by Jack Archer
“That’s sort of what I wanted to ask you about,” Rystar said and set her drink down on the table, its condensation making a ring on the white resin. “I’ve only ever piloted a Mach III. I’m not even sure what the old II’s look like anymore.”
“The only reason I suggested the II was because it’s smaller and less threatening,” Kyran explained. “If they see a military class Mach III dive down to their doorstep, even a busted-ass one, I assure you they’ll be more suspicious than you’d like them to be.”
“How did you know it was military class?” Rystar asked, narrowing her eyes at him.
Shit. Kyran sniffed and leaned back in his chair, thinking quickly. “It’s the same style as some of the Mach III’s I’ve seen come from Earth. I assumed you inherited it or bought it in a junkyard.”
“A junkyard?” Rystar scoffed, pulling her Cortijet from her pocket and taking a hit. “I’ll have you know my mother fought in the Second LASSO War in that piece of junk.”
“Alright, alright,” Kyran chuckled and held a hand out, “no need to get so defensive, sugar.”
Rystar didn’t growl at the nickname. This time, her face flushed, and she took a sip of her drink before looking up at Kyran with her soft, green eyes. In them, he saw the forests of his homeworld, the dark, salty seas of his hometown. Same shape as Ephrem’s, but an entirely different color. He shook his head and sipped again.
“What’s in that anyway?” he asked after a moment, pointing to the object in her hand when she took another puff.
“It’s called a Cortijet,” she responded, looking down at it as she exhaled the thick vapors. “I have something called ACCF, totally incurable. This is an experimental treatment to help the lungs repair themselves from the damage caused by it.”
“ACCF, huh?” Kyran said, hanging his head. “Well, I’m glad you have something to help you with it.”
“Me too,” Rystar said, “the pain can be unbearable sometimes.”
Sometimes.
“Is that why you drink so much?” Kyran said, his filter disappearing the more he sipped at his own glass. He met Rystar’s gaze, and she gaped at him for a moment before setting her glass down and tilting her head.
“A little forward,” she scoffed, but her smile remained. It was hard to not reach out and touch her hand, to let his fingers graze over hers. Her hand would turn over, and he’d lightly stroke her palm before bringing her fingers up to his mouth and dragging a fang across them with such ease, so careful. But he didn’t, and she sighed as if she noticed.
“Well, we’re friends now, aren’t we?” he asked and set his drink down, licking his lips and fixing her with a gentle stare. “You’re not even trying to escape or anything.”
“You must have really won me over with your sob story,” she replied, a half-smile gracing her face.
“Is it really a sob story if it’s actually sad?” Kyran asked.
“I guess you’re right,” she said, shrugging. “You just don’t strike me as the type to get caught up in something like this, you know?”
“What type do I seem like?” he asked, voice going low as he leaned forward towards her, elbows on the table.
Rystar gulped and tucked her chin back a little as he got closer, and he was drunk on the feeling of making her writhe under him. Psychologically, that was. Not physically. Yet. He rolled his eyes at himself and focused on Rystar again, even though that was getting more difficult as the night wore on.
“You seem like the type to do what’s best for him and his crew,” she said, tilting her head. “Not that that’s a bad thing, but wanting to recruit people for a war between the Terrans and Ya’ados—”
“—and Sustris,” Kyran tacked on for good measure.
“—and Sustris,” Rystar repeated and nodded at him, “seems like… not your kind of thing.”
“You’d be surprised what kinds of things I’ve done,” Kyran said into his drink.
“Tell me about them,” Rystar said, downing the rest of hers and sliding it away to lean forward on the table. The look she gave him was criminal. It wasn’t sexy or seductive, it was just curious. He hadn’t seen someone so into what he did in so long. Not since…
“Alright, I guess I can’t get away from story time for much longer,” Kyran sighed and looked up at her. He took in a huge breath and pursed his lips for a moment. “I was on Earth for a while, long before you were born.”
Rystar’s eyes flew open, and her mouth curled up in a grin. “How old are you?”
