Harmony's Way

CHAPTER 22

The sniper rifle surprised her.

Harmony had known that Lance had been on the SWAT team in Chicago; she had even been aware that he was a sharpshooter. Yet when he pulled the specially designed sniper rifle from its case and began to put it together, she could only watch him.

He handled the weapon like an extension of himself— confidently, certain of each move he made as the different parts of the weapon were cleaned, then put in place.

With each added part, he checked the weapon for any flaws, any weakness.

She studied his expression as he worked at the small table in the hotel room they had finally settled on. His face was set, composed, relaxed. There was no frown marring his strong brow, no sense of anger tightening his mouth.

As she cleaned and checked her own weapons on the extra bed in the room, she realized that perhaps there were parts of Lance that she didn’t know as well as she should. Parts of him that perhaps she was frightened to know.

He was a man of many layers, of many depths, and infinite patience. She had never met a male as patient, and yet with such a sense of inner strength as Lance held. Unlike Breed males, Lance didn’t push his dominance, his power. He used it when he had to, when it became apparent that cool logic or patience wouldn’t achieve the results he was searching for. But he didn’t feel the need to impress that dominance on anyone.

Unlike Jonas, Lance didn’t play games, he didn’t manipulate or threaten. Like the wind, what he couldn’t go through, he went around or chipped at, layer by layer. But this was the first time she had seen the warrior she had only caught glimpses of before. In his face, in the prepared readiness of his muscles and the cool, objective look in his blue eyes as he studied his weapon, she saw a man who had no qualms in taking that final step to do what he felt was necessary.

It sent a strange tingle of arousal through her body. The certainty that in ways, many ways perhaps, he was stronger than she was, stronger than the Breeds she had known. He was a man who understood and believed in the laws of the land. In justice. But he was also a man who understood that even those laws had a limit.

Tonight, his laws and his justice wouldn’t exist. And she regretted that. Dragging him into her world wasn’t what she had wanted to do.

Tearing her eyes from him, she lowered her head and concentrated on cleaning her own weapon, on preparing for the night they would awaken to later. It was barely daylight now; the ride from Broken Butte to Estes Park had been made ahead of schedule. Of course, the fact that the wind seemed to push at their vehicle had helped. Lance had broken speed limits and driven with a calm efficiency that she admitted had made her nervous.

He had spoken little. His gaze had been fierce, his expression set. They had eaten breakfast before checking in, and the minute the door locked behind them, he had picked up the metal case he had carried in with his duffel bag and begun assembling the rifle.

Harmony had followed his example, beginning her own pre-battle rituals. But it was different now. As she searched inside her for that core of ice, for the shadow called Death, she realized it wasn’t there anymore. Rather than feeling the vengeance clawing inside her, she could only feel regret.

Emotions rose, twisting, churning inside her chest until she wondered at the fact that she could breathe for them. As though something inside her had changed with this mating, some intrinsic, important part of her that had once enabled her to kill so easily. It felt… missing.

She shook her head unconsciously, frowning as she tried to make sense of herself. Had the potential to love always been inside her? She had never felt it before, had never known the need to love, until Lance.

Laying the ammunition clips aside, she laid her hand on her abdomen, her fingers rubbing at the area imperceptibly. A baby. What was she supposed to do with a baby?

But her arms ached to hold it, and as she closed her eyes, she saw tiny features framed by Lance’s thick black hair, seeing the world through his midnight blue eyes. A little boy perhaps, one who could know laughter.

A cold shudder raced over her body as her eyes jerked open and she moved from the bed. It wasn’t that innocent picture she saw, it was the labs, the babies whose ragged cries echoed through the cold stone walls as they wailed for attention. Their cries piercing as they screamed for warmth.

Little faces flushed with rage, eyes staring out at the world in wounded fury as nothing but the cries of others answered their demands.

“Are you normally this jittery before a job?” Lance’s voice broke through the nightmarish memory as she swung around to face him. “We need to leave.”

