In Service

by Mima

“I like the way you think.”

  Grady grinned. “I like you, too, lovely one.”

  She wrinkled her nose. “I’m not lovely.”

  “Oh, woman. That is so not true. Let me show you how lovely you are.”

  And he did.

  Chapter Eight

  Shon sat on the side of Grady’s bed. She was softer when she slept. Her hair was snarled, and she smelled delicious. Salty and rich. He was so fucking tired. He’d just finished a long talk with Vel. Kor wasn’t speaking to him.

  Grady wrapped around her. It was weird to see a woman in his arms. Shon was used to seeing Vel’s lean length and red-gold hair alongside Grady’s blond. His men never slept with their servers.

  Sighing, he reached out and stroked a brown curl. It was thicker than it looked, the hairs catching on his calluses. Malla opened her eyes.

  “Hey.” She smiled.

  His heart kicked.

  “Shon.” She held out her hand.

  Fuck. “I need you to come with me, Malla.”

  She frowned. “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah, sure. I don’t need service. I want to tech you out.”

  She blinked. “All right.”

  That serious moue to her mouth made his dick twitch. She eased out from under

  Grady’s massive arm, tucked the covers around him. Without any fuss, she dressed in her underwear, but when she reached for her robe, he touched her arm and shook his head.

  “Loose pants. Something to move in.”

  She went to her room and he followed her. She moved to her little case in the corner.

  Spirit, she hadn’t even unpacked yet. She pulled out a sweat outfit. Seeing her ass covered in shiny, reflective, skin-forming material made his dick fatten, uncomfortably bent in his pants. Then she added a tight shirt that hugged her breasts and ribs. Crap.

  He led her out of the room. Vel was leaning against the wall in the hallway, wearing his “I’m a prince and you’re scum” look.

  Malla stopped. They looked at each other. He didn’t soften. She ducked her head and went into their training room. Vel followed them in.

  A few minutes later, Shon was laying out four guns on a counter and firing them up when Kor slammed into the doorway.

  “Shon.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Don’t do this.”

  “We’ll see, Kor.”

  “Just because she survived a bug attack doesn’t mean she can take on professionals.

  She’s fresh out of school.”

  “I’m older than you.” Malla’s voice was cool as she stepped up to their gun wall.

  “Not in firefight years, baby.”

  “You know what, Kor?”

  “I know I don’t want you anywhere near Dunru, Char’s team, or Radha’s extraction.”

  “Hmmm. How does that phrase go? Shut the fuck up?”

  Silence carried as they watched her lift Grady’s ion cannon down. She staggered a bit, then laid it on the counter. Her hands drifted over the muzzle and power pack, and damned if his dick didn’t sit back up and take notice.

  Kor stepped farther into the room, his face urgent. “Malla, you’re ours. You can’t expect us to split our concentration on a job this tricky. You’d be our first priority and that’s not good for the mission.”

  She abruptly began to move purposefully over the gun. While she took it apart, Vel came up from his post by the door to stand by her and watch. She matter-of-factly broke it down into its eleven components, then pointed at each and named them.

  “Trigger. Power pack, ion class thirty-one, known as ‘mean green.’ Force outlay.

  Optional monopod.” She rattled it all right off, then put it back together.

  Kor had drifted up behind him while she used her thighs to hold the power pack so she could get some torque on slotting the muzzle back on.

  Malla looked over her shoulder at him. “We were trained in twenty different guns, from miniature personal safety to anti-structure distance. I’m certified in short-range quick draw, midrange moving target, and distance still shot. I’m pretty good at distance moving target and midrange multiple targets, too, and I was going to get certification in those this year. Maybe I still can.”

  With a sexy heave to her body, she drew the ion cannon up to her shoulder, turned, and fired it in one motion. Right into the middle of the target across the room. She was pushed back two meters, but held her balance.

  “Fuck, that is so hot,” Kor breathed.

  Shon’s dick jumped in his pants. He ground his knuckles into it, gritting his teeth.

  Malla looked at him. “You still haven’t read my file, have you?”

  Shon bared his teeth at her. “I’ve been a little busy.”

