He swam down to the reef, to the oyster beds and collected the pearls on offer. His hands shook so much he could hardly hold the delicate sea-gems, or put them into the suit’s protective pouch. Singing his thanks to the shells, he swam around the reef, trying to get his body under control.
An hour later, surfacing, he dragged himself up onto the landing. Removing his enviro-suit, he activated the fresh water shower and stood under the cold jet hoping for a respite from the heat within. No such bloody luck.
He left the pearls in the belt, the shielding would protect them until he could concentrate on preparing them for sale. Right now his mind was on other things—as other parts of his anatomy.
By the time he reached the house he was dry and a walking inferno.
Pausing at the door, he smelled the delicious aroma of food, by the scents he recognized his favorites. His belly rumbled. Then Sam’s personal redolence hit him. He followed the trail through the kitchen and into the elevator.
Reaching the first level, the door slid open. John halted, mid-step. Feegling hell!
She was reclining against a chair beside the oblong table in the formal dining room. Oh great stars, give me strength—she was naked.
Bloody feegling hell!
His mouth went desert-dry as he watched her fingers trailing over her skin, touching the pearls around her throat, slipping lower to the crystal necklace and the last, flicking the gem in her navel. Was she even aware of what she was doing as she watched him in that heavy-lidded, somnolent way?
A tiny lift of the corner of her mouth. Yep, she damn well knew exactly what she was doing—to him! Clever kitten. Very naughty kitten.
“I thought you might be hungry after your work, Kuno,” she said huskily.
He cleared his throat. “Yeah.” Oh yeah!
The table had been elaborately set with the best china, silverware and crystal. Stir fry tofu and salads and a crisp vegetable platter with balsamic dressing arrayed the table. Champagne bubbled in one long stemmed glass. He strode forward and picked up the bottle, pretending to study the label, trying to remain aloof from Sam’s sexuality. Trying—and failing.
“Vintage 2008. That was a good year. I bought a case off galaxy-e-bay awhile ago.” He set the bottle back in the ice bucket. “Where’s your glass, kitten?”
“I don’t drink alcohol now.” Unconsciously, she ran a hand over her stomach, her fingers brushing against the mutatis gem at her navel.
John smiled and sipped his champagne, watching her over the rim of his glass. He sent out a tentative mind-probe, sensing her. She was wired. Really wired. Good.
He sat opposite her and served food for two onto platters. He pushed one across the table to her and teased a fork into his meal, forcing down a mouthful. Stars, he was so feegling tight, he could hardly swallow.
He held the fork between his lips and ran his tongue over the tofu. “Sweet and succulent, just like you, babe.”
She smiled. “Which is the more succulent?”
“If I said the tofu, you’d bite me, so I’ll say you. Wanna bite me anyway?”
Sam swallowed, her pulse leaping. John felt her response deep inside. Every ridge on his feena went super hard in a nano-second.
He reached for the champagne and downed the glass in a gulp. He saw the triumph in the flare of her eyes. She’d read him like a book. His naughty kitten was too damn smart for his own good. Damn! Score one to Sammi.
John reached for the mango and bit into the flesh, juice running down his chin. He curled his tongue into the fruit and lapped. Bit and lathed it, like he did so often to Sam’s anatomy. Her gaze followed his every move. The gaze was combustible.
“Mm, tastes so good, kitten. Want some?”
She took the proffered fruit and mimicked his actions using tongue and teeth and lips. “Full and succulent, just like you babe,” Sam said.
John bit back a scream and nearly choked on the mango.
She stood up and leaned against the table, watching him, eyes narrowed.
His gaze met hers. Smiling, she arched her back and stretched, and slowly, so slowly, walked toward him. John held his breath.
She stood before him and arched her back again. “I feel funny.”
You and me both, kitten. John bit back the thought. His fists curled against his thighs. Sammi! He sent out a tease of cat musk.
A flush swept up her body. Her nipples puckered. She swayed slightly, running her hands in her hair, lifting it from her nape.
