by Liza Probz
"Gnarsharks."
A memory of Sylvie strapped to the metal table, the scientist cutting off her clothing while giggling to himself, flashed through his mind and he fought to remain calm. If I'm going to get anything out of Jark'Khal, I'll have to be methodical. No going yellow, and no violence.
Even if not punching the man would be one of the hardest things he'd ever had to do.
The tautness in his guts grew stronger. The thought of another man's hands on his female, it almost made his insides ache. He had to work extremely hard to push his ire away and answer her.
"I expect to determine whether he had any involvement with the Hareema. He was awfully eager to cut you up. Maybe you were the distraction the Hareema used to sneak into our ranks, or maybe he was charged with getting you out of the way. Maybe the dissection would tie up the loose end."
"That's an awful lot of maybes." She glanced over her shoulder at him.
He nodded, again making note of her intelligence. She didn't miss much and even saw things that he overlooked. It was stimulating, being in her presence. In many more ways than was appropriate.
Sylvie's expression tightened. "I think he had another reason to want to cut me up."
She shivered, and Xivthar wanted to embrace her. Any reason to have his hands on her seemed like a good reason, though it was more than the physical attraction. His stomach fluttered with the beating of butterfly wings and he moved himself from the dastardly hope that something might become of them.
Her remark brought up the memory of that bastard Jark'Khal going purple, and the regent struggled to keep his cool. Punching's too good for the eel-skinned pervert.
He glanced at the female beside him. The look on her face was pensive, the memory obviously playing through her mind as well. Her green eyes were narrow, her features tough as if she had forced herself to be tougher for the upcoming encounter.
Maybe I'll let her have him. She looks meaner than the gnarsharks.
Chapter 22
They entered the Ministry of Science, and Sylvie suppressed her gag reflex. The place made her sick, but she wouldn't let it show. It was a weakness she couldn’t afford.
Heads raised and eyes widened at their unexpected appearance. She followed X as he made his way to the scientist who had gone maroon on him yesterday.
"I want to speak to Jark'Khal."
"Yes, Supreme Regent." The scientist bowed slightly and started leading them to a familiar corridor. "He's still in a holding cell, per your orders."
Sylvie forced air into her lungs as they walked past the cell where she'd been kept. Even though she herself was a scientist, she wasn't sure if she could get over the trauma of her imprisonment and near-death experience. Maybe this corridor would always give her the creeps.
Doesn't matter. You won't be here for much longer. Odds are you'll never have to walk down this corridor again. Never have to see the inside of one of these cells again.
As long as she could convince the regent to send her home.
You know what you have to do.
Sylvie sighed inwardly. Only as a last resort. She'd try using her brains on him before surrendering her body, though their encounter earlier left her almost willing to push the issue. Never had a man taken her so passionately, her body warming at the remembrance of his mouth pressed to the center of her. She let out a soft groan as his hand grabbed hers.
X’s eyes were boring into her, his expression tense. He must have thought the groan was from fear instead of lust. He's worried about me.
She gave his hand a little squeeze, then tilted the corners of her lips into what she hoped was a reassuring smile, and politely pulled her hand out of his.
No time to become infatuated. It's Earth or bust, remember?
The scientist stopped in front of a cell and placed his hand against the membrane. A slit appeared and he held it open for X and her to pass through. The membrane sealed behind them, and Sylvie turned to confront her captor.
Jark'Khal's color was so deep a blue it reminded her of the ocean depths where little light penetrates.
Despair. That's the color of despair.
The scientist sat on the cushion that resided in the center of the cell. His head was between his hands, hanging almost into his lap. The short tendrils that almost resembled human hair were lying limp against his skull. Sylvie could almost smell the dejection in the thick air of the cell.
"Jark'Khal, I have a few questions." X's voice was filled with tension.
The former lead scientist didn't bother to lift his head. He sat there, unmoving.
"How long have you been working for the Hareema?"
This got his attention. His head whipped up, surprise written large over his dark features. "What?"
"How long? Did you go over to them of your own free will, or have you been replaced? Am I talking to a Hareema right now?"
"You can't be serious!" Jark'Khal's color was rapidly lightening, moving from blue to a red that was growing brighter as she watched.
"You better answer me," X said, as energy waves started pulsating on his muscled arms.
"I'm not an enemy agent!" the man screeched, shaking his head frantically. X still advanced on him, the energy charge he was building up growing brighter. Jark'Khal tucked his head in and huddled in the center of the cushion.
Unexpectedly, Sylvie felt a twinge of sympathy for the guy. The regent was going at him hard, without mercy.
"Wait. He's too shocked to answer you."
"I'll give him a shock." The regent's eyes were glowing, the ring around the pupil almost eclipsing the black. He had to be furious.
"You can't electrocute him, not without proof."
"This is how I get my proof." The waves of energy were increasing in speed. The light it gave off was so bright, Sylvie was fighting not to shield her eyes.
"No. He might not be working for the enemy. I wasn't, remember?"
"So...?" X trailed off, a corner of his mouth turned up cruelly.
