by Linda Gayle
“Hey, handsome,” Kels called when Elion walked right past him for the door. Kels was leaning against the wall, arms crossed over his chest and his foot propped against the diner’s side, and Elion’s head came up in a hurry, surprise widening his eyes.
“There you are.”
“Where else would I be?” Kels patted the side of Elion’s face. “What’s wrong? You look like you’ve seen a stray spirit. Sayal’s all right, isn’t she?”
“Yeah, yeah, far as I know. I dropped her off like I told you, hours ago. Didn’t you get hold of her?”
“Didn’t bother. She knows to meet us here at eight-hour. No use crowding the girl.”
“Yeah.” He drew on his cig, burning the ashes right down to his knuckles.
Not a good sign. Kels rubbed his chin with his thumb. “Let’s get a seat. I’m sure she’ll find us all right.”
They went through the high doorway, into the steel-walled, always-busy diner. Aleut Station was old and sprawling, and though no one stayed there longer than necessary, it saw plenty of traffic from all sorts of species. It always struck him that, despite there being no segregation, the nonhumans and humans drew an invisible line down the center of the room. On the one side sat Earther pilots, passengers, and various other unsavory ilk, ragged and sallow for the most part from months traveling deep space, muttering over their hool and eggs, and on the other side, burbling, whortling, whistling offworlders slurping and munching whatever it was they consumed.
A waitron approached them. Kels asked for a table way in the back, where they’d have some privacy, and he and Elion followed her to it. They ordered drinks before they even sat. Kels needed a hit of something strong to brace him for the jarouk game.
Elion tossed his cig in a bin. “How are you feeling? Not so fogged?”
Kels smiled tightly as he sat facing the room, his back to the wall. “Yeah, about that… Sorry to put you through it. Honestly I didn’t know the thing was functional.”
“I find that difficult to believe.”
“I promise you.” He held up a hand. “Second time today I creamed my pants. Now is that the sort of thing a guy like me would normally admit to?”
“Second? Then you and Sayal didn’t…?” One eyebrow rose.
“Well, we didn’t fuck, no.”
“She didn’t…?” He trailed off again.
“Say it, El. Didn’t what? Suck me off? Nah. Never even got as far as taking out my cock. We groped and kissed, you know. I got her off with my fingers. Thought I’d break her in slow and easy.”
“When you’ve got a competition tomorrow? Shouldn’t you be…?”
“I’m not going to answer until you start completing your fucking sentences.” Now he lit a cig and watched his mate sweat. Kels could outwait anyone, and he knew Elion’s breaking point.
After an uncomfortable silence in which Elion patted his pockets for cigs, looked at Kels, who gave him his and started another for himself, Kels decided he needed a nudge. He said, “Listen, mate. You asked to meet early. I can see something’s on your mind. You can tell me. It’s about Sayal, isn’t it?”
Elion folded his hands in front of him, the smoldering cig between his knuckles, and crack if his hands weren’t shaking. “Yeah. Yeah, it is.”
Kels propped his elbow on the table and rested his cheek in his palm, ever patient. El stared into space. Finally, Kels said, “What, did you fuck her?”
“No.” He looked appalled at the very idea, but then he turned away again. “No. But…she did… We did…”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake, out with it.”
“She sucked me off,” he said in a tense sotto voce, leaning toward him over the table. “All right? I took her to the back of the station because I thought she might enjoy seeing the view out the aft observatories, and we were sitting and talking, and all of a sudden we were kissing and then…” He flipped his hand. “There it was.”
“What, your prick? With her mouth around it, just like that?” Kels schooled his features rigidly, though he truly wanted to burst out laughing. Poor Elion, wound in a knot over such a minor thing. “Well,” he said seriously, tapping his ash into a hole in the table, “I hope you didn’t enjoy it. Because if you did, that would just be the end of everything.”
“I did,” he gritted out, his body vibrating, making Kels guess he was bouncing his feet under the table, rife with nerves.
“Dear, oh, dear. Did you, uh, reciprocate in any way?”