John clenched his jaw. Slowly, she lowered onto his lap.
“This chair isn’t right for what you want to do, kitten.” He inclined his head towards the green leather sofa. “Mm?”
“Mmmm,” she purred.
He swept her up in his arms and stalked across the room, lowering her onto the lounge, and knelt between her legs. He leaned forward, probing his tongue into her and lapped.
“Definitely sweeter than any mango, kitten-mine.” He delved some more and smiled as he felt her first ripple against his cheek, her fingers threading in his hair holding him tight as she ground against his face. He pulled away and turned her, bringing her to her knees. He knelt behind her, his feena sliding between her folds to find her. He stroked with the tip, while his fingers found the meridian. She pressed back into him and he teased in all the way and exploded.
John paused, berating himself. So much for the famous sensualator control. He was a quivering mass of goo. He thrust carefully, aiming for the right. She anticipated him and met him half way. Then they moved as one to the left. Then to the center. Ecstasy.
The sofa creaked. The leather squelched as they moved, each moaning a release that made John see stars. He figured Sam would, too, but just to make sure he fired off a volley of pheromones and she cried out. His name, a dozen felinus words. Yep, she was feegled. Stage One Seduction complete.
They lay on the lounge, she face down, John still inside her, holding his weight by knees and elbows. He smoothed away the hair from her nape and kissed her neck, leaving a trail of licks and bites across her skin. His tongue prowled, his teeth nipped, finding Tu’urell, the prowler meridian point.
“Kuno.”
“Mm.”
“Will you do that meridian thing again?”
“Which one? You have so many trigger points now, kitten-mine.”
“I’m spoilt for choice. But the one between my legs, the…”
“Here?” He pressed between the perineum.
She held her breath for long seconds and climaxed. The gold-blue light of starfire erupted between them. She saw it and the moment she did, John felt the subtle tension in her body. Fear, not rapture raced through her veins.
A piece of the puzzle fell into place. Something had been done to her during convergence. Something that scared her.
John raised up and stroked inside her, a new direction, between center and left. Her mantle sheathing his feena pulsed and his ridges rippled in response.
“That feels nice, Kuno.”
Nice? He bit back the retort. I aim for beyond nice, kitten-mine! And to give weight to his thoughts, he stroked in her again. When he had finished with her, she was beyond words. He carried her upstairs to the bed and lay her down upon it.
Kneeling beside the bed, he leaned into her, gently smoothing each strand of hair from her face. He bent and kissed her. Feegle me! John almost laughed aloud. His kitten was asleep. Deeply asleep, satiated, a smile on her face. Stars! How he loved this woman.
He traced his fingers over her body, touched the gem at her navel, while his other hand caressed his own body, mimicking the journey. The navel rings of pearl-crystal burned, a sure indicator that Sam was seduced almost beyond her endurance. His own body was an inferno. Seduction was a sword that cut both ways.
As John leaned against the door frame, he watched Sam. He smiled to see the frown of concentration on her face, the smear of red paint across her cheek. She paused and studied the canvas propped up on the easel.
“No!” she
whispered and ran a hand through her hair.
Laughing, John padded forward and paused in front of her. “That look is not gonna take off, Sammi.”
He waited while her gaze returned to the present, to him, she’d obviously lost herself in her work.
“What?” she demanded, huskily.
“This.” He touched her blonde hair, now streaked with sticky red paint, standing on end.
She half turned and viewed herself in the reflection of the window, then laughed, looking back at him.
John smiled and directed his attention to the painting. He drew in his breath. Many had painted the famous Broome sunsets, but Sam had seen beyond the obvious, portraying the emotion, each brush stroke layered with meaning, texture and love. She painted as a felinus.
Truly remarkable, unique, was his Sammi. He breathed another charge of scent over her. She wriggled and dropped her brush.
“Allow me,” John said as she went to retrieve it.
Sam frowned at him. As he dropped to one knee, his sarong parted. She had quite a view. Bending forward, he kissed her knee and pressured a point behind, tongue and lips and fingers working together.
