Cyborg Nation by Kaitlyn O'Connor (english readers TXT) 📗

She liked both sides. Before, she’d felt as if they needed her. Now, she felt completely protected by them and she realized with a touch of surprise that they’d created the perfect symbiotic relationship—from her viewpoint, anyway. They met all of her needs. She wasn’t as certain as she would’ve liked to be that she met all of theirs. It was important to her, though, to do her best to give them what they needed just as they gave her what she needed.

They probably didn’t need the outlet sex gave them nearly as much now as they had when there’d been too little to excise all their excess testosterone. Since the crash, they’d had almost more ways to expend it than they could handle—fighting for their lives, and pushing their bodies to the limit in physical expenditure, and having to hunt for food to supplement their dwindling supplies. It had been a conscious decision not to approach her for sex out of consideration for her injuries, she knew, but she thought the other things had made it easier to exert that self-control.

She needed it, though. It wasn’t just that she wanted it, wanted to feel the pleasure they could give her. She needed the reassurance that they still wanted her, still found her desirable.

She got that assurance the moment she moved closer to Gideon. The surge of the sea around them bumped them lightly against one another in an imitation of the sexual act and his cock rose hard against her in response. To her consternation, though, he grasped her hips, holding her slightly away from him even as she tried to initiate sex by stroking her hands along his body.

Desire filled his eyes, darkening them, but there was a question in them, as well. “I do not think you are as well as you believe,” he said gruffly.

She ignored the twinge of irritation that comment elicited. “Who’s the doctor here?” she murmured, leaning closer to nibble at his chest with her lips.

“If I believed it was the doctor making the decision based upon skills, I would not doubt, but you have none of the things you need to test to make an informed decision, so I do not think it is the doctor making this decision. And, while I am no physician, I have more experience, I am certain, with wounds. I know how those wounds should have affected you and how you should have progressed in recovering, and you came far closer to dying than I liked or expected and have taken much more time to recover than I anticipated.

“As much as I would enjoy fucking you until you were screaming with pleasure, I would far rather wait until I am certain that would be the results and not further injury that would take more time to recover from.”

Bronte’s irritation mounted. “I feel well enough.”

“But you do not know that you are.”

Thoroughly annoyed by that time, Bronte let out a huff of anger and turned away from him. He caught her, pulling her back against his body and holding her. “It is not that I am not tempted,” he murmured huskily near her ear. “But I can not trust that I would be as careful of you as I needed to be, because I can not remain in control of my desires when we come together. I have tried and all that it has taught me is that no amount of determination to hold onto my control will make a difference. I still lose my ability to reason.

“And I am not the only one who wants you or who has a right to want you. As much as I would like to ignore Gabriel and Jerico and only concern myself with my desires, we can not make this agreement between us work if we do not consider every partner equally.

“If I do not consider the danger to you, I can not expect them to. And while I might be able to be careful enough of you to do this, they will also expect to have you, and I trust them less than I do myself. In battle, I trust them implicitly. With you, I do not. I know that they would not want to hurt you, would never deliberately hurt you, but they are accustomed to being told what they can and can not do.”

Mollified, Bronte ceased trying to pull away from him.

Not that it had done any good to try except to let him know that she wasn’t willingly allowing him to hold her.

It was annoying, though, that he always seemed to be right, always made her feel as if she was being unreasonable.

Maybe because she was much of the time, but then that was because emotions tended to be unreasonable and she couldn’t help being governed by them anymore than he could help that he didn’t have them to govern him, but had cold, hard reason instead.

The temptation to see if she could push him beyond his control was thrumming through her, though, in spite of the fact that even she didn’t think she was up to having sex with all three of them.

It was unfair. She knew it was, but she didn’t especially care about being fair at the moment.

While she was considering how little she cared about the fairness of getting her way at the moment, Gideon stroked a hand across her belly and cupped the mound there. “What is this?”

There was no surprise in his voice as if he’d just realized there was a rounded mound there when there hadn’t been before. He’d taken advantage of her distraction and proximity to examine what had been bothering him for some time.

Her heart thudded uncomfortably, but this time not with desire. Bronte swallowed against the sudden knot in her throat that was a combination of fear and reluctance in having to face something she didn’t really want to face. “I don’t know,” she said finally.

“It is not … right, is it?”

She gnawed her