His impatience didn’t stop her from moving her hips from side to side a little more than necessary as she preceded him. He slipped a hand from her waist to the tattoo that sat low on her hips. “I like the design.”
“It’s an ancient symbol for freedom.”
“Freedom?”
“I had it done after my folks died, to remind me that to be free of fear, I needed to be strong.”
He swatted her backside. “Hurry. You little tease.”
He had no idea. She laughed and wriggled beneath his touch, anticipation starting to tingle down deep. Sweet Vigo, she wanted him, in her arms, in her bed, in her life—for as long as it lasted even if it might be only another day.
The fresher was actually cozy, with its black tile walls, mirrored ceiling, and white floor. Although manual cleansing wasn’t necessary—the sonic cleaners and blowers did the job—she wouldn’t feel clean without using soap and a buff pad to scrub deeper into her skin. Derrek possessed an assortment of lotions and pads. She sniffed several before choosing a spice that reminded her of vanillan.
She cocked her head. “Do I have something you want?” she asked, enjoying being a tease. Enjoying his happy grin and how that made her feel so wanted.
He chuckled. “Oh, yeah. You most definitely have something I want.” He took the lotion from her hands. Flipped open the cap and squeezed some into his palm. After setting down the container, he rubbed his hands together and then began to lather the scent into her neck as the fresher system boosted up. “I’m going to kiss your neck, your shoulders.” As he named places on her body, he massaged the soap into her skin with caresses meant to entice as much as to clean, but remained especially careful over her burned arm.
“Mmm. You sure you know exactly what you’re going to get?” she murmured, the reference to her domination subtle, but he picked up on it immediately.
His tone turned confident. “Actually, I do. But you don’t.” He slid his hands down her back, and his confidence actually made her feel as if they belonged together.
Damn, his hands felt good—silky, yet rough. Tender but demanding. “What do you mean?” She looked over her shoulder at him. He was staring at her back, his eyes focused on her tattoo, his eyes dark with passion. With the water misting over his face and emphasizing his chiseled cheekbones, he had a look of intensity about him that sent a frisson of warmth to her core.
He winked. “I’m going to do whatever I want to you.”
At his words, heat spiked, hot and harsh. Her bones turned to a gel.
“I’m taking charge beginning right now.” He grinned, a predatory gleam in his eyes.
“You want to be in charge until my Quait kicks in?” The idea excited her. Deep down in her heart, she wanted an equal partner in bed, in all things. She wanted to share and be shared. She wanted to take charge . . . or not. That meant taking turns.
“How long can you hold out?” he murmured, sending a sizzle of tension to her pleasure center. Already dampness seeped between her thighs. With no more secrets between them, a new intimacy added joy to his every caress. His hands caressed, and his tone cajoled, making her want to cavort all night.
“Still . . .” She turned and leaned into him, pressing her breasts against his chest, her cheek to his heart, not quite daring to believe she could be this happy. So at peace. “Have you forgiven me? For lying to you?”
He smoothed her hair with his hand. “I understand you lied to me out of necessity, and I forgive you. Now that I know your heart is good, I trust you. I never meant to hurt you, and it won’t happen again. I don’t give my trust lightly, but when I do, I give it all the way. I won’t change my mind again.”
“Good,” Her body lightened in relief. “Because I couldn’t handle it if you ever mistrusted me again.” Her heart would shatter.
While they stood he smoothed more lotion into her back, her bottom, her thighs, the caresses soothing, yet sensual. “There’s probably one more thing you should know . . .”
“Huh?”
“There’s an alien in my head.”
Not now, you idiot.
Huh? It was like someone was talking to her from inside her own head. In confusion she glanced at Derrek. “Did you just call me an idiot and do it telepathically?” Azsla frowned up at him.
“So you can hear Pepko, too?” he asked, clearly annoyed at the interruption.
“Pepko? Who the hell is Pepko?”
I had to communicate with her, or she might assume you were crazy and refuse to mate with you.
Derrek had an alien in his head, and now it was talking to her, claiming it had something to do with their lovemaking. “And what the hell business is it of yours?” Azsla asked the alien, too annoyed to be frightened, too curious to remain silent. Talk about secrets. Maybe she didn’t know Derrek at all. Maybe she should back off, reevaluate.
You people are too damn stubborn for your own good. For Stars’ sake. I, Pepko, had to resort to lowering his inhibition and putting fantasies in both your heads.
“You said that wasn’t a fantasy,” Derrek claimed. “You said it was a scene from our future.”
“Would someone please tell me what’s going on?” Azsla asked in growing frustration. They might die tomorrow or the next day. She wanted to hold onto Derrek and kiss him. She didn’t want to discuss fantasies, she wanted to make one.
Fantasy, future vision, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that you two are destined to be together.
“Why?” Azsla asked, giving up on the idea of making love until this conversation was over.
I can only prod so much.
“You didn’t answer her question,” Derrek growled.
Telling the future can distort it.
“Is he always so cryptic?” Azsla asked. If the being had to interrupt their lovemaking, at least he could do them the courtesy of being articulate.
“Yes, he’s usually cryptic, annoying, and interfering.”