Fear and anger knotted her insides as she paced to the closed curtains, her hands rubbing at the chill bumps that had risen on her arms. “And go where?” Harmony’s gaze flickered to him as he carefully broke the gun apart again and laid the pieces in the foam padding of the metal case. “My first idea was better.” She breathed in a shallow, quick gasp. “Dane will hide us until the child is born. We’ll be safe. The baby will be safe.”

Lance clipped the case closed before lifting it from the table and setting it on the floor. Watching her closely, he leaned back in the chair, bracing his arms on the sides, and watched her with grim determination. “If we start running now, we’ll never stop. And neither will our child.” Lance’s voice was firm, final.

This was a side of Lance that, she admitted, made her pause. The dominance was like a fire in those blue eyes and in the chiseled planes of his face. A part of her responded to the sheer force she glimpsed in him then. It made her want to submit to him, made her want to give him whatever he was demanding. But he was demanding her soul now.

“I can’t let you do this.” She lifted her chin, meeting his gaze head-on. “There’s too much at stake and too many dangers that could have followed us here.”

“Of course we were followed.” His smile was tight, controlled. “We lost them in Boulder, but I’m sure they’ll catch up to us soon enough.”

Shock vibrated through her system.

“You knew we were followed?” she whispered.

She had suspected it when he drove through Boulder rather than the more direct route around the outside of the city, but she hadn’t been certain. Her own radar, the prickle at the back of her neck, hadn’t been present, so she hadn’t been certain.

Lance shrugged. “I thought I glimpsed the heli-jet in the distance in the rearview mirror, but I wasn’t certain. It could have been a plane, hell, it could have been a shadow. But we were followed.”

She wrapped her arms across her chest then, breathing in deeply. God, she hated all these emotions churning chaotically inside her. As though once she had begun feeling, it wouldn’t stop. It wouldn’t ease or give her peace.

“That’s all the more reason to contact Dane.” She breathed in deeply. “He’ll know where to hide us…”

“I don’t need one of your ex-lovers to protect my woman or my child,” he stated grimly. “Don’t push this, Harmony, because you’re going to lose.”

“Is that what this is over?” She stood there, blank, amazed. “You won’t accept his help because I slept with him?”

“I am perfectly capable of protecting my woman and my child,” he informed her, his voice deepening. He retained his patience, though his gaze hardened. “We retrieve the information you have and get it back to Braden. From there, we’ll know how to handle Jonas.”

Men! She stared back at Lance in bemusement.

“Lance, I don’t doubt you would protect us. The point is that if we found a place to have the baby in safety, then we could fight the rest later.”

“If running or hiding would assure your life and our child’s, then I would be perfectly capable of hiding us. Son of a bitch, Harmony. I understand your history with the bastard, but we do this my way, not his.”

“I’m not doubting you…”

“Well, excuse me if it sounds like it,” he snapped.

“You’re bargaining with other people’s lives,” she whispered desperately. “We can’t do that, Lance.”

“I’d bargain with the devil himself for your fucking safety.” An edge of impatience colored his voice. “If the first Leo exists, then his location is not going to be in those files. If the Council ever had a hint of where he was, they would have struck. A few power-hungry Council scientists would not have sat on that information before using it.”

He sat there so calmly, commanding, determined that this was going to go his way, period. For a moment, Harmony almost gave in. She almost agreed.

Then the faces of those babies in the labs flashed before her mind again. Screaming for attention, for warmth. They hadn’t known warmth, had never known love or a gentle touch. That was the fate that awaited her child if the Council took her—that, or death.

Straightening her shoulders, she let her own determined gaze meet his.

“Then I’ll leave alone. I know how to contact Dane…”

She didn’t expect his response, though she should have. His patience evaporated as her eyes widened. A hint of fear flew through her a second before he reached her, his hands gripping her upper arms firmly.

