by Zoey Draven
Stella would be able to come so easily just thinking about Tavak. But afterwards, after the high of the pleasure was gone, her reality would come crashing back around her. She would be sad and alone, her bed empty beside her, his rejection just as painful, and perhaps would even feel shame for what she’d done.
That was why she forced her hands to still in the shower cabin. She took a deep steadying breath, ignoring her body’s needs, while also telling herself that this wouldn’t be forever. Just right now. Just until she stopped thinking about him constantly. Just until she stopped craving him and missing him. Loving him.
And when that happened, she would return to Dumera, or maybe venture to a new colony if she couldn’t find work. And she’d take a lover there, wherever she was. And he’d be kind and handsome and while sex with him might not be as magnificent and toe-curling and consuming…that was okay.
So why did the mere thought of taking someone else into her bed make her feel restless and melancholy?
Because my heart already belongs to another, she knew.
Stella sighed, turning off the water, and stepped from the shower. She dried herself quickly, wringing out her wet hair and roughly scrubbing a towel over it. She dressed in her sleep shorts and a loose tunic, stuffing her old clothes in the hidden compartment that sent everything down to be laundered.
Pulling up her Coms device, she checked the time on Dumera. It was morning there but Stella was just preparing to sleep. How had she already gotten so out of sync?
Because there’s not a sun to guide me, she thought, staring out the wide window of her cabin, stepping up to the strong material, pressing her fingertips against it.
Endless darkness, though it was sprinkled with suns that were of no use to her on Haase’s vessel. They guided other beings’ days and nights.
A quick rap of a knock hit her door and Stella turned, frowning.
“Haase?” she asked, quickly walking to the door, pressing the wide pad next to it so it slid open smoothly. “What are…”
Stella froze though she blinked in surprise.
It was…Tavak.
Standing outside the door of her quarters.
On Haase’s vessel.
In the middle of the Third Quadrant.
But that wasn’t possible, was it?
For a moment, she thought she was hallucinating. Maybe her thoughts in the shower had somehow manifested him on Haase’s vessel.
She almost laughed at the thought. Her next thought was that maybe the deceleration had fucked with her mind. Should she go to the medical bay, just to make sure that nothing was wrong?
“Stella,” came his voice.
And that voice made her jolt. It was husky and scratchy and real.
“Oh my God,” she breathed. “Are you…what are you…”
She couldn’t make her tongue work properly and for once, she might’ve been at a complete loss for words.
But then her eyes met his and the full force of that swirling gaze made her realize that somehow, some way, Tavak truly was on board Haase’s vessel, standing at her door.
“What are you doing here?” she breathed, sounding winded even to her own ears as she took him in from head to toe. He was wearing his usual set of black pants and a dark grey tunic, though they looked wrinkled and a little worse for wear.
Somehow she’d forgotten just how massive he was even though she saw Ravu around the vessel on a regular basis. He filled her doorway completely and then some, the breadth of his shoulders disappearing slightly from view past the frame.
His features were set in his usual frown, his jaw tight, those eyes swirling fast.
“You left,” he murmured.
Stella blinked.
“I went to Reji’s and he told me you were gone,” Tavak continued, raking a hand over the top of his smooth head. It struck Stella how tired he looked, as if he hadn’t slept in over a week.
Her brow furrowed.
“And that made you…” She trailed off, shaking her head, still reeling and in disbelief. “How…how are you even here? I mean, we aren’t anywhere near—”
That was when she realized it.
“Oh, the—the deceleration. You vessel hopped, that was why we slowed down,” she said softly, biting her lip. “So Haase and, I’m assuming, your brother brought you here.”
“Pax.”
“But why are you here? You hate space,” she commented softly, trying to ignore the concern she felt tugging at her chest when she saw how on edge he seemed, how his gaze flicked back towards the window in her room.
Just then she heard a few engineers coming up the corridor, laughing and joking around. Igon, Kijjor, and Qerop by the sounds of them. Tavak’s head turned to regard them and Stella saw them pass.
Igon stopped briefly, however, eyeing Tavak with a narrowed gaze before he nodded his head at her.
“You good, little star?” he murmured.
His hands were coated in grease and Stella knew they were on break, heading towards the cafeteria where she’d left platters of hot food on warming plates for them.
“I’m fine, Igon,” Stella replied, shooting him a small smile. She wasn’t scared of Tavak. Well, she was a little frightened by the way that her heart picked up speed and her belly felt fluttery with nerves but she wasn’t intimidated by the male. “Get to the cafeteria before your food gets cold.”
Igon grunted, and with one last look at Tavak, he nodded, and the group carried on their way.
Stella watched them go before her gaze flitted back to the male she’d lost quite a bit of sleep over the past couple weeks.
“Can I come in?” he asked, that voice gravelly and rough, pinning his gaze on her.
That gaze stole her damn breath. It was painfully obvious to her that her time away from Dumera had done nothing towards her damn pesky feelings for him.
And it might be a mistake but Stella nodded and took a step back, allowing him entry into the room. Her hand slid from the pad and the door whooshed shut behind him.
Then they were alone.
