Mesmerized

by Sahara Kelly

  This particular hypnotist apparently sucked at her job, because she’d lost control of Vad. And cost Ric a good weeks worth of fucking in the process.

  Bad enough he had to deal with an Earth woman in the first place, especially this one, whom he instantly disliked. Earth women were pushy, opinionated, too skinny, lousy at sex and all around disappointments as a female species.

  The woman faced away from them, so he couldn’t see anything but her back and hair. What hair she had, anyway. Short, black and spiked on top, there was very little to it. Like the woman herself, who looked like she needed a Siktor of constant eating. Didn’t they feed the women on this planet? M’Loran women were very tall, with full, heavy breasts, wide hips and ample asses, exactly the kind of female he liked to sink into when the need for sex became overwhelming. Like now.

  He sighed and leaned forward, intent on giving the audio command to the system monitor next to the mirror.

  Lou stopped him. “No problems with your microchip, is there?”

  “It’s in place,” Ric replied. Knowing how hypersuggestible M’Lorans were, hunters were equipped with microchips that blocked any attempts at hypnosis.

  He activated the audio system and the woman’s voice filled the anteroom.

  “Imagine yourself in the place that gives you pleasure,” she said to Mal. “Surrounded by still waters, comfortable air and a beautiful M’Loran woman.”

  Ric snorted. Yeah, he could imagine that all right. Her voice held a husky, seductive edge that sparked his attention.

  “Tell me what you want Mal,” she urged. “Let me take you there.”

  She reached for Mal’s hands and held them, massaging slowly with her thumbs. Instantly, images of her long fingers wrapping around his cock had Ric’s penis springing to life, despite his aversion to human women and this one in particular. She had a mesmerizing voice that could coax any man into an erection.

  Within moments, Mal had closed his eyes, appearing completely relaxed. No small feat for the six foot nine giant with a warrior’s sense of vengeance and mayhem.

  “Tell me your crimes,” Mia coaxed, and Mal confessed as easily as if she’d just asked for directions to the nearest Jolsu shopping center. If Ric weren’t so annoyed, he’d have laughed at her easy expertise in extracting confessions. Too bad her hypnosis hadn’t worked that well at keeping Vad imprisoned.

  She continued to massage Mal’s hands while he spewed forth his list of crimes in great detail. Her fingers lightly trailed up his arms and down again. Ric fought the ache between his legs. He absolutely did not desire this woman. She merely had a seductive voice. And besides, he was horny as hell, which was her fault in the first place.

  “When you hear the phrase, flowers grow in the sunshine, you will immediately cease all hostilities. Repeat the phrase to me.”

  Mal recited the phrase like a lovesick poet and Ric rolled his eyes toward the cosmos. Mia stepped out and a guard came in to remove Mal.

  Women. He could imagine some guard at the facility shouting that out as a convict made an escape out the doors. He laughed out loud.

  “What’s so funny?” Lou asked.

  “Flowers grow in the sunshine?”

  Lou cracked a smile, his full face wrinkling even more. “Yeah, I know, but they let the hypnotists pick their own subdue codes.”

  “It’s moronic.”

  “Well, thank you very much for that comment.”

  Ric turned to find her standing at the door, a very annoyed look on her pixie face.

  Urksa. No, English. Shit. No wonder Mal was mesmerized by her. He’d never seen eyes so vividly blue, so wide and expressive. She had a flawless face, creamy cheeks and lips made to suck a man’s cock. For an Earth woman, she wasn’t half bad to look at. Still too skinny, though. And where were her breasts? Those small things under her tight shirt couldn’t be all she had. They looked like pieces of Kinsto, tiny M’Loran fruits.

  She lifted a brow and asked, “And who the hell are you?”

  “UlRic Lor.”

  “Am I supposed to kneel or bow or something? Your name doesn’t mean squat to me. What’s he doing here, Lou?”

  Lou’s wry smile widened as his gaze flitted between Ric and Mia. “He’s here about Vad.”

  “Oh.” She shrugged and entered the room, inching her skinny ass onto the top of the long table. “I don’t know what happened with that. They misused the code, I guess.”