I’m just doing my job.
“And that would be?” Azsla pressed, confused and aggravated. Finally Derrek had accepted her. And she wanted to hold him, kiss him, and make love to show him how much he meant to her.
I’m ensuring the future. But since I’m obviously not wanted, I’m leaving.
“And don’t come back.” Derrek embraced her tight. “At least not any time soon.”
Had Pepko really gone? She didn’t know since he had no physical form. But his sudden appearance and sudden silence—hopefully a vanishing act—had broken the mood.
Pepko had stirred so many questions in Azsla she didn’t know what to ask first. “Where did it come from? Has he always been in your head? What does it want from me? From us?”
“He does that,” Derrek said. “Just shows up and disappears.”
“How rude.”
Derrek chuckled and kissed her brow. “I met him about the same time I did you. At first, I thought I was going crazy, but gradually I accepted he has some uses. Like his lowering my resistance to you.”
“He made you accept that I was a First?”
Derrek shook his head and kissed her nose. “From the first instant I saw you, I felt protective. I wanted to kiss you, make love to you—beyond all reason.”
“And Pepko planted that fantasy of us making love . . .”
“Yes. Pepko may have helped accelerate our feelings for one another, but he didn’t create them.”
“I don’t like someone interfering with our lives,” Azsla said, uneasy with the idea that an alien could invade her thoughts at will. Uneasy that Pepko had changed Derrek’s mind about her. Uneasy that an alien being was now in the picture.
“That would be a triple ditto for me,” Derrek agreed. “But even when he’s gone, I still want you.”
“Good to know.”
“The verdict is still out on Pepko’s motives. Yet, while his timing tends to be inconvenient, I don’t believe he’s a threat. He is annoying, though. I mean, here I have you willing, naked, and heating up, and he decides to pay a visit. You’d think he’d have some sense of privacy, but the concept seems one he can’t grasp. After living several millennia he ought to have a little patience. But no, he interrupts and then after he realizes how annoyed I am, he leaves.” He shook his head and laughed. “But he always gets in the last word.”
Azsla didn’t want to think about the alien. She’d learned in her short lifetime that there were too few moments of pleasure, too few times to relax between the battles, and she was damned sure not going to allow a whacked-out alien to deprive her of making love to Derrek. “Let’s pretend he doesn’t exist. That he didn’t interrupt us.”
“That’s fine by me.” Derrek inched his hands under her breasts, lifting them, cupping them while he did delicious things to her nipples with the pads of his fingers. At the same time, he angled his head to take a kiss.
She wanted him to take. And take some more.
Even as her feelings roused, she tamped them down. Not yet. Banishing her Quait to a corner on her mind, she locked it down, refusing to take over.
Derrek took his time, kissing her thoroughly, his mouth teasing her lips, biting just a tad, his tongue gently exploring. Stars. He knew how to kiss. He seemed to know exactly how to tease and tempt.
Thoughts whirling, blood spinning, she was ready for him right now. But when the fresher cycle ended, Derrek picked her up and carried her to the giant tub, stepped in, and sank with her into the lovely water.
“Oh, my.” A hot bath would have been a luxury dirtside, but on a spaceship, in hyperspace, every sensation elevated to the next level, and her excitement rose, too. Where her nerve endings might have read exciting, they now screamed thrilling. Where her heart might have sprinted, it now galloped. Where her brain might have had trouble taking everything in, she was overwhelmed. Delightfully, erotically, deliciously loved.
And the hot water only seemed to magnify the warm feelings she had toward Derrek. If only they could stay here together. Forever. Right in this moment.
The heated water stimulated nerve endings. Deciding she needed more of Derrek’s mouth, she tugged his head back to hers for another kiss. She’d never been into kissing, but Derrek made kissing special. In fact, he elevated it to an art form. And Derrek’s kisses whetted her appetite, increased her hunger.
Enjoying the way he took over and set the pace, she did her best to allow him to do as he wished. If that meant letting him nudge apart her thighs, or tweak her nipples or stroke her earlobe, that’s what she did. The sensory overload, his lack of any discernible pattern, drove her wild.
He fired her up with a tiny bite on her earlobe, teased the curls between her legs, then caressed her breasts. Whatever he did pleased her. Pleased her so that her breath came in pants. Pleased her so that she found herself holding back her Quait. Holding back more than she’d ever done before.
Sweet Vigo. She didn’t want him to stop his loving that had her right on the edge.
So when he lifted her from the tub, her body warm, wet, and wanton, she simply pillowed her head on his chest and let him carry her to the bed.
She didn’t care that she was wet or that the sheets would dampen. She could think only of the pleasure he was giving her and the gratification to come.
When Derrek snapped metal and leather cuffs over her wrists and ankles, she jerked open her eyes in surprise. She’d heard of slaves who were into bondage, but Firsts . . . well, the act was meaningless for a First since they could order their partner to release the bindings. Without hesitation, she let him have his way. After all, she could use her Quait to get him to free her any time she wished.
He’d attached her arms over her head, her feet to the corner bed posts. Testing the bonds, she found she had wiggle room. However, she didn’t see the point. But when she expected him to come to her, he instead walked across the room and dropped the key into a metal box.