“I am…” he replied, scrunching up his face and counting on his fingers, “seven hundred and forty years old.”
Rystar’s mouth hung open now, and she looked down at the table before narrowing her eyes at him. “So that means… how long were you on Earth?”
This is why he didn’t want to have this conversation. It made him too close, too human, even though his biology said differently. “Since the 1500s, I believe. Saw your history, your failings, your eventual successes.”
Rystar’s mouth shut as she processed the information, her eyes a stormy green now, swimming with confusion. “You mean to tell me you were on Earth since the 1500s? You’re more human than I am.” She let out a humorless laugh and played with the condensation on the table.
“I’m just as human as you are if you think about it,” he said in a low voice, tapping his fingers on the table before reaching out to grab her hand. “I fought in your wars, healed your people.”
“I’d say you’ve earned your status as human,” Rystar said, smiling at him. It hardly extended to her eyes, and Kyran didn’t know why his chest tightened the way it did. He couldn’t tell her about Ephrem, not yet. It had been fifty years, but it still hurt like nothing he’d ever felt in his seven and half centuries.
“I should probably get going,” Kyran announced, squeezing Rystar’s hand and letting go, ignoring the coldness that seeped through him now.
“Yeah, I’m going to stay here for a bit, have another drink or three,” Rystar said, holding up her empty glass and standing up with Kyran. They faced each other, almost the same height, and Kyran longed to hold her without knowing why.
Was it because of Ephrem?
He shook the thought from his head and put a hand on her shoulder before brushing past her and heading towards the elevators, back to his quarters.
Chapter Five
Rystar Umara: DSV Firehawk
Why did Kyran living on Earth so long bother her?
Rystar couldn’t put her finger on it, just a dull ache in her bones that screamed she would never be as human or as in love with Earth as Kyran was. He had seen the Earth before it died when it was in its prime. He had seen the rise of the Aurumnean Empire as well as the fall of the American one.
She sipped on her drink and thought about his deep red eyes that seemed to know everything about her and where she lived and failed to be upset or angry about it. In fact, it was just the opposite. He was the last living remnant of Earth, and she had to hold onto him as close as she could.
“Rystar?”
She looked up to see Shea still in his work clothes, dusty hair cropped up in all directions. “Hey, come have a drink with me.”
“I saw Kyran leave. Were you two hanging out in here?” he asked, heading towards the cabinets and bringing out a sleeve of crackers.
“Yeah, we were just catching up,” she said with a shake of her head. “Why?”
“Just asking,” he said, shrugging. He ate a few crackers before putting the sleeve away and heading towards the table. “Don’t feel like drinking tonight.”
“Yeah, that’s fine,” Rystar said, nodding and looking down at the empty glass she hadn’t refilled yet. Suddenly, she didn’t feel like drinking either. “Are you upset or something?”
Shea didn’t respond immediately, and Rystar looked up to see his frown and how he chewed on his lip ring before raising his eyes to her again. “I’m sorry, yeah, everything is fine, I just—” he cut himself off with a shake of his head. “I don’t
know. Ever since Chantakor, we haven’t really talked. I feel like you kind of forgot about me.”
Rystar’s eyebrows stitched together, and she stood up, moving towards him, but Shea tensed up as she got to him, and she stopped, holding out her hands. “I know it’s been crazy, and I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to ignore you.”
“I don’t feel ignored,” Shea said, lifting his shoulder and rubbing the back of his head. “It’s just with…” he gestured to the door Kyran had left from, and Rystar kind of felt like she got it.
“He’s just really intense,” she managed to stammer out, “he kind of demands your time when he speaks. It’s weird.”
“Sure,” Shea said with a knowing smile, playing with the hem of his jacket. “I’m going to go take a shower. I’ll see you later?”
“Yeah, see you later,” Rystar said with a shake of her head, watching him leave and wondering just how much she had ignored him.
If Kyran’s talk had put her in a weird mood, running into a shirtless Shea in the hallway had amplified that by a hundred.
