“Is something on your mind?” he asked. “Something wrong? I noticed that Jason Mercy has been paying a lot of attention to you lately. Is he bothering you?”
Rena held back a smile. Drogan had noticed Jason flirting with her, and this filled her with giddy happiness. But her euphoria was brief. She remembered that Drogan was the captain, and the regs clearly stated that if crew did get involved with one another, he would have to step in and deal with it. She realized he was just doing his job.
She cleared her throat. “No, sir, he’s not bothering me.”
“Are you sure? You’re not just saying that to be nice or not cause trouble?” He placed his elbows on the desk and clasped his hands together, bringing his head forward and resting it on his fists. She shook her head, trying to get this conversation over with.
“Yes. I’m sure.”
“Because as you know…”
“I know the regs.”
“He’s quite the Casanova around here.”
“I know it’s against policy to get involved with other crew members,” she said.
Drogan cleared his throat and unclasped his hands, letting them fall to the desktop with a soft slap that echoed off the walls of the small office.
“Um, it’s just I don’t want you to get hurt, should you decide…” His voice trailed off.
“I know of Lieutenant Mercy’s reputation.”
“Yes, well…” Drogan seemed to shift uncomfortably in his chair, not meeting her eyes.
“Sir?”
He cleared his throat again and swiveled his chair away from her. All Rena saw was the side of his face. His long, dark brown hair was pulled back, his profile clearly defined. For the first time she noticed a tattoo of what looked like a skull right below his ear. She raised an eyebrow. She had never noticed that before. She thought back to her days in school, and tales of Earth pirates floated to the top of her mind.
There were rumors of how Drogan’s family had gained their wealth and prominence. Drogan didn’t need to be a captain. Hell, he didn’t need to be anything. His family was rolling in money. People whispered that most of it came from pirating and looking at him now—with the scar through his eye and his strong square jaw, sharp cheekbones, slightly hooked nose, and hooded blue eyes—he sort of looked like a pirate. Could the skull be a sign that those rumors were true?
Rena didn’t have time to dwell on that thought. Drogan turned to her, a tenderness in his eyes that caught her off guard and caused her heart to melt. It had suddenly become difficult to breathe.
“I don’t want to see you get hurt. You mean a lot to me. I consider you more than my assistant. I consider you my friend. I’ve known Jason a long time. He doesn’t strike me as the man you deserve to be with.”
And what man should I be with, exactly? she wanted to ask, but her mouth and brain were not communicating. She was speechless, unsure how to respond. He was looking at her with tenderness, his face full of emotions she couldn’t identify.
Rena felt herself tearing up. She turned her head away, afraid she would embarrass herself by crying. She valued his friendship so much, and yet he had no idea the impact his words had on her heart. She wanted to be more than just his friend and knew that that could never be.
Regs aside, Rena knew in her heart that she wasn’t his type. Never in a million years would he go for her. He went for tall, willowy women who were curved in all the right places and full of vibrancy and fire. Rena preferred nights in her room curled up with a good book or quiet games of chess. She loathed crowds. She wanted intimacy without the fear of interruption. Drogan, on the other hand, loved crowds and nights out on the town, with a woman on each arm.
Also, Rena knew she lacked that sexual spark that men like Drogan and Jason Mercy were drawn to. They liked women who oozed sexual experience. She may have had a wild week at the Fantasy Spa, but put her in a position like that in real life and she would have no idea what to do. Sex with a real man scared her. Lover after lover had told her she was fine in bed, but in her mind “fine” meant boring. It was easier to be with a machine, her hand, or a vibrator than to risk being with someone who would inevitably go elsewhere when he realized just how limited she was when it came to sex.
Rena’s imagination knew no bounds, but she was too scared to live out her fantasies, especially the darker ones involving submission that she had played out during her time at the spa. She doubted anyone would believe her if she told them what she had done during her week off.
She glanced at Drogan, who was watching her closely, seeming to gauge her reaction to his words. She looked down at the floor, still not sure what to say.
“It can be lonely out here,” she suddenly blurted out, startling herself with how sad she sounded. She had allowed part of her guard to come down, exposing her vulnerability.
“Yes, it can be,” Drogan agreed. “But that is no reason to jump into some meaningless fling with Jason to fill the void.”
She raised her chin, feeling defiant. “Why not?”
“Because you deserve better,” he murmured.
She clenched her jaw. He sounded like he was talking to a child, like he was trying to show her the error of her ways. What was wrong with wanting to be desired? What was wrong with remembering, just for a moment, what it was to feel?
Rena realized, all of a sudden, that she was tired of her crush on Drogan. It hurt to want someone and know that they would never want you. Regulations be damned, she wanted to lose herself in a meaningless fuck, like she had done on Elysian 8.
“Maybe I don’t want better. Maybe I just want to forget.” She refused to look at Drogan to see his reaction.
