by Elin Wyn
I wasn’t sure what her expression was, but I knew in my own mind that I hated the missed opportunity. She nodded and turned away from me to grab the drill. “Thank you,” I said as she handed it to me.
“Welcome.”
We went back to work on the system, rerouting wiring and connections to make sure that the sensors and keypad weren’t connected to anything at all except the computer and each other. After two hours of that, we finally finished. Maris left to get out of her disguise while I went to finish building the converter for the Skimmer.
And for two long, painful hours, I’d been careful not to touch her again.
I could run calculations better than anyone on the ship.
Except maybe Maris.
It wasn’t worth the chance of losing her.
Maris
After my mother struck her demented bargain with the fertility doctors, I swore I’d never have anything to do with a male for as long as I lived.
Naturally, I assumed my life would stay contained to the Terran System, where avoiding males was easy.
For the most part, all I had to do was not venture to any of the breeding facilities.
But now such an oath was impossible to stick to.
The original crew of the Rogue Star had been entirely male. Decent ones, too.
Aavat could be a bit of a dick sometimes, but all in all, he was still a good guy. Dejar occasionally acted like he had a stick rammed up his ass, but I was glad to have him as captain.
The rest of the Shein males had yet to give me a reason to think of them as anything less than good and decent beings.
Then there was Orrin.
I had been so sure he was going to kiss me last night…
And stupid me, actually felt disappointed that he didn’t.
My heartbeat quickened as I thought about Orrin wanting me.
As much as I didn’t like the idea of another person being able to arouse such feelings in me, I felt good when I thought about him.
That good feeling was swiftly shoved aside with the realization that there was always a chance I’d been mistaken.
Maybe he wasn’t going to kiss me at all. Maybe I’d turned into a giddy school girl over nothing. Maybe Orrin needed me to kiss him first.
Who knew? Not I!
I wasn’t even in love yet and I was already exhausted over it.
No wonder I thought it would be best to avoid all of this nonsense.
Engines. Engines were safe.
I forced myself to put vows, love, and Orrin out of my mind for now.
I had something else that needed to be taken care of, and unfortunately, it didn’t involve anything nice and simple that my toolkit could help with.
I opened the door to the cargo hold. It wasn’t a regular meal time, so I was met with a series of curious looks.
“Hi, ladies.” I waved awkwardly. Most of them waved back. Amber-Eyes sat in her usual corner, glaring at me.
One of the women, the one with three eyes and bone white skin, approached me with a friendly smile. Her name was Vixaine. She was the one who could speak every language.
“Is everything well?” she asked.
“I actually have a question for you,” I told her in a low voice. “Can we speak privately?” She nodded. I bid her to follow me into the hall. I closed the cargo bay door behind us.
“What do you want to ask me?” she asked, her middle eye blinking.
“The one who always sits in the corner, what’s her name?” I asked. Vixaine shook her head.
“She will not reveal it,” she explained. “She’s the only one of us who hasn’t.”
“Don’t you think that’s strange?” I asked.
She tilted her head elegantly. “After what we have been through, we have earned the right to our privacy.”
I lowered my gaze, feeling ashamed of my accusation.
“Of course,” I apologized. “You’re absolutely right. But can you tell me if she left the ship at all yesterday? I thought I saw her when I was out.”
“No, she has not,” Vixaine replied after a moment of silence. “She hardly moves at all.”
“I see. I must’ve been mistaken.” I opened the door to the cargo bay for her. “You know you don’t have to stay in there, right?”
“As I said,” Vixaine looked over her shoulder at me as she stepped back into the cargo hold, “we value our privacy.”
“Right,” I nodded stiffly. “See you at dinner.” I closed the cargo hold behind her. Well, at least I had an answer.
I hadn’t seen Amber-Eyes off the ship. Maybe I’d just been too worried. Heck, maybe there was someone from her system here, looking for her. That wouldn’t be a bad thing.
Either way, it was time for me to get on with my day.
I took a moment to watch Orrin work before he noticed I was there. A bomb could go off and I doubted that he’d blink, his focus was so intent.
His hands were massive, but that didn’t affect the deftness of his fingers as he worked with smaller tools. The low work lights made his skin look like a dying fire, rich tones of red, orange, and copper all blended together. His tattoos stood out in stark relief. They were the same style as all of the other Shein’s tattoos, but the details were different.
One day, when I knew him a little better, I’d ask him what the markings meant. Maybe trace over the bold swirls on his upper arm, the shoulder I’d seen when he lent me his shirt.
My heart started picking up speed again.
Oh yes, I wanted to kiss him.
Stupid heart.
“What are you doing down here again?” I asked him. Orrin turned his head slightly and smiled as if he’d known I was there the entire time.
“I’m going to start the rewiring for the stealth system today, but I want to make sure everything’s in good shape before I do,” he explained. “I found a few leaks.”
“Let me see.” I walked over to where he stood.
“Careful! There’s cooling gel all over the floor.” He spoke too late. Three steps in and I started slipping.
