She was beautiful. Even with her face pale, hair tousled, expression closed and wary, she was female sensuality personified. Under her curtain of pale blonde hair, her face was heart-shaped, with big, tilted green eyes, short straight nose and a mouth that was sweetly curved, even when she was biting it, sucking one side of her lower lip between her teeth. Maybe especially then.
The little motion was a tell. She might not expect warmth from him—that was good, because he was not ready to give it—but she definitely had emotions of her own. She was real.
“Of course there’s a difference. She’s trained in the sensual arts, but she’s also a lady. And, don’t worry, she knows better than to expect any emotional involvement,” Stark went on relentlessly. “You’re a man in your prime, yet you live in a world populated by mine techs. You’ve no females around, except a few employees—whom I’ve seen and who are not enticing—and another man’s wife. You won’t come to the city to meet any women, so I’ve sent one to you.”
Creed’s gaze drifted down, over a slender frame clad only in a strappy little red dress that revealed the curves beneath. High, round breasts, a small waist and those round, lush hips tapering into slender legs that went on forever. Small feet in red sandals that revealed manicured toes.
Toes that were currently curling, digging into her sandals so hard they were white with pressure. Another tell.
His gaze went back up, noting her hand digging into her hip, the tips of her fingers white as well. A pulse hammered in the delicate hollow of her throat, and the look in her green eyes said she was waiting for him to toss her out into the night. Which he should. Put her back on that cruiser and send her wherever the seven hells Stark had found her. Let her get busy seducing some other man. He wasn’t some fool who couldn’t find a woman if he was in the market for one—which he was not.
“I don’t need you to pimp for me, Logan.”
“Taara’s not only experienced at showing a man how to find pleasure, she’s a nice woman. You’ll enjoy her visit in more ways than one. Even chat, something you can use more practice with.”
He didn’t want to chat with this enticing creature. Unless it was with hand signals, like ‘Come here’ or ‘Lift that short skirt and show me what’s underneath’. Which was not going to happen.
He’d been trained in celibacy. It was what he knew and what he understood. Females and how to deal with them except as employees or business equals, he did not understand. Also, he neither wanted nor trusted physical intimacy—it carried the promise of darker things to come, of pain and humiliation.
Creed opened his mouth to argue with Logan, but his throat had gone dry, his tongue cleaved to the roof of his mouth.
His body too was frozen in place as surely as if he’d been cryo-flashed. Except it wasn’t ice slithering down through him, as insidiously and with as much intent as a sand viper, it was heat. Burning through his chest, every beat of his heart sending licks of fire out through his arms, hands flexing at his sides. Down through his legs, the muscles bunching, ready to pursue, to spring. And especially down into his groin, curling lazily in ever tightening spirals that were at once pleasurable and painful as his cock twitched and then began to stiffen, his balls drawing up tight.
The heat of arousal. He’d felt it before, had been battling it back for years with meditation, with physical exercise so demanding it took all his strength, leaving none for temptation.
But in his sleep, he was helpless against the demands of his strong, virile body. He’d awakened many a time, sweating, trembling, his belly wet with his release, from a dream of some nebulous female.
The woman standing before him was the embodiment of his every craving. She was real. All too real. With a mighty effort, Creed reached inside and found his calm, drew it around him. Although somehow he felt as if even that could not protect him now.
“I’ll give you two a chance to get acquainted,” Stark said. “Treat her well.”
Creed’s head snapped around, but his brother had already broken the link. Creeds took a deep, slow breath, forcing the tumult of anger, want and need deep down inside him, cloaked it in silvery calm and tied a knot. He was definitely gonna get Logan for this—later.
He turned back to his visitor. “You can stay the night,” he said, pleased that his voice betrayed none of his disquiet. But then it never did. His training with the Zhen Monks had taught him nothing if not the appearance of control. “Leave in the morning.”
She let go the wall to wrap her arms around herself, her green eyes now wide with ... fear?
