She was way off there. Both on the decent and the human part. “Well, now you know different.”
“Then maybe I can stop him. We have a duty—”
“Jesus, stop the duty crap. We don’t have a duty to anyone here. Not to Kinross, or your Dr. Yang, or all those people sleeping in cryo, who probably bought their places and murdered the people who did win the fucking lottery. The only person you have a duty to is yourself.”
She opened her mouth, no doubt to argue some more, but then she clamped her lips closed. He could almost see her brain working, going over what he’d said, her brows drawn together. Finally she muttered, “I need to read some more.”
He sighed. He’d liked her naive; there had been a freshness to her. He had a feeling she was going to get difficult and stubborn and… “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
They left the chamber, locking the padlock behind them, and then headed back toward Destiny’s cell. As they turned a corner, lights flashed on somewhere up ahead.
“Stop!” a voice called out.
“Shit,” Milo said. “Run.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
“…for there are two distinct sorts of ideas, those that proceed from the head and those that emanate from the heart.”
—Alexandre Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo
Milo grabbed her hand and they ran.
Behind them, the thud of booted feet sounded so close. They came to a junction and Milo hesitated, and she dragged him to the left. Then they were running again, flat-out. Her heart was racing; every cell of her body felt alive.
Milo was holding her hand. And she could still hear the people behind them. Suddenly, he tugged her to a halt and dragged her into the opening of another tunnel. He waved the torch and the light went out, then he muttered a few words and stepped back against the wall, wrapped his arms around her, and pulled her hard against him. “Quiet,” he murmured. “Cloaking device.”
She closed her mouth and held her breath, totally conscious of his arm around her middle, his hard body flush against her back.
Outside their tunnel, she could see an approaching light, and the sound of feet getting closer. A few seconds later, five men hurried past, not even hesitating as they ran within feet of their hiding place. Destiny hadn’t come across any information on cloaking devices in all the books she had read—except science fiction. And Harry Potter. But this one clearly worked very well.
The light was disappearing and the sounds fading.
Milo put his mouth so close to her ear she could feel his breath, and a shiver ran through her. “Stay still. They’ll likely come back this way.”
She nodded. “How does the cloaking device work?” she asked.
“Don’t worry about it.”
“I’m not—” Then the words trapped in her throat as his mouth pressed against the side of her neck and the cloaking device vanished from her mind. He trailed hot kisses across her skin, and she was suddenly conscious of his hard hands splayed against her middle. She wanted to turn and face him, but he held her in place, one hand sliding over her to cup her breast, and her head fell back against him.
He squeezed gently and her nipple hardened under his touch.
His hand left her, and she opened her mouth to complain as his palm slid under her shirt and touched her bare skin.
“Oh,” the word escaped her as his fingers plucked at her hard nipple.
“Shh,” he whispered against her ear and a shudder ran through her.
Closing her eyes, she gave herself up to the sensations filling her. His warm breath against her ear, one hand on her breast, the other splayed over her belly, inching closer to the waistband of her jeans.
“You can breathe, though.”
She gulped in air as his teeth nipped at the sensitive spot where her shoulder met her throat, and she tilted her head to the side so he could do it some more. He licked along her skin, then nibbled her ear.
Heat was building in her belly, sinking between her thighs as he massaged her breast. Then the other. Tingles ran along her nerves. She pressed herself back against him and the hard line of his erection pushed against the cleft of her bottom.
He wanted her.
His hand slid lower, over her jeans to rest at the junction of her thighs, and she pushed against him, desperate for more. Then his fingers moved between her legs, pressing upward, and pleasure shot through her. Her thighs tightened around his hand