by Megan Hart
His kiss sent a shiver trickling through her and made her nipples perk to life, but she felt disconnected from her body's responses. Linna sighed and relaxed against him. The soft material of his shirt and pants felt luxurious against her bare skin.
His hands whispered up and down her sides, her waist, and slid up to cup her breasts. One dipped down to circle her erect clit, eliciting another sigh. Her body responded to his caresses, but she still felt...nothing.
Erystus walked her to the edge of the pallet, turned her, pushed her to side on the edge of the lumpy mattress. Linna blinked again to clear her vision, but the haze in front of her eyes wouldn't go away. She spread her thighs at his urging, and he knelt between them. His hair tickled her legs and thighs as it trailed over his shoulders and caressed her.
Linna shivered at the sensation, which reminded her of the nanobots that had worked on her during her stay in the surghosp. His hot breath blew against her, and she felt the delicate stroke of his tongue on her sensitive flesh. The man between her legs made love to her with his tongue and lips and fingers with as more skill than any lover or client she'd ever had. Almost any lover.
Del was better.
Her body arched beneath Erystus. She shuddered. She felt him tonguing her clit, felt his finger sliding inside her, but her body didn't tumble into the climax she knew was building. His strokes quickened. He licked and sucked her.
But she didn't come.
Panting, face pinked from exertion, Erystus sat back on his heels. Linna lifted her head to peer down at him. He was shaking his head.
"Is your cunt made of metal, too?" he snapped as he got to his feet. "Working on you is like working on a dead woman. I can feel you getting off, but you're not reacting. I know women can fake climax when they don't have it, but are you faking not having one when you are?"
She struggled to sit and shook her head to clear it. "You were altering my consciousness, weren't you?"
The arrogant jerk grinned. "It's what I do, sweetheart."
Linna put a hand between her legs. Her pussy was warm and slick. She felt her own touch, just like she'd felt the pirate's tongue and lips and fingers, but the post-orgasm throbbing wasn't there. Her clit still felt swollen, her cunt tender...but she didn't feel like she'd climaxed.
She gave him back a grin of her own. "I didn't feel it."
Erystus sighed. "I could have you killed for this. You're a worthless piece of trash to me, a bad deal. A spoiled bargain. You're not any good to the brothel if you can't have an orgasm with anyone other than that hulking brute over there, and believe me, I know you can have them. I heard you screaming all the way to the bridge."
Linna crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him defiantly. "If you're going to kill me, do it. Don't just brag about it."
He leaned so close to her she could see the glitters of violet in his blue eyes. "Do you want me to kill you?"
Linna didn't answer. Erystus sighed so deeply and took on a look so wounded, Linna had to bite back a laugh. In a gesture rapidly becoming familiar, he smoothed his golden mane away from his face, and huffed. "I have a reputation to keep up."
Linna suddenly understood something about Erystus. "You don't want to kill me, do you?"
He frowned. "No. I dearly want to fuck you until you scream my name and beg for more."
She felt guilty giggling when Del still snored on the floor, but she couldn't help it. "Why?"
"Because you're beautiful." He reached out to touch her cheek, and she didn't pull away. "Because you have something in you that makes me feel soft inside."
It was an odd statement, especially coming from a man who'd just moments ago threatened to kill her.
"You're going to let us go, aren't you?"
He nodded. "It's easier to do that than to try and get rid of your bodies."
"You don't mean that."
His eyes flickered and she caught a glimpse of the harder man, the tyrant. "Don't tempt me. I might still have your sweet taste on my tongue to distract me, but it won't last forever. Neither will my sentimentality."
Linna bit her lip, stepped toward him, and kissed him thoroughly on the mouth. His hands came around to cup her ass and pull her closer to him. His erection ground against her belly. His tongue darted between her lips and then he pulled away.
His eyes searched hers. "That felt a little more real."
"Thank you," she told him.
