Page 96 of Freedom Mine
“I don’t recall. Some friend of Mac’s. The picture was taken a week after I arrived. I wasn’t in a good place from what Mac told me late.”
“You don’t remember?”
He stared at the picture but remained silent.
She traced the image of a much younger Kayo. Skinny, virtually no muscle mass, and a haunted look in his eyes. Jace had said Kayo had been kept in a cage for years. . . Kayo’s expression in that picture was of the walking dead. She barely recognized that man as the same one that held her now. Kayo’s strong arms had wrapped around her like a blanket, making her feel more than protected. She felt loved.
“Took some time before I let Mac or anyone near me. We had a big strike that year. There were thirteen men here at the time. We all earned our freedom status, and everyone left. Except me. I was too unstable, and I had nowhere to go. Mac didn’t force me to leave. He said if I was staying, I’d have to be in charge of the new men. Gave me a knife, not sure why exactly, except he must have known I needed it.
“In the six years I’d been a slave, I hadn’t owned anything, especially a knife. As a soldier, I always had a weapon on me, a knife, laser rifle, something. They ripped more than my armor and weapons away from me when they enslaved me. That knife. . . I can’t explain it, Alli, it made me feel whole again.”
Kayo unclipped the sheath and knife from his belt and placed them in her palm. Alli wrapped her fingers around the knife as she blinked back the tears. Now was not the time to ask what they’d done to him, or why he’d been left in the cage for so long.
“Come, Kayo. We need to celebrate.”
That devilish grin of his surfaced. “I like celebrating.” He let her tug him until he was standing. With a sultry look, he backed her against a wall and placed an arm on either side of her.
“What exactly are we celebrating?” he asked.
“You no longer own me.”
Her words took a moment to sink in, but she couldn’t miss the light in his eyes. “That is cause to celebrate,” he said, as his mouth found hers, not with an urgency as she had expected, but with a gentleness, as if he were savoring the moment.
As hard as it was to do, Alli broke the kiss, took his hand, and led him to the bedroom, where Kayo told her to wait for him. She removed her boots, then stopped, wondering if he truly intended to come back. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d walked away. But they were past that, weren’t they? Kayo was more somber today, but not skittish. At least the way he’d kissed her hadn’t seemed skittish at all. If anything, it had felt a little remorseful.
Alli sat on the edge of the bed and waited, her anxiety growing as each minute passed. Less than five minutes later, he returned with a cup in hand. He hadn’t sipped it yet. Soup maybe? Though she didn’t see steam.
“I forgot you hadn’t eaten,” she said.
“This isn’t dinner,” he said, waving the cup under her nose so she could smell. It smelled like hecka drops, but it was a liquid.
“Dessert?”
“You’re my dessert,” he said, the corner of his mouth hitching up. Heat spread through her, warming her cheeks. It amazed her how he could make her feel so wanted, and not like she’d been with so many men before.
“Alli?” He had bent over slightly, trying to get her to look him in the eyes. Her mind had wandered again. It was shameful that she couldn’t stay focused on him, especially when he was hyper-focused on her.
“Hey,” he said, again waiting for her to look at him. A single finger lifting her chin, that’s all it ever took for him to coax her head in his direction. “You left me for a moment there.”
She loved how he looked at her, with devotion and need. “I’m listening,” she said, keeping her eyes on him. It was easy enough to do, especially the way his eyes drank her in.
“This, my Alli. . .” He pointed to the cup. “. . .is for a game.”
“A game?” She’d seen him and the men play cards numerous times, but none of those required food or drink. “Bawson challenged me to a game of Strip Quarks a while back.”
Kayo’s eyes darkened for a minute, but he said nothing. Perhaps mentioning Bawson or any of the men right now wasn’t a good idea. She was nervous, and sometimes when she was nervous she talked too much. That night at the lake, being with Kayo, even naked, was easier. She’d set the stage and had invited him. Right now she didn’t know what he planned. If he’d kept his hot body pressed to hers instead of going to the kitchen, her nerves would not have bested her.
“This game is meant to help us learn about each other.”
“That sounds nice.” And it did, strangely enough. A game wasn’t full of pressure or expectations. She could relax, maybe ease back into kissing him. She caught that wicked grin of his as he shut the door and put the cup down on the dresser. “What are the rules?”
“First, taste,” he said as he dipped a finger into the bowl and scooped out a pale red substance that dripped very slowly off the tip of his finger.
She stuck out her tongue. Slowly, he dragged his finger over the tip of her tongue. A tingling accompanied a burst of sweetness like hecka drops, but not quite. She wrapped her tongue around Kayo’s finger, sucking slowly, lapping every drop of the liquid off of him. Even after there was none left on his finger, it was too late, she needed to continue sucking that finger. Gods, she was becoming hot and wet from sucking his finger! She increased the pressure with her mouth, closing her eyes, listening as Kayo’s breath quickened.
“You’re going to be very good at this game,” he said, pulling his hand away.
“The rules, Kayo,” she demanded, not intending her voice to be so heavy, but the heat consuming her body, the need to put her mouth on him and lick or suck something had risen quickly.