“Like fucking hell!” His features were contorted with fury, his eyes burning with it. “Attempt it, Harmony, just fucking attempt it and I swear to God I’ll slap you in cuffs so fast it will make your head spin.”

Her lips parted as she stared back at him, shocked at the burning heat that flowed from his hands into her arms.

“Let me go.” She jerked against his hold.

“Do you think I’m going to let you keep running?” His gaze bored into hers. “That I’m incapable of protecting you and our child?”

“That’s not what I meant.” She shook her head desperately. “You don’t understand…”

“I understand that Jonas, Dane and these fucking files have haunted you for ten years, and it’s coming to an end here.”

His head lowered, his lips drawing back from his teeth in a primitive snarl.

“It ends here. Right here, by God.”

“Even if it means our lives?” she cried out, fighting to hold back her fears, her tears. “They’ve followed us, Lance. We can’t even be certain who it is that followed, or who’s waiting. Don’t ask me to take this chance. Please.”

He dropped a hand to her abdomen, his palm covering it, his eyes darkening to a near black.

“If it meant your life, I’d know it,” he snapped. “I would feel it and the winds would scream that knowledge to me. This is the only way.”

“No.” She jerked at his hold again.

“Yes.”

He didn’t give her time to argue. As her lips opened to curse him, his were there, covering them as his arms pulled her against his chest.

Arousal should have been the last thing in her mind, the last thing she responded to. They were in the middle of a war zone and it was about to get worse, she could feel it. But his lips on hers were a sensual, erotic act of mastery. He didn’t ask for her kiss, nor was he tentative. He demanded. He controlled. And ultimately, Harmony found herself submitting to the wicked, erotic nips at her lips by sharp teeth and the hungry growl that came from her own throat.

That dominance was her undoing. Female Breeds must have been programmed to submit to the males, though until Lance, that genetic coding had never made an impression on her. With Lance, she couldn’t deny it. She couldn’t deny her need, or her hunger, any more than she could deny the fears that, for the moment, dissolved beneath his passion.

His hands trailed down her arms, broad, calloused hands that stroked her flesh with sensual roughness and replaced the chill of foreboding with heated, wicked lashes of pleasure.

She was lost in him. As impossible as it should have been, as furious as she was with him, he still managed to consume her, to build the hunger simmering within her to a full, raging blaze.

She tore at his clothes, nothing so important now as feeling his flesh against hers, the warmth of his body stroking over her.

Her shirt fell beneath his hands, just as her jeans parted seconds later. Gasping, panting for air, they groped and ripped at clothing, socks, shoes, until Lance was tumbling her to the bed, his large, harder body coming over her as his lips tore from hers.

“Mine!” He reasserted his claim as he parted her thighs, his cock pressing into the slick, heated depths of her vagina. “Tell me, damn you! Tell me you’re mine.”

“Yours.” She could barely breathe, but she couldn’t stop the word being torn from her lips as she stared back at him, shocked by the intensity of his eyes.

They blazed in his dark face, deep blue flames of determination, dominance and powerful male force, glowing with an otherworldly light.

“No one will take you from me,” he snapped, one hand tangling in her hair as his cock surged inside her, fierce, hot, stretching her to her limits as she arched into the thrust.

She would have closed her eyes, but she couldn’t break his gaze. He held her trapped, staring into her eyes, breaching her soul even as his erection breached the aching depths of her pussy.

She would have closed herself from him if she could. The distracting pleasure washing through her broke her concen-tration, fractured her ability to hold that inner part of herself aloof.

“Don’t…” She begged him to release her, not with his body, but with that inner link she could feel forging inside her soul.

He rose above her, the width of his shoulders gleaming, damp with sweat. She could feel the power flowing through him, the strength that was so much a part of him wrapping around her, sheltering her. Protecting her.

“I won’t let you run.” His voice throbbed with furious determination. “I won’t lose you. Or this.”

He moved then, his hips drawing back, stroking exposed nerve endings, sending her senses reeling with pleasure as she arched against him to hold him inside her.

