She was fighting her tears. He could always get to her emotionally and it was scary as hell. She wanted Turk but they couldn’t repeat the same mistakes again. “No more secrets.”
“Agreed. No more secrets.”
He leaned forward to kiss her lips but she pulled away. “If we start that, we’ll never leave this bed.”
“I don’t mind.”
She laughed, shaking her head at him. “I may have today off, but I want to go over everything that you found so far during your investigation. Especially your suspicions regarding the fire.”
He sat up. “Let’s take a shower, then eat lunch first.”
“Turk…”
“I just want to make sure to take good care of you. Let me.”
She smiled. He had been attentive to her when they had first started dating, but that had stopped sometime after he started drinking heavily.
“I am very hungry. Someone wore me out last night.”
He chuckled, rubbing her bare back as she sat up next to him. It felt so good to have his hands on her. She never could resist his touch. He had gotten out of many arguments with her because he knew how much she craved his caresses.
“Shall we shower together?” He leaned over to kiss her shoulder.
“Will we only shower or do other — things.”
He smiled against her skin. “I so want to do other things, but we’re talking and I want us to keep talking. I’ve waited years for you so waiting a few hours before I make love to you again is nothing.”
“I’m not big on waiting,” she told him with mischief in her eyes.
“I need to go to my suite to get a change of clothes.”
“I don’t want you to go,” she pouted.
“Go shower. I’ll run down to my suite to change. Then I’ll come back and fix you lunch.”
“Are you planning to poison me? Last time I had something that you cooked, I threw it up an hour later.”
He put his hand over his heart. “That offends me greatly, Rena. You’ll have to trust me that I won’t kill us via food.”
She laughed. “Trusting you to handle my ship is one thing, cooking me food is another.”
Rena grabbed a shirt and pants from her closet sauntered to the bathroom naked. She could feel his eyes on her ass the whole way. She paused and looked back. “Trust has to be earned, but you’re starting to earn mine. I’ll hurry.” She turned and closed the door behind her.
A part of her wanted to call him to the bathroom so that they could share the shower. She could spend days in bed with him. It would take days, weeks, months, years to make up for all that they had lost.
The water felt so good. It relaxed her aching muscles. She quickly showered and pulled on her shirt. She brushed her wet hair and then went to see if Turk had returned. She found him in her kitchen area. She stood at the entrance, watching him as he chopped vegetables and whisked some eggs. He was humming the whole time. The smell of the onions he was sautéing made her stomach growl.
She could get used to this every morning for the rest of her life. She felt something inside her ease; a heaviness she had held for all these years was lifted off her. Nothing was determined yet, and they still had a long way to go to repair their relationship. They’d lived apart for years and it was going to take a while for them to get to know each other again.
How many women had he been with? Did he have other girlfriends after their breakup? Were these things she really wanted to know? She was sure, through time together, she would find these things out. There were more pressing things they needed to discuss, like how they were going to work on their relationship if he returned to his ship. There were so many unanswered questions.
“Are you hungry?” he asked from across the room.
She looked at his joyful face and a calmness settled inside her. Yes, there were things they still needed to work out. Yes, they had to learn about each other all over again, but Turk was worth whatever she had to do to make sure he remained in her life.
“I’m starving.”
*****
Turk was trying to hold back his excitement. He had pined for this woman for years and now he couldn’t believe he was finally with her again. She was freshly showered, her damp hair was combed back, and she was not wearing any makeup. This was how he preferred her — well, except naked in his bed. He preferred that much more.
“I take it you still eat meat. I saw that you had quadru sausage and beta duck eggs. I’m making you an omelet. Would you like orange juice, coffee, or water?”
“You really have changed, haven’t you?” She gave him an admiring glance.
He shrugged. “I hope that I have. I certainly put in the work.”
He sat down across from her with his own plate. She reached across the table to take his hand. His whole body reacted to that simple touch. He wanted her again. He was tempted to knock the plates off the table and take her right there. He looked over at her beautiful face and felt a tenderness he didn’t think he was capable of.
She smiled at him and squeezed his hand. “This is a dream come true. Thank you for last night and for breakfast.”
He pulled her hand to him and gently kissed her knuckles. “Thank you for giving me a chance — giving us a chance. Now eat before it gets cold.” He let her hand go.
“You are so bossy.”
“You love it and you know it,” he said as he gave her a wink.
They ate in comfortable silence, giving each other heated looks. When they were done, she helped him clean the dishes and put them away.
“So what are we doing today?”
“I need to review some background checks that Drako was supposed to run for me yesterday.”
“Who are the background checks on?” When he hesitated to answer her, she pressed him further. “Come on, Turk. I run background checks on every crew member before I hire them. I would know if something is off. Give me some credit.”
