Wager: A Sci-Fi Romance (The Jekh Saga Book 4)

by H. E. Trent

  He scoffed. “History says that if I do tell you, you’ll tell my business to anyone with at least one functioning ear.”

  “Baggianate! I do not.”

  “Oh? Because I recall you telling Ma about the internet thing. About all the chicks from the website who fucked me over.”

  “Because Ma was worried. You were acting weird and she thought you were sick or something.”

  “And Stephanie. You told Luke about Stephanie.”

  “That was only because Luke was the one who introduced you to her. I needed to let him know she was a sketchy bitch.”

  “And Carla.”

  Precious clucked her tongue. “Yeah. Sketchy bitch.”

  “Nina.”

  That name made Precious squint, and murmur, “Nina?”

  “Uh-huh. Remember Nina from church. Nina with the curly hair.”

  “Oh.” Cringing, Precious put up her hands in a gesture of Okay, you’ve got me there. “She was sweet. I’ll give you that. In my own defense on that one, though, I’d had a bad feeling about her, and so I might have blabbed a little to remind folks that I’m always right and that my warnings shouldn’t be ignored.”

  “There was nothing wrong with her.”

  “She was married, Marc.”

  “Separated.”

  “Yeah, that’s what she told you after I made you ask her if she was married, and you didn’t even want to.”

  “I only asked her to get you to shut up, so congratulations.”

  Precious heaved a sigh. “I don’t need the congratulations. I’ve got a woman’s intuition and I date women. I’ve got a certain edge. So come on, tell me. If I share with anyone, it’s only gonna be Luke or Owen, and they’re not gonna tell anyone who’ll mock you. You know they won’t.”

  “But they’ll know.”

  “So fucking what? What are you so ashamed of? None of us are angels. We never have been. You afraid you’re going to lose your reputation as the least despicable amongst us?”

  “When you put it that way, yeah. Maybe I am.”

  “Oh, please. This is Jekh. Nobody gives a shit about what happened on Earth, except, like, five people on this farm, and if your family and closest friends don’t tease you about crap you’d rather not think about, then you need to start worrying that nobody gives a shit about you. Tell me. Spit it out.” She gave her COM an impatient tap. “Come on. I want to get back to the house before Cet gets bored again and decides to go into mine and Fastida’s room for laundry. She almost found my toy pile last week.”

  “Yo.” He swiped a hand through the air and gave his head a hard shake. “TMI. I don’t want to think about my sister and sex toys together in the same conversation, or even have thoughts about both in the same day.”

  “Prude.”

  “I’ll own that.”

  “Well, I told you that, so now you’ve gotta tell me something.” She grinned. “That’s only fair.”

  He dragged his hand down his rough beard and let out a breath. “So, I had this thing going with Sera, you know? Barely started.”

  “What kind of thing?”

  “Like, a relationship kind of thing.”

  “You sure? Because in the past, you—”

  “She initiated it,” he snapped.

  “Okay, okay.” She put her hands up again. “I needed to make sure we were on the same page.”

  “She yelled at me for not being aggressive enough in pursuing her, or whatever, because I was going to get out of the way and let Jasper have a shot at her. He’d told me he was interested, but then she came to me, and…” He shrugged. “One thing led to another, I guess.”

  “And you like her?”

  “Of course I do. I…” He grimaced and pounded his thighs with his fists. He loved the woman. But maybe he was wrong to. He’d always been bad at giving more than he got back.

  Precious’s expression softened. “What went wrong from there?”

  “Jasper fell down the side of a mountain, and I guess she decided she felt a little bit sorry for him.”

  “I think you’re leaving out some action.”

  “Nothing major. Long story short, she decided that she could be a two-man woman.”

  Precious narrowed her eyes. “Okay, but…most Jekhan women are two-man women.”

  “By necessity, and I’m not Jekhan. I don’t need another guy.”

  “Neither does Jasper. Unless I’ve completely misread him, he’s even straighter than you. What’s he think about the arrangement?”

