Embrace the Romance

by S. E. Smith

  The door to her cabin opened, and Cherkogin strode out. Axur and Kivo emerged a moment later, but angled toward Bethnee instead of following the commander. Cherkogin turned to look at Axur, then gave Bethnee a respectful nod. “We’re clearing out. Thank you for your help, homesteaders.” She turned and made an upward spiral motion to her enforcers, and walked down the path with them following.

  Axur stood, arms crossed, watching them go. Kivo sidled up to her and put his head on her knees. They stayed that way until the low thrum of high-low flitters faded.

  He held out a hand to her. “Could we go inside now? My dangly bits are getting cold.”

  She smiled and took his hand, and let him help pull her up. “Can’t have that. You might need them.”

  The cabin was finally warm again. She didn’t want to go back to the cave until Axur’s monitoring confirmed that the enforcers had rounded up all the mercs and were on their way south.

  Bethnee poured boiling water into the teapot. Axur sat at the kitchen-area counter she’d built to be comfortable for her height. Even though his face still sported streaks of dirt, and mud caked his long hair and beard, he was still plasma hot. She probably looked like something her weasel had dragged in. Felt like it, too.

  Axur was idly folding a thin towel into various shapes. “I keep meaning to read the settlement contract, but legalese puts me to sleep. Tell me about this ‘plus one’ clause.”

  “It’s complicated. Paying settlers can sponsor as many people as they like, and it confers homesteader rights to those people after a year, as long as they live on the settler’s property. Those people can’t do the same unless they wait another a year and buy or build their own homestead. Landed homesteaders like me can sponsor one at a time.”

  Axur smiled. “Thank you.” He gave her a speculative look. “What’s Pranteaux’s friction with you? Is it because you’re a minder?”

  “No, he’s a minder, too, a general filer who remembers everything. Nuñez says he’s a control freak who overcompensates with his need for respect.” She shrugged one shoulder. “I just think he’s an asshole. Probably didn’t help that I told him so to his face.”

  Axur laughed. She was going to miss the sound of it.

  She poured the brewed tea into both their cups. “Congratulations on the new job, by the way. Will you have to move to the spaceport?” She pushed the cup of hot tea and a sugar stick across the counter toward him.

  “I didn’t take it.”

  “Why?” Maybe he felt like he owed her. “This is just your legal residence. You don’t have to actually live here. You could be with Jumpers again, and it’d be a good use of your abilities. You like people. You liked Cherkogin.” She pointed to his discarded poncho. “You’re free.”

  “All valid points, and I’d have said yes if they’d offered when I first landed.” He stroked Kivo’s broad head resting on his thigh. “But everything changed when I discovered the pets.” He looked around at her tiny cabin. “I never had my own home before. Being a planetary enforcer would take me away from home a lot.” He swirled the sugar stick in his tea. “I liked being a Jumper. They help people in trouble, and look after their own. But I volunteered for the medic training and kept up my language skills because they’re often more effective than guns.” He gave her a lopsided smile. “Don’t tell any Jumpers I said that.”

  “Your secret’s safe with me.” She couldn’t hold her answering smile for long. “You have a lot of assets. You could move to a bigger city and be a medic and rent your printer.”

  He stilled. “Do you want me to go?”

  “No, I want you to stay, because I think I’m in love with you.” She wrapped her arms around her ribs. “But it’s not about me. I want what’s right for you.”

  A slow smile rose on his face. “All the cities are in the south, and Serena would be miserable in the heat.” He stood and eased his way around the end of the counter. “I know you’d take her, but Trouble wouldn’t have anyone to watch over, so I’d have to leave him and the others with you, too. Kivo’s a theft magnet, like Jynx, so I’d have to leave him, as well.” He edged toward her, close enough to touch her. “And that means everyone I love would be here.”

  She looked up at his strong, kind face. “You could have anyone you want. Someone who can promise not to be scared with you. Someone who’s normal.”

  “Normal is boring.” He touched the scarred side of his neck with his cybernetic hand. “I’m no prize.” She hadn’t seen that vulnerable look on his face before.

