Crime and Punishment 4: Burning Submission (8 page)

“You can heat and cool water, but what else?” he asked.

“Well, you know I can set fires. They had me do that quite often, but whenever I tried to heat up the object without touching it, whoever was close to it got burned. I’ve also been able to make things wobble slightly without touching them. I was never able to do what I just did with you. The drugs they had me on kept me too mellow to fight back. When they said stop, I stopped. I was like a zombie.”

“Until the day you thought they were going to kill you,” Josh murmured.

Jennifer nodded and slid her hands in the back pockets of her jeans. “I think I might’ve been between doses of drugs at that point. I don’t remember feeling quite as mellow. The adrenaline in my system probably burned off whatever was left.”

“You said something earlier about manipulating electrical current.”

“Yes,” she replied. “I can make it overload. Apparently, based on what happened when I escaped, I can also manipulate the electrical current around the body and cause a person to have a heart attack.”

“Do you think that’s what you did to the men who held you captive?” Josh asked.

“I think so. They jerked and grabbed at their chests as though they were having one. I’m not really even sure how I did it. I believe I was just in panic mode. And Josh, don’t you dare ask me to try it on you.”

Josh lifted his lips in a half smile. “I wasn’t planning on it.”

“Good.”

Josh pointed toward the house and started walking. Jennifer fell into step beside him. “Now that you know you can manipulate without touching, you should practice it. Maybe one day try to freeze the creek behind the house.”

Josh opened the screen door and stepped aside so she could enter first. Jennifer narrowed her eyes at him and then snorted softly. “Right.”

She walked into the house. Josh followed and let the screen door shut behind him. “You never know until you try.”

“Sure, coach. I’ll get right on that,” she drawled as she opened the fridge.

She reached for a beer, appeared to change her mind before going to a bottled water instead. “Are you afraid to drink, Jennifer?” Josh asked.

Lifting the bottle to her lips, she studied him warily as she took a long sip. Josh recognized a stall tactic when he saw one.

She lowered the bottle and replied as she twisted the cap back on the top, “Not for the reasons you’re thinking.”

Josh took a step toward her. Once he’d homed in on that pull that always seemed to radiate off her, it was hard to resist getting closer. He wanted to touch her, taste her, feel her naked body pressed against his. This sexual attraction could get out of control really fast if they both didn’t keep a handle on it, which probably had everything to do with why she wouldn’t drink.

Josh took another step, backing Jennifer up against the counter. “And what reasons would those be?”

Her cheeks flamed pink, and her eyes widened just a little. Had she said something she hadn’t meant to? Or was it his invasion of her space? He inhaled her flowery scent mixed with the woodsy smell of the outdoors. His nostrils flared, and every inch of his body tingled.

The lights overhead flickered, and they both glanced up. Josh looked back at Jennifer, but she continued to stare at the bulbs warily. Had that been her?

“Show me how you can manipulate the energy around a person’s body,” he commanded.

She brought her wide eyes back to his. “No,” Jennifer whispered. “What if it goes too far?”

“Try it and see.”

“Why?”

Her breathing was shallow. He could see her pulse beating in the side of her throat. He struggled with the need to bend down and suck on that beating pulse, really get it going.

He ignored the desire and brought his gaze back to hers. “Because you need to know what you can do.”

“I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You didn’t out there. I don’t believe you will now. Here,” he said as he lifted his shirt over his head and tossed it aside. “I’ll make it easier for you.”

She stared at his chest and harrumphed. “That’s supposed to make it easier for me?”

Josh pursed his lips and shrugged. “Maybe the clothes inhibit it.”

“You’re insane.”

Chapter Twelve

Jennifer couldn’t stop glancing back at Josh’s chest. God, she loved a good set of pecs, and he had an amazing pair. His bare chest distracted her more than anything else. He was nuts if he thought standing in front of her half-naked and looking like a Greek god would do anything for her concentration.

She understood what he was trying to get her to do. For the most part, she agreed with him. Unfortunately, the last thing she wanted to do at the moment was practice her powers. Sex was what she really wanted, and she wanted it in a bad way—rough and hard, dirty and sweaty. She wanted him to just take her. Now.

