“Captain Thantos is not currently on the ship. Shall I summon him?”
“Yes. And open the damned tube. I don’t need it now.”
It took a strenuous effort to remain awake until she felt Corin’s presence beside her. She opened her eyes, looking up at him. “Don’t go after Sadin without me.”
He leaned down. “It will be best if I go alone. I only waited because I wanted to be certain that you would be all right before I left.”
Lana struggled and finally managed to grab hold of his hand. “We can’t afford to be separated now. He’s seen your face. He knows we’re together.”
Corin frowned. “You will be safe here.”
She tightened her grip on his hand. “You don’t understand. We’re both more vulnerable to his attack now. A year ago, Sadin killed my partner, Patrick. He morphed into a perfect likeness of me, walked right up to Patrick, and blew his head off before Patrick realized it wasn’t me. We didn’t know, until then, that he was a chameleon, and Patrick and I had been working together for three years. We trusted one another.
“If you leave me here, he can get to both of us. He’ll know that even if we suspected, we would hesitate, and that would be all he would need.”
Corin frowned. “I would know you. His subterfuge cannot work when we know his capabilities.”
Lana sighed, but she was too near drug induced sleep to allow room for much irritation. “Then you will be safe,” she muttered. “I won’t be. I let you get too close. I wouldn’t take the chance that I was wrong.”
Chapter Seven
Lana was ready to set out after Sadin as soon as she woke—in spirit. Physically, she realized as soon as she made her first trip across sickbay that she wasn’t in any condition to leave immediately. After a brief internal debate, she headed for her cabin, made use of the facilities to freshen up, and then collapsed on her bunk.
When the faintness had passed, she rolled onto her side and called up a display of the area and the files on Sadin. She was deeply immersed in sifting through the puzzle of where Sadin might have gone when Corin came looking for her some time later. Several minutes passed before she realized he hadn’t moved from the doorway.
As it slowly filtered through her mind, she pulled her attention from the files and glanced at him curiously. His expression was taut, his gaze fixed on the curling thatch of hair between her crossed thighs. As if he sensed her watching him, he dragged his gaze up her body. Their eyes locked for several moments before it dawned on Lana that Corin wasn’t accustomed to nudity.
Without a word, she rose from the bunk and moved to her locker. Removing a long, loose robe, she slipped into it and dropped onto her bunk once more. “I was trying to figure out where to look for Sadin.”
Corin frowned and moved closer, studying the display. After a moment, he moved to the end of the bunk so that he could see it correctly. Lana moved over and patted the bed. “It’ll be easier to see if you sit here beside me.”
He glanced down at her hand. Finally, almost reluctantly, he leaned his trident against the bulk head and settled on the bed beside her. Lana glanced at the wicked looking trident that was never far from his hands and shrugged mentally. It wasn’t a bad idea to be prepared. She doubted Sadin would attempt anything on their ground, but there was no sense in taking unnecessary risks. It was only through sheer luck that she’d managed to escape him with her life. She’d have felt better if she could’ve convinced herself it was her skill that had saved her, but she knew better.
She’d allowed herself to be distracted and it had almost cost her her life.
“He will have left Ata Prime,” Corin said after a moment, his voice sounding deep and husky.
Lana shrugged. “Maybe, maybe not. I imagine he headed for his ship when he managed to elude us, but the first thing I did when I arrived was find his ship and disable it. Unless another ship has arrived since I did and he was able to either stowaway or steal it, he’s still here. And, if he’s still here, I’m thinking he’s tired of having me on his tail. He’s going to be trying to figure out a way to set a trap to get me out of his way permanently.”
Corin was silent for so long that she glanced at him questioningly. “The rangers would send another.”
“Yes, but by the time they did, his trail would be cold. It could take a long time for another ranger to present any sort of problem for him.”
Corin moved to the end of her bed and began discarding his armor. She watched him curiously for several moments and finally dismissed it. He didn’t need it at the moment and she doubted it was very comfortable.