“Forget what?” he asked in that same soft, patronizing tone that was now grating on her nerves.
“I want to forget that I’m wallpaper, that no one sees me, that all of the men on the crew treat me like a sister or a friend, but not like a woman. You guys love to stare at Ensign Lucinda’s assets. She bends over and all the guys stop and stare. I could do the same thing and…nothing.” She knew she was digging herself a hole that she wouldn’t be able to get out of, but she was too tired and angry to care. “I just want to be the center of attention for once, even if I know it means nothing.”
“Rena—”
“Forget it. Never mind. You wouldn’t understand. Forget I even said anything. It was stupid.”
She turned on her heel and left, ignoring him as he called after her. The doors swooshed shut and she power-walked to the lifts. She punched the call button with more force than it needed.
“You okay, Rena?” Jason asked. She had barely even noticed he was there, waiting for the elevator alongside her. Suddenly a wicked urge took hold of her.
“Do you want to have dinner with me?” she asked. Her brain and mouth were still not cooperating with each other.
“Sure. What time should I pick you up?” Jason asked, grinning.
“Eight o’clock.”
“I’ll be there.”
“Don’t be late. This is a one-time offer.”
The elevator doors slid open and she stepped in. Turning around, she punched the button for her floor. As the doors closed she saw the shocked look on Drogan’s face. He had overheard the conversation. Good.
Once the doors were closed, Rena leaned against the back of the car, head hanging down, heart threatening to beat out of her chest.
Oh fuck, what the hell have I done? She groaned.
When the doors opened to her floor, she walked out, shaking her head, her mind going a mile a minute trying to think of a way to get out of her date with Jason.
She paced the small sitting area of her quarters, trying to think of anything that wouldn’t sound like an excuse. She felt nauseous. She glanced at the clock. Four hours until dinner. She walked over to her desk to bury herself in work. It was the only thing that would take her mind off the colossal mistake she had just made.
Three hours later, a small screen popped up on her computer. It was a message fr
om Drogan requesting her notes from a vid conference he’d had a few weeks ago. She shuffled through her papers until she found them. Placing them on top of a pile of other notes, she sent him a quick message telling him to let himself into her quarters to pick them up.
Glancing at the clock she saw that she had twenty minutes until Jason would come to get her. Her shoulders slumped. She would feel horrible if she didn’t go on the dinner date with him, but she knew she would also feel horrible if she did. She had used him in anger, wanting to get the patronizing tone of Drogan out of her head and prove that she was the kind of woman that men wanted. Now she was stuck.
Pushing her chair back, she trudged to the bathroom, figuring she should just get the date over with, even if she was going to feel miserable the whole time. She turned on the shower and quickly undressed, stepping into the warm spray of water.
She had been in the stall for only a few minutes when she heard Drogan’s voice call out to her just beyond the door of the bathroom.
“Where are the notes?”
She turned away from the spray and wiped water off her face, ignoring how her body tightened in response to that sexy baritone.
“The desk. The notes are on the desk,” she called out, and turned back to her shower. She didn’t have time to entertain her arousal. Where she would usually take her time, build up a fantasy in her mind and let her fingers do the walking, she had a date in a few minutes.
Cleaning up and drying off quickly, she stepped out of the stall and grabbed a towel. Wrapping it around her body she rushed into her bedroom only to stop short when she heard two male voices talking in the living room. Tilting her head, she listened to the conversation. Drogan was talking to Jason.
“Just treat her right,” Drogan ordered.
“Don’t worry, Captain. I swear I won’t fail you or her.”
Rena rolled her eyes. Drogan was acting like her father, sizing up a date. She shook her head and went to her closet. Rena selected a pair of dark pants and a simple red sweater, then quickly slathered lotion on her body. She’d deliberately avoided sexy underwear, going with a comfortable cotton panty-bra set instead, then pulled on her pants and sweater. Slipping her feet into simple black flats, she grabbed a small purse with her crew ID in it and stepped into the living room.
Drogan was still there, sitting on Rena’s couch talking with Jason.
“Why the hell are you still here?” she demanded. Annoyance quickly turned to real anger.
Drogan stood up quickly. “He and I were just discussing the latest sports scores.”
Rena resisted the urge to roll her eyes and marched over to Jason. She grabbed his hand and tugged him with her to the door.
“Good night, Captain, sir,” she threw over her shoulder as the door closed behind them. She dragged Jason all the way to the lifts and punched the up button.
“Wow, I had no idea you were so eager to go out with me,” Jason said. “Had I known, I would have asked you out sooner.”
Rena glanced over at him to find him smiling at her, eagerness shining in his eyes. She groaned inwardly. She just knew her night was not going to end well.
