by Dani Worth
“No problem.”
My legs wobbled with the first step, and Erik pulled me closer as he walked me into the tunnel. I glanced up and caught Maska looking at us through the window. Pain poured off the man in waves, and I wanted to tell him he had nothing to worry about. Though Erik’s warmth and strength were welcome…though he smelled so good he made my mouth water, I had no intention of doing anything with the man. I didn’t want to do any more damage to any of these people.
I was going to sleep a couple of days, then give Lux the wires to her ship so she could take me out of here. No one knew I’d found one of the last escaped Replicants, and as long as he changed back into his feminine form, it would stay secret forever.
I just wanted away from here.
Unfortunately, once Erik dropped me off at my living pod, I found I no longer had a choice. My VR screen showed a message, and only one place had my number. Seems Lux’s search on the NED had alerted the wrong people, who in turn had dug until they came upon Kei’s vidscreen calls to Replicant medics. They knew I had one of the escaped Replicants and were demanding to know why he hadn’t been brought in.
Chapter Eight
I gave the administrators on Bastilleen some bullshit about problems with the ship. Though, technically, it wasn’t a lie. I’m not sure what prompted my actions, but after my shower, I crawled into that big bed and slept like the dead. When I woke, it was to alarms.
Recognizing the signal for an incoming windstorm, I raced to the panel by the front door and programmed the dome to close. I watched the little leeto outside scramble toward a hole in the tree and hoped he’d make it through. Some of the fierce storms took out even the giant, ancient trees that had withstood the explosions.
The wind hit as the dome cover closed, and I programmed low lights. The tall pods were built to sway with the winds so they didn’t snap. The interlocking tunnels had been designed by the most brilliant Gwinarian engineers, and each one sat at angles that helped support the pods while still allowing the bit of sway needed to fight the winds.
They roared outside now, ripping off leaves and small limbs that I could hear crashing into the dome. I thought about sneaking into the social pod for more booze, but didn’t have the energy. Instead, I looked in the fully stocked cooling unit built into the wall of the kitchen.
This was the room I’d avoided the most. Growing up, our family had spent most of our time in the eating area of our kitchen, sprawled on the massive cushions, sharing food or playing games. Our cushions had been a crazy pile of jewel tones because Galan, one of my fathers, had loved the brightest, most gaudy colors he could find. Naanlee and Borkan both preferred more subtle blues and greens, but they’d been unable to resist anything Galan wanted.
Neither could I nor my sisters. Galan had been a bright, beautiful ray of sunshine who thought nothing of sweeping up one of us in his brawny arms and dancing us down a public tunnel. He’d worn small braids in his long hair, and every morning I’d crawled into his lap on those bright cushions and asked him to put braids in my hair.
Realizing I was staring at the cushions with the cooling unit open, I reached inside and blindly grabbed whatever was on the top shelf. Leafy blues, just like Earth’s leafy greens. These tasted better cooked in some kind of sauce, but I didn’t want to stay in the kitchen. Crunching on the raw vegetables, I wandered back into the main room and suddenly missed my ship. I had vids and music on it. Not much—I’d been too busy to collect personal things for the most part, but I had a few things to keep my mind occupied. I paced the room, but with the dome cover on and nothing of my own inside, it was the same as walking around a rental room. Maybe more luxurious, but nothing here was mine.
In the corner, I spotted a notch on the wall and pressed it to discover it opened into a small workout room I hadn’t realized was even there. It had an air tread, the VR weight system, and one wall was a floor to ceiling mirror. Borkan, my other father, had set up one just like this in our home because Naanlee preferred working out in private. Or so he said. My sisters and I had figured out pretty young that all three of our parents liked working out in private. Especially after Galan had wedged a big, fluffy couch in the corner of the room.
