Ellie moaned. She opened her eyes, stared straight at him and commanded, "Rub my clit, Lucas. Don't fool around. Make me come. Please. Touching you, watching you, turns me on so much."

"Shit yes," he growled as everything unnecessary melted away.

For a brief moment, they were just a guy and a super-sexy girl getting it on, like he'd done so many times before. Looking for quick, hard relief. Except this time was like fucking in the middle of a lightning storm, even though all he had inside her was a couple of lousy fingers.

Their energy neutralized his worry, doubt and...anger.

Temporarily, he felt free of every burden.

It was as if he could run unfettered again.

Or at least it seemed that way.

Lucas aimed his elation at Ellie. He tried to refund to her even a portion of the ecstasy she'd granted him. Not only when she'd jerked him off, but also when she'd acted as an antidote for his lingering depression, granting him a much-needed respite.

She was the best medicine he could have hoped for.

So he complied with her wishes, even though he would have liked to drag out their exchange indefinitely.

He tested several different motions until he found one that drove her wild. When he flicked his thumb over her clit while drilling his fingers into her, her thighs began to tremble around him. With one hand, she reached up and cupped her own breast, surprising him with the amount of force she used to stimulate the berry-colored nipple.

He'd have to remember that for later. If there was ever another time he allowed himself to live this dangerously-and risk them both crashing and burning when things didn't go as planned.

Damn, she practically squeezed his fingers from her undulating sheath when she clenched on him that time. It would feel amazing if she did that to his dick.

Willing himself not to get fully hard again, he dedicated himself to bringing her to climax.

It didn't take long.

Ellie screamed, her eyes flying open and her fingers tangling in his hair. Then she shattered.

Her arousal drenched his hand, making him glide easier in between the clamping of her muscles, which nearly froze him solid within her.

An unnatural, feverish glaze came over Ellie's eyes. She became animalistic, roaring her completion in a way that would have been unbelievably hot if it had been a product of regular arousal. Though it was the first time he was seeing the reaction firsthand, he'd seen plenty of similar responses on the tapes they'd lifted from Morselli's dungeon.

His heart stopped in his chest. Would she be okay? Was this her new normal?

It should have occurred to him sooner. The discussions he'd had with JRad about how, even now, Lily sometimes had reactions during sex that were influenced by the one time she'd taken Sex Offender. It changed something permanently within the people who'd been cast under its spell.

If it did that to Lily after a single dose, what would it do to Ellie, who'd taken more than just about any other still-living person on the planet?

Unsure of how to react, Lucas retreated. He kept her from falling, but stopped touching her otherwise, making her descent from her orgasm sharp and unsupported.

"Lucas?" She called for him, confused.

"I've got you," he promised.

He simply didn't know what to do with her.

What was the right thing?

It might be too late for him to do that. He should have talked to her about this first. Maybe to Jambrea or Lacey, to find out what the medical repercussions might be. Shit, he'd gotten carried away and done exactly what he shouldn't.

Lucas pushed himself up onto the opposite end of the tub, sitting on the side near the bath mat, leaving Ellie to recover once she could sit up on her own.

The bathwater had grown chilly. It was time to face reality and the consequences of what they'd done.

Ellie mimicked him, heading for the exit. He steadied her until she climbed out of the tub on her own. But when she realized he didn't plan to follow right behind like a dog in heat, her face fell.

"Wow. I think I missed something. What just happened?"

"We got each other off." He played dumb.

"I thought that was the opening act, not the whole show." She snagged a fresh towel off his rack and wrapped it around her, hiding her spectacular body from his view. "Why are you stopping? You can't possibly have had enough, after how long we waited for that. Did you?"

"It's probably best if we get some sleep, don't you think?" Lucas exaggerated his yawn.

Couldn't she feel the effect the drug still had on her? Was it wrong of him to touch her now? He would never take advantage of what those monsters had done to her. The only way he could avoid it was to let her go until he could be sure she was thinking rationally.

"I don't know when the Men in Blue will call back with info, but when they do, we may not have a lot of time before we need to act on it."

