by S. E. Smith
Tink’s eyes widened even further when the familiar voice whispered in her ear. “Hang on.”
One minute she was on a spaceship god-knows-where and the next she was in Cosmos’ lab. She watched as a small smoking device was tossed into the space ship’s bridge. Her breath caught in her throat as she watched J’kar lunge for her a moment too late. He leaped over the railing using one hand to give him momentum but the doorway was already closing before his feet hit the other side of the railing. The last thing she saw was a look of pure rage - she had never seen anyone look like they had pure death in their eyes before. It was not directed at her but at the man holding her. It was a look that said painful restitution would be paid for taking her. Then, everything went mercifully black.
Tink slowly stretched her arms over her head, tilting her head back and arching her back like a cat. “Mm, what a dream.” She mused as she tried to get her brain working.
Moving like she had weights tied to her arms, Tink rolled over to look at the clock. Her eyes flew open when she realized it was four in the afternoon. Groaning, she pushed herself into a sitting position.
“Well, it’s about time you came back to the world of the living.” Cosmos’ deep voice said from the doorway. “I thought I was going to have to call in re-enforcements if you didn’t wake up soon.”
Tink let out a little yelp before flopping backwards on the bed. Raising a hand to her chest she gave the man standing in the doorway her best “evil eye”. The last thing she needed was a scare before caffeine, especially after the weird dreams she just had.
“You scared the holy crap out of me, Cosmos!” Tink said as she let out the huge breath she was holding. “What are you doing here? You weren’t supposed to be home for a couple of weeks according to the message you left with RITA.”
“The trip turned out to be a bust. Mom and Dad had another invitation to present in Japan and called at the last minute to cancel my heading to Chicago. It’s just as well. What the hell do you think you were doing? Do you have any idea how dangerous what you did was? Have you lost your mind! You scared the shit out of me. If I hadn’t come back when I did there is no telling what could have happened to you!” Cosmos’ face darkened the more he spoke and the level of his voice rose higher than Tink had ever heard him speak before.
Normally when Cosmos got mad he got really, really quiet. Tink couldn’t ever remember hearing him actually raise his voice before. Not even when she took his favorite motorcycle, Harvey, for a spin and crashed it into a tree. It took her three months to rebuild it and he had hardly talked to her until she presented it to him. Even now, he kept it locked up so she couldn’t get to it.
“What the hell are you talking about? What did I do?” Tink couldn’t think. Her head felt like it was full of cotton. “God, I need some caffeine. Can you wait to tell me what I did after I’ve had a cup or two of coffee?” Pushing herself off the bed, she started to walk across the room when she caught her reflection in the mirror.
“Oh, God.” She said as she took in her appearance. She was still dressed in the outfit she wore to Purple Haze’s the other night.
Turning to look around the room for any evidence of a hopefully non-existent one-night stand, Tink let out a breath when she realized only one side of the bed was messed up.
“I don’t remember drinking anything. Please tell me you didn’t rescue my virtue or I let that bonehead of a professor into your lab.” Tink ran her hand through her hair again and tried to smooth out some of the wrinkles in her clothes. Sighing loudly, she shook her head.
“Forget it.” Tink said raising her hand to silence Cosmos before he could even utter a word. “I don’t think I could deal with it yet if I did such an asinine thing. Give me fifteen minutes to get a shower. If you could get the coffee and maybe some toast for me I’ll be out in a few minutes.” Tink begged a very disgruntled looking Cosmos with pleading eyes.
“Fifteen minutes.” Cosmos said as he turned to leave the room.
Pausing, he turned back around. The look in his eyes made Tink’s breath catch again. She had never seen Cosmos look so shaken.
“Tink, I’m glad you’re okay.” Cosmos turned again and left before Tink could reply.
Shaking, Tink moved into her bathroom slowly undressing. Raising a shaking hand to her mouth, she wondered what she had done that was so bad it could affect Cosmos this way. Pulling her hand away, she looked at it. There, in the palm of her left hand, was a series of intricate circles. Frowning, Tink rubbed her right fingers over it. It looked sort of like a tattoo but was so finely drawn she couldn’t image how anyone could have created it. It wasn’t raised up or red like it had just been done. She had seen new tattoos on some of the mechanics after they got them done and they were always red for a couple of days afterwards. This didn’t make sense either. As sensitive as the palm of your hand is there is no way she could have been so drunk as to not remember it. Hell, she didn’t even drink so that left being drunk out. Could someone have slipped something into her water? No, she remembered leaving the bar just fine. In fact, she remembered everything from the time she left the bar until….the dream.
It had been a dream, hadn’t it? There was no way she could have gone through a magical doorway and landed on a spaceship, could she? Turning the water to the shower on, she adjusted the temperature to be a little cooler than she liked it in a hope it would help clear her mind. God, she felt like Alice in Wonderland falling through the rabbit hole. She remembered working on the generator and planning on sleeping in late. Leaning forward, Tink rested her forehead and arms against the side of the shower and let the water run over her. Shaking her head from side to side over and over, she tried to remember when she went to bed but all she could remember was being on the spaceship staring into the most amazing silver eyes she had ever seen. Then, being pulled over the railing and hearing a roar of rage so intense she shook out of fear.
