He wanted to pull her into his arms and comfort her, but then he remembered all he’d seen on the media and resisted the urge.
As if she’d read his mind, she said, “I’m well aware Roberts has put vid clips of me harvesting organs out of patients. I look like a woman possessed of a demon. Extracting still-living organs is not a pretty sight. What you don’t see, and what the media fails to mention, is that those patients are brain dead. Did you know, before this, those vids were used to train other doctors on how to transplant organs?”
He didn’t know.
“What you don’t see is the rest of the room, where up to ten people wait to receive one of those organs. You don’t see that part. Only the part where I look like a bloody monster, ripping apart a glistening and clearly alive human body.”
He’d felt sickened by the gruesome clips, but now they made sense. He really had to stop believing everything Roberts put out there about Jynx. Time after time, the information turned out to be utterly bogus.
Almost a hundred faces flashed in his mind, all those he had intentionally killed, by duty or self-preservation. Not for sport, like some Runners did. He didn’t enjoy killing and went out of his way to avoid it. But when he’d been young and just starting out, he’d had no choice but to kill or be killed. His survival instinct ran too deep.
“Would you kill someone to save yourself?” he asked, already knowing the answer.
“No,” she answered automatically.
“No. Just like that? You don’t even have to think about it?” He found her quick answers unsettling.
“No, I don’t. I know I wouldn’t, because if I did, I wouldn’t be me anymore.”
“Hippocrates.”
“Yes.”
“Reputation.”
Jynx nodded. “Yes.”
“We seem to have something in common.”
She flashed him an understanding nod filled with grim acknowledgment. “We are both slaves to our reputation. The difference is, at the moment, my reputation isn’t hurting me. It’s despicable and horrific, but it isn’t my fault. I’ve been true to myself, my inner reputation. I’ve hurt one man in my entire life and that was Roberts’s lackey. That’s where your problem is, Mr. Nash. Between your inner and outer reputation. That’s what hurts.”
“Don’t flatter yourself. I’m not hurting over you.” Crap, he sounded like a defensive prick.
Again, she gave him that subtle nod of understanding. “You don’t want to deliver me, but you will, because you have to. Roberts locked you into it. You have no choice. You are going to do your job and that’s that.” Her voice held no menace or malice, only that infuriating acceptance.
“There’s always a choice.”
“I suppose. You either take me to Roberts or not. You’ve chosen to take me to planet Juno. That decision pretty much dictates the rest of your choices, doesn’t it?”
“And you seem to think I’m all atwitter over it.” He laughed coldly. “What makes you think I give a shit about you?” He winced inwardly when she flinched at his vulgarity.
“I don’t think, I know. I can see it in your eyes. Glare at me from under your lowered brows all you’d like. To put it in your vernacular, I’m not buying it. You’re trying to play indifferent when you’re not. You do care.”
Anger surged. “I don’t give a flying fuck at a rolling doughnut about you!”
Jynx jumped to her feet. “Yes, you do! And that’s why you’re always bellowing at me!” Her hand shot to her mouth as her eyes went wide. She took a deep breath, sat down on the edge of her bunk and composed herself. “I’m sorry I yelled at you.”
“Holy-moly, you really are, aren’t you?” She’d probably raised her voice only a handful of times in her life. “You’re unbelievable.”
Her eyes caught his with a wide, confused gaze. She opened her mouth to defend herself, but he cut her off.
“I yell and scream at you for days on end, but you do it to me once and apologize.”
“I’m not playing you.”
“I didn’t say you—damn, woman!” When he realized that he was bellowing at her again, he took a deep breath. “I know you’re not playing me. That’s what’s pissing me off. I wish you were playing me, because then I’d know what to do.” Why was he standing here telling her the truth? Maybe because she seemed to be able to see it anyway.
“What do you want to do, Mr. Nash?”