She put her hands on her hips. "Don't act like this is a necessary sacrifice. Or for my own good. I know what's best for me. It involves you and me and doing more of what we just tried."

"Things have been insane today...er...yesterday, E." He knew it was a lame excuse, but he wanted to give them time to adjust. And her the chance to come to her senses if she wanted to, or needed to. "I don't think we should rush anything."

"If we went any slower, we'd be going backwards."

She stared at him until he angled his torso away from her and drew clean water to douse his liner. He slathered it in Hibiclens to inhibit bacteria growth then took extra time rinsing it.

She seemed to get the point.

He'd tapped out for now.

"Have it your way, then." A huff came before she pivoted to exit the bathroom. "But I'm taking your bed. Have fun on the couch."

Ellie grumbled beneath her breath about stubborn bastards, making him grin as he finished his routine. She stomped down the stairs, though he wasn't worried she was going very far nude. The lock flipped on his front door before she returned. The sound of a pillow being fluffed reached his straining ears.

"Sweet dreams," he whispered too softly for her to hear.

Then he took forever tidying the bathroom before settling in for a long, freezing shower.

Chapter Eight.

Ellie thrashed on the cement floor of her cell without a thought about the bruises she'd leave behind on her elbows or her legs or even down her spine, since she'd gotten downright bony lately. They didn't feed her much here, despite how ravenous she always was. A side effect of Sex Offender, she thought, though her logic was still fuzzy from the last dose they'd given her.

The men who paid Morselli to rent her drug-crazed body wouldn't appreciate the marks on her ivory skin. At least not ones they hadn't put there themselves. Or ones she gave herself when fucking them like a madwoman. She wondered how much more of this her body could withstand before her heart detonated in her chest.

"Don't be a pain in my ass," the guard grumbled as he tried to quash her flailing so he could administer another dose.

"Take that shit yourself and you'll bend over and ask for it. Even from a guy with an elephant dick. Especially from someone like that, though you won't find many around here." She spit at him. "You'll welcome anything that gives you a moment of relief, including getting fucked up that flabby, glow-in-the-dark butt of yours, long after you've started to bleed. Doesn't that sound like fun? No? Then quit forcing me to do it, you disgusting excuse for a human being."

Okay, so antagonizing the guy probably wasn't wise. But she couldn't stand to be quiet anymore. Playing meek hadn't gotten her out of this hell. No good-behavior early release either. They could take her freedom, but they couldn't make her like it, or even pretend to. Not until they jammed that shit down her throat again.

They'd raped and beat her so often that even the thought of punishment no longer frightened her. Sometimes she hoped they'd go too far and kill her. At least then she'd be liberated.

"You know the other bitches around here beg for more of this shit. Too many started killing their cellmates, hoping they'd get both cuts, so we had to isolate everyone. Not only the guys either. Women too." The dungeon warden examined her for a second. "Why don't you crave it like that? You're the only one left from the batch of originals, you know that?"

She hadn't. Was she bordering on extinction?

That stupid devil-man had managed to injure her when she thought she was numb to the damage he could inflict. Was her turn coming? Would this be over soon?

Or was she destined to eternal torture for some unknown reason?

Somehow, she seemed to have enough natural immunity to resist addiction to Sex Offender, maybe even to dampen some of its effects. Now that was a terrifying thought. Could it affect others even more than her? If so, she didn't see how they didn't rip themselves to pieces searching for relief.

Hell, maybe some of them had.

She'd been trying her best to convince this guard to try it, just once, for a while now. If he did, as weak-willed as he was, he'd be destroyed. Like she probably already was. Even if she managed to escape, she'd never be normal again.

It was the only wish she had, though, so she clung to it.

"Do us both a favor and take it on your own today," he snarled at her as if they were buddies instead of mortal enemies.

"It'd be faster if you took a taste." She tried to focus on what she was doing instead of the fire in her skin, an aftereffect from yesterday's high. If she closed her eyes she could imagine herself getting stung by a swarm of bees, all over her body, or maybe running through a field of poisonous nettles.

