Her eyes sparkled as her fingers undid the top button of his shirt. "Let's just say I find it necessary to strip you, period."
His hand stopped hers from proceeding and, with a look of sheer deviltry, he asked, "How about a game? I brought my cubes."
Cherry narrowed her eyes at him. "Which ones?"
"The honest ones, of course." He managed to look indignant.
"And what might the stakes be in this game you're suggesting, Captain?" She slipped her hand out of his and ran it down his chest and over his flat stomach but once more he stopped her from going further.
"If you want to strip something off me, you'll have to get a quad and vice-versa. One quad, one piece of clothing forfeited."
"Mmmm. Sounds interesting, but counting both my shoes, I only have six pieces to lose and I know you have even less. What does the winner get if all the clothing is already lost?"
A low growl accompanied his slow grin. "In this game, love, the winner gets anything he wants."
"He? Don't count on it, pal. Let's play."
Using the room service tray, he set the game up in the middle of the king-size bed.
Cherry got the first quad and chose to remove one of his boots first. She tickled the arch of his bare foot and said, "One down, Captain. Only three pieces to go."
However, he got the next set of four and went right for her blouse. He took his time raising the t-shirt up her body and over her head. His brow raised admiringly as he noted how a white lacy demi-bra lifted her breasts.
His leering expression caused her to sharply inhale and her aroused nipples peeked out over the top edge. Unable to hide his pleased grin, he said, "So, this is why you dressed in the bathroom this morning. When you have my supply station reprogrammed, you can do something about the clothing selection too."
Using only his index finger, he skimmed her bare flesh and she playfully slapped his hand. "No touching. You haven't won yet."
He managed to get another quad on his next roll, and though he was clearly anxious to see whether what was hidden beneath her blue jeans was as seductive as the brassiere, he had no choice but to remove her shoes first, one at a time.
Cherry could see he was growing increasingly uncomfortable in his jeans and wickedly left them for last. His luck ran better than hers in the following innings and soon he was discovering the sexy white thong that matched the bra.
His darkening eyes revealed just how hungry she was making him. "And to think all this time I was glad my station couldn't provide you with underwear."
As he sat there trapped in the tight pants, he began to wonder if she was purposely losing. Before long, he had the pleasure of removing both the flimsy pieces of enticement... very, very, slowly. As his fingers barely caressed her flesh, her breath quickened, and he knew she wouldn't want to play much longer, at least not with cubes.
On her next turn, she threw a quad and demonstrated a definite lack of patience as she stripped off his slacks to bare his lower body.
Despite both their desire to change the game, neither was willing to be the one to forfeit. It was necessary for each of them to take several more turns before Gallant was able to conclude the match by tossing a green quad.
By that time, Cherry was ready to pay whatever penalty the winner demanded.
In the end, the loser was the one doing the demanding and, as usual, one explosive release wasn't nearly enough.
Later, when their pulses finally slowed and urgent need became affectionate cuddling, Cherry said, "I just remembered. There are a few more things besides your supply station that need replacing. Your protective suits had to be left behind on Lore and so was the slave collar and chain."
"The suits I can take care of in Innerworld. The collar is just as well gone."
"Oh? It seemed to be a fairly useful prop for you."
He grimaced. "If I didn't have it, I'd have come up with another idea. I should never have kept it once I got it off."
Cherry raised her head to look in his eyes. "I beg your pardon?" With his hand at the back of her neck he pulled her head down for a kiss but she resisted. "What did you mean by that? On Zoenid you said something cryptic to Dutch about being a slave also." His hand fell away from her neck and he let out a sigh. "No secrets, Gallant. Spit it out."
He shook his head as if he didn't believe she could do this to him so easily, but he told his tale anyway. "It was an assignment. I was given the job of tracking down a report that a slaver was illegally working within the Consociation borders, primarily abducting adolescent children from the more passive cultures and selling them to a breeder farm. Making contact with the slavers and infiltrating their tribe was a rather routine matter for me.
"Stomaching the abusive way the children were treated, however, was more than I could quietly handle. I objected one too many times and ended up with that collar around my own neck before I could get out of there to make my report. Dutch was the man who won the privilege of teaching me precisely what rights a slave has."
Cherry held herself very still as his eyelids lowered, temporarily shutting her out. She could sense him replaying a nightmare in his mind and forced herself not to ask him to say more than he wanted to.
"The only reason I let him live to throw it back in my face was because he and that collar ended up saving my life. One night, a rival tribe of slavers attacked the camp where we were staying. I'm sure if I had been chained to a post, I'd have been massacred along with everyone else. But Dutch had been having some fun with me, so he was using his wrist manacle. When the bloodbath started, he couldn't find the key fast enough and took off with me still chained to him."
He paused a moment before continuing. "When the Princess drugged me, and I was helpless, it was like being back in that slave camp again." This time, when he pulled her closer for a kiss, she gave it willingly. "I will never forget what you did for me back there, love."
She gave him another long, sweet kiss. "And I'll never forget you, Gallant Voyager."
Before falling asleep, with her head tucked beneath his chin, Cherry murmured, "Have I told you how much I loved your taking me to see Rose?"
