She wandered the other, nearly deserted streets of the city for a time and finally, tired and more depressed than ever, returned to the barracks.
It was just as well she hadn't been able to get near the hospital or she might have been tempted to do something really stupid. She had no idea how the cyborgs might react if they discovered they had a human among them—they might merely send her packing but somehow she doubted it would transpire that their idea of a solution and hers coincided so well. They might decide to keep her since there seemed to be a rather shockingly uneven ratio of men to women, but she was very much afraid that she would never really be accepted even if they wanted her to stay. And it could be far worse. They might decide to terminate her, or imprison her until they could deport her.
She was almost desperate enough to risk it just so she could have some peace of mind regarding her pregnancy. Shehad to know if it was normal. But how?
It occurred to her as she made her way along the main thoroughfare towards the barracks that she might have another option.
This planet was abundant with life and appeared to have been capable of sustaining life for thousands of years if not longer. There must have been intelligent life on the planet when the cyborgs arrived. It seemed ludicrous to think there wouldn't have been on such prime territory. The question was, how intelligent? Advanced enough to help? What were the chances that they would be willing to help even if they had the technology? Or had the cyborgs slain them when they'd claimed their world? Or driven them to some distant corner so that she might search for years without finding them?
It seemed a long shot, but she figured it couldn't hurt to look and see if there were any signs of other intelligent beings.
Reese met her at her door when she reached her quarters once more. Her belly instantly clenched with nerves at sight of him.
It wasn't altogether because she dreaded the ‘talk’ he'd put off until they landed.
He looked—absolutely divine. He'd shed the uniform they'd worn during the trip. Now he wore nothing more than what amounted to a loin cloth to cover his privates. Around his waist, he'd fastened a leather belt that secured an ornately handled sword and scabbard at his side. He'd pulled his long, blond hair into a queue at the base of his skull and tied it with a twisted length of leather.
The uniform conformed to the shape of his body in loving detail, and she'd known he was built well, but their coupling before had been so frantic they hadn't actually taken the time to undress and she hadn't had the opportunity to admire his body.
Nor did she think she'd ever properly appreciated his classical features as she did now for although she'd always considered him heartstoppingly handsome, she'd always been too overawed to do more than sneak peeks at him.
The scanty clothing that had been furnished for her own use made more sense to her now. Obviously, his clothing and the clothing they'd been given aboard ship were not only typical, but in common usage among the cyborgs because the planet's climate required nothing more.
For many minutes, she simply stopped and stared at him. Finally, however, she realized that he was giving her an equally thorough examination. Discomfort settled over her as his gaze swept over her belly and she jolted forward once more.
Yet another thing to worry about, she thought wryly as she punched in her code at the key lock of her quarters. The climate might be balmy enough to make clothing unnecessary, but that it also left her with very little to hide her condition. She had no clue of when it would become obvious that she was breeding, but she doubted it would be long.
"Make yourself comfortable,” she offered a little stiltedly, gesturing in the general direction of the chair as she headed toward the bathroom. “I'm going to freshen up."
She didn't feel the need to wash up nearly as badly as she felt the need for just a few minutes to collect herself. On the other hand, she didn't want him to know she was stalling for time. She didn't linger.
Reese was pacing the floor when she returned to the living area.
Amaryllis studied him with a mixture of surprise and uneasiness. “You didn't want to sit down?"
He glanced at the chair distractedly and finally shook his head.
"Refreshment?"
"No. I thank you."
Amaryllis nodded, studied the chair a moment and finally decided to leave it in case he changed his mind and sit on the bunk that served as a couch during the day. She didn't particularly want Reese towering over her, but he did even when she was standing. She figured she might as well get as comfortable as possible, particularly since her knees felt a little weak.
The moment she settled, Reese stopped pacing and knelt in front of her. “You have decided?"
Amaryllis frowned at the abruptness of the question. She hadn't expected him to come straight to the point and she wasn't particularly pleased that he had. “No."
He looked confused. “The hunter—the one called Cain—he is here. You are here."
"He's here?” she echoed, surprised.
"You did not know?"
"I didn't."
He looked somewhat relieved, but also confused. “You have decided not to contract with him?"
Amaryllis felt blood flood her cheeks. “He hasn't asked."
"You are waiting for him to ask?"
Indignation added to the color in her cheeks. “I'm not holding my breath, if that's what you mean,” she snapped.
He frowned. “I do not understand."
"What don't you understand?"
"Why would you hold your breath?” he asked curiously.
Amaryllis bit her lip to keep from smiling. “It means I'm not waiting for Cain to ask, OK?"
He still looked confused but finally he took her hand. “I have come to ask if you will not decide yet. I have made an appointment for reprogramming."
He looked so earnest Amaryllis didn't know whether to laugh or cry. It was probably the sweetest thing any man had ever said to her and she would never have imagined Reese, whom she'd always thought of as practically a demi-god, would be so desperate for her approval as to consider such an ‘improvement’ necessary.
To her horror, tears filled her eyes.