  “Priorities, Shon. You’ve got enough time to fuck me, but you can’t read a three-page summary?”

  Vel spoke up. “I read it.”

  Malla looked at him, and Shon could see the change come over her face. Her eyes

  softened, that mouth drew in. He ground his knuckles into his erection again.

  “And in your experience, is my background good enough for this mission?”

  “Not even close.” Vel answered without hesitation.

  Kor and Malla both started to talk and Vel held up his hand. They fell silent.

  “However,” Vel continued, “the pros of you assisting us outweigh the con of your personal danger. You’ll go in under disguise and with extreme safety precautions like a body tag, a sensored suit, joining our private mental link and staying on the outskirts with Grady.”

  Vel’s eyes seemed to glow like mirrors with the intensity of his stare. “And Spirit help us if we can’t be cold enough to close you out of our minds and go on regardless of damage you take.”

  Malla stared back at him, her brown eyes narrowed as she jerked the power off on the ion cannon. She spat at him, “You do it for Grady. You’ll surely be able to do it for me.”

  “Ah, but that’s where you’re wrong, lovely. I barely manage to do it for Grady, one of the strongest and most experienced warriors in all the worlds. For you, I’ll be out of my mind the first time you take fire.”

  Malla rolled her eyes. “As long as I’m alive, I can feed you by blood alone, if that’s the way it goes.”

  Vel stepped right up into her, knocking the gun hard away from between them. “I

  never want to taste your blood again except in passion. Spirit, Malla, you’re not just a sweet fuck for the sake of service. Understand the level of risk we’re taking with our own lives and multiply it by ten for including you. Every single of one of us would be willing to die for you.”

  They stood nose to nose, with Malla’s head tipped back to take him on. Then she threw her arms around him, burying her face in his throat.

  “Fuckin’ A, not you, too, Vel!” Kor threw his arms around dramatically. “No! Shon!

  Vel! No!”

  “Tell me what we’re going to do after Vel phazes us into the third floor, Kor?” Shon picked up the fallen ion bolt and laid it on the counter with the other guns. He turned to the young soldier, who was not nearly as hot headed as he made himself out to be. Shon leaned back against the counter, his gut churning, his shoulders tight. He crossed his arms defensively.

  “What are we going to do with you after you sift through the brains of half the

  druggies in Dunru to identify Char? What are we going to do after our first firefight to get into Char’s hideout, after our second firefight to ‘convince’ them to give us their information? What about when Grady goes down from using his gift on the external watch on the Duke’s building, and what, just consider this for a moment, what the fuck are you going to do after the first alarm gets tripped, and I lose myself in Fury?”

  Kor started to talk, but Shon cut him off. “I’ll tell you what you’ll do. For all our superior gifts, we’re going to crash. We’ll have made it farther than any of High Post’s teams, or Char’s attempts, and we’ll have to back out, get to Malla�
�s safe house, and recharge. Then we’d have to go back in. Through all their reinforcements. And then we’d do that over, and over, until we wore them down or we died. The Duke has a lot of cred, and this is Dunru. I don’t see us taking on the whole moon. If the mission takes more than twelve hours, the Duke’s dogs at High Post will recall us, or we risk court marshal, and Vel can’t take that scrutiny.”

  Kor crossed his arms and began to pace.

  Shon continued relentlessly. “Instead, with Malla, I calculate the mission will take six hours, tops. We go in, get to Char’s team. We recharge. We get into the interior, and we recharge. We get to Radha, and we recharge. Then we get out. And we’ll possibly need to recharge at least once while tracing out. The odds without her aren’t good.”

  “The odds of keeping her alive aren’t good either!” Kor growled.

  “We’ve always gone in and out on extractions because that’s our physiology, and the rules say servers stay out. Dunru is outside all the rules, Kor. So we break the rules, too, and we have a chance. Malla can harmonize. We bring her in, and we’re way ahead of their expectations. We armor her up, we keep her at the back with Grady, and all of our odds go way up.”

  Malla watched Kor. She gently left Vel’s arms and stepped toward him. He stepped back.

