Meta:Between the Books: Volume Twenty

Volume Twenty - Training Day Part II
Date	December 2005
After	Volume Nineteen
Before	Carlos' Black Box Vol. 2
Location	Arizona
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Previous Volume Nineteen	Next Volume Twentyone

From her peripheral vision Damali glimpsed Carlos watching her. Shabazz had called the entire team into the dining room after the dinner table had been cleared. Newbies sat in chairs with senior Guardians leaning over their shoulders pointing at diagrams. Intense gazes paid studious attention to the next day’s training mission.

It was gonna be a rough one. Earlier today wasn’t nothing. With Marjorie’s promising display, everything had just kicked up a notch. The positive vibe was thick enough to make the air in the house intermittently crackle. Every newbie was energized and focused, each wanting their personal gift to finally break through and shine.

Maps of the obstacle course terrain had been spread out before the juniors; J.L. was showing the newbies the logistics of mock demon-tunnel construction. Jose was explaining why the weres kept the entrances to their nests low so that a creature on all fours could move with a speed advantage, while two-legged humans couldn’t.

Damali knew she should have been paying attention and adding her comments, too. But something primal already had her in its grip and wasn’t letting go without a fight. There was no weapon she knew of that could get it up off her. This beast named desire was no joke.

Dan gave poignant insight about the entities not being able to actually grab a weapon out of one’s hand, if it had been properly treated with sacred elements—the same reason vamps could mentally make untreated clothing vanish, but not the newbie’s weapons. That only gave Marlene a reason to rag about the importance of doing the laundry to specifications, lest the team find themselves in a lair hot-zone buck naked, simply because someone slacked on the job. Damali tried to focus, lest she slack on her job right now.

All instructors, except her and Carlos, were rapt as Rider explained how to hold onto one’s weapon while moving through the tunnel sludge. Mike told the newbies what to listen for. Jose eloquently explained what to try to delineate as a tell-tale demon scent, and that the seniors would add sulfur marker decoys along the way for the newbies to locate amid the competing, putrid scents. Marlene and Shabazz gave wise advice on how to find that quiet, still, Zen place within to cope with the coming ordeal.

Damali just wondered how she and Carlos would get through their own personal ordeal that was becoming increasingly difficult as the night wore on.

Right now, there was no such thing as Zen. Her common sense was unraveling layer-by-layer. She could feel Carlos’s gaze on her from where he sat casually perched on a kitchen stool on the other side of the small dining room. With his arms folded and sitting up higher than the table, he looked like a billiards judge. To everyone else but her, he exuded ultra cool, his back leaning against the wall. His exterior repose appeared relaxed, but she knew he was anything but that—like her.

She was already wet for him and he hadn’t even touched her.

The slight flicker of silver that overtook Carlos’s irises one thread at a time was a dead giveaway to her man’s growing distress. She saw it before anyone else noticed, but refused to look at him or acknowledge it. Every now and then, he’d regroup and quietly battle to get it to flare down. The intensity of his gaze had put gooseflesh on her arms and made it hard for her to breathe.

Carlos was taking in slow, even breaths as though summoning patience. He was laying for her. That, she could also feel. The brother was plotting. Trying to figure out an angle, how to break her off from the family herd. Glimpsing him, she knew he was working on a strategy to get to her alone, somewhere very soon. She wanted that in the worst way, but was trying to hold onto a very fragile line without losing her balance.

Quiet knowledge was destroying her. The mat exercises were hot foreplay that had been left unresolved to simmer for hours afterwards. Slow cook, low flame. His eyes hunted her. Tonight she was prey. He’d hardly touched his dinner. Yet, Carlos’s sensual hunger was palpable all way across the room. Just sensing that made her crazy. It had been a long time—too long… and she was only human.

Damali let down her psychic guard for a moment and glimpsed Carlos quickly again from a sideline glance. J.L. was still talking. Good.

Although the desert evening was cool, a large V of sweat had dampened Carlos’s red t-shirt. Beads of perspiration peppered his forehead and upper lip. Every now and then he’d casually lick his lips and take in a slow inhale through his mouth. Good God.

