“Is he dead?”A quiet question asked in a voice that made the other half of her, the scared broken child, go motionless, wondering . . .
“Yes.” When he didn’t say anything else, she continued. “Lin and I, we were the last two left. He was nine, I was eight.” She felt her heart begin to speed up, her spine to knot. “The monster didn’t want to break us too fast, so he was careful. But one day he did something to me, and I didn’t respond like he wanted. I didn’t scream. So he threw me headfirst through the large glass window at the front of the cabin.” Pain, blood, the glitter of glass in the sun, she’d never forget any part of it.
“Enough, Sophie.” Max’s entire body was so hard, so unmoving, she’d have thought him stone but for the furious beat of his heart.
“I want you to know.
“You never have to beg me for anything.” A harsh order.
“Lin saved me,” she said, clasping his words to her soul. “While the monster was outside, checking to see if I’d survived, he somehow managed to get to the comm panel, input the emergency code.” And then Lin, the sweet, talented telepath who might’ve been her friend in another life, had died, his internal injuries too massive. “Everyone’s forgotten them. Carrie, Bilar, and Lin, but I remember. Someone should
This time, Max did move. Pulling away, he turned. She went into his arms, ready for the heat, the almost violent pleasure-pain. “People talk about how the Psy are starting to break,” he said in a fierce whisper, “but nobody ever speaks about the victims.”
He understood, she thought, he
CHAPTER 24
Your request to have Sophia Russo, minor, age 8, removed from your official family history has been granted. The state will pay the costs of her care and education until she reaches her majority. You are no longer considered bound to her or responsible for her in any way.
Max’s embrace tightened until it almost hurt. But she needed it, craved it. The lost, indelibly fractured half of her clung to him, realizing it was being accepted, no matter the extent of its flaws. “The anchor thing,” he said. “That’s what saved you. Because it’s a rare ability.”
She nodded. “When the monster threw me through the window, he didn’t just scar my face. He also broke my mind.” She’d been a terrified child who’d finally realized that no help would come, that she’d soon be buried in an unmarked grave beside Carrie and Bilar. “But my brain didn’t give up. It ‘rerouted’ itself directly into the fabric of the Net, the only thing big enough to hold together what remained of my psyche.”
“I am so damn proud of you,” he said, his voice low and husky.
She wanted to grab onto the commitment, the promise, implicit in his words. “I’m really broken, Max.” It was the final secret, the final truth. “I can pretend to be normal, but I’m not. I never will be.”
“You survived—how you’ve done it doesn’t matter. The fact that you have? It’s better revenge on that bastard and the ones that allowed him to do what he did than anything else.”
Shuddering at the unflinching acceptance in his tone, she moved one hand lightly over his back. His muscles shifted beneath her touch, as if in response. Growing bolder, she pressed harder, felt his abdomen grow taut against her. It was instinct to spread out her hand, run her fingernails over the fabric in sensual exploration.
Swearing low under his breath, Max moved back a step, gripping her arms at the elbows. “Aren’t you going too fast?”
“No.” She could feel her nerves, ragged and frayed, close to overload, but still she wanted more, wanted to fill herself to the brim with him, until she had enough for a lifetime. “Don’t stop, Max. The touch keeps me here.” Not in the past.
Max groaned. “Drink. And behave.” He put the hot chocolate in her hands and picking up his coffee, headed to the couch.
Left with no choice, she followed a second later. Putting her drink beside his on the coffee table, she turned her body sideways on the couch, terrified she’d scared him with the voracious depth of her need . . . but not ready to accept his decree. He’d told her she’d never have to beg. He’d accepted her. He was hers. “I’m not misbehav —”
Max had his mouth on Sophia’s before he could think about the consequences, his hand tangled in her hair. God, he was so angry over what had been done to her, so fucking pissed at the parents who’d rejected her when they should’ve stood by her. And because he’d die before he hurt her, his anger had nowhere to go—except into a raging protectiveness. Running his tongue along the seam of her lips, he urged her to part for him. And when she did, he swept in without hesitation, taking, tasting, claiming.
Her hands fell to rest on his thigh, excruciatingly close to his cock. Releasing his grip on her, he picked up those delicate gloved hands and put them on his shoulders. She clenched her fingers on him, her nails biting just enough through the thin gloves and the material of his T-shirt to make him want to strip it all off and tell her to use those nails on his flesh.
She was all huge eyes and kiss-bruised mouth, but she did as he asked, her curvy body coming down on his thighs even as she leaned in and took his mouth. He hadn’t expected that, hadn’t expected her to seize the reins. But he was more than willing to let her have her way.
Her kiss was inexperienced, hesitant, and so arousing, he had to lock his muscles to keep from pushing up that primly buttoned cardigan and cupping a sweet, plump breast in his palm even as he took her mouth in a much more sexual fashion. Instead, he let her sip at him, let her stroke and taste and lick. The last made his fingers clench on her hips. She did it again.
Sophia Russo was a quick study.
Feeling his lips curve in a smile that was more than a little feral, he sucked at her upper lip, bit down on the lower. She jerked, then pressed into him, her arms weaving around his neck. Taking that as a yes, he repeated the caress, moving his hands down her hips and over the taut length of her thighs at the same time. A shuddering moan before she finally tore away her mouth.
Her eyes were awash in black, a sea of purest midnight. He’d been ready for that. But he wasn’t ready for the fever in her cheeks, the thumping beat of the pulse in her neck, the way her body turned all loose and limber, as if she was drunk. Alarm spiked. “Sophie, talk to me.”
“Mmm?” Dropping her head to his shoulder, she rubbed her cheek against his T-shirt, a lazy kitten. “I think you blew my circuits.”
The dazed comment made him want to laugh in spite of the savagery of his emotions—but worry cut the impulse midthought. Maybe this was as close as they’d ever come, him and his Sophie. “Are you in pain?”
Another lazy rub against him, her hand clenching and unclenching on his other shoulder. “I never realized men and women were so different . . . not really.” Her breath blew hot on the skin of his neck as she spoke, her body a warm, luscious weight against his aroused form. “It’s quite extraordinary.”
“Baby, you can’t avoid the question.” Brushing her hair very carefully off her face, he looked down to find her eyes closed. “Are you in pain?”
“Have you ever had your foot fall asleep after a period of inactivity?”
“Yes.”
“And the sharp stabs afterward when you try to use it?” A smile flirted with her lips. “That’s what it feels like.” Her eyes opened. “I’m waking up, Max. A little pain won’t make me take a step backward.”
