by Mima
“Don’t back down, woman. It’ll be fun for both of us.” His voice lowered to a rumble. “I know what to do with a clit.”
She stared. This is sexual harassment. The little voice inside her head sounded kind of angry and shocked. But one glance at his bare toes curling where his feet stretched from under the table made a throatier, saucier voice purr, This is the real world. Be a big girl and take what you want.
“Just for tonight?” The saucy purr was notably absent from her strangled rasp.
“I’ve got a big soft bed for the entire starcourse. Don’t go writing me off . . . or picking out a damn white dress.”
He expected this to be long-term but casual. Compulsively, she bit her lips. “This isn’t very nice of you.”
He never stopped stroking, but he did flop his chin forward and laugh. It was a deep laugh of genuine amusement. “The best sex isn’t nice. Let me show you, Becca Sharpin.”
Just then she made her choice.
He stood up and he was tall. His erection tented the loose, soft cream pants he wore. “Make a decision. You can be happy here at night and trained during the day, or you can be among the happy crew, alone and horny.”
“Let me tell you something, Captain.” Becca’s pride hissed and spit at the gall of the man. “When you’re aware one of your officers is enjoying his intern, it doesn’t matter if she appears to be sexually satisfied. Do not think that you can join the fun, since the woman is clearly a slut. It’s beyond insulting—it’s stupid.”
Leo laughed loud, deep guffaws. He opened the door to the hall. “Good night, Jake. Full impact.”
Becca stalked behind him, chest heaving in agitation. At the door, she paused and looked back at him. It wasn’t the cheese that left this sour film in her mouth. “Leo may be an asshole, but you’re a dick.”
The captain’s face was very closed. He stood in his stylish, masculine den and saluted her. A shiver chunked down her spine like a brick of ice going end over end.
Leo laughed all the way back to his suite, whereupon he tore her pretty green dress off. “You’re a stupid, prideful, little girl, Pipsqueak. You coulda been a contender.”
“Shut up.” She wrestled away from him. “I can’t believe you just walked me over there, expecting me to say yes. What, did you want to watch?”
“Hell yes, I’d love to. But Jake doesn’t swing that way.” He caught her arm and tried to pull her back down on the couch. “Quit being so squirrely. It made me hot to see you smack Jake down. Plus I’ve got to get my use of you while I can. Your time is limited now.”
“I’m not having sex with you after you tried to whore me to your friend. And you’ve gotten too much use, if you ask me. I’m taking a break.” She forcibly pulled herself away. Striding to the two drawers he’d allotted her by the bed, she tugged on her flight suit, partly because it covered her from neck to ankle and she felt fragile and partly because she knew he hated it. Leo’s crack about her time swirled in her stomach.
“Don’t put that ugly thing on,” Leo whined from the doorway. He already had a whiskey in his hand. “Get on the bed and I’ll lick you out good.”
“No.”
He scowled. “Becca, you’ll either fuck me or get out and sleep in your pod.”
“Fine.” She was still so mad she could hardly catch her breath. She was mad at the captain, whom she liked. She was mad at Leo, whom she hated. She was mad at herself, for going off so easily nearly every time with Leo, who was only a mediocre lay when she wasn’t wired by the fact she was banging her senior chief. She was mad at this ship, which was supposed to be the start of her real life and instead had turned into some sort of trap.
She stormed out and went to the crew lounge. She tried to play cards but couldn’t concentrate. She sat on the couch and watched people interact, but she hated them all. She slouched to her old bunk she hadn’t visited in two weeks and there was someone in it. She finally went back to Leo’s and slept on the couch.
The next day he refused to instruct her, instead continuing to give cryptic, ominous warnings. That night, the night before they docked at port, the entire ship buzzed with anticipation. Leo was already drunk by the time she made herself enter his suite. He was also already nude.
Becca stood in the doorway, fuming. “I’m still not in the mood, Leo.”