  “Because you’re a cyborg?” She reached out to slip her hand into his. She stroked a thumb over the exposed biometal knuckle. “Cybernetics are a part of you, but they’re not you. The man I know is caring, smart... beautiful.” Her eyes welled with tears. “Anyone would be lucky to have you.”

  “What if the only one I want is a nova-hot veterinarian who loves animals?” He slid his other hand up her arm slowly and rested it on her shoulder.

  Bethnee smiled. “Nuñez would be happy to hear it.” She put a hand on Axur’s waist. “She and her wife think you’re sexy. They like to share a handsome man on special occasions.”

  Axur shook his head. “The only woman I want also has a cybernetic leopard and a hot-spring pool.” He put his other hand on the side of her face, and wove his fingers into her hair.

  She leaned into his touch. “As it so happens, the only man I want is tall and strong, and loves animals.”

  He lowered his head to hers, stopping just before their lips touched. “Do you still want to kiss me?”

  She raised her hand to his face to caress his cheek. “More than anything. Do you want to be kissed?”

  “More than anything.” He met her halfway to join his lips with hers.

  He tasted cool and sweet. Heat pooled in her abdomen and warmed her core. She pulled herself closer, wanting to share the heat with him. He left her mouth and trailed kisses to the side of her face. She gasped in a mix of pleasure and pain as he brushed by her sore jaw.

  He pulled back to look at her face. “Sorry, I didn’t think.” He touched delicate fingers to her cheek. “I’ve just wanted you for so long. I love you.”

  She gave up fighting the tears and let them fall. “I love you, too, but I’m a mess. Could we maybe talk about this in my geothermal pool?”

  He gave her a lascivious grin. “Naked in your geothermal pool?”

  She chuckled. “Yeah, naked.” She boldly slid a hand around to cup his muscular ass. “I’m worried about your cold dangly bits.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  GDAT 3241.266

  They didn’t make it to the pool as fast as Axur had hoped.

  Security systems needed arming after he’d brought all his gear into her marvelous cave. Animals variously needed calling in, drying off, feeding and watering, and cleaning up after. Using his enhanced speed and strength burned through calories like kindling, and he didn’t have Jumper nutrient rebalancer concentrates to compensate. Bethnee had pushed her talent limit to the edge, too.

  Finally, she led him to the geothermal pool. She turned and kissed him. “Hello, fellow homesteader.”

  “Hey, yourself.” He could drown in the depths of her eyes. “Can we get naked now?”

  She laughed. “Yes.” She started to pull her tunic up with trembling hands, but he stopped her. “I want to make love with you more than my next breath, but I don’t want to scare you.” He slid a hand up to her shoulder. “I’m not a telepath or an empath, I’m just a flux-to-the-max Jumper. You have to tell me what’s too much, or too fast, or too close.”

  “I’ll try. Sometimes, it takes me by surprise.” She held up shaking fingers. “This isn’t from fear, it’s from wanting you.” She flattened her palm on his chest. “I haven’t had a lover since I was seventeen, and that was sex in the back of prepaid autocabs. You’ll have to tell me what’s going on with you, too. I love your strength, but I can’t read you. I tank at communicating with humans.”

  “As it happ
ens, I have built-in capacity for comms.” She snorted in amusement. He captured her fingers and kissed them. “We’ll figure it out together.”

  They explored each other in the warm pool. He loved finding the places where he could make her gasp and moan, and helping her find the spots on him that sent fire through his every synapse. He carried her naked to her bed, and only had to evict four furry occupants before joining with her to give them both the pleasure they’d been seeking. Their bodies seemed to fit together, like they’d been made for each other.

  When he awoke and turned the lights up a bit, he discovered the bed had been invaded by three cats, a ferwinkle, a foo dog, and a chimera. He had a feeling their bed would never be cold or empty.

  Bethnee stirred and rolled to the side, eliciting a muffled meow of protest from Delta the cat. Bethnee sighed and rolled back to drape herself on Axur. He loved the feel of her skin on his, the scent of her, the weight of her on him.

