LETHAL TOUCH: BREAKING THE PRIME CEO

THE FIRST TOUCH

"Too loud."

The whisper was like a verdict, straight to the point.

Kael detonated his muscles.

The servo-motors in his gauntlet whined, launching her.

Adia flew.

She went airborne, a ragdoll tossed by a hurricane, up and fast. Her back slammed to the industrial ceiling grid twelve feet above.

SWOOSHH. GRRACKK!

Metal struts buckled, raining the plaster down, exploding the dust.

She hung there for a split second, pinned by gravity and momentum before she fell, hitting the stainless steel prep table on the way down, denting the heavy surface and rolled onto the frozen tile floor.

Silence.

Kael stood motionless. His chest heaved beneath the black armor.

[TARGET STATUS: NEUTRALIZED]

He checked his mind system.

[HEART RATE: 180 BPM]

[ERROR. SENSORS COMPROMISED]

He was vibrating, the sound of her heartbeat was still echoing in his ears, louder than the crash.

He walked toward the body.

"Extraction team," he said, speaking to the comms. "Prep for disposal. The Well is unstable."

He reached down to grab her ankle.

But then, the body moved.

Adia’s hand shot out, grabbing his ankle.

Her fingers were white and incandescent.

Kael looked down.

The leather of his boot armor smoked and boiled.

Adia lifted her head.

Blood ran down her forehead, cutting a red path through the grime on her cheek.

Her eyes were molten gold.

She smiled a bloody terrifying smile.

"Disposal?" she rasped with her we, broken voice.

SHRIIINGG. CHTALKK.

Her shoulder, dislocated by the impact, popped back into the socket with a sickening wet thud.

Kael stepped back.

Impossible.

The trauma was supposed to be lethal, spinal fracture probable, internal hemorrhaging certain.

She stood up, rising like smoke.

The wounds on her face knit together. The cut on her lip sealed. The bruise on her cheek faded in seconds, burned away by the sheer wattage of her internal reactor.

"For the record, I don't break," Adia whispered. "I just get brighter."

She lunged, slamming her palms against his chest plate.

CKRANGGG.

The impact rang like a church bell.

Kael grabbed her forearms, tried to snap the bone to end the leverage.

But she was real hot.

[WARNING. EXTERNAL TEMPERATURE: 2000 DEGREES]

[ARMOR INTEGRITY: FAILING]

The matte black composite on his chest liquefied.

Adia screamed, pouring every ounce of Passion she had stored into the metal, making the chest plate glowed cherry red, then orange, and then white.

Kael roared.

The heat punched through the insulation, searing the undersuit. He released her arms, shoving his back, staggering.

"You witch," he hissed, clawing at the emergency release seals.

ZHIIISS-PLOP.

The chest plate fell away, hitting the floor with a heavy, wet splat of molten slag, burning a hole straight through the tile.

Smoke rose from his chest. The ballistic undersuit was shredded, fused to the edges of the burn.

He was exposed.

A patch of skin, right over his sternum.

Adia panted, wiping blood from her chin, looking at him.

"Take it off," she taunted with a voice that dropping an octave. "You're cooking, idiot."

Kael glared at her.

The heat was unbearable.

He unlatched the helmet.

TIS-CLICK.

Then he threw it. The helmet smashed into the wall, shattering the glass visor.

For the first time, Adia saw him. He was severe.

Sharp cheekbones, grey eyes, like the color of ice in pale blue and piercing smog. A mouth set in a permanent line of cruelty. His hair was black, matted with sweat, falling over his forehead, cut short.

He was beautiful in a terrifying sterile way.

He stripped the gauntlets, throwing them down, stripping the pauldrons.

He stood there in the tattered remains of his undersuit. Muscles corded and tense. Veins bulging in his neck.

He was a predator stripped of his shell.

"Better," Adia breathed.

She licked her lips unconsciously.

Kael saw the movement.

His eyes dilated, swallowing the iris of the pupil.

[TESTOSTERONE: CRITICAL]

[DOPAMINE: RISING]

[LOGIC: OFFLINE]

He wanted to strangle her.

"You are a disease," Kael growled.

He stepped over the molten armor.

"Cure me then," Adia said.

She ran before Kael realize. She laughed with a manic drug-fueled sound. She kicked the loading bay doors open.

Then the storm hit them instantly.

WHOOOSSHH.

The alleyway was a nightmare because the Grief Storm was at its peak.

Adia ran into the deluge, scrambling up a pile of wet trash crates, vaulting onto a fire escape.