  “The best I could tell, he didn’t seem all that put off. I could be wrong. He might be waiting for me to get perturbed and fall off so he can have his chance.”

  “Doubt that. He’s opportunistic, but he ain’t what I’d call a scavenger.” She narrowed her eyes even more. “So…”

  “I don’t know what you’re getting at.”

  “I’m trying to figure out what the problem is.”

  “Come on, Precious. You know I can’t compete against him.”

  “Dude!” she squawked and gave his nipples punishing yanks through his shirt.

  “Bitch!” He’d probably be feeling the chafe for weeks.

  “You just fuckin’ said she came to you. Trust me, she could have gotten action from any unattached guy in Little Gitano, but, Lord knows why, she wanted you. Now, you’re basically throwing her choice back in her face. You’re gonna make her regret putting herself out there like that.”

  “You’re assuming she even wants me at this point.”

  Precious shrugged and flicked her braid over her shoulder. “Not gonna lie, she’s been cozying up a little with Jasper in the past couple of days. Dorro got him a wheelchair, so he’s moving around a bit now and has been having the occasional meal at the house. He’s even been helping Sera with her physical therapy exercises. She asks him lots of questions about being in the military and stuff no one else would give a shit about, but that makes sense now why she’s being so friendly. Thanks for the backstory.”

  “She’s with Jasper now?” Marco threw up his hands. “What am I supposed to do with that?”

  “You take your idiot self over to the house for dinner, you act like nothing’s changed, and then you take her somewhere for a good screw.”

  “Precious.” He dragged a hand down his face and groaned. She made everything sound so easy, but things rarely were.

  “Seriously. Are you saying you haven’t?”

  “I don’t kiss and tell.”

  Precious’s mouth quirked into a sinister smirk. “Because she sure as shit isn’t getting any from Jasper, with his hip being mangled. You make sure she knows which of you beasts can still work it.”

  “Jesus Christ, you’re tactless.”

  “You’ll thank me for my good advice one day. Mark my words.”

  “I’m not sure you’ve given me any good advice yet.”

  “Oh, fuck you. But for real. Go have dinner. Talk to her. Let her know that you’re okay with her decision, even if you can’t say it in words.”

  “I’m not like Luke. I can’t go with the flow on some things. I can’t compartmentalize the heavy stuff and act confident even when I’m not.” He grimaced. “I’m not sure if I am okay.”

  “God.” Precious drew a breath and squeezed his shoulder. “And that’s the thing. If you want her—”

  “I do.” He wanted her so bad that his chest hurt. He’d hardly been able to take a deep breath all week. How could anyone expect him to be okay? He’d had barely a sip of something he’d wanted so badly, and too quickly, his prize got whisked away. He shouldn’t have been such a stranger to disappointment, but he’d mistakenly let optimism creep in.

  “Okay,” Precious said. “You want her, then you’re going to have to find your balance. This isn’t a contest between you and Jasper. What you do with her is of no concern to him, and vice versa. Being on Jekh, I know that sounds outside the norm, but you’re a different kind of guy. You can’t let jealousy rule the roost. And I know you think I
’m the worst possible person to be dispensing advice about jealousy, but I know that condition better than anyone. I swear to you, I know what I’m talking about.”

  “You’re telling me to be content with only having her half the time.”

  “For you to be so brilliant at engineering, you do some seriously bad math.”

  “How?”

  “You’re not factoring in the right variables. You’re thinking that there’s a line drawn down the middle.” Precious made a vertical swipe through the air with her hand. “You’re thinking Jasper’s on one side, and you’re on the other. But the thing is, there’s no reason the two of you can’t share space, and her, at the same time.”

  Marco’s expression must have be one of clear incredulousness, because Precious chuckled and gave her head a shake.

  “Oh, poor, naive Marco. Really, dude?”

  “Maybe I don’t see how it could work.” He was afraid that he’d do what Precious said and that he’d have to watch some other man come in first place for Sera’s attention. Marco would have to continuously fight for his fair share or give up.