Keeping her distance, not trusting herself, Damali stayed close to the kitchen door and tried hard to watch the lesson that really should have intrigued her. But it was nearly impossible to concentrate now. Her mouth was going dry just from picking up Carlos’s heavy vibe. She could feel him watching her like a panther. He remained as still as stone, then slowed his breathing until it almost stopped, his eyes keened on her. The slightest movement she made, his current was all over her. His vibration was stalking hers, crouched low and ready to pounce, if opportunity would allow. Maybe later once everyone was asleep, this time she’d let it.

Thankfully, the newbies weren’t that tuned-in yet, and none of the seniors gave notice or balked. They were probably just as messed up from their own personal dilemmas. Marlene was even cool. Damali knew none of the seniors were particularly concerned, given there was little Carlos could do about the house edict, as long as she held the line. That was the problem, she wasn’t sure that she could much longer.

Damali centered herself, trying to find that ephemeral Zen place that wasn’t within her now to be had. She gave Marlene a private glance to let her mother-seer know she wasn’t crazy. Maybe, in part, she was trying to convince herself and needed visual confirmation from Marlene. She wasn’t sure, when tonight she definitely had to be. None of the Guardians looked up as the lesson proceeded without incident. The turmoil would pass. It was only temporary, Damali told herself, making it a private mantra.

However, as J.L.’s hair began to subtly rise with static electricity, panic shot through her. J.L. was the closest senior tactical sitting near Carlos. It hit him, went around the room to buzz Dan, and then mildly arced into Shabazz’s locks. J.L. fought not to look up, as did Dan. Shabazz just coolly shook it off. But when Damali glanced up with the intent to give Carlos a hard-eyed warning to be cool, he was already staring at her with solid silver.

Damali looked away quickly, almost having to lean against the wall to catch her balance. She watched J.L. struggle to maintain his scholarly focus, and heard him accidentally repeat himself twice.

“Anybody want some water?” J.L. finally said, clearly needing to walk away for a moment to distance himself from Carlos. “I’ve being talking non-stop for almost an hour, people.”

“Yeah, bring everybody some cold water,” Shabazz muttered as J.L. passed Damali.

“I’ll help,” Damali offered, also needing to get out of the room for a minute.

To her horror, even though no one else looked up, from the corner of her eye she saw Carlos slide off his stool in one fluid move. He then casually loped around the team, not drawing any particular attention to himself and entered the kitchen behind her.

J.L. stood up from the fridge so quickly that he almost banged his head on the top freezer door handle. “Yo, I didn’t even hear you walk in, man.” He smiled tensely at Carlos and handed him a water bottle. “Damn that was old-school vamp.”

Carlos just looked at the bottle and then turned his line of vision on Damali. “I don’t need water, thanks. But I do need to talk to you—alone.”

“I have to get these waters into the other room with J.L.,” she protested, nervously beginning to gather the bottled waters that were lined up on the counter.

Carlos grabbed her hand and slowly drew her to him. “Later.”

J.L. stood momentarily trapped in an awkward position, looking between Carlos and Damali. “Uh… I can get those. I’ll tell ‘em… uh, something,” he said and then hurried out of the room with the first armload he carried.

Carlos started walking, his fingers threading through hers and tightening as he gently pulled her along to follow him.

“Are you crazy, Carlos?” she whispered, hurrying to get next to him to bring him to a halt.

He just nodded and yanked back the flimsy, accordion plastic door to the pantry, which the team had turned into a makeshift laundry room. “We need to talk,” he said flatly, and spun her around him and then yanked the partition closed behind him.

“Oh, my God,” she whispered, wiping her palms down her face. “Man, you have lost your mind?”

“Yeah,” he said quietly. His silver eyes and the faint yellow haze from the kitchen light showing through the plastic door, was the only illumination in the tiny room.