“I’m so sorry about—” she wrinkled her nose. “You know. Your boots.” Her gaze dropped to his bare feet. He went barefoot a fair amount, so his feet were nearly as tanned as his head and torso.
“Not a problem,” he said. “They’re in the cryocleaning unit.” He was still focused on her voice. Soft. As soft as the tops of her breasts. As soft as her skin looked, gleaming in the lights like pale gold satin. His hands twitched, craving a touch.
“So, can I bunk here tonight?” Coy asked from the doorway. Her gaze flickered between him and the blonde, but her expression was bland. “Or I could sleep on the cruiser.”
“We have plenty of rooms,” Creed said instantly. He didn’t want to be alone in his house with the blonde. She was walking, talking, breathing temptation. And if he gave in to her siren call, he was unsure if he would ever find the tattered shreds of his control.
The pilot nodded. Then she bent and hefted two bags, one expensive looking red leather with gilded fasteners, the other utilitarian, scuffed. “Lead the way.”
Creed reached for the red bag, and she handed it to him without a word. Carrying it, he led the way along the passageway and through a set of wide, double doors into the passageway to his house. All the buildings were linked with passages wide enough for a hovie cart, so that in bad weather or if they were under attack, no one had to go outside to get from one to the other unless they chose.
“Thank you for bringing in my bag,” the blonde murmured behind him. Taara, Stark had called her. A name as pretty and fluid as her curves.
“No problem,” Coy said. Her voice lowered, not meant for his ears. “You’ll be okay. Creed Forth’s good people. But I’ll be nearby tonight. You can link me if you ... y’know. Need someone to talk to.”
Creed’s shoulders tightened. What did the pilot think he was going to do, jump the blonde the minute he got her into a room?
A pause, then a whisper. “Really? That’s so sweet.”
“Hey, we girls gotta stick together, you know?” Clearly meant to make the blonde laugh, and it worked. A little chuckle whispered over his skin, leaving behind the sensation that he’d been stroked
“You gonna be okay?” the pilot added.
“I don’t know,” the blonde whispered. “I—I was supposed to stay here for a while.”
Creed’s shoulders tightened, along with his jaw. Damn Logan to the seventh hell. He’d chosen the worst temptation of all. Had he sent a bold, confident female, or one who oozed sensual aggression, Creed could have turned her away easily.
This woman made him want to protect her, to reassure her that nothing and no one would be allowed to hurt her. Made him want to keep her, at the same time he knew he must push her far away.
At least this was what he thought he knew.
Chapter Four
Creed dreamed again. And this time, when his nighttime muse came to him, she had a face and a definite form, as well as a voice he now recognized.
‘Come to me,’ she murmured. ‘I’ll take care of you.’
And he rose and went to her, his body hard and aching with desire that was centered in his groin, his cock so hard it pierced the air before him like a weapon.
‘You’ll take this?’ he asked her, palming himself, showing her. Praying desperately that she wouldn’t turn him way, wouldn’t find him wanting.
Her eyes never left his. ‘Yes. I’m supposed to be here.’
She wa
lked toward him and his body shook with the force of his conflicted emotions—want and need, anger and fear. Fear that if he broke the bonds on the years of aching desires, the storm would sweep him into the maelstrom, destroy him. And take his hard-won self-respect with it.
‘Hey, wait,’ cut in a new voice.
He looked over and saw the pilot in the door of his room, frowning at him. She shook her head.
‘Don’t give in,’ she said, her voice sliding into the deeper, serene tones of his Zhen master. ‘Temptations of the flesh will destroy you. You must control them, or they will control you, you know this.’
‘But I’m supposed to be here,’ Taara repeated. And when he looked back at her, tears welled in her green eyes and slid down her face.
He froze. Fear, he understood and anger. But tears? They were messy and complicated.
He shook his head. ‘No. No crying.’ His own voice rumbled in his ears, filled with the echoes of other, uglier voices from deeper in his past.
‘No crying, boy. Do what we tell you, or else.’