J’kar. The man with the dark silver eyes was called J’kar. Sliding her hand down, Tink turned off the water and reached for the towel on the towel rack. Drying herself off and wrapping the towel around her hair, she slowly dressed. What if it hadn’t been a dream? What if it was real? Pulling a pair of white lace panties on, Tink slid her legs into a pair of black jeans. Slowly pulling on a matching lacy bra, she tugged the towel off her head and pulled on a white T-shirt. Tink hung the towel back on the towel rack and grabbed her dirty clothes off the floor stuffing them into the dirty clothes hamper. At the last minute she remembered the lanyard with the odd metal device hanging from it. She could ask Cosmos what it was. She pulled her skirt out of the hamper to retrieve it. She remembered putting it in her pocket. Patting each side, she frowned when she didn’t feel anything. Pulling the other clothes out, she looked through them…nothing. Where could it be? Shrugging her shoulders, she wondered if maybe it had fallen out when Cosmos grabbed her and he had it. Grabbing her hairbrush off the counter, Tink left the bathroom and headed for the little kitchenette.
Cosmos looked up from placing two slices of whole wheat toast on a plate next to two eggs over-easy. He watched as Tink came into the room. She was brushing out her short hair which was drying into a wild swirl of curls around her head. Dressed in a tight white, v-neck T-Shirt, black jeans, and barefoot she was beautiful. He felt his chest tighten when he thought of what could have happened to her if he hadn’t come home when he did. He closed his eyes when he remembered the look on the other men’s faces. He knew the one man would kill him without a second thought. The way he came after him and Tink was enough to make him glad he hadn’t had to fight him. But it was the way the man looked at Tink, as if she belonged to him and the look he gave Cosmos that left him in little doubt he would never have willingly let Tink leave.
Pouring a cup of coffee, he pushed it next to the plate he set out on the breakfast bar. “Feeling better?”
“Yeah. What about you?” Tink set the hairbrush on the stool next to her and climbed up onto the one in front of the food. Leaning ov
er she took a deep sniff. Her stomach let out a growl. “Mm, caffeine and food. I could get used to this.” She said appreciatively.
Cosmos’ lips curved up at the corners. “Yeah, well don’t plan on it. That’s about the extent of my culinary skills.” Taking a sip of his coffee he leaned against the counter. “Tink, I have to ask you about what happened last night.”
Tink’s hand paused in the act of taking a bite out of her eggs. Setting the fork back down on her plate, she picked up her coffee cup instead. She needed to feel the warmth of the cup around her hands and the smell to calm her suddenly racing pulse.
“What do you want to know?” Tink asked hesitantly.
“Tell me what happened. All of it.” Cosmos asked quietly.
Tink took a sip of her coffee to give herself time to get her thoughts in order. Setting the cup in front of her but not letting it go she took a deep breath and began telling Cosmos everything that happened the night before. When she finished she took another sip of her coffee. It wasn’t as hot as it had been and she realized she wasn’t hungry any more.
“So, what happened after I passed out? What did you throw onto the ship? The men didn’t hurt me or anything. Hell, we didn’t even talk to each other really. We couldn’t understand each other.” Tink said defensively.
“It was a smoke bomb from Halloween. I had a couple of them left over and it was handy. After I grabbed you, you passed out. Scared the shit out of me at first! Then, I realized you were breathing okay and your color looked good. I figured your body was just saying enough was enough. I carried you up to your room and let you sleep it off. I kept an eye on you all day and had RITA monitoring your respiration.” Cosmos reached for the coffee pot and filled his and Tink’s cup back up.
“How did RITA know the portal was about to open?” Tink asked as she picked at the toast on her plate.
“I set a default on the portal to open two hours after the initial opening. It is set to find the DNA signature of the person who goes through. From what I could gather from RITA when you opened your cell phone to take pictures, which by the way I want to analyze, she was able to connect with the computer system on the ship via their “wireless/Bluetooth” connection. It isn’t quite that simple or easy but gives you an idea. Anyway, she was able to contact you.” Cosmos explained.
“Are you saying RITA is still on the spaceship I was on?” Tink asked faintly in disbelief.
“A part of me is, dear. It’s like my twin is there now.” RITA said in a cheerful voice. “I was able to load my basic programming to the ship’s computer. By now, my ‘twin’ should be analyzing and adapting to their system. It will take a little while, a couple days at least, for my ‘twin’ to fully acclimate herself.”
“RITA, can you give me it in basic terms?” Tink pleaded her head beginning to ache again.
“I’m taking over their ship and giving them a taste of Earth etiquette? How does that sound?” RITA replied.
“Like trouble with a capital T.” Tink groaned as she laid her head on her arms which she had resting on the countertop.
