HIGHLANDER: The Highlander’s Surrender Bride (Scottish Alpha Male Pregnancy Romance)

by Tencia Winters

  She looked at the collections of circuits and chips. It was the size of the palm of her hand and as far as computing power went a digital wrist watch would have been able to do more. She was finding that to be particularly irksome. And finding the means to correcting that was proving to be a tiresome chore.

  “You’re nothing but a glorified recording device,” she said to the small collection of hardware. “You shouldn’t be this hard to work with.”

  It was true. Her project required only that the device play back certain sounds, in certain sequences, at certain settings and frequencies, and nothing else. But every time she tested the sounds under the pitches that she needed them to be in her lab, the sounds came out more like a tuba player high on meth.

  And then she had discovered the problem: the motherboard was wet… with humidity… generated from inside the damn call box.

  The only way around that was to work in an airtight room and remove the humidity factor completely, but it wasn’t going to happen aboard ship here. And she reminded herself that in the real world people wouldn’t have access to that kind of an environment if her device should fail. No… if she could skip that step now in development, it would aid the Carver Group in deciding on whether or not her project was worthwhile or not.

  There were still so many problems to solve.

  She found the storage compartment where she had fished out most of the electronics that she needed for the last three days. She’d been to the room nine times since then and found that it was more like a refuse pile than anything else. The room was simply an array of shelves loaded with plastic crates filled with the debris of unwanted electronics. Discarded parts were the rule in the room and no one had voiced her disapproval in salvaging what she needed for her work from there. She had pried chips, wires, screws… whatever she needed. And if anyone was upset for what she took or left behind, no one had said anything. She figured that there was no reason for anyone to become upset over what was left behind.

  Maybe that was her problem.

  She was using secondhand materials, things that had already been put through their paces and possibly discarded because they had reached their limit. She hadn’t thought to try and look for fresh parts, apart from what the Carver Group had already given her. She’d anticipated some problems but completely overlooked others. But sooner or later it was going to come to that: the unexpected problems.

  She pushed open the door to the electronics storage room and she gasped and dropped the motherboard to the floor, nearly stepping on it when she saw what was within.

  She saw a man and woman, sitting on a chair that was pushed up against the wall. The woman had her back to her and the man’s hands traced up and down the woman’s naked back as the pair of them moaned.

  Nya saw that the woman wore a small skirt that was presently further up her abdomen than it should have been, and her lack of panties told her that this woman was either anticipating this kind of event or maybe she simply had discarded them. That seemed a possibility as she saw the woman’s shirt lying on the floor next to what Nya presumed to be her lab coat, both of them looking as though they had been removed in haste. And she sat straddling the man.

  She could only make out some of the general features of the man over the woman’s shoulder. He was Asian, his hair dyed partially blond, his eyes tightly clenched from their movements and unlike the woman that straddled him he was still mostly clothed. She could see his checkered shirt was still in place, though his trousers were pulled down around his ankles and his lab coat was still in its proper manner across his shoulders.

  The pair of people looked as if they had thrown themselves into this tryst as though they had precious little time to complete it. And neither of them seemed to take any notice of her.

  The woman moaned and the man grunted as their bodies rocked against one another, the sounds they made were in a strange kind of rhythm. The air in the small room was thick with musk and Nya felt even more foolish for not having heard the sound before she cracked the door open.

  “Oh my g...” she began, her face turning red, “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’ll just…” she stuttered before bending down to pick up her pocket-sized motherboard and closing the door behind her, sealing the couple in their privacy once more.

  She rushed away from the room, mortified, her work forgotten and her line of thought destroyed. She felt terrible enough to want to try and curl up in the non-existent space beneath her bunk and try to disappear.

  Chapter 5

  She didn’t emerge from her cabin until later in the evening when the boat had gone into its night cycle and she felt safe that others would have gone to sleep. Part of her felt terrified, thinking that the pair of lovers she had seen had by now, most certainly, started the gossip ring about her walking in upon them. She cringed inwardly at the thought as to what might be said about her.

  She didn’t dare try to imagine what they could have said about her as the day went on and instead tried to bury herself in her work. And for the remainder of the day that had seemed to help.

  However the feeling didn’t last and when her stomach began to growl, she knew that her hunger had finally overcome her fear of ridicule. Gathering up her lab coat, and confident that at least half boat was asleep, she went to the dining room for supper. She knew the routine of the boat well enough to know that food would still be found: Dane had explained that no one, not even the crew, was on a set schedule. Food would be prepared for all hands and left out for others to eat as they willed.

  When she arrived in the dining room she found the place mercifully empty. The table where the supper was set out beckoned her, loaded with heat trays where small electric heaters kept the prepared sustenance warm. She stepped the table, gathered up a tray and surveyed the food that would remain here until morning when the new crew rotation began.

  There were small cutlets of brown meat that looked like steaks, mashed potatoes, assorted vegetables, bread, and some kind of red paste that looked like it was supposed to be pudding.