  “Kor, can I tell you why I came here?”

  Shon just knew he was about let fly some crude comment. “Kor.”

  He shot him a hard glare but kept his mouth shut.

  “I came here because I knew, when I saw your public file, that I could make a

  difference. When I thought I was just a novice, I still was so sure, down to my bones, that I would be the best server you ever had. Because I was ready. Ready to give myself over to Luo hunger and sex and the demands of missions. I never wanted an active duty team. I wanted an exploratory team.”

  Kor snorted. Malla ignored him. She was only an inch or two shorter than he, and her eyes were steady as she took a step closer.

  “Until I saw you. You, and your swaggering smile. Vel’s locked down eyes and Grady’s weary ones. Shon looked about to snap any moment, about to kill everything. His eyes were screaming for help.”

  Spirit. Stop, Malla. Stop.

  “Smiles can’t swagger,” Kor muttered. He broke, looking away from her.

  “Yours does, but your eyes don’t. Your eyes are much, much more daring. Your smile says ‘Let’s have fun’ but your eyes say, ‘Don’t fuck with me.’ Your eyes warn people that you’re the real thing.”

  “Damn straight.”

  “I wasn’t finished with my training, but I had enough. I knew I was ready, and I knew I couldn’t wait. You needed me now. I wanted to help you all so badly. Then Headmistress told me I had all the power you’d need, and it was like this perfect blending of destiny. Then, I just wanted you. I wanted to match my power to yours. I’d been reining it in for so long, I should have guessed my status, but I didn’t. I left my Base so sure that I’d found the path I was meant to find. I’m woman enough for your bed, for Grady’s heart, for Vel’s arm, and” --

  Malla broke off and looked right at him -- “Shon’s Fury.”

  The crown of Shon’s head sizzled. His hands flashed cold, his heart jumped, and his knees trembled. “Stop, Malla.”

  “I will not.” She turned back to Kor, who looked ready to run. “You are my men. I knew it when I first saw you. I’m a little overwhelmed to be part of an Elite team, an active duty team. I’m scared, and I know I’m not up to your level yet. Healing Vel was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life. But I let myself go, and as awful as it was, I’d do it again for him. For any of you.”

  Vel pivoted away from them, bringing one hand up to scrub his face. Earlier, Vel had struggled to tell Shon of his emotional confusion.

  Vel sat on his bed, staring at his spread palm in distaste. “I can

  still feel that moment when I needed, and she’d given it all to me,

  and I still needed, and she just let it all go, and disintegrated. For me.

  I drank her down, and it was bitter. I knew her pain, and her fear.

  Her confusion, her need to care for us. She was thinking about you,

  how she hadn’t healed you yet. She was the most giving thing I’ve

  ever known, and it was like drinking peace. Even as I thought I

  killed her. That’s when I finally came all the way back to Grady, and

  wrenched us out of phaze. In a moment, I knew we were all fine,

  but I’ll never forget that moment just before. She gave herself to me.

  She’d never even met me. And she gave it all, so pure. I’ll love her

  forever. How can I be jealous of her? How can I deny Grady’s

  feelings when I have the same ones?”

  Kor spoke up. “Malla, you don’t get it. We know you’d do that for us. You’ve already proven you will. And it makes us crazy. We don’t want that. We don’t want your self-sacrifice. We want your strength.”

  “Then let me be strong. If I let you go off to battle, you should be able to let me fight, too.”

  “Your battles are in a bed. I couldn’t do what you do, couldn’t be that strong. Giving pieces of myself away to hungry bastards who are never full. Let us take the body damage.

  You have to stay back, where we can trust you to pick up our pieces.”

  Shon was impressed. “Wow, Kor, that’s really…good.”

  “Shut the fuck up, Shon.”

  Malla stood, so small and shiny in her workout gear, the bright training lights bringing out gold and red in her simply tied back hair. One tear trickled down her cheek. Aw, shit.

  His throat was suddenly too small for his lungs. No, baby.

  “Aw, shit, Malla,” Kor said. He reached for her with a shaking hand, his thumb taking the tear away.