Feeling a smile stretch my mouth, I swallowed and touched my cheek, only to find it wet. Looking down, I found wet tracks on my red cotton shirt and realized I’d been crying a while. Walking to the one mirrored wall, I stared at my blotchy, red face with its sharp angles and pinched mouth and remembered staring at my reflection as a youth. Seeing ornery, shiny eyes, darker than most Gwinarians’, and healthy, rounded cheeks.
I’d been pretty then.
My gaze moved up to my hair, and I touched it, feeling another smile at the memory of Erik calling it an interesting hairstyle.
These seesawing emotions are gonna kill me.
I needed another shirt, so I walked into the bedroom part of the pod and growled to find the beeping VR screen. Again.
“Guess you didn’t buy the broken ship excuse,” I muttered before carrying the screen into the closet and burying it under a pile of laundry.
I nearly crawled out of my skin when I backed into the room to find Lux standing there. “What the hell? How did you get in?”
She gave me one of those really? looks. “Maska has moved back to his living pod.” Her brows pulled together as she stepped closer.
“Good.” I knew my face looked bad. Didn’t care either.
“Aren’t you going to insist I take you off planet with him?”
“No.”
She growled and stomped closer, stopping when she could poke a finger into my shoulder. “You’ve got us all walking on eggshells around here. Make up your damned mind. And what did you do to my ship?”
I grinned. “Finally found out something’s up there, huh?”
“Kol is going over every inch of it to find the problem, but we really don’t need him to waste that kind of time, do we?”
“What do I care what Kol does with his time?”
“Look,” she said on a sigh. “You don’t have to sabotage the ship to keep from taking him back to Bastilleen. We can come up with a solution.”
“For the record, I disabled the ship the first day so you couldn’t take off with him. Also, we have no choice once that ship works. Your nosy scan on the VR screen about the NED got to the wrong people.”
She backed up and slumped down to sit on the edge of my bed. “What options do we have? Maska can’t go back.”
“No options. He was a prisoner, he escaped and he has to go back. That’s it.”
“Can you honestly tell me you can’t see the compassion, the utter kindness in that man? He’s…” She sucked in her lower lip and bit it. “He’s empathic. I can’t imagine what Bastilleen would be like for someone like him.”
It would be the worst possible nightmare. “Lux, it’s my job. I could go to jail for not taking him back.”
“You could say he got away.”
I threw up my arms. “Where? It’s not like there are hundreds of life pods here anymore. The city is small. There’s no place for him to hide, and with only one ship going in and out, I can’t say he jumped another.” Sighing, I reached for a pair of soft, Dranellian cotton pants and tugged them over my bare legs. “Has he talked to Erik yet?”
Lux shook her head. “I don’t know. Egan told Erik that Maska was awake, but Erik just locked himself in that empty pod again. Maska went back to the one they shared. Why don’t you help them?”
She lost me. “Help who?”
“Maska and Erik. I can’t stand the thought of Maska going back, but the thought of him going back brokenhearted like this is even worse. You could help them. I think there’s still attraction from Erik toward Maska. Jarana, these two were really in love. They’ve been here over a year, and they were always touching, always taking off to be alone.”
“How exactly am I supposed to help them?”
“You could be their sexual catalyst.”
I chok
ed on surprised laughter. “Their what?”
“You know what I mean.”
“You do realize I’m the reason the relationship is ruined, right?”
“Honestly, I did blame you at first, but if any of us are to be honest, the lie is the reason for the ruin. But something drew those two together, and I truly believe the love is there regardless of what form Maska is in.”
I sat on the bed facing her, curling one leg up under me. “You really changed.”
“Yeah.” She grinned. “Having two men like Egan and Kol loving me changed everything. You know, Kol thought of himself as a straight man, and trust me, he has no problem taking Egan down these days.”
I shivered, remembering that kiss they’d shared in the tunnel. “They are damned hot together. Think I’d have trouble leaving the bedroom.”
“I do, Jarana. I do.” She zoned out with a secretive smile on her face.
Chuckling, I stood up. “I’ll go talk to Maska. You should probably chase down your men to take care of that problem you’re developing.”