  Ric approached, stopping only inches in front of her, enjoying the way her eyes widened as she assessed his height. He’d guess she was nearly five foot eight or so, which made him a foot taller than her. “So, you blame someone else for your failings?”

  She straightened her shoulders and lifted her chin, glaring at him. Gone was the mesmerizing hypnotist, replaced by a woman of fire. “Hey, asshole. I didn’t fail at anything. I did my job, the facility guards just fucked up.”

  Ric turned at Lou’s quiet chuckle. “UlRic Lor, meet Mia Logan, the unit’s number one hypnotist.”

  Mia crossed her arms at Ric’s snort. “What bug crawled up your ass, M’Loran? Have you got some problem with me?”

  “I have no problem with you, Logan. Other than I think you’re inept and I’d rather not deal with you.”

  He could tell she held her anger in check, but it simmered on the surface. She may not be considered attractive by M’Loran standards, but her passion excited him. Which added more fuel to his already pissed off state. He didn’t want to feel anything for this female. She wasn’t his type at all, despite what his cock thought. He mentally counted to ten in M’Loran to dampen the hardening.

  “You want to tell me what the hell is going on here, Lou?” Mia asked, turning her back on Ric.

  “Vad’s escaped and Ric has to track him.”

  “If I know Vad, he’s probably already returned to M’Lora. He’ll seek shelter with the other warriors, who will protect him,” Ric added.

  “So, why did you come back here if he’s already there?” Mia asked.

  “Because I was ordered to do so by your superiors.”

  Mia turned to Lou. “This doesn’t make any sense, Lou. Explain it to me, would you?”

  Lou held up his hands. “Hey, don’t get me involved. I was just here to witness Mal’s confession. You and Ric will have to deal with this.” With a wink in Ric’s direction, Lou made his escape.

  Mia heaved a sigh and closed her eyes. She really didn’t need this today. Or any day, for that matter. Her caseload had gone through the atmosphere, and now one of her M’Loran subjects, Vad, had escaped and left the planet.

  She’d never lost a subject before. Something had to have gone wrong with the way the guard gave the subdue code.

  And to top off an already miserable day, this giant with hair like midnight and dark eyes to match had insulted her. Not that she cared. She’d been insulted by better than him. It all rolled off her back.

  She scooted around on the table and found him standing in the center of the room, legs spread and hands behind his back. He sure as hell was hot to look at. The man screamed sex like a neon sign emblazoned across his crotch. Dressed in black leather pants, a tight black reflective t-shirt of some kind and a full-length leather duster, he looked dark, dangerous and sexy as hell. A throbbing stabbed between her legs and she felt the dampness gathering, but fought to ignore it.

  So, she hadn’t had sex in a while. A good, long, drought-stricken while. So, this tall hunk of space beefcake set her libido to pumping like a marathon runner’s heartbeat. So what? She’d ignore him and he’d go away.

  “Apparently you’re going to accompany me to M’Lora.”

  “Huh?” Had she heard him right? She gazed around the room, wanting to be sure he’d been speaking to her. “Not me, buddy. I stay on terra firma.”

  “Check with your superiors. I’ve been told you have to go along. And believe me, I don’t like the idea any more than you. In fact, I probably hate it much more than you do.”

  “Gee, th
anks a lot.” She slipped off the table and approached the monitor, giving the command to bring up Lieutenant Morris, her unit commander. A gruff voice responded.

  “Yeah, Mia, what can I do for you?”

  “Some space cowboy named…” She turned to Ric and asked, “What is your name again?”

  “UlRic Lor.”

  “Ul…whatever, says I have to go to M’Lora.”

  “Yeah, you do,” Morris replied. “I want you to help Ric track Vad and accompany him back. We don’t want the subdue code to get screwed up by anyone else again. You give it, and you monitor him.”

  Mia ignored the increased pace of her heartbeat. “You know I don’t do space travel, Morris.”

  “Today you do.”

  Shit. She hated traveling via those body-melting methods. She’d tried it once with a friend of hers who convinced her a quickie trek to Mars would be fun. She’d had space sickness for a month after that and never cared to repeat it.

