Evan shoved him back before he could connect, and an oppressive silence grew.
“Don’t kill them,” MacNair muttered.
He nodded, though the need to crack heads was riding him hard. “What do you think you’re doing?”
The one he’d shoved away motioned to the exam bed. “SLAL asked us to confirm one of the blood tests they ran last night with a scan.”
Zondra started toward the bed, and Evan restrained her.
“Which test?” he asked. “No one touches my wife without me knowing why and approving it.”
The doctor glanced over Evan’s shoulder, seeking out MacNair.
The latter didn’t wait for a question to emerge. “Son, you are talking to a bonded Dominant male as deadly as any Xxanian warrior in existence. You do not ask me what to do about his mate.”
“Yes, sir.” He met Evan’s gaze solidly, but there was a tremor in his hand that said he’d rather deal with the admiral. “One of the tests had an... unexpected result. They think it’s a false —”
“Which?” Evan grumbled.
“They... um... they said telling you would be —”
“Which test?” Every muscle in his body tightened down.
“Tell him,” MacNair ordered. “You do not taunt a Dominant with a problem with his mate this way. It’s a good way to get a scan plate inserted anally.”
The senior doctor answered from the far side of the exam bed. “Pregnancy, but it must be a false —” He stopped talking when Evan moved.
The closer doctor fled to the far side of the bed with his boss. The older one backed toward the code pad and the emergency call button for the Marine guards.
“You won’t need that,” Evan informed him. He lifted Zondra onto the bed gently. “Do the test.”
She reached for his hand, and Evan took it. Words failed him. This was life altering, exhilarating... and terrifying. He stared at her, trying his best to avoid obsessing over the plate hovering over her lower abdomen.
The doctors chattered on in the background.
“They were so sure this would be negative, they left it for last.”
“I heard they nearly missed it.”
“Those guys? SLAL never screws up that badly.”
“Oh, like you have firsthand knowledge of them.”
Evan snapped. “Answers. Now.”
Silence fell.
“Oh, man,” the younger one breathed. “There he is.”
“He?” Zondra asked.
The other made a vague sound of agreement. “How old do you figure he is?”
“He,” Evan repeated. I have a son. I have to learn how to be a father.
Zondra smiled and squeezed his hand.
“Ask SLAL. Xenobiology is not my field. I don’t know how these sca —”
The senior doctor elbowed him hard enough to knock the air out of his rude young counterpart. He hurried into an explanation before Evan could launch across the table and throttle the bigoted asshole.
“Xxanian fetuses develop faster than human, but I can’t say how quickly because this one isn’t pure Xxan. If the baby was human, I’d say conception took place between three weeks and a month ago.”
“A week,” Evan informed him. “We mated and ripened her womb a week ago.”
The two doctors stared at each other. The tension rising in the room made Evan’s skin crawl.
“What? Damn it, tell me.”
“Even by Xxanian standards, I’d expect the baby to be... say double that or a little less. I mean, the —”
“Impossible.”
“The Xxan carry for about half a normal human —”
“She wasn’t ripened! Are you fucking dense?”
MacNair moved to one side, his glare a message to calm himself.
“Maybe she’s human enough that she didn’t need ripening,” the younger one suggested.
Zondra bit her lower lip, shaking her head in what was surely a sign that she couldn’t answer that, one way or the other.
Evan reined in his frustration. “You’re telling me it could have been our first night together. Or while we were traveling to SLAL. Or when we mated. In short, you’re clueless.”
The older doctor cleared this throat. “How long did you gestate, Mrs. Duncan?”
“Six months.”
“But her brother gestated for five,” MacNair added. “Her seir did as well.”
“Strong Xxanian genes then,” he mused.
“So you’re saying there’s no way to tell?” Evan asked.
“We might be able to get a closer idea by charting the baby’s growth every week over several months. Or you could return to SLAL and let them run more tests.”