She lifted an eyebrow and I pointed at her hard nipples.
Looking down, she just shook her head. “Damn things always give me away.”
I found Maska heading toward the communal showers outside the mines. He was in no condition to be back at work, and yet he didn’t look tired. Just sad. Like Erik. I sighed. He was fully Maska to me now. I barely thought of the name on his file. Maska fit him—a lovely name for a lovely man. A lovely Replicant man. There was too much proof in the love the others held for him for me not to believe it.
His hair lay in ropy disarray down his back, sweat dripped off his light brown skin and he ignored me as he brushed past. I got a good whiff of him, and my knees locked when his earthy scent shocked my system into arousal instantly. He halted, looked at me over his shoulder, and the smile that pulled at those sensual lips sent wicked images into my head. He continued walking toward the showers, and I followed along like we were tied together with string.
Maska turned at the shower to face me, his eyes slitted, his stare direct as he slid the zipper of his microsuit down. That long, elegant torso came into view and I couldn’t tear my eyes away. He peeled the suit off his body, revealing nicely defined arms. He bent to push the suit down his legs. He had fantastic, masculine legs with muscled thighs and calves. That trail of silky black hair below his belly button led to an impressive dick.
An impressive, hard dick. That answered one question.
He liked women too.
Or…he’d been thinking of Erik before I caught him.
“I actually came to talk to you.” I bit off a curse at my husky voice, not that he wouldn’t already know fire licked along my skin and I burned with the effort not to strip down and get into that shower with him. As an empath, he’d feel it, but the fine trembling in my hands would have given me away anyway.
I had such a thing for wet, warm skin.
“So talk,” he answered, stepping under the showerhead. He placed his palm on the indicator, and once his identity was established, the water came on in the temperature and pressure he liked. He held his hand under the shampoo/soap dispenser and began working on that long, thick hair.
“I decided not to take you back.”
His arms paused, hands still on his head, arm muscles flexed and so damn defined, I wanted to lick along them, drink the water from his skin.
“You have to take me back or you’ll be prosecuted. Along with anyone else here found guilty of abetting a felon. I know how the system works.”
“I was going to suggest you shift back, but unfortunately, Lux nosed around looking for information on the NED, and now the administrators on Bastilleen know I found you.”
Still watching me, he returned to washing his hair. “So when do we leave?”
“We’re not. Not entirely. I’m going to destroy the device and have Lux take us off planet. I’ll say you escaped. You can take another form and eventually come back here and start again. As long as people can’t see the tattoo, you’ll be fine. You need to work on repairing your relationship with Erik. He’s a good man.” I gave him a tight smile. “I tried to come on to him on the supply station before any of this happened. He turned me down. Said he was committed. That kind of love is rare.”
Maska closed his eyes, rubbed the ropes of black hair slowly between his palms. “Erik loved the woman he met. He will never see me as anything but this again.” He waved one hand down his body.
The pain was so fresh, I could feel it radiating off him in waves. “Why did you end up on Bastilleen, Maska?”
He didn’t answer, just turned, and I couldn’t stop my small groan as I watched suds slide down the masculine planes of his back and into the crack of his ass—which was toned, round and perfect for my hands. He had knife wound scars on his bicep and another on his back. Even through the suds, I could make out the triangular shape of a well-recognized racist symbol from a nasty race from the Toquerian Sector. Someone had carved that into his back. I closed my eyes, pictured Maska held down on Bastilleen—he wasn’t a small man, and as strong as he looked, it would have taken a few to hold him down.
“Jarana?”
Opening my eyes, I met his gaze and knew my heart was there, in my eyes. I let him see me like this, let him know that under the hard, bony exterior, I had a hated soft and mushy center. I couldn’t stop myself. That stupid breakdown had me feeling so damned vulnerable, I had little control over my emotions.
His milky eyes narrowed, his nostrils flared and he slowly ran his gaze down my body as his hand slid down wet, soapy skin to wrap around his dick.