Reese's reaction was far more violent. He released her hand as if he'd suddenly discovered he was holding fire and leapt to his feet. “You are not pleased."
It was a statement, not a question. Amaryllis didn't trust herself to speak. She shook her head.
His face hardened. After a moment, he nodded sharply, turned and strode toward the door.
Amaryllis leapt to her feet. “Wait! Don't go!"
He halted and turned to look at her questioningly.
Moving toward him, she placed her palm on one of his hard cheeks, stroking it. “You don't need to do that. Not for me."
He nodded. “I understand. It would not make a difference."
All the doubts and fears Amaryllis had been harboring shattered. One thought emerged crystal clear. She couldn't just allow Reese to leave thinking that she cared less than nothing about him. It hurt her to see him trying to preserve an emotionless front when everything about him told her he felt pain.
Shaking her head, Amaryllis caught his hand and tugged on it until he reluctantly followed her back to the couch, then pushed on his chest until he sat down. When he'd settled, she placed a knee on either side of his hips and sat on his lap, facing him. “Itwould make a difference. It would change you and ... and I love you just the way you are,” she finished, leaning toward him and brushing a light kiss across his hard mouth.
She felt a jolt of surprise go through him, either at her words, or the kiss, or perhaps both. When she leaned back once more to study him, his expression was a mixture of desire and disbelief and confusion. She could see that he was reviewing every exchange between them, trying to understand how it might have happened that she would fall in love with him, but it wasn't something that could be analyzed. The first time she'd set eyes on him it had knocked the breath right out of her, as if she'd
been body slammed by his pheromones. It would probably be more accurate to say that nothing he'd done or said since had knocked the sense into her, not even when she'd learned that he'd been sent to infiltrate them. She smiled faintly. “You'll never figure it out,” she murmured, rubbing the tip of her nose against his.
He swallowed audibly. His hands were shaking slightly when he captured her face between them. “Amy,” he said gustily, leaning forward to brush his lips lightly against hers.
Her lips tingled at his touch and she flicked her tongue out, tracing the shape of his lips. His breath left him in a rush. He hesitated and then covered her mouth with his own, thrusting his tongue into her mouth to caress the sensitive inner flesh.
The warm intoxication of desire flowed through her as his essence flooded her senses, bringing a flush of heightened sensation to her skin. It took an effort to lift her eyelids when he withdrew to study her once more. “Will you make contract with me?” he asked, his voice raw with his own needs.
A knot of misery gathered in her throat at his insistent question. She found she couldn't meet the look in his eyes. Instead, she studied the musculature of his broad chest, tracing the bulges and dips that defined each muscle mass with the tip of one finger.
She did love him. She didn't care what he was supposed to be, only what he was. She would've liked nothing better if she could've just closed her mind to all her doubts and jumped at the chance he offered her.
But she loved him. She might be carrying his baby, and she might not. She might be carrying some horrible deformed thing. She might never be able to bear a normal child and she knew that was what he wanted. A family. Not just her. A family.
It wouldn't be right and it wasn't something one did to a person they loved. She couldn't lie about something as important as the possibility that her genes were as defective as her body, not even a lie of omission. And she couldn't bring herself to tell him. Horror filled her even at the thought of doing so.
He might want her anyway.
Or he might look at her like everyone else had always looked at her. Even after she'd had all the surgeries that made her look normal, all they'd been able to see was what she'd been before.
She didn't think she could bear that look from him.
Instead of answering his question, she leaned down and followed the path her finger had traced with the tip of her tongue. He tensed, released a pent up breath that was like a groan.
"Amy,” he said hoarsely.
She lifted her head to look at him.
He stroked her cheek. “I want to do this correctly."
Amaryllis frowned in confusion.
Frustration flickered in his eyes. “By your customs. But—I have need."
Relief flooded Amaryllis. She slipped her arms around his neck, sliding forward on his lap so that his engorged cock was nestled along her cleft and sending delicious tremors through her. “To hell with the customs. We'll make new ones,” she muttered, grinding her cleft along the hard ridge of his cock. “I have needs too."
Leaning forward, she caught the lobe of his ear between her teeth, sucking it. “I'm wet for you,” she whispered. “I want to feel you inside of me. It felt so good when you were inside of me before."
He caught her shoulders in his hands, hesitated, as if of half a mind to push her away. His fingers tightened, digging into her flesh. Abruptly, he relaxed his fingers, slipping his arms around her. Clutching a fistful of her hair, he tugged her head back and lowered his mouth to her throat, sucking open mouthed kisses along the sensitive flesh of her throat, the side of her neck. She closed her eyes, savoring the awakening of her body, the heat and tension that began coiling inside of her.
Again he paused, but this time it was to rid himself of the sword belted at his waist. Amaryllis heard it drop to the carpeted floor. Briefly, disorientation made her head swim as he twisted around, lowering both of them onto the bunk. Before her equilibrium had quite settled, she felt his mouth along her collarbone, felt his hands pushing her breasts from the cups of her halter. Her nipples, almost painfully sensitive with her pregnancy, sent twinges of discomfort through her as blood engorged them. She gasped when his mouth covered one distended tip, digging her fingertips into the hard flesh of his shoulders.
