Page 2

Lucky

Quick dick is always worth it.

I force my fingers to uncurl from my rifle.

The last person from Red Zone disappears behind a crumbling building. They’re heading back to their base, but it’s taking too much effort not to start spraying bullets. They threatened Eden . My Eden. I only just got her back from the Sinners and in one night she was at their mercy again .

All at once, I see the walls of the med bay closing in while I wait and wait for her to come home. I feel the gun at the back of my head while I watch Alastair threaten and manipulate her. I smell the sweaty mob of angry Red Zoners as they shove toward her.

I’m so sick of being so fucking helpless .

My arm is wrenched behind me. My pinned arm screams in painful protest as I struggle, the joint straining at a brutal angle. Jasper’s hand wraps around my chin and forces my head back against his shoulder.

“Be still, Lucien. You and Jaykob can thrash about like apes when we return home if you wish to wrestle. With me, you will behave.” His lips brush the shell of my ear as he talks, and he inches the arm behind my back higher.

I grunt in pain, breathing hard, but I stop moving. After a moment, I lean into the strain until my back arches from the sharp-sweet hurt, and goosebumps ripple over my skin.

The miserable, angry panic doesn’t subside, though.

My eyes search out Eden, the way they have ever since I realized she was at the center of tonight’s firestorm. Again and again. She’s always in the middle of it.

Her long hair is windswept, strands flying free of her braid, and she’s white as bone, but there’s no other mark on her. She’s not filthy like me or Jasper. She’s not covered in blood or bruises. There’s no sign at all of how close she came to dying tonight.

We all could have died tonight.

I almost had to watch it happen, too. Fuck, the bomb. I nearly killed Jasper myself. Stupid, stupid, stupid . I was stupid. Careless. What is wrong with me? This isn’t a game. What if I’d lost them tonight? It was a mistake to come out here. I don’t know what I’d do if?—

“Ah!” I cry out as Jasper wrenches my arm higher, and I lift onto my toes to ease the pressure.

“Rein it in, sweet boy,” he tells me gently, so at odds with his vicious hold.

Eden doesn’t even look at me. Her guilty eyes are glued on Dom as he sweeps into the forest.

Look at me. Look at me, look at me, look at me. I need those eyes on mine. I need her to never be out of my sight again.

I need to be more careful.

“I can’t ,” I choke out. “Please. Let me go to her. I need to... I have to do something.”

My brain is clouding over. I can’t move. I’m useless again. Impotent. Weak.

“Houst—”

Jasper releases me before I can even finish my safeword, turning me so he can look at me. His grip is fierce against the side of my face.

“Lucien, this wasn’t your fault.”

“I don’t care about fault. I just need everyone to stop being in danger for like two fucking minutes.” My chest feels too tight to pull in air properly.

The rest of our group is heading for the trees, and Eden trails behind them like a hesitant duckling. It only takes seconds to come up behind her, and she glances at me distractedly when I take her arm and drag her into the trees.

Ava slows for a minute, checking on her, but I don’t have it in me to reassure her right now.

Eden tugs back against my grip. “Wait, Lucky. I need to talk to Dom. He’s devastated. Do you think I should?—”

I yank Eden into my chest and kiss her hard. Her soft lips give under mine. She’s pliant. Warm. She makes a surprised sound, and I drive her back into a tree, sinking deeper into the heat of her mouth. Tasting her. Needing her.

Ava can stay or go or film the whole thing if she wants to, but I’m not stopping.

I rip at the buttons on Eden’s pants. Her zipper. It’s when I start wrenching the fabric over her hips that she turns her head away from my kiss with a gasp. I move my mouth to her neck and shove her clothes down past her ass. I suck on her pulse, hard enough to bruise.

She’s here. She’s here, she’s here, she’s here.

“ Lucky ?” She grabs the front of my kit, but trails off on a snaking moan.

I bury my fingers into her pussy, rubbing her slippery clit with my thumb. She’s too worked up, the same as me. Her cunt is as hot as her mouth, and she grinds her hips down over my hand.

My cock throbs .

I kneel down and yank her boots off, vaguely aware of Jasper moving up to guard the trail behind us. A flashlight bursts to life, and our tangled nook between the trees brightens.

Eden pants above me. Her eyes are dark and dazed with lust behind her glasses, her lips bruised red and still wet from my kisses.

Her eyes are finally on me .

“I get you’re worried.” I rip her pants the rest of the way off, and she needs to clutch the tree to stay upright.

“I get that there are five of us.” I jerk her pale legs apart and lean in to bite her inner thigh.

