Gia scowled. “Are you going in another pod or something? There’s plenty of room for three.”
Slowly, Zan shook his head. “I’ve got to stop him, Gia. I’m going through the wormhole with the ship.”
“No.” She said it so definitely, refuting his words.
“I need you to be safe.”
The towel he had wrapped around her shoulders fell away as she hauled her fist back and hit him on the shoulder. Even weakened from her injuries she packed a hell of a punch. “Don’t you think I need the same thing? I’m not going without you!”
“You have to. Gia, Duffy can’t fly one of these things by himself. He’d probably fly into an event horizon and get sucked into the next black hole he stumbled across.” Swallowing his pride he said, “I don’t want him to die either. I need the two of you to look out for each other. For me.”
Her mouth opened, and he took full advantage by claiming her lips. So sweet, so hot, he wanted to drown in her essence, that heady female fragrance that was hers and hers alone. His tongue swept through her mouth seeking a deeper taste, needing to imprint himself on her the way she’d done for him.
Gia’s hands curled around his vest, pulling him closer, yielding to him completely. He wanted more time with her. Eternity with her by his side wouldn’t be long enough to discover all of her secrets. What wouldn’t he give to have that chance to explore her to his heart’s content?
Though it nearly killed him, he pulled back, just in time to see Duffy lurking by the hatch door. He averted his eyes, but not before Zan saw the flash of misery there. It was just as well he stayed behind. He didn’t want to cause Duffy any more hurt than he already had.
“Here.” Duffy extended the jumpsuit he found and tossed a bag onto the passenger bench. “I packed up a little currency too. Might be able to convince a bigger transport to give us a lift.”
Zan stood and studied the man he’d used and abused for almost five decades. Duffy looked exactly the same as he had when Zan first met him after the ranking ceremony. It was the one and only time they’d been physically intimate. He’d been honest with Gia—he didn’t want Duffy to die. He owed him so much more than he could ever repay.
“Duffy, I . . .” The right words hovered just out of reach. Should he apologize for his deception in the past, or thank Duffy for coming through for him and Gia?
Duffy’s eyes filled with emotion. They’d known each other too long for him to not read his intentions. “Don’t do it, Cap’n. The ship ain’t worth getting yourself killed.”
“I have to try. It’s my responsibility to take him out no matter the cost to myself.”
“Like hell it is. Duffy, hold him,” Gia muttered, and flipped the ignition switch. The pod lifted off the bay floor and hovered for a moment. Zan dove for the door, but Duffy intercepted him, tackled him like a ton of bricks as the pod sealed itself shut.
“This is pod five, ready to go. Open the hanger doors as soon as all persons are secure,” Gia called out over the comm unit as Zan wrestled to get away from Duffy.
“No, damn it all, Gia, I’m not going with you!” But the comm drowned him out.
“Pod one all set.”
“Pod two, good to go.”
“Pod three’s ready.”
“Pod four in position.”
“Let’s do this thing.”
Zan elbowed Duffy in the face but it was too late as the outer hull separated wide enough so the pods could slip out into the cold grasp of space. If he opened the door now, they’d all be sucking vacuum.
“What the hell? I have to go with the ship,” Zan roared as Gia exited the ship.
Still naked and seated confidently behind the controls of a spacecraft once more, Gia glanced at him over her shoulder and said in an imitation of his captain’s drawl, “Seems to me like you ain’t got much of a choice in the matter. I’d reckon a space pirate such as yourself would recognize when he’s being kidnapped.”
Gia watched as the living spaceship flew through opening and the wormhole closed in on itself. Zan muttered an oath and slumped against the hull of the pod. The confines in the pod were simple and sparse. Two benches along the wall, a chair for the pilot and one other person, and a small lavatory in back. The setup kind of reminded her of her stinger.
It sure as hell didn’t fly like her stinger though. Top speed was barely sub-light and the navigation could only be described as clunky. After taking a scan of the nearby star systems, Gia plotted a course to the closest life-sustaining world. Almost two weeks away with no guarantee of intelligent life once they got there.