“Can you run from this, Harmony?” His hips twisted as he penetrated her again, a fierce, hard thrust that sent him tunneling to the depths of her as she gasped at the heat exploding through her. “Tell me, baby. Tell me you can walk away from this.”

If it had just been the pleasure, she could have walked away. But it was more. As he fucked her with hard gliding strokes, he infused her soul as well. Heat moved from his body to hers, chasing away the cold determination she had fought to rebuild inside her heart.

One hand gripped her hair, kneading, pulling at the strands and adding another level of sensation. The other hand cupped her breast, lifting it, until his mouth covered her nipple, his tongue flaying it with whiplashing pleasure.

He broke through every defense she could muster and left it lying, crumpled at her feet, as her hands gripped his hair and held him to her breast.

His hips pumped against hers, churning, thrusting, stroking inside her as his pelvis rasped against her swollen clit. The sensual stroke and slide, retreat and entrance were driving her insane. The pleasure built, layer upon layer, until nothing existed inside her but the need, the hunger clawing at her womb and in her soul.

“Feel it!” He lifted his head, staring down at her, his expression strained as the spiraling intensity of pleasure began to build. “You won’t run. Do you hear me?”

She shook her head, fighting to breathe, to think.

“Say it, Harmony.” His voice was a dominant, commanding baritone that rippled through her senses.

He wanted surrender. She shook her head, fighting against it, fighting the need to give it.

“Say it, damn you!” One hand gripped her hip to hold her still as he slammed inside her, his legs widening, pushing her thighs apart as he shifted and touched her deeper.

“Don’t do this.” Baring her teeth, Harmony fought to hold on to herself. “No.”

“Say it. You’re mine, damn you. Fucking mine. You will follow me. Say it.”

His hand gripped her wrist as her nails dug into his shoulder and he slammed her hands to the bed. Her punishment came in a slow, torturous withdrawal of his cock from her inner grip. A sensual, heated slide of powerful flesh over desperate nerve endings.

Transferring her wrists to one hand, he clamped her firmly to the bed as he gripped her hip once again and held her still beneath him. With the strength of his body he controlled her, just as he was fighting to control her with his will as well.

“I won’t,” she moaned, fighting against fear and hunger and the overriding need to do as he demanded.

“You will, Harmony.”

Before she could struggle, he moved, sliding free of her before turning her to her stomach and trapping her against the bed.

“Damn you, Lance.” She fought as he lifted her hips, shoving a pillow beneath them before thrusting inside her aching pussy again.

“Stay still.” His hand tapped the side of her ass in a warning little slap. “Give me what I want, baby, and you’ll get what you want.”

“I can’t do this.” Her fingers clenched in the blankets. “I won’t…”

“You will, Harmony. Say the words. Tell me you’ll follow me. I won’t let you run.”

Pressing her forehead into the blankets, she shook her head furiously.

“Oh, I think you will, sweetheart.” The soft, warning croon should have prepared her, but it didn’t.

She jerked as she felt him lean back, felt his cock throb inside her with a hard pulse before his hands separated the smooth cheeks of her rear.

“You’re so wet.” His fingers moved to where her pussy stretched around him. “So sweet and slick, all over.” He smoothed the rush of liquid from where it seeped past her vagina, back, back.

“Oh God!” Her eyes flew open as she stared into the room with dazed shock.

His finger pressed against the small, hidden entrance of her rear. His thumb massaged, pressed. It wasn’t the touch so much as it was the impression of dominant control, of her own submission, that threw her mind into a frenzy or confusion.

She felt him leaning over her then, his arm reaching to the night table where his shaving kit rested. As he moved, his cock stroked into her, taking her breath, leaving her little oxygen to gasp as she watched him remove the small tube of lubrication he carried.

Harmony shuddered beneath him then.

“There, sweetheart.” His hand caressed over her rear as he straightened behind her again, the movement causing her to shudder in pleasure beneath him.