“Shit!” I wobbled like a baby deer to keep myself from falling. I lashed out and grabbed onto Orrin’s arm. With one large hand, he tried to steady me, but something felt wrong. His hand was covered in thick, slimy cooling gel. My entire forearm was thoroughly coated in the gunk.
“You okay?” He was trying not to laugh and failing.
“I didn’t want to fall because I didn’t want to get covered in goo!” I exclaimed. I held up my arm. “A moot point now, wouldn’t you say?”
“It’s not that bad,” Orrin grinned. “It’s great for your skin.”
“Somehow, I doubt that.” My nose wrinkled as I took in the chemical smell of the cooling gel.
“What are you making that face for? It’s not that bad,” Orrin teased.
“Not that bad?” I replied. Struggling to keep my balance, I bent down and gathered a handful of cooling gel. Before Orrin realized my intentions, I launched the handful of cooling gel at him. “Tell me again how it’s not that bad!”
“You’re going to pay for that!” Orrin laughed. He scrounged up enough cooling gel to fling back at me. This time, the gel had only just dripped out of the piping. Icy cold gel splattered across my neck.
“Not fair!” I shrieked.
“Completely fair,” Orrin declared. “I got here first, I get the advantageous position.” I scooped up more gel and grabbed onto him, using his body as leverage to pull myself across the treacherous decking. My body collided with his. I forced my hand down the back of his shirt and smeared cooling gel all over his upper back.
“Now it’s fair,” I smirked. Orrin arched his back as if he could escape the slimy sensation trickling between his shoulders. “You look like a duck!” I cackled.
“I don’t know what that means!” Orrin exclaimed. I moved again, with the intention of putting more cooling gel down his shirt, but Orrin dodged my advance, throwing me off balance. I couldn’t right myself. My feet kept sl
ipping around beneath me.
I was going down, and I knew it, but I’d be damned if I went down alone.
As I started falling, I grabbed at Orrin once more. He lost his footing, and we fell together. I landed hard on my backside. He pushed his hands out to avoid landing on top of me and crushing me. My sides ached from laughing so hard. I’d never laughed this much in my life, not even with Aryn.
“Are you proud of your handiwork?” Orrin chuckled.
“Very. I consider this battle won,” I declared.
“I’m the one who has you pinned. I think that makes me the winner,” Orrin challenged.
“Yes, but you’re immobilized. You can’t move without falling down on me,” I replied.
“I’ve been stuck in worse places,” he grinned. “And least the view is nice.”
I looked up at him, with his kind eyes and charming smile. My breath hitched in my chest. His eyes flickered to my slightly parted lips.
Looks like I’d be breaking that vow sooner than I thought. I lifted my head off the floor, fully aware of how much goo had seeped into my hair and pressed my lips to his. I felt his body go still with surprise for a split second before he started kissing me back.
His lips were like the rest of him, steady and sure. I wrapped one arm around his back, not caring about the mess I made. Keeping himself supported with one hand, he cupped the back of my head with the other, holding my lips to his.
His tongue slipped past my lips, eliciting a sensation unlike anything I’d ever felt before. Something I never knew resided within me sparked to life. I allowed myself to be overcome with desire. I allowed myself to get lost in him.
I felt something deep inside me push back against the kiss—or, more accurately, against what it meant. It shoved and struggled against surrender to the feelings that were rapidly swelling in my chest.
Just as quickly as it appeared, it faded. It wasn’t broken. It didn’t shatter. But it stood aside. It had no choice. Even the acrid scent of the engine room, made all the more intense by the leak, faded into the background as he pressed his body more tightly to mine.
I brought my hand up to the back of his head, urging him on.
Orrin huffed a hard breath through his nose and took another deep one, and I felt a slight shudder run down his form. His kiss became more eager, our tongues dancing and pressing in an increasingly frenzied dance. He pulled back to press the kiss to my lower lip, suckling at it for a fleeting moment before diving back in to reclaim my lips entirely.
The heat blossomed and grew between us, primal stirrings deep inside leading us toward something a lot more significant than a kiss.
Our hips began rocking in tandem, and the feeling of his rapidly hardening length pulled me suddenly from my reverie.
The catch in my chest returned, though it couldn’t have been more different. I wasn’t reluctant, or unwilling now. I was scared of how badly I wanted him in that moment, right there in the mess we’d made of the room and each other. Nothing mattered but that desire, and as desperately as I wanted to keep drifting in the slow, soft bliss of that kiss, I couldn’t.
It couldn’t go any further, either. I wouldn’t be able to keep myself in control. I pulled back from the kiss, bringing a hand down to his lower back to slow his hips even as I struggled to keep mine still.
I wanted so badly to say something, anything, to let him know how wonderful the kiss was, to explain why I couldn’t go on, but I didn’t have to.
Orrin just leaned down to give a soft, reassuring peck at my lips before working himself up to his feet. He extended a hand to me and, with a steady strength, pulled me up and steadied me.
He traced one gentle finger down the curve of my cheek, his steady gaze meeting my own, searching for something deep inside.
“Brilliant, beautiful lady.” Leaning forward, he breathed into the shell of my ear until I trembled at his touch. “Thank you.”
