by Linda Mooney
Bajud smiled. “Vessels like that establish a route. It follows a specific timetable. Knowing when the ship will be within range is essential to keeping their regulars coming back.”
Meredith squinted at him. “I get what you’re saying. Keep going.”
“They took you from Earth. They said you must serve them for two years. Which means, in two years, their route will have circled back to within range of your world to leave you behind, and perhaps take another woman to fill your place.”
“But I have no idea how long I’d been on the ship. I had no sense of day or night. There was no way for me to tell time. No. Wait.” She remembered the bowl she’d used to studiously keep track of how many clients she’d serviced. “I think I was taken about three weeks ago. Maybe a month.”
“A month, out of two years?” He grinned. “That means you had not been on the ship long. As such, your world can not be too far from where we found you.”
“That’s still a whole lot of space to try and track down.”
“That is true.” He rubbed his chin, an affectation she’d seen Neeveer do on occasion. “My father offered a lot of money for you. Even after we retrieved you, you said he left more money as a token payment.”
“Yes. That’s what he told me. I believe him.”
“Merry, let us assume you are a merchant, and you have come into a product that is in great favor with many of your buyers. In fact, it becomes so popular, one client steals it from you, but leaves behind a payment that more than makes up for your loss. What would you do?”
His grin was catching. She could almost read his mind.
“And if I’m not that far from the place where I originally got the product, I would turn right around and go get another one!” Jumping up, she reached out and gave Bajud a quick kiss on the cheek. “That’s to thank you for helping me. All that’s left is for me to convince him it’s possible. Do you think he’ll track the whoreship?”
The Alcatian suddenly became serious. “I do not know. All I am sure of is that if we do not proceed immediately, there is little chance we will be able to come back here in two years to try again. In fact, I can promise you this opportunity will never present itself again.”
“Then I must convince Neeveer now,” she stated, and rushed out the door.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Promise
Either he knew she was looking for him, and deliberately avoided her, or she simply couldn’t find him. The ship was bigger than she expected. If someone had asked her which was bigger, the whoreship or the Alcatian cruiser, she couldn’t answer truthfully. After a while, she gave up and got directions to the main eating hall where she had another bowl of oftusel. From the eating room, she was able to make her way to Neeveer’s cabin without any trouble.
She had been prepared to spend several hours being bored out of her mind. To her surprise, she soon fell asleep. It was the feeling of something nuzzling her breast that awakened her. Partially opening her eyes, she rolled over and reached up for him.
Warm lips took her nipple and began to suckle. She responded by running her hands through his hair, massaging his scalp with her fingertips. Everything she did to caress him back only increased his ardor, and a low growl of pleasure rumbled in his chest.
“My one.”
His hands were between her thighs and slowly stroking the soft inner skin. Every so often his thumbs would brush over her lower lips, tickling and arousing her further. When he climbed upon the bed, Meredith stopped him. “No. Let’s do it my way this time.”
Neeveer paused. Whenever she said she wanted to do it her way, he had no idea what it entailed until she showed him. The Alcatian either preferred the missionary position, or he was never taught there was another way to copulate. She would put money on the latter.
Getting onto her stomach, she pulled her knees up to her chest and bent over, presenting him with her buttocks.
“Ever take a woman from the rear?”
He didn’t hesitate. Swooping over her, he reached under her arms for her breasts. Grasping them, he lightly fondled them, pinching the tips and enjoying the little moans of happiness she uttered. He sniffed her bare back, sometimes kissing it, sometimes licking the smooth skin. “Ahvahla.” His breath was a puff of heat that sent shivers through her.
She loved the way he nibbled her flesh. Mental images of his gleaming white tusks as they brushed along her ribs gave her goose bumps. He had never hurt her with them. He had never bitten or caused injury to her, although there were mornings when she’d felt a bit bruised after a vigorous night of lovemaking that included a lot of oral play.
Lovemaking. Meredith squeezed her eyes shut to prevent the tears from spilling. That was what it all boiled down to. She realized it, as much as it hurt to admit it. Neeveer didn’t love her. Yes, she could tell he cared for her, perhaps in the same way an owner would care about a pet, because that’s what it all came down to. That’s what she was to him. A pet. A human pet. Something he could enjoy at his leisure whenever he had the urge, without having to worry about commitments or consequences.
A hand reached down between her buttocks, searching for her clit. She whispered to him, “Go lower.” The fingers slid further until they found her opening, already wet and ready. One digit touched the hard little nub jutting between the swollen lips and batted it. She couldn’t suppress her groan of delight.
He found her entrance again by touch. The rest of his body remained bowed over her with his face burrowed into the hair gathered at her neck. She sensed him guiding his erection to her and positioning the head.
“Stay with me, Merry.”
Her eyes flew open in surprise. At the same time, he pushed into her. Not hard or demanding as he normally did, but tenderly, smoothly, pressing through the hot walls of her inner chamber an agonizing inch at a time. He was barely halfway inside when he withdrew nearly all the way.
“Do not leave.”