“No, back up,” she said in a panicked whisper, flat-palming him hard against his stone-cut chest. She froze as she heard J.L. return to gather the rest of the water bottles and waited until he left the kitchen again before speaking. “You have thirty-seconds to state your case, Carlos, and then we’re outta here. The only reason I’m standing in here with your crazy ass like this is because I’m too embarrassed to move!” She glanced around, straining to listen for intruders. “I’ll say we went on the porch to get some air while we discussed tomorrow’s training exercise tactics we’ve heard so far.”

“Tell me when my thirty-seconds to plead my case starts,” he murmured in the semi-darkness, his voice a low rumble.

“Now. Whatchu gotta say that—”

The kiss he delivered was so hard and so furious, and had he’d backed her up against the dryer so fast that, for a moment all she could do was hold onto his broad shoulders. He came out of the kiss like he was suffocating, his hands gripping her upper arms only to slide across her shoulders in a hot sweep and then splay at her back. He moved against her, grinding out the pent-up frustration they’d both felt until the sound of denim friction filled the tight space.

“Nine weeks and I’m no longer pleading my case, I’m begging,” he said in a gasping whisper, rapidly spilling kisses down her neck as he spoke in fast, broken jags. His mouth captured her nipple through her tank top, and he suckled it until her eyes crossed beneath her lids. “You asked me if I’m crazy, the answer is yes. Si! I don’t care.”

“I do,” she whispered into his mouth as he lifted his head to claim her lips. It took everything in her to fight the impulse to go with his insane flow.

“My balls feel like they’re about to be sucked up into my abdomen,” he said in a gasp as their kiss broke. “Girl, I miss you so much, I can smell you all over the house.” His fingers tangled in her locks and tightened as he pulled her forward slowly by her hair for another punishing kiss. “It’s midnight, my time, and, mi corazon, you know what the night does to me when I’m around you… nine weeks of sheer agony, por favor.”

Her jeans were sticking to her. His body was hot iron. The earlier demonstration on the mat had messed them both up. It was no secret. Her butt was pressed against the dryer, and he hiked up her tank top before she could pull out of the next kiss. He’d pleaded his case so damned well that tears of raw want brimmed in her eyes. He quickly kissed them away, making them fall, chasing them down her cheeks with his nose.

“Oh, baby, I’m feelin’ it like that, too… so bad I wanna fucking cry myself. Don’t you know?” His words began to melt her spine and make her hips work with his driving rhythm. “Every morning, each time I wake up… shit… and roll over, I’m about to go blind.”

She clamped her hand over his mouth. “You’re talking me outta my drawers. Don’t.”

He kissed the inside of her palm, then licked it, as he slid his hand between their bellies and then between her legs. The long-missed sensation caused her to clamp a hand over her own mouth to hold back a moan. But when his palms covered her breasts that was it. She felt her willpower evaporate and knew he’d felt it, too.

Her hands fell away from their mouths and found his shoulders. An opportunity had indeed presented itself. She’d left herself vulnerable, currently in the same condition as her nose: Wide open. He’d use the judgment lapse to break her down, for sure. Her jugular was already in his mouth being suckled.

“Baby…” She’d forgotten the other half of the statement as her hips undulated with his. She was supposed to be saying, “Baby, stop,” but the ‘stop’ part never left her throat. Her soft groan had drowned it out.

He picked-up on the unfinished sentence and filled in the blanks, blowing her mind verbally as he caressed her nipples. “All I keep thinking about,” he murmured, in a low, thick voice against her neck, constantly rubbing her breasts as he spoke, each taut nipple gliding between his fingers, “is after nine weeks… how good it’s gonna be. It’s been too long, girl. Don’t you want to?”

When she answered with a shattered whimper, he rained damp heat down her throat in ardent attention and spoke against her collarbone, his hips still moving.

“I keep remembering how tight you are, how good you feel gloving me, ‘Mali… and ‘cause it’s been so long I can’t get my mind off how tight you’ll be now… like that very first time. Slick perfect fit. I can’t stand it. Your skin feels like butter. Jesus, woman, just looking at you and hearing your voice every day is pure torture. C’mon, baby, let’s do this. We gotta.”

She clapped her hand over her mouth again to keep from making another sound.