“No. We are through being lab rats,” Evan decided. “We’ll wing it.”
“No,” Zondra agreed. “Evan and I both have work to attend to.”
He smiled widely and kissed her cheek.
The senior doctor didn’t hide his disappointment well. “We’ll see you back in a month for her routine check then.”
“No,” MacNair inserted. “SLAL will.”
That time, the doctor scowled.
Too bad, old man. No scaly baby for your amusement.
Chapter Ten
The snickering at the back of the classroom warned Zondra that the jokers of the group were preparing their first prank. She’d hoped for half a day of peace before it started, but that wasn’t in the battle plans.
Oh, well. Set the pace now instead of later.
She turned to them. “My name is Zondra Duncan. I am a second generation Xxan-human crossbreed, and I will be teaching you the Xxan language. Before we begin, are there any questions?” It was bait for whatever trap they thought to spring.
Two hands signaled for her attention. One was insistent and the other tentative. She nodded to the hesitant one.
“I know this class is intended for troops in battle and interrogation teams, but I was wondering if we could cover medical aid as well.”
That surprised her. “In what way?”
The young corpsman darkened. “How would a Xxanian warrior ask for medical aid?”
“He would not. Your average Xxanian warrior will die before he asks for aid. It will be up to you to sedate or restrain your prisoner to test and treat him. Make sure to use restraints appropriate to a Dominant, even if you aren’t certain of his status.”
He opened his mouth to respond, and Zondra continued.
“By Xxanian beliefs, a warrior who asks for aid or begs for mercy is a coward... a pathetic weakling. Forcing care on him will actually save his honor, as well as his life. Assume all captured Xxanian warriors are injured until testing proves otherwise.
“In the same way, you will be treated better by the Xxan if you do not ask for their aid. It would be best if I didn’t teach you how to ask at all.”
The corpsman hesitated, then nodded. “I think I understand.”
“However, knowing you are a human medic will work to your favor when captured. The Xxan would prefer to allow humans to tend to their own rather than waste Xxanian resources on enemies.
“To tell them, you will say zhahhh zee etthhh ahh.”
Before the corpsman could repeat it, the other man who’d motioned for her attention asked the impertinent question she’d suspected was coming from him.
“How do I tell him I’m going to peel his scaly skin from his corpse?” His eyes were cold and his smile more of a warning than a sign of humor.
Zondra pretended to consider it. “You want to compliment your enemy?”
His eyes narrowed, and his smile went brittle. “How is that a compliment?”
“Having scales means he’s a Xxanian warrior and not a human soldier. And someone bold enough to make such a threat is either a stupid Subdominant or a formidable Dominant.” She searched out his rank and found him a lieutenant. “Since most men of your rank and rate are... passably Dominant, he will assume the latter is true.”
The man gaped at her, seemi
ngly stunned by her assessment.
“That means your death will honor him. After a threat like that, he will kill you or die trying to. And if he does fell you, he will take your threat to you, perhaps while you are still breathing. If you scream, he will make it last longer.”
Several of the soldiers went pasty, and a few swallowed down what was probably the urge to vomit. Humans were so easy to disgust.
Zondra sauntered between the rows of desks toward her prey. “If you wish to intimidate a Xxanian Dominant, it cannot be accomplished. If you wish to insult him...” She placed her hands on his desk and leaned forward. “Zhoe zhathhh s’huuu zayahh ta.”
A bark of laughter from behind her drew Zondra’s gaze. She turned her back on the stunned lieutenant and headed for Aleeks with a smile of welcome.
“That will get him killed for certain,” her brother opined. “Only a Subdominant would be careless enough to lose after that.”
“His attitude will get him killed,” Zondra dismissed the concern.
Aleeks’s jaw tightened, and he assessed the soldier as a threat to her.
“What does it mean?” the man in question asked, oblivious to the scrutiny.
Yes, his attitude will get him killed. Probably before he learns better tactics and situational awareness.