His erection slid back into her, this time almost to the entrance of her womb, when the skin contracted around his penis, and the small nodules surfaced. Mr. Bumpy returned, with its swirls of blood vessels that bunched and swelled underneath the velvety skin, and gave his hard-on that rough texture that nearly drove her wild as it rolled over sensitive nerve endings.
Meredith gasped at the slow, gliding movements filling her with his thickness. One hand continued to play with her nipples, but the other manipulated her clit. She could feel herself beginning to rise.
Something tickled her anus. In the back of her mind, she dismissed it as pubic hair, until she remembered he had none. He had no body hair anywhere except on his skull. The movements continued to play with her, and Neeveer maintained his rhythmic in and out with long, bold strokes.
Her hands grasped the hands holding her. With her forehead pressed to the bed, she lifted her hips with each plunge. The heat inside her continued to build and rise, like a water coming to a boil. Simultaneously, Neeveer’s thrusts gradually increased in pressure and speed, and she could tell this time she would reach her peak.
It’s the little muscle. The revelation clarified in her mind as the protuberance started to drill into her anus, sending a whole new wave of sexual delight pouring through her. She barely had the chance to breathe when her orgasm flashed with bright, burning shards of heat, searing and scalding her with their intensity. She barely heard Neeveer’s roar before he clasped her hips in a vise-like grip, and began pounding into her with short, choppy jabs. Her orgasm continued to roll over her, held against infinity while Neeveer fought for his own release.
The sensation became too much to bear. Pleasure and pain converged into one soul-scraping implosion. She thought she sensed him erupting, and then everything went black.
*
“Do not go, Merry.”
The words were whispered in her ear. She felt his heat at her back and smelled his cinnamony scent. A hand brushed the hair from her face as he nuzzled her temple.
“I need to see my home,
” she murmured. “You have to understand. I cannot survive without returning to it. You get to go to Alcatia. You get to go home. Why can’t I?”
“We are tracking the ship as you suggested.” There was a pause. “It was an excellent suggestion. You were right. It left its usual course and is backtracking.”
She rolled over to where she could look up at him. In the light of the pale gold ball that hovered beside the bed, his face reflected the conflict inside him. His orange eyes were the color of dark brass.
He’s going to miss this, having a willing body at his beck and call. Even as she silently told herself that, she could feel a part of her heart crumple and die.
“What about your orders? Your mission?”
“Once we have obtained a direct link to your world, Bajud will deliver you in one of the smaller survey pods.”
“Why can’t you take me?”
Another look of pain flashed through his eyes. “I am already being questioned for my past actions. I cannot risk losing my job for dereliction of duty.”
Reaching up, she touched his lips with her fingertip. He never kissed her like a human man kissed a woman, although he had licked or suckled every other inch of her body.
“How long do you think it’ll take before we discover something?”
“I cannot tell you.” He paused again, apparently debating his next words. “Will you not reconsider?”
“I can’t.”
He moved away from her, leaving her with the chill of his absence. Unwilling to let things remain as they were, she cuddled next to him, and was relieved when he didn’t flinch or draw back.
“Until the moment comes when I must leave, will you continue to make love to me?”
Neeveer turned his head to look at her. “What is make love?”
“What we just did. That’s making love. It’s when the act is not as important as wanting to make the person receiving it feel wonderful.”
Reaching over to rub the back of his fingers along her cheek and neckline, he responded, “Yes, Merry. I will continue to make love to you until you are no longer within my grasp.”
Meredith gave him a warm smile at the answer and snuggled against him, but not before she thought she caught the faint glimmer of a tear in the corner of his eye.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Return
As best as she could keep track, Meredith estimated a week went by without any word. She trusted Neeveer to keep his word when he said he would track the whereabouts of the whoreship, to see if it would lead them to discover the location of Earth. All she needed was patience. And this close to the prize, hers was running very thin, leading her to repeat an old saying she’d heard when she was young.
It’ll be that moment when I’m not thinking about it, when I’m not anticipating it, that something will happen. Just you wait and see.
She took to walking the corridors to help pass the time, and to give herself something to do. If she got lost, there was always a crew member hurrying by whom she could ask directions. She also figured out how to get the replicator to produce her shift in a longer length, and to make a decent hair brush and toothbrush. For once, since her initial kidnapping, she felt more like herself.
It was in the middle of week two, when she and Bajud were sharing each other’s dinner company in the main hall, that he got a call to report immediately to command. Excusing himself, he rushed away. It wasn’t unusual for someone to be paged during their meal, but this time Meredith felt a tingle go up her spine. Too excited to finish, she activated the return on the tray, then went directly to the meditation room, as she liked to think of the quiet study with the rainbow of drippy lights.
Another person was already inside, stretched out in one corner, but that didn’t bother her. It was rare to find the room totally unoccupied. Taking an opposite wall, she curled up on top of one of the larger pillows and tried to calm herself as she focused on the misty doorway.
Ever since that night Neeveer told her his son would be sending her back, her heart leaped into her throat whenever she heard him being ordered to duty. This time, though, this time she knew this was the call she’d been praying for.
