Page 39 of Skyn
“Now, on to what I want to show you.”
Ben gestures toward his console, and I lean in. Rows of articles, dates, and data pulled with surgical precision. His work. His mind made visible. And I smile—becauseI know him. I have known him for years, followed his infuriatingly linear research since I was a Bronze. Ben is the stair-stepper, the man who moves forward one precise inch at a time and saves hours of footage displaying goosebumps.
I know exactly what he’s looking for.
I don’t even have to think. I reach behind him, fingers gliding past his shoulder, and call up three more articles from the IS.
Ben stills.
Double take. Triple take.
Then, with something soft, awed, completely unguarded, he pats the seat beside him. “Please, love, sit.”
Love.
The word lands low in my stomach, warm, unexpected. I let it settle.
And I sit. Now, we’re researching together, and, as he reads aloud, Ben’s voice tightens, breathless. “It fits. It all fits. My prototype SKYN is so close Fawl.”
Time folds in on itself. Hours and days collapse. The mannies bring hot coffee in the morning, crusty croissants by midday, bloodred wine when the sun is long gone. I don’t register the transitions, only that we arestillhere, that our hands move in tandem.
Ben builds the path, his console filling with ruthless, elegant logic, and I find the fractures. When he accelerates, I pull back, make sure we don’t miss the important things in the rush forward.
And it’s working.We’re working.
There’s a moment—when the fatigue sets in, when my body stretches and starts to give under the weight of the day—that I catch him watching me. Not in the quiet way he sometimes does. No, Ben looks at me like I ampartof the breakthrough on SKYN. A way for this society to recognize the power of vulnerability, of humanity, again.
That night, we collapse together into one of the lab rooms, crammed in with the mannies, exhausted beyond words, ready to wake in six hours and do it all over again.
I could do this forever. With him.
Chapter18
The Mannies
That thought, the desire to work alongside him forever, stays with me, makes me more afraid than I want to admit, even as my body pulls me into sleep.
I wake up to warmth, to the soft weight of something pressing between my legs, the slow drag of something wet and rough against my pussy. My panties are pushed to the side, and my breasts are pressed out of my tight bodice.
My eyes snap open.
The mannies.
I can tell it’s Hank who is between my legs, by the sheer size of him. Then I feel a shift near my side—a whisper-soft pull at my nipple, an almost-reverent caress of a wet tongue. Elton, the sensitive little artist, latching on and sucking harder.
I twitch, try to move, but my wrists are held high over my head. Crispin stands above me, head tilted, watching.
Something prickles at the edges of my mind. Their tongues are everywhere, hot and wet dragging up the insides of my thighs, flicking over my nipples, plunging into my mouth like they own it.Oh God, my mouth.There’s no finesse. No rhythm. Just raw, hungry friction—sucking, lapping, devouring. It’s messy. Desperate. Like a dog rutting against your leg, shameless and single-minded. My body responds anyway, heat curling in my belly, a treacherous flush of sensation flooding through me.
I thrash, but whoever’s holding my legs tightens their grip—not cruel, but firm, keeping me in place. “Hank!” I hiss.
Hank is lapping at my pussy now with gusto. Every clumsy, greedy stroke feeding something dark and needy inside me. I think of them with the ice cream. Me asking Ben if he could taste it.
He can.
“Hank! Bad bot.”
I twist my head toward Ben. Ben will?—
