“Stay out of my head!” Anya snapped. “Yes, but it’s equally insulting that you doubted and I don’t particularly care if you think I’m worthy or not!” She thought that over. “Worthy of what?”
His thick, dark gold brows arched upward. “Of me.”
Anya gave him a look. “I suppose it didn’t occur to you that I might find you unworthy of me?”
His amusement vanished. “Why would you not?”
Why indeed? Physically, he was such perfection it was downright intimidating, and there was no doubt in her mind that, both chemically and physically, she was drawn to him. She knew why she doubted, though. “Character,” she responded succinctly.
He seemed to dismiss that after a moment, but she could see he was irritated that she might find him lacking in any way. He reached for her, dragging her against his chest. It felt almost like being pressed against an oak.
It took her brain several moments to catch up, for she hadn’t even seen him move.
Stunned, she stared up into his deep blue eyes, mesmerized by the shifting colors that reflected his thoughts and emotions. She found she couldn’t move as his head drifted closer, as his lips descended toward hers, found she didn’t want to.
His heated breath caressed her lips as he drew nearer, his own lips parting as his breathing accelerated in sync with her own. His scent and heat acted upon her like a strong aphrodisiac. Her lips tingled, parted seemingly of their own accord.
His hands, like manacles already around her arms, tightened almost painfully and then loosened fractionally even as the pain registered in her mind. “Fragile,” he murmured, his lips grazing hers as he formed the words, sending shivery sensation through her that made her feel as if she was melting, becoming a liquid pool of desperate need.
“Infinitely sweet,” he said on a whisper of sound, very deliberately brushing his lips lightly along hers. “I have not felt this kinship with another being in eons, not felt such desire ever before.”
A question rose in her mind, but vanished as he sealed his lips to hers. The faint scent and taste of him that had been teasing her to distraction instantly intensified as he invaded the sensitive cavern of her mouth with his tongue, tasting her, touching off jagged electric currents. The flash of heat that went through her was scorching in intensity, demolishing all rational thought, instantly driving her upwards from curiosity and burgeoning desire to ravening hunger.
Uttering a faint sound of surrender and desperation, she leaned into his kiss, opening her mouth to him in welcome. She felt a shudder run through his great body. The hands that had been gripping her upper arms released their hold. His arms came around her, molding her to his length.
Her head spun as he lowered her to the blanket and covered her body with his, fitting their bodies so cunningly together she felt the heat and strength of his body along her entire length, felt the power of his desire in the turgid flesh that nestled against her thigh.
It sent a sense of wonder through her, heady desire, and, faintly, a sense of power that so marvelous a being found her so desirable, quaked at her touch, was as vulnerable to his need for her as she was to her need for him. His mouth moved over hers with escalating hunger, touching off echoes within her body until she felt as if she was on fire, feverish.
He broke the kiss. “I want to see and touch your body all over,” he murmured almost feverishly as he skated his lips and tongue over the sensitive flesh of her throat and the small patch of bare flesh above the neck of her suit, “taste your essence, bury my body deeply inside of you, spill my seed into your womb. It will flourish there. I know this—that you were destined for me. You are what I have searched for. You were meant for me.”
It was the seed thing that brought her euphoria crashing down around her. Her body had been skating the edge of a glorious high right up until he’d brought procreation into the mix.
“No!” she gasped, struggled for several moments, and abruptly sat straight up in bed, breathing as if she’d just run a marathon, her heart hammering almost painfully in her chest.
* * * *
A wave of shock rolled through him. At first he was too stunned to feel anything but surprise that she had broken the connection between them. A mixture of conflicting emotions pelted him when the surprise wore off. He was pleased to discover that she was more of a challenge than he’d anticipated. At the same time, frustration arose in him that she had broken his hold on her subconscious before he had familiarized himself with her as thoroughly as he had wanted to. Unquenched desire still simmered within him from the taste of her he had had and that did not please him at all. Outrage swept all before it, however, when it dawned upon him that it was his mention of filling her with his offspring that had roused her enough to flee from his hold.