Cosmos tried to cover his laugh with a cough. “You can say that again. God, your mother has taken over the space ship. They won’t know what hit them!”
Barely raising her head to glare at Cosmos, Tink muttered darkly. “You think this is so funny, don’t you?” Raising her left hand to stop his sarcastic reply, Tink lowered her head back down to rest her chin on her right forearm.
“What the hell is that?” Cosmos asked as he grabbed her hand yanking it towards him so he could see it better.
“I don’t know. It suddenly appeared after J’kar touched me.” Tink tugged on her hand trying to pull it away from Cosmos.
For some reason she wasn’t sure she wanted to talk to him about it. God, she was so confused. It felt like someone was tearing her apart on the inside. She felt itchy and achy and having a major PMS attack all at once. All she wanted to do was cry. She never cried! Not even when she was PMSing. All she wanted to do then was beat the crap out of someone. What was going on? She felt like she was falling apart all of the sudden. Fighting back tears she pulled on her hand again.
Cosmos looked at the intricate circles then at Tink. His eyes widened when he saw she was on the verge of tears. Letting her hand go he walked around the breakfast bar and slowly pulled her into his arms.
“It’s okay, baby.” Cosmos said gently as he rocked Tink back and forth against his huge chest.
Tink suddenly couldn’t hold the tears back any more. She began sobbing uncontrollably. Wrapping her arms tightly around Cosmos waist, she pressed her face into his chest and cried like her heart was breaking. It felt like it was. She hurt so much and she didn’t understand why. All Cosmos could do was hold Tink tightly against him as she cried. When the sobs finally calmed to hiccups, he picked her up in his arms and carried her back to her bedroom. Laying her gently down on the bed, he pulled the covers over her. He brushed the hair away from her face before leaning down and giving her a kiss on the forehead.
“Let me get you some aspirin. You need to lie down for a little while longer. You haven’t had near enough sleep.” Cosmos said softly.
Letting Tink’s hand slide from his, he walked into the bathroom. In the medicine cabinet he found some aspirin. He shook out two and filled a cup with some water. Walking back to the bed he helped Tink into a semi-sitting position and held out the aspirin. Tink took the aspirin and water before slowly sinking back down into the comfort of her bed.
“Thanks, Cosmos. I don’t know what happened. I’m just so confused. Maybe after I get some sleep everything will seem better.” Tink turned onto her side and wrapped her arms around a section of the comforter almost like she was trying to snuggle up to someone and hold tight to them.
“No problem, baby. I’ll be down in the lab if you need me. Just call out to RITA and she will let me know.” Leaning down again, Cosmos brushed another kiss across Tink’s forehead before getting up and heading out the door.
He paused briefly at the door watching as Tink’s eyes closed and her breath evened out as she slipped into a light sleep. His eyes were full of worry as he studied her one last time before he walked out to go downstairs to his lab. He needed to review everything that happened. Including what the intricate circles on Tink’s hand were and what they had to do with the man who had murder in his eyes.
Chapter 8
J’kar let out another loud roar before his fists hit the wall behind the conference table. Nothing! They had found nothing. He was breathing heavy and shaking. At the table, four men watched him with concern. His brothers, Borj and Derik, sat near the head of the table in the conference room right off the bridge. Lan, his head of security and childhood friend and Brock, his head engineer and another childhood friend sat across the table near the windows facing the black darkness of space. J’kar felt that black darkness all the way to his soul. For a Prime male to find his bond mate then lose her was devastating. The male was very protective of the female and would fight to the death to protect her if necessary.
“What do you know?” J’kar asked harshly. He was trying to control his breathing and the desire to destroy anything he could put his hands on.
Lan cleared his throat before responding. “The video of the corridor where the female appeared does not show much. All we can see is once she steps up behind the Juangan. The video from the bridge isn’t much more helpful. Out of nowhere there is an energy disruption. There does not appear to be any reason for it except the female. The energy output is impressive. The device the male tossed seems to be harmless. There were no poisonous chemicals or explosive qualities to it. It appears to merely produce a harmless colored smoke. There is also the black case she left near the front. It contained a strange device for making sounds. In addition, there were numerous images of the female along with other females and males.” Lan reluctantly added the last part.
After viewing the images he didn’t think J’kar was going to be very pleased wi
th the finding. Many of the images were of the female with other males. Most of the images showed the female in the arms of the other males usually in a passionate embrace.
“What images? Where are they?” J’kar demanded holding out his hand.
Lan handed the images over to J’kar reluctantly. J’kar’s face became darker and darker as he viewed the collection of images Lan handed him. A nerve twitched on the side his jaw as he stared down into the smiling face and twinkling eyes of his bond mate. She appeared to know a great many males! Many showed her in some type of embrace with them and her face alight with laughter.
“J’kar, we did find a device on the floor near the railing. It appears the female dropped it when she was taken.” Borj said quietly as he studied his brother.
He had never seen his brother this upset and worried at his control. He wondered what the images contained that would cause his brother’s face to become even darker with fury than it had been before.