“I want to go back in time and never have met you.” The truth came right from his gut. He wanted that so badly, he wished he could make it real just by saying it. Wish in one hand and crap in the other; see which one piled up faster. He had an uncomfortable feeling about what he slogged through right now.
She looked stung by his nasty tone. “Since you don’t have that option, what would be your next choice?”
“Believe me, I’d like to let you go, then tell Roberts to piss off and die.” Again, straight from his gut. He didn’t have to hand her a knife or a gun since he seemed more than willing to hand his heart over.
“You don’t have that option either.”
“Couldn’t you at least try and talk me into it? Harp on me just a bit?” He knew it wouldn’t make a difference, but he still wanted her to plead with him just the same.
“Not even to make you feel better.” She settled herself on her bunk. “Please don’t look at me like I’m insane. I’m not. If I were you, I think I would do exactly what you’re doing.”
“No, you wouldn’t.” He knew a healer like her wouldn’t even contemplate her decision. She would morally know what to do, and she would do it without a second thought.
“I think I would. I’d want to keep my word, protect my reputation. Out here, on the Fringe”—she lifted her hand as if to encompass the enormity of space—“reputation is one’s most valuable possession. Mine is irrevocably slandered.” She dropped her hand into her lap. “No amount of good works can overcome Roberts’s nasty smear campaign. Live or die, I will always be a hated woman. Even if you freed me, someone else would only capture and deliver me. You see, it’s not so horrible that it is you who does. It has to be somebody. I’m thankful for the fact that it’s somebody who won’t hurt me while I’m in his care.”
He thought of the bonus Roberts offered with those sly words: You’ll want to do her when you see her. He glanced at Jynx, then away before she somehow read the truth.
“You think I’m some kind of nice guy.” With a flip of his chin, he whisked his hair out of his eyes but kept his attention on the far wall. “Tell you what, I wanted to take you up against the bars of your cell just a few moments ago.”
“I wanted that too.”
Her bold admission drew his gaze to her.
“Why does that surprise you, Mr. Nash?”
“Because you shouldn’t.” He didn’t want to go any further into this conversation. Mainly because he wasn’t sure he could handle hearing what she had to say.
“Why? Because you found it degrading?” She tilted her head, exposing the vulnerable curve of her neck, almost like an invitation for him to pick up where he left off.
“You should,” he said pointedly, trying not to think of how close he’d come to lowering his lips to kiss and bite at her silken skin.
“Yet I don’t.” She looked so impossibly beautiful in that lilac dress with his big white socks on her feet.
“I could chain you up and do anything I wanted to you.” He deliberately raked his gaze over her, as if he gave the idea serious consideration. “You don’t find that degrading?”
“I find that oddly compelling. And you wouldn’t have to chain me up.” Demurely, she lowered her gaze. “Unless you wanted to.”
Swallowing hard, he wished at the moment he wore anything but tight jeans. That damn swelling became painful. He wished something on the ship would beep or whine so he could leave without another word. No such luck.
“So, in addition to accepting your fate, you’re also giving me free rein with your body?” He had n
o idea where the question had come from other than directly from the little brain.
“Yes.”
Her response was quick and automatic, sending another surge of desire through him. He wanted to go to his workout room and drive himself to exhaustion with exercise. If he didn’t, he feared he would wrench open her cage and take her hard and fast against the bars. All he had to do was yank up her skirt and push her thong panties aside.
“Don’t even have to think about it, just—”
“Yes.”
When she stood and strode to the bars, his lip twitched. When she wrapped her slender hands around two widely spaced rods of solid durosteel and looked right into his eyes, he growled. She was beyond alluring without even trying.
“There are many things I regret not doing. I don’t want you to be one of them.”
He fought the urge to let his jaw drop to the floor in shock. She’d stunned him. He’d never known any woman to be so sexually assertive.
“I still won’t set you free,” he said coldly.
“I know,” she said, her voice warm with acceptance.