Aleeks answered before she could. “‘You are impotent and should be clothed as a woman.’”
“Zoey zath shoe say ah ta?” he asked, grasping at the sounds he remembered.
Zondra shot him a bland look. As she’d expected, he’d ignored the warning Aleeks offered about how a Xxanian warrior would react to it. “You think telling him you prefer fucking his brother rather than his sister will make him fall down laughing and allow you an easy kill? I don’t think that is wise. Neither do I think it will work.”
Aleeks didn’t bother to stifle his snort of laughter. His eyes glittered in amusement.
Of course, he knew that wasn’t what the lieutenant had said, but gibberish wasn’t acceptable. By the time the men learned enough Xxan to know she’d lied, they would have forgotten what he’d said.
“How do you say it?” he grumbled.
She smiled. “There are sixty-two base sounds in Xxan. Once you can make them all, you can learn to speak the language.” Zondra glanced at Aleeks. “Don’t you have somewhere else to be?”
Her brother shook his head. “And miss this? I don’t think so.”
But his sideward glance toward the lieutenant said he was staying to protect her.
****
“You know, I heard something very interesting, Jobel,” Reynolds taunted.
“Oh yeah? What’s that?”
By his tone, Evan could tell Jobel was less than interested. Since almost none of what Reynolds said was worthy of attention, Evan was personally trying to tune it out as well. Sometimes it was better to let Reynolds talk and feign interest. At least that way, the work got done without something Reynolds was working on breaking.
“I heard Duncan has been offering little school girls candy lately.”
Evan froze with the wrench in hand. His heart was pounding, and the ventilation fans were the loudest sounds in the compartment. Evan didn’t doubt that everyone was staring at him, waiting to see what his reaction to the accusation would be. He went back to work, tightening the bolt and fussing unnecessarily with other things to avoid looking at them. Reynolds could hang himself how he would.
The jackass in question moved closer, and Evan tightened his grip on the wrench, picturing teeth shattering to his swing.
“What is she, Duncan? A high school junior? Sophomore, maybe? How old is your child bride?”
“Zondra has bachelors in archeology and xenoliguistics.” It was true and one of the many things he’d learned about her after the mating frenzy passed.
“Yeah. I’ve heard most of them go through school quickly.”
Evan didn’t reply to that. There was no need to. It was a fact. Instead he triple-checked the bolts for a tight fit.
Reynolds squatted down next to him, trying to catch Evan’s eye. From anyone else, it might have been a challenge, but Reynolds wasn’t man enough to make a challenge believable.
“So how old was she the first time you fucked her, Duncan?”
Reining in the urge to bust him in the mouth for that comment alone was difficult. Sarcasm was the lesser of two evils; it wouldn’t land him in the brig. “Want a vicarious thrill, Reynolds? Can’t get any of your own, so you want other people’s adventures?”
“For the sake of argument... let’s say I do.”
A peek around showed everyone in engineering waiting for an answer. Evan made a show of securing the panel and turned his back to it.
That gave him time to consider his options. If he refused to answer, they’d make up their own stories, and those stories would likely be damning hyperbole. If he played it up, he could make Reynolds green with envy and ensure all that was passed was something resembling the truth.
“All right then. Since you’re so hard up, I’ll tell you. She was sixteen luscious years of virgin.” His cock came up at the memory of their first night together. He’d decided in the last few days that their son had likely been conceived in the excesses of that night.
Reynolds gaped at him. Evan pretended to be oblivious to the response.
“Sixteen?” Jobel parroted, his eyes wide. “You are seriously shitting me.”
“I didn’t know it yet,” he admitted. “Zondra is very mature for her age, being Xxanian. I thought she was drinking legal, at least.”
“A virgin,” Deacon groaned.
“Ohhhh, yeah.” He drew that out, savoring the fact.
“How’d you find out?” Jobel asked.
“That she was a virgin?” Evan replied. “In the usual way.”