Chapter Forty-One
Tavak deliberately turned his back to the window, looking down at her, his eyes running over her, as if he’d been…starved.
Stella’s lips parted and she fidgeted, feeling a drop of water from her still damp hair run down her neck. Goosebumps exploded across her arms, highly aware of his breathing, his eyes, the warmth pouring off him.
Her cabin was small but he made it seem miniscule.
“Why are you here?” she asked. Her voice was quiet and she held his gaze as she asked it.
She heard his hard swallow. The way his chest seemed to rise and fall faster. His jaw tensed.
If Stella didn’t know any better, she’d say he was nervous.
“Tavak?” she whispered.
He took a deep breath through his nostrils. He met her eyes.
“I was a whore for most of my life.”
Stella stilled. The words hung between them, heavy and suffocating.
She heard another hard swallow.
“After Kerivu was destroyed, my brother and I landed on a colony called Jrika,” he continued. “I still have nightmares about that place. It was an unlisted colony in the First Quadrant. Frequented by criminals and murderers and thieves.”
“Tavak,” she started quietly, finally pushing past the lump in her throat. “You don’t have to—”
“Pax, I do,” he growled. “And I should have told you a long time ago. Before we ever…vauk.”
He looked away from her, briefly, his head turning to look out the window. His brows furrowed even deeper.
When his gaze returned to her, he said, “We lived there for nearly two years. We had nothing after Kerivu. We were living on the streets of that place, in filth and grime. Ravu nearly starved. Then he got sick.”
Stella’s fingers touched her lips, feeling them begin to quiver.
“Even on Kerivu, I’d already begun selling myself,” he said. His voice was soft and
quiet. “Prostitution was in my blood, after all. It was strangely easy that first time. So when we landed on Jrika, it seemed like the only way. And then Yikerza found me. The Wa’zuyi you asked me about,” Tavak growled, his hands fisting at his sides.
Stella feared she knew where this was going. Her throat stung, her feet taking her closer to him.
“He ran a brothel on Jrika. Many females and males, from all over. But he didn’t have a Keriv’i male.”
Her stomach roiled.
“He became my handler. I got a portion of the credits from the…the work,” Tavak said, his lips twisting bitterly. “And there was a lot of it. During those two years, I couldn’t tell you how many beings I fucked. Even still, Ravu and I were barely surviving.”
Stella knew she had asked about his past. But this was hard to hear, hard to imagine. She couldn’t fathom this proud, strong male in a position like that.
But he’d do it for his brother, she knew. For their survival, no matter how difficult.
“And after Jrika?” she whispered, reaching out a hesitant hand to touch his forearm.
He didn’t flinch away this time. Instead, he gripped her hand, threading their fingers together, the warmth and wideness of his palm achingly familiar. Stella sat them down on her bed and Tavak sagged down onto it.
He was exhausted. Truly exhausted. She wondered how he’d even managed a flight plan to meet up with Haase’s vessel.
“A human female came upon us one day on Jrika,” Tavak murmured quietly, his grip on her hand tightening at the words.
“A human?” Stella asked, brow furrowing.
“Her name was Madame Allegria,” he said, the words rolling off his tongue like boulders, heavy and lifeless. “She owned her own brothel and was looking for Keriv’i males to work there. She found my brother and I. But there were two others living on Jrika that I knew of.”
Stella had a suspicion that she knew who they were.
“Khiva and Dravka?”
Was that how they’d all met?
“Pax. She made us an offer. A good offer. She would take us off Jrika, give us a place to live, food whenever we needed it. She told us she charged her clients 900 credits a night and that we would take half of that. Every single night we worked.”
Stella squeezed his hand, hearing the despondency in his voice. She swallowed, not entirely sure she wanted to hear what happened next.
“Madame Allegria was a wealthy woman. She was charming and beautiful,” Tavak murmured. “She made it easy to say pax to her. And once we did, those first few months, life was better, although Ravu had a difficult time adjusting.”
Her breath hitched.
“On Jrika, Ravu never…” She trailed off, not wanting to say the ugly words.
“Veki,” Tavak said, his voice clipped. “I made sure of that. It was part of my deal with Yikerza. He wouldn’t go after my brother as long as I heeled at his side. But Madame Allegria wanted all of us and Ravu knew that Jrika would kill us if we didn’t leave.”
What an unfathomable, terrible situation. Stella couldn’t imagine it. Just the thought made her feel like her lungs were seizing up.
“But after a time, Madame Allegria began to show who she truly was. She kept her word in some regards,” Tavak conceded. “She gave us rooms in her brothel. She kept us fed.”
“But?”
Tavak looked at her, his brow furrowed. It looked like he was elsewhere. Gaze slightly unfocused. Slightly dazed, remembering it all.
No wonder he didn’t want to tell her these things. No wonder he had kept these things locked up so tightly.
And Stella had pushed and pushed until he’d finally broken.
That thought left a bad taste in her mouth, knowing what she did now.
“She kept us confined to our rooms during the day,” Tavak told her. “Not like Keriv’i males could wander around on the streets of Everton.”
“Everton?” Stella breathed.