“No! Leave me alone. Get away from me!”
The sound of his own hoarse shout woke him. Creed opened his eyes and lay there, listening. He took a deep breath, and let it out, waiting for his thundering heart to slow. It had only been a dream. By far the most vivid of those that plagued him lately. And no wonder, with her under his roof, even at the other end.
His house was simple but it was big. He liked space around him, craved it. With credit, a man could have rooms and a house as big as he wanted, especially here where there were no other buildings crowding in, no skyscrapers towering over dirty, wet streets. No constant din of traffic, commerce and voices. No stink of too much humanity crowded in.
He’d built his house on the lower slopes of the mountain, with one range of peaks rising behind and another across the valley. The house blended in with its surroundings, neutral hues and shapes that echoed the blunt squared rocks of the bluffs over the river. Inside, it was spare but luxurious, with chairs and sofas big enough for a man to sprawl out in and room for all his activities and then some.
He’d added guest rooms, because Logan and Joran visited. Sometimes he had other guests. Stone Masterson and his pilot had stopped more than once, and irridium buyers made the trip to see where the coveted ore came from.
All the guest rooms were at the other end of the house from his, because he wanted his space private. Even with several visitors, he could close the door to his suite and have his bedroom, meditation room, study and lav to himself.
But this was the first time he’d had two single women under his roof. The pilot, he discounted. She worked for Stark, and anyhow he was pretty sure she was gay. Like having another man here.
Taara, on the other hand ... he could feel her presence vibrating like a vein of ore on the other end of a test drill. Exciting, alluring, beckoning him to the glittering core of her.
He needed to get her out of here.
He’d send her back with the cruiser, back to wherever Stark had found her. Give her some credit. He didn’t want her to lose out just because he wasn’t interested in availing himself of her services. Sex work was honest labor, just like anything else. With vaccinations for STIs and pregnancy, it was a viable career choice.
Although it was dangerous, since it involved physical contact of the most intimate kind, often in privacy.
He scowled into the darkness, his hands clenching on the light sheet that covered him. What was she doing, exposing herself to danger like this? Taara was so delicate. He was a male, much larger than her, in top physical condition. If he lost control, he could hurt or even kill her and who would know, unless she was implanted with a microchip or wore a monitor of some kind? Like many Frontierans, he’d had his comlink surgically implanted over his left ear. From what he’d seen, she had not.
Surely there was some other way she could earn a living. He’d give her enough credit she didn’t have to barter her body any longer, and she could set herself up doing ... whatever she wanted.
And he’d never have to see her again.
Jack-knifing up, Creed slid out off his bed and pulled his loose, soft pants up around his waist, fastening them as he walked over to open the sliding door, and step out onto the balcony.
He leaned his hands on the railing, the cool night breeze ruffling his hair and cooling his hot, damp skin. He looked out across the valley, a place of shadows in the brilliant starlight. The sky held a panoply of stars, and although two of Frontiera’s moons were down, the nearest one hung in a huge silver crescent over the southern horizon.
This moon shone with silver promise, but it was out of reach. Like her. He wanted to do more than look at her. He wanted to touch her ... with his hands, with his body. Wanted to bury himself in her like a weapon in a sheath, wanted to drive himself into her endlessly, again and again, in every position he could dream up, holding on until he was sated and drunk on her ... if he could ever get enough to reach that state.
His heart pounded hard, his breath deep and swift, his cock rigid with need in his soft pants, his hands clenched on the railing. Woman, female, softness and warmth, yielding and enveloping. He wanted her so badly he feared she’d swallow him up, never release him.
And that would be a cloak that contained no calm, no control for him. This, he could admit here in the dark of the night, was what he feared. That emotion, lust and need, should he loose them in himself, would destroy him, overpowering him and flinging him at a woman’s feet, at her mercy. That he would need so much and so powerfully that he’d give anything, do anything to possess her, to keep her.