"Initiate an energy exchange with him." She stood on tiptoe to grab his face and turn it toward hers. "Calm down."
When she thought she had his full attention, she continued. "Initiate an energy exchange, a REGULAR energy exchange and not a killer dose of electricity. Then we can at least determine whether he's a Hareema agent."
His face tightened and Sylvie thought for a moment that she had failed to convince him. Then the light began to dim and the waves slowed their rapid pace.
"Initiate energy exchange," he barked to the quivering ball on the cushion.
Jark'Khal scrambled up, holding up his arm, which quickly put out a charge. Light flashed from between clasped hands.
Jark'Khal was a Zantharian.
"He could still be working for them!" X growled.
Sylvie grabbed him around the neck and dragged him into a corner. She wanted to offer him comfort, to press peace over him and help him get back to his solid-minded self.
"What's gotten into you?" she hissed. "This isn't the way to perform an interrogation. You might as well threaten to dissect him!"
"If it would get him to talk, I would!" the regent all but snarled back.
Sylvie couldn't figure out what had gotten him so upset. He was a sickly yellow color, anger of some kind, but darkened by an emotion she didn't know. She had to take control of things, had to get him to calm down.
"X," she purred, running a hand down his cheek. "Why don't you let me try something? An old Earth tactic. We call it 'Good Cop/Bad Cop’."
The purr seemed to have caught his attention. His eyes slid down from hers, lingering for a moment on her lips, and then affixing themselves firmly to her breasts as his breathing shifted.
"I'm going to be the Good Cop. You just keep doing what you're doing, but rein it in a little. Got it?"
"I'll play along. For now." His expression turned stony again.
"Jark'Khal," Sylvie said, approaching the Zantharian as he panted on the cushion, his color candy apple red. "The regen
t here is a little upset. Now, I want to trust you, but you realize that it doesn't look good for you, right?"
"I don't understand," he said. "I was following orders, and I simply got a little excited."
"A little excited?" X's voice rose to a roar. "You went purple!"
Sylvie held the big man back, although he wasn't struggling very hard. He's playing along. Clever guy.
"You were just following orders." Sylvie worked to use a soothing, peaceful tone.
"Yes," the scientist said, his face eagerly repentant. "The Minister of Defense authorized the dissection. I was following his orders!"
"This is getting us nowhere," X grumbled. "If you're not an enemy agent, tell me why you were one of the first responders to the scene of the crash? You were there at the Earthling's capture. You've been working on the recovered ship. You were in charge of dissecting the captive. All signs point to you. You! YOU!"
Whoa, talk about melodrama.
"Please!" the scientist wailed, "I was only doing my job. I've always wanted to dissect a human! To get a look at the skeleton, all those delicious vertebrae! That might make me sick, but it doesn't make me a traitor! She’s the greatest find ever."
Sylvie fought the urge to vomit. The guy wanted to check out her skeleton outside of her body. Why was she trying to save his life?
Are you any better? You're a biologist who came to this planet all set to take back samples of its life and poke and prod them in your laboratory.
Still, the thought hadn't aroused her.
"Enough!" the regent shouted. "Why haven't you gotten the ship up and running yet? Sabotage our recovery of the ship, dissect the female, and everything is all tidy."
The scientist's face was a shifting mask of emotions. Frustration. Hope. Fear. "My team has been working day and night to get that damn ship back online. It's the main computer. Something called Magnis. It keeps thwarting all of our attempts to force its activation."
"Magnis? He's still alive?" Sylvie was glad the ship's brains hadn't been totally destroyed in the crash. She knew he was only a computer, but people got very attached to their electronics. Even if he did beat her at every game stored in his memory banks.
"Yes, he's alive all right," Jark'Khal said. "He keeps denying us access. As far advanced as we are compared to you, I was sure we'd have cracked it by now. Maybe if you talked to the computer," he said, addressing Sylvie. "It might activate if it heard a familiar voice."
"That's actually a good idea," Sylvie said. She'd assumed the computer was dead, but if he was standing in the way of figuring out how her ship had taken down the shields, then it couldn't hurt to try and talk Magnis into helping out.
Once they'd figured out this mess, she and Magnis could fly on home. Without having surrendered herself completely to the regent. Heavy emotion rose sharply inside of her at the thought of leaving him. She glanced up at him as he continued to verbally pound the creep beside her.
"Sure, a great idea. Get both you and your ship in the same place so Hareema agents can take you both out in one fell swoop. I don't think so." X's tone was adamant.
"Come on, X," she said. "We don't have any other leads. It's worth a shot."
The regent's eyes narrowed. His skin was darkening, but not taking on a particular color. "If it's a set up, I lose any hope of finding out what happened."
And you lose your hold over me. Once I have my ship back, I won't have to sleep with you for a ride home. As much as I was curious about making love to him, he was almost desperate to have a go at me. His obsession should have been disturbing, but it wasn’t. I couldn’t remember the last time I had a man in my bed, or simply on my mind.
"I'm willing to argue the point." She straightened her shoulders before sneaking a peek at the prisoner.
Jark'Khal was hanging on their every word, still terrified that he'd be accused of being an enemy collaborator.