After contacting the other pods with their heading she took a deep breath and turned to face the music to the tune of one large and irate space pirate.
“What. The. Fuck?” Zan seethed from his position on the floor.
Instead of answering him right away, Gia yanked on the butt-ugly gray jumpsuit Duffy had snagged for her. Though it wouldn’t be on her top ten favorite wardrobe items list, she’d spent more than enough time naked over the last few days to last a lifetime. After she was dressed she knelt beside Duffy, who was sprawled on the floor, one hand cupping his left eye with blood spurting from his clearly broken nose. “Get a med kit,” she told Zan.
“Get it yourself,” he shot back.
Her hackles rose, but she would tend to Duffy’s injuries before she tore Zan a new one. “Fine, be a big, spoiled child. I’ll take care of Duffy.”
Or as she was starting to think of him, Zan’s whipping boy.
“Can you sit up?” Gia asked him while she rummaged in the medical supply kit she found under the farthest bench. Half of its contents mystified her, but gauze and dry ice packs were pretty universal with space-lane-faring vessels.
“I think so.” With her help, Duffy sat upright, propping his back up against the hull. “It probably looks worse than it is.”
“It looks like hell,” she told him flatly. “Your nose looks broken.”
He touched it lightly and winced. “Wouldn’t be the first time.”
After she got the bleeding under control, she helped ease Duffy onto one of the low benches. Setting the cold pack over his eye, she gave him a shot of pain medication. “See if you can sleep.”
“Doubtful, but I reckon you two will be wanting some alone time.” Duffy’s expression was grim.
“Nope, you can watch me kick his stubborn ass all you want.”
Her patient smiled even as Zan muttered, “I’d like to see you try, angel.”
She rounded on him. “What the hell is the matter with you? I just saved your bacon and you’re giving me a rash of shit over it. Did you really want to go running back to Hosta that badly?”
“It’s my duty to help those people. Isn’t that what you wanted me to do? Step up and take over, free Hosta from my father’s tyranny?”
“I want you to do it the smart way, which certainly doesn’t include charging off into the outer reaches armed only with a ship you can’t communicate with! What good would your death do them?”
“It would be proof that an immortal can die. Maybe they wouldn’t be so afraid to challenge Xander if they believed they stood a chance of winning.”
“You know what I think? I think this whole self-sacrifice thing is just a cover. I think that you were just planning to do what you do best, run away from a difficult situation.”
He let out a bitter laugh. “Going head-to-head with Xander is the easy way out, is that what you’re saying?”
“Dying is the easy way out. You’ve opted to do that several times over the last few days, Zan. It got me thinking about why. Why are you so ready to lay down your immortal life at every opportunity?”
“Because I love you!” he exploded, fists balled up until his knuckles turned white. “Isn’t that enough for you?”
Gia forgot how to breathe, his passionate announcement blotting out everything except him and her and the crackling air between them. It was always like this with them, emotions running hot and ready
to go nova in the next heartbeat. He pissed her off like no one she’d ever met. Didn’t the man ever think before he ran his mouth? Could he really be so dense to believe that burping up those words like some kind of emotional acid reflux in order to win an argument would help his case?
Hands on hips she stared him down. “You know what? It’s not enough. Running off to get your dumb ass gutted like a martyr and saying you’re in it for love? Fuck you, Zan, for using me as an excuse. The same way you’ve been using Isabella’s death as a shield to keep anyone who would care about you at a distance. You’d die for me, so how the hell come you don’t want to live for me?”
Zan’s mouth dropped open. Gia turned away from his stunned expression, her head suddenly throbbing. “I’m beat. The course has been input, so we should be good for a while. Wake me if anything interesting happens.”
