sex bots 04 - one night steined Read online

Frank thought about quipping, “Where else would I be?” but he didn’t want to make Kuri think he’d been waiting for her call. Trying to sound as disinterested as he could, he asked, “You’re coming to town?”

  “Yeah.” Her voice was bright and happy. “I told Shani I’d come to her party on New Year’s Eve, but I’m going to drive up in the morning. We could have coffee.”

  It was less than he wanted. “Yeah. Coffee’s fine.” He ran through places he could invite her and then manipulate their coffee into at least a lunch. “How about Irascible Joe?”

  “The one in Capitol Hill or over by the park?”

  “By the park.” That location was less crowded. Frank wondered if he could talk Kuri into driving over to the party together. He could argue that they should take a cab to avoid driving drunk.

  “Great. See you then.”

  The next four days dragged so slowly. Frank wondered if the circuitry dictating his circadian rhythm might have been corrupted. Most of the team was taking time off to buy Christmas presents, and even if he’d had everyone on hand, there was not much else to do. The companies and organizations they spied on were all running on bare-bones staffs. Hence, there wasn’t much information passing hands for Q-ter to monitor. One year, Frank decided, he’d plan a large-scale rescue during the holidays. However, not having organized any such thing for that year, Frank had nothing to do but think about his upcoming date with Kuri.

  He shaved that day, swerving the razor nimbly past his network of scars, and wore a brand-new shirt he’d bought for the occasion. Frank had found it at a consignment shop, though Royce had assured him it was made by some fancy designer. He made sure to wear tight-fitting boxer-briefs to make it less obvious if he threw wood. He even wore leather shoes.

  Kuri was standing in front of the coffee shop as he pulled up. She looked gorgeous in a cream-colored coat with a sparkly pink scarf around her neck. Heck, the stein stood like a heroine in an old movie, so damn pretty Frank could hardly look at her. When he parked, it took him a few minutes to work up the courage to get out of the car.

  It had been easier when Kuri was broken. Then, Frank could imagine a reason why she’d want to be with him. But now? The beautiful, confident woman waiting for him on a corner was out of Frank’s league. If she’d ever been in it.

  “Frank?” She knocked on his window, jolting Frank out of his reverie.

  “Uh, yeah.” He rushed to open the car door and climbed out. When he got to standing, Kuri folded into his arms for a hug. He was so shocked at first that he froze. Even with the boxer-briefs, she must have felt how hard he instantly got. He patted her back, though he tucked his hips away. “Hey, Kuri. Did you have a good trip?”

  “Yeah, I did.” They started walking, and she wove her fingers with his. “The traffic was better than I expected.”

  He wasn’t sure what they talked about, not even when they stood at the counter and ordered their drinks. All Frank could think about was how Kuri smiled at him. They spoke as if they were friends, and maybe even lovers. When they sat at a small booth across from each other with hands cupped around their respective mugs, Kuri crossed her legs with his under the table.

  “I got a room downtown for the night.” Her lip quirked up mischievously. “It cost a half-month’s salary, but there’s a view of the water.”

  Frank’s heart pounded as he thought about Kuri alone, standing at a window looking over the whole town full of flickering lights. “Sounds nice.” He adjusted his slacks. Damn, this mini-date better end with enough time before the party for Frank to take care of the bulge. Otherwise, it was going to be a really long night.

  “You want to stay with me?”

  His tongue swelled inside his mouth. Frank tried to force himself to say something. At the very least, he wanted to ask what exactly she was proposing. But the sound dried in his gasping throat.

  “Geez, Frank. Don’t look so terrified.” Kuri eased back in her seat, as if his reaction made her timid where she’d been confident before. “If you wanna drive all the way back to Ballard tonight, be my guest.”

  Driving. Danger. Practicality. That, Frank could handle. “Um, you’re right. It would make more sense for me to stay nearby. Thanks.” He forced down a long swig of coffee and coughed when it scalded his throat.

  “Gosh, I forgot how much of a prude you are, Frank.” Kuri gave him a little wink from behind her giant cup of Chai tea. And Frank, for once in his life, had no idea what to think.