“I’ve been giving this a lot of thought. I feel that Sadin is still in the area, that he hasn’t gone far. I’m as sure as I’ve ever been about anything that he only went far enough to gain the time he needed to set a trap … which means we can only spring his trap, not set one of our own up.
“I think we’re going to have to split up.”
Corin turned to look at her in surprise. After a moment, he dropped the last of his armor on the floor and sprawled out on her bed on his side, propping his head in his hand. “You said it would be safer if we stayed together.”
“Safer, yes, but we won’t get the chance to spring his trap and come out of this alive if we do. It’s me he wants. You’re not a ranger and he knows all he has to do is leave Ata Prime and you won’t be a problem for him. With me, it’s different.”
“Will he not be suspicious?”
“Probably, but if we don’t give him a choice I think he’ll go for it anyway. Not that I intend to really split up. I only want to make it appear that we have. Your ability to communicate with the forest could be helpful. Is it strong enough that you could track me at a distance of say a quarter of a mile?”
Naturally enough, Corin wasn’t familiar with the measurement. After a short discussion, they settled on a distance they were both comfortable with. They worked out several simple signals and counter signals that they could use to identify themselves to one another, verbal and hand signals in case they were unable to use one or the other for any reason. “It’s important that we agree that we’ll use the signal and counter signal immediately. That way, if Sadin tries to mimic either one of us, he won’t be able to get close enough to attack before we realize it’s him.
“I’ll take the trail and check each cabin I come to. That way I’ll always be in plain sight. The only thing that worries me is that he managed to morph and elude you before in the forest.”
“It will not happen again.”
“We could be betting our lives on it,” Lana cautioned him.
Corin shook his head. “His scent does not change, whatever form he takes. The forest knows him now as the strange one.”
She studied him a moment and finally nodded. “Good then. We’re set. We’ll rendezvous at the nearest cabin at dusk each evening if we’ve had no luck with Sadin. I don’t mind camping on the ground if I have to, but I’d rather have shelter if it’s available. Agreed?”
“Agreed.” He tugged on her arm until she yielded and lay back against the bed, staring up at him. “And when we have captured this killer, you will return to your own people.”
It wasn’t a question. She couldn’t tell how he felt about it, however, whether he would be sorry to see her go, or relieved that he wouldn’t have to deal with a female so unlike those he was accustomed to. She didn’t want to examine her own feelings about it, but an unaccustomed sense of loss swept through her. She draped an arm across her eyes, clearing her throat of a sudden huskiness. “Yes. I’ll head back to HQ with him to turn him over for trial.”
“He has killed here on Ata Prime. Rex Pimetrius will want him tried here.”
Lana shrugged but dropped her arm to the bed, fixing him with a determined look. “I expect a lot of planets will be fighting over who gets to execute him. That’s not my problem. My job is to take him in. I hope you and I will not find ourselves on opposing sides once we’ve caught him … because I’ve been after him
a lot longer, and I’m not about to let him slip through my fingers now.”
He smiled faintly. “You are so quick to challenge.”
She couldn’t tell whether it was a rebuke or not, but she suspected it was. “I’ve never seen that ignoring an issue helped me in any way.”
“I have no concern that you will not see that justice is done for all. I will find a way to satisfy Rex Pimetrius that will be satisfactory to you, as well.”
Relief surged through her. She knew Corin was a man of his word. She would do what she had to do, but she far preferred to think that she could part with him on good terms. “Good.”
She started to rise, but Corin met her half way, covering her mouth in a heated kiss that made desire curl in her belly. She felt more than well enough to indulge, but guilt pricked her, too. She had wasted enough time as it was, even though it wasn’t something she could’ve helped. She knew they should be on their way.
“We have things to do,” she murmured when he broke the kiss and began to chart a path down her throat.
“Yes, we do.”
Amusement touched her. “I meant work.”