  “Marco, bro, you’re overthinking this.”

  He put up his hands in defeat. “All right. Maybe I am. And maybe you’re right—I don’t know enough about this stuff and I don’t have the right kind of role models. I’ve never been much for blazing trails. I always left that to you and Luke. I can’t believe I’m doing this and not one of you two.”

  “Hell, I’m surprised, too.” She grinned. “But listen, you’ll know if it feels right. If it doesn’t, figure out why. That’s all I can tell you until you get into the thick and see how things are.”

  “Into the thick, huh?”

  “Yep.” Precious padded toward the open door and waved him on. “Come on. We’ll go to the house to wait on Luke and the rest of them. While we’re anticipating dinner, you can see what Sera’s up to.”

  “After a week of avoiding her, that’s going to be awkward.”

  “Do what the rest of the Ciprianis do when they’re out of their leagues.”

  “What’s that?”

  She tossed a grin at him over her shoulder. “Pretend like a motherfucker.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Marco had never been the kind of man who was good at swagger and bluster, but he kept Precious’s advice in mind as he strolled through the side door of the main house and into the kitchen.

  Court and Erin were at the long island pulling foil over the tops of deep casserole dishes.

  Court looked up with a brow raised. “Where the hell have you been? We were starting to wonder if we should send a search and rescue team into the mountains to look for you, but Precious insisted you were holed up working.”

  Bless her.

  He grunted noncommittally and took the soft roll Erin handed him. “Didn’t want Owen to think I was sitting around twiddling my thumbs while he was gone.”

  “You always were the most focused of the hoodlums. Did you make any headway?”

  “A little. I think the process will move faster going forward. After we get this vehicle running, we’ll have experience to draw on.”

  “Great,” Erin said. “I think Edgar finally worked out all the kinks in The Tin Can’s electrical system. He claims it’s making fewer weird noises now.”

  “That’s awesome.” Marco ate the roll in two bites and adjusted the wrist strap of his COM. He felt greasy as hell. He’d been taking whores’ baths in the icy stream, but his ablutions had been far too inefficient for him to shake off the feeling of generalized grossness.

  He grimaced. “Mind if I jump into the bath before dinner?”

  “Go ahead,” Court said. “I don’t think anyone would be in there this time of day. Most of the farmhands stay in the fields until dark, and most everyone else is either in Little Gitano trying to find temporary housing for some of the bunker ladies or they’re resting before dinner. Most of the kids are napping right now.”

  “Surprise, surprise,” Erin muttered.

  “Even Elken?” Marco asked.

  “She was the first one down. I think I heard Sera say she was sleepwalking last night, so she probably didn’t get any restful sleep. And if she’s sleepwalking, that explains in part why Sera can’t get her onto a schedule.”

  “Something for Dorro to work with, though. And I’ll be quiet, then.”

  Erin cleared her throat and gave Marco an assessing stare from his head to his toes. “Did you…bring a change of clothes, or do you want us to toss those into the laundry real quick?”

  He looked down at his attire and groaned. Greasy, but at least the pieces matched. “Could you? If we weren’t such good friends, I wouldn’t take you up on the offer.”

  “Trust me, if you weren’t like a brother to me, I would keep my mouth shut. Leave your clothes outside the bathing room door. I’ll scoop them up after we get these pans into the ovens.”

  “You need some help? They look heavy.”

  “They are,” Court said with a snort. “But we’re used to them now. There’s no such thing as a small meal around here. If we don’t have guests, we wonder if the planet has been invaded again.”

  Crinkling her nose, Erin shooed him toward the hall with dismissive flicks of her hands. “Go! Oh my God, the longer you stand there, the more noticeable your aroma is. You smell like oil and fungus.”

  “Okay. Shit.” Marco moved with long, efficient strides toward the door, unfastening the buttons of his shirt as he went. He moved quickly and with purpose so that if he were spotted by anyone in the gathering room who wanted to try to draw him into a conversation, he could claim later that he hadn’t heard them. The hallway connecting the communal area of the house to the wing with the bedrooms and the big bathing room was blessedly empty.

