Page 30 of Vanish Into Light

“Alright.” Lance clicked on his helmet, made sure his infrared goggles were secured on the brim and ready to flip down as needed, and faced off from his company. His company, plus one conduit, and one hell beast who’d just propositioned a threesome.

Focus.

“We’ll be in two teams. Gavin, Tris, Gallo, you’ll head east out of the driveway. Rose, Morgan, and I will head west. Beck’s gonna act as air support.”

Gallo’s brows lifted, and Tris’s gaze narrowed.

He’d called himBeck. Oops.

“Everyone have their radios?”

Nods all around. Beck lifted his and waggled it in demonstration, which left Lance fighting an amused snort, for some reason.

Good God, he’s charming me, he thought, with a little shiver.

“We’re gonna keep it to an eight-block radius to start. Check in when you hit your border, and we’ll look at the weather and reevaluate. Also, radio in if you see anything of interest.”

More nods. This was all rote; they’d heard it hundreds of times before.

“Okay. Roll out.”

Morgan swung on behind Rose and wrapped her arms around her waist.

Beck gave a quick, smirking little salute, bent his knees, and then jumped aloft, wings open, thrusting, and propelling him up and up, until he was only a black, batlike silhouette against the gray clouds.

When Lance finally tore his gaze away, he found Rose watching him, her smile small and knowing.

He frowned, and kicked his bike to life.

~*~

Hard rains kept the large part of depravity off the streets and indoors. But a relatively clear morning had all sorts venturing out onto the littered sidewalks, and clustering around the rusted structures in the brown-grassed parks. Haunted eyes followed their passage. Rose glimpsed more than a few envious glances: if they left their bikes unattended for even a second, they’d get boosted.

Before the Second Rift – the one that had taken his life – Castor’s neighborhood had been considered one of the better ones. Now, the once-great houses seemed in similar disrepair as the one where they’d spent the night: sagging, moss-eaten roofs, peeling paint, endless streaks of graffiti. People lived twenty or thirty deep in most of them; the more trash in the yard, the more humans in the house.

It was three times as depressing as the city had been when she’d lived here with Beck.

As if he’d read her thoughts, her earpiece beeped and his velvet voice came through. “Wretched, isn’t it?”

Before she could answer, Lance said, “Yeah, well, we’re not here to talk about property values. We’re looking for occult weapons.”

Rose had forgotten they were all on an open channel.

A glance upward proved that Beck was flying along a good twenty feet above, easily keeping pace with the bikes. “Of course, Lieutenant,” he said, pleasantly enough, but Rose could detect the exact tenor of amusement.

Lance sighed.

If she was being honest, Rose wasn’t sure Lance was going to come around to Beck’s way of thinking about…the three of them. When Beck had first suggested it, as elegantly and subtle as he suggested everything, she’d thought that he was crazy.

He’d always been a little bit crazy, though, hadn’t he? She loved him, agreed with him, thought in line with him, but she wasn’t so naïve as to think that most men donned coats, and boots, and knives, and left their homes each night for the pure joy of killing.

He’d been right about her, five years ago. When he showed her how to hold a knife, and taught her how to dance, how to fly, how to wound. He’d drawn out the quiet, frightened thing that lived inside her until it filled up every inch of her skin. He’d seen the truth of her when no one else had, herself included.

So maybe he was right about Lance. Maybe he could see what lived beneath his skin, too.

He’d been very convincing, anyway, kissing her, his tongue lapping slow and gentle in her mouth, while his hand worked its way under her shirt and massaged her breasts. “He” – he’d said between kisses – “my sweet love” – he rolled her nipple between expert fingers, until she was panting – “is a starving man. He’s nobler than us.” Quick as a flash, his hand had slipped down, ducked inside her panties, and cupped her mound, tips of his claws teasing oh-so-delicately at her most tender skin. “He’ll never sacrifice his morals. But he is so, so,sohungry. For you. For me. For the other side of his code.”

He’d eased her back to the pillows, settled between her legs, and while he’d fucked her slow and deep, he’d whispered in her ear, helping her imagine how it could be, and when she’d come, it had been to the mental image of all three of them tangled together.

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