"Sure I can't convince you to give me a ride?" Erystus laughed and shook his head as he stepped away from her. "Forget it. You might not be Xanderran, but you're as bound to that man as if you were. Any woman who can resist me is worthless to any other man."
She didn't tell him it was her enhancements that gave her the ability to close off parts of her mind. He'd asked if the medtechs had partitioned her brain like a hard drive, and they hadn't. They had provided her with additional neural circuitry, though, parts she could control at will.
"You made my body respond," she told him, to soothe his ego. "Just not my mind."
"And not your heart," he replied with a laugh. "Not that I have much use for that part of you anyway."
Linna looked down at Del, who had begun to stir. "No. Not my heart either."
Erystus sighed loudly and nudged Del with the toe of his extraordinary boot. "He'll wake up soon. I'll have some clothes brought for both of you. And I'll be dropping you off in the next solar cycle."
She caught him before he could leave the cell. "Dropping us off? Where?"
Erystus quirked his brow at her again. "Why, on Xanderra, of course."
The door slid shut behind him, and Linna let herself sink back down onto the bed.
Of course.
Del watched Linna and that benizona Sloane put their heads together and giggle, but he didn't let any reaction show on his face. He'd woken, wearing clothes he didn't recognize, on the pallet. Linna had told him Sloane was going to let them both go instead of selling them into slavery. He hadn't asked what magic she'd worked on the pirate to get him to agree, but watching them now, he could guess.
"I promise," he heard her tell the blond man. Eyes bright, she laughed and touched the pirate's arm. It was a casual touch that told Del a lot about what had happened while he was knocked out. He gritted his teeth and looked away.
"But I don't think that's likely," Linna continued with a shake of her head.
Sloane, with a glance at Del, captured her hand and brought it to his lips. He kissed the back of her hand, and Del saw the pink flash of tongue. He looked away.
"Don't bother thanking me." Sloane appeared in front of him.
"I wasn't planning on it," Del replied as evenly as he could with a clenched jaw.
The pirate, who stood tall enough to look him in the eye, captured Del's chin with his hand. "Thank your woman."
Del knocked the pirate's hand away and kept from following it with a punch to the jaw by self-discipline alone. Sloane laughed in Del's face, then looked over at Linna with a softer expression.
"She's someone special," the pirate said. He leaned so close Del could smell the bastard's perfume. "And she tastes exquisite."
Del's fist swung and met the pirate's palm. For a moment, the two men stared each other down. Linna stepped between them.
"Control yourselves," she scolded. She turned to Sloane. "And you. Quit trying to cause trouble."
Sloane shrugged and gave an arrogant grin. "Trouble is my job, sweetheart." To Del, he said, "Take good care of her."
"She's pretty capable of taking care of herself," Del said.
Linna's head twisted to stare at him when he said that, her expression unreadable. Then, eyes narrowed, she turned back to Sloane and kissed his cheek. "Thanks for this."
Sloane waved his hands. "Get on that transport before I change my mind."
Del looked to the hatch, which spiraled open at the pirate's command. Through it, he could see the stark interior of a simple transport pod, designed to hold three people with room for a small load of car
go. He'd taken one very similar from Xanderra to the first ship he'd berthed on. That seemed like a long time ago.
"Does this transport have your markings on it?" he asked.
"Of course it does." Sloane grinned again. "Go on. Ask me how I know you'll get to the surface when you know as well as I do that the Melekim Gadol refuses to do business with known renegades. Go on. Ask me. I know you want to."
Del fixed the pirate with a level glare and didn't say anything. Linna looked concerned. She peered past Del into the transport, then back at Sloane.
"Reach the surface? You mean there's a chance we won't?"
"Xanderra has restricted commerce routes," Del explained, never taking his eyes off Sloane. "Unauthorized ships are shot down on sight."
"What?"
The pirate laughed. "Ask me how I got authorization, Delek Tennvic. Go ahead."
Again, Del refused to ask. He could guess well enough what games the pirate had played to get permission to land this transport.