  She sighed, knowing she had no choice but to follow orders. “Fine. I’m on my way out the door.” She turned to Ric and crossed her arms. “Looks like I’m your traveling companion.”

  “It would appear so. Are you ready to go?”

  “No. I need to pack.”

  Ric laughed. “There’s nothing to pack. Your earth clothes won’t be acceptable on M’Lora.”

  “Why the hell not?”

  “Because you’ll freeze to death. Meet me at the ship in a sikto and I’ll have preparations made.”

  “A what?”

  Ric inhaled deeply, showcasing his broad chest and flat stomach. “An hour. Tunnel Seven.”

  Before she could even respond with an okay or kiss my ass, he’d turned and walked out.

  Rude bastard. But damn sexy. Just what she didn’t need to endure right now. Then again, she’d been complaining that her life was routine and boring. Next time she thought about bitching about routine, she’d remember this trip to hell and back she was about to take. Already her stomach was doing somersaults at the prospect of the flight.

  She stormed into her office, thinking about the massive amount of work that would only grow while she was gone. She had system entries to make, codes to input, and hypno-classes to teach to new recruits.

  No wonder she had no time for a personal life. Work had become her life.

  How had she ended up in this line of work? Granted, she’d been born with inherent hypnosis abilities, thanks to her parents, and she’d naturally gravitated to investigative work. But lately, what had once seemed like a thrilling adventure into detective work had turned into nothing but a series of ten-minute hypnosis sessions followed by hours of paperwork.

  This wasn’t fun anymore. And work had always been her passion. God knows she didn’t have any others. Other than a handful of colleagues she called friends, she lived a boring, lonely, isolated life with very little time for fun or pleasure.

  Pleasure. How long had it been since she’d had decent sex? Or even bad sex? What had happened to her lifelong dreams of adventure and passion? She’d lost focus somewhere along the way, and had allowed herself to be led into this career that consumed her. Now she was approaching thirty, with no prospects of love, marriage or family in the future.

  And she was complaining about space travel? Her somber and thoroughly unpleasant traveling companion wasn’t her first choice, but how many years had she wanted to see M’Lora? After dealing with the criminals from their mutant clan, she’d learned much about their culture.

  The blue planet, they called it. With two moons—one blue, one amber. The stories she heard painted it as a garden of winter pleasures.

  She snorted. If Ric’s irritating personality was indicative of the natives to that planet, the only pleasure she was going to get was in leaving it.

  She wondered, though, if all the M’Lorans were as hot as UlRic Lor. There was some secret about M’Loran males that she’d never been able to uncover.

  Maybe this was her chance to find out why Earth women returned from visits to M’Lora with huge smiles on their faces.

  Chapter Two

  “You’ll have to remove your clothes.”

  Mia’s head shot up at Ric’s comment. “Excuse me?”

  He motioned to her jumpsuit. “Naked. You can’t travel in clothing, they’ll burn up.”

  Naked. Great. First she couldn’t pack anything, then she arrived at tunnel seven only to find this tube-like thing that she was supposed to travel light years through the galaxies in. And now she had to do it with her ass bared? “I don’t think so.”

  Ric crossed his arms. “You have no choice. Either travel naked or die.”

  Well, those were rather limiting choices, neither of which she cared for. This trip was becoming more and more dismal by the second.

  “Fine. Let’s get naked then, and get our show on the road.” She grabbed the zipper, then noticed him just standing there watching. “Well? If I’ve gotta strip, so do you.”

  He smirked. “I’m not undressing.”

  “Why not?” Was this some kind of sexual come on? If so, she wasn’t in the mood.

  “I’ll become gaseous in flight.”

  Mia placed her hands on her hips. “Look, I don’t really care to hear about your intestinal problems with space flight. I have my own worries.”

  He laughed then, rich, dark and tripping along her nerve endings. She resisted the urge to shiver at his husky tone.

  “Not that kind of gas, filor. I will shift into gaseous state for the trip.”