“Gia—”
Ignoring him, she lay down on the opposite bench from Duffy, facing the hull. She was tired of fighting for her life, tired of fighting with Zan over his. If he continued on his self-destructive path he’d eventually succeed because she wouldn’t be there to stop him. She wished she had let him go through the wormhole. Better he died loving her than live hating her for making him face the truth. Though she couldn’t control her tears, she did make sure they fell silently onto her ice-cold hand.
25
Zan stood on the precipice of madness. He had too much energy, was confined in too small a space, and was bogged down with too many secrets. Between Duffy’s sulking and Gia’s silent treatment the quiet hung thick in the recycled air.
The pod was too cramped, and he had to duck his head every time he stood up. The sanitary facilities were barely serviceable enough to keep them clean. Protein-rich beverages and water were dispensed by thumbprint three times a day, enough to keep them alive for a few weeks. Having lived aboard a ship for the majority of his life, Zan was used to the sameness of space. With all the energy the pod could muster focused on getting them to the nearest port, there was nothing to do but talk and think. If he’d been alone, it wouldn’t have been so bad, but with the thick undercurrents of stress and the tight quarters he was about to lose his mind.
What the hell had happened between Hosta and the pod? What made her think he wanted to die? Everything he’d intended to do had been to protect her and his crew, the people of Hosta. He didn’t take immortality lightly. It had been his burden to bear for most of his life.
Duffy murmured something too low for Zan to hear, and Gia smiled in reply. Gia laid a hand on Duffy’s arm and the other man shook his head, eyes full of mirth. Zan ground his molars together. The friendship forming between the two of them irritated him for no good reason.
Is it because they seem content without me? My former lovers bonding over their combined cleverness in forcing me into this situation?
And that’s what they were to him, he realized—the only two people in the universe he considered his lovers. Though he and Duffy hadn’t been together for more than fifty years he still recalled that first night onboard the stolen vessel.
Duffy had been the original flyer for the living ship. An alien trader come to Hosta, Duffy had participated in the ranking nearly two decades before and was awarded his position. He hadn’t challenged Zan, who at that time had still been mortal, and Zan hadn’t even recalled his name when he’d first come aboard. On the run from his father, who’d kept him in prison for more than twenty years, Zan hid his desperation as he commandeered the test vessel.
His first had a way of finessing the young creature, getting it to respond better to nudges in the right direction. On Zan’s orders he’d encouraged the hybrid to open a wormhole to another star system. The energy drain on the young ship had nearly killed it, and Zan informed the crew that they would remain where they were until the ship grew in strength and abilities.
None of them knew what he’d done to escape, or even that he’d been imprisoned, a figurehead that his father hauled out for ranking ceremonies. None of them knew about Isabella, or so he’d believed.
Night after night, Zan lay in his bed and stroked his shaft, recalling the sweet clasp of a lover’s body. He hadn’t had one since Isabella, didn’t want another to suffer the same fate. It was bad enough Xander ordered him to participate in the ranking every year, that he had to kill all the men he fucked. And he did fuck them first, because it was the only release he allowed himself other than his own hand.
One night about two weeks into their mission Duffy had arrived at his quarters. “Cap’n, may I speak with you?”
Zan nodded and let him in.
“The crew is wonderin’ if they’ll be home in time for the ranking.”
“The ship is still too small. They can retain their positions for now. No need for a new ranking.”
Duffy shifted from foot to foot. “What’s our heading?”
Zan pointed to the transparent star chart hologram projected from his desk. “See that little blue planet? That’s Earth. The world is inhabited with creatures much like ourselves. I caught a few of their satellite transmissions. We could mix with the population there without them even knowin’ we were from outer space. Learn them up good, so when they do become space farin’ we know exactly what we’re dealing with.”
Duffy studied the chart. “Sounds like you’re planning to stay a spell.”
That was exactly what Zan was planning, to live anonymously among the people of Earth—the last place his father would ever look for him. “The yellow dwarf star is stable and the ship can have a constant supply of food. We should be there in a day or so.”
