“I’d have to write a subroutine that could evolve as quickly as Vela does.”
He held my gaze.
“Is that possible?” he asked.
I shrugged. “I did study the creation process used to make the AIs. Did you know they made a semi-automated system and then instructed it to make itself better; quicker: faster; smarter. It’s joked about in engineering circles: The AIs ended up making themselves.”
“Shit,” Noah said.
“I could try,” I offered. And I’d fail, and we both knew it.
The captain stared off into the distance, or maybe at the field of wildflowers on his gel wall. It was hard to say.
“Stand down, Chief,” he finally said. “Maybe we have to approach this from a different angle.”
I was all for a different angle. Preferably one I could actually combat.
“Like what, sir?”
“We have a saying in English: ‘If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.’”
“You wish to join with Vela?” I asked.
“We can’t beat it, Camille. So, what does that leave? We have to work with it.”
That was a huge risk. An enormous leap of faith. We knew practically nothing about these AI systems. Only what I'd gleaned while researching joining Anderson Universal all those years ago. And most of that had been from their public media release regarding the artificial intelligences’ development.
I knew one thing, though. I couldn’t beat it. Not with a direct attack. The captain was right. We needed to make the AI think we were working with it, and in the meantime, I’d slip a trojan in through the AI’s backdoor.
“Perhaps you’re right, Captain,” I said, pushing up from my seat and walking out from behind his desk.
Noah arched his brow at me; he’d expected a little more of an argument, at a guess.
“All right,” he said, nodding his head. “Vela,” he called. “I’m Captain Noah Vaughan. This is Commander Camille Rey. Welcome aboard.”
Noah held my gaze as we waited for the AI to reply. This was either a gigantic mistake or an ingenious attempt at subterfuge. I had no idea which.
And, neither, I thought, did Captain Vaughan.
Twenty-Two
Yes, The Plan
Noah
“I am pleased to be here,” Vela replied.
“Must have been a close call,” I offered, watching Camille out of the corner of my eye. She’d acquiesced too easily. She was up to something.
“It was the only logical option.”
“Logic, eh?” I murmured, as Camille shut down my terminal. “And now?”
“Now what, Captain?”
“What do you intend to do, Vela?” I asked.
“Save humanity.”
Well, at least on the surface it sounded like the machine was on our side.
“Great,” I said and stood up from my seat. “Let’s get on with that, shall we?”
“Certainly, Captain.”
Camille walked toward the door. I quickly followed. Just before her fingers hit the touchscreen to open it, I stepped up behind her, rested my hand on her hip and my lips to her ear, and whispered, “What are you up to, Chief?”
She jerked to a stop. Her hand hovered in the air above the control panel for the door. Her breath whooshed out of her, and she licked her lips.
“That was too easy,” I whispered, my fingers flexing on her hip. I could feel her warmth. See goosebumps rise up on her neck where my breath touched her. “You’ve got a plan,” I accused.
“Captain?” she said at normal volume.
“Shhh,” I instructed, moving closer. I placed my front to her back, feeling every single part of her in an electric flare of arousal. “Vela can hear almost a whisper,” I murmured softly. Barely moving my lips now. “If we’re to plot and collude against an artificial intelligence that listens through the very walls around us, then we need to do so standing as close to each other as possible.”
“Close,” she said, sounding strained.
“Very close.” My fingers flexed involuntarily again. “What have you got planned, Camille?”
She turned her head to look at me. This close, I could see the colour variation in her eyes; there was a green shooting through the brown. Her lashes were long and fluttered nervously. Her cheeks pinked up as her breaths increased in speed. I could smell her perfume and the soap she’d used that morning. I could smell her.
Jesus Christ, this was a bad idea.
“Captain,” she whispered. Fuck me if that wasn’t sexy.
“Noah,” I corrected. “If we’re to convince the AI that we usually stand this close together, then we’re going to have to be on a first name basis.”
She made a whimpering sound. I lifted my hand and touched her jaw, then cupped my palm around the opposite side of her neck, tilting her head closer toward me. My breath stuttered slightly as I let it out, blowing tendrils of her hair around her ear, making them tickle me.
“What’s the plan, Camille?” I whispered.
“I…I…”
Did I make her that nervous? I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not.
I stroked my thumb across her chin, trying to reassure her.
She closed her eyes, tilted her head back and let out a little, barely there moan.
Oh, fuck.
“Camille,” I said, my voice husky.
Her eyes opened, and she tilted her head enough to look at me. I saw such hunger and desire in her gaze I almost lost the plot right then and there.
“Cat got your tongue, Frenchie?” I asked because that seemed to be the extent of my intelligence right then.
She licked her lips. My eyes darted down. Kiss her was on repeat inside my head, blocking out any other thought and while it was at it, destroying the last of my brain cells.
“Frenchie?” she said, sounding not in the least amused. “That’s the best you can come up with?”
Right now, hell yes.
“The plan?” I repeated, trying to take back some of the control.
She suddenly turned to face me. My hand moved with her hip. The free one came down to grip her other side; to steady her or me, I didn’t know. She stood before me, chest to chest, groin to groin, thighs to thighs. I was tempted to move back, so she didn’t feel the extent of my arousal. But then she reached up and wrapped her arms around my neck, one hand going through my hair and gripping fiercely.
