by Jael Wye
Bianca’s eyes locked on Cesare with a tremor, her icy mask beginning to crack. “Then you don’t need him. Take me, and let him go.”
Victoria threw her head back, crowing in savage triumph. “Let him go? Let him go?” Terrible laughter ricocheted around him. “And to think I actually imagined you might be a threat, little Bianca. Once this stupid episode is over, I’ll give you a last thrill before I kill you. I’ll let you watch me ride him.”
She leaned down and slowly curled her tongue around his nipple, keeping her eyes on Bianca’s stricken face the whole time. As her mouth slithered over his flesh, he felt the shocker easing back from his temple slightly. She raised her head to look down at him, her smile glinting.
He wouldn’t get another chance. He braced himself and whipped his head into her face with all his strength.
Chapter Fourteen
Red Star
A dull crack, a choked scream of surprise and pain, and Victoria was suddenly flying across the room.
Without thinking, Bianca shoved herself off the wall. She crashed into the other woman, tangling her gloves in her flying yellow hair. Victoria brought the shocker around, pounding it into Bianca’s shoulder.
The charge seared through her s-suit, tearing a scream out of her. She spun around and flung Victoria into the wall by her hair, thick strands coming away in her fists. Bianca slammed into the opposite wall, her nerves still singing with pain.
Victoria braced herself against the wall and wiped her hand across her mouth, smearing blood across her face. Her lips drew back, revealing jagged, broken teeth.
For an endless moment, the chamber was frozen in a horrible tableau, crimson sparks of light glittering on floating drops of blood and the compac clutched in Victoria’s hand.
Bianca shot a glance at Cesare. There was a bloody gash on his forehead where Victoria’s teeth had cut him, but his eyes were open, glinting with hatred.
“I’m going to rip your hearts out with my bare hands!” Victoria shrieked. She reared back and threw the red ball straight at her gilded vidscreen.
Bianca flung herself forward, trying to catch it before it hit a comp. She missed. Unable to stop, she crashed into the vidscreen frame, sending splinters of gold flying into the air.
The room swung crazily around her as Victoria launched herself at her, lacquered nails reaching for her eyes. Bianca scrabbled blindly for the vidscreen, ripping it out of its socket. She twisted, flinging it at Victoria with all her strength.
The edge of the massive screen slammed into her, sending her spinning back into the wall, screaming in rage. The shocker flew out of her hand.
Bianca tumbled up, snatching the shocker out of the air. She caught herself against the ceiling and twisted around, swiping the rod out blindly, a fierce scream tearing her throat. But Victoria wasn’t there.
She caught the flow of blue silk out of the corner of her eye, and turned to see Victoria claw at a wall panel. She was gasping and clutching her side where the mirror had hit her. Behind her, a hidden exit shaft hissed open. “It’s mine,” she shrieked, blood flying from her lips. “The elevator, Mars, the whole fecking Sol! It will always be mine!” With one last blazing glare, she pulled herself through the hole, and the door crashed shut.
Bianca suddenly realized that her suit had gone dead. The compac! It must have hit her suit and bounced away. Had anything else been compromised? She looked around in near panic. Everything was functioning normally, she saw with nearly crushing relief. She had saved the car from infection.
She shoved off the ceiling down to the room console. Taking care to keep her suit away from the comps, she hit the intercom with the butt of the shock rod. “Iqbal! Han! Are you there?”
A low hum sounded over the com. “Ay, we’re here!” Bo said.
Relief swamped her in a dizzying wave. The Earthers had taken control of the car. They could keep Victoria’s sec unconscious for now. “I found Cesare. Victoria’s escaping,” she said to them. “She has a lander stashed somewhere. Find it and stop it!”
There was a split second of quiet on the com. “Ay,” Bo said.
Bianca didn’t waste any more time. She launched herself at the bed where Cesare lay bound.
“S-space babe,” he slurred. “Glad you showed up. This party was getting stiff.”