CKLANGG, CKLANGG, CKLANGG.

"Freeze!" Kael’s voice echoed from the doorway.

He burst into the alley.

The rain soaked him instantly. His shirt clung to his chest, translucent, revealing the hard topography of his torso.

He jumped, caught the railing of the fire escape, swinging himself up with terrifying grace.

Adia climbed up the rusted iron.

The city screamed around them with the sound of sirens, thunder, and the low moan of the wind.

She reached the slippery roof.

Tar paper and gravel slick with ice.

She spun around.

Kael vaulted the parapet, landing in a wet and feral crouch, stalking toward her.

"Nowhere left to burn," he said.

Adia backed up.

She hit the edge of the roof.

Behind her, a fifty-foot drop into the Sinks.

She looked at him.

He looked… hungry.

"I don't need to burn," Adia whispered. "I just need to touch."

She ran forward and tackled him, unexpected, illogical. But she hit him with the force of a train.

BRAAKK. SWIISSHH. SPLASHH.

They went down, sliding across the wet gravel, hitting the roof floor.

She was on top him. Then he was…

He pinned her fast, rolling her.

His hands found her throat again.

But she bucked her hips.

His groin brushed hers.

The contact sent a shockwave through Kael’s spine.

He gasped and loosened his grip.

He looked down at her.

She was wet and shivering. Her lips parted, her chest heaving against his. The glow under her skin was pulsing in time with his own blood.

"Do it!" She dared him. "Get this over with!"

She reached up.

Her hand touched his bare chest.

Just her palm on his heart.

Kael flinched.

What he expected was the burn, the explosion, the emotional overload. He braced himself, for death, for explosion.

He closed his eyes.

...

Silence.

The roar of the wind stopped.

The stinging bite of the freezing rain vanished.

Kael opened his eyes.

The world had stopped.

"Hahhpf!" Adia gasped. Her eyes went wide.

They were lying on the roof.

Five feet away, the storm was raging. They could see the black rain falling in sheets. They could see the lightning forking across the purple sky. They could see the trash swirling in the wind.

But it wasn't touching them.

A perfect, invisible sphere had formed around them. A five-foot radius.

Inside the sphere, the air was still, dry and warm. Exactly 72 degrees.

The rain droplets hit the invisible barrier above them and slid down the sides, unable to penetrate the sanctuary of their contact.

It was a bubble of impossible peace in a world of chaos.

Kael looked at her hand on his chest.

He didn't feel pain, nor did he feel the drain.

He felt...

Balance.

His heart rate dropped.

180...

120...

80...

60...

Perfect sync.

Adia felt it too.

The screaming pressure in her head, the constant need to discharge, the burning itch of the Well.

It was gone.

For the first time in her life, she wasn't overflowing.

She was just...

A woman.

She looked up at him.

The water had dried off his face instantly, warming his skin.

"What..." Kael whispered. His voice was hoarse. "What is this?"

He looked at his hand. It was resting on her shoulder. He moved his thumb, tracing the line of her collarbone, touching her soft resilient skin.

"Mmhhn…" Adia shivered from the sensation. His touch was grounding her.

"It's quiet," she whispered. "It's so… quiet."

He looked into her eyes. The gold fire had dimmed to a soft, warm ember. Then he shifted his weight, pressing his hips to hers.

"Nnh-ah... stop... what you doin'?" Adia’s whisper was thin, broken as she tried to swallow back a soft moan.

He felt the softness of her thighs, the hardness of her hip, her breath against his rib.

He realized with a jolt of terrifying clarity, that he didn't want to leave this circle.

If he let go, the noise, the cold, the storm would come back.

"Don't move," Kael murmured.

He lowered his head, burying his face in the crook of her neck, inhaling her skin.

"Mmhhnn…"

Adia’s hands tangled in his hair as she let out a soft moan. She pulled him closer.

"You're not cold," she murmured, brushing her lips to his ear. "You're warm."

She wrapped her legs around his waist out of reflex, as if her body were reacting to a deep-seated need.

Kael groaned with the vibration that travelled through his chest to hers.

He licked the sensitive skin of her neck.

Adia arched into him.

"Aahnn… stop-mmh…" she breathed.

The storm raged outside their invisible bubble, a hurricane of grief and hate.

But on the gritty tar paper of the roof, inside their sphere, there was only the sound of two people breathing and the terrifying, electric silence of skin finally met.

Kael lifted his head, looking st her lips.

He leaned down.

His lips hovered an inch from hers.

"You are…" he whispered, not finishing his word.

Then he closed the gap.

...