Captive of Pleasure; the Space Pirate's Woman (The LodeStar Series) (32 page)

He tucked his chin and looked down into her face, upturned like a flower to the sun, and where that poetic shit was coming from, he didn’t know and didn’t want to.
 

“You okay? I didn’t scare you, did I? Didn’t go all Mau on you.”

“I called in four of your strongest men to subdue you,” she said solemnly.
 

Dark as his mood, he couldn’t help chuckling at that. “Think you’re funny, eh?”

She ducked her head, but not before he saw her smile. He filched her mug and took a drink.

“Ah…did I—” he began. “That is, did we—?”
Did I take your virginity when I was too damn drunk to remember? Or did I just rut on you like a sloppy drunk, and give you a disgust of me
and
sex?

“Oh,” she mumbled. “Um, no. We didn’t. Not really.”

Relief flooded him. “Okay. That’s good. I mean, for you. I was drunk. Wouldn’t want to…hurt you.” He took another drink of coffee.

“You didn’t,” she said, not looking at him.

Joran walked over to look out the open door at the morning. It was late, the sun already high and hot.
 

He rarely slept late, and knowing the camp had roused and begun their day without him sent guilt churning in his gut, battling the gesic. He needed to be out there, available for them to talk it out. For Ilya to pound on, if that was what she needed.

And he had to plan what to do next. They had to go forward, even without Var. If they didn’t, Cerul still had the upper hand, and she would come down on them like an asteroid. Also, one of Vadyal’s minions would step up and take over his place as head of the slavers. Get the operation running again, just as before. This was probably happening even now.
 

He remembered the look in Vadyal’s mistress’ eyes, as she’d proclaimed that she had the keys to all his wealth. Perhaps she saw herself as the new head of his operation. It would explain the gleam of triumph.

“Do you want breakfast?” Zaë asked.

He shuddered. “Hells, no. Just coffee for now.”

The camp was active, although those he could see out and about were moving slowly, as if weighted with an unseen burden. It lay across his shoulders, too, almost more than he could bear and still stand.
Var.

He drained his mug abruptly and turned back to stalk across the tont. “More coffee. Please.”

She set his mug under the spout of the coffee maker, and when it was full, slid it across the counter to him. He looked her over, standing straight and graceful in her waterfall of lii silk, the deep vee of the neckline baring the top of the delicious cleft between her breasts, the fabric clinging to her curves.
 

The collar glinted on her throat. He sipped his coffee and contemplated her. He didn’t recall a whole lot of the evening before, but he remembered how good she’d felt in his arms, a man would have to be dead not to.
 

She gave him a look from under her lashes, and then smiled tentatively, her blue eyes luminous.

Joran flinched as he remembered that Var would never see his woman’s smile again.
 

“Zaë,” he began. “What happened last night—it didn’t mean anything more than just…sex. Not for a man like me. You get that, right?”

Her smile slipped away. Then she lifted her chin, and faced him proudly. “Of course,” she said. “Just sex, I understand. That’s all it was for me, too.”

What the fuck? He stared at her. She didn’t even know what ‘just sex’ was—or hadn’t experienced it, not fully, so she sure as hells couldn’t claim that—not when she’d held him in her arms and comforted him, then clung to him as he kissed and fondled her.

Which was where his drunken memories faded, but he knew more had happened, because he’d awakened with his cum dried on his skin. Had she found pleasure? Probably not, in fact, surely not.
 

“Baby, I doubt you had that great a time, with a drunk on you.”

She scowled at him, her cheeks going scarlet. She slammed her coffee mug on the counter so hard coffee slopped over the edge. “Oh, I had a
fine
time. I’m not stupid, you know. I’m perfectly capable of making sure I find pleasure, even if you were so drunk you couldn’t—”
 

Her eyes widened, and she clapped her hand over her mouth.

His brows flew up and then he grinned at her. “Fuck me, you got yourself off, didn’t you, sweetheart? Well, good for you. Make you a promise, though. It’ll be the last time you have to do that, with me anyway.”

She stared at him over her hand, frozen.
 

“Although,” he added, leaning in. “I wouldn’t mind watching you pleasure yourself. In fact, it’d be seven hells of a turn on for me.”

She made a sound that was half-way between a whimper and a squeak. He put his hand over hers, tugged her hand down and kissed her, on her open, soft, surprised lips.
 

It was even better than he remembered. Maybe they could have their little show and tell right now. He was having trouble remembering why he’d thought it wasn’t a good idea.

Then someone pounded on the tont door. “Boss! Boss, you in there? We have visitors.”

Joran closed his eyes, and wished Haro to the deepest of the seven hells. But at least the man had hailed him the old-fashioned way, letting him have his privacy. He let Zaë go and straightened. No, the interruption was for the best.

He walked away from her. Left her leaning on the counter, flushed and dazed, her mouth soft and wet from his kisses.

He yanked his shirt loose from his pants to cover his erection as he crossed the room. He opened the door and jerked his head to beckon Haro in, and Qala who was on his heels.

Haro wasted no time. “Vadyal’s whore is here. I kid you not—she just landed in that fancy ass gold cruiser. She’s waiting on board, wants to see you.”

“That was fast.”

“Yeah,” Haro growled. “Can we blow the cruiser, and her in it,
please
?”

Joran grunted. This did not sound like the worst option available. Except that she’d indicated that she knew a lot about Vadyal’s operations, including who his minions and partners were. This was information Joran wanted.

“You want my opinion?” Qala asked.

He raised his brows.
 

“She’s after a new partner—you. I saw the way she looked at you, right over his shoulder.”

“Well then,” Joran said. “Reckon I’d better attend her on her craft.”