His golden skin was splotched with red where Victoria had shocked him. His wrists and ankles were raw from the binders.
Tears flowed around her face, little drops of crystal hanging in the air. “I have to get you out of here. Where’s the key tab?” She looked around frantically.
Cesare’s eyes were drifting closed.
Feck the key tab. She ripped open her hip pouch and pulled out her minicutter. Taking care to steady her fingers, she started cutting the lock on his right wrist. She pulled it off within moments and cast it aside. Quickly, she moved down to the binder on his ankle. Before she could start cutting, Bo’s voice sounded over the com.
“We’ve located Victoria. She’s in a small lander near the exhaust coils. She’s launching right now.”
“No! Get a message to Volkov! We have to—”
“We’re sending vid stream to your location, Bianca,” Han interrupted her. “We think you should see for yourself.”
Something in Han’s tone gave her pause. She cast a quick glance around the habsuite. Victoria’s framed vidscreen was floating placidly in a corner, showing a reflection of the floor. It was still live. The thick, gilded frame must have insulated the screen comp against infection from the compac and Bianca’s suit. She leaped across the room at it and pulled it upright, taking care not to touch the screen. It showed her a brief reflection of her own white face, then it glinted with a chill light, and the vid began.
It was a simple tracking stream from the cable sensors. The signal from Victoria’s lander showed a steady blue pulse, moving down toward the planet in a perfect landing arc.
* * *
“Kill them all! Kill them all!” Her wheezing chant rattled through the lander, but the sound was nothing compared to the screaming fury in her head.
Victoria crouched in her seat harness, staring out the front viewport at the great curve of Mars. Her eyes scoured the hazy planet, looking for one specific dark red shadow on the surface. The landmark that pointing the way to her destination, the entrance to the headquarters of the Aurora project. When she got her lander down there, got to the weapons in the underground labs, her enemies would all die.
The fecking rats had no idea. No idea what they had unleashed. Death eating them from the inside out. Years, decades of agony.
The elevator would be hers. Mars would be hers, and Eldorado, and the whole fecking Sol. Nothing could to stop the destruction she and her partners could unleash. Nothing...
The console chimed. She slammed it with her fists to shut it up, but it simply cheeped louder and faster. The bloody thing was telling her that it couldn’t reconcile the landing trajectory. That she was sliding off course. But that was impossible.
She was in control of the lander comps.
“Mine!” she screamed at the console, the word tearing past her jagged teeth.
The heat of entry began streaking around the edges of the viewport, framing the looming red planet with white flame.
She flung out her arms, fingers clawed to grasp at Mars as it rushed toward her. “Mine! You’re mine!”
* * *
On the screen, the lander signal flared in emergency pattern. Then it was simply gone.
She stared at the black screen. “What happened?” She whispered.
There was silence for several seconds. “The lander burned up in the atmosphere,” came Iqbal’s voice.
The vid switched to a live cam view. It showed a white contrail through the Martian atmosphere, like a scar in the sky, a
nd a few charred, glowing fragments of a landing pod vanishing into the curve of the planet. Victoria was dead.
“How...” Bianca trailed off, in shock. The sensor feed abruptly cut off, and the Earthers appeared in the vidscreen, ranged at various stations in the control room. They were all turned toward the vid. Four sets of cold, alien eyes looked out from the vidscreen at her for a moment. Then, in a voice as thin and sharp as a blade, Asif said, “She must have hit a bad entry.”
Bianca knew then, without a doubt, that Victoria’s “bad entry” had been no accident. And she knew how the Earthers must have done it. Jack the nav systems in the lander, scramble its destination algorithms so that it couldn’t calculate its entry correctly. Then all they had to do was sit back and allow Victoria to launch herself to her death, and their revenge was complete.
Bianca could not be sorry. Still, she shivered and looked away.
She steadied her voice. “Cesare needs medical attention.”
“Understood. We’ll be there in five minutes,” Iqbal said.
