Mind Guest (Diana Santee Book 1)

by Sharon Green

  As I looked around my mind was working, and it didn't take long to come to a decision. I'd been on my way to pick-up when the fever had hit, and there was no reason not to take up where I'd left off. Granted I wasn't feeling any too steady, and my strength seemed to have drained out of my toenails, but I'd continued on in worse shape in my life.

  I threw the old blanket into a heap and swung my legs over the side of the bed, then waited a minute for the dizziness to go away. The fever was almost completely gone, the wound in my side was barely more than tender, and if I ignored the weakness I should be able to do what had to be done. When the room settled down I put my feet on the bare wooden floor and stood up, wavered a little, then decided to hold onto the bed for support. My ears were ringing faintly and Bellna was getting upset, but I still managed to walk to the foot of the bed without falling all over my own feet.

  Once there I took a deep breath and straightened up, then ran my fingers through my knotted hair. It wouldn't be a snap but I would make it, and as soon as darkness fell my trail would be obscured. The next step was finding out if my clothes were anywhere around.

  I had just let go of the footboard of the bed and had taken a step or two toward the wardrobe on the far side of the bed when the door behind me swung open. Fallan started into the room with his usual broad stride, but stopped short and stared when he saw me standing in the middle of the room. He looked tired, as though he'd been working hard at something, and I cursed under my breath and wished he'd kept at it a little while longer.

  "You are awake sooner than I - " he began, obviously surprised at seeing me, and then he realized just where he was seeing me. "And you have left the bed. With whose permission did you leave that bed?"

  "With my own permission," I answered, ignoring the growing annoyance in his eyes. "I dislike this place and shall now leave it. You, of course, may stay as long as you wish."

  "How kind and generous of you." He nodded, folding his arms as he stared down at me. "And where, may I ask, do you think to go?"

  "You may not ask," I retorted, looking up to meet his eyes. "What destination I have in mind is none of your concern. And you need no longer waste your valuable time on me, Captain. You will receive no reward for the doing, nor even recognition. I do not return from whence I came."

  A statement which, I hoped, was a lie. I'd come from Dameron's base and I wanted to get back there, but I was quickly running out of strength. My knees were vibrating when I turned away from Fallan toward the wardrobe, but his hand came to my shoulder before I could take even a single step.

  "You believe I care for you for no other reason than reward or recognition?" he asked, his tone unexpectedly quiet. "Is it not possible that I merely care for one who is in need of such care?"

  "It may perhaps be possible." I shrugged, too tired to wonder why he wasn't feeling insulted. "After my recent experiences with the men of this area, however, I prefer to disbelieve the possibility. And I prefer, as well, to continue on alone. The presence of one of the male persuasion makes me uneasy."

  "An understandable attitude," he said, still sounding unreasonably reasonable, still holding my shoulder. "You, however, must understand a thing as well. Though I am a man and therefore suspect in your eyes, you must continue to remain with me till you are well. At that time I will see you safely to wherever you wish to go. Is it agreed?"

  Oh, sure, all the way back to base. Dameron would just love that, and I'd be guaranteed first prize in any unusual souvenirs contest they might have.

  "No, it is not agreed," I said, turning back to look at him and knocking his hand from my shoulder. "I do not wish to remain here and I shall not. I do not care to have your company upon my journey, and I shall not have it. Is it so supremely difficult for you to understand that I wish to be alone?"

  I wasn't feeling too well and was therefore in a lousy mood, but Fallan didn't come up with the fight I was looking for. Anger flashed briefly in his eyes when I knocked his hand away, but by the time I asked my question the anger was gone.

  "The language is, I fear, a trifle too difficult for me," he agreed with a sigh, then moved forward fast and scooped me up off the floor into his arms. "It will be best, I think, if I return you to your bed till I am able to puzzle out your meaning. You require rest and I mean to see you have it."

  I had the strength and the time to pound at him only once before I was back in that bed, flat on my back with the old blanket pulled over me. I struggled up to one elbow and glared at his grin, but all he did was pat me on the head.

  "It pleases a simple man such as I to see acceptable obedience in a girl child such as you," he said with a good deal of amusement. "Your departure now would be beyond reason, and although you seem to have grown to your present size without acquiring a drop of reason, you shall not continue further without it. I will be pleased to teach you reason in our time together - during which time you will also mend and be restored to full health. I go now to fetch a bowl of the thin gruel I have prepared for you. Your body requires the moisture and nourishment. Do not stir again from that bed."

  He gave me a hard-eyed look to go with the order, then turned and walked out of the room. If I'd had the strength I would have been furious, but all I was up to was a glare at his departing back. He thought I was being unreasonable by insisting on leaving right now, but I didn't give a damn. I could damned well be as unreasonable as I felt like being. He was nothing but a cheap, for-hire mercenary, and had no business ordering me around. He probably would have been damned good in bed, but his constant crowding was beginning to turn me off. I wanted out of here and I would get out of here, and nothing he said would stop me.

  I pushed the blanket away and got to my feet again, then headed for the window. Passing the open doorway I could see Fallan bending over the hearth, messing with a pot and a bowl. I wasn't in the least hungry, and wouldn't have wanted anything made by a low-born like him even if I were. I reached through the dusty sunlight to the side of the window, opened the latch, then pushed the window wide against a small amount of resistance.