Linna, on the other hand, had no clue about Del's family connections. She turned to Del. "What's going on, Del?"
"Ask him who his father is."
"Del?"
Del still refused to speak. Silently, he pushed past Linna and the pirate and got into the transport. Through the hatch, he heard her speaking to the pirate. Her voice, raised in anger, made it easy to hear every word.
"You mean you got paid to drop us off?" she cried. "You didn't do this out of the goodness of your heart, you son-of-a-bitch! It was just another deal to you!"
Then Del heard the distinctive crack of a palm against a cheek, and Linna slid into the seat beside him. The hatch spiraled shut and the transport began to rev up for separation from the main ship.
"What's so funny?" she asked after a moment, as the transport pod slid into orbit around his home planet.
Del shrugged. "Did you really think fucking him would get you anywhere? He's a pirate. He's only interested in profit."
"Fuck--" She twisted in her chair to stare at him. "Is that what you think?"
He returned her glare with a neutral stare. "Is it?"
Linna frowned and faced front again. Her hands came up to rest on the transport's simple control panel. She tapped her fingers on the metal.
"You mustn't think very highly of me," she said, "if you'd assume something like that."
"It's what you do, isn't it?" Del asked, knowing his words were cruel, but not able to stop them. She was his behshera. He ached with love for her. The thought of her with another man sent him surging into rage and despair. She was his behshera...but he wasn't her behsherat. "There's nothing stopping you from fucking anyone you please."
"Nothing stopping me!" She gasped. "You...oh, you bastard!"
Then she got up from her chair and moved to the back of the transport. Away from him. Now that they were behsherit, his heightened awareness of her meant he could hear the change in her breathing that meant she was upset. He smelled the tang of salt and knew tears filled her eyes.
Del kept his gaze focused on the transport controls, even though he didn't need to actually do anything with them. The small pod rocked as they entered the atmosphere. The window in front of him showed the familiar terrain.
"We'll be landing in about ten minutes," he said.
He didn't expect an answer, and he didn't get one. Del looked down at the clothes Sloane had given him. They weren't exactly up to his father's standards, but there wasn't anything he could do about it. He touched the shimmering red material of his pants. At least the color was right.
Seven years before he'd sworn to never wear red again. He'd thought he'd never come back to Xanderra either. He'd believed he'd be living his life alone.
"Transport XZ-7734, you are cleared to land." The com-speaker crackled to life. The voice spoke in Xanderran. It had been a long time since Del had heard that language. "Please state your occupancy."
"Delek Tennvic and behshera Linna Fortense on board," he replied in Xanderran, knowing Linna didn't understand it.
He had about five minutes to tell her who he was and about his family. He should prepare her for the pomp and circumstance he was sure waited for them on the ground. It wasn't fair not to warn her about his place in this society, or not to give her some idea of how she'd be expected to act as his behshera.
The transport rocked again, harder this time. A warning light began to blink. Del flipped a few switches, but the controls were still locked on remote auto-pilot, and he couldn't do anything.
"Harah!" he cried as the trajectory map showed their course.
They weren't going to land at the Yarushalim space dock, their original destination. Something had gone wrong, really wrong, with the nav systems. They were completely off course.
"Tennvic to base control," he barked, still flipping switches to no avail. "Release auto-pilot! Let us go, damn it! Let us go!"
"No way," came a familiar voice over the com-speaker. "You're set to crash land in the jungle. Have a nice trip."
"Shitdamnpissfucktits!" Del shouted, stealing Linna's favorite curse. He got to his feet and pounded at switches and buttons, but all he got was laughter from the com-speaker.
"What's going on?" Linna cried.
"Buckle in," Del told her grimly, as he struggled to override the transport's controls.
"But--"
"Buckle in!" he screamed. "We're going down!"
Without another argument, Linna did as he said. Her face had gone white. The transport shook harder. The lights went out. The control panel blinked and buzzed.
