Seeing Stars

  “You asked what I wanted.” Drew looked over her shoulder, a little startled when he rubbed his cheek against hers. A hand on her neck brought her glance back to Korm, who’d already shucked his pants. Her own breath caught as she eyed every sculpted muscle of his abdomen, the ridge of his hip. She swallowed as his penis bobbed in acknowledgement.

  Somewhere during the time her mind shut down on pure sexual anticipation, her cargo pants slithered towards her ankles. Korm grabbed the hem of her tank and pulled up. Her arms followed the movement, trapped when he grinned down at her, holding her wrists tangled in the fabric. Every naked line of her body pressed against his. “Breathe.” Ash reminded as his hand trailed down her quivering abdomen. He delved her saturated pussy. Drew gurgled in mindless pleasure.

  Korm let go of her hands, his own landing on her breasts. Searching for a sane thought Drew slid her hands over all that tantalising skin, seeking and finding his cock. Ash pushed at her from behind and Drew shifted, allowing him entrance. His fingers slid around her clit while her core clenched, protesting the emptiness.

  Sliding her fingers around Korm’s cock, she squeezed, just enough to get his attention. It did all right. Pulling away, Korm pushed down on her shoulder. The lighter grey of his eyes was just a bit wild. His nostrils flared like a stallion scenting his mare. “Your mouth is too high.”

  Allowing the movement, Drew kneeled, thrilled at the new view. If Korm was magnificent from above, he was godlike from below. His sac was large, suspended to perfectly showcase the wide blunt length of him. Drew leant forward, her tongue flicking out to taste the seam between hip and thigh. Male musk saturated the skin there, making her even wetter. Dimly she wondered if she was on a pheromone high. Could you get high from pheromones?

  It didn’t matter and Drew’s mouth closed over the head of his cock. Her hands cupped the sac while she wondered how far she could take him. Tongue swirling over the bullet head, she sucked hard, tasting the nutty flavour of precum. Niiice.

  “Get down, I can’t get good leverage.” Ash’s voice broke into her all-you-can-eat buffet. “Kormec, come too. She’s too short for me to take like this.” She whimpered a bit as Korm disengaged her to squat on the floor. Then, amazing both God and woman, he lay down, sprawled on his back in front of her. Drew fell on his penis like a woman starved. Taking him in her mouth, she steadied him with her hand. Slowly she crept down him, discovering that she could almost fit all of him inside her mouth.

  Ash’s sudden thrust made her swallow all of Korm. The feeling was amazing, cock in mouth and cock in pussy. Ash withdrew, pulling her back. Drew followed the motion going back down on Korm, who grasped her hair in a vice-like grip. The rhythm pounded through her, building a galaxy of sensation inside her. Every stroke of Ash inside her. Every lick and slide of Korm’s penis fed on more sensation. She wanted it all. Ash’s strokes became more demanding. The man beneath her made a guttural sound, his hand on her head urging her on as his cock grew thicker. His breath more ragged. Drew couldn’t tell whose breathing was heaviest. She felt—connected. Every star, every sensation, for the tiniest of moments the universe stilled and she could feel her mouth on Korm, her vagina closing around Ash. Korm thrust upwards hard while Ash gripped her hips, jerking and slamming his nuts against her clit. They climaxed in a Big Bang, screaming the far-flung release.

  Drew peeled her eyes open and peered at the aftermath. Arms and legs tangled all over. She had no bones, she decided, and laid her head back down on the shoulder that supported her. A hand trailed down her hip. Drew looked—lolled, really—and found Ash curled against her while she was tucked beside Korm. Closing her eyes, she let herself drift, shutting down the alarm in her brain that wanted to kill the perfect moment.

  “Is that important?” Korm’s chest rumbled the question beneath her. Drew came to, realising that the alarm wasn’t in her head. The pinging systems alarm was insistent. Drew hauled herself to her feet.

  “What is it?” Ash asked.

  “Systems alarm. It’s not mechanical,” she told him when he looked ready to bolt to the engine bay. Drew sighed and hunted the floor for her clothes. At least her libido was satisfied at the moment and her imagination was on overload, or she’d be wondering more about why she was so ramped up. Why was sex with these two so much more, when she’d never had much of a need for it before? Hell, she’d thought she was beginning to think she was frigid until now.