Eden flinches, but her breathing snags on a gaspy moan.

“I get that Jayk is jealous, and Jasper is confusing, and Beau is dramatic, and Dom is hurting.” God, I can smell her.

I can see how wet she’s getting. My fingers are bruising her hips, and easing my grip takes so much effort.

“I get that the low-drama guy can usually wait.”

I meet her eye, and I let all the fear and worry and that fucking helplessness show.

“But this isn’t a Dom moment, Eden. I need you, too. Please don’t make me wait.”

Tears gather in her eyes, and she shakes her head. “Oh, Lucky, no.” Her hand finds my hair, and she strokes it back off my forehead with heartbreaking tenderness. “You get any moment you need.”

Tears prick my eyes too, and I tear open the front of my pants to free my cock.

I surge to my feet, lifting one of her legs as I go, and I fuck into her.

She’s a wet vice. Hot and plush and it doesn’t matter that the angle is awkward.

It doesn’t matter that I’m loaded up with gear and that bark is scraping her ass.

She’s squeezing my dick with perfect little shivers, and her arms are all around me.

She’s with me. Wrecked with adrenaline and fear and soaking my cock like a good fucking girl.

“What were you thinking?” I whisper in her ear as I fuck her desperately. “You offered yourself up to them? You don’t do that, beautiful. You don’t ever. Fucking. Do. That.”

I kiss her neck, her cheek. Anything I can reach. She grinds back over my dick, gasping and panting in my ear, meeting my thrusts with the same fervor.

But her hands are gentle on my neck. Soothing.

“You’re no one’s sacrifice, okay?” I tell her urgently.

My whole body is lit up, fighting pleasure and fear, my cock slick in her snug pussy. Eden doesn’t say anything, so I take her harder—until it hurts. Pine and sex spiral through the air around us. Ancient scents. Like witchcraft. Like vows.

She cries out. “Yes. Yes, yes, okay. I— Lucky, I’m sorry.”

I’m shaking like a leaf. I’m going to come.

Eden’s hands find my hair, and she drags my head back from where it’s buried against her throat until we’re looking at each other. Her cheeks are dark red now, and her pussy is gripping me hard. I rest my forehead against hers.

Her glasses fog up.

“Just let me fucking keep you safe. Stop doing things on your own. I’m here now. I’m with you. Do you get that?” I kiss her again and taste brine. She’s crying. Or maybe I am. “I’m here. Just let me help.”

“I will. I swear, Lucky. No more secrets. I’m here.”

Eden cries out again as I squeeze into her.

She comes hard around me, in scorching, fluttering pulses I want to drown in.

I yank her hips into place so I can ride it out with her, so I can bury myself deep and explode to the feel of her breaking over me.

I come hard, groaning, soaking her in me, breathing her in as I claim every gasp and moan and shivery sob as she comes down.

Finally, her toes touch the ground, and my shaking has eased to a tremble.

I glance at Jasper, who looks back at just the same moment. A dark, feral hunger prowls his eyes. He turns back to study the darkness, but his grip on his rifle is white-knuckled.

Eden’s fingertips brush my lips, and I look back at her.

“Are you okay?” she asks, still trembling and breathless. “Did that... help?”

We’re both half-dressed and freshly fucked, and our whole group is probably ready to pluck out our eyeballs with rusty pliers for making them wait after the night we’ve had.

This might not be my classiest moment.

“There’s not much a quickie can’t fix, right?” I tease, trying to summon a wink.

Eden’s fingers move from my lips, and she tugs my beard.

“Ow!” I swat her hand.

“Be serious, Lucky,” she scolds, her eyes soft.

I let the smile die. It’s easier than it usually is, to let it fall. Eden sees through it anyway, and I don’t want to pretend with her.

“It helped. I’m just.. . I’m really glad you’re okay,” I tell her.

Eden grimaces, and I pull her in for another hug.

I still feel the need to chain us together for the next twenty years or so—but even minus the shackles, it feels good to have her close.

Maybe if we stay this way, I can make sure she doesn’t fall into a den of vipers, and she can make sure I don’t do anything stupid.

I don’t know where any of us go from here. How the hell we’re going to get Heather back, or fix the Sinners problem, or how we’re going to make it even another month without food—but even if I need to drag her off to a cave and feed her fresh kills by hand, I’m keeping this girl safe.

Ugh. These primal instincts are gross.

I wonder if this is how Jayk feels all the time.

Eden rests her head against my chest, and I bury my hand in her hair.

I just need to keep her close.