She gave him a look, lifting her hand to lightly touch the bruise on his cheek. “Who helped you?”
He looked surprised. Anger flickered in his eyes briefly, but then he shrugged. “Jared is strange lately.”
Chloe felt her heart flutter a little wildly. “Really?”
He grunted. “I was working with Sebastian, Thor, and Lucien and had asked them what they did when they came to you … because I wanted to be sure to do something different and Jared hit me with his wrench.”
“In the face?” Chloe gasped, horrified.
“No. On the back of the head. When I came to, he said it slipped, but I do not believe that for a moment!” he added indignantly. “It is damned strange to me that he begins to have trouble holding on to the fucking thing the minute any one of us mentions your name! He clocked the fucking fuck droid … uh … Damon on the forehead with it only a week ago.”
Chloe’s thoughts went a little wild for a moment, but she ruthlessly reined them in. “He hit Damon, too?” she asked disapprovingly. “Why?”
“As I said.” He frowned, thinking it over. “Jared said that he should be first because he was first onboard the ship and Damon said that he couldnotbe first because he had been first onboard … uh … Actually, I do not recall exactly what the discussion was about.”
Chloe looked down at his chest, struggling with an odd mixture of anger, embarrassment, hopefulness, anxiety, and amusement. She didn’t like to think about them fighting over her—fighting at all—but especially over her. It wasn’t as if their fighting over her was going to win them points! Or thattheycould decide who was going to have her with a battle! The hopefulness …. Jealousy because they cared? Or possessiveness because they felt like they had some kind of claim to her?
As much as she hated it, she had to conclude the latter. What elsecouldit be if they were fighting over who was first as if that somehow gave them more of a claim?
“So … what did Sebastian and the others tell you?” she asked, determined to focus on Kane and dismiss the others from her mind. It washisnight. She wasn’t going to spend it speculating over how the others felt about her. Except for Damon, he had ended up dead last on the list, and she’d had sex with Damon before the list was even made up, so he actuallywaslast even though Damon had the last night on her card.
“Not to begin with the kiss,” he said promptly.
She sent him a startled look, immediately disappointed and worried that she hadn’t been a very good kisser. “Why not?”
“Becausetheyall did and none of them could remember much that they had done afterwards. Well, I do not know about Jared. He would only scowl at us after the fight.”
Chloe blinked at him. “There was a fight? I thought you said he knocked you out with the wrench?”
Kane looked uncomfortable. “Well, I was not out long. Sebastian gave me the wrench and I allowed it to slip out of my hand and into his face and then we sparred for a few minutes. But then Sebastian and Lucien and Thor stepped in and stopped it, reminding us that we would end up in the brig and I would not get to come tonight.”
“Well! That was a dirty trick!”
“Yes, and that is what I told him! It is one thing to do something like that to the fucking … uh …. Never mind!”
Chloe might have followed that line of discussion. It seemed to her to be a strong indication that all of them thought it was perfectly alright to pull dirty tricks on poor Damon! Kane apparently decided he’d spent enough time talking, however, he caught her shoulder and pushed her onto her back.
“I will start here,” he said decisively, staring at her breasts.
Chloe instantly felt her belly tighten even though she found it a little disconcerting to carry on a conversation that was certainly not calculated foreplay and then leap right in. Shrugging inwardly, she folded her arms behind her head and smiled faintly at him. “Why there?” she asked.
He scooted down the bed, sat up and leaned across her, propping himself up with his elbow and forearm planted along her side opposite him. “Because if I kiss your mouth I will be as mad to get inside of you as the others and I also will not remember whether I gave you pleasure or not.” He lifted his free hand and cupped first one breast and then the other. “And also because I have been wanting to touch these since the first time I saw them.”
Chloe was beginning to feel very warm all over. “When was that?” she asked in a suffocated whisper.
“When you leaned over me to give me water that first day,” he murmured absently, watching her nipples pucker and tighten with apparent fascination as he stroked first one and then the other with his fingers. “They looked soft and just the right size for my mouth.”
Chloe chuckled despite the pang it caused her to remember that day, in spite of the warmth he’d already drawn from her core. “That small?”
His lips curled up at one corner. “Jared is always saying I have a big mouth.”
Chapter Twelve
“Let me be the judge of that,” Chloe said huskily. “I like your mouth.”
He flicked a glance at her face. For a moment, he met her gaze and then his gaze dropped to her lips. “Not yet,” he murmured. “I will forget all of my programming and I am trying very hard now to remember it.”
Chloe felt her throat close with a mixture of emotions she had trouble identifying. Foremost, though, was the warmth of desire and the tickle of curiosity. “What are you supposed to do with those?”