  She had gathered up a plateful and sat in a corner, hoping no one else would come in while she ate. She briefly pondered serving up another plate and keeping it with her overnight to avoid needing to come in to breakfast the next morning and thus avoiding the embarrassing stares and gossips that were sure to come. It seemed a good plan, but after only ten minutes or so of privacy, someone did come in.

  Dane.

  He smiled when he saw her and she felt herself turn inward. If anyone had heard about what had happened to her today, he would have. But he casually walked to the supper trays and after gathering a plate from the heated food trays he walked to the corner table where she sat. “Good evening. Mind if I join you?”

  She felt like saying yes, but after the way she’d conducted herself the day that they’d met she felt as if she had to make up for poor impressions. Today’s events certainly were no exception. “Not at all,” she said with indifference.

  Dane sat down across from her and began to eat, dipping his fork into his mashed potatoes and taking a mouthful of it. After a few minutes of strained silence he finally spoke. “I understand you had a bit of a thrill today.”

  She nearly choked on her own mashed potatoes. “Excuse me?”

  He chuckled as he swallowed his food. “Dr. Inira and Dr. Yao… they mentioned that you walked in on them today in the scrap room.”

  Though she was positive that he couldn’t tell she was blushing, she felt her cheeks turn red. “I… uh…”

  He chuckled again. “It’s alright, don’t worry about it.” He took another forkful of his food.

  “But… I…”

  “Rule number three, remember?” he said between bites.

  She thought back to three days ago when she had first come aboard. The memory hit her, “No jealousy?”

  He nodded. “Why do you think we have that rule?”

  She rolled it over in her mind. “I… I thought that that was a professional rule? No jealousy over s
uccesses and failures or something like that?”

  Dane shook his head. “I fail to see how someone could be jealous of a failure, but no… that’s not it. Jealousy aboard ship here is a tad more… personal.”

  Nya’s look of confusion must have shown because Dane watched her quietly for a moment before he went on.

  “Did you know that Dr. Inira and Dr. Yao are married?”

  She felt a sense of relief sweep into her. Somehow this tidbit of knowledge made her feel better; knowing that the people she had unwittingly stumbled into were married to each other brought with it a sense of security that she had not felt. It was only natural for people who were married to be intimate… albeit in such an unexpected place. “Oh… well… that’s good, but it doesn’t make me feel any better for knowing…”

  “But not to each other,” Dane interrupted.

  Nya froze. “Huh?”

  Dane nodded. “It’s true. Dr. Inira’s husband is aboard ship with us even now… he’s the chief of operations below deck. Dr. Yao’s wife is back on the mainland, some kind of real estate broker I think.”

  Nya suddenly saw the reason why the two lovers had chosen to have their tryst in a storage room over their bunk. Though her sense of security and relief was now gone from her, it seemed fairly obvious why the two lovers had chosen such an odd place. “They’re having an affair?”

  “Hardly, each of their spouses is keenly aware of what goes on here.”

  She shook her head with confusion. “Dane… Mr. Carver…” she said, trying to keep her thoughts ordered. “I don’t understand, what does that mean?”

  “Well,” Dane said, wiping his mouth with his napkin, “I’m sure you’ve heard how being at sea for a long time can affect a person. It makes one… lustful.”

  “You mean like in all of the old sailor’s stories?”

  “Exactly,” he said, cutting into a slab of steak. “It’s a perfectly natural bodily function, Nya. We all feel it. And sometimes we need to vent… or indulge… take it as you will. And when we’re all out here, the only people that we can do so with are aboard ship. That’s why we have rule number three.”

  She turned the rule over in her mind for a moment before she reached the conclusion as to why such a thing was necessary. “So, this sort of thing happens a lot?”

  “All the time,” Dane confirmed. “Sometimes the people that come aboard are married to each other; they tend to each other’s needs fairly well. But sometimes they’re married to some back on dry land, or they’re not married at all. Despite that, we’re all subject to the tremendous power that biology has over us. And as scientists we’re able to separate logic from emotion. An indulgence every now and then is acceptable to people like us. Larger connections usually are unheard of for those of us who come aboard and are unmarried. And as long as such couplings don’t interfere with our work, we never see any need to put a stop to it.”

  Nya was silent for a time, simply contemplating that. She lightly jabbed at her food with her fork before her mind completed its cycle and arrived at the only conclusion that it could fathom. “They do it for fun?”

  Dane shrugged. “We’re only human. We have needs. And logic offers a sense of serenity that allows us to rise above emotions that might complicate things for us. It’s the same principal as needing to sneeze or scratch your nose. The reason can be enough to distract you for a short time but it can be dealt with and forgotten just as quickly.”

  Dane took a drink of the cup of water he had and was quiet for a moment before he looked at her over the rim of his cup. “You should try it sometime.”

  Nya was taken aback by that. “Pardon?”

  “Find someone to relieve a little stress with,” he offered. “Dr. Yao told me that he felt a little bad that he didn’t invite you to join them when you walked in. He was so embarrassed. And had Dr. Inira been more attentive, she might have gone along with that request.”