She had questioned his worthiness, implied that she found him lacking in some manner! Her arrogance might have amused him if it had not made him so furious.
Chapter Three
Anya’s alarm was sounding, but she was so deeply wrapped up in the alarm racing through her body that moments passed before she realized what the ungodly racket was that was making her skull pound and setting her teeth on edge.
“Off!” she snapped as the realization sank in and dropped heavily back onto her pillow as the sound vanished and blessed silence returned except for her labored breathing.
She felt as if she’d woken from a nightmare, distressed. Closing her eyes, she struggled to grasp the threads of her dream that were rapidly vanishing from her mind. She frowned when the memories eluded her except for thin wisps that she could scarcely put together.
Giving up finally, she pushed herself upright again and thrust the covers away. The light brush of her hands over her body sent nearly agonizing sensations through her and gave her pause. She felt the dampness of her sex then and was even more puzzled.
She rarely had what most people described as wet dreams, but when she did she certainly didn’t awaken with the sense that it was a nightmare she’d had.
Vaguely, she remembered something about an alien world, but she couldn’t produce the images, only the sense that she’d dreamed of an alien world.
That wasn’t that hard to figure out. She’d had nothing on her mind when she’d retired beyond the sense of frustration she felt about being forbidden to examine the alien artifact they’d found.
She was the chief science officer. Mostly her duties were as medic to the crew members because there was little call for a science officer. But that didn’t change the fact that she was qualified to serve in that capacity and required to when and if the need arose.
When she’d performed her morning ritual and changed out of her nightwear and into a fresh uniform, she left her quarters and headed toward the mess hall.
She was sore from the unaccustomed exercise the day before, not only from the running and tugging at Melanie and the others, but from the work that had had to be done to seal the breach in the hull before they could pressurize the bay once more and get inside the station.
The day crew was in the mess hall when she arrived. Except for the occasional scrape of fork or spoon to plate and the faint chink of crockery against the tables, the room was silent. No one, it seemed, was much in the mood for talk. In fact, a survey of the room’s occupants produced the information that everyone, without exception, looked to be suffering from a hangover. Russo and Mitchner sat at a table alone, glaring at their plates as if the sight of the food was repulsive, their steaming coffee mugs clutched in their hands as if to ward off any attempts to snatch them away.
Wondering if it was merely their hangovers, or if they’d been apprised of the fact that they’d been left behind when everyone else abandoned ship, she moved to the food unit and, as was her habit, carefully selected a balanced breakfast even though she felt vaguely nauseous at the prospect of actually eating it.
Melanie was sitting at a table alone and after she’d collected eating utensils, Anya joined her.
She didn’t feel much like talking and she
could see from the vague, glazed look in Melanie’s eyes that she was of a similar bent, but, mentally shrugging, she took the plunge anyway. “How are you feeling?”
Melanie lifted her head and stared at her blankly for several moments. Finally, she blinked as if coming out of a trance. Slowly, color seeped into her cheeks. A shiver skated down her spine. “Better than I should be, I expect.”
Resolutely ignoring her disinclination to eat, Anya nibbled half heartedly at her food. “I could give you something to help with the hangover if you want to come down to the med lab when we’re done here.”
Melanie shrugged. “I had the wildest dream last night,” she finally said, leaning closer and speaking in a low voice.
Anya felt a jolt run through her. “Did you?” she prompted.
Melanie nodded, but then frowned. “Not that I can remember a lot of it.”
Anya stirred the food on her plate. “What do you remember?”
Melanie dragged in a deep breath and let out a sigh. “There was this absolutely gorgeous man. And, this is weird, he was blond. I remember that.”
Anya failed to grasp the logic of the ‘weird’ part, but she felt her stomach tighten as Melanie’s word’s instantly stirred her own memories and an image appeared before her mind’s eye. “What was weird about him being blond?”