He briefly tightened his embrace. "As a matter of fact, you've thanked me at least a thousand times, but I don't believe you ever said it exactly that way. Did it hurt much?"
As exhaustion carried her toward the land of dreams, she smiled to herself and whispered, "Hardly at all, love. Hardly at all."
* * *
Shortly before three the following afternoon, they were back in front of the White House. As planned, Cherry worked the crowd furthest from the gates, yet still within the restricted zone. Four o'clock passed with no better luck than the day before.
On the third day of their vigil, a continuous downpour chased away all but a handful of diehard reporters. Gallant and Cherry agreed that she had tested every one of them already, which was a good thing because most of them, like themselves, were wearing hooded plastic ponchos that were being sold by an enterprising man on the street. They hesitated to leave the area before four o'clock though, despite the fact that it appeared to be a waste of time.
At about three-thirty, Gallant saw a figure of medium height hurrying toward the police line not far from where they were standing. The person was wearing a tan raincoat, dark slacks and sneakers, and carrying a large umbrella, none of which was remarkable. But when he or she attempted to duck under the plastic ribbon right past the police officers, Gallant nudged Cherry.
She looked in the direction he nodded in time to see two of the officers drag the person back behind the line by the arms. Cherry couldn't make out what was being said, but the hand motions indicated that the person did not have authorization to enter the area and was frustrated as hell about it.
Cherry and Gallant watched the person back off when one officer started slapping his baton into his palm. The figure started walking away but halted a few feet from Gallant and Cherry to take another look at the White House.
The umbrella tipped b
ack, revealing an extraordinarily unattractive woman with a thick scar across the bridge of her nose and another along her jaw. Cherry's memory flashed an image of Honorbound. Without waiting for Gallant's approval, she acted. "Excuse me? Ma'am? Maybe we could help you."
Gallant squeezed Cherry's upper arm twice, letting her know he was going along with her.
The woman took a step closer, her narrow-eyed gaze darting suspiciously from one to the other.
"Hi," Cherry said, extending her right arm for a handshake. "I'm Jane Doe of Channel 6 News."
The woman hesitantly raised her hand, but a split second before their fingertips met, she caught sight of the thin gold choker around Cherry's neck that housed the universal translator. The woman's hand instantly withdrew to touch her identical neckpiece and her eyes widened with recognition of the enemy. Dropping the umbrella, she took off at a run.
"Wait!" Cherry shouted as Gallant leapt over the plastic ribbon. She bolted under it right behind him, but his longer legs outdistanced her in no time. She simply kept running after them, knowing he couldn't spare the seconds it would take for her to catch up.
"Would you care for some assistance?" a gravelly, Welsh-accented voice called from behind her.
She kept running as a tall man in a hooded, nylon rain parka and aviator sunglasses caught up with her and placed his hand on her lower back. The voice had sounded familiar so she refrained from reacting violently, and when the man lowered his sunglasses to reveal luminous, golden eyes, she was certain of his identity.
"Falcon! I had no idea you were here." His hand on her back somehow helped her pick up speed and they began closing the distance to Gallant.
"You were not supposed to know, but I have been keeping an eye on you... and him. Aster was worried."
"She's okay now." Cherry couldn't get over how fast she was running without losing her breath, though she knew Falcon well enough not to be surprised at anything he was capable of. "Where's Steve?" Falcon's wife was one of those few women Cherry had felt an instant connection with.
"She and the children are visiting her brother today. You may recall he works for the Treasury Department here. I did not think she needed to be out in such inclement weather."
The rain slick sidewalk ended the chase when the woman attempted to make a sharp turn into a park and lost her footing. The moment her body hit the pavement, Gallant dove on top of her and held her down with her arm twisted up her back.
"Who are you?" he demanded as she struggled to free herself.
"Jane Doe. And I'll have you arrested for assault, you bastard! Get off me!"
"I think not." He looked up to see Cherry and a stranger hovering over them.
"This is Falcon," Cherry said quickly. "He's one of ours."
Gallant nodded at the man but immediately returned his attention to Cherry. "All right, love. She's all yours. But be careful. I heard Illusian females bite."
With that reminder, Cherry avoided touching the woman's face and grasped her hand instead. A second later, she recoiled as violently as if she had contacted a live electrical wire. "Wow! Is she ever!"
"Let me introduce myself, Commander Bessima. My name is Gallant Voyager."
"Impossible!" she cried. "The Princess would be with you, not that... that demon child of Norona. I know the real Gallant Voyager bears the two white stripes of royalty in his hair." She twisted against his restraining hold in spite of the pain such movement had to cause.
"Actually, Commander, it doesn't much matter what you do or don't know. Honorbound and her troops won't be joining you and the Illusian barrier has been refortified."
"Liar!" she shouted.
"I'm afraid not," he continued, not sounding the least bit sorry. "You're the only one left free now. And you have an appointment on an operating table in Innerworld. Cherry, I could use that hand of yours, if you can stand to hold on to her for a few seconds."
Prepared for the contact, she controlled Bessima while Gallant pressed several of the little gold nodules on his ring.
Seeing that everything was under control, Falcon said, "I will advise the other emissaries that they may return to their homes now." He gave them a mock salute and walked away.