“How much do you know about Jaken and Nade?”
“The twin idiots? They can be rude at times, but seem harmless enough.”
“What did your background check tell you about them?”
“Actually, they’re the only two I didn’t run checks on. They were crew members on board this ship when I took over the bank loan from the previous captain. Captain Diesel highly recommended them to me and when I interviewed them, they were knowledgeable enough and came across as eager to work for me. Over the past year, that has changed slowly. I can tell that they don’t respect me and at times, I’ve had to threaten them with probation or even firing if they didn’t straighten up. They seemed to change their attitude, at least temporarily.”
“Well, they are my number one suspects.”
“Is there anyone else you’re looking at?”
He glanced away quickly, but she caught it.
“Who?”
“I asked for a background check on — Collins.”
She looked at him in surprise. “Jesse Collins, the liaison? Why?”
“I just — I don’t trust him.”
“How do you even know him? You met him once from what I know.”
“I observed him a few times.”
“When?”
He didn’t say anything.
“Were you spying on me?”
“Of course not.” That sounded like a lie to his own ears. “I was looking out for you.” He waited for her outburst of anger but got laughter instead.
“You are so full of it! You were watching us because you were jealous.”
He gave her a side smile. “Maybe a little.”
She gave him a knowing look and they both laughed. It was wonderful to share laughter and smiles with her. He felt like he hadn’t truly laughed or smiled in a long time. He loved seeing her laugh; it made her face light up and reminded him of the very first time he saw her.
“I’ve missed this, just having a little fun together.”
She touched his face. “I’ve missed this, too. I’ve missed you
every day.”
“Why didn’t you return my messages?”
She sighed and placed her hand over his heart. He knew his heart was beating fast.
“I was hurt and angry.”
“I’m so sorry I put us in that position because of my drinking. None of that would have happened if I hadn’t let the alcohol control me.”
“Was there anything I did that made you give in to the alchohol?”
“No, honey, things had to happen the way they did for me to reach rock bottom. Only then could I admit I had a problem. I regret that you were hurt in the process, but I don’t regret the time. I needed that time to get myself well and back on track. You couldn’t have saved me from my own self-destruction.”
“You seem to be doing really well now. You have your own ship.”
“I got into a good rehab program. Then I applied myself to gaining my galactic captain’s license. I got it, but worked on other ships for a while to really learn all aspects of life on a ship before I took command of my own ship.”
“Is that why Drako let you come to investigate? You’re an expert on how a ship should run?”
“That’s his reasoning to the GP, but he let me do it because of you. He knew I wanted a chance to try to make things right between us somehow.”
“I’m glad you had a friend like Drako to help you through the bad times.”
He noted a bit of wistfulness in her voice. “What about your mother? She was there for you, wasn’t she?”
“You know I’ve never been close to my mother. Things got worse when she kept trying to push me to forgive Tena.”
He shook his head. “You don’t like to be pushed. You end up pushing back.”
“Exactly. I wasn’t ready back then to forgive Tena for all that she had done, just like I wasn’t ready to talk to you. I was pretty stubborn about it.”
“What about now?”
“I think I’m ready to try to start again with Tena, and with you. It’s not going to be easy. We each have a long road ahead and there’s a lot of work to be done.”
“I’m willing, no matter how long it takes or what I have to do in order to have you back in my life.”
“I feel the same.”
They kissed and all other thoughts left his mind except for her. He almost growled when she pulled out of his arms. “Hey — where are you going?”
“Let’s take a look at those background checks.”
He sighed, realizing the moment had been interrupted. “Fine, but I still hungry for you.”
She giggled, keeping out his reach. “Let’s work up your appetite.”
Chapter 14
“Where is she?” Jaken demanded.
“She called earlier to check on the damages but didn’t say when she would be in,” Nade responded.
“Has Turk returned to work?”
Nade shook his head. “Captain Bitch told many of the crew to remain away from their work areas until the destruction from the fire is properly cleared. There were a few that were injured and had to be sent for medical attention. He might fall in one or the other category. Why, what are you thinking?”
“I think that they may know each other more than they’re letting on.”
“What do you want to do?”
“Keep an eye on them. I want to know every time they meet. I also think we’re going to have to move things up faster if we plan to get rid of her.”
“If the GP doesn’t step in to remove her, what do you want to do about it?”
“We’ll get rid of her, one way or another.”
*****
“I still can’t believe you had Drako run a background check on Jesse.” Rena sat back in the chair. They had been going over the background checks that Drako sent them. She was frustrated that the background checks on Jaken and Nade revealed inconsistencies from what she had been told from the ship’s previous captain.
“He seemed pretty suspicious to me,” Turk commented without looking at her.