  Drew wiped a hand over her face before running her fingers through her hair. She had to stay on track. “It’s probably the secondary IP computer in conflict with the mainframe. There’s always a chance of that when you run it long term.”

  “What does that mean in layman’s terms?” Korm coloured immediately, bringing a smirk to Ash’s lips. For almost half a minute, Drew didn’t get the pun, then she couldn’t quite get the image out of her head. She pushed the image away.

  “It means that we’ve got to reroute to the closest skid port so that I can correct the conflict. Kisk-Q is too far away and we run the risk of losing vital support systems if I ignore it.” She could practically feel the building argument and distaste in Korm. She could see Ash’s blatant curiosity.

  “Where are you going?” Korm demanded as she walked away. Irritation and just a touch of fear shot through her as she waved him off and headed to the cockpit. Not fear of the ship failing them, but of the feelings that swirled in her. Feelings that did not belong to her.

  Chapter Four

  Korm’s sneer of distaste curled through the back of Drew’s mind as they stood behind the privacy shield on the lowered engine bay ramp. The shield did not actually stop anyone from entering the open ramp, but would sound an alarm if unauthorised personnel tried to get in. It also shielded the engine bay from prying eyes while affording them a clear view of the dock

  She shot a look at him and frowned at the neutral expression he used to survey the pitted, scarred landing pads and ramshackle, beyond poverty-stricken port-of-call. Where Kisk-Q was possibly the best a mining colony had to offer. Decent government, steady safe jobs, and public education, Sefnee was far on the opposite end of the spectrum. Mined of all of its potentially valuable minerals, the moon-sized asteroid was riddled with caverns and tunnels perfect for pirates and criminals to get lost in. Without any engines to keep its location, Sefnee drifted, slowly bumped hither and yon through space. After a hundred years of settling in and resisting the GI Guard’s sporadic attempts to evacuate the warren of seedy businesses and even shadier denizens, Sefnee wasn’t exactly a vacation Mecca. Warm, dank air smelling of fumes, unwashed bodies, and a general rank fetidness, blew down from the vents cut into the asteroid turned space station. Everywhere hawkers of mostly illegal goods and mystery food ‘delicacies’ vied for newcomers attention. Clusters of shops with wire fencing for ventilated roofing made for a chaotic business district.

  The man didn’t have to actually do anything to ramp her irritation. Opening her mouth, she had every intent to tell him, ‘Sure, there’s a NovaBlooms in the market quarter,’ just to see him bristle at the idea of the high-end department store gutter to gutter in a lowly skid port.

  “Amazing!” Ash’s body heat invaded her space as his hands slipped around her waist from behind. Drew wanted to protest, but the urge died with the press of lips against her neck. His easy intimacy baffled and shook her resolve. With anyone else, even Korm, the shine of metal flashed under her nose would have had her fighting a potential garrotte. “We have something for you.” We? As in Ash and Korm? She glanced at the warrior but he looked away. Ash’s breath brushed against her neck, where she could imagine the extra long chain would rest. “Say yes, Captain Drew Rodgers.”

  “You know, they say to beware of a trader’s gifts.” She was teasing, but swore Korm’s skin flushed at her comment. Drew twisted to meet Ash’s intense expression. Again, the feeling of brushing up against both men’s emotions disconcerted her. The moment filled with expectation, irritation and longing. “The necklace is important
. How?”

  “It is the trilliacia. It is the only damn thing left to offer.” Korm’s expletive surprised her enough to glance at him. He walked to the hydraulics holding the ramp open. “The trilliacia will offer you some protection if we are caught.”

  “What? Like temporary membership to the Nightsky clan? I didn’t think skids like me applied?” She couldn’t help the nasty tone that slipped out.

  “Either take the damn chain or not, Drew.” Kormec-ra, the proud kith warrior, turned his head to pin her with an expression that shamed her for making light of the gift. She didn’t know all of the circumstances of their flight from the Starpath. Coming from great wealth and power to travelling with only the clothes on your back had to be a great blow to the pride. Drew imagined that circumstances had to be dire for them to leave behind everything to avoid an arranged marriage. Frankly, she wouldn’t want to be pushed into a marriage not of her choosing. News companies throughout the universe were well known for playing headlines to the highest bidder, proving that sensationalism was a human trait, not an Earth one.