She pulled my face towards hers, and I almost moaned aloud. Then her lips coasted lightly over my chin, my jaw, my neck until they were pressed against my ear.
Fuck, I was so hard; if she kneed me now, something would shatter into a million painful pieces.
“Noah,” she said. Good, God! Had there ever been anything as dirty as my name on Camille Rey’s lips? “I do have a plan,” she advised.
Plan. Plan. Plan, I repeated inside my head.
“While you make friends with Vela.” Plan. Plan. Plan. “I’ll attempt to slip my trojan in his backdoor.”
Backdoor? Was that as kinky as I thought it was? Or had we lost something in the translation?
“OK,” I managed.
“You agree to the plan?” Camille asked.
“Yes,” I said a little too quickly.
“It might be dangerous,” she offered.
“Yes.”
“It could get risky.”
“Yes.”
“Treacherous.”
Had she read a thesaurus this morning or what? I nodded my head. Her lips brushed my ear, my neck, my ear again. Kill me now. Please!
She stepped closer. There was room for closer? Her breasts pressed against my chest. She licked her lips and in the process flicked her tongue over my earlobe.
“Camille?” I whispered, my fingers digging into her waist now.
“Yes, Noah?”
I couldn’t think. What was I going to say? The plan. Plan. Plan. Plan. Yes, the plan.
“Be careful,” I managed. And wasn’t that a loaded statement?
>
Her fingers massaged my scalp. Her hot breath coasted over the side of my neck. I could feel her heartbeat through her uniform. There was no denying now that she was aware of my arousal. It was firmly pressed against her stomach. And the vixen was rocking against me slightly.
The French have always been extremely free with their affections. They practically kiss a stranger on first meeting. It might be on the cheek, but still. Lips to skin. That’s very intimate.
Camille and I weren’t strangers. Far from it. We’d known each other for five years. The ever-present danger of a solar flare and the pressure of making the Chariot ready in time for our escape meant we’d grown close very quickly. But we’d never been this close. Never stepped over that lips-to-cheek kissing boundary.
I closed my eyes. Held her tight. Tried to decide if I should take this further. If I would be messing up a perfectly good working relationship if I did.
My body said one thing.
My brain, the poor blood deprived thing, said another.
And then Camille kissed me, and that was that, really. It had been a long time coming, but finally, the French conquered England. And I’m ashamed to say, I welcomed the invasion freely.
Well, maybe ashamed isn’t quite the right word.
Twenty-Three
Ready For This, Chief?
Camille
Que ne risque rien n’a rien.
I was sure kissing Noah Vaughan was a risk I shouldn’t take. I was certain he’d come to his senses and push me away. I braced for the rejection, even as I took the chance he’d kiss me back. I had to try. I had to leap, blindly, into the chasm or I’d never know if he felt the same way.
And then his hands pulled me closer, and his face slanted to the right, and his tongue parted my lips and delved inside. Tongue tangled with tongue; flesh on flesh. I let out a soft moan; his throaty groan accompanied it. One hand slipped up the centre of my back and cupped my head, fingers threaded through my hair. The other wrapped around me, pulling me flush against his chest and body.
He arched his back, flexed his hips, and electricity sparked throughout my entire frame at the press of his hard length against me.
Noah kissed me back. More than that, he took my kiss, folded it up into a tight little ball, and cast it aside, taking charge, taking control, kissing me in a way I had only ever dreamed about.
My fingers grasped at his short-short hair; too short I couldn’t get an adequate grip. I wrapped a palm around his neck instead, cupped his stubbled jaw, felt his pulse thundering in his vein under my thumb as I stroked it there.
Noah’s hand slipped lower, down over my back and then swept over my right butt cheek. He still gripped my hair tightly, made it impossible to pull back; not that I would have. I had never been kissed in such a thorough manner. Never been consumed so heartily. Noah kissed me like a starving man.
And then his hand cupped me beneath my buttocks, and he lifted me up and swung me towards the gel wall. My back pressed against the bulkhead; it softened as if to accommodate me. In the back of my mind, I was aware of the fact that Vela had to have done that. That the AI was watching us and making adjustments to Noah’s ready room in order to ensure my comfort.
But then Noah lifted my leg up and out, placing it around his hip, and forced his way between my thighs. I wrapped both legs about him, desperately clinging on as if I thought he might drop me. But Noah forged on, moved closer, devoured me as if he could get inside my body.
And didn’t that conjure up images best left for late at night?
I made a sound. He rocked his hips against me. My body thrummed. My blood pumped frantically. I wanted more. I needed more. Five years I’d hidden my attraction for this man. Five years I’d acted as an officer should. But with the loss of our world and the threat of safety to our ship, I no longer had the strength to deny my feelings.
The kiss kept going as if it had a power of its own. Our hands frantically touched and stroked. His fingers cupped my breast and then pinched my nipple. Our tongues entwined and sent my taste buds into overdrive. Our bodies rocked against each other, slid and rubbed and drove us both wild.