“Shea, what are you doing out here?” Rystar asked, offended he had the nerve to be around her looking the way he did. “I thought you were turning in.”
“I took a shower, and I thought about some things,” he said, pushing some damp, shaggy hair from his face, and Rystar shuddered. “I wanted to catch you before you got to your room to tell you I’m sorry.”
“You have nothing to be sorry for,” Rystar said, holding up her hands and shaking her head. “I shouldn’t have ignored you for as long as I have. You’re my partner above all else, and you’re out here in this unknown place, and I’m pretty sure I got you fired from the FDDS—”
“Speaking of,” Shea cut in, taking a steady step towards her, “I still don’t agree with how you did what you did, but I can see why. And I’ve changed my mind.”
“That must have been one hell of a shower,” Rystar chuckled and took a deep breath as he stopped a foot from her. Rystar was tall, but Shea towered over her, and it was refreshing.
“Not as good as it could have been, I think,” Shea said with a deadly grin, tilting his head at her and pushing on his lip ring, pressing his tongue between his teeth. Rystar blinked slowly and sighed.
“Shea, I can’t keep doing this with you, I’m your—” she began but stopped, realizing she didn’t rank over him anymore. Earlier in the day, she had attempted to access her old email and found she couldn’t, so they were definitely not bounty hunters for the FDDS anymore. Shea wasn’t her subordinate, although she wondered if he could sub for her.
Focus!
“You’re not my superior anymore,” Shea said, tilting his head back and smiling again. “I’m just another rogue bounty hunter to you. So we can do whatever we want.”
Oh, if only he would let her do whatever she wanted to him, there was so much. For now, she got up on her toes and pressed their lips together, lightly at first but then more insistently. She wrapped her arms around his bare waist and sighed as he pushed them together, loving the way he ran his fingers through her hair and scratched at her scalp.
They got so caught up in each other, they forgot they were in the middle of the hallway where anyone could walk in on them. Rystar pulled away, and Shea followed her, intent on keeping her as close as possible. Rystar’s voice was low when she spoke again. “We should head to my room.”
Shea said nothing but nodded his head, grabbing onto Rystar’s belt loop as they walked the last few paces to her room and shut the door. Shea pushed her against it as soon as it was closed and lifted her up by her thighs so she could wrap them around his waist. Holding her up with one hand, he let the other cup her face as he kissed her deeply, trying his best to crawl inside her and live there forever.
She didn’t realize how strong he was until he wrapped one arm around her back and carried her across the room to her bed, laying her down gently and running his hands up her sides, over her shoulders, up her face and into her hair. Rystar pulled away and took a deep breath, throwing her head back and letting Shea place kisses down her jawline, her neck, her collarbone.
She writhed beneath him, the weight he put upon her, so alive and warm and insistent. He was already shirtless and asked her to be, too. Rystar sat up and stripped off her jacket and shirt, throwing them across the room before Shea was on her again, hands splayed across her skin, leaving trails of fire wherever he touched.
He had freckles spattered across his chest and looked like a galaxy as he stood up and stripped off his pants before crawling up onto the bed and her. She unhooked her bra and slid it off as he kissed between her breasts, taking her all in, and she scooted up the bed, sending him further down her anatomy, not that she minded.
His hands looked huge on her body, and she shuddered thinking about the things his fingers were about to do. Currently, they were messing with the waistband of her jeans, sliding around her hips and scratching down her sides, and she was in pieces. He unzipped her jeans, and she wiggled out of them as gracefully as she could, but really, there was no graceful way of taking off your pants as quickly as possible.
“Ry, I have to tell you something,” Shea muttered as he kissed her stomach and climbed up her again to get to her lips. He placed little pecks on her cheeks, her bottom lip, and she felt the cold metal of his ring press against her skin. It made her shiver.
“What is it?” she asked, vaguely curious about anything someone would want to say at a time like this.