  She touched the links, noticing the faint pattern that shimmered over the surface of the metal. This close, she could see that it was a match for Ash’s bracelet. She understood pride and the need to not be beholden to generosity. “Okay, then. I accept. Thank you. Both of you, I’m honoured.”

  “No.” Korm walked back, his large frame looming over her. The serious vibe she was getting from him and Ash made her want to squirm out from between them and run. She held her ground and met him stare for stare. Once again, she was between them, feeling like the three of them were a completed circuit and with sexual energy arching between them. “No,” he repeated, in a much softer voice as he touched the chain briefly. “The trilliacia isn’t a trinket to be passed around. It is a gift that must be chosen in the giving and the receiving. Do you choose this?” He touched the chain again, his eyes locked with hers.

  Drew didn’t know what to say. There was a massive cultural point she was missing here, warned her hindbrain. She didn’t want to be considered their sister or something equally icky. Ash was completely still behind her, holding the chain between her and Korm. Each one of them focused on her answer. “Yeah. Yes, I choose your trilliacia.” The words loosened the tension from the two men. Ash leaned in, brushing another kiss on her shoulder while Korm watched her with his inscrutable expression. Emotionally, he drew back. Ash dropped the chain to her waist and hooked it around at her side. “I thought this was a necklace?”

  Ash laughed and came around to adjust the extra links to hang in the front. “Kith women do not wear neck or wrist jewellery.” At her frown of confusion he smiled again, flashing gorgeous dimples as he explained. “Women wear waist, ankle, and eyebrow jewellery. Men wear neck, wrist, and nipple jewellery.”

  “Uh. Well.” She was certainly glad no one offered her a nipple ring. There were some lines she didn’t want to cross. Drew glanced back at Korm. “We good?”

  Korm nodded once. “You can get the necessary parts to repair the ship here?”

  “Yes. I just need to erase the old IP programme and plug in a new one. It’s a simple fix, but the programmers purposely add self-destruct codes to the memory sticks, so that they are a one-time use. If your system goes bad again, you have to buy another.” She was able to address them both while she fidgeted with covering up the chain belt with her tank top. Realising that her clothing choice of worn Earth denims and a sleeveless top wouldn’t cover the expensive chain, she used the excuse for a chance to compose herself and get some distance. Drew edged from between the men to rummage in a wall locker where she thought she had hidden a semi-clean pair of coveralls. She clenched her jaw, ignoring the feeling that one of them disapproved and one was amused as she shoved her booted foot through the legs and pressed the tear-away fastenings together. The chain could have weighed a ton for the emotional drag it was putting on her. She made herself rejoin her guys. They aren’t stray animals to adopt, she reminded herself. Ash and Korm didn’t need her. They’d leave when they found a safe haven.

  “Is that an actual combustible fuel engine?” Ash went on point like one of her uncle’s hunting dogs, his nose centimetres from the privacy shield. He glided out of the ship and was bouncing down the dock before Drew could warn him to stay close, be careful, and well…not to wander off after strange vehicles belching noxious fumes.

  Korm sighed. “I’ll get him.” His big shoulders squared as he started to follow then paused. Confusion wedged between her skull and neck as he touched her cheek with one large finger. “Be careful, lady.” She nodded, admitting the tension was less from her concern over Ash’s tendency to run off than this connection she was experiencing with them. The confusion had been with her from the moment she’d realised they were staying on.

  “You too.” She scanned the crowd one more time, barely seeing Ash duck into a shop sporting shiny twenty-first-century wheel covers as decor. Drew pointed him out and handed him one of the palm-sized devices she’d brought with her. “There he is. Here, take the backup remote so you can get back in. I’ve already set the system to recognise the both of you.” Korm gave the thing a bare glace before nodding and taking off after Ash. “Meet me back here in an hour.” Waving his acceptance, he ignored a persistent hawker with a glowing rock and shoved another peddler out of the way. She almost laughed at the obvious satisfaction the man got from the manhandling. The same as Ash got from all things mechanical. With the second remote, she closed the bay door, locked down the ugly metal shield plating to deter jackers from stripping the Pandora for parts, set the alarm and went in search of an IP programming stick.

