the wall, he rose to his feet and shoved his pants to the floor. Taking her mouth with his, he fitted himself to her and pushed up inside. No hesitation. No thoughts. It was mind-bending. She was so hot and slick, taking all of him on his first thrust, to the hilt.

Her mouth was soft and wet, sucking on him, sucking on his tongue, then deepening the kiss. Between them, he felt her undoing the bustier, and he did his best to help. Slowly, the thing opened up, one loosened lace at a time. He ran the tiny black straps off her shoulders, letting them fall to the sides, and then there she was, her breasts so soft and full and filling his hand even as he filled her, again and again, getting lost in her, mindlessly, so easily, following the heated warmth of her skin into a pleasure so deep he never wanted it to end.

All he wanted was to be with her.

To be like this, driving into her, holding her to him. He had his tongue in her mouth, his hand on her breast, and his other hand wrapped under her thigh, lifting her leg around his waist, letting him go deep and deeper. He thrust into her, and she took him every time, all the way, moving her hips with his, until the heat and the rhythm and the seductive softness of her body took him straight over the edge.

He pinned her up against the wall, his body rigid with the pleasure pulsing through him, her soft gasps of breath hot against his mouth. Women. Geezus.

So perfect. Especially her. Hot, and soft, and wet, and silky, turning him on and setting him off.

He pushed into her one last time, keeping himself deep inside, just to feel her as he finished off, just to hear the small sound of pleasure she made. God, he could do her all night long, but she didn’t feel like she had the strength left to get to the bed.

So he held her, and he stayed inside her, just loving the way she felt, his heart still pounding.

She was so dangerous.

God.

“You okay?” he asked after a few more moments had passed, brushing his mouth across her cheek.

“Mmm-hmmm.” She rocked against him, ever so slightly, and his eyes damn near crossed-it felt so good.

He smiled and kissed the side of her neck.

“I wanted to do this the night we met,” he whispered against her skin, “from the minute I walked into the gallery and saw you.”

“Mmmmm.” She was still pulsing around him, soft, latent ripples.

He tightened his arms around her and buried his face in her neck, and he breathed her in, filled himself with the warm and lovely scent of her skin. “You feel so damn good.”

“Oh, Dax,” she murmured, softening against him and running her fingers up through his hair-and he kissed her, moved his mouth to hers and just played with her, sucking on her tongue, gently biting her lips, just trying to get more of her.

She was so responsive, teasing him, giving of herself-he felt it with every move she made.

Carefully, slowly, he pulled out of her, and he kissed her while he did it, softly, on her mouth, on her cheek, on the side of her neck. Then he lifted her into his arms and carried her to the bed.

He wanted her naked.