If anything Duffy looked even more uncomfortable. “Spit it out, Duff.”
“Well, I know I’m an outsider and all, but your people need the structure the ranking provides, especially if they are gonna be among civilians on a foreign planet. You need to rank them before we get there.”
Zan shook his head. “No. You do it if you think it needs to be done. I can’t, not without killing them.”
Duffy studied him a moment. Zan appreciated that the other man didn’t ask why. “Is that because of your wife?”
Zan had him slammed up against the nearest bulkhead in no time flat. “What the hell do you know about it!”
Instead of panicking or stuttering, Duffy just met and held his gaze. “Nothin’ more than talk. People are curious about you.”
“Why?” Zan released him and stepped back.
“You’re Xander’s only son. Rumors fly about important people.”
“Well, I don’t want to be important anymore and my wife is not a subject open for discussion. Understood?”
Duffy nodded. “You still love her, then. That why you haven’t been with another woman?”
Zan’s tone was laced with menace. “Back down now, Duffy. I’m warning you.”
But Duffy didn’t. “You’re going to lose control of them awful fast if you don’t rank them.”
“I already told you to do it.”
“And the Cap’n needs to rank me.”
“That’s what you want, then?” Furious at the man’s relentlessness, Zan pushed Duffy down over the sofa. “Fine. Do I need to beat you to hell and back first, or should we just get right to the fucking?”
Duffy didn’t say anything, just dropped his pants around his ankles and bent over the couch. His cock was hard, actually wet from precum, and his hole was slicked with some kind of oil. The man had prepared himself to be thoroughly fucked.
“You really want this, don’t you? It’s got nothing to do with the ranking. You want me to fuck you.” Zan’s own cock stirred as he thought about losing himself inside another person, feeling the tight squeeze of someone else’s body instead of his own hand.
“Yes.” Duffy spread his legs wider, the invitation clear.
“By anyone, or just by me?” Zan had no idea why he asked the question, but it was important to him.
“Just you.” Duffy gripped his own shaft and stroked. “I want to feel your hard c
ock in me, plunging in as deep as you can go.”
Zan didn’t need to hear anything else. Kicking off his own pants he climbed onto the couch behind Duffy, bracing his hands on the wall before aligning his cock with the small opening. Part of him wanted to go slow, to enjoy burying his cock into Duffy’s channel, but it had been too long and he was too far gone. With one powerful surge of his hips he drove his stiff prick in deep.
The clutch of muscles around his cock was tight. Zan closed his eyes and pulled back, enjoying the grasping pulls along his shaft as though the narrow passage wanted to keep him within. The man beneath him wasn’t fighting to get away, and without the power struggle Zan was free to lose himself in the carnal act for the first time in two decades. So damn good . . .
Duffy let out a hoarse shout as Zan pulled back before ramming forward again. It was a brutal fucking. He couldn’t be gentle or go easy as he drove his meat into the other man’s ass. One hand fisted in Duffy’s hair, the other landing on his hips to synchronize his driving thrusts.
He was so hot he thought his skin might burst into flames at any second. His balls were drawn up tight, and he yanked his shaft free at the very last second, spilling all over Duffy’s ass.
Duffy had come too, his hands covered in the evidence of his release.
Zan turned away, not able to look him in the eye.
“I’ll take care of the men. Any who’d challenge you have to challenge me first.” Duffy had waited several moments before leaving.
They hadn’t talked about it since.
There were times when Zan had been able to repress the memory, but then he’d see the longing in Duffy’s eyes. He’d considered it, but the idea of sharing so much of himself, the memories cataloguing a lifetime’s worth of mistakes, scared the hell out of him. He wasn’t a naive boy the way he’d been when he married Isabella. Caring so much for another person had the power to break him.
So he found women, both on Earth and in space ports, and pleasured them. Trying to forget what he’d once had, ignoring the potential present he had with Duffy. A few quick bouts of pleasure saw him through.
No Mercy Page 20