Qala put her hand on his arm. “Be careful. I noticed something else, didn’t pay attention then. She’s—”

“The one who shot Vadyal,” Joran said with her. He raised his brows. “Sharp eyes, Qala.”

Haro gave her a proud look. “I didn’t notice that. Course I was a bit busy, stopping a laser shot myself.”

“How’s your shoulder?” Joran asked, already tucking in his shirt. Mention of the Serpentian woman had quelled his arousal as quickly as a dash of ice water.

“Fine. Riley fixed me up with gesics and a session in the regen tube. He said I should be healed up completely in a week or so.”

“Good. You follow his instructions, understand? Laser wound is nothing to mess with.” He’d lost Var, he wasn’t losing Haro to infection.

Haro looked at him with surprise, then nodded, a smile tipping up his wide mouth. “You bet, boss.”

Qala frowned. “I don’t like this. The woman’s a conscienceless slut—killed her man and stepped over his back to get to you. What’s to say she won’t do the same to you?”

“Difference is,” Joran said, “I won’t turn my back on her.” As he had with Cerul.

He jerked his head toward the door, and the pair stepped outside. Joran looked across the room at Zaë, who was watching, her arms wrapped around herself, face pinched.

“Stay in the tont until they’re gone, bunny,” he said.
 

“Don’t worry,” she said with a shudder. “I don’t want to see them either. But please, be careful.”

He shook his head. “That’s not really in the holodice right now.”

She took a step forward. “Joran, what are you up to?”

“Is that what you call me?”

She looked hurt, her eyes wide and dark. “I may not call you by your given name?”

No one called him by his given name, except his brothers. An unexpected surge of humor licked through him, lighter than air. “Not unless you call me Master part of the time.”

She wrinkled her nose. “We’re done with that, remember? And you didn’t answer my question. Fine, then, but be careful, Storm. Or who knows, you may end up with a collar around
your
neck.”

He shook his head at her chidingly. “Best watch your tongue, my Zaë. ‘Cause now you’ve earned yourself another reprimand.”

The thought of chastising her later, just the two of them on his big bed, with her sweet bottom up over his thighs chased away a bit of his revulsion at what he had to do next.

“Then perhaps so have you,” she shot back. By the look in her blue eyes, she was thinking a real punishment.

He shook his head. “Can’t wait to see what you come up with. Something with feathers would be fun.”

Then he stepped out to do yet another unpleasant task, his mood lighter than he deserved.

***

Zaë intended to stay in the tont, really she did. But she was on edge after her skirmish with the Storm and worry scratched at her like the mawwr’s claws when it forgot to sheathe them.
 

And perhaps she was a little jealous—all right, a lot. One moment he had been holding her in his arms and kissing her as if she was the most delectable dessert ever, and the next he’d been opening the door to his lieutenants, forgetting her as he went off to meet with another woman. One who was apparently so evil she shot her own lover to get to Joran Stark.
 

Qala had called her dangerous, and a slut. Neither of which Zaë wanted the Storm exposed to. These people behaved as if sex was a natural, easy thing, so if they colored this female with the acidgel of sluttishness, that said very bad things. What if the woman tricked him? Even managed to harm him?

She would keep an eye on him—from a distance. She wasn’t stupid, or so she hoped. She’d already been snatched once, so she would keep her distance from the slavers’ craft.

She was surprised not to be accosted when she slipped out of his tont. But although his people were out and about and she received the usual curious looks, everyone seemed to be precoccupied with a new tension.
 

Because of Var’s death, she knew. Ilya’s tont door was closed, but Ringi hurried to it, a covered dish in her hands, and disappeared inside.

But the tension was also, Zaë soon realized, because everyone knew that there was a strange ship here. The Storm’s people all seemed to be busy outside, but when she studied one group of warriors around a hovercycle with its insides laid out on the ground, their heads turned as often toward the mooring area for space craft as they did toward the repairs.

She walked alongas if she was on a casual stroll. ‘Just going to the cata pen,’ she would say if anyone asked her.
 

It was not as hot in the shade of the trees, and a breeze rustled the leaves overhead, teasing at her hair and sending her skirts rippling around her.
 

A rough looking older man with a long gray beard, sharpening a long blade in the shade of an awning, paused to give her a speculative look. Zaë hoped her guilt and nerves didn’t show. She nodded pleasantly to the man, causing him to wink at her and grin, his tanned face crinkling into a thousand creases.
 

She paused by the cata pen to pet her favorite mount, then walked on. Just past the pens, she stopped to look around. She was close to the camp, and still in sight of the knife sharpener.

She waved casually to him, and then reached blindly for a nearby shrub, as if she were picking leaves for a bouquet. One hand full of leaves, she peered through the trunks of the trees. There was the
Hawk
under her awning.
 

And to one side of her, Zaë glimpsed gold cerametal—an opulent cruiser. In the shade of one wing sat a woman, her auburn hair like a signal flag against the gold of the cruiser and her metallic gown. Zaë couldn’t see her face, but the woman’s bearing said she was beautiful and she knew it.

A servant moved to her, bearing two goblets of dark wine, while a man sat beside her, leaning close. The woman leaned into him, her hand on his chest, his arm over the back of her chair. The line of his body, the tilt of his head toward her said he was focused entirely on her.

A giant fist struck Zaë directly over her heart. The man was Joran Stark, and he was looking at the woman the way he’d looked at her, Zaë. As if she were the most entrancing creature he’d yet seen, and he wanted more.

Zaë sucked in a breath, jealousy and anger flaming in her middle. She crushed the leaves in her fist. She’d known he was promiscuous, but this was beyond anything!

Then the woman moved, and Zaë saw her face. Her anger turned to horror. She sucked in a breath, ready to call out a warning. Her mangled handful of greenery fell to her feet.