Minutes later, Bajud walked into the room and spotted her on the pillow. “Come with me to navigation.”
She half-ran to keep up with him. He may have been shorter than his father, but his strides were just as long. They traversed many corridors, finally stopping in the middle of one. “In here,” Bajud gestured, and entered first.
Meredith walked through the mist, and gasped. Instinctively, she clutched the Alcatian’s arm to keep herself from falling.
There was no floor. At least, it appeared that way. To her eyes, there was no room, only space. Wide open and endless space. Stars and nebulas floated about her, passing over and through her, as she stood gaping in wonder. A comet blazed by her head. Common sense told her it was all an illusion. That she was still inside the ship, and everything she was witnessing was merely a projection. Unfortunately, her mind refused to listen, and it took her several rapid heartbeats to overcome her fear.
A handful of men moved about a center console situated not too far away. Bajud guided her over where Neeveer was conversing with another Alcatian. Sending the man away, he looked at her, his eyes taking in the floor-length, pomegranate red gown. At the way the string of evadium pearls reflected the scarlet color like drops of blood.
“We think we have located your Earth. Come.”
They seemed to float between rotating planets and their moons, toward a small star cluster located at the furthest end. The Milky Way resembled a fried egg, with the yellowish bulge in the center, and whorls of white surrounding it. As they drew closer, Meredith noticed the familiar flat spiral of her own solar system lying on the far edge. At least, she hoped it was that galaxy.
“A scout ship was ejected from the mother ship we have been tracking, and disappeared inside this system. Can you describe to me which planet is yours?”
“It’s a green and blue one, with an atmosphere. Third one from the sun.”
“What color sun?” Bajud inquired.
“Yellow.”
“Any unusual planets or phenomenon?”
She did the quick mental chant she’d learned in grade school. “Miss Venus eats many juicy strawberries up north. Two, three, four, five. The fifth planet is massive. Huge. The sixth has rings. Oh, and there’s an asteroid belt between Earth and Jupiter, too. Jupiter’s that big fifth planet.”
“The Gajamora system,” a third voice commented. Meredith glanced up to see another Alcatian standing on the other side of Neeveer, and noted he also wore a gray uniform.
Neeveer nodded. “That was my guess. Extremely remote. I am surprised the Orturgians ventured that far away from the main commercial lanes.”
“Orturgians?” She repeated.
“The ones piloting your whoreship.”
“What do Orturgians look like?”
“Tall. Multi-legged. Purple. Highly intelligent. Not prone to warfare.”
The description almost made her laugh out loud. During the time she was aboard the whoreship, she had thought of Gleeth as both her captor and her pimp. And, damn it, she’d been right.
Bajud came up beside her. Something blue gleamed in his hand. “I have the coordinates. When should we leave?”
“Soon,” Neeveer told him. “We will reach perigee within fourteen jareg. After that, we will have to swing around that sun to maintain escape velocity and resume our current trajectory.” He never glanced at Meredith as he spoke. “You will need to be aboard the survey vessel and be ready to launch at six-eight jareg.”
Bajud took a half step backwards and bobbed his head. “Come, Merry.” He touched her arm to get her attention, but she was focused on the man with his back to her. A back that, beneath the uniform, still bore the marks her nails had dug into him that morning when they had made love.
“Merry.”
When Neeveer never turned to see her leave, sh
e finally gave in and followed Bajud out of the navigation room. They walked in silence through the long, seemingly endless hallways, finally reaching a location where the Alcatian stopped and pointed.
“Your room is down—”
“How soon are we leaving?” she interrupted. “Give it to me in terms I’ll understand. After another sleep cycle? Before my next meal? When?”
Bajud looked off into the distance for a moment. “Very soon. I suggest you go get whatever you wish to take.”
Her eyes widened. “That soon?”
“Hurry, Merry. I need to program the ship. I will be back for you when it is ready to launch.”
He turned and left at a swift pace. Meredith watched him go until he disappeared around a corner, then found the doorway to the bedroom she shared with Neeveer.
There was literally nothing here that was hers. Everything she owned originated from the ship. What clothing and other articles she’d had when she’d been kidnapped were on the whoreship. Still, she knew she couldn’t arrive back on Earth with nothing. Dialing up two more shifts, she wrapped her brushes inside them and brought the ends of the fabric together where she could wear everything like a sling over her head and across her chest. When she was done, she sat down on the edge of the bed to wait. It wasn’t long before Bajud entered the room. He eyed her bundle but didn’t comment on it.
“Come.”
Her body felt like it was made of disjointed ice crystals. Pain stabbed her with every step. Her stomach constricted so tightly, she wondered how she managed not to pass out.
She should be jubilant! She was going home! She was going back to Earth! So why the hell did she feel so goddamn miserable?
She glanced over at the Alcatian leading her down the corridor, and a knife slid into her heart. She liked the young man, but her soul was crying out for another to be in his place. At one point, she glanced behind them to see if maybe Neeveer was following at a distance, perhaps to watch them leave, but the hallway was empty, and another piece of her heart withered, froze, and fell away.