  * * * * *

  By the time the party wound down, Kuri wondered if maybe she’d made a mistake. The last week had been almost painful. She’d been so hot for Frank since seeing him that she’d masturbated every night. Half the time, Kuri’d thought she should have just slept with him the day after Christmas. Then at least she would have gotten some sleep.

  Frank didn’t seem to be any calmer than she was. He kept to the corners of Shani’s apartment, trying to smile so hard he grimaced. He’d nursed the same drink for hours, which she guessed was a good thing. It wouldn’t do for either of them to be drunk.

  She slipped into the kitchen where Frank was perched in the corner by the fridge. Kuri steeled her nerves with a sip of the wine in her hand. “You ready to go?”

  His Adam’s apple bobbed on a swallow, but Frank nodded. “Sure.” He downed his scotch in a long gulp.

  When he crossed to her side, Kuri couldn’t resist teasing. “Trying to get your beer goggles on?” Ribbing Frank felt like old times.

  “Getting ready to lay back and think of England.” Frank smirked. He waved across the entryway to Shani and Royce.

  His joke broke that weird icy tension, and Kuri wrapped an arm around his waist as they opened the door and headed into the hallway. “Gonna make me do all the work, are you?” She pressed the button for the elevator, her skin sizzling with the idea of what was to come.

  The door opened and Frank followed her into the plush box. His hand rested on the small of her back. When the door closed behind them, he rounded so he leaned against the wall, but his arms circled her waist, pulling her close enough so their coats whispered together, but their bodies didn’t touch. “Probably.” Frank’s eyes sparkled with wickedness, and just a hint of insecurity. “Maybe I’ll play hard to get.”

  If she thought her skin was hot before, Kuri had another thought coming. Her breasts felt plump and tight under the sparkly shirt she’d worn to the party. Between her legs, a slow build of arousal grew damp and needy. She pressed across that extra inch, forcing her body against his, feeling his thick answer through his pants. She couldn’t help her mocking whisper of, “I’m just hoping you’ll play hard.”

  The door opened and cool air rushed into the elevator. Kuri leapt away in case some lifer was standing there, but the entrance hall was empty.

  “Should we hail a cab, or are we walking?” Frank took her hand and led her to the glass doors. Then he pulled her onto the sidewalk. It was exactly the type of heavy-handed shit she could not stand from him as a boss, but Kuri was surprised to realize it was exactly the thing she liked about him on a date. A thrum of a pulse began again inside her suddenly too-tight jeans. She pressed against him in the cold night air. “Taxi?”

  Frank wrapped around her, using his overcoat to shield her against the wind. He lifted a hand, waving down the yellow cabs that streamed down the hill to downtown. One stopped and picked them up. The car whisked them through the streets full of revelers tromping from party to party.

  Kuri rubbed him through his pants, breathing in his ear, thrilling when he rasped, “You have no idea how that gets me.” She did know. She’d come to remember their first night together with the passing lights and the rushed car sex. There was a twinge of sadness to the memory, since she hadn’t been exactly lucid the whole time. But she’d learned over the past months to separate the good from the bad. Sex with Frank had always been great. Even when what came before or after was bad. Those moments where they’d shared one breath and one body were the best in her
life.

  “Kur, I have to tell you something.”

  The taxi stopped in front of the high-end hotel where she’d booked a room. Kuri couldn’t really afford it, but she needed this night to happen on neutral ground. Okay fine—she needed it to be on her turf. “Sure, Frank.” She let him pay, not worrying over whatever he imagined he had to confess. Kuri knew he’d tried to spy on her. Frank wouldn’t have been Frank if he hadn’t. She waited until they were in the elevator, heading up the thirty flights to her room before she asked, “What do you need to say?”

  He seemed to shrink into the corner of the elevator, but Kuri didn’t follow. “I reanimated someone once.”

  The door opened, and Kuri waited a beat to get out. She wanted Frank to keep talking, and wondered if he’d go through with it if they went into the hall. “Yeah? Why?”

  Frank strode out of the elevator, only changing directions when she plucked at his sleeve, gesturing to their room. “She was half-built already. Had all the circuitry and everything. They just hadn’t set up her battery to the recharger.” He stepped into their room, but didn’t move to take off his coat. “Okay fine, she wasn’t fully programmed.” He sat on his bed and hung his head between his hands.