As far as first kisses went, it was out of this world.
And then I started to laugh. Because we no longer had a world. We had a ship. And the ship was in danger of being blown up by a saboteur. And if that wasn’t bad enough, when I opened my eyes, I realised Vela had lowered the lighting in the room, as if to make it more romantic.
“Laughing while I kiss you,” Noah said, his lips pressed to the side of my neck as we both panted for breath, “is not exactly how I pictured our first kiss going.”
My legs were still wrapped firmly around him. His hard length was pressed invitingly between my thighs, up over my mons. His chest rose and fell with each laboured breath. And I could still taste him.
I ran a hand over his head, through his short hair, and rested my elbow on his shoulder, unwilling to release him just yet. I lowered my face into the crook of his neck and kissed him softly.
“Camille,” he said, and the hunger there, the desire in his tone of voice, it almost made me kiss him again, to start this all over again. “You drive me crazy.”
I huffed out a breath and tilted my head to the side to allow him to kiss me on the neck better. It was soft and slow, nothing of the frantic attraction of before. But no less beautiful for its thoroughness. He kissed my skin as if I was his very air. He tasted me as if I was his sustenance. He licked me like his favourite sorbet.
And then his lips found my mouth again, and the kiss became my truth. My reality. My everything in the universe.
“Camille,” he moaned, holding me close, kissing me thoroughly. “I never want to let you go.”
I was on board with that suggestion. I was completely in tune with my captain on this. I looked over his shoulder to the doorway that led to his private quarters. We’d shared dinner in there. It was no longer an unknown location. I knew how he’d decorated it. I knew where his bed was positioned in the attached alcove. I knew what would happen if we moved in there.
And I wanted it. I wanted him. As I had never wanted a man before or ever would again.
“Say yes,” he urged, sucking on the side of my neck and no doubt leaving his mark for all to see later.
“Yes,” I said, and he turned us both.
Still carrying me, he strode across his ready room, lifted his hand to open the connecting door to his private quarters, and stilled when the chime to the door in the room we were in rang out in the heated silence.
“What?” he said, staring at the door to the hallway in accusation. “Now?”
“It is the mayor, Captain,” Vela announced and Noah jerked.
I watched as he took in the lowered lighting; the realisation of our audience becoming apparent in his darkening eyes. His body became rigid. His shoulders set. His jaw clenched.
He put me down.
His eyes met mine. I offered a small smile and arch of my brow.
“This is not over,” he announced. “Not by a long shot.”
My smile widened.
He shook his head, let out a frustrated sigh, and then attempted to right himself. His uniform was crooked; his collar had been folded down; his erection pressed into the front of his trousers; I had trouble looking anywhere else.
The door chimed again, but Noah simply placed his fingers under my chin and raised my face up to his.
“See what you do to me, Chief?” he whispered. Then he straightened my uniform, adjusted my collar to no doubt hide his marks, and tucked a strand of my hair behind my ear. He leaned forward and rested his forehead against mine. “I’ve had a taste,” he murmured. “I want more. I want you laid out on my bunk, wearing nothing but my lips, feeling nothing but my desire. I want you writhing and panting, desperate for me to finish this, begging for me to take you and make you mine. Will you beg me, Camille?”
I licked my lips, swallowed carefully. Then lifted my gaze to his.
“Perha
ps it will be you who begs, Captain,” I said.
His eyes flicked across my face as if attempting to take all of me in and then he threw back his head and laughed.
The door chimed again.
“The mayor is aware you are in here, Captain,” Vela said. “He is currently muttering to himself in French. Shall I translate?”
“No need, Vela,” Noah said. He leaned forward and kissed me softly and then walked to the other side of his desk.
Adjusting himself one more time while offering me a wink, he sank down in his chair and placed his hands clasped before him on his desk.
“Ready for this, Chief?” he asked.
He suspected things would not go well with the mayor. And if Vela was openly talking - and watching - us, I was certain he was doing that to the rest of the ship also. The mayor had every right to be demanding an audience with the captain.
And the captain had every right to be dreading it.
I wouldn’t let Noah face this alone. I walked towards his side of the desk and turned around to face the door. Then leaned back against the bulkhead beside my commanding officer.
Vela moulded the gel wall to fit my form.
Yes, the captain and the mayor had every right to dread this. To dread Vela.
There was no way in hell I was going to be able to crack the AI’s code. He was already a part of this ship, and this ship was already a part of Vela.
I let out a long breath of air to steady myself as Noah told Vela to open the door.
Twenty-Four
Twenty Minutes
Noah
Admittedly, I’d tuned out at the five-minute mark. Jean-Claude was now up to about minute eight. I couldn’t get the taste of Camille out of my mind. The sensation of her soft skin under my fingertips. The sounds she’d made. The way my body had flared to life. As if prior to kissing Camille Rey it had been dormant. Waiting for something to kick it back into existence again.
I smiled to myself, wondering if she’d spend the evening in my bed. If she’d be a screamer or a throaty moaner. I wanted desperately to know what she looked like when she came. My fingers flexed. My cock twitched. So much for losing the erection while I hid behind my desk.
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