  “What time is it?” she asked.

  He checked his chrono implant. “A little after zero one hundred.”

  She slid her hand up to caress his jaw with her thumb. “Can’t sleep in a strange bed?” She tweaked his earlobe. “Or with a strange woman?”

  “You’re not strange, you’re unconventional.” She made a rude sound, and he laughed. “Cyborgs love unconventional women who live in caves.” He wrapped his arm around her waist.

  “Good,” she said. “I love cyborgs who have their own freighters. And printers. And autodocs. And runabouts.” She kissed him between each item she listed.

  He laughed. “It’s too far for my potential patients and customers, though. I like your idea of looking at the abandoned house next to Nuñez’s to see if we can make it into a medical clinic.” He kissed her hairline. “According to a forecaster friend of Cherkogin’s, trouble is brewing in the Concordance, and frontier planets should expect an influx of refugees. Something to do with Ayorinn’s Legacy. You know, those nonsensical poems that predict a radical vector change for civilization.” He shook his head. “The CPS dismisses them as a hoax, but I don’t trust the CPS much anymore.”

  She sat up slowly. “I’m going to the fresher and check on Trouble. Want some water?”

  “Yes, please.”

  He watched her because he could, enjoying the sleek curve and sway of her slender hips as she walked.

  He sat up and rearranged pillows, blankets, and animals so she’d have a place to sit when she came back.

  She returned carrying a glass of water and the wrapped Solstice Day present he’d given her. Trouble the dog walked in behind her, slower than usual, but looking alert. She handed him the water, then helped Trouble up onto the bed next to Kivo.

  She kneeled on the bed and stroked Trouble’s head. “I’m not sorry Kanaway died.”

  “Me, either.” Axur took a deep, steadying breath to keep the anger at bay. He wanted to resurrect the asshole, just so he could kill him himself, more slowly.

  She crawled toward him to sit next to him against the pillows, holding the present. “Can I open this now?”

  “Sure.” He watched her face as she unwrapped and opened the box.

  After a moment, recognition dawned. She stroked the heart-shaped piece of fur and looked up at him with a smile. “You printed this?”

  “Yes.” He loved her quick mind. “I’ve been working on a formula for synthskin patches for me, so I thought I’d experiment with synthfur for Jynx’s leg. She deserves to be free to go outside whenever she wants.”

  She put the fur back in the box and put it on the nearby ledge, then kissed his shoulder. “It’s a perfect gift.” She slid herself under his arm. “I’m thinking it wouldn’t hurt to plan for an influx of new people, regardless. Once word gets around you’re a trained medic with an autodoc, more people will visit Tanimai, and some will stay.”

  “I guess I’m the first of the influx, then.” He picked up her hand and kissed her fingers. “Lucky for me, I fell in love with a woman with a homestead and built-in family.”

  “We’re the lucky ones.” She kissed his chest. “I think you should talk to Cherkogin again. Offer to be on reserve, train with them monthly. You’d learn things you can’t find out from just listening to their comms. Then we could prepare better, if we get more refugees.”

  “You wouldn’t mind?” His two potentially serious relationships while in the military had foundered when their assignments had taken one or both of them away for ten-days at a time. “I have to admit I was tempted, but you’re more important to me.”

  “I appreciate that, but you’ve got skills you should be using.” With a somewhat awkward move, she straddled his thighs and faced him. “Strength. Comms. Languages. Making friends. Blowing things up.” She rested her hands on his shoulders and gave him a sharp smile. “Make them pay you in hard credit.”

  He laughed. “Now the truth comes out.”

  “Yep,” she said. “We have to finish more of the cave so your animals can be comfortable when we’re here.” They’d decided to spend time at both her place and his, to maintain his homestead claim. “That takes renting the rock laser, and that takes hard credit.”

  He glided his hands up to her waist and leaned forward to give her a long, sensual kiss, with a promise of more. “I love a nova-hot woman who knows how to make a good trade.”

