Assuming that was even true, and she wasn’t making all this up out of her head. Maybe all the stress had scrambled some of her mental wiring.
Laying her hands flat on the desktop, Trinity pulled in a breath, then another. The view out her windows, from up here on the twentieth floor of this building, was really quite astonishing. Yes, Gabriel had explained to her how the Zhore made their cities living things, utilizing practically every inch of usable space for plants and trees, but it wasn’t until now, as she looked at all that green, shimmering and waving from every balcony, every rooftop, that she realized what a difference such a practice made. On Gaia, the cities were cold, shades of gray and white and black. Most of the buildings here seemed to be constructed of materials in soft shades of ivory and warm tan and even a sort of burnished rust color. They provided a welcoming backdrop for all that vegetation, which ranged from a green so deep it was almost black to the brightest, freshest chartreuse. And the flowers, too, many of them white and blue and purple, were cool and soothing to the eye.
She had guessed it might be beautiful. She just hadn’t realized quite how beautiful.
All that beauty wasn’t enough to drive the doubt from her head. Something strange was going on here, even though she couldn’t explain what. This sort of sudden, insane attraction was nothing like her. Oh, she’d had her relationships, but she’d either eased into them slowly, never sure how long they would last before seeing into her lovers’ minds got to be too much and she had to break things off, or going for the quick and easy lay, not allowing herself to get too involved.
If only she’d been smart enough to do either of those things with Caleb.
Thinking about him was not a good idea. Scowling inside her hood, she went back to the screen that held Zhandar’s schedule for the week. It looked as if they were supposed to be headed out to a work site later this afternoon.
Together.
So check your raging hormones at the door, she told herself. Because whatever else is going on, I doubt the people who live in that particular building would be too thrilled to find you and Zhandar having hot sex in the petunia bed.
Not that they had petunias on Zhoraan, but still.
* * *
It was torture to have Zhanna so close to him within the confines of the air car they were driving to that afternoon’s project. Very well, she wasn’t so close — safely on the other side of the console that separated the two front seats — but even so, he felt as if he could almost breathe in her presence, feel her heart beating.
She sat quietly, watching the streets of Torzhaan flash by outside. He hadn’t asked how long she’d been here, but he guessed it couldn’t have been much more than a week or so. Her birth town of Alizhaar was much smaller than Torzhaan, and very different topographically. Here the land rolled in gentle hills, rising gradually to the Sarazhin Mountains to the east of town. At this season, they were bare of snow, although they wore white caps in the winter, even if the city itself rarely saw any real snowfall.
“And how is your office?” he asked, thinking he should make some sort of conversation. True, he and Leizha had often driven in silence, but that had been a quiet born of long acquaintance, of knowing that they did not have to talk if neither one of them was inclined to do so. Here, he felt as if the silence was too thick, filled with a need that was certainly palpable to him, if not to Zhanna.
“Very nice, thank you.” She shifted in her seat so she wasn’t so obviously staring out the window. “The view is beautiful.”
“Yes, Leizha always enjoyed it.”
A little pause. Then, “She was your assistant before?”
“For several years, yes.”
“And she left to go on retreat?”
There was certainly nothing out of the ordinary about that. It was anyone’s prerogative to take their leave, to go where they could meditate and rest and relax. There was always someone to come along and take over their position, to help out so things kept running smoothly. And yet Zhandar found himself tensing. “Yes, she did. She felt it was time.”
Another brief silence. “Have you ever gone on retreat?”
“No. Not yet, at any rate,” he amended hastily, since he realized it was somewhat strange for someone to have held a single position for as long as he had and not take a single sabbatical.
“I suppose it would be hard to tear yourself away, if you truly loved what you were doing.”
It was such an un-Zhore-like statement, in its way. Work was never supposed to be the center of one’s world; that importance was reserved for one’s mate and children. And yet he did love what he did, making Torzhaan bloom and flower. For too many months, it had been all he had.
But in that moment, Zhandar felt his need for her intensify. They’d only met a few hours earlier, and yet, in a few simple words, she’d shown that she understood him far better than those who’d been in his life for years.
His fingers tightened on the steering wheel. He actually didn’t need to drive manually, as the air car was equipped to maneuver itself anywhere within city limits, but he’d come to enjoy steering the vehicle, feeling it respond to his commands. And if he ever did make a mistake, the automatic systems would come back online, ensuring that no one could be harmed by a moment’s carelessness.
“I suppose that is true. I hope you’ll come to love it as I do.”
Her hooded head tilted toward him. For a second or two, he feared that he’d stepped over a line with that statement. It was one thing to express a wish that she would enjoy the work, or find it rewarding. But to love it?
Then she replied, “I think I will. I do love flowers.”
He couldn’t allow himself to let out a sigh of relief, but he did feel his fingers loosen slightly on the steering wheel. “Well, we also plant decorative grasses, and vegetables, and fruit,” he said, his tone teasing.