“No. That she was sixteen?”
Evan laughed harshly. “Her family found us in bed together.”
“Her family?” Reynolds had finally found his tongue and ripped it out of the cat’s mouth.
“Well... her older brother, father, and godfather.” He imagined facing her grandfather — or gran-seir, as Zondra called him — would have been very different and pretty bloody. Then again, he wasn’t sure how a Xxanian Grea Elder would have interpreted the scene. He did know the elder of a nest ruled with an iron fist.
Jobel muttered something unintelligible. “Shit. That must have been ugly.”
“All things considered, not too bad. I did give the admiral one hell of a shiner before we got it straightened out.”
Deacon shifted closer. “Admiral? What admiral?”
“Guess I forgot to mention that.” Evan hadn’t forgotten it. He’d been saving it for the right moment.
“Spill,” Jobel urged him. “How did an admiral get into the mix?”
“Zondra’s godfather is Admiral MacNair. Course, I didn’t know I was laying a punch on the fleet admiral when I did it.”
There was a moment of stunned silence.
“Let me get this straight,” Deacon stated. “You fucked Admiral MacNair’s teenaged goddaughter.”
Evan hooked his hands behind his neck and leaned his head back. “Yes, I most certainly did.”
“He caught you in bed with her.”
“At the lodge. Still going at it when they came through the door. Almost all night long and still going.”
Jobel grumbled a series of curses.
Deacon continued. “You punched the old man in the face.”
“He did have his own bruises,” Reynolds griped.
“Bruise. Singular, and I was outnumbered,” Evan reminded him. “But I held my own.”
“And the admiral didn’t crush you,” Deacon marveled.
“On the contrary, he told us to decide what we wanted and helped us get married.”
Reynolds snorted. “It was probably a shotgun wedding. A choice between military prison and marriage maybe. She pregnant, Duncan?”
He smiled. “We didn’t know that when we go
t married, but... yes, she is pregnant.” He shot a warning look at Reynolds. “To me. And no. It was not a choice of military prison or any other punishment and marriage. It was a choice of go our own ways or get married.”
“You knocked up the fleet admiral’s sixteen-year-old goddaughter?” Jobel exploded.
Evan smirked. “Oh yeah.”
Deacon chuckled. “Man, you are either screwed for life or set for life.”
Chapter Eleven
Zondra opened her eyes to the darkness, shivering at the empty space next to her, at the lack of Evan’s warmth. She pushed from the mattress and donned a S’suuhhea, feeling exposed though she couldn’t state why.
There was something too still, even for late on an evening when everyone who wasn’t on duty would be ashore. Holiday weeks were like that. Those that could take leave took it and didn’t look back. Those that couldn’t celebrated however they could, legally or not.
Aside from the usual sounds of ventilation and machinery, there was nothing of note. A sudden wish for the sounds of the center nest assaulted her. Zondra closed her eyes, visualizing the whisper of the tabletop fountain as the rushing water of her gran-seir’s water wall, the splash of water in the family pool, the rustling of plants —
It lasted only until the click of the lock.
She looked at the clock, her mind doing the calculation that it was too early for a meal break. If there had been an incident, the response would have woken her.
The door started to slide, and Zondra searched for a scent, recoiling from the sour smell of Reynolds. As if his scent wasn’t unpalatable enough alone, he was unwashed and stank of cheap liquor, sweat, and grease.
Zondra folded herself into the clothing cabinet, working on stilling her air as she settled on the cold deckplates. She shut the door carefully. There was no way to know how sensitive Reynolds’s hearing was. If he heard her, hiding would gain her nothing.
Reynolds crossed the room toward the bed, making a poor showing of stealth. A string of foul language left his lips. “Where the fuck is she?” The mattress rattled on the metal frame as he tore the sheets and blankets off the bed with a roar of frustration. The whisper of them landing on the floor caressed her abused ears.
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