“Oh… baby, damn… they won’t hear us, and won’t miss us… I swear to God this won’t take long,” he said, his movements against her growing more urgent as his arms wrapped around her waist in an anchor position.

She clapped a hand over his mouth again when he groaned. It was so ridiculous, yet so necessary, she wanted to shriek. She had one hand over his mouth, the other over hers, and he was moving against her like a freight train, beginning to bang her against the dryer with a very distinct, repetitive thud. She tried to keep her hands in position and push off the appliance with her foot. But her insane solution had not only created muffled passion, it also left her entire body exposed.

He was now between her legs and had separated them with his knee, then he went for her jeans fastenings. Her eyes almost bugged out of her skull as she tried to shake her head no. This was too tacky!

Unfortunately, she’d made a crucial mistake when she’d moved. He dipped his pelvis lower to further erode her resolve.

The hard length of him was now rubbing directly against her bud. Every stroke that was thinly separated by wet denim sent a shudder through her that finally forced her to release their mouths. She couldn’t take it. The sensation nearly made her cry out. Instead of pushing him away, her hands sought his back, and then yanked up his shirt so she could feel his glorious skin against her entire torso.

Sudden heat from the flesh contact made him drop his head to her shoulder and move against her harder, her hands reveling in the way his deep breaths caused his back to expand and contract. He smelled so good, tasted even better, he felt fantastic… God, she’d missed him so much!

Reeling in his arms, she was so close to the edge of an orgasm that her nails began to rake his skin. Not thinking, he was practically pushing her up onto the dryer. Losing all perspective her legs wrapped around his waist as he lifted her and halfway tried to get up onto the flat surface with her.

The lid buckled from their weight and created a loud bang. They both froze for a second.

“Oh, shit,” she whispered.

“*bleep* it.” He kept leaning her backward, his voice now sub-sonic bass.

“No!” she said in a quiet hiss between her teeth.

“Then what do you want me to do!” he said too loudly, making her cringe and cover his mouth again fast.

His eyes searched hers, holding instant panic within them. He jerked his mouth away from her cupped palm, eased back slowly, kissed her hard, and then started babbling in an urgent whisper.

“Please just don’t say no, not tonight. No mas, por favor. I don’t care, the shed, one of the Hummers, the obstacle course, whateva… take a walk with me in the woods, girl. Best two out of three—I’m about to bust a nut in my jeans… I swear I never thought I’d have to admit some shit like that to you, baby, but I missed you so much… thirty seconds inside you and I’m done.”

“Carlos be quiet,” she said through her teeth, and then kissed him hard while trying to slide off the dryer. “I want to as much as you do—”

“Just pull down your jeans before I lose it up in here,” he said in a tight whisper against her neck, the bricks of his stomach contracting with each word. “We can work it out.”

“The dryer will bang,” she said with a forlorn moan, kissing his neck and shoulder, her perspective shot to hell.

“Then on the floor, all fours, no dryer—”

“What! If they open the door and see that, I’ll die.”

“Shit, like we ain’t dying now?” He was sucking in huge gulps of air, nuzzling her so forcefully that his five-o’clock shadow was putting friction burns on her throat.

She held his face firmly and kissed him fast, her mind scavenging for a compromise. Sweat was running down their backs. Condensation was beginning to build on the walls around them. Something had to give. They’d passed the point of no return. His hands were all over her, resonating with a single vibration; let me get some or I’ll die. The solution she mentally landed scorched them both in a shared vision.

“You’d do that, here, now?” he asked. He stared at her unblinking. His barely audible question was strangled by awe.

She nodded.

“Oh, God, I love you, D,” he murmured in a near sob and then began kissing her so feverishly her lip almost split.

She hugged him hard, tore her mouth from his, and spoke quickly in his ear. “I’ll swallow and act like I had to go to the bathroom to pee, and then brush my teeth. You take a walk outside after, so the noses don’t automatically bust us. All right? I can’t be caught doing this. That’s non-negotiable.”