“Kuno,” she whispered, staring down at him. “That tickles.”
Grinning, he rose to his feet and stepped away, stretching across the table beside her to return the brush to the palette. His hip touched hers, deliberately provocative.
Sam watched him, like a cat sizing its prey. His action, so innocent—the result anything but. The sarong was taut across his ass, revealing every contour. Dry-mouthed she looked at him.
As usual, he wore his sarong, hitched low over his right hip, tight across his belly, leaving little to the imagination. His hair was sun-bleached, golden blonde, streaked with red and black, and loose around his shoulders. As he moved, his hair swept around his neck, her heightened senses hearing the swish and slow scrape against his skin. She groaned in the back of her throat.
He turned to her enquiringly, his eyes all innocence, his smile pure rogue.
She cleared her tight, dry throat. “You wanted something, Kuno?”
In response, he hooked a thumb into the top of his sarong. She held her breath. Was he going to drop the garment…?
That kilt-thing really turned her on. Even more than seeing him naked, because she knew what lay beneath the fabric. Her fingers tingled with memories of how she delighted in teasing it off his hips, a slow, delicious centimeter at a time, before she found him…
John smiled. “Would you like to have dinner on the roof tonight? Maybe sleep under the stars?”
“I’d like that.” She studied him with narrowed eyes. “And…? There’s something else on your mind.” Besides the obvious. She waited patiently.
“I can’t hide much from you, can I, kitten?”
“Nope.”
“I received an email from Pete today. Christmas Night, there’s going to be a celebration to mark two hundred years since first contact. I’ve been asked to officiate.” He grimaced. “As resident local alien, I guess I was the obvious choice.”
“Not to mention being royalty. San-Duran.”
He sniffed. “Yes, there’s that, so I can’t get out of it. And as my mate, neither can you. Except I told them that you might be indisposed.”
“I might?”
“Yep. By my calculations, I’d say you might be birthing our daughter.”
“It’s May, now, I—”
John smiled and raised her palm to his lips. “Felinus gestate longer. Hybrids even more so.”
She blushed. “Kuno, you…you won’t leave me alone will you, I mean when it’s time?”
“Of course not. Do you think I would miss the birth of our daughter—for any reason? To be with you, to share the new life we created. You are so human sometimes.”
“I know, but I’m frightened.”
He stepped closer. “Of what?”
“I’ve never had a baby before.”
“The doctor said you’re healthy, the child is strong, despite everything you…well, she’s felinus. Cats are resilient, tough.”
Sam clasped her hands in front of her, her knuckles stark against her flesh. John held her hands between his.
“Kuno, the scans showed the baby is felinus-human…normal. But—”
“Do you fear that the child has been hurt in some way by the monster? Or something you have done, or experienced, may have injured her?”
“You’re a damn good sensualator.”
“Thank you.” He squeezed her hands. “The child is perfect. You are perfect.”
“And…um…?”
“Yes?”
“She’ll be a kitten when she’s born?”
John laughed. “What?”
“She’s felinus, she’ll be a kitten.”
“Felinus do not morph before puberty. At this time, that’s when the felinus genes take hold. No woman gives birth to a kitten. Is that what frightens you?”
“I just don’t know what to expect…I mean, I know about human births, but felinus…”
“Just the same, Sammi, except the man is with his wife and child through every moment. We’ll mind-link, the three of us. There’s no trauma, I promise.”
“And you say it’ll happen around Christmas?”
“More or less.”
“Christmas Night tends to be a momentous one for me. I met you for the first time, face to face and the Voyagers arrived here.” She frowned. “Well, if I’m expected at this ceremony, what do they want me to do? I’m not much on speeches and stuff.”
“I thought we might sing.”
Horror washed through her. “I can’t.”
“You did on Chizan.”