Logan and Joran had rescued him from poverty and chaos, but not before he’d suffered. They’d given him safety, care and enough to eat, sent him to school and forced him to stay there until he graduated, then given him a place in Logan’s burgeoning business. They’d given him, without saying the words, love.
But he’d craved something apart from the busyness of commerce. He didn’t care about wealth and power like Logan did. He didn’t feel at ease with females, the way Joran did.
He’d found his something more in a chance meeting with the Zhen-Lou, when they streamed into the New Seattle docks like a healing wind and showed him that anger, even rage could be channeled, used for good instead of merely destruction. They’d cleaned out a nest of drug peddlers and other lowlifes. He’d witnessed the swift, brutal reckoning, then followed the cadre of quiet, lethal warriors to their lodgings and waited in the café, heart pounding, until one of them turned and looked at him, then beckoned him to their table.
Creed had been eighteen. The absolute confidence, their physical grace and discipline, the simplicity of their clothing and the daring with which these warriors accomplished what the local police had failed to do, sealed his future like a garment settling into place.
He wanted a life in which he was in control, in which he saw a wrong and righted it, and did so while holding himself apart from the suffering around him. And apart from the messy, confusing emotions that accompanied his urges toward the opposite sex. Females were too soft, too fragile. They let emotions guide them. Maybe that worked for them, but he wanted no part of it, couldn’t emulate their openness.
The intense, constant training he received and the meditations he was taught as a Zhen Lou warrior monk calmed the chaos and allowed him to live a life that was hard but simple, direct and satisfying.
But for a long time now, he’d been unable to ignore that side of himself any longer. Yearning for physical passion had been working in him like a ferment, growing and churning until he feared it would overtake him. And if he let that become important, who knew what darker urges he’d loose. Men killed for lust, for possession of their lover of choice.
Shadows moved in the valley below. A herd of skrog grazed slowly along the river across the valley, the huge omnivores moving together. Nearer, a catamount slipped along from one shadow to another, tail curling behind as it trailed the scent of prey. A lo
w mrrow signaled its mate waiting somewhere ahead.
A winged shadow slipped from the sky and dove, a small squeak sounding as a gyre hawk caught a rock rat or other small prey in its claws. It rose again with flapping wings, to meet another hawk circling.
All the wild creatures had mates. A wave of cold rolled up through Creed. Loneliness. His arms shook as he gripped the railing and his head bowed under the weight of it. He’d been alone for so long. He had his brothers, a few friends, the people who worked for him, but no one to call his own.
Only twenty-eight years old, and he felt like an ancient soul. Like the Lost Warriors, wandering the stars in search of their treasure, the fabled Phoenixes, but never finding them.
He forced himself to let go of the railing, and sank down on the mat kept laid out on the balcony floor. Kneeling, he placed his hands on his knees, palms down, and concentrated.
Slowly, under protest, but at last bowing to his training, his emotions folded in on themselves and receded deep within him, replaced by calm. His arousal faded. Only then did he let his mind open.
His memories carried him back, to another kneeling mat, at the monastery at Zhen-Lau.
Before him, cross-legged on a dais, sat the Zhen master, Zhou-way, ‘he who takes the wind’. Though the old monk’s face was seamed with decades, his body was taut and lean.
At Creed’s side was a pack, with his weapons, mealpacs and one change of clothing.
‘You leave us now, young Creed. Go, take what we have taught, as you make your way in the world. But know, your demons will follow you.’
Creed bowed to show respect. ‘I can fight them off, master, with the weapons you’ve given me.’
He’d learned self-discipline, not only of the body but of the mind, a self-possession that his older brother Joran called eerie. Creed called it good. Never again would he be at the mercy of lust, rage, or fear and those who tried to wreak it.
Master Zhou shook his head, his gaze keen. ‘No, you mistake my meaning. They are your demons, Creed. They have no choice but to follow you, until you are ready to release their chains and set them free.’
Creed of Pleasure; the Space Miner's Concubine (The LodeStar Series) Page 4