She felt his lips curl against her skin. “This is work—very hard work. It requires concentration, stamina, self control—skills I am striving to master.”
Lana chuckled, dropping back on the bed and smiling up at him. “You’ve mastered them. Believe me.”
He shook his head. “I require much more training and practice—till morning, at least.”
Lana’s brows rose with interest. “It’s night?”
Desire and suppressed laughter gleamed in his eyes. “The sun has set.”
“That will require stamina,” she murmured. “All night?”
“Until one emerges victorious,” he promised, pushing her robe up her thighs and sampling the flesh he exposed with little nibbling bites and the stroke of his tongue.
Lana gasped as he reached her thighs and pushed them apart, nibbling along the keenly sensitive flesh of the inside of one thigh. “Sounds like a challenge,” she whispered huskily as he reached the apex of her thighs and his hot breath trickled through the thatch of curls that covered her mound. He studied her pussy for several moments, as if mesmerized by the intricate folds of pink flesh. Swallowing audibly, he glanced up at her, his eyes glazed with need. She looked down at him through half closed eyes, waiting breathlessly to see what he would do. With slow deliberation he opened his mouth and stroked his tongue along the delicate flesh, parting the petals, delving past the fragile barrier to the exquisitely sensitive flesh it protected.
Lana jerked as she felt the heat and faint roughness of his tongue. Her breath left her in a choked rush. Knee weakening pleasure jolted through her, the flesh over her entire body erupting with sudden, stinging sensation. Her mind clouded with the drugging euphoria of passion.
Emboldened by her reaction, he settled his mouth over her, feasting on her flesh with the gentle suction of his mouth, the teasing stroke of his tongue. Her fingers curled into claws, digging into the bedding. She was torn between pleasure that bordered on unbearable and the desire to spread her thighs wider and give him greater access. The latter won out and she curled her hips up to meet his deliciously agonizing caresses, pushing her thighs wider.
The stroke of his tongue, his tugging kisses on her clit wrung whimpers and tortured cries from her as her body soared rapidly beyond her control, racing toward release. Abruptly, sharp convulsions of pleasure exploded inside her, tearing shrill cries of ecstasy from her lips.
She went limp, gasping for air as he lifted his head and looked up at her, too weak even to protest as he began a tortuous climb up her body with his lips that wrung shuddering echoes of bliss from her sated body and spawned a burgeoning of renewed desire. With an effort, she lifted her arms and wrapped them around his shoulders as he reached her breasts and assaulted each in turn with the same determined patience to wring every ounce of pleasure from her body.
By the time he lifted his head and moved up her neck, she was writhing with renewed need, breathless, drunk with desire. She pushed against him and when he dropped beside her on the bed, she charted her own course of discovery. With her hands and lips and tongue, she tasted and tested every inch of his flesh, every contour, every hard ridge of muscle.
He jerked reflexively when she reached his taut belly, his breath rushing from his chest as if she’d punched him. Catching his cock in her hand, she lifted her head and caught his gaze as she opened her mouth over the head of his cock, sucking it. He let out a hoarse, choked groan, grasping her shoulders. She lifted her head, fixing him with a heated glance. “My turn,” she murmured. Opening her mouth over the head of his cock again, she sucked the rounded knob until he was gasping hoarsely in an effort to catch his breath. She took him fully inside her mouth then, gripping him tightly with her tongue and cheeks as she engulfed as much of his turgid flesh with her mouth as she could before she allowed his cock to slide from her mouth and then took him fully inside her mouth again.
Tremors went through him. He moved restlessly beneath her ministrations, catching her shoulders in a tight grip and then releasing her, as if he wasn’t certain he could bear the pleasure and was more reluctant still to give it up. She moved at a pace that seemed to tear the most pleasure from him, feeling her body climbing toward release once more as she sensed his body spiraling toward culmination.