Without thinking, she lifted her hand and let it hover directly over his right pec. The dusty brown nipple called to her, made her want to lick out and suck the hard nub. What would he do if she did?

She curled her fingers and then straightened them just inches from his warm skin. A tingle moved through her arm and fingertips. Josh’s soft gasp let her know he felt it too, so she brought her gaze up to his face. “Can you feel that?” she whispered.

“Yeah,” Josh replied. “What are you doing?”

She stared back at her hand. “I don’t know. I’m just…stimulating the energy around you.”

Jennifer’s body began to heat, and her nipples ached as they pressed against her bra. The place between her legs throbbed in need. She’d been without way too long. She tried to concentrate on the energy, but all she could see in her mind or feel in her body was Josh fucking her, touching her everywhere, kissing her with those gloriously full lips, and rubbing the stubble on his jaw over every inch of her aching body.

The air Josh sucked into his lungs made the burning in her fingers register. She gasped and jerked her hand back, stunned at the red spot that had begun to form over Josh’s pec.

“Oh, God,” she murmured as she reached for a paper towel and wet it. She turned back to Josh and placed the cold towel over his burned flesh. “See? I told you I would hurt you.”

“You didn’t hurt me,” he said as he put his hand over hers and took the towel.

He readjusted it over the red mark before turning his gaze back to hers. She didn’t see anger in his eyes, or fear. Instead, she saw barely controlled lust, and she swallowed.

“What were you thinking about when you did that?”

She couldn’t hide anything from him. There was something about him, his commanding presence, his authoritative control that had her wanting to spill her guts every damn time he asked her a question.

“Obviously, something I shouldn’t have been,” she replied sarcastically.

“Like what?”

She growled in exasperation as she threw the water bottle in the sink a couple of feet away. “I was thinking about fucking you. Okay? Are you happy now? It’s that damn chest of yours. How can you look so good for a man your age?”

“Wow. A man my age?”

Thinking she’d hurt his feelings, she turned to apologize, but the teasing glint in his eyes and flirty grin brought her up short. She crossed her arms over her chest. “Sex is out, so forget it. I don’t have any condoms, and considering you just recently got out of the hospital, I doubt you have any either.”

Josh looked down at his chest as he removed the towel. The burn had faded to a dull pink, which relieved her somewhat. Unfortunately, his closeness and the track of their conversation only added to her unease. It wasn’t that she was afraid of him. She was afraid of herself and what she might do, especially now that her abilities seemed so uncontrolled.

“Condoms are an easy fix, sweetheart. Every drugstore has them.”

She sighed. “That’s not the point. We barely know each other.”

“That doesn’t stop me from wanting you.”

Jennifer closed her eyes, fearful that if she looked at him, she’d climb his muscular body like a tree and grind herself against him until she came. Would having an orgasm relieve any of this sexual tension, or would it just make it worse?

“Besides,” Josh said. “There’re other things we can do besides fuck.”

Jennifer opened her eyes just as Josh took a step toward her and tossed the towel in the sink by her hip. “Oral never did anything for me,” she whispered, and truthfully, it hadn’t.

Josh’s lips twitched as he placed his hands at her waist and brought his mouth close to hers. “You haven’t had me eat you yet.”

She snorted. “You know what they say about—”

Josh’s mouth covered hers, cutting off what she’d been about to say. His kiss was warm and soft. With a whimper of surrender, Jennifer opened her lips, inviting the wicked invasion of his tongue. She unfolded her arms and snaked them around his neck, pressing her breasts against his chest where she could feel the beat of his heart thumping in time with hers.

He tightened his arms around her lower back and held her close…tight but not so tight she couldn’t breathe. Instead, his embrace was firm and comforting. His arms around her felt good…and right. Way too right.

A tingling began in her lips, and she groaned, trying to push at Josh’s chest. He broke the kiss and reached up to capture her hands in his. “I’m going to hurt you or both of us,” she pleaded.

“I felt it too, but I trust you. Concentrate on the kiss and not the tingling.” He lightly touched his lips to hers. “If you think about the tingle, it will only get worse.”

