“Took you long enough,” he drawled, that wicked, wicked smile on his face melting what little remained of her insides.
“What are you doing?” The utter stupidity of him lying naked in her bed struck her cold, chasing away all the fuzzies she’d been feeling.
He shrugged. “It seems obvious to me.”
She bent to pick up a blanket that had half fallen on the floor this morning and threw it over his thighs and lower abdomen, where certain parts of his anatomy left no doubt what he had in mind.
“You’re going to get us in trouble. No, forget that. You’re going to get yourself killed.”
He sat up and flicked off the blanket as he stood. She took a step back, but he stalked her across the room.
“Rian shut himself in his quarters with two bottles of Violaine. I doubt he’ll come out for the next few hours, and everyone else is keeping themselves busy. I don’t know about you, but every hour that goes by I get a little bit crazier from wanting you. Plus after what just happened, we need this. So if you don’t stop thinking and come here now, I won’t be responsible for my actions.”
The back of her legs bumped into the chair set against the desk as he caught her, but his statements had silenced the small inner voice warning her this was a bad idea.
His green-gray eyes smoldered, scorching her before he lowered his head, placing a hot, open mouthed kiss on her neck just below her ear. She shuddered at the simple, yet consuming contact. He was right. Almost losing Rian, seeing him come so close to death, knowing that next time Ella might not be around to save him, it had broken something inside her, something she couldn’t put back to rights. But it had borne a tentative new courage to not be afraid of owning what she wanted out of her life. She needed this, needed Tannin. But this time, she wanted to do things her way.
She grabbed a handful of his hair and tugged until he leaned back from her. With a hand in the middle of his chest, she urged him toward the bed, smiling as he dropped down to where he’d been lying when she’d found him.
With quick movements, she stripped out of her clothes, letting them fall to the floor around her until cool air swirled over her bare skin, an arresting contrast to the heat building inside.
She placed a knee on the bed next to his hip, capturing his hand when he would have cupped her waist, instead taking it and laying his large, roughened palm over her breast.
He made a low sound. “I see the lady knows what she wants.”
Feeling free and empowered, she smiled at him, climbing all the way onto the bed, her thighs on either side of his hips. “I thought you already knew what I wanted.”
She kissed the underside of his jaw, loving the abrasive texture of his whiskers against her lips. He groaned as she lowered herself just enough for the tip of his erection to brush her very center.
“Let me guess. You want a new pair of shoes?” He tipped his head back and sucked in a breath as she repeated the teasing movement, this time increasing the pressure, the sensation of him slipping against her pure torture. She could only bear it because she was in control and could end it whenever she wanted.
“Actually, I do want a new pair of shoes, but that’s not what I was thinking of.”
Wanting more of him, she found his lips, kissed him deeply for a moment, then pulled back again.
“Maybe you want a diamond pendant to go with that star you wear, then?” His voice had become deeper, uneven. And this time when she rocked against him, she almost took him inside. Almost, but not quite, and the action had both of the moaning.
“A diamond would be nice, but still not what I had in mind.” She arched against him once more, knowing even she wouldn’t be able to stand the teasing torment much longer.
“Then you must want this.” He seized her hips and forced her downward even as he thrust upwards.
“Oh god, yes.”
So much for having all the power. Tannin might have been underneath her, but he set the pace, controlling every measured stroke and leaving her gasping each time he retreated.
The sensations wound tighter and tighter, sending her soaring until pleasure ripped from her very heart and soul, taking her to a place she’d never been and had never dreamed existed.
Below her, Tannin growled, wrapping a large hand around the back of her neck as he flipped them. She’d barely come down when he pushed her high again, cresting another intense wave, and this time he went with her. He shuddered against her and she felt him come deep inside her, creating yet another surge of bright, powerful feelings.
“Jezus,” he breathed out as he rolled to his side, tucking her into him. “If Rian doesn’t kill me, there’s a good possibility that you might.”
She laughed, since that about summed up how she felt. A yawn crept up on her, the lack of sleep from the night before weighing her down. Her eyes drifted closed and she felt Tannin pull a blanket over her as she snuggled deeper against him. At last, it seemed she’d relaxed enough to get a few minutes sleep. There was something so warm and peaceful about curling up next to Tannin after he’d loved her so well. In fact, she’d be quite happy to stay right here for the rest of eternity.
Chapter Twenty-One
Rian braced his hand against the bulkhead separating his bedroom from the privy, taking another burning swig from the bottle of Violaine. It didn’t help. The urge to scull the bottle until he collapsed into oblivion shook him, but getting wasted wouldn’t make a difference.
The witch had done something to him. He might have been dead, as hard as that was to believe, but she’d brought him back wrong. A part of him was missing. Where once there’d been a deep, dark, black hole of utter desolation and despair right in the middle of his soul, now there was nothing. He wouldn’t say he felt whole. Jezus, nothing would ever be able to do that, even a frecking miracle from God himself. But that chasm of utter wretchedness had been the driving force behind his longing to take down every Reidar in existence.