  My clothes in the wardrobe were probably still wet, so I'd be better off forgetting about them. The nightshirt covered me well enough, and would certainly do until I got where I was going. I leaned out the window to see how far it was to the ground, pulled my head back in and hiked up the nightshirt, then -

  "There is clearly one of us who is incapable of understanding simple speech," Fallan growled from behind me, all traces of patience gone. "Take yourself from that window and do so now!"

  I glanced back over my shoulder to see him standing there with a full bowl in his hands, his dark eyes flashing with such strength and dominance that my body attempted to respond. I had, however, already decided to leave the good Captain Fallan, and right now, when his sexiness couldn't reach me, was the best time. I turned back to the window and threw a leg over the very narrow sill, started to swing out - but was caught before I could free my second leg. Fallan pulled me back in with very little effort, his arm wrapped tight around my waist. I screamed and kicked, but he still reached out and pulled the window shut.

  "In all fairness, you should be taught a good lesson for such foolishness," he growled, fighting to hold me still. "Were you not hurt and ill, I would - uhh!"

  He grunted with the pain of my elbow into his middle, a blow I remembered just in time. His arm loosened enough from around me that I was able to put my leg behind his before pushing with my hip, and he actually went down! I couldn't help giggling as he sprawled flat on his back, but I didn't have time to giggle long. The door to the room was standing open and that would be the easiest way to go, so I started toward it - just as Fallan reared up, threw an arm around me, and pulled me down to the floor on top of him.

  "No!" I screamed, furious that he refused to acknowledge the way I'd defeated him by staying down the way the others had. "Release me at once!"

  "I am to release you so that the long series of accidental mishaps which have descended upon me sinc
e first we met might continue?" he demanded, forcing me face down across his folded legs. "I knew well enough that they were no such thing, yet chose not to press the matter. It is now time to cause a mishap of my own, one that has been much too long in the coming."

  He held me across his knees and pulled the bottom of the nightshirt up, and I didn't know what the hell he was doing. I struggled and fought to get loose - and then howled with the first swat from his big hand on my bottom. It stung less than the second smack, and the second less than the third, and after that I lost count. I couldn't believe he would dare do that to me, that he would dare spank me, but that's exactly what he was doing. It began to really hurt and I began to cry, but that didn't stop him. He continued to hold me down across his lap and spank me, and I couldn't stand any more. I had to get away -

  - and then everything suddenly changed, but only inwardly. Outwardly Fallan was still spanking away, but inside nothing I'd done seemed all that right any longer. Somehow the Bellna presence had gotten the upper hand without my realizing it, and this time I was really stuck with the consequences.

  I'd never been spanked before, not even as a child, but it was much too late to stop it. All I could do was squirm against his leg as I stared at the dirty wooden floor while Fallan paid me back for everything I'd ever done to him - and what Bellna had done as well. I really felt it every time his big hand reached my bottom, and it didn't stop reaching my bottom for what seemed like a very long time.

  When the bastard finally let me go, I crawled off his lap and knelt there with my hands behind me, the tears streaming down my face. Bellna had started the crying but I couldn't seem to stop it, not with the way my backside stung. It wasn't that the pain was so terrible - it was nothing compared to the way I usually got hurt on the job -but the humiliation was more than I could stand. If I could have stood straight I would have broken Fallan into small pieces - but I couldn't stand straight. Fallan did the standing instead, and then looked down at me.

  "You may now return to your bed," he said, sounding all through with playing games. "Should I find you out of bed again without permission - my permission - you will find sitting a vair even more difficult than it currently is for you. Now, go."

  I swiped at my eyes with the back of my hand and then tried to stand up, but I still couldn't do it. Somehow Bellna had used my body as though there were nothing wrong with it, and with her out of control I had nothing left. Walking wouldn't have been very comfortable after that spanking Fallan had given me, but in order to walk I first had to stand up. I couldn't stand up, I couldn't walk, and it slowly became harder even to kneel. The things in the room started to swirl around gently, and suddenly I was heading face down for the floor. A big arm caught me just before I hit, and then it and another arm lifted me into the air.

  "You would indeed have done well on your own," Fallan's voice came, the dryness impossible to miss. "After a few brief moments of activity, you seem near to a faint."

  He put me into the bed and covered me with the blanket again, and although my head was already beginning to clear, he wasn't far wrong. I did feel as though I were about to pass out, with or without the dizziness. I'd been more than eager to be on my way to rendezvous, but I really hadn't intended to kill myself doing it.

  Insisting so stubbornly had been Bellna's idea, that and getting so rough with Fallan. She'd managed to pry loose a couple of simple techniques, and hadn't realized how stupid using them on someone like Fallan was. After watching him fight that house guard, she should have had some idea as to what it would take to put him away. She was huddled in her usual corner of my mind, sniffling and hurting from the spanking we'd gotten, nicely intimidated but almost as aroused as she'd been during training with the slavers.