Bianca let the vidscreen go and shoved off the wall back to where Cesare was lying. He moved his head uneasily, his freed hand floating up, as if reaching for her. She fumbled for her minicutter, pushing it all out of her mind—Victoria, the Earthers, Eris.
She had found him. Everything else could wait.
Elevator Car 001
Water flowed between his lips in a silky flood. He swallowed. Breathed in a delicate, pure scent. Like a flower on the surface of Mars. “Bianca,” he murmured.
“I’m here.”
“You came for me. Is this a dream?”
He felt her soft fingers tremble as they touched his face. “No,” she whispered. “You’re awake now. We’re still on the elevator car, but we’re in a new room now. How are you feeling?”
It felt...like he was floating in nothing. The bands around his wrists and ankles were gone. A soft bed net was holding him flat. But he was still drifting.
He opened his eyes, and there she was. His world steadied, fixed around her shining beauty. And he realized that another torment was searing through him. He licked his lips. “Hot,” he said. Every cell in his body was blazing. But not with pain. With desire. His rod thrust up between his legs in a fierce erection.
Not because of Victoria. No, he wouldn’t let that puta have anything to do with this. She was gone. He remembered one of the Earthers saying she was dead. He wasn’t hard because of her, because of the poison she had shot into him.
He was hard because of Bianca. It was passion for her that was flooding into him, sweeping everything else away. All doubt, all memory. It was just her. The one woman he needed. Who was his.
“Do you want more water?” she said.
“No,” he said, his voice low and hoarse. “I want you.”
Her face wavered uncertainly. “Victoria gave you...some unusual drugs. We’re trying to figure out the mitigator. And we’re trying to find the best combination of meds to fight your space sickness.” Her soft fingers brushed a lock hair off his forehead. “You should have something to make you feel better soon. Just try to relax.”
“Don’t need more drugs. Just need you. Not her. No one else. Just you.”
“You don’t know what you’re saying. You need to rest.”
“Dust that.” His fingers fumbled for the catches to the webbing, ready to rip them off and lunge up off his bed to catch her. He’d do anything for her. He’d beg. “Don’t leave me like this.” He freed one arm and reached out for her. She reached back for him, and their fingers meshed, ivory and bronze laced together.
“I won’t leave you,” she whispered.
“I need you. Now. Please, Bianca!”
He watched her, waiting, for a terrible, aching eternity. Her lovely face went still. It seemed to him that the whole universe went still. Then, she smiled at him. A pure, gorgeous fire ignited in her eyes. His breath came in a rush of relief.
She wove her trembling fingers into the webbing by his head and pulled herself down until her lips were only centimeters from his. Her voice low and soft, she said, “I’ll do anything you ask. Anything for you.” She moved her lips close to his ear. “I love you, Cesare.” He felt her mouth brush his earlobe, and then she was pushing away, floating above him.
She was like a dream, her hair a night-black halo around her face, her eyes shining. Her slender fingers went to her throat, moving slowly down between her breasts, undoing the seals of her carbon suit. With a little tug, the fabric started to ripple over her slender shoulders and arms.
The panels of her suit opened around her like a flower opening its petals. With a twist of her hips she turned gracefully, and the suit was floating away. She drifted above him, naked. The pure, sleek lines of her body made him catch his breath. Supple strength clothed in flesh as sweet and ripe as a peach.
Her arms flowed up over her head. She moved her legs, turning and spinning, and he could just see the sweet, silken flesh between her thighs. He ground his teeth. She spiraled up to the ceiling and held herself there with one finger, smiling down at him, her fair skin glowing rosy. But there was still a hint of concern in her eyes. “Remember how I told you to fight vertigo?” she said, her voice a soft tremor. “Focus on just one thing.”
“All I can focus on is making you come on my rod,” he growled up at her.
She blushed harder at his words, but her smile burned hot on him. “That’ll do,” she murmured.
* * *
She had never felt so wild. It was Cesare, and how good it was to be with him again. In this moment, everything else was gone, and there was just him.