“That was different. That was for family. For…for…”
“Say his name, kitten.” He paused, his gaze intense. “Say his name! Harimal. To speak the name of the dead is to make him live forever. That’s what the ancient Egyptians believed, and why they carved their names on every tomb.”
Sam smiled. One of the first things they discovered about each other in that first chat room meeting, was their shared love of all things Egyptian. “Everyone craves immortality of one kind or another.”
John nodded. “And few achieve it, at least for the right reasons. Notorious rather than noteworthy.”
“If you want me to sing in public, I’d not be noteworthy. I’m not trained, I’d embarrass you.”
The fire in his eyes died and he gripped her shoulders and raised her to her toes. “You can never embarrass me, Sammi-mine. Nothing you say, or do, or think…nothing in the known universe can ever turn me from you! Do you understand?” He shook her gently. “Do you?”
“Yeeees.”
He shook her gently, again. “Nothing will ever turn me from you. Nothing.”
“You’ve made your point.”
“Perhaps not enough.” He released her. “Then I can tell Pete that we’ll sing a felinus song to mark the occasion?”
“I suppose, if I’m not indisposed. I mean I might be too fat to appear in public. More than nine months? I’m going to resemble a beached turtle.”
John laughed. “Not to me.”
She snorted her derision. “And you needn’t look so smug. Men! You feegle us and we are the ones to get fat!” She lifted a paint brush from the table, waving it at him, leaving a trail of red paint over his chest. “Just get out of my studio. I’ve got work to do.”
John stalked away, past her desk and paused. He picked up a sheet of paper and ran a fingertip over the sketch, frowning. He turned to Sam.
“Where did you get this design?”
“That? Oh…”
“Where, Sammi?”
“Is something wrong?” A knot formed in her throat, a moment of panic before she swallowed, releasing the tension. His eyes glowed golden—cat’s eyes, mesmerizing.
“Sam, tell me, please!”
“It was from one of the prison dreams: I had a deck of cards. I was a fortune-teller and warrior-Hari came to
me for a divination. It was the weirdest dreamscape. I don’t know anything about tarot.” She walked slowly to him. “I can’t remember all the pictures, just a few. I’m making my own deck. I…I just need to do this.”
John smiled. “Hari knew the cards. It was part of his heritage. He gave you the knowledge, a gift.”
“What’s that mean?”
“In the time of the daman-san, magic was rife on Chizan. Paradoxically, it was both our curse and our salvation. The tarot deck is part of the Ronsevaal legacy and the foremost crystal mages were my ancestors.” John paused. “My father began to explain to me before we left and Hari told me stuff he shouldn’t have, but…”
“He always shared with you?”
“Yes. Now I’m going to do so with you. It’s against the rules, but feegle the damn rules.” He paused. “You know the story of Scheherazade?”
“As in one thousand and one Arabian nights? Felinus have a pre-occupation with that number.”
“Mm.” John smiled, his eyes teasing. “I’ll tell you a secret every night, for one thousand and one nights. That’ll keep you entertained and at my side.”
“You think I need encouragement to be with you?”
“A cat likes to cover all contingencies.”
“What secret are you gonna tell me tonight?”
John grinned and lifted his shoulder. “That’s a surprise for tonight.”
Sam edged forward, running her nail over his bare chest. “Can’t you tell me now?” She purred, low in her throat and smiled to herself, seeing the flush race across John’s body. The subtle clenching of his stomach muscles.
Laughing, he took her hands and stilled them, raising her fingers to his lips. “Are you trying to seduce me?”
“No trying about it, Kuno, I think you are seduced.”
He raised a brow. “You think?”
“Ah, cat-boy, I know.” She smiled. “Clever kitty, to divert me. Will you tell me more about the cards?”
“If you tell me more about the dream.”
“We were punished for it.”
“You what?” John caught her hands and drew her closer.
“Hari wore a collar. The starlord was joined to it. When we disobeyed, or just when we upset him—and sometimes it didn’t take much—Hari was subjected to agony, like you wouldn’t believe. I shared it on occasion, when he couldn’t shield it from me.”
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