She chuckled. He loved the sound of her laugh, throaty and warm. The only problem was, he could feel himself responding, his body aching with need for her. He pushed the desire down with every bit of willpower he possessed, at the same time thanking all the spirits of his ancestors for the bulkiness of the robes he wore. There would be no evidence of his arousal that anyone could see, least of all Zhanna.
“It will be interesting to see how it all works when you’re building it from the ground up,” she said, and now she sounded quite serious. “In general, you’re replanting and retrofitting, rather than starting from nothing, correct?”
“Yes,” he replied, matching his tone to hers. “But this building is new construction, and so we’ll be starting from scratch. It’s an interesting process.”
She nodded then, and the moment was lost, just as some of the heat began to recede from his body. Zhandar couldn’t even regret that; he was too relieved that he hadn’t betrayed himself. He knew he could say nothing to Zhanna until he knew for certain that she felt as he did. With Elzhair, it had all happened quickly, but he could already tell that his new assistant was a very different person from his late wife.
* * *
Watching Zhandar stride around the bare rooftop, pointing here and there, and sometimes waving expansively with his arms as he explained a particular point of design, Trinity wondered if it was like this for all the Zhore. Did it hit them like a bolt out of the blue, charging them up as they realized the person they faced was the one they were destined to spend the rest of their lives with?
She didn’t know. All she had to go on was what Gabriel Brant had told her, and it had been explained to her in purely clinical terms, that the Zhore mated for life, although Gaian scientists didn’t yet know exactly why. Maybe her briefing had been so coldly clinical on purpose in order to keep her from forming any foolish romantic notions as to what coupling with a Zhore would be like. He’d already made it pretty clear what he expected of her when she returned.
If she returned.
She shivered. Funny how she could feel so drawn to Zhandar, an alien whose face she hadn’t even seen,
and yet repelled by Gabriel, who was of her own kind and, she had to reluctantly admit, too handsome for his own good. Had he made all his trainees a conquest, or had he bestowed particular attention on her because of her peculiar talents?
It was an attention she could have done without. And, speaking of attention, she should really be paying more attention to what Zhandar was doing and saying, rather than woolgathering while he worked. Even after being here less than a day, she could tell the Zhore were far more lax about workplace discipline than the Gaians, but even so, she didn’t want to make a bad impression.
Stylus in hand and tablet in the other, she approached the spot where Zhandar was engrossed in conversation with the foreperson on the construction crew. She could tell from the height of the other Zhore and her smaller frame that she must be a woman, although she was still taller than Trinity herself.
Not that that took a lot. She’d never been blessed with height. Maybe her diminutive size had something to do with men thinking they could walk all over her.
“…and a water feature there, I think,” Zhandar was saying, pointing with one gloved finger toward a sheltered corner where a wall was being built to contain what she thought must be the air-circulation units and other equipment used for climate control in the building.
“That wasn’t in the original plans,” the construction foreperson said. Her voice was surprisingly clear and sweet, but even so, Trinity could hear the doubt in it.
“True, but now that I’ve walked the site and seen where the light falls, I think it will be helpful there. And if we open up this area next to it, we can place benches among the planters so that the people living and working here can come up and relax and meditate as it suits them.”
It was difficult, listening to them speak but not being able to see their expressions. Zhandar’s tone was mild enough, but she could tell that he expected to have his way on this.
The foreperson’s barriers weren’t as strong as Zhandar’s, that was for sure; Trinity could feel annoyance slipping out around the edges, coupled with a faint tinge of worry that the project wouldn’t be done on time, and that she would be the one who suffered the consequences, not the high and mighty designer from the planning ministry. It was a very human reaction, and, sensing it, Trinity felt herself relax a little.
Guess they’re not quite as different from us as I thought. I suppose they couldn’t be, or how would a Gaian girl ever marry herself off to one?
That was probably not what she should be thinking about right now. Thoughts of marriage and children naturally led to thoughts of the necessary prelude to such things, and she’d just barely managed to shove lustful thoughts about Zhandar out of her head as it was.
“What do you think, Zhanna?” he asked then, and she nearly jumped out of her skin.
Her borrowed skin.
“I think it would be beautiful,” she said honestly. Fresh water was a precious resource on Gaia, and not something to be wasted heedlessly in waterfalls and fountains purely for decoration’s sake. But it was clear to her that they didn’t have the same restrictions on Zhoraan, so why not create a little oasis around every corner? She added, “And being in the shade like that, there won’t be too much of a problem with evaporation.”
“My thoughts exactly.” Right then his barriers seemed to slip a little, and she could sense the approval radiating from him. Approval, and….
But then it was as if a wall had come up, and she was cut off from him. Since she was desperately managing her own barriers, she didn’t try to probe. It was enough that he liked what she had said, and that she’d supported him.
“Very well,” the foreperson said, sounding resigned. “You will put in an addendum that there will be a delay of approximately a week to accommodate the change in design?”