I backed up until my spine hit the wall. Heat built inside me so rapidly, moisture gathered between my legs, my breath picked up. I stared at those streams of suds and water, stared at his big, stroking hand and had to close my hands into fists so I didn’t rip off my clothes and join him. Shutting my eyes again, I leaned my head back. “Gods, what’s wrong with me?” I muttered, sure he couldn’t hear me while under the water.
“We’re compatible.” Now his voice had picked up a husky tone.
“Huh?”
He turned and more suds flowed down his body, catching in the fine dusting of dark hair on his legs. The man had long, long legs. “Replicants put off pheromones very similar to Gwinarian ones when they’re compatible with another species.”
“So, you do this with every Gwinarian you pass? And Erik’s human, so humans too?” What a pain. I’d be a walking hormone.
He got more soap and started working on his chest. “With Erik, yes. With you, yes. With everyone else, no.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m attracted to Erik and to you, and you obviously return it. Together, we can form a permanent, compatible bond, so we put off sparks.”
A permanent…oh hell, no. I tore my gaze off his gorgeous body, then had to hold my breath when I realized the musky scent of the soap, combined with the steam and those damned pheromones from him, created a heady mix of odors that seeped into my pores. “Look, Maska, I just wanted to tell you I’m sorry for using that device. I know there’s no excuse for it, but I never meant to cause you pain. And I wanted to warn you that maybe you need to find a way to get out of here and run—take another form if you don’t want to go back to the one you donned for Erik.”
The sounds of moving hands on slick skin stopped. I looked back at him.
“That would put you in a bad situation.”
I shrugged. “I’m not so sure I don’t deserve that anyway.” Pulling away from the wall, I offered him a small smile.
That vulnerable, brittle feeling was back full force, and I had to get out of there.
Chapter Nine
Striding back the way I had come, I nearly crawled out of my skin when I was spun and backed into a dome wall. “Sheesh, you and Erik both have this move down pat.” I glanced down. Maska was still wet, still naked…and still fully aroused. He had a gorgeous dick, long and thick. My mouth watere
d and I thought about dropping to my knees, taking it into my mouth. In the past, it had been one of my favorite things to do. I realized I hadn’t sucked cock in more than seven years. I couldn’t take my eyes off it.
His chuckle was low and it sent even more heat zinging through my nervous system. Before I could pull away, I started to tremble, and this pissed me off. I curled my lip and looked up at those milky eyes. This close, I could see the faint outline of a pupil and realized that opaque color could actually be some sort of protective cover. “Wow, what color are your eyes really?”
He slowly closed his eyes, then leisurely opened them again. I held my breath as the most beautiful irises I’d ever seen appeared. Gwinarian eyes were lovely with shades of amber and brown. Maska’s eyes were a bright violet color and the pupils were black slits, almost like an Earth cat’s. “You have the most beautiful eyes I’ve ever seen.” I lifted my hand, couldn’t stop myself, until I touched one corner. I slid my fingers down his cheek, felt the stubble on his chin and groaned when I realized it was silky.
I suddenly wanted him to rub his jaw all over my breasts.
My breath picked up fast, and I couldn’t stop myself from stealing one taste. I leaned up to put my lips on the wet skin of his neck, inhaling his unique scent. He wrapped one hand around my throat and pushed me back gently until the back of my head touched the dome. He slid his other hand from my waist, over my breast and up until this hand joined the first. He had long fingers. I noticed he was careful to avoid the healing scratches on my throat.
“I swore,” he whispered. “Swore when I met Erik that I would never touch another.”
“So stop.”
“I can’t.” He slid his thumb along my lip. “You have such need. Such a fiery need to be touched. It calls to me.” His intense stare made me shiver, and he moved closer until the heat from his body seeped into me. “You have water from me on your mouth.”
I sucked on the pad of his thumb, and he groaned before slipping his thumb into my mouth. I pulled it deep and felt an answering pull between my legs.