  Nya’s mouth was slightly agape. She had been expecting to be mocked for how she had reacted. She certainly hadn’t expected… this. Part of her wanted to believe that Dane was playing some sort of a trick upon her, but she could discern none of the usual markers for such a thing. He was being honest.

  “It might have done you some good. I understand you haven’t been making too much progress on your call box.”

  Nya felt stretched between two emotions: surprise and defensiveness. “But… I haven’t… it’s only been three days!”

  “And that’s exactly my point, Nya. Sex has a way of unraveling the knots. It relieves the stress… helps you think. It’s done wonders for me in the past.”

  Nya felt a little surprised to hear that. “You’ve done it?”

  “Many times,” he admitted, but there was no hint of ego in his words. “Although to be fair my appetites are sparse and I indulge maybe only once every voyage or so. Sometimes, not even then.”

  That surprised her. She would have thought that any woman aboard this boat would have jumped at the chance for some no-strings-attached sex with the owner of the Carver group. Why didn’t they?

  Dane finished his meal with a smile and rose up to deposit his plate, utensils, and cup into a washtub. “Just think about what I said,” he added as he made his way towards the door. Before reaching it, he turned and looked back at her. “You know… if you’d like, I’d be happy to help you relieve some of that stress.” He threw her a wink. “You know where my door is.”

  He turned and walked silently out.

  Nya only sat, stunned.

  Chapter 6

  By the end of her first week onboard, Nya found she was unable to focus on anything that was important to her. She had always thought the stories of how sailors at sea could be ravenous when they came in to port were preposterous. But now, with the possibility of sex firmly on her mind, she had begun to realize that there was more truth to such things than she had thought possible. And with plenty of time to herself she felt as if she were slowly being consumed by her biology.

  Sex had not always been easily within her reach and she had leapt at willing partners when the opportunities had come. But no one had simply offered her sex as casually as if they were offering her tea before. It was an experience that she had not been entirely prepared for.

  And it had kept her up nights, like tonight.

  She sat upright in her bunk just like she had for the whole night, trying to focus on how best to fix her current array of problems with the call box. But her mind had kept drifting to what Dane had said to her in the dining area three nights prior. Her thoughts were locked on it the same way iron particles clung to a magnet dragged through sand.

  Had he been serious about his offer?

  Though Nya wasn’t given over to religion, she prayed to God that he was serious about sharing himself with her. Liberal as the attitude towards sex tended to be on this boat she found it hard to believe that the owner of the Carver Group would be willing to couple with her at all. Not when there were more sophisticated women aboard. Even if she slept with him only once or even at all, she found herself tempted by it.

  Nya had given in to the desires of the flesh plenty of times before in her past. But the differences then compared to now were drastically different. She had cared for the people she had bedded in the past. There had been an emotional connection. That had always seemed important.

  But, she reflected, if it had been such a crucial thing why hadn’t any of those relationships lasted?

  It was a good question and it was one that she couldn’t answer.

  Maybe there was something to the whole idea that she hadn’t really noticed? In the days after her initial embarrassment she had seen doctors Inira and Yao going on about their work. They had carried on as if they had exchanged nothing more than a passing ‘hello’. If there was any tension between them she hadn’t seen it. And she had been quick to notice that the work in their labs, while she didn’t fully understand it, had taken some considerable leaps and bounds. She’d seen the pace at
which they had been working. And after their coupling, their work seemed to have progressed via a quantum leap.

  It was that kind of success that she was in need of just now.

  When she’d returned to her cabin, the work that she had done seemed menial by comparison. And it was not something that she felt at all proud of. She had two weeks still to complete her work, but she hadn’t even gotten so far as to get her call box wet outside of a testing tank yet. Part of her current string of problems was that she couldn’t perfect the damn water-tight seals.

  She looked across her cabin at her desk where her current prototype sat. The box’s was only about a third completed. It had a skeleton, but its guts and brains were missing. The dimensions were much as she had intended them to be. On the whole, the device was the side of a bread box. Its four walls were of industrial plastic, capable of withstanding certain amounts of pressure at various depths of the water… if she could just figure out how to protect the electronics within.

  Its innards were, at a glance, a jumble of electronics that – obviously – if exposed to water would short out and render the entire device useless. And it was those damn water seals that she couldn’t figure out and more, she needed a redundancy system in case the system was breached in the real thing and water got inside.

  The Carver Group wouldn’t accept her work if she couldn’t find a means to back it up somehow. One line of defense; the overall case for a system like this, wasn’t enough. That there would be some water seepage seemed inevitable. What she needed was a means to waterproof the electronics inside the box as well when that happened. Like finding a way to waterproof a message in a bottle after the bottle had been thrown out to sea. But the only means she had devised to that end made the entire thing too heavy, too bulky. And enough so that the device might decouple from the hull it was attached to and sink, making it into litter at the bottom of the ocean.