That was where he’d lived before Dumera?
“Pax. And she didn’t pay us what was promised.”
“How much?” she asked, almost afraid to ask.
“One credit for every client.”
Bile rose in Stella’s throat and she breathed in deeply through her nostrils. One credit every night…when he’d been promised 450.
Sex work was common but there were laws in place to protect the workers. How had she gotten away with it? Especially on a place like Everton?
“If I thought Yikerza was a monster, he had nothing on her,” Tavak said quietly, meeting her eyes, seeming to need them to keep him grounded. “You wanted to know about the scars on my back?”
“Tavak,” she whispered, tears blurring her vision, feeling something sharp in her chest.
The scars…they’d been from her?
“She had a room in the basement of the brothel. When she thought we needed to be punished, when we did something she didn’t like, when a client didn’t leave completely satisfied…”
A bitter laugh broke from his throat, a laugh that Stella never wanted to hear again because it cut at her.
“She whipped you,” Stella whispered, the tears finally breaking over her lash line, streaming down her face. The archaic, ancient method of punishment, of torture, didn’t even seem fathomable in this day and age.
“Pax,” Tavak said, his jaw tight. That was all he’d say about it though Stella sensed that there was more he wasn’t saying. And just imagining what he might leave out and why was enough to make her want to vomit. “And she enjoyed every moment of it.”
Fury mingled with her nausea.
“Where is she now?”
Tavak turned his head to regard her, hearing something in her voice, something that frightened her.
“Because I would very much like to murder her,” Stella informed him through her tears.
Tavak’s eyes flared, seeming to resurface from the daze of the memories, reaching forward to wipe at her tears. The heat of his palm was familiar, achingly so.
“Bloodthirsty and beautiful,” he murmured. “How perfect you are, vellia.”
Stella blinked, longing going through her at that familiar word. Tavak’s hand slid away from her face, his jaw tight, his brows furrowed.
“She’s still on the New Earth colonies,” he finally said. “As far as I know. And I check the news coming from the colonies often.”
That was when Stella remembered. Seeing the logo for the Everton Gazette on his Coms device.
“You sound disappointed by that.”
“She’s meant to be locked away by now, rotting on a prison planet somewhere,” Tavak informed her.
“I don’t understand.”
And so he told her. Everything. All the little details that led to their escape from Everton, which had started with Evelyn Tesler. Eve. Khiva’s Eve. Eve, who’d become a client of Khiva’s on Everton, though she’d had no idea about the brutality and extortion they faced at the hands of the brothel’s owner.
Khiva and Eve had fallen in love, and once Khiva finally confessed everything to her, Eve had helped him escape, had offered them all passage to Dumera. But Jrika had still been fresh in their minds, and even after everything, they’d decided to stay on Everton, because at least they had a home, at least they wouldn’t starve.
Stella understood their decision, though Tavak cursed their cowardice now.
And then he told her about Valerie. Madame Allegria’s niece, though Valerie hated her. Tavak told her about how Dravka and Valerie had been in love for years, but had never acted on it for fear of reprisal from Madame Allegria.
But then it became too much and Valerie decided to act. She’d contacted Eve, made plans for the Keriv’i males’ passage off Everton before it was too late.
It had been nearly five months since they’d left Everton. Five months since they’d given a client they trusted information on all of Madame Allegria’s illegal business activities and crimes.
“But it’s obvious that Celine Larchm
ont did nothing with the information,” Tavak finally finished, his shoulders drooping as Stella ran her thumb over the back of his hand. “Power is everything on the New Earth colonies. And with that information, Celine Larchmont could control Madame Allegria easily. She chose power over justice,” Tavak guessed.
All of that…and they were still left wondering.
It all made sense now.
And it was a lot to process.
“I’m sorry,” Stella found herself whispering to him quietly, squeezing his hand. “I’m so sorry, Tavak.”
“Veki,” he murmured. “I’m the one who is sorry.”
Her brow furrowed.
“I should have told you when you asked it of me.”
She remembered the first time they’d had sex. Or at least, attempted to. After everything he’d experienced with human females on Everton, Stella understood now why he’d been so cold to her in the beginning. She must’ve brought back a lot of memories.
Stella licked her lips, looking down at their entwined hands, feeling strangely numb but also feeling too much.
“How could you stand it?” she whispered before she realized that she’d spoken at all.
“Kruvu?”
Stella looked up at him, biting her lip. “How could you stand being with me?”
His eyes flashed. A pained expression came over his face and she wasn’t certain she’d ever seen it before.
“Oh, vellia, I—”
“I must’ve reminded you of…of your clients,” Stella said quickly. “I’d made it obvious how much I liked you, how much I wanted you. And I kept pushing and pushing even when you made it obvious you didn’t want anything to do with me. At least, in the beginning.”
A gruff sound rose in his throat. “You’re nothing like them, Stella. I figured that out quickly.”
“But some part of you never forgot,” Stella whispered. “You wouldn’t look at me that first time. I didn’t mean to make you remember—”
“Stella,” Tavak rasped. “None of that had anything to do with you. And pax, it was obvious that I’d struggled that first time.”