Melanie gave her a look. “You know I go for dark men,” she said irritably. “I just can’t figure out why I’d have a wet dream about a blond god when I don’t usually find fair men attractive.”
Anya choked on the sip of coffee she’d just taken, nearly snorting the brew through her nostrils. Her eyes watered. Her nose stung. Grabbing her napkin, she covered her mouth and nose and coughed until she’d managed to bring up the liquid she’d inhaled.
“You ok?” Melanie asked sympathetically.
Not really. She managed a thin smile, though. “It just went down the wrong way,” she said a little hoarsely. Frowning, she took a careful sip and swallowed with equal care. “So … you dreamed this hunky blond guy made love to you? Maybe you were thinking about somebody you’ve known?”
Melanie shook her head. “That’s what’s weird. Somehow, I knew he wasn’t a man at all, not human anyway—but, god!—the guy was built like a dream. Fucked me six ways from Sunday and I swear I’ve never experienced anything like it! It was better than the real thing, better than anything I’ve ever experienced anyway. It was like he … he controlled the pleasure centers of my brain.”
The jealousy that coiled in Anya’s belly was both surprising and sickening. “You … he … y’all did it?”
Melanie snickered and covered her mouth. “Your accent’s slipping. You ok? Seriously, you haven’t gone all southern gal in a while. I thought you’d ditched the accent for good.”
Anya sent her friend a narrow eyed glare. “What’s wrong with my accent?” she asked stiffly.
Melanie held up her hands. “Don’t be mad. I always liked it. You were the one that decided you needed to ditch it because nobody took you seriously.”
Correction, everyone tended to equate the slow drawl with stupidity and ignorance regardless of the honors she’d accrued. Realizing Melanie had a point, Anya struggled to tamp her anger, but it dawned on her fairly quickly that she wasn’t really angry about the remark about her accent. The ‘slip’ into her normal speech patterns was evidence of her distress not the heart of it. Unaccustomed as she was to feeling jealousy at all, she still recognized it. It didn’t matter that it was crazy to feel it. The emotion was still coiled like a poison serpent in her belly.
She tried to shrug it off, but finally excused herself and left the mess hall. There was little to do in the infirmary to distract her. More than half expecting crew members to pop in and ask for something to soothe their hangovers, she was surprised when they didn’t and disturbed for no reason that she could completely fathom. It occurred to her after a while that it bothered her because it didn’t seem typical of the behavior she’d come to expect of the crew. Even Melanie hadn’t come to request a painkiller and although she wouldn’t have categorized any of the crew members as drug heads, they were certainly accustomed to popping pills for whatever ailed them.
Truthfully, that was about the only purpose she served. It was required that anyone going into space be in peak physical condition. Except for an occasional accident or illness, she had more time on her hands than she knew what to do with and no one was the least shy about dropping by to ask for something to ease aches and pains, something to help them sleep, help them wake up, soothe their nerves, pep up their sex lives.
Why hadn’t anyone at all come to the infirmary when she knew at least a few had to be suffering the aftereffects of the booze they’d had the afternoon before?
That wasn’t the only thing puzzling or disturbing her, however. Fending it off as long as she could, her mind eventually returned to the discussion she’d had with Mel at breakfast. It wasn’t just bizarre that they’d had the same dream, or two damned similar dreams, it was scary.
It was almost as scary that she felt like Melanie had trespassed.
The thought flickered through her mind that nothing had changed except the acquisition of the alien artifact, but it seemed too farfetched to associate the dream, and the variation in behavior she’d felt, and sensed in the others, to what appeared to be nothing more than a stone.
She resolved, though, to tamp her strange sense of possessiveness and try to delve Melanie’s mind a little more closely.
Melanie looked at her a little warily when she joined her for lunch. “Still mad?”
Anya managed a strained smile. “I wasn’t really mad to start with.”