“You’re goin’ to get gone tomorrow if you don’ keep to the nice underschtanding we had before. You screwed yourself with your pride and going AWOL from me. Get in bed an’ let Chief fix you up.”
“I’m getting my things.”
His hands were all over her before she’d taken three steps into the garish room.
Yelling, she fought him, but when he produced a laser knife, she froze. He was too drunk to use it with any accuracy, but still sober enough to think he could.
“Thass right, Pip. You just shut the fuck up. Take that ugly wrap off right now, or I’ll end up marking you when I do it.” He took another swig. By now he’d discarded a glass and chugged straight from the bottle.
Shaking, Becca shucked the flight suit. She had on her ordinary underwear.
“Good. Now for something long overdue, Little Miss Stuck-Up Smarty Tits.” He dropped the bottle and grabbed her hair in a painful, twisting wrench.
She grabbed his wrist in both hands with a cry. He stumbled backward and she fell to her knees. He flailed, dragging her as she frantically crawled to keep up with him, and when he sprawled on the couch, she landed between his thighs. His grip burned, and she could hear her hair ripping. Her heart slashed back and forth in her chest.
“Suck me.”
“Fuck you, Leo. Let me go.” Her voice shook, and tears burned in her eyes, but she kept her gaze on that knife.
He swung her head back and forth, wrenching her neck and sending biting pain through her scalp. “Bitch! Suck! My! Dick!”
He slashed the knife down and she screamed as it seared a gash into the couch, leaving a black ridge of burned fabric and a waft of smoke. He pulled her face into his stomach.
She thought of biting him, but he rested the fist holding the knife on her shoulder. The sizzling laser light crackled inches from her head. Breath coming in burning rasps, she sobbed as she lapped sloppily across him.
He sighed. “Ah, don’t cry. Shit. I hate it when they cry.”
It wasn’t much of a ploy when she began to wail, collapsing onto his thighs in shivering fear. Tremors rocked her body so hard she couldn’t have wrestled a bottle from a baby.
Groaning, he mashed her face into his hips, but she cried so hard she couldn’t even grab him with her trembling jaw. Roaring with disgust, he shoved her away.
She yelled, scrambling across the blue carpet to get to the door.
“Becca—” Leo called out, but she was through it like a sonic blast. She hit the wall opposite the door in the hallway and slid into a pile of gasping tears. Shuddering, she lunged up again and managed to run, awkwardly. Some guys wolf-whistled as she stumbled, nearly nude, through the levels to her old pod. Some offered help but she just kept going, using the wall for support. She finally made it to Bixy and shook her awake, limp with relief to find her. The older woman tucked her into her own bunk, and found her a flight suit. Becca didn’t sleep.
The next morning, before the crew were called to queue for disembarking at the port, the security master showed up while Becca huddled miserably in the corner of Bixy’s bunk.
He escorted her barefoot and empty-handed off the ship. He himself processed her into the port’s files. Then he walked her to the gateway for disembarking passengers. Not the gateway for temporary visiting crew.
“I don’t have shoes. I don’t have my plax-page. I don’t have any of my stuff. You can’t be serious.” The man was tall, thin, and dark. She felt like an old drawing of death loomed at her side.
“I’m as serious as you were when y
ou thought you could spit on a Syndicate captain.”
She said the first thing that popped into her head. “Ex-Syndicate.”
He looked her up and down with scorn. “Yes, you’re that stupid.”
He walked away. She was stranded. Abandoned. Fucked.
Becca looked around the bustling hallway intersection. Signs pointed down the three hallways detailing entertainment, food, and lodging. Her feet were like ice. Putting a hand to her head after one particularly scornful look, she felt the rat’s nest of her dirty hair. Memories of Leo’s fist yanking on it made a headache bloom instantly. She was thirsty.
Stumbling, she made her way into the food hall. She stuck next to the wall and gasped when she caught sight of three slinks trailing in unison down the hall. There had been no slinks back home. They lived up to their nickname, sinuously flowing in an S-curving line. Their pointed teeth and short bowlegs were hidden among the other people, but she had no desire to strain closer to see them. Danger flowed off them naturally.