  “Hey-hey.” A vendor waved mystery meat on a stick in Drew’s face. Rat or some other vermin, soaked in soy sauce and seasoned with whatever fungus grew naturally on Sefnee. Drew’s stomach wanted to lurch. She’d take an energy bar any day. Instead, she ignored the man/woman—she couldn’t’ tell the difference. Filth and disease had eaten at the person’s skin. Stringy thin hair and crumbling blackened teeth were the norm here. The few children that she saw ran in packs of their own for survival, probably unaware of their parentage. She snarled at a thin, but fairly decent-looking kid who tried the cute scam on her. Drew kept going. Like snakes, the young here were more dangerous than the adults. Scanning the scrap buildings, she found the symbol and slipped past the rolled-up fence that served as a door. “Wa-ell, wa-ell,” the scratchy voice greeted her within a few steps of entering the computer cluttered shop. Hardware and bits and pieces from every age jumbled together on dusty mouldy shelves. The speaker coughed, giving Drew a chance to locate the blanket-wrapped skeletal figure in the chair. She frowned as the reek of Rooma, a mushroom-based alcohol, hit her nose. “If my old eyes don’t deceive me. They sez you took up with Capn’ Larissa’s boys.”

  “Shiv.’ So, everyone in the underbelly of space knew who’d ferried Ash and Korm from Celestial VIII station. The news struck a wary chord in her. Like most small traders, Drew had a far-flung network of contacts, some more loyal than others. She wove through the shop and knelt on the dirty floor. “You’re only about ten years older than me.” Shiv cackled and shivered—Rooma addicts often developed a neurological disorder. Rooma effects had taken a hard toll on the once brave and brash woman. One filthy nail-bitten hand patted her on the shoulder. Wild dilated eyes jumped from point to point, never truly settling on Drew.

  “I’m hunnreds of years older than you, chick-a-lee.” Squinting, Shiv leant forward, blasting Drew again with her breath. “You still gots Mara’s treasure? She came to me, you know. Afore she…” Her gaze shifted over to the shelves, bouncing to the door and to her guest.

  Drew detested the dependency and Shiv’s drug use had ultimately been the reason for their parting. Mara had been willing to overlook the using, hoping that they’d be able to reason with their third partner, make her want to get better. Shiv had stolen them blind and retreated to Sefnee, floating without an anchor as much as the asteroid she l
ived in. Drew even knew about the comm calls and visits Mara made to try and clean her up. In the end, you couldn’t help someone who wasn’t willing to help herself.

  Patting Shiv’s trembling hand, Drew nodded. “What’s the term?” She cocked her head, scanning scribbled labels attached to the shelves where a couple of wand-sized data sticks lay. Shiv had picked up a few things from Mara over the years, making her a kick-ass security backup with some decent mechanical skills. Too bad neither Drew nor Mara had been able to do the same. Drew was good enough in a bar fight, but she was no match for someone like Korm, or Shiv stone-sober and ready to rock space. “On ice. I’ve got it on ice.” One bin title struck her and Drew stood, walking the short distance away. “I’ve got an IP conflict. This a full erase and reboot kit?”

  Shiv’s trembling became worse as she huddled over her knees, murmuring about needing another shot. Drew sighed, taking the stick, and knelt in front of her old friend. She patted the hand again, her other taking out the throwaway cred-card that wasn’t linked to any of her accounts. She carefully folded the woman’s knobby fingers around it, speaking quietly. “There’s around fifty-k on the card, Shiv. Take it. Go to Kisk-Q. I never sold Mara’s condo. You can get help.” Her throat ached, remembering the times they’d run badly needed vaccines past the GI Guard—she, Mara and Shiv. The three of them had owned the skies. “You remember that orphanage we relocated?” The words hurt to speak, but Shiv nodded. Drew chose to believe it was a nod, not another drug withdrawal shudder.

  “They was-s-s young. S-s-sick. Needed more n’ meds.” Shiv stared into the past, remembering more than her next dose of Rooma. “But we saved ‘em. Dinn’t we?”

  “Yes, we saved them. You were amazing, holding the soldiers off with a riding crop and a measly stunner.” The old woman’s ravaged cheeks were like paper in her palms. Drew leant forward, trying to will strength into her old friend. “Go to Sister Gale. She’ll help you.”