Mel gave her a look. “You could’ve fooled me,” she murmured, then looked Anya straight in the eyes. “I was so unsettled I forgot to thank you for saving my ass yesterday.”
Anya reddened, but she felt pleasure lift her spirits slightly. “You’re welcome.”
Mel seemed to relax. “That’ll teach me to unwind with booze, right?”
Anya shrugged. “We’ve been away from home a long time. I guess we’re all long overdue for letting loose.”
“Very,” Mel agreed, “but I think I’ll just wait until I get home to try it again. I’ve just gotten so used to being on this chunk of metal, I’d forgotten how really dangerous it is out here.”
“I think we all have—or had. Yesterday was a real eye opener.” She shivered. “Do me a favor?”
“What?”
“If I ever volunteer to space walk again, knock me out. I don’t think I’ve ever been so terrified in my life. I don’t know what possessed me even to suggest it.”
Melanie grinned at her. “And here I’d been admiring your balls, lady!”
“If I had any before they were about the size of peas by the time I got to the station.”
Melanie chuckled, but sobered almost at once. “Jokes aside, and I don’t know if everybody realized what you’d done, it took more than I have to offer yourself up as a sacrifice.”
Embarrassed, Anya felt her face heat up. “It was hardly that,” she said dryly.
“Not that you knew, and I know you took the risk to give the rest of us a better chance, even if nobody else realized it.”
Anya pushed her plate aside and clasped her hands in front of her on the table, staring at them meditively for several moments. “Tell me more about that dream,” she said finally.
Mel regarded her uneasily. “Are you going to get mad at me again?”
Anya managed a tight smile. “I’ll try not to.”
Frowning, Melanie seemed to be working to dredge up the memories. Her first words confirmed it. “Oddly enough, I don’t remember it as clearly as I did this morning. The thing that seems to stick in my mind most is pleasure and uneasiness—feelings, not too much I can visualize. I found myself in this alien landscape. I do remember that, and oddly enough Carol told me she had almost the exact same dream.”
Anya’s eyes widened in stunned surprise.
Her heart lurched almost painfully. “She did?”
“Yeah, weird, huh?”
“I’d say unbelievable except for the fact that I’m pretty sure I had the dream, too.”
Mel looked as stunned as Anya. “What do you think it means?”
Anya shrugged. “Not portents,” she said dryly. “I think it’s that thing down in the bay.”
Melanie’s jaw sagged to half mast before a sound roughly reminiscent of a laugh erupted. “You can’t be …. You’re serious, aren’t you?”
Irritated more because Melanie had confirmed her suspicion that she was letting her imagination run away with her than because she felt her friend was ridiculing her suggestion, Anya felt her lips flatten into a thin line of irritation. “I’m open to your suggestions,” she said testily. “Why do you think at least three people had, from what we can tell, almost exactly the same dream?”
Except he hadn’t fucked her six ways from Sunday. He hadn’t done anything but kiss her!
Her body instantly stirred at the memory. Viciously, she tamped her wayward libido.
Mel shrugged. “I don’t know. I’d be more inclined to think it was something we ate, though,” she responded cattily. “You’re not going to report something like that, I hope? They’ll think you’ve got space dementia.”
“That was going to be my next guess,” Anya said with rising ire. Turning her head, she stared stonily at the far wall of the mess hall for several moments before it dawned on her that the conversations she sensed around her and Mel had a similar thread.
Instantly distracted, she focused her gaze from one table to the next and discovered there wasn’t a single agreeable conversation going on in the room. All the faces within her view wore scowls.
A puzzled frown drew her dark brows together. “Is it just me? Or does everyone seem particularly moody?”
Surprise flickered over Mel’s features. Turning, she surveyed the other crew members as Anya had. “I guess you figure this is because of the rock in the bay, too?”
“It isn’t a rock!” Anya snapped testily.
Lords of Mayhem Page 4