“She wouldn’t let me. She said it was payment for my kindness or some such nonsense.”
“Hm.” He squinted through the smoke. “Well, I hardly know what to say. This is most unexpected.”
Elion, the very picture of misery, shook his head. “I’m sorry, Captain. I never got involved with any of your birds, never wanted to, and I know how much is riding on this one. I had no right. Believe me when I say it was neither planned nor intended.”
If he was calling him captain, he must truly be contrite. “And it won’t happen again?”
“Of course not.”
“Because you didn’t say that, you know. That it wouldn’t happen again.”
“I forgot.”
“Ah.” Saints below, no wonder Elion avoided relationships. He hadn’t the emotional fortitude. Kels clapped his hand on the back of his friend’s neck and gave him a little shake. “Elion. Elion, my dear, my love, it’s all right. I don’t care if you fucked her five ways till doomsday.”
“What? Truth?”
“Of course. I told her the same thing. She does fancy you—Well, obviously you know that now.”
“She told you she fancied me?”
“Mm, yeah.” He blew out a cloud of blue smoke through pursed lips. “Not in so many words, but it was clear to me. I can read her like a digipad.”
“Really.”
He almost laughed at the wonderment in his mate’s voice. “Elion Andervaars, is it possible you’re developing a small crush on our passenger?”
Elion’s fair cheeks colored, and he leaned back in his chair. “Oh well… She’s hardly my type.”
“You mean she doesn’t have a dick?”
Elion shrugged.
“You’ve had birds before. Can’t make up your mind, can you?”
“It’s not as if you haven’t had men.”
“True enough, though only for gaming. Usually.”
“You really don’t mind, then?” The waitron had returned, and Elion took their drinks from the tray, hool for both of them.
Kels waited until the waitron had wandered off, then said, “Frankly I’m glad to see you putting your dick to some use. When’s the last time you got laid? Kachemak Station?”
“Before that.” Elion sniffed, lifting his drink to his lips.
Kels caught himself before he asked why, because he had a sinking feeling he knew the reason. Physical need alone drove Elion to seek relief now and then, but what he really wanted, desired…was Kels. Crack and ruin. Then it was a good thing he was getting off with Sayal—a very good thing. It might open some doors for Elion, make him entertain other possibilities.
He swallowed down half the shot of biting, bitter hool, enjoying the burn in his stomach. “You should fuck her, El. I think she’d like that. In fact, I know she would.”
“I don’t want to get that involved,” he said. “The blowjob was spontaneous, like I said.”
“Yeah? Was she any good?”
“Mm.” His eyes grew big as his lips tightened around his cig again, and he nodded. “One of the best I’ve ever had.”
“Brilliant.”
Elion glanced at him. “I don’t understand. I mean, I must have seriously misread you. It seemed like you and her were getting close fast, like you cared for her.”
“I do; I do care for her. Don’t get me wrong. She’s a lovely chicky, everything a man might desire. Smart, beautiful, brave. But also remember, my entire motivation in this game, beyond getting the Nova back, is rescuing my Keeva.”
“Ha.” Elion set down his glass. “From what, Kels? Fame and fortune? Keev’s a scrag survivor. She’ll do what she needs and get what she wants. Can’t you see she was using you to win that agent? And once she got him, bang, out the door with you.”
“Yeah, well, there was more between us than sex.” Kels puffed on his cig, frowning. There had been, right? He realized he hadn’t spared a passing thought for Keeva all day. His mind had been filled with Sayal. Now his mind churned with images of Sayal giving Elion a blowjob. Where’d he say it’d happened? In the back of the station where those windows looked out at the planets? Very romantic. He was a smooth one, his mate. But he did believe Elion hadn’t planned it.
“Listen,” Elion said, bringing his attention back. “There’s something else. Sayal’s very nervous about tomorrow. She told me so, a couple of times. It could turn out an embarrassment if she bolts or freezes.”
“She won’t. She’s a hot one, even if she doesn’t know it yet. I’ll get her cranking.”