He shook his spinning head. “Let me get this straight.” He used his fingers to tick off each point. “With your permission, I keep my rep, earn a pretty penny, and get to exercise the very depth of my physical needs upon your body?”
“Yes.”
“You’re not unbelievable; you’re insane.”
“I’m honest.” Jynx peered at Foster as he stood beyond the confines of her cage. “I enjoyed your touch. I liked the feel of your new beard against my skin and the smell of your aftershave and the deeper scent of your body. Even the bubblegum on your breath aroused me. You have a beautiful body, Mr. Nash. Physically, I find you extremely attractive. I can tell that the feeling is mutual.” She nodded to his painfully obvious erection. “Just as you can’t fake emotional distance, you probably can’t fake a physical interest either.”
“So we’ve got the hots for each other.” He shrugged, deliberately downplaying the sparks he’d been flashing since he entered the cell room. “Big deal.”
“Then why are you reluctant to indulge yourself?” She lifted her chin in challenge, a bit shocked at herself. What had the Fringe done to her? She’d never said such unashamed come-ons to any man in her life. Perhaps her bold behavior was prompted by the fact she had so little of her life left to live.
“I thought you only kissed four guys?” he mocked, raking his gaze over her body with laser blue concentration.
“Only four.” She struggled to keep some kind of perspective. Her honesty stunned him and it started to frighten her. She should be lying her head off and doing anything she could to escape, but she simply couldn’t.
“You’re acting like you’ve done a fleet.”
“I’m not acting.”
His eyes went wide with mock terror. “You’ve done a fleet?”
She laughed. “I’m telling you that I’m interested in you. Just because I’m willingly tossing my favors at you doesn’t mean I’ve tossed them around lightly to other men.” Her one-night stand with Brandt came to mind. “Well, one other time I’ve cast my favors rather lightly, but I certainly haven’t done a fleet.”
“Four men.” Foster held up four fingers.
“Not all at the same time.”
He wiggled his fingers. “You’ve made love to every man you’ve ever kissed?”
She considered his question for a moment. “I had sex with them, but I didn’t love all of them.”
“There’s a difference?” His question revealed more about him than he realized.
“A very clear and distinct difference. Brandt was a coworker, and I enjoyed his companionship very much, but I didn’t love him.”
“Yet you had sex with him.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I wanted to. He wanted to. Mutual delirium. We were rather drunk and full of ourselves, having just solved the perplexing riddle of how to deliver Tyaa plague vaccine to the entire Void in a month.”
“A month?” Foster’s eyes went wide. No mocking surprise this time.
“I had a hunch, and I checked it out with Brandt’s help. Turned out I was right. We filed a hasty report and celebrated ourselves stupid.” All the joy left her then. “Within hours, the entire lab and everyone connected to it but me was destroyed.”
Foster grimaced but didn’t interrupt.
“Anyway, I cared for Brandt, and I slept with him, but I didn’t love him.” With a frown, she considered. “I might have come to love him, if my life could have gone on the way it was, but it didn’t, and I no longer have that choice to make.” She reeled her gushing mouth in. “I’m sorry, I’m babbling. It’s just, I’ve been in this cell for four days and nights, and I’m bored, lonely, and—”
“Randy as hell,” he finished for her softly, his gaze making a pointed sweep of her body.
“Yes.” She realized she had practically snarled the word at him. “I’m sick to death of thinking about my life when I have no control over it. Thinking about you has become an extremely pleasurable diversion. I’m randy as hell, as you say, because you are in my head constantly. Looking at you, standing there beyond my grasp, knowing you are beyond my grasp, is akin to waving a chocolate cake under a diabetic’s nose. It’s mean to flaunt something at me I can’t have. It’s—”
“Teasing.” He lowered his head and pursed his lips with a cool seduction.
“Precisely.”
“Something to be said for an educated IWOG lady.”
His low voice rumbled up her body, and it took her a second to catch her breath. “And what’s that?”