  She wanted Fallan more than ever, but I wanted him less than ever. He'd had every right to get even for what I'd done to him, but not by humiliating me like that. I would have faced him if that was what he wanted, with or without weapons, but he wasn't interested in facing me. All he was interested in doing was humiliating me, and I'd get him for that.

  "You will eat some of this, and then you will sleep," Fallan's voice came, and then his arm was under my shoulders and raising me up. "We must strengthen you if you are to journey alone."

  "I cannot sit so!" I yelped, trying to twist away from his arm. "The sting - I cannot sit so!"

  "Then you had best swallow this quickly, so that you may lie down again," he said, making sure I couldn't slip free. "Or do you mean to disobey me?"

  I looked up into his eyes as he said that, and what I saw there made me stop struggling even as feebly as I'd been doing. He raised the wooden spoon sticking out of the bowl and put it to my lips, and with a vast amount of reluctance but absolutely no hesitation, I swallowed every drop. I'd get him for what he'd done to me today - but some other time.

  Chapter Nine

  That first meal didn't last as long as Fallan thought it would. I continued to swallow until half of the soupy, watery gruel was gone, and then, between one spoonful and the next, I was gone. I either fell asleep or passed out, but I didn't know I had until I woke up again. By that time it was well into the night, but Fallan was still awake and waiting for me with a present. The fever was still faintly with me, so it was battery acid time again.

  I wanted to tell Fallan what to do with that swill, but all I did was take it and drink it down. For some reason I felt … intimidated by Fallan, but that had to be because of the weakness that continued to hold me. Once I was back to my old self, I'd find some way to get even with him.

  The next day I felt considerably better, but even with the fever gone Fallan refused to let me out of bed. In the afternoon he changed the bandage on my ribs after reapplying the jelly-like glop to the raw-looking wound, and what pain I felt during the process had nothing to with Clero's handiwork.

  Bellna was back to actively panting after Fallan, and what her yen did to me with the mercenary captain so close to my naked body is best left undescribed. If he had finished the bandaging and then had dropped his pants and raped me, Bellna would have been in soft-headed heaven. Fortunately or unfortunately, he did nothing of the kind. He finished the bandaging, put the nightshirt back on me, and then left without a word. I spent the next couple of hours twisting around in the bed, wishing to hell that planet had cold showers.

  Just at darkness Fallan brought me the meal he'd cooked, and after I ate it he took the plates away and blew out the lamp. I was annoyed as all hell that he hadn't even given me a chance to discuss the matter, but after only a few minutes of bad-tempered tossing I fell asleep.

  Not much time could have gone by before I was awakened by the sound of soft voices from the next room, and at first I was more sleepy than curious. After a couple of minutes of hearing the voices, curious got the better of sleepy, so I eased out of bed and moved silently to the door.

  Opening the door just as silently was not as easy, but after another minute I had it done. I had a nice, wide three-inch opening to look through, and what I saw made me feel like a peeping Tom. Fallan was entertaining, and he and his lady friend were lying on a comfortable-looking pile of blankets in front of the fire.

  Neither Fallan nor the woman were wearing anything, and whereas I couldn't help but be impressed by how well-endowed Fallan was, his companion seemed more nervous than eager. She lay there trembling, just short of flinching, and when Fallan began to reach out a hand to her, she screwed her eyes shut and clenched her teeth and fists.

  "Believe me, girl, I shall bring you no hurt," Fallan whispered, but he sounded as if he'd said the same thing a dozen times before and the girl still wasn't believing. He shook his head with very faint annoyance, then began to work on her as if he were also trying to work himself up. Someone would have had to have been blind to miss how ready he was, but he took his time with the girl as if she were the only one who mattered.

  It didn't take all that along before he reached her, but he kept at it until she was not only aroused but as e
ager as he was. She lifted herself to him when he moved over her, her moans low but intense, and when he took her in his arms and entered her she welcomed him with her entire self. After that she made nothing but sounds of pleasure, and I closed the door on their enjoyment feeling more confused than I had in a long while.

  I'd had a good deal of personal if not intimate contact with the men of this world, but none of them had acted the way Fallan did - either in bed or out. And mercenaries were supposed to be worse than the general, run-of-the-mill population. If that was so, then why -

  Suddenly all thoughts were driven out of my head by the screaming that filled it, the screaming produced by Bellna. I'd forgotten all about my unwelcome guest again, but she hadn't missed paying close attention to what was going on in the other room. She hadn't been quiet while watching she'd been speechless, and now her rage was filling me the way spring storms fill an arroyo.

  When Fallan had chosen the black-haired slave over me in the slave market Bellna had excused away his rejection, but she was totally beyond looking for excuses now. She hated him for not taking her when she wanted him so badly, and she hated him even more for bringing another woman to his blankets when she was just in the next room. I climbed back into bed fairly resonating with her fury, but there was nothing I could do to stop it. The little girl in my head was feeling betrayed and vengeful, and I'd just have to wait until got she over it.

  I did wait, but I had the makings of a really good headache before the frozen, still-offended silence finally descended. If not for that hovering headache I would have gone back to my own thinking, but the threat was there and I was also tired. When the peace and quiet came I closed my eyes, and before the noise could start again I was asleep.