Elion shook his head. “I know you can, but should you? There’s something fragile about her.”
His friend’s pleading gave him pause. “El, if you don’t want me to fuck her, I won’t.”
Elion seemed to realize they’d come to an impasse. He wasn’t sure enough about his feelings to claim Sayal for himself, but he cared enough that he didn’t want to see Kels plow her over. Kels read the play of emotion in his friend’s eyes. He couldn’t help him make this decision. It had to come from the heart.
Finally Elion said, “For whatever reason, she seems to think she’s got to get to the high games. It’s important to her. I wish she’d say more about it, but I guess she can’t get there without practicing here, or somewhere, first.”
“True enough. You know…you could do her. In the arena,” Kels suggested, “‘stead of me.”
“Saints no.” Elion reeled back, staring at him with disbelief. “Did your brain get that fried? That’s not my gig at all.”
“Don’t know until you’ve tried it.”
“Are you still hinting at that triad idea? Because I’m not interested. I told Sayal that as well. Get it out of your head right now.”
“She brought it up, did she?”
“In a roundabout way.”
“You don’t fancy that? You, me, and her together?”
Elion’s face had become one big frown, and Kels smiled. The poor bloke—he was twisting something awful. He decided to push. “If not in the arena, outside it, then?” he quietly proposed.
Elion pressed the heels of his hands against his eyelids, then finished his hool in one gulp. “What would be the point of that?” he said, his voice getting raspy.
Kels waited until his mate’s eyes turned to meet his, and took a long, leisurely, suggestive drag on his cig. “Pleasure,” he murmured and let the smoke flow from his nostrils.
Elion’s body went from jigging to stone still. He stabbed a finger at Kels. “In all the years we’ve been together, you’ve never spoken to me this way.”
“Some things are worth waiting for,” he drawled. Saints, it was fun to get Elion going. He really shouldn’t have waited so long; his mate was right.
If El’s face grew any redder, it’d catch fire. Abruptly Elion’s gaze fixed on the entryway, and he breathed out a groaning sigh. “Thank the saints, here’s Sayal.” He stood to wave her over, and Kels could see his dick was stone hard against the fastener of his pants. His own body hummed with anticipation. It would be the challenge of a lifetime to coax El into bed with him and the bird…but so very worth it.
Sayal finished adhering the patch to Kels’s armpit. She’d tried to think of a believable place to put it, and this seemed to work. The burn ointment had dried somewhat, and one corner of the patch kept curling up. Muttering an oath beneath her breath, she licked her thumb and tried to wet it down.
“Having a problem, luv?” Kels looked down at her, his arm raised.
“No. It’s…it’s just dried out a bit is all.”
“It’ll still work, won’t it?” Elion asked.
“Positively.” They stood together in the diner’s roomy cleanser. Elion had his back to the door to make sure no one tried to get in. Kels had taken off his shirt and now waited patiently for her to finish cementing her lie to his skin.
A knock came on the door. Elion said over his shoulder, “Occupied,” then whispered, “Better get a move on. There are a lot of people drinking out there who’re going to need this room soon.”
Sayal straightened. “Done, I think. How’s that feel?”
“Like there’s nothing there,” Kels said. He studied her a moment, and she wished their bond were deeper so she could read him better. Surface emotions were all she’d ever mastered, and Kels was harder to read than most. It was her empathic ability that she’d rely on tonight, her ability to draw away pain…and poison.
She gripped his wrist, opening the bond, though he’d never know. As always, sexual heat flowed from him to her. She’d never met a more sexual being. Even her creator had been able to switch his libido on and off, but Kels oozed desire. He’d already been hot with it when she’d arrived, and Elion too, the two of them giving off such powerful auras of lust that by the time they’d finished their drinks, gone over their plans, and risen to hide in the cleansing room, her nipples ached, and her pussy was swollen and wet.
The knock came at the door again, and Kels bent to kiss her. “Thanks, precious. We better get going. It’s almost nine-hour. Ulvik’s punctual if I recall.”