“Lance…”

“It’s okay, baby.” She felt the cooling lubrication against her rear entrance. “It’s all okay.”

“Oh God… Damn you, Lance.”

His finger slid inside that back entrance, sending thrilling flames across nerve endings never stroked in such a way before.

“Never had this before, baby?” His finger shuttled in and out for several strokes. “What about this?”

A second joined the first, stretching her as tremors of ecstasy wracked her body and perspiration began to dampen her flesh.

“Do you know, little cat…” His voice was a soft croon. “My strong little kitten. You haven’t had this because you refuse to submit to any man. To anyone’s dominance over you. You didn’t belong, Harmony. Let’s see if you belong now.” Another finger pierced her.

She was crying, whimpering little sounds of pleasure and pain that stoked the hunger higher and left her mindless with the need for release.

“Give me what I want, Harmony.” His voice was strained as his fingers fucked her with the same slow rhythm he was setting with his cock. The dual penetration was mind numbing, dragging her sensibilities beneath the wake of the pleasure.

“Lance…”

“That’s not what I want to hear.” He wasn’t heeding her whimpering pleas. “Tell me, Harmony. Tell me who you belong to. Who you follow.”

The fierce need, the raging lust echoed in his voice with the demand for surrender. Total surrender.

She shook her head again, unable to voice the denial when everything inside her screamed that she give in to him.

“No. Lance, please…” She found the strength to whisper, to beg as she felt the thick length of his erection leaving her empty, unsatisfied.

“Easy, sweetheart.”

Her breath caught in her throat as the head of his cock tucked at her rear instead.

“Lance?” The feminine thrill of sensual fear that echoed in her voice might shock her later, but for now, the fear of the unknown held her in its grip.

Emotions clashed inside her, the press of his cock against her ultra-tight entrance sending more than the thrill of the forbidden racing through her. This was the ultimate dominance, the impression of sensual, wicked control gripping her mind as he began to stretch her.

She couldn’t take him. She had never before been able to take such a touch.

“Trust,” he whispered then. “See how well you trust me, baby.” His voice was a guttural growl as she tried to scream against the heavy invasion.

He was taking her, slowly; inch by inch her body was accepting him, the anal penetration scouring her mind as her body relaxed, even against her will, and she felt the length of him invade her in a slow, measured thrust.

“Mine.” His voice was primal now, throbbing with the demand. “Mine.”

He rose over her, his body covering hers as he began to move, thrusting inside her with a diabolical rhythm as one hand moved beneath the front of her hips and his fingers speared inside her pussy.

“Tell me. Now!”

“Yes.” With her hoarse scream she felt the last of her in-hibitions, the final shield of her defenses, collapse. “Yours. I’m yours.”

Sobs of need fell from her lips as tears washed from her eyes. The pleasure was overwhelming; the strength and purpose of the man filling her, stimulating her, stealing her mind and her soul, rocked her with a shocking sense of belonging.

“Will you follow me?” He was gasping at her ear, his body heaving against hers, his fingers and his cock fucking her with a ruthless determination to secure every part of her.

“I’ll follow…” She shuddered as something inside her clawed for release. “I’ll follow…” And she knew she had no other choice, she never had.

As the final submission, the final vow to give someone else control filtered through her mind, she felt her body dissolve.

The orgasm that exploded inside her was a white-hot cataclysm that burned through her soul. The past was obliterated beneath the pleasure; the future contained nothing but Lance—his touch, his heavy moans, his teeth at her shoulder as he bit her with shocking strength seconds before she felt his explosion.

The furious blast of his semen filling her rear as his fingers filled her spasming pussy was too much. Another blinding release tore through her, ripping over nerve endings, throwing her higher and leaving her to trust Lance to catch her.

Trust. As the final shudders rippled through her body and she collapsed beneath him, exhaustion pulling her beneath its black velvet surface, that thought flitted across her mind. Yes, she trusted Lance, but did she trust herself?