  “Kor, that was so beautiful,” she whispered. Her arms hung loose at her sides, her shoulders drooping. “But I have to go on this mission. I know I’m not the same kind of warrior you are. But every once in awhile, we can both do what needs to be done. You’re able to give me your emotions so I know you’re not just disrespecting me, being over-protective. But you have to put away the emotion and see the logic of my ability to change this mission. You’re my men, Kor. I belong here. Let me stand by you when you need me most, and I’ll ask you to do the same.”

  Kor and Malla now stood face to face. Her eyes held a mix of emotions -- fear,

  yearning, devotion. Her lip trembled. Kor was rigid, fists clenched, nose flaring. Then he exploded in a rush. It was fast even by Luo standards and by the time Malla gasped, he had her on her back on the training mat. His hands wrenched her pants open, then ripped them down past her hips. He had his dick out in record time, and was shoving it into her bare pussy, despite the fact that she couldn’t open her thighs. He pumped, his hard ass clenching as he tried to probe into her body.

  Shon tightened his fists, locked his knees to keep from going to them. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Vel turn and watch.

  “Malla, fuck, yes. Oh, Spirit, you’re wet, so hot. You’re gonna burn my dick, baby.

  Brand me. So sweet.” Kor was babbling, as he sometimes did when he fucked.

  His eyes were glazed, and his hands worked her breasts while he ate at her neck. Malla tossed her head, crying out, panting kittenish mews, shuddering under him. Kor must have got some part of himself into her because he started humping on her, his shoulders blotting her out as he grunted and moaned. Shon’s dick throbbed, beating in time to Kor’s thrusts. He saw Vel reach into his pants and palm himself. Shon curled his fingers so hard in his fists that his nails cut into his thick-skinned palms. His balls were like stones, aching, and his tip burned where it was trapped against his waistband.

  Shon watched as Malla threw her arms out, up above her head, strained her neck back, and came, wailing Kor’s name. Kor made a sound somewhere between a choked scream and a laugh, his body flattening, hips jerking. He held himself stiff for a lo
ng breath, then relaxed with a gasp. Malla sighed. There was a distinctly happy tone to it.

  She was incredible. He couldn’t think of a single server in their history who would take such treatment with such open pleasure. Several would have secretly liked it but bitched Kor out the second he came. Some would have cried. He could think of several that would have knocked his head off his shoulders for even trying. Malla liked it. She didn’t see it as disrespect. She took the passion each of the men gave exactly as it came. Kor gave her everything he had, rude and raw, and she didn’t judge him. She loved him.

  “That wasn' honest se

  t

  x with a man.” Her furious, hurt words during his last session

  came back to haunt him. He’d never be able to give her that. Never. He couldn’t risk it.

  Wouldn’t risk her. He wondered if he had the ability to share himself that way, if she would love him like the others.

  Vel sighed, long and strained, next to him. He looked over in time to see a wet spot appear at the top of Vel’s pants, his face contorted, teeth bared. Shaking his shoulders out, Vel took his hand from his pants and wiped it on his thighs.

  Meeting Shon’s gaze, Vel looked over at him and grinned. “Was it good for you, too?”

  “It was damn fine. Kor managed to deliver two moments of beauty in one conversation despite being his usual stupid self.”

  Vel laughed. Shon pasted a grin on, but as he watched Kor put Malla back together with gentle touches, he thought, That’s as l

  c ose to honest passion as I’m ever going to ge .

  t

  Sharing her through them is all I can taste.

  “So it’s settled then. Malla is on this mission.” He waited, but Kor simply stood, staring down at Malla’s sprawled, faintly smiling form. “Kor? You on board?”

  Kor faced him and Shon readied himself, sure he was about to launch an attack. He didn’t look like the relaxed guy who’d just been gently tidying his woman. His eyes were grass green, his jaw jumping.

  “Do you honestly think that rescuing this server, bringing a rogue team back to High Post, recovering the Blades, and stopping the Duke is worth her life?”

  Shon stared at him. His throat closed. His eyes burned. He knew exactly what Kor was saying. None of the logic mattered. But they were soldiers. They were supposed to turn their hearts off.