Elion stood away from the door. As Sayal passed, his hand brushed her hip, and the connection she had with him ratcheted up her desire. By the Fates, she needed a cock inside her soon. But first the jarouk…
They walked the corridors toward Ulvik’s studio in relative silence, unusual for these men, sandwiching her as usual. She noticed their expressions were withdrawn, as if each of them had something on his mind. Something seemed to have happened in the few hours they were apart. She wondered if Elion had told Kels about the blowjob. He seemed lost in his thoughts, although when his blue eyes met hers, she could see the desire in them, barely banked.
They reached the inkman’s plain door. Before they entered, Kels put his hand on her shoulder. “Now you’re sure you’re feeling up to this? Your back’s not paining you?”
“Not at all. I looked in the mirror, and I still can’t see anything. I have to say. After all that, if I don’t get a biolume tat out of this, I think I’ll actually be a little disappointed.”
“Be glad if you don’t turn into a clam,” Elion said drily. “You don’t have to stay for the game. It’s not a pretty sight, watching a fella get stung by jarouki scorpions.”
“I feel that I should. I want to.”
“Well,” Kels said, “if at any time you feel a quease coming on, El will take you out, all right?”
Would it really be that bad? She took both their hands and squeezed their fingers. “Thank you for caring about me.”
Kels and Elion glanced at each other, one of their secret exchanges that spoke so much.
Treena came out the door just then and grinned at them. “Ready for Daddy’s card game? I saw him a few minutes ago shaking up the jarouki.”
“Wonderful. Angry scorpions,” Kels drawled.
“Oh, they’re just his little pets.” Treena’s gaze touched on their linked hands, and she bit her lip. “Go right in. He’s waiting for you.”
Kels let go of Sayal’s hand to take the door, but Elion, tellingly, did not. She smiled at him over her shoulder, and he rubbed his thumb over the backs of her knuckles. The Fates had truly been kind to her, bringing her to these men.
Ulvik was indeed waiting for them. His bland gaze settled on Sayal. “How’s the tat?”
“It’s fine. Hasn’t bothered me all day.”
“I’d like to examine it before we get started.”
Kels looked at her, and she nodded. “It’s all right. I don’t mind.”
They fo
llowed Ulvik into his black on black workroom, where he beckoned for Sayal to lie belly down again on his table. He pulled up his stool and sat beside her, fitting his monocle against his eye, then lifting her shirt. Sayal couldn’t see his face, but she heard his intake of breath, and her heart skipped a beat.
“What is it? Is something wrong?”
She felt his cool fingers moving over her skin. “Interesting…” he murmured. Arms pillowed beneath her cheek, she twisted her head enough to see him. He’d dropped his monocle and now fitted goggles over his head. Lights came on inside them, and he bent closer to her back.
“What do you see, Ulvik?” Kels asked. He stood protectively close on her other side, his hand on her shoulder.
“I don’t see anythin’,” the inkman muttered. “That’s the problem. Not even with the ultraviolet. Hmm…” He probed, and she flinched.
“Something’s happening under there,” she said. “It hurt a bit when you did that.”
“Did it now?” His voice was distant and distracted as he continued probing. Her breathing quickened as flicks of pain stabbed her.
“Now I’m really feeling it,” she said, closing her eyes against a particularly sharp bite.
“Quit, Ulvik. She’s hurting.” Kels leaned over her; she felt his hip against her side. Whatever his expression, it caused Ulvik to sit back and take off his goggles.
“How long you plannin’ on being on Aleut?” the inkman asked.
“Soon as we get our ship, we’re out of here,” Kels replied.
“It would be better—safer—if she stayed nearby. I’m not exactly sure where the ink has gone.”
“What’s that mean? It’s in her bloodstream?” That was Elion’s worried voice. He’d been a meter away but now came to stand next to Kels. “You promised that wouldn’t happen, you bastard.”
“I never promised,” Ulvik said drily. “I took precautions against it. I told you. There were no guarantees.”