An _expression of appreciative agony spread across his face as she gently raked her fingers over his nipples and sought his jeans button. The soft sound he made and swallowed almost caused her to take off her clothes. To avoid that foolish option, she kissed him hard again and muffled his gasp. His hands tightened on her arms and one look said it all—do it. Terms gladly accepted.

“But you’ve seriously gotta promise to be quiet, though, while I go for this. Okay?” she whispered quickly, trying to get him out of his pants.

The moment she touched him he bit his lip and shuddered so violently that tears spilled over his closed lashes.

Still teetering on the edge herself, she could definitely relate. But from what she knew of her man, his condition seemed far worse than hers. Carlos’s brows were knit, his devastated _expression held in-state somewhere between intense pleasure and extreme pain as he fervently nodded. But he was now so hard that it was impossible to get him out of his jeans without pulling them down over his hips or she’d accidentally scrape him on his zipper.

She squatted, looked both ways, her heart thudding, both of them breathing like racers while she hurriedly inched down his pants to free him. As soon as she did, he dropped his head back, put a fist against his mouth, and allowed the trapped moan to implode inside his chest.

Instant reflex, her palms cupped his clenched ass and she nearly gasped from the tight, smooth feel of it in her hands. Pleasure denied too long was eating them up. The man she loved needed immediate relief. Even though she wanted him inside her in the worst way, this solution was best, given the circumstances.

What was left of her judgment told her that, if she pulled down her jeans for him, that would kick things up to a whole different level of sheer madness. Pure chaos. She had to focus and just give him what he needed, like he’d done for her so many times before.

His ragged breaths hastened her to draw him into her mouth, remembering every delicious ridge and vein of him by blind touch and taste… the course of her tongue knowing the way, guided by the taunt muscle beneath his burning skin that spasmodically contracted to the rhythm he wanted her to follow. She had to be delirious.

He held onto the dryer with one hand to keep from falling when his legs practically gave out beneath him. Her hands were trembling with need to the point where she could barely hold him. Time was ticking, the mission was basic: Stop his agony, pronto.

She slid her hands over his hips and up his inner thighs to fondle his sack and grip him tighter to keep from strangling on his uncontrolled thrusts. He was almost there, bent over her, hands shaking, fingers tangled in her locks. His voice entered her head like the deep penetration he craved from her body, but couldn’t have. Oh, Jesus…

Footsteps paralyzed them both, made them stop breathing, and squeeze their eyes shut. Shabazz’s easily recognizable shadow loomed beyond the other side of the plastic door in angry silhouette. Damali covered her chest with her shaking palm; her heart was about to go into arrhythmia. A stroke was a good possibility, too. Her mind was screaming; she felt faint. Don’t open the door, don’t open the door! ‘Bazz, please, have mercy, don’t open that door!

“I’m only gonna say this once,” Shabazz said in a quiet, lethal tone. “You guys have ten seconds to pull yourselves together and open that damned laundry room door. If I was a demon, your asses would be dead—as would everybody else in the house. I’ve just started counting. One.”

Damali popped up so quickly that she almost bumped her head on Carlos’s chin. Within two seconds, her tank top was down and Carlos was walking in a panic-stricken circle, trying to get himself back into his jeans and zip them up. He sucked in a silent groan, wincing. The quick sound of metal ripping made Damali cover her face with both hands and breathe into them not to pass out. With three seconds to spare, she smoothed down her locks and did a fast decency check on Carlos. After she received his suffering nod, only then did she reach out and open the door.

“We were just—”

Shabazz held up his hand and cut off her breathless words. “Save it, Damali. The newbies ain’t hip. But this is way outta line.” He took off his fatigue vest and handed it to her, immediately looking away from her tank top. “You need to go in there and finish the parts of the training that you know best, before they pick up the vibe. They may be slow, but they ain’t all stupid.” He looked at Carlos hard and shook his head. “You, brother, need to take a loooong walk around the house to cool your ass off. Then sit on the porch until you get your head together.”