  Also by Carol Van Natta

  Space Opera:

  Last Ship off Polaris’G (Central Galactic Concordence Novella)

  Overload Flux (Central Galactic Concordance Book 1)

  Minder Rising (Central Galactic Concordance Book 2)

  Zero Flux (Central Galactic Concordance Book 2.5)

  Pico’s Crush (Central Galactic Concordance Book 3)

  Jumper’s Hope (Central Galactic Concordance Book 4)

  Paranormal Romance:

  In Graves Below (Magic, New Mexico)

  Retro Science Fiction Comedy

  Hooray for Holopticon

  About the Author

  Carol Van Natta writes science fiction, fantasy, and paranormal romance. She is the author of the multi-award winning Central Galactic Concordance space opera, adventure, and romance series that starts with Overload Flux. She also wrote In Graves Below (Magic, NM), a paranormal romance, and Hooray for Holopticon, a retro science fiction comedy. She shares her Fort Collins, CO home with the resident mad scientist and various cats. Any violations of the laws of physics in her books may be blamed on the cats, who are notorious gravity scofflaws. Someday, she would like to travel to the stars and take her cats, a foo dog, and a six-legged chimera with her.

  author.carolvannatta.com/

  Mascot

  A Novella in the Aeon's Legacy Series

  By

  Alexis Glynn Latner

  About Mascot

  Daya Tattujayan is the manager of a remote and nearly derelict space mining station. She has plenty of problems to deal with even before the interstellar syndicate that owns the station sends an auditor to check up on her work.

  Rik Gole is a nomadic interstellar auditor with no roots to tie him down. He is ruthless when he has to be and very good at what he does, but Rik would be the first to admit that a woman like Daya and a place like this station are way outside of his previous experience.

  Before Daya and Rik can decide whether they are antagonists, allies, or something more, an unexpected enemy attacks the station. To save their lives, they must dare to trust each other. And they need help from a very unconventional defender—Daya’s mysterious alien pet, the mascot of Star Corner Station.

  One

  Starships always shone when they reached their destination. When they emerged out of the strange non-space of starflight, returning into real space and time, starships shed light. The shining wasn’t usually apparent to passengers, even though it might be visible to watchers in the nearest space station. In his career to date, Rik Gole had ended a couple of hundred starflight journeys without seeing anything of the sort.

  This time was
different. Reaching this out-of-the-way destination took a high-energy starjump. The energy of the starjump made the star-freighter shine like a beacon when it got here. Shining on Star Corner Station, the light of Rik’s arrival accentuated how ugly it was.

  The Station was a cobbled-together hulk, battered by asteroid impacts and crudely repaired. Windows in deeply shadowed crevasses of the station showed as bright pinpoints, but the pinpoints were scattered, even furtive, suggesting that large sections of the station were deserted or decommissioned. The Station’s hull told which way the local cosmic wind was blowing—from above. That way lay a massive, brilliant blue star embedded in the Starcross Nebula. The radiance of the star drove a violent wind of gas and dust across the Station, the top side of which was conspicuously weathered—stained and pitted.

  Behind the Station, a shiny, barren orb hung in front of the nebular backdrop of pink and blue gas and dark dust. That was the metal planetary core that Star Corner Station orbited, and the last remaining reason the Station existed. Whether it was a good enough reason was a question Rik meant to answer.

  Rik was an interstellar auditor.

  Unlike some auditors for the Faxen Interstellar Financial Authority, FINFINA, Rik took no joy in the exposé of an unprofitable enterprise, one that had outlived its time, but nonetheless employed a number of people and played some kind of role in an orbital community. Or helped a remote world communicate with the rest of the universe. Or housed a terraforming operation. Something like that. If Star Corner Station had any such redeeming features, that was not obvious. But Rik was here not just to shine an investigative light at the surface of it; he was here to illuminate its inner workings.

  That he had been sent to Star Corner Station meant that FINFINA had reason to suspect misadministration or dishonesty. He was here to find out exactly what was wrong and who was responsible.