“Of course,” Zhandar replied. “I certainly wouldn’t expect you to face any kind of repercussions because of my own whims.”
If someone else — say, Gabriel, or Blake Chu — had uttered those same words, Trinity would have been looking for the undercurrent of sarcasm in them, as if the foreperson should be to blame for wanting to preserve her own hide. But because it was Zhandar saying them, Trinity knew they were only the truth. He had changed his mind, once he truly walked the site, and he wanted the blame for any delays placed squarely on him.
That was so refreshingly unlike any other man she’d ever known that she felt another surge of warmth toward him. This one, however, was not like the blaze of desire she’d felt when she first met him. This was different. She thought she might like him, or at least she liked what she’d seen of him so far.
And that scared her more than anything else. She could just barely accept that they might have some strange chemistry going on. Gabriel hadn’t actually warned her that this might happen, but if she looked at it logically, it did make a strange kind of sense. Her psychic abilities meant her mind wouldn’t necessary react the same way to the presence of the empathic Zhore as other humans might. Why Zhandar, of all people, she had no idea. The Zhore themselves obviously didn’t have a problem with this kind of instant attraction. Just the opposite, from what she could tell. Empaths couldn’t lie, and would know right away they were with their soul mate.
Even so, she wasn’t sure she wanted to like Zhandar. It would be so much easier to let her body take over, when the time came, to share passion but not intimacy, and then leave as soon as she knew she was pregnant. That way, there wouldn’t be any emotional ties. Liking him shouldn’t factor into the equation. But she couldn’t be cold and clinical. She knew she would have to hurt him, and that realization pained her more than she wanted to acknowledge.
The foreperson had nodded, and then handed her own tablet and stylus over to Zhandar. He’d been scribbling on it while Trinity was ruminating, and so when he spoke again, she had to force herself not to startle.
“That should be all for now,” he said. “Zhanna, could you please make a note as to the change in the schedule so it can be filed with the planning commission?”
“Of course,” she replied, using a gloved finger to flick to the page she needed. Then she moved the box containing the project completion information to one week later. Again, the software was unfamiliar, but not so much so that she couldn’t manage working in it. Clearly, the people who had written the program had borrowed a good deal from the Eridanis.
Zhandar thanked the foreperson for her time, and then he indicated to Trinity that they should head to the stairwell. At least they were descending this time, and not walking up; the elevators hadn’t yet been installed, and it had been a long climb of fifteen stories to get to the roof. She would have said she was in fairly good shape, but she’d certainly never made a climb like that before, especially burdened with heavy robes that had to weigh a good ten kilos.
As she trailed along behind the Zhore, she couldn’t help staring at the breadth of the shoulders under his robes, and wondering what his body would look like when he took them off. He seemed very well built, but it was so hard to tell.
And thank God for that, she scolded herself. Because if you could really see him, you’d probably be in even more trouble than you already are.
Well, true. The one Zhore she’d seen had been…“handsome” didn’t seem precisely the right word…but beautiful, features regular, skin shimmering and oddly lovely. If Zhandar was anything like that under the hooded cloak concealing his face, she’d probably spend all her time staring at him instead of getting any work done.
Right then she didn’t want to analyze why she thought that work was so important, considering she’d come here to seduce him…or some other likely Zhore. Playing secretary was only incidental.
And yet, she realized, as she followed Zhandar out to his car, she wanted to do a good job for him. She wanted him to value her, not as someone to be used, but as a part of his team.
How she’d reconcile that longing with her true reason for being here, she had no idea.
CHAPTER EIGHT
“You’re sure?” Rozhara asked, not bothering to keep the incredulity out of her voice.
“Of course I’m sure,” Zhandar replied. He sat in his counselor’s office, on one of the comfortable divans she used for these sessions. “You think I’m unable to tell when a woman is sayara?”
“That is not what I meant. It is only….” Her words died away then, as if she was pausing to gather her thoughts. Her gloved fingers tapped the soft material of her chair, and she went on, “I mean no offense, Zhandar, but you can see why this surprises me so much. To have a compatible woman appear almost out of nowhere, just as Jalzhin was pressuring you to make a choice….”
“Believe me, I am just as surprised as you are.” That was an understatement. He still kept wondering if he had fallen into a hopeful dream, one where he would be granted everything he desired. That he would want Zhanna so badly — well, he was still wrestling with that. In the back of his mind, he had hoped that perhaps one day he would be able to allow another woman into his life, but as the same time, he couldn’t help experiencing pangs of guilt over the strength of his current need. After Elzhair, he hadn’t thought he would ever feel this way again.
Actually, to be honest, he wasn’t sure if he had felt this way with her, either. Their bond had been undeniable, and their marriage a beautiful thing, but at the same time, he knew deep down that this pull he felt toward Zhanna was even stronger than what he had experienced with Elzhair. And that seemed like a betrayal of her memory.
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