“’Bazz, man, for real, listen…” Carlos said, beginning to uncharacteristically stutter in an agitated flurry, panting out sentences. “See, it’s not what you think. I was just talking to her. Need a just few more minutes of private convo to work out some details for tomorrow. Have a heart, man. What had happened was—”

“This hot vibe in the house will jack those newbies up,” Shabazz said flatly. “I feel your pain. I do have a heart, that’s why I’m allowing you two to save face.”

He gave Carlos a steely grit when Carlos and Damali still couldn’t catch their breaths.

“I told ‘em,” Shabazz said, almost growling, “that you more advanced and disciplined Neterus heard something and were doing recognizance around the perimeter, to cover for you.” He drew a breath and let it out slowly.

Damali closed her eyes and tried to breathe through her nose. But what was the point; she had just died that thousand death thing she’d been promising Carlos she would for nine weeks, if something like this ever went down. Happened right on the spot. Total mortification was in full effect. Now if a hole would be so kind as to just open in the laundry room floor, she’d be good ta go. She’d gladly take a Harpies’ snatch right now. Anything to get out of Shabazz’s presence. Never again, never again, never again, till she had her own space, oh, Lawd, never again in the house!

“But after the top of the dryer went,” Shabazz said after a Zen-gathering pause and speaking in an excruciatingly slow manner, his tone articulate ice, “Mike looked at me. I looked at Mike. Dan can barely keep his hands from shaking. Jose is weaving where he stands, and J.L. can’t thread together a coherent sentence. So—take a walk, Rivera. This is raggedy as a bowl of yock. Tomorrow is gonna be one of the juniors’ toughest lessons ever, and I’m trying to preserve y’all’s dignity by excusing this lapse of leadership and letting it slide. Therefore, I ain’t see shit. I don’t know shit. I ain’t hear shit. I ain’t feel shit. I’m sensory numb, right about now. It ain’t my business, but keeping these newbies safe and training ‘em right, is. Mar had to shut down her third eye ‘cause this bull was so ridiculous. In the laundry room with a full house? Over the top, even for y’all.” Shabazz looked out the kitchen window and just shook his head.

Carlos and Damali sent their gazes off in different directions.

“D,” Shabazz said more calmly, obviously having gone to that very special place deep inside his head. “Go splash some cold water on your face, take a deep breath, and go school those kids and get ‘em ready to rumble. That’s your job.” He looked at Carlos. “Rivera, since you clearly ain’t gonna get no sleep tonight, you’re on patrol. So, patrol. Outside. That’s your job. I don’t want you in that packed bedroom tonight tossing and turning in your sleep, sending shockwaves through the house, trippin’ out newbies, and keeping even some of the senior Guardians up all night with you—feel me? One near catastrophe per twenty-four hours is enough.”

Carlos nodded but never looked at Shabazz. The muscles in both men’s jaws were pulsing. Damali slipped out of the makeshift laundry room around Shabazz too humiliated to even speak. But in her haste to escape further scrutiny, she momentarily forgot that she was standing in front of Carlos for a reason—to be his visual shield.

“Damn, man,” Shabazz said turning and walking away. He pointed at the kitchen door that led to the porch without looking at either of them. “Leave by that exit, Rivera. The team don’t need to see you all jacked up like that. Be smooth. This ain’t nowhere near smooth. Shit!” Shabazz stalked out of the kitchen, blue static current crackling through his locks.

The elder Guardian’s words haunted them both as Damali held onto the edge of the sink and began running cold water from the tap to dab her face. Oh, God—she couldn’t breathe. Carlos passed her, lingered behind her for a moment, but then wisely kept moving as she dropped her head forward and simply closed her eyes.

“Meet me on the porch later?” he asked quietly as he stood by the door, still messed up and obviously insane.

She couldn’t even look at him. Her face burned hotter as she glimpsed the wet spot on her tank top under Shabazz’s vest where Carlos’s mouth had been.

“Get away from me, Carlos Rivera,” she said softly, her tone brimming with repressed hysteria. “Baby, please, por favor. Just stop, before I have to kill you.”

References

	Edits to this page before January 1, 2021 use CC-BY-SA-licensed content from the Fandom Vampire Huntress Legend Series Wiki.