The heat and adhesion of his mouth, the teasing nudge of his tongue, intoxicated her, separated mind from body so that she couldn't think. She could only feel the pleasurable sensations bombarding her in waves that seemed to grow stronger and stronger until she was fighting for breath, until darkness swam around her and the urgency to feel him inside of her overwhelmed all other considerations.
She ran a hand between them, over his hard belly, delving the tips of her fingers beneath his loin cloth. She touched the head of his cock, explored it, shifted until she could almost wrap her fingers around his hard length. He jerked, surged upward until his cock filled her palm.
It was as delightfully hard, and thick and solid as he was and her belly clenched almost painfully in anticipation. Heat and moisture flooded her passage.
He reached down, fumbled briefly with the tie and released the cloth. Before she could try to wedge his cock past the leg of her briefs, he pulled away, grasped the straps on either side of her hips and jerked them down her thighs to her knees before settling over her again.
She uttered a sharp gasp as she felt the head of his cock delve her cleft, slip along it, nudging her clit.
She was bound, unable to spread her legs wide enough to accommodate him.
It took several moments for her heated brain to register the fact that her briefs were pinning her legs together, and many more than she wanted to devote to the effort of wriggling out of them.
A fine sheen of moisture covered them both by the time they'd managed to engage their bodies, for despite the moisture that had gathered to ease his passage, her body resisted the girth of his cock. Reese made a sound that was half groan of frustration and half desperation, caught her around the waist and heaved upward. Amaryllis dug her heels in to counter her thrusts and then wrapped her legs tightly around his waist, panting as she felt him slipping more deeply inside of her, felt herself stretching.
Shaking now, he withdrew and thrust again and again until he'd sheathed himself fully inside of her. They paused to catch their breath, sharing a deep kiss that began with heat and ended with a conflagration. Gasping, he released her lips and began a desperate, driving rhythm. Amaryllis squeezed her eyes tightly together, luxuriating in the pure bliss of his fierce possession, feeling him right down to her soul as their warm, intimate flesh merged, caressed each other in a tight embrace. Delicious waves of excitement wafted through her, of electric pleasure, coiling tightly inside of her, building until her entire body felt was if it hummed with ecstatic energy. Abruptly, it ruptured, sending her flying over the edge of rapture into mind sundering bliss. The spasms of pleasure rocking her caught Reese, pitching him into his own shattering release. Shuttering, shaking, he thrust until his cock ceased to ejaculate and collapsed weakly on top of her, gasping for breath.
The weight of his body crushed the air from her lungs. Amaryllis had to struggle to catch her breath. He shifted after only a moment, however, easing the pressure as he nuzzled her neck and upper chest.
She was just beginning to thoroughly enjoy his affection when he murmured, “There is great rejoicing in the streets. The first child is born."
It took Amaryllis several moments to ascend the depths of satiated bliss to even partial cognition. “Wha...?"
"Reuel's woman has given birth.” He chuckled lazily. “If we do much of this, we will have our own before the contract is signed."
Amaryllis shoved at him and sat up, feeling a surge of panic and the anger that walked hand and hand with it. “What? His woman? She isn't a person anymore? She's just ‘Reuel's woman'? Anyway, it isn't possible. I saw her on the ship. She wasn't that far along."
Reese propped his head on his hand, frowning, confusion and dawning anger in his eyes. “Da
lia has given birth. I didn't mean it the way you think. But it is true. I've only just come from the medical center. The child is strong and healthy and perfect.” He frowned thoughtfully. “There was something said about the gestation period being shortened because of the ability we have for rapid cell regeneration."
Sheer terror replaced the panic and Amaryllis shoved him off of her abruptly, stalked from the room and slammed the bathroom door behind her. Leaning weakly against the door, she wasn't even aware of her surroundings for many minutes. She couldn't even think. Disjointed sentence fragments kept running through her mind like a chant—shortened gestation period—rapid cell regeneration—strong, healthy, perfect baby—time—not much time.
The discomfort of a warm, sticky wetness oozing down her thigh finally brought her back to the present reality. She stared down at it for several moments as if it was a live thing crawling along her leg.
It was a live thing, full of live things.
Christ and all the saints! What had she been thinking? It wasn't like she could get pregnant, again. She was already pregnant, but wasn't that enough of a complication in her life, compounded as it already was with the fact that she didn't belong here at all?
She hadn't been thinking.
She'd only been feeling—allowing her emotions to overrule what little judgment she had.
She had to fight the urge to simply climb out of the tiny window set between the lavatory and the shower and run until she couldn't run anymore.
After a moment, she discarded the halter and climbed into the shower, bathing herself thoroughly.
Not that it mattered now.
She discovered when she got out that she didn't have anything to put on. Naked, she left the bathroom and crossed the room to the chest that held the clothing she'd been given.
Reese was watching her. She was aware of it without actually looking at him.
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