At the next intersection, she tried to report Leo to the police. They were ready for her. They held up her plax-page and it detailed a diary she’d never written of how she was going to blackmail Leo into certifying her. It was full of incriminating pictures she’d had no part in taking and a deposition from the captain saying that she’d behaved with conduct unbecoming and hostile.
She stared at the trio of female officers. Two were laughing, while the third glared at her stonily.
“You can see that my neck is bruised. I’m standing here barefoot. They took everything from me, those two assholes. I’ve got nothing.”
The two laughed harder and the third leaned in. “That’s what whores get, cunt. You try to play their game and then you come crying to us when you get burned. But if you’d fucked your way to paradise, then everything would be okay. Get out of my face.”
Becca’s jaw chattered, but she lifted her chin. Her chest hurt from the force of hate inside her. “I need my plax-page.”
“Fuck you!” one of the other women snorted. “Or rather, go fuck someone to get a new one.”
Woodenly, Becca turned and walked through the first dark doorway she found, into what turned out to be a bar, a rather nice one, with booths and bench tables, and even some low tables with pillow seating over in the corner. She went to a booth, needing to hide. She sat, and the menu of their chiller shimmered into focus on the table. Realizing she had no way to get food or the water she desperately wanted, Becca put her head on the table. This was unbelievable. She wanted to cry but strangely couldn’t.
A waitress came by. She took one look at Becca and patted her shoulder. “Sit there until it gets crowded, sweetie. Maybe it’ll be a slow night.”
So Becca did. She sat there until her ass went numb. But finally she knew she had to act. There were only two options. She could get up and get work. That would be scary, because without credentials of any kind, she’d be forced to work illegally. She didn’t even know how to start. The thought of being at the mercy of another shady man like Leo made her shake.
Or she could go to the vid-com in the corner and call her brother. A military private would be here within the hour, she had no doubt. And then she’d be packed home to Mom and Dad, barefoot.
What should she do? Go home to recover in comfort and start the long, embarrassing fight to regain her reputation, or stay here and try to scratch a living in some shaky underworld, hiding from Leo’s lies?
“All right.” Becca grudgingly agreed to be alone with the captain. “I’ll stay.”
Leo laughed in loud, deep guffaws. He opened the door to the hall. “Good night, Jake. Near miss.” The door zipped closed and the room was quiet.
They stood opposite each other, with the black glass table between them.
“What do you want from me?” he asked.
Her head jerked. “Wrong question.” She was tired of payment and power.
He nodded. “Fair enough. Is Leo treating you all right?”
She shrugged. “We fuck. He’s a smart engineer. It’s okay.” His thick hair was more combed than usual. A strip of strong, furred chest was revealed by his robe. “I find your question ironic. Are you concerned about the levels of coercion your senior chief is using when he has a relationship with his intern? Is there a line you don’t want him to cross?” She looked him in the eyes. Oh, he had such pretty eyes. Intelligent, too. “Like asking me to spread for his friends?”
The challenge hung in the air. He moved from his couch and walked over to the wall. Taking down a curved spike the size of her head, he carried it back over and sat again. He stroked his hands along the inside curve, holding it with a frown. “Do you know what this is?”
She felt sullen but knew that by staying here, she’d put herself in a position to connect with the captain. If she was going to try to salvage some sort of political face from this, she had to control herself. She sat without plopping. She considered the object. “Is it a horn?”
He nodded. “It is.” He held it out to her.
She took it, and it was surprisingly heavy. It almost landed in the cheese, but she got both hands on it in time. Ridged with a subtle twist, it—a sense of dread came over her. Her stomach heaved and her skin prickled. She tossed the thing onto the couch across from her as if it was toxic.
He laid a protective hand on it. “This is the Horn of Andeela. It’s what I guard for the Brotherhood.”