Heaven, he was so beautiful. Her gaze roamed all over his body. Broad shoulders rippling with slabs of muscle under smooth bronze skin. Laughing dark eyes blazing with desire. Long, lean flanks twisting under the net. His sex jutting up through his fist toward his stomach.
He groaned. “I can feel your eyes on me.” He dug his heels against the padding, shoving his hips toward her. “Touch me,” he said.
“Yes,” she breathed. She floated down to him, moving over him slowly, a breath away, her lips just skimming over his throat, his chest, down his stomach.
“Touch me!”
She moved between his thighs, and reached out to touch his long, veined rod. Slowly, she circled the pad of one finger over the welling bead of moisture on his broad crown. He bowed up off the mattress, a guttural sound breaking out of him.
She slid him a smile, and then slowly leaned down to replace her finger with her lips. She had wanted to taste this man from the instant she saw him. And he was delicious. She ran her tongue over the tip of his rod, nibbled and kissed him, drawing sharp breaths out of him. He rocked toward her mouth. “More!” he demanded. He cradled her head in his big hands.
She smiled up at him again, and took his crown into her mouth, playing her tongue over him. She took him deeper, soft and slow, and then drew up, letting him feel just the edge of her teeth. He rewarded her with a low groan. She let him go and began kissing her way back up his stomach, brushing the tips of her breasts against him as she went.
Suddenly, he snatched her hips and brought her to his mouth in one swift motion, and she gasped in shocked pleasure. He stroked his tongue over her tab, forcing a cry out of her. She clutched at the net to keep from flying away, but she needn’t have worried. Cesare anchored her with a ruthless grip on her thighs and kissed her deeply. His tongue and lips drove her, forcing pleasure on her until she could hardly bear it. She came close enough to her climax to feel the first golden sparks of it, and then she wrenched herself away. Cesare let out a frustrated growl and tried to catch her again as she floated above him. “Where do you think you’re going?” he said.
“Nowhere.” She drifted downward as slowly as she could force herself. “I just... I’m getting so close. And I want yo
u.”
His breath hitched, and she saw his erection jerk in excitement at her words. She couldn’t resist the violent demand low inside her body any longer.
She twisted her hips to straddle him, hooking her legs around the frame of his bunk. Trembling, she lowered herself until her sex just kissed the broad, slick head of him Their gazes locked, a thrumming awareness sharpening to an almost painful pleasure at the point where their bodies hovered, just at the verge of joining. Never breaking their gaze, she pulled herself down on him just as he thrust up into her with a fierce moan.
Bianca thought she would break with excitement. Then he brushed one finger over her tab, and she did. She cried out over and over, gone past all words.
* * *
Cesare pulled her down onto his rod over and over, his hips pumping up into her, making her arch over him. Her black hair flew in a shining cloud around her face, her eyes closed in bliss. He squeezed his own eyes shut, feeling the jack building and pulsing, feeling his stones drawing tight and hard as he thrust deep inside her.
Suddenly, there was nothing beneath his back. He was floating up. His eyes flew open. Somehow, Bianca had released the net from the bed and wrapped it around herself, cocooning them both together in mid-air. He faltered for a second. “Bianca,” he gasped.
Her face glowed above him. She wrapped her long smooth legs around his hips and pulled herself onto him. “One thing...” she breathed. “See only one thing.” She caught his face in her small hands and kissed him, a tiny moan in her throat. She snapped her hips forward, and the last of his hesitation shattered.
Pleasure surged through him, bearing everything else away. There was nothing but her. She brought him higher and higher, stretching for the blinding point of fire hovering just out of reach. And then he was there, in the heart of the flame with her.
* * *
“Don’t worry. Everything is going to be all right,” Bianca said into the com. “My car will be docking on Eris in two days. I’ve already begun restructuring StarLine. I’ve taken control of the Board and fired Victoria’s sec. I’ll make certain that the station and the cable continue to run as usual.