It was tempting to seek relief in another hit, but that would only bring more pain tomorrow.

No thanks.

Except she didn't have a choice.

"Fine. We'll do it the hard way." He was fast. Or maybe her reflexes were dulled by continual drugging.

Before she could dodge, he'd fisted his hand in her hair and yanked her head down, smacking it on the floor as he straddled her. Pinned to the floor, she bucked, trying to dislodge him with the superstrength that was one of the few benefits of Sex Offender.

It didn't matter, though, when he pulled a giant knife from his belt.

"I don't give a shit if you're one of the Scientist's pets." The blackness in his eyes made her believe every threatening word he told her. "There are hundreds of others nearly as good as you around here. If I slip and cut your fucking head clean off, no one will care."

Ryan will. She thought of her brother. Only that could make her quit endangering herself. For him, she would try to live another day.

When their parents died, she was the thing that had kept him going. Without her, what would happen to him?

She didn't want that responsibility on her soul.

Ellie stilled as the freezing steel dug into her neck, scratching her. A warm trickle ran along her skin, making her squeeze her eyes closed.

"That's better." The guard throttled her neck with his other hand, cutting off her air until she struggled, before letting up on her windpipe. "Why defy me when you know I'm going to win? I do every day, don't I?"

Because it was the only way she had to keep her spirit nourished.

Hope that she would someday get free still blossomed deep inside her, in a place she kept so secret they couldn't find it and crush the dying embers of her belief.

Tired of their game, he reached in his pocket for the tiny vial that held the precious drug. After popping it open, he tipped it against her lips. She kept her mouth closed long enough that he jabbed her throat a little more. Then he mashed on her face hard enough that she feared he might break her front teeth if she didn't open. The thought horrified her.

So she relented.

Chemicals mixed with her saliva, allowing the drug to be absorbed almost instantly into her system. If it hadn't muddied her brain, she would have known the types of reactions occurring since she'd studied so long and hard for her job as a lab tech for pharmaceutical firms.

Now it was for nothing.

She could never go back to that career, knowing what it could be used for. How it had ruined her life. What a stupid mistake-going to work for the Scientist-though she hadn't realized what her enigmatic company was beneath the cloaks they'd used to obscure their true purpose. When their salaries were nearly double the national average for employees without experience, it should have been a clue something wasn't legit.

Ellie paid for that dumb mistake every single day. Every minute.

A surge of power went through her, enabling her to flip her guard onto his back.

She would have grabbed his knife, but he'd caught on to her tricks long ago and thrown the damn thing through the bars to one of the other minions outside her cell. Fuck!

"You know it's not the weapon you wanted anyway, Pretty."

She hated when he called her that.

But, damn him, he was right.

The ache started inside her. First as a white-hot pinprick, then growing until it was a supernova of lust in her core. Compelling her to fuck. Screaming at her to find relief for the discomfort in her pelvis and breasts. Desire taken beyond pleasure to pain. If she didn't appease it, it would drive her mad.

Insane men and women had fled past her cell before being put down like rabid dogs by the guards many times during her stay. That wasn't how she wanted to go out.

Ellie nearly ripped the guard's pants in her desperation.

She didn't remember taking his puny cock out or hovering over it, jamming it inside her. But by his grunts, she knew she had.

Before this place had become her existence, she had only ever gone to bed with a few men. And she'd never fucked like this. Foolish and naive, she'd never really comprehended the meaning of that word. This was fucking.

All she cared about was calming the cyclone whipping her into a frenzy. The person she used to satisfy herself meant nothing. It disgusted her to treat another human being that way, even if they had forced her into it. The repulsive cycle of abuse was something she tried to untangle, but she rarely was clearheaded enough to make sense of it.

Right now, she didn't give a shit.

Ellie flung her head back and whipped her hair from side to side as arousal coalesced into an impending orgasm. Finally, relief. At least for a moment. Coming would only sate her for a few instants at first. It would be half the night before her body settled enough to abstain even for an hour without it being pure torture.