He propped himself up on his elbow and stroked at her cheek, gazing down at her with such longing in his eyes that Rystar didn’t know how to handle it. His eyes, such a dark brown laced with gold and black rivers around the edges, and she was lost for a moment until he began to speak again.
“I think I’m in love with you,” he said, brows furrowed and eyes filled with concern. He sounded like he was ordering a drink but the biting of his lip said otherwise.
Rystar’s heart contracted, her breathing became more erratic as she processed the fact that one, no one had ever told her that they loved her, and two, it was Shea Hendi, the former bane of her existence, and now… Now, what was he? Partner? Friend? Lover?
Her mouth hung open, and she shook her head, but before she could stammer anything out, Shea kissed her again. He pulled away, eyes focused on hers. “You don’t have to say anything. I just wanted you to know.”
“Well hell, Shea, what am I supposed to say to that?” Rystar huffed but pulled her arms around his neck and pulled him back down to kiss him. When she pulled away, she was almost angry, but his bright demeanor softened her chest a little. “I really like you. I don’t know when it happened, maybe on Chantakor. I don’t know if I love you, and I’m sorry.”
“I don’t need you to love me the way I love you,” he said with a shake of his head. “I just need you to be honest with me. That’s all I ask.”
Rystar laid there for a moment, soaking all of him in. She shook her head, wondering how she got so lucky before pulling him in and whispering against his lips. “I promise.”
Shea smiled as if that was all he needed in life and scooped her up, holding her tightly as he drove his tongue in her mouth, kissing her as fiercely as she did him, biting her lower lip, and moaning into her neck when they came up for air. His sounds were addictive, and she scraped her nails up his back to make more. She wasn’t disappointed and chuckled to herself, making him swoop back down and bite at her shoulder, her collarbone.
He made his way back down her body with a thick-fingered hand and dipped into her panties, sliding into her wetness, and she threw her head back as he circled her, slowly, painfully slow. He lowered his head to suck on a nipple, and she arched her back at him, desperate for more.
As he slid a finger in, Rystar wanted to howl into the night but bit her lip, clamping down around him, and Shea smiled against her cheek. “God, you feel amazing.”
“You have no idea,” she murmured as he kissed her again, sending in another finger and thrustin
g so slowly, in the most delicious way, and she bucked up into him, wantonly groaning at the way he made her feel.
“Show me, then,” he whispered and slid his fingers out. Suddenly she felt empty and cold until his weight was on her again. His naked erection pressed against her thigh, and she bucked up, her hands shooting down between them to grab at it. Shea moaned as her hand wrapped around him and squeezed, bringing him closer to her.
But Shea had other plans and scooped her up, sliding off her panties and sitting her in his lap as she lined herself up and sank down on him. Sure, she might be going a little fast. Foreplay was an important thing. But she needed him so bad at that moment as they sat there, holding each other as she made herself accustomed to him inside her, and finally, she began to move.
Shea moved his mile-long legs so that he was sitting cross-legged underneath her with her legs wrapped around his waist, and she bent down to kiss him, moving her hips to slide along his length and listening as she made him moan with every move.
“How about now?” she said breathlessly, her arms draped around his neck, pressing their sweating foreheads together.
“You’re incredible,” Shea whispered on her neck, biting lightly and making Rystar push herself into him until she couldn’t go any further.
“I’m alright,” she chuckled at him, leaning back to get a good look at him in this state. She wasn’t disappointed. His shaggy hair hung in strings down his forehead, his dark eyes only slightly focused on her in the haze of lust they both watched the other through. “You, on the other hand, are…”
“Just doing my best,” he panted out, letting his hands trail down her back to cup her ass. He looked up at her through his eyelashes. “You’re kind of my first.”
Rystar cocked an eyebrow and stopped grinding for a moment to look at him before pursing her lips as he began to smile. “You’re a jerk.”
“You like me,” he said and pressed his lips against her neck, lifting Rystar up and setting her down on her back. He placed one hand on the bed next to her and hooked his other arm under her knee before thrusting into her again, and Rystar let her head fall back against the sheets.