What would happen now that it was gone? Would he wake up one day and just not care anymore? Think, oh well, maybe it was someone else’s problem?
Some of the anger and bitterness he’d felt for the scum-sucking bastards spilled over into a loathing toward her, and he threw the half empty bottle into the bottom of the shower, wishing the sound of breaking glass could have been more satisfying. At least his resentment and rage were still in good working order.
He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and strode over to rip a clean shirt from a hanger in his locker.
The priestess would make this right. He didn’t doubt she’d know exactly what he was talking about. She probably thought she’d done him a favor. Helped him.
Well, he hadn’t asked for her frecking help, and Zahli shouldn’t have either. The ship’s regen unit probably would have revived him just fine. He’d seen people brought back from impossible wounds.
Somehow, he knew the witch was in her cabin, though he didn’t want to examine too closely how he could be so sure. He slapped his hand over the door control far harder than necessary, leaving a stinging in his palm.
He expected to find her perched on the middle of the bed in a meditative pose like he had last time, but instead she sat on the padded bench seat, feet tucked underneath her, watching a program on her viewer. Or should he say his viewer. She was only a guest on his ship, after all. No matter what the rest of the crew might think.
“I wondered when you’d come looking for me.” She turned the screen off and then looked up at him. “Fury and confusion are coming off you in waves.”
He clenched his fists, teetering off-side when he’d scarcely been in front of her for two seconds. “Stop reading me.”
Her lips thinned, an annoyed expression crossing her features. In the back of his mind, he realized the more time she spent with them, the less Zen and priestess-like she became.
“I’m not reading you. You’re projecting your feelings. You might as well be yelling at me.”
“So fix whatever you did, and I
won’t need to anymore.”
She crossed her arms, tilting her chin up as she gazed at him. “Fix you? Last time I did that, you didn’t seem very impressed.”
“You took something from me. I want it back. Now.”
She stood, walking over until she was toe to toe with him, though her head barely topped his shoulders. For the first time in a long time, the urge to retreat, to back down, rolled over him, almost putting his feet into motion before he’d quite gotten a handle on it. Sheer stubborn willpower kept him where he stood.
“I took a vortex of blackness from your soul. Something that was slowly sucking the life out of every good thing you have in your heart. If I hadn’t, you’d be lucky to live out another year. And if you did, you wouldn’t like the soulless creature you’d become.”
An unfamiliar emotion tightened his chest, because she was right. There’d been a monster deep within him, waiting to claw its way out and strike down everything he cared about. Yet, despite knowing what it’d been doing to him, he feared its absence almost as much.
“You don’t want that back, Rian.”
She reached out and touched the middle of his chest, where his heart pounded like thunder. Like the last time she’d gotten too close to him, he wanted to pull her against him, take from her anything he could get. Yet this time, no fight exploded within him and the lack of malevolence toward her felt foreign, thrilling, and shocking.
He knocked her hand away. He still didn’t trust himself, didn’t quite believe that the absence of the black vortex inside him would be permanent. He’d come here wanting the darkness back, because he’d thought he needed that bleakness to drive him against the Reidar. But her simple words had him running scared of the moment it would return; surely it couldn’t be that easy to take away something so deeply embedded.
“I saw what they did to you, saw every burning, tortured moment, the ones you remember and the ones you’ve forced yourself to forget. I know you’re different now. I saw everything that made you the man you are.”
His heartbeat increased to a deafening roar, making his whole chest ache. He’d never told anyone, not even Zahli, exactly what’d happened to him, the things the Reidar had done to him, the things he’d done for them. What they’d turned him into. And now, this woman standing in front of him knew every dirty, reprehensible thing about him. Just when he’d thought she’d repaired his soul, he felt it cracking all over again.
She tilted her head, a caring, forgiving glint to her gaze. “Don’t do that, Rian. It wasn’t your fault. You shouldn’t feel ashamed. I don’t think any less of you for it, and I know the people you care about wouldn’t either.”
There didn’t seem to be enough air in the room. He clenched his fists, the compulsion to lash out bubbling up from deep within him.
“You might have seen those things and taken some of the darkness away, but you still have no idea what I’m capable of.”
Her rich hazel eyes darkened. “I know exactly what you’re capable of. And though you might think me naive and sheltered, I can tell you, there aren’t many men in the universe like you.”
She reached out for him and he caught her wrist as she laid a palm against his neck, her fingers slipping into his hair. Before he could pull her away, a streaming explosion of pleasure erupted through him. He sucked in a breath, dropping to his knees as his legs gave out. Groaning, he pulled Ella down against him, grabbed a handful of her thick, soft hair, and buried his face in the warmth of her neck. He inhaled the scent of exotic moon jasmine until dizziness warred with the rushing ecstasy.
Every cell within him felt alive in a way he never had before, like the blood in his veins was fizzing. His arm wound around her, across her lower back, wrenching her harder against him.