  Kuri wasn’t sure what he needed, so she took off her coat and her shoes. Deciding her brand-new credit card could handle it, she pulled a couple small bottles out of the mini bar and poured them into the glasses so kindly offered by the hotel. “I’m not sure why it matters. It’s not like you killed her.” She shot Frank a look. “You didn’t kill her, right?”

  “No.” He shook his head. “No, really. I just… I went out on a tip, and there were three steins at the lab, but the other ones were destroyed.” He took the drink she offered, but then stared at the glass. “I had to end it for them.” Then his gaze changed, became dreamy and faraway. “But she was different. I was able to find out where her makers had gone wrong. I upgraded some of her systems and activated her, and she worked.” His eyes widened in pride, then narrowed in defensiveness, before they darted to the side. “But then she didn’t.”

  Sighing, Kuri laid a hand on Frank’s shoulder. “Frank, you were playing God.” When he opened his mouth to argue or apologize, she squeezed his shoulder to shut him up. Then Kuri crouched to look into his eyes. “But it’s not your fault.”

  He scowled. “Of course it is.”

  “No.” She stood, taking a sip of her wine and realizing she’d been overcharged. She winced and put down the glass. “It’s the fault of the people who made her, and of all the other hundreds of thousands of lifers who played God back then. But you, Frank? You fight those people.”

  Frank shrugged. “Maybe I’m no better.”

  “Yeah you are.” She touched his head, pulled it into her hip so he laid his face on her belly. “You gave in to a moment of weakness. Okay fine, maybe a few weeks of weakness.” She smiled. “But you didn’t make your whole life about serving your ego.”

  “Didn’t I?” He looked up at her, his scarred, handsome face searching.

  She couldn’t help but kiss him, press her lips to his mouth and let him know he wasn’t bad. His breath tasted bitter and spicy, and completely him. “You’re a man,” she whispered against his lips. “And you did the best you could.”

  He shuddered and his arms came up, circling her hips. “I’m sorry, Kur,” he said to her bellybutton.

  But Kuri didn’t want this. She hadn’t called him to get an apology. As Dr. Sheila always said, no good could come of dwelling in the past. The road to recovery lay in creating new memories. “Frank?”

  He looked up.

  “Much as this self-pity party has been fun, can I finish my wine now?” It wasn’t really wine she was after, but needed a little break from intensity before moving into phase two of their evening.

  “Sure.” He looked around, seeming to just have noticed the drink in his hand. He raised an eyebrow at the brown liquor as if it had personally challenged him, and then downed it in one shot.

  “Hey, slow down.” She grabbed her own glass off the counter and took a sip. Of course, Frank was twice her size. He could probably drink an awful lot before he got tipsy.

  “How much did you say those little bottles cost?” He opened the minibar and peered inside. It reminded her of what it would be like to be married to him. Of course, their refrigerator would be bigger—and filled with entrails.

  “A lot.” She bounced onto the bed, trying not to spill her drink.

  “I’ll cover it.” He plucked out a mini-bottle of champagne. “Perfect.” Frank popped off the cork and filled his glass. He turned to her and said, “See how I’m not pouring out your drink? I think that’s very mature of me.”

  She snorted out a laugh, giggling harder when he handed her the glass of champagne and offered to take her wine away. Kuri lifted the fizzy wine to her lips.

  Frank raised the remaining bottle. “Cheers, doll. Happy New Year.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Frank felt the force of her stare as he crossed the room. He knew what Kuri expected, and hell if the thought didn’t get him hard enough to pound nails through a two-by-four, but he didn’t know if he could handle the risk. “Doll?”

  She stepped up behind him, to wrap her arms around his chest. Her face only reached between his shoulders blades, but her breath was warm and moist even through his shirt. “Yeah, Frank?” She ran her touch down along his sides, and Kuri tugged his shirt out of his slacks.