Orrin
After we had cleaned ourselves up, Maris and I finished working on the stealth systems. The memory of the kiss we had shared still dazzled me. The touch of her lips on mine was exhilarating, and I wanted to feel that again.
To be honest, I wanted to feel that feeling every second of every day. I hadn’t realized how much I missed being around a female until the women had arrived and started proving themselves. Now I realized that I had also missed having a chance to spend time with a woman, especially romantically.
Having Maris in my arms had made my heart race and sent my nerves into overdrive. Every part of my body that hers touched had erupted in a sense of pleasure that I never knew I had desired. When we broke apart and stopped kissing, I felt as though part of my own body had been ripped away.
If anyone had asked me what we had done to finish the systems, I couldn’t tell them. The entire time we worked next to one another, all I could think about was touching her again, kissing her again, taking her to my quarters, claiming her.
However, when we were done, she only smiled at me, kissed me on the cheek, and left to speak with Kalyn.
Like a sane, responsible person.
That left me to go to Dejar and Aavat and tell them that we were ready to transport the family.
So, that’s what I did. “Captain?” I asked as I walked onto the bridge. Dejar stood at the gunner station with Valtic, the two of them scrutinizing the readout from a monitor. He looked up and motioned me over.
“What is it, Orrin?” he asked as I stepped close.
“Stealth systems and engine are ready to go, sir,” I responded. He looked at me, nodded, and turned his attention back to Valtic.
Valtic was running through a simulation of an attack. The opponent was the dark ship that had attacked us shortly after we had first rescued the women.
After the simulation of the Rogue Star was destroyed yet again, Valtic cursed. “I must express my deepest apologies, sir. According to the computer, that ship is far too advanced. It should have destroyed us before. My sincerest regrets, sir.”
Dejar put his hand on Valtic’s shoulder. “It’s okay. We’re already running under the assumption that the ship pushed us towards Outpost Nine, so destroying us was not in their plans. Keep working on it, see if there’s anything you can come up with that can give us an advantage if we meet them again.”
“Sir.”
Dejar turned back to me. “We’re ready, you said?”
“Affirmative.”
“Good,” he said as he walked by me. “Come with me.” We left the bridge and started down towards the hangar bay. “How’s the sensor system?”
“Should be good, sir. We’ve put the sensors and keypad on a totally independent system. If they’re tripped up again, then someone is messing with it.”
“Understood. Do you know what we’re doing?” he asked.
We rounded a corner and headed down the hall. “All I know is we’re transporting a family somewhere,” I answered. “I just asked Maris for the technical specs.”
“That’s right. A family has requested passage to Neo. We’re running a bit low on funds, so Aavat and I decided to take the job to get some of our accounts replenished.”
I was a bit taken aback. Neo was a small moon in orbit around Wera, an uninhabitable water planet. It was only a short trip from here, but Neo was not the type of place most people ran to, it was the type of place most ran from.
“Wow. They must really be desperate to get away,” I commented.
“They are, that’s why they’re paying twice our rate,” he responded. “From reading between the lines, it sounds like the mother has attracted the attention of a local Dominion official.”
I fought back a snarl. Of course.
A man would be willing to do anything to keep his mate safe, and if the family was lower caste and friendless, there’d be nothing to stop the official from harassing the poor woman, possibly even leaving the children motherless.
“Oh.”
“Yeah. It’s a messed-up situation. Still, the enemy of o
ur enemy isn’t necessarily our friend.” His lips twisted into a half-smile. “Kayln’s telling the women that they have to be in disguise for their work shifts or find a way to stay out of sight while the family is on board. Be careful with Maris. I know the two of you have projects that need to be seen to, but be cautious.”
“I understand, sir,” I said. It made sense, but I knew Maris would grumble. “When will they board?”
“In a few hours,” he answered as we came to the engineering bay. “We need to give the women enough time to apply their disguises. We’ll be leaving tonight and should hopefully arrive in the early morning.” He stopped and looked at me. “I hate to do this, but I’m going to need you to personally keep a close eye on the stealth system and the engines for the entire trip. We promised the family we’d be hard to track, and I want to make sure we deliver.”
“Understood, sir. I’ll keep on it until we return here. We are coming back, correct?”
“That’s the plan. We still need to get the refugee women off the ship and on their way back to their respective homes.” He clapped me on the shoulder and left.
I looked around, remembered that I still needed to install the converter on the Skimmer, and decided to quickly head there, get that project finished before we headed out.
I met Maris on the way, her disguise mimicking what she had used last time we went shopping.
“You look lovely,” I blurted before I could stop my tongue.
Although it was hard to tell, I think she blushed. “Thank you,” she said. “What did you want me to work on tonight?”
“I’m sorry to do this to you, but if you could run maintenance on compartments three and four, and when you’re confident that they’re working at optimal levels, there are a few minor repairs needed in the cooling chambers.”
She shrugged. “It’s okay. Little jobs need to be done, too.” She patted my arm and headed to our workstation.
I continued on to the cargo bay. It didn’t take long to install the converter and, as I started up the Skimmer so I could run another batch of diagnostics with Shar on the modifications, the family was escorted aboard the ship.