Abruptly, he caught her, stilling her motions as he reached the edge. She hesitated, torn between a desire to bring him off and an equal desire to feel him inside of her, bringing her to culmination once more.
The former won out and, ignoring his efforts to stop her, she began moving over his cock rapidly once more, sucking him, stroking the length of his cock with her mouth and tongue. He groaned, his cock jerking in her mouth as he reached his crisis. She sucked him hard, stroking his cock with her mouth and tongue until she’d milked him dry and his cock ceased to jerk in spasms of pleasure.
Her body was still humming with need when she released him at last, but a sense of satisfaction filled her as she lifted her head and looked at him, sprawled weakly beneath her, his massive chest laboring for breath. Dipping her head once more, she kissed his sated member, then his belly and moved upward, kissing his chest.
He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her down on top of him and nuzzling her neck. She lifted her head, sucking his earlobe. “I believe I won that round,” she murmured huskily.
A sound that might have been a half-hearted chuckle rumbled from his chest. Spearing his fingers through her hair, he rolled until she was beneath him. Covering her mouth with his own, he kissed her languidly, stoking the fire that still raced through her blood until her body vibrated with her need. She kissed him back hungrily, stroking his tongue and sucking it as she had his cock. Her fervor fed his own.
She felt the rise of the titan along her leg and parted her thighs until he’d pushed his cock between them. Sandwiching his engorged flesh tightly between her legs, she moved against him until he was rock hard and throbbing once more with his own need.
Drawing away from her, he grasped her knees, pushing them up and parting her thighs wide as he probed the tender flesh of her pussy with his cock head, forcing the mouth of her sex open and penetrating her. Lana gasped as she felt his turgid flesh sinking deeper inside of her, felt her flesh fisting around his.
She didn’t protest or make any attempt to rush him as he possessed her fully and began a lazy rhythm of thrust and retreat that teased as much as it pleased. Instead, she stroked his muscular body appreciatively with her hands, savored the feel of their joined bodies, the slowly mounting pleasure, his heat and weight and scent as he engulfed her in a haze of welcome longing. In time they reached a point where neither could bear to wait longer, however, and he began to thrust faster and harder, bringing them both to a shattering climax.
He sprawled weakly atop her as the pleasurable tension was swept away by release, leeching the strength from his body. Wit
h an effort, he gathered his strength and levered himself off of her after several moments, collapsing beside her on her bunk.
Lana was more than half asleep when she felt his lips along her neck. “Insatiable brute,” she muttered with amusement.
She felt him smile against her throat. “Do you yield, woman?”
“Mmm,” she murmured, lifting a hand to stroke his hair. “Absolutely … but just once more … for now.”
Chapter Eight
Lana left her locator when she set out the following morning. Sadin had crossed and re-crossed the trail she followed until it was virtually useless to her. She’d packed for three days. She didn’t know if she’d begun to hope that it would take her that long to conclude her business on Ata Prime or if it was merely common sense to expect that it was bound to take her several days to find his lair.
Her reluctance deeply disturbed her, however, for many reasons.
The first, of course, was that the longer Sadin remained at large, the more danger he presented to everyone. She was anxious to catch him before he killed again. She was fairly certain that she’d correctly assessed the situation and that she was his prime target now and he would not be seeking another helpless female to target. She could not be completely certain that he wouldn’t, though, and that made it of prime importance to catch up to him as quickly as humanly possible.
She had no intention of doing less than her best regardless of her mixed feelings about leaving Ata Prime.
She didn’t know whether she was more glad, or more sorry, that she’d allowed herself to become so deeply involved with Corin.
Leaving was going to be one of the hardest things she’d ever done.
It was mid day before she managed to thrust Corin sufficiently toward the back of her mind to focus on her task. Wryly, she realized that she’d probably done more to endanger herself and help Sadin than he could’ve possibly imagined. Fortunately for her, she hadn’t run into him while she was wandering along the trail thinking about Corin instead of catching a killer.
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