“The Syndicate?” Becca didn’t want to be talking about them.
He shrugged. “That’s a cold name for a very passionate organization. When I asked to be relieved of active duty, that’s what they gave me. No one ever really retires after having benefitted from their structure. Until they take it back, guarding it is my permanent assignment.”
The fact that the Syndicate was legal on most planets didn’t mean people liked it. Lots of people who tried to join the group died, but never through the direct fault of anyone, and lots of people who belonged got benefits that didn’t match their surface efforts.
“What you should know is that I couldn’t hold this treasure secure without Leo’s help. It takes a lot of power to put up special defenses for it. So, if you like, I’m blackmailed by Leo. He helps me keep this protected, and I turn a blind eye to his drinking on the job and engaging in other massively unprofessional behavior.” The captain stood and set the horn back in its cradle on the wall.
Was it a weapon? She fought the desire to turn her back on it. How did he live with it so near?
“You asked an interesting question. Is there a line of misbehavior that Leo can’t cross with me?” He braced himself against the back of the couch, staring at her over the seat of it. “Yes. But you’re not on the far side of it. I can see how it makes you angry, but I want you to understand. I’m not excusing my decisions. I’ve walked a path and now I’m here. Just like you’re not running diagnostics in the kitchen, I’m not running a noble ship.”
Becca stared at him and didn’t like herself very much. Both of these men had been nothing but up front with her about their interests and rationales. It made no sense that she was so angry with them yet wanted them at the same time.
“Don’t judge yourself so harshly, Becca. You do the best you can and take pleasure where you can, and get through.” He looked down at his big hands gripping the shiny couch. “Leo probably charmed you, flirted and demanded. But I’m more direct. Tonight I need to be with someone, and I’d like it to be you.”
She reached forward for the wine and poured a glass. It took effort to soften her spine, but she managed to ease back on the couch. A healthy swig let her organize her bitter thoughts. His threats were subtle but real. She would try to get what she could from this. “I’m not interested in a feel-good sharing. I get enough of that from Leo. But I can see my way to possibly . . . How did you put it? Trying a new flavor?”
He inclined his h
ead.
“I’m interested in you,” she acknowledged. “And as much as I consider myself capable of making it on my own, I’m not against . . . opportunity.”
He could have grinned and said something snide. But he merely nodded.
She softened. She liked him a lot more than Leo, and she did Leo every night. She was sick of him. “You know what?” She stood up. She didn’t need to poke for some reward, telling herself she was on the upper side of some invisible power scale. “Let’s leave opportunity to the future.” Sometimes, sex was just for fun. She circled the table and knelt on the couch directly in front of him. His lashes lowered, lips parting.
She put one hand over his where it clenched the top of the couch, then let it travel up his arm, over the silky fabric of his robe. Tucking it under the edge so that her palm rested on one thick pec, she smiled to feel his heart thudding under the skin, fast and strong.
“You’re sure?” he asked softly.
Her irritation melted away. She’d been hot for him the first time she met him. Here she was, so she’d seize the moment. She leaned against him and angled her face up to his. Slowly, she licked her lips, teasing him with her eyes.
“I don’t get women.” He laughed softly. He shrugged out of the robe and shucked his pants. Just like that, all he wore was the couch.
Her hands went straight to his nipples, pebbled, flat, and brown. “Oh, I’m still pissed. Doesn’t mean I’m not curious.” She thumbed his nipples with firm, circular presses.
His hands came up and returned the favor, easing inside the V-neck dress without hesitation. “It’s been a long time for me. I’ll do better the next time.”
She laughed and arched her chest into his touch. His hands were rougher than Leo’s and so was his skin. On a whisper, she dared to issue him a command she never wanted to give Leo. “Harder.”
He never even paused, instantly pinching her nipples in a smooth, pulling grip. Struggling out of her dress, she gasped and shivered as he worked to maintain the tight pinches.