He yanked on the fistful of silken strands, tipping her head back, intending to crush her mouth beneath his, kiss her while he pinned her down and stripped her naked, so he could pound into her until he forgot. The hot blaze of utter rapture already coursing through his body made him shudder as he lowered his head, her lips a breath from his. Yet, as he glanced up into her deep moss colored eyes, as she took in a small breath and leaned into him, wanting to be kissed, reality resurrected itself.
With another groan ripped deep from within him, he let her go and shoved backward, coming up against the bed, chest heaving as he tried to get enough air, to inhale without her filling his lungs. Ella dropped back against the bottom edge of the padded bench, her breathing as erratic as his, her eyes dark and seemingly bottomless.
“What the frecking hell did you do to me?” His voice sounded scratchy, like he’d just woken up from a long night of marathon sex, though it’d been a lifetime since he’d done anything like that.
She shook her head, tangled strands of her hair slipping over one shoulder. “I don’t know. That wasn’t meant to happen.” Her voice came out just as husky, setting off another fire within him.
“Bullshite.”
She drew her knees up toward her chest and for the first time since he’d found her on Arleta, she looked unsure and hesitant. So damn vulnerable he wanted to wrap his arms around her and protect her from every bad thing in the universe. Except he was one of the bad things in the universe.
“I really don’t know. All I wanted to do was connect with you, help you to understand how much you mean to everyone. But when I opened a telepathic link between us—” She broke off and took a breath.
Likely because if she’d felt even half of what he’d felt, just the memory of it was enough to send him into sensory overload.
He jerked to his feet. He’d thought if he stopped touching her, he’d be able to resist, get back onto solid ground, remember the thousand or so reasons why even being near her was a bad idea. But it seemed like his body had been caught in the gravitational consumption of a black hole—no matter what he did, he was going to get sucked in.
“Don’t ever touch me again.” His hand shook as he reached out to open the door, making him want to string together as many inventive swear words as he could. But she’d already seen how unsettled this encounter had made him; he didn’t need to verbally punctuate it.
“Rian, wait.”
From the corner of his eye, he saw her stand, but he slipped out the door before it’d fully opened, scraping his chest as he twisted sideways to fit through. He couldn’t face her now, not without losing it. And despite what she might think, there could be nothing more unpredictable than him without his thin leash of control.
Chapter Twenty-Two
“Sen says the delta-shield is all ready to go.”
Tannin looked up from the newsreel he’d been reading on his commpad and saw Rian crossing the galley, stopping in front of the coldstore and helping himself to a bottle of water. Tannin had seen some bad injuries over his years living on Erebus, seen men die, killed, slaughtered. Yet, he’d never seen someone come back from a wound like Rian had.
What Ella had done was nothing short of amazing. And just a few hours later, here Rian stood, walking around as if nothing had happened.
Rian twisted the top off the bottle and paused by the galley bench to take a long swallow, some of the water overflowing and tracking down his neck into the collar of his shirt.
“What’s the plan?” he asked as the captain came over to the table and set the half empty bottle down then dropped into a seat.
“As long as you and Callan are sure all the authorization codes are set, we’ll be heading to Kasson Three within the hour.”
Tannin turned off his commpad and leaned forward, bracing his elbows against the table. “And what about when we get there?”
“Hack the space station’s systems and get us information.”
He nodded, since he already knew as much. “What exactly am I looking for?”
Rian shrugged and took another quick drink. “I don’t know. Anything useful.”
Unable to help himself, he coughed out a laugh. “You know how complicated it is to navigate data streams? Even
when I know what I’m looking for, it’s like trying to organize atoms in a molecular cloud. Unless you’ve got something specific for me to look for, this will be a waste of time. Besides, I don’t know what will happen once I actually get into their system. I may only have a minute or two to get what you want before they take action.”
Rian frowned, crossing an ankle over his knee and bracing an elbow against it.
“Isn’t there some way you could just take whole heap of information, so we can make a quick getaway and then sort through it later?”
Tannin’s mind ran through some possibilities and he nodded. “I could do a hard rip. They’d know we were in as soon as we got there, but I’d only need a split second to cipher off a whole chunk of their system’s data. But it’s risky. We could hit pay dirt, or we could get the laundry schedule. We won’t know until later, and I doubt we’ll get a second go at it.”
Rian tossed the empty water bottle in the waste chute. “If I know the Reidar, they’ll be trying to blast us out of space as soon as we get anywhere near Kasson Three. If we make it back alive, I’ll take whatever you can get me. Launch is in five minutes. I want you up on bridge.”
Cold apprehension warred with heated aggravation as Tannin watched Rian walk out. He hadn’t mentioned anything about the possibility of getting blown up. Standing, he shoved his commpad in his pocket and went down to where Zahli was tidying up the guest room Graydon had stayed in. As he walked in, she was pulling blankets from the bed.
Stopping in the doorway, he leaned against the metal framework. “When I decided I wanted to join the crew, I didn’t realize that entailed putting myself at risk of getting blown into tiny pieces.”
She looked over her shoulder at him, but didn’t pause as she stripped the pillowcases. “Rian’s always threatening to blow people up. What did you do now?”
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