  Unfastening the strap of his COM, he peeked into the bathing room. Finding the chamber empty, he quickly shucked his clothes outside the door, and then strode in. He set his COM atop the table near the light sensors and grabbed towels, soap, and a shampoo disc from the shelves.

  The bathing room, at approximately six meters wide by ten meters long, could have been easily mistaken for an indoor pool by an uninitiated person. The water wasn’t really deep enough to swim in, though. The water came up to the chest of an adult when seated, and there were benches of varying heights installed all around the structure.

  For Jekhans, bathing was a medium of meditation. Showers might have been more efficient, and many on the farm were adapting to the human custom, but Marco didn’t think the bathing room would be decommissioned anytime soon. The Jekhans spent hours soaking in solitude, and many of the Terrans had adapted the practice as well. Marco hadn’t made use of the bathing room in months, and a deep clean was exactly what he needed.

  He walked along the edge to the back, right corner of the room to his favorite bench and dropped his cargo onto the ledge.

  “I thought I heard your voice in the kitchen,” came a familiar, quiet feminine voice.

  Shit.

  With his gaze pinned on the high, glazed window in the corner, Marco froze.

  “I was in the pantry trying to make a call.” Sera’s footsteps padded closer. “Jasper said that the wager pool was meeting to update their records today, so Ara went into town with Brenna to…” She giggled. “Disrupt things, I suppose.”

  More footsteps. If she were shy at all, or bothered by his nudity, he couldn’t tell.

  He cleared his throat and reached for the railing. “How do they, uh…plan on doing that?”

  She stopped immediately behind him. She was so close that he could feel traces of her exhalations on his back. His skin prickled with nervous energy. “I imagine them showing up will be disruption enough, but if it isn’t, they plan to inform the group that they’re putting a legitimate system in place for mate acquisition, and that everyone in that room would be at the very bottom.”

  She giggled again, and suddenly there was a tender touch at the base of his spine that nearly propelled
him across the room.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked when he reached around and grabbed her wrist.

  “Nothing. I, uh…” He let go of her hand and descended into the tub. “I’m ticklish there, I guess.”

  Precious had said to “pretend like a motherfucker,” but apparently the Cipriani genetics that allowed for such antics hadn’t been switched on in him.

  “Oh. I won’t touch you there again, then. I’m sorry.”

  He sucked in a breath and dunked his head beneath the water. He hadn’t meant to make her feel bad, but he wasn’t thinking fast enough. The right words didn’t land in his head like magic the way they seemed to for Luke.

  Surfacing, he moved to his bench and cut a sideways look to Sera. She was taking off her shoes. “Do you mind?” she asked.

  “Mind what?”

  She paused her hand over the catch of her sling and canted her head. “I know encroaching on your bathing time is highly unorthodox, but I’d prefer not to talk to you from above you. Or I could wait until you come out if—”

  “I’ve got your clothes, Marco,” Erin shouted into the room. “They should be ready in an hour. The machine’s empty now.”

  “Thanks, girlie,” he called back, and then turned to Sera.

  Her hand still hovered over the catch of her sling.

  “Oh. You’re fine,” he said, drumming his toes nervously against the tub’s tile floor. “I’m trying to get the grime off. You’re not intruding.”

  “Good.”

  He noticed she didn’t cringe when the sling gave way. She held her unsupported arm against her belly without so much as a gasp, and then deftly unfastened her dress’s clasps.

  Getting better.

  And Jasper had apparently helped.

  Marco grunted.

  She furrowed her brow. “I don’t have much time lately to soak. Sometimes I bring Elken in, though. She gets bored quickly. She makes me wonder if she’s Jekhan at all.” Her dress hit the floor in a whisper.

  Marco held his arm up to assist her descent onto the bench next to him and tried not to ogle her feminine curves. He didn’t feel entitled to. Not yet, and perhaps never. He’d never be able to forget how she’d been used and he didn’t want to be added to the number of men who had done the same.