“You’re smart.” He looked into her eyes. “I find smart extremely sexy.”
Lifting her chin, she smiled knowingly. “It probably doesn’t hurt that I’m blonde.”
“Doesn’t matter.” He approached the bars. “You could be bald. I don’t think I’d care. I’d probably find it sexy on you. Then again, there’s nothing I’d rather do than run my fingers through your hair, cup your head, then ravish every inch of your face and neck with my mouth.”
Intrigued, she pressed closer to the bars and offered out her wrists. “You can chain me up if you want.”
With a grunt, he considered her supplicating stance. “I can pin you to the floor if I want.”
Heaven help her, that’s exactly what she wanted him to do. With her voice barely above a whisper, she said, “You could pin me to the floor, the bars, or my bunk.” He thought he could get her to back down, but every time he upped the ante, she matched him. “Or you could just take my hands in yours.”
Grasping her small hands, slipping his huge fingers between hers, he barely tightened his grip as he surged forward. When he pressed against the bars, she felt the teasing hint of his erection against her belly.
He groaned and closed his eyes. “The bars are like a chastity belt.”
She laughed and lifted her head. “You could take it off.”
“I think you’re safer behind bars, Jynx.”
Arching her neck back and her face closer, she whispered, “I like the sound of my name on your lips, Mr. Nash. I’d love to hear you whisper it in my ear.”
It took a moment, but he realized he hadn’t called her anything but Sweets until now. Lowering his mouth to the hollow of her neck, he stroked his rough new beard along her sensitive, willing flesh. “Keep calling me Mr. Nash, Sweets. I like that.”
He seemed determined to keep some kind of emotional distance between them, and she thought that wise.
“Of course, Mr. Nash.” She rolled her head back until she could look into his eyes. “I wouldn’t want to displease you.”
“You are getting very close to critical mass. You best consider the ramifications of playing this game with me.” There was no mistaking the warning in his words or his gaze.
“I’m not playing you. I want you.”
“I’m not letting you go,” he reminded.
“I
know.”
“There’s no reason for you to do this.”
“Other than I want to.”
“Why?” Suddenly he gripped her hands tight. “Why would you do this? Why would you allow me such”—he searched desperately for the right word—“liberties?”
“Liberties?” She chuckled softly. “You make it sound like a horrific sacrifice on my part.” She clasped his fingers more firmly with hers. “You are behaving as if you are a despicable wretch that I’m only indulging out of pity. That simply isn’t the case at all.”
“You don’t love me.”
What he said so shocked her, she let go of his hands and stood utterly speechless.
Chapter Nine
Yanking his hands back from the bars, Foster didn’t say a word as he strode from the cell room. He went straight to the bridge and turned the music up to a deafening degree. Stabbing his finger at the main console, he checked everything twice.
“Stupid ship. Where are you when I need you?”
For the first time, he fully appreciated his ship’s name. Damn You seemed to sum up everything in one breath.
Damn Roberts, damn Jynx, and damn himself.
“Damn it!”
Sifting through the litter on the floor, he found the printed contract. Flipping rapidly, he didn’t find what he wanted. Turning down the music, he popped a fresh wad of bubblegum into his mouth as he went through the contract line by line. He felt a glimmer of hope and popped rapidly at his gum.
“No way.”
Carefully noting each line again, he didn’t trust his eyes and looked the contract over three times. Still not satisfied, he pulled up the ecopy. “No way did I leave that out.”
A red light flashed on the main console. Request for live audvid. He checked the source. Planet Windmere. Had to be Duster. Relieved to have something to focus on other than what he’d said to Jynx in the cell room, he opened the link with, “How’s the Bandit of Taiga?”
“I’m fine.”
He fought down an urge to cover his balls. Scary Mary. Calling him on an unscrambled live audvid from Windmere. He locked her signal from cross feeding.
Runner: The Fringe, Book 3 Page 7