Finally, he turned to her, a look of complete triumph in his eyes, a warm smile on his lips. Fists on his slim hips that showed off his cut abdominal muscles and the sexy triangle of hair below, he looked entirely too sexy and pleased with himself.
“What have you done?” she asked, her voice husky and smoky with need.
He folded his arms across his chest. “That was the only key.”
“Like I’d want someone else to unlock me.”
“You still aren’t getting it.” He chuckled. “I can’t take the key out of that box.”
She lifted her head and stared at him. “What?”
“It’s on a timer. Unless the ship has an emergency, I can’t open the box for three hours.”
She almost giggled. “When did you set this up?”
“After I learned you were a First, I ordered my chief engineer to make the change.”
Back then, he’d been thinking of lovemaking? Of imprisoning her?
And now they had three hours? She tested her bonds. Her wrists were wrapped in leather, the metal cuffs tight. Her ankles the same.
Of course, she could stop him from doing anything she didn’t like. Make him do anything she wanted . . . except free her. He’d taken away that option.
She was his to do with as he wished.
At the idea of how he’d shifted things in his favor, dampness creamed between her thighs. Her nipples tightened. And when he kneeled between her parted legs, she sucked in a breath of expectation.
“I underestimated you,” she admitted with a gasp.
He stroked the insides of her thighs, his voice low and raspy. “I’m glad you approve of my tactics.”
“I didn’t say that.” But she grinned as his fingers teased her sensitive spots. “But so far, so good.”
“Ah, then you see the beauty of my plan and all its ramifications?” he teased.
Ramifications? Stars. She could barely think at all. And every rational part of her was bent on tamping down her Quait. On waiting for his fingers to move higher between her legs. “What . . . are . . . you . . . saying?”
For an answer, he used his fingers, stroking, teasing, caressing where she needed him most. The most exquisite sensations rocked her. Every cell in her tensed until she strained at her bonds, panting for more pressure, more friction, more Derrek.
When she thought she could hold back no more, he replaced his fingers with his mouth. She had to bite back a scream. Oh, my Stars. What he was doing was incredibly better than what she could have directed . . . She finally got it.
His plan was wicked.
Devilish.
He was giving her so much pleasure that taking over would be a bad thing. She could never be so inventive . . . Oh, my. Where had he learned how to . . . ah . . .
She was holding herself back. Delaying her pleasure so he could give her more. He had her right on the edge. She couldn’t squirm. Could only accept the pleasure he gave. And she verged on explosion.
Yet held back. Kept it together . . . so he would keep giving her more.
More licking.
More caresses.
More tension.
Until holding back her release had her crazy with pleasure.
Frantic, she tugged against the bonds. Not that it did any good. She had no choice but to take more pleasure . . . and more.
No one could last forever. But she wanted to. She wanted this moment to stretch out. She wanted to wait. For him. For her.
But the tension was gathering with the force of a tidal wave. She arched her back, lifting toward him. Aching. Yearning. Needing him inside her.
Just as the first tendrils of Quait escaped, he pulled back his hands and his mouth.
She gazed up at his face
, fierce in concentration and forced her Quait into a semblance of order. Reached with the last of her strength to check her own need.
“You’re tormenting me,” she complained and complimented in the same breath.
“I’m not done.” He took her nipple between his teeth, teased the tip with his tongue.
“I can’t wait . . . can’t hold back . . . I’m . . .” But she could hold back. As good as he now felt, he was giving her time to recover, and she didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. But then she just went with the freedom, the happiness, the absolute wonder that he brought to worshiping her body that had her bursting with an inner bliss.
“Please, Derrek. I want you inside me,” she pleaded.
“Thank you for asking.” He shifted between her legs.
“I’m not asking. I’m begging.”
He thrust into her. And she did lose it. Yet she didn’t feel so much as if she were taking control but adding her own crazed lust to his. They were moving together, pumping in a primitive dance, both physically and mentally bound, tied together until she could no longer tell where her will began and his ended. Because they desired the exact same thing.
When the ultimate wave of pleasure swept her away, she took him with her, crashing senses, heart-pounding craziness, and the wonderful swirling of emotions that couldn’t be sorted or analyzed . . . only felt.
After she finally caught her breath and stirred, she realized the cuffs still held her fast. Derrek turned his head and checked the timer.
He shot her a totally mischievous grin. “You know that box isn’t going to open for another hour. I think I can put that time to good use.”
She grinned. “Well, you know, I always did hate to waste time.”
23
DURING THE JOURNEY to Alpha One, Derrek’s home base among the asteroid mines, Azsla consulted frequently with Taylo Misa and found the scientist to be brilliant, thorough, and extremely helpful. After she’d drawn up the specs for the tactonics housing she’d need to stop Katadama, he’d promised to have the device ready by the time they arrived.
As they had popped out of hyperspace, Azsla surveyed the specs from the link in Derrek’s cabin. Taylo had already found and mined the tactonium she’d need for the bomb. Her major worry was that Katadama’s density seemed higher than any substance in their solar system.
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