  Oh, shit, that’s right. M’Loran’s were shapeshifters. Where the hell had her brain gone today? “What’s filor mean?”

  “Woman.”

  “The name’s Mia and I already know my gender.”

  “Time is of the essence here,” he continued, ignoring her. “Undress so I can cocoon you.”

  She really hated her job some days. Grabbing the zipper of her jumpsuit, she yanked it down, stopping halfway. “Do you have to watch?”

  His lips curved in a sensual smile. Her body reacted with puckering nipples. Traitorous damn female hormones.

  “I will be placing you in the cocoon. I’ll see you completely naked then. It seems that your modesty is a little unwarranted, don’t you think?”

  “Whatever, let’s just get this over with.” She unzipped the suit and stepped out of it, feeling exposed in more ways than she wanted to think about. His eyes roamed over her body as if he were assessing her in depth. She resisted the urge to cover herself and stood still, hands on her hips. “Look, M’Loran. Don’t get any funny ideas about having your way with me in my sleep, okay? Because I’ll know it if it happens.”

  “Indeed, you certainly would,” he said, mirth evident in his laughing voice.

  He directed her to a transparent, upright tube. She was no scientist so she didn’t have the slightest idea what the M’Lorans used for space travel. It looked like an old fashioned tanning bed to her. “You’re overly confident in your sexual abilities, aren’t you?”

  “No. Just honest.”

  “Quit staring at me. You might as well give up any notions that you’re going to fuck me, because it isn’t going to happen.”

  “I don’t want to fuck you.”

  “Good.” She slid into the chamber, but before he could close it she grabbed his wrist. “Why not?”

  He tilted his head. “Why not what?”

  “Why wouldn’t you want to fuck me?”

  “You’re not my type. I’m going to close this now, and when I do—“

  “You sure know how to sweep a girl off her feet don’t you? And what do you mean I’m not your type?”

  He leaned against the chamber. “Why do you care? You just said you weren’t going to fuck me.”

  She shrugged and said, “Just curious, that’s all. I’m not repulsive, you know.”

  “On M’Lora you would be.”

  Wonderful. Now she was really looking forward to the trip. Would she have to be enshrouded in veils to hide
her hideous face and body? “Why am I repulsive?”

  “You’re not like our women. You’re too skinny. M’Loran men like their women to have some substance-curves, flesh, a little meat on them.”

  “I don’t have time to eat much. I’m very busy,” she said in defense of her too-skinny body. Damn him for making her feel inadequate. She’d never cared before what men thought of her appearance, so why now?

  “Perhaps on M’Lora you’ll eat better and add some curves. Although there’s no hope for your tits.”

  He closed the door, shutting out the stream of curses she flung at him. No tits, indeed. Asshole. She flipped her middle finger in the universal sign of fuck you, but he smiled and waved his hand over the controls.

  A sense of warmth enveloped her as a fine mist filled the chamber. She shivered, but only for a second as the mist surrounded her body and mind, lulling her into relaxation.

  Ric watched Mia drift into space sleep. Then he moved to the controls and maneuvered the craft out of Earth’s orbit. Once past the seven planets, he set the directionals toward M’Lora and shifted from his human form. He poured his nearly liquid state into the chamber with Mia, the seal closing over them for the remainder of the trip.

  She looked so fragile in slumber, another reason he rarely took Earth women sexually. Always afraid their small frames couldn’t hold his size, he feared injuring them. This one, in particular, would never feel his cock thrusting inside her core, despite the fact that even in this state he desired her.

  He fitted his shape around her body, protecting her even further by shielding her against the harmful rays and temperature extremes of high-speed space travel. Her body warmed him, the shared heat a benefit to mutual habitation of the chamber. He breathed in her scent, no perfume present as some female species used in overabundance. Instead, she smelled clean and earthy, her woman scents permeating the chamber.

  She sighed in a deep, relaxing manner, her small breasts penetrating his liquidity. The part of him that was male hardened to solid form as he brushed against her pubic mound. She had a dark thatch of hair between her legs, and her nether lips showed a dampness, as if in desire. When she whimpered, he knew her to be sexually aroused.