  “I don’t know about this. Maybe we should wait.” He stilled her hand against his belly. Her tiny palm rested right above the low-slung belt of his pants. Frank took a deep breath to calm his cock. “It’s only been a few months—”

  “Shh…” Kuri unbuttoned his shirt with deft fingers. She rose on tiptoe to whisper toward his ear. “We don’t have to have sex. We can just make out.”

  He considered that possibility. Yeah, even kissing Kuri and rolling around on the bed with her sounded pretty damn hot. Frank figured he could probably even come just from rubbing against her thigh. He didn’t care so much about getting off himself, though. More, he wanted to push her over the edge and hear her sounds. Of course, Frank didn’t have to fuck her to make that happen. His fingers and tongue were more than up to the task. “Okay.”

  He twisted in her arms, letting her slip his shirt off his shoulders. Then Frank leaned down and slid his mouth against hers. He slanted his lips—she tasted like flowers and sweet champagne. When Kuri sighed, Frank worried he’d lose his mind.

  “It’s okay.” Kuri tugged him onto the bed. She lay back, pulling him with her as she went. “I trust you.” She wrapped her arms around his neck, smiling up at Frank.

  He needed her to know—now, before anything could have the chance to go wrong. “Kuri, you know I love you, right?” Frank’s hips surged forward of their own accord, pumping into the mattress, thank God, instead of her groin.

  She twisted onto her side and hooked a leg over his thigh as if they were teenagers groping on a couch. Kuri tilted her head and pressed her soft and perfect lips into his cheek. “I love you too, Frank.”

  With a pull, Frank rolled her on top of him so that the length of her slender body was balanced along his. She must have felt him, there was no avoiding it. But Frank needed them to be touching. He pulled the collar of her shirt to the side to reach more of her skin.

  “Here.” Kuri shrugged her shirt over her head, revealing the puckers of her breasts, unencumbered by a bra. Then she crushed their chests together. Frank wasn’t sure which of them moaned louder.

  She started shimmying out of her jeans while still lying on top. The friction was maddening, and though Frank considered telling her to stop, or to wait, he knew that Kuri, once she set her mind to something, couldn’t be deterred. She eased the denim off her feet and then straddled Frank’s hips, rising to sit.

  Her center burned through his pants, stole his breath. Her scent surrounded him—floral and sharp. She was still wearing panties, but the
way she ground on his bulge through his pants, she could have been wearing nothing but skin. “Oh, I’ve missed this.” She bent to lap at one of his nipples—something she’d never done before.

  Frank wasn’t sure he could move from his position on the bed. If he lifted his arms, he might grab her, maybe even bruise her tender flesh with his passion. He fisted the bedspread, fighting for control.

  “Um, Frank?” Kuri stared down at him from her seat. She looked like Lady Godiva astride a horse.

  “Yeah?” He struggled not to pump up into her heat. Even through clothes, he knew it would only take a few strokes.

  “Why aren’t you, y’know…participating?”

  He blinked, feeling a blush rise from his chest to cover his cheeks. “Uh, I don’t want to hurt you.” Embarrassment threatened to soften the rod in his pants, which he guessed was a good thing. But no man wanted to hear complaints from a naked female.

  “For goodness sake. You’re not going to hurt me.” She took up rolling her hips again, grinning. But then Kuri reached down to his nipple and plucked it between her fingertips, hard.

  “Ow.” Frank gripped her hip in one hand, covering his sore nipple in the other. He scowled at her, though his dick didn’t seem to have minded her attack at all. “Don’t do that.”

  Kuri’s grin turned wicked. Her doe eyes narrowed. “Oh, scared I’m gonna hurt you?” She reached down between her legs, cupping his balls.

  Fuck if the idea of her squeezing didn’t get him stiff as iron. “I don’t think so.” Frank flipped her onto her back. He snatched her hands away, pinning them over her head. He tried to stop himself, not rut into her like an animal, but Kuri opened her legs and clamped her ankles on his back.

  She dragged him in, and damn—Frank hadn’t realized Kuri was that strong.

  “You keeping those pants on?”

  “Maybe.” Frank thrust up into the cradle of her groin. He pressed hard enough that Kuri arched off the bed, her gasp filling the room.

  Frank raised his eyebrows. “Maybe if you ask nicely.”