Putting one arm around Cherry while gripping Bessima as well, Gallant turned the ring's opal one complete rotation.
In the blink of an eye, they vanished.
Chapter 20
"Hold on, Rom," Dr. Xerpa warned anxiously. "Here comes another strong one." Delivering a baby was not in her normal realm of medical services but Aster had refused to allow any other doctor near her throughout her pregnancy.
Propped up next to Aster on the double-wide, slanted obstetrical bed, Rom squeezed his mate's hand as he personally felt the same wave that contracted her abdomen. He didn't even attempt to block it out. When it passed, he asked if she was all right as if he wasn't experiencing every feeling along with her.
"Will you both please calm down," Aster said with a laugh. "I swear, I feel terrific. Before I came to Innerworld and was treated for it, I had menstrual cramps worse than these little twinges."
Innerworld's medical technology hadn't been able to spare her nine months of pregnancy, but the labor itself was about as strenuous as a jog around the administration building. She had had the option of the totally painless method of surgically removing the infant, followed by an hour of treatment under the healing beam. That would have to have been done before labor began, however, and she was determined to wait for Cherry as long as possible.
"You are now fully dilated, Aster," Xerpa said. "It should only be a little longer."
"No! Not yet. Not until Cherry gets here. What's taking her so long?"
It was Rom's turn to laugh. "She and Gallant only arrived from the surface a half hour ago with their prisoner. You know she has to go through sanitizing before coming in here."
"Can't they turn up the damn beam or something? What good is all your damn technology if you can't even get my best friend here when I need her. Damn it! I promised her I'd wait."
Dr. Xerpa patted Aster's bent knees. "I'm sure she'll understand. Get ready. You're going to have to start pushing, and I'm afraid this is going to be a lot worse than a twinge."
Aster didn't want to disappoint Cherry but the urge to push was too strong to hold back. Simultaneously, she and Rom groaned and clutched the handrails as their daughter began making her way down the birth canal.
Cherry burst into the delivery room and screeched to a halt. "Holy stars, if that ain't a sight! I hadn't realized Rom would be in labor too."
"Your humor is not appreciated at the moment, Cherry," Rom grumbled through gritted teeth.
"Don't listen to him," Aster countered in a strained voice. "Doctor, you can deliver our daughter now."
And with another long push, a big, beautiful baby girl slipped peacefully into the doctor's waiting hands.
Rom, Aster and Cherry shared hugs and kisses while Dr. Xerpa finished her job with mother and baby. As quickly as possible, she had the infant cleaned, wrapped and snug in Aster's loving embrace.
"What did you finally decide to call her?" Cherry asked, unable to take her eyes off the little dark-haired angel.
Aster and Rom glanced at each other and smiled before giving their joint answer. "Shara."
"Well, how do you do, Miss Shara. I'm your Aunt Cherry." With a feathery stroke on the baby's soft cheek, she promised, "You're going to have a wonderful life, kid. I'm personally going to see to it."
Aster smiled at her obviously smitten friend. For the moment, she forced aside her worries about Shara's future as the first child born from the joining of a Noronian and a Terran. There would be time enough to worry in the years ahead.
Chapter 21
As soon as Romulus was able, he made arrangements for Bessima's mind to be fully reprogrammed and her appearance surgically altered. An adjustment to the retina in one of her eyes prevented her from ever accidentally creating images, even though she would have no memory of bei
ng an Illusian. She was then shipped off to another planet to begin a new, productive life.
The day after Shara's birth, giving Romulus a fabricated excuse, Gallant and Cherry returned to Washington, D.C. to perform the final act in Bessima's play. Mother Nature, or possibly the real Supreme Being, decided to help them along. The rain stopped shortly after sunrise and an incredible double rainbow stretched over the White House for over an hour. Taking that as a promise of miracles, the largest crowd yet turned out that morning.
All of the Innerworld emissaries and trackers had been recalled, so Gallant had no fear of one of them picking up the energy wave he was about to create. He knew Rom and Aster would be suspicious after they heard about the incident, but Gallant and Cherry had agreed that it was best if their friends not be burdened with the truth in advance.
At eleven o'clock in the morning, the spectators in front of the White House watched a spot of white light, similar to a star, separate itself from the sun. The spot moved across the sky then grew larger and larger until people began to realize it was coming closer.
Before panic could set in, a huge ball of sparkling light was hovering directly above them and a deep man's voice reverberated clearly over the noise of the crowd.
"Fear not, my children. I come in peace."
Within seconds, the only sounds on the street were the clicking and whirring of cameras.
"The images you have seen regarding the coming of the Supreme Being were false, created by someone whose only god was power. That person has been dealt with and will not be able to deceive again. I will leave you now with the same messages you have been told before. Treat all living beings as you wish to be treated yourself. Respect Mother Earth's gifts. And remember that every day of your lives is Judgment Day."
An instant later, the ball of light soared back to the sun. Long minutes passed before the people began to talk and move again.
When they did, Gallant and Cherry had already returned to Innerworld.
* * *
GALLANT (The Innerworld Affairs Series, Book 3) Page 27