She smiled at him, no longer upset about it. “Jealous much?”
“Jealous — a lot.”
She got up and moved to stand behind him, wrapping her arms around his neck and kissing his cheek. “You have nothing to worry about. Jesse may be attractive, but—”
“You think he’s attractive?”
“—but, he doesn’t compare to you at all.” She nuzzled his neck and inhaled his scent. God, how she had missed his scent over the years. She wanted to rub her body all over him and carry his scent with her all the time. Did that make her crazy? Maybe, but she felt like she had been crazy during the years she had been separated from him. He had never left her heart, no matter how hard she had tried to push him out.
“So, what now?”
“Now, we need to review the video feed I recorded.”
“What video feed?”
“I put up some hidden cameras throughout the ship to try to capture the culprits.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about that? How many cameras are we talking about and where are they?”
“I didn’t tell you about it right away because the twin numbnuts were watching me like a couple of hawks and it seemed like they were trying to keep me away from you. Then I didn’t want to tell you in case you had issues with me spying on your crew. I know you’re extremely protective over them.”
She folded her arms over her chest. “I have a medium-sized ship. If you installed enough cameras throughout the ship to monitor all crew members, that’s going to be hours and hours of viewing.”
Let’s go down to my suite so that I can pull up the video feed.”
She followed him out of her suite down to the level his suite was on. She frowned that it was such small quarters. She wanted to offer for him to move up to her place but thought it might be moving things too fast.
Turk pulled out his handheld computer and started typing. “Let’s view the feed of the area where the fire was started, the day before, the day of, and the day after the fire.”
She moved closer to him and he hit play on the video. They watched as people passed through the area, including Rena herself. At first, it was starting to look pointless, then thirty minutes prior to when the fire broke out, they saw the three people who were the last to pass through the area. Two of those people were Jaken and Nade.
“What do you think?”
“It’s probably enough to get Drako to send someone to question them.”
“Make the call to Drako. I’ve got to call and check in with my crew to see how the clean-up is going.”
*****
Jaken punched the console. “They used to be in a relationship.”
Nade looked at his brother. “How do you know that?”
“I checked both their captain’s training and they went to the same training facility. I also checked their previous known addresses and they shared a place a few years back.”
“So what? They wanted to be together again?”
“Then why would they lie about knowing each other?”
“It’s too convenient. We need to be careful.”
“Agreed.”
*****
Twenty minutes later
Turk pulled her into his lap and kissed her. Her body was heaven to him. Nothing felt as good as his Rena. He nuzzled her, doing his part to heat her up. She responded instantly. He always could get her revved up. She moved her bottom against him and his hard shaft pressed tightly against his pants. He pushed his hips up so that she could feel his need.
Rena turned so that she straddled his lap and began to ride him through their clothes. She nibbled his chin and smiled when he growled. His large hands gripped her hips and moved her against him harder and faster.
“You are being so bad, Rena. I can’t concentrate with you near me or touching me.”
“You make me forget my own name sometimes, especially when you kiss me. No one makes me feel like this.”
Suddenly, their clothes were just in the way. He ripped her shirt dow
n the center and was rewarded by perfect round and completely naked breasts. She was feeling the same about the clothes because she was trying to unbutton his pants.
Somehow, after ripping and shrugging, they managed to get her naked and his pants pulled down to his ankles. She straddled him and now nothing was separating their skin.
“I need you now, Turk!”
He needed her too. He gripped her hips and brought her sweet pussy down over his pulsing dick. They both moaned in pleasure as he filled her.
“Baby, I can’t go slow this time.”
“I don’t want slow.”
“What do you want?”
“You — fucking me — hard!”
No other words were needed as he helped her set a hard and fast pace. She rode him hard and wild.
It didn’t last as long as he wanted because they were both so impassioned and needy. When they both had their release, Turk pressed his forehead against Rena’s. He loved her and wanted to tell her that, but wasn’t sure if she would think it was too soon. Was she sore from last night? He couldn’t feel guilty about it because it was life affirming for him. This was the person he was meant to be with. To have the chance to hold her and touch her again was mind blowing.
*****
Another round of lovemaking left Rena feeling completely relaxed. She sighed as she got up and started putting on clothes.
“Where are you going?” Turk leaned up on his elbow on the bed.
“I need to go home and change.” She showed how her clothes were torn.
“I don’t want you to go. I have plenty of clothes,” Turk offered.
She snorted. “Honey, I want to wear my own clothes. Besides, there are still a few things I need to check on from the crew and I want to see what Jaken and Nade have done in my absence.”
“Fine. How about I come over in a few hours and take you out to dinner?
She gave him a big smile. “I would love that.”
Fighting the Stars Page 8