Del forgot about trying to stop their flight. He buckled himself into the seat harness and hooked his feet into the ankle straps. The small ship shuddered so hard he thought they'd be lucky to hit the ground at all. They might just fall apart in the air.
"We're falling," Linna said as she looked out the transport's front window.
"It's not the falling I'm worried about. It's the landing."
Then they crashed through the first layer of Xanderran jungle and headed for the ground beneath.
Chapter 11
Linna knew what death felt like. This wasn't it. This was unrelenting pain. This was persistent, glaring light so bright it hurt her eyes. Was she back in the surghosp?
She blinked, but still couldn't see. Her eyes. She remembered she could control them. She forced her pupils to shrink closed. That helped a little with the bright light, but didn't do anything for the pain.
She couldn't move. Panic flooded her. She was paralyzed. Even before, lying at the bottom of the stairs in puddle of her own blood while her husband stood over her with a butcher knife, she'd been able to move.
Helpless! She was helpless! She did have a voice, and she used it to groan aloud.
"Linna."
She recognized the voice. "Del?"
"I'm going to unbuckle you from the chair in a minute. You have to make yourself ready. We're upside down. You're going to have to hold yourself up so you don't fall."
Now she remembered the transport pod and the crash landing. The bright light dimmed and went out. The darkness wasn't much better, but at least it didn't hurt. Linna blinked. She saw the shape of Del's head below her just before she felt his strong hands on her waist. She heard the clang of metal and felt herself sag.
"Reach out straight ahead," he told her. "Grab the bar that's near your knees."
She found it. The metal was hot in her palms and she hissed. "Got it."
"I'm going to unbuckle you the rest of the way. Are you ready?"
Now she understood why she couldn't move. The harness had kept her in place. "I'm not paralyzed."
"I hope not." The familiar dry humor of his voice gave her strength.
Linna tightened her grip on the bar. The multitude of aches and pains were fading. Not disappearing, but she didn't think she was quite so badly off as she'd first thought.
"I'm ready."
His hands moved over her body, unhitching and unhooking the buckles and straps t
hat had kept her bound to the chair. She felt herself begin to fall and held her arms stiff to prevent herself from dropping too fast.
In the next moment, she was in Del's arms, right side up. She touched her toes to the floor, then let her weight rest on her legs. He didn't let her go right away, and she didn't try to move out of his grasp.
Linna put her head on Del's chest, grateful for the warmth of his closeness. He sighed. His hands came up to hold the back of her head and he kissed her.
"Are you all right?"
She nodded, then realized he might not be able to see her in the dark even though she could see him. "Yes. You?"
"Nothing that won't heal."
Linna looked around. "What happened?"
"We crashed."
"Del, I know that."
He gave her another long, slow squeeze. "We need to get out of here."
"How are we going to do that?"
He turned toward the transport's front window, now above them. "We have to crawl out through there."
"No problem. We've done harder than that. Remember?"
"I remember."
She'd been hoping to hear more dry humor, but this time, his tone was grim. "You're worried about something."
"We landed in the jungle. The trees are very thick here. There's a lot of undergrowth. I don't think we made it all the way to the ground."
"We're in a tree?"
The transport shook as she spoke. Linna clutched Del for balance as the pod shifted beneath their feet. Now she caught a glimpse of leaves and branches, dappled with silver light, through the window.
"Move," he told her quietly, and pushed her toward the window.
She climbed fast, ignoring her bruises and the protests of her muscles. Del was right behind her. She stopped at the window.
"It's still sealed."
"Reach for the red handle up near the top," he said. "Pull it."
She found it and gave it a yank. The window separated from the transport and fell away with a loud clatter. Hot, moist air flooded over her, making her instantly begin to sweat.
"Go through."
She found handholds and lifted herself through the empty space. Then she couldn't help the little scream that burst from her mouth at the sight in front of her. They'd landed in a tree, all right. A very, very tall tree. Considering the only trees she'd ever seen were the anemic and stunted shrubs in the Newcity gardens, this tree seemed like something out of a viddy story.