"But not here." She threw her thumb over her shoulder at the scientist. "Are we done with this guy?"
"He's told us nothing." X shook his head. "However, he doesn’t seem to have anything worth digging for anyway.”
"Then let's get out of here. These cells give me the creeps."
Chapter 23
Xivthar pushed the food around on his plate. He felt downright petulant. It wasn't like him, but he couldn't help himself.
The most beautiful creature he'd ever seen was sitting across from him, making little moans of delight with each bite of the seafoam concoction in front of her. "My God, X, this has to be the most delicious thing I've ever tasted. Better than dark chocolate even. I can't stop myself from eating it all."
And she did eat every last bite, moaning over each one as she gazed up at him. Then she licked the spoon.
His cock twitched painfully under his sarong.
When she'd finally finished torturing him, she hopped up from the table in his sitting room and stood in front of him, her mood having brightened significantly. "Let's go see about my ship.”
X dropped his fork. It clattered against his plate, the discordant noise grating against his already frayed nerves. "As I told you in the Ministry of Science, it isn't safe."
"And as I've told you a hundred times since, we don't have any other options."
The regent ran a hand through his tendrils. They were more agitated than usual, waving against his head in disarray. "I'll think of something. I don't want you anywhere near your ship. It would be too easy to... to..."
"Too easy to what?" She narrowed her vibrant eyes at him. "There's no reason to keep me from my ship. I'm in no more danger there than I am walking the hallways where your subjects keep calling for my exile. Or worse."
She was right, and the crowds were only getting thicker. Xivthar imagined it was only a matter of time before the council was convened and his leadership was questioned. A crisis required swift action and so far he'd done little to protect his people. The defense shield was still down and his planet could be flooded with Hareema agents at any moment, or worse, maybe they'd already arrived.
The point that seemed to stick out the most to his constituency was the fact that he was being seen with the Earthling female. They knew she was in his quarters right now. If his predilections were as widely known as they seemed to be, he had a pretty good idea of what his subjects thought he was doing with her in here.
Which was exactly what he wanted to be doing.
Except they weren't. They were arguing. Again.
X had had enough of this verbal sparring. He'd rather engage in another type of sparring, one that involved his—
"Listen, X, I don't want to tell you how to do your job, but right now you don't seem too focused on the task at hand."
She sat back down, placing her elbows on the table and her face in her hands. Her position afforded him an uninterrupted view of her magnificent chest. Those pale globes, how badly he wanted to taste them, to touch them and see them on full display. She had opened her legs for him earlier. She would do it again.
"You aren't even paying attention to me now!" she yelled, bringing his gaze back to her face. "You're too distracted to be any help to your people!"
"I know!" he bellowed, standing up from his chair and stalking over to her. "You distract me like no other has before. I can't concentrate, all I can think about is possessing you."
She leaned back in her chair to put some distance between them, but he pushed into her space, taking her chin in his hand and forcing her eyes to his. “X… what are you doing?”
"I only know of one way to dispel this hold you have over me. I must have you." He pressed his face against her neck and licked her salty skin.
"Stop," she whispered, her voice lower than moments before. She pushed at his chest, but her actions were futile, the woman barely putting her strength into it.
"My body is screaming for me to take you. I've never experienced anything as powerful as this need I have for you. Don’t deny me, Sylvie. I wouldn’t deny you." He brushed his lips by her ear as she
shivered and snuggled into him. He wasn’t alone in his desires, but she seemed the only one willing to fight it. "I know you want me too."
"I do not." She moaned as he slipped the tip of her earlobe into his mouth, her fingers tightening on his back.
"You lie only to yourself, pretty girl. Spend one night with me. One night to get each other out of our systems, to satisfy our mutual curiosity."
"One night?" Her voice was soft, very unlike the woman he had seen only moments ago.
Was she wavering?
"One night."
"And then you'll send me home?"
His grip on her tightened, and so did the clenching in his gut that hadn't stopped since earlier. The clenching that demanded he claim her as his for all time.
"Then I'll send you home," he said after a moment.
"I don't believe you."
Sylvie pulled away from him, slipping out of her chair and walking around the table. "You're the Supreme Regent. I'm sure you promise women the world when you want their bodies. How is it that I trust you to keep your promises afterwards?"
X's skin bristled. Was she calling me a liar?
"I make no other women promises. Any female I might be interested in tells me whether she wants to mate, not the other way around, and as for keeping my word," he moved around the table, his groin throbbing painfully as a light sweat broke out across his skin, "how dare you suggest that I wouldn't?"
"What guarantee do I have? Hypothetically, if I did agree to sleep with you, what guarantee can you give me that will assure me of a ride home, immediately?"
X growled, staring down at her, before walking to the console. He called up a standard order template, input the required information, and then signed it with a flourish. He reached into the image to pull out a hard copy.
"Here's your guarantee," he said, rolling it up and tossing it to her. Why she wanted to get away from him so fast he would never understand. He could offer her everything – anything…
The professor unrolled the parchment and read it carefully. "This says you are granting me immediate transport from Zanthar to Earth."