With each brush of his lips over her mouth, she relaxed a little more. When he sucked on her lower lip, she moaned and leaned into him, unable to ignore the need that got stronger with each passing second.

Every part of her body hummed with a vibrating energy that had her squirming. Was this her lust? Her powers? Was it the energy the two of them together created?

She tried to break her hands free of Josh’s grip, but he kept them hostage as he wrapped his arms around her waist and pinned her hands at her lower back. The move forced her to arch and pushed her nipples more firmly against his warm, hard chest.

When she couldn’t break free, her heart skipped a couple of beats in both apprehension and excitement. What was he doing?

“Do you like to tie women up?” she whispered against his lips. “Like Linda’s husband?”

“Yes, I do.”

His admission should’ve scared her, but somehow, deep inside, she already knew, and the thought made her insides quiver with renewed excitement.

He caught both wrists in one of his large hands and brought the other around to cup her breast. Jennifer moaned and closed her eyes against the onslaught of lust that had her pussy clenching.

She should’ve been afraid, but she wasn’t. She knew from talking with Linda that Linda enjoyed what her husband did while she was tied up. The only reason they’d talked about it at all was because Jennifer had woken from a bad dream in the middle of the night. When she’d walked to the kitchen to get a drink, she’d seen Linda and her husband in the den. Linda had been tied to the table on her stomach, her husband swatting her on the ass with a riding crop.

Jennifer had immediately rushed to her friend’s rescue. The whole situation would’ve been comical, and now was, but the things Josh made her feel had the scene looking much more erotic. She imagined him doing that to her, and every nerve in her body sprang to life.

Josh hissed and then covered her mouth with his. The kiss was hard, demanding, and so thoroughly consuming it took her breath. She did what Josh suggested and thought about only the kiss, pushing the tingle to the back of her mind. It worked. The sensation lessened, but the throbbing in her pussy became worse. It was as though the fluctuating energy pooled between her legs with a shocking force that nearly brought her to her knees.

“Josh,” she whimpered against his mouth.

JOSH TIGHTENED HIS fingers around Jennifer’s breast as the tingling in his body intensified. Damn, this was going to be intense, provided she didn’t blow them both up. He’d never felt anything like the sparks of electrical current that now skimmed over his nerves and culminated in his dick.

Maybe they should stop this before it went any further, because damn if he’d be able to keep himself from driving into her, condom or not. It was as though the current increased his desire for her, turning it into an almost unstoppable need.

He broke the kiss and released his grip on her wrists. Cupping her face, he pressed his forehead to hers and drew in several deep breaths to try and get himself under control. Jennifer seemed to be suffering just as much as he was.

“We need to run to the store,” he whispered. “I don’t know what it is, but it won’t be enough to just eat your pussy, Jenn. I’ll be balls-deep inside you before I can stop myself.”

“I think it’s the current. It’s stimulating us somehow, increasing our sexual need.” She moaned and brought her mouth closer to his. Josh gritted his teeth and kept himself from devouring her, but barely.

She surprised him by grabbing one of his hands and placing it between her legs. He felt her heat, and his balls drew up tight in anticipation.

“Josh, please,” she begged. “I can’t breathe.”

He knew exactly what she meant. The need was all-consuming, taking every bit of fight out of them and leaving them both quivering in heat.

He cupped her through her jeans, pressing his palm against her mound. She moaned and rubbed herself against him. Josh covered her mouth with his, swallowing her groans of lust. Her tongue touched his, and a small spark tickled and popped between them.

With a growl, he opened her jeans and then tugged them down her hips. He slid his hand inside her panties and cupped her wet pussy. Her cream coated his fingers as he slid them through her labia, teasing her opening.

Jennifer gasped into his kiss and began to tug at his jeans. When she cupped his straining rod, his hips jerked roughly toward her touch.

Unable to control himself anymore, he thrust two fingers deep inside her, bringing her to her toes.

“Oh, yes,” she hissed.

Her fingers tightened around his shaft, and he growled low in his throat as she pumped it quickly up and down. There was no sweetness, no slow touches, just pure, insane, animal lust.