Chapter Three
Drogan resisted the urge to go after them. He clenched his jaw and reined in his temper. The thought of Jason being on a date with Rena, much less touching her, pissed him off. He had felt her pain when she told him how lonely she was. His heart ached for her. The pain turned into acidic anger, then desire. He wanted to show her just what he thought of her wallpaper comment. He’d almost gotten up from his desk, rip off her clothes and show her he did see her and wanted to see a lot more of her. Her anger and low self-esteem left a bitter taste in his mouth.
He could have wrung Jason’s neck. The man should be nowhere near his Rena, much less on a date with her. He had been mentally kicking himself for holding back when talking to her. He had wanted to tell her what he felt for her. Hell, he had wanted to do more than tell her. He had wanted to show her over and over again just how much he noticed her, desired her.
He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, trying to find something calming inside of himself, something that would keep him from going to the cafeteria and hauling her down to his quarters to give her a lesson on just how sexy she was to him.
The scent of jasmine reached his nose, causing his brain to go into a temporary fog of desire. His cock became hard in an instant. While she was in the bathroom, fantasy after fantasy had played in his mind, but Jason’s presence had thrown cold water on his fire.
He’d wanted to smack his lieutenant and order him to leave at once, but instead he made Jason promise to treat Rena with respect. Drogan knew Jason all too well. Hell, the man was his cousin and had been his old wingman before Drogan became captain of the Hades’ Helmet. They had been a holy terror to the female populace and had even shared women at times. Drogan didn’t want to share Rena with anyone. Blowing out a breath, he left her quarters and headed for his own. Once there, he did his security routine and entered the dim room.
“Lights,” he called out. The room began to become brighter. He made his way to his desk and laid down the pile of papers. He sat down in his executive chair and put as much concentration as he could into going over the notes before him. When he finally got to the bottom of the pile, he noticed a small, unmarked silver disc.
“Must be the softcopy,” he said to himself. Just to make sure, he slipped the disc into the console and waited for the computer to read the data. He had looked away from the monitor for a second, when he heard a male voice come through the speakers.
“On your knees,” the voice growled.
Glancing back at the screen, his heart stopped and his breath halted. Rena sank down to her knees, a blindfold around her eyes, her long hair unbound, falling around her shoulders in waves.
Drogan gulped. At first he was concerned with what he was seeing. There were two other men in the room. One of them walked over to Rena and gripped her hair in one of his hands. He pulled back gently until her face was tilted up toward him.
“Are you sure you want this? Do you understand what you are asking for?”
“Yes, master,” she replied in a husky whisper.
“Get on all fours. Ass in the air,” the man holding her hair ordered. She did as she was told. Her high, rounded ass lifted up as if in offering.
“Fuck,” Drogan uttered as his cock came to attention. The man was using the same tone that he fantasized about using with Rena himself.
Drogan reached down to caress his hard shaft, pressing against the soft material of his standard-issue uniform pants. He watched as the scene progressed.
One of the men dropped to his knees behind her, running his hands over her body with tenderness, reverence even. Rena stayed still. Only a slight tremble betrayed her nerves.
Drogan watched as the man took her from behind while the other two watched. Drogan’s hand moved faster over his cloth-covered cock, but it wasn’t enough. He quickly hit the pause button, stood up, and undressed. A small sense of guilt nudged at him, but it didn’t last for long. He opened a drawer and took out a bottle of lube. Squeezing the clear gel into the palm of his hand, he stroked his shaft from root to tip, pausing to smear precum over the thick head of his penis. Then he began sliding his hand up and down its length.
He pushed play with his free hand and watched as Rena began to climax. Jealousy warred with arousal, and arousal won. Rena’s soft moans and cries filled the quiet of his quarters. The first man took her hard and fast, spanking her ass cheeks from time to time. When Rena couldn’t take it anymore, the man let her rest, but soon another man had begun the process of bringing her to climax with his mouth.
The second man gently rolled Rena onto her back, spread her legs, and buried himself between her thighs. Her hips arched up off the floor. She ground her pussy into the man’s face as he gripped her hips tightly. She rode his mouth as the other two men dropped down to the floor, flicking, nipping, and sucking the hardened peaks of her ni
pples. She writhed and moaned beneath them. It wasn’t long before she let out a scream, and as she screamed she came, her body convulsing.
Drogan’s own climax joined Rena’s. His hips bucked off the chair as his hand pumped his cock faster and faster until he fell over the edge, crying out Rena’s name.
Drogan came down from his high gradually. Breathing in harsh pants, he let himself calm down and pushed the pause button. He reached down, pulled open a drawer, found a box of wet-wipes and cleaned up. He threw the used towelette in the trash and looked up at the screen. The frozen image on the monitor showed Rena on her hands and knees, mouth agape, ready to take in the hardened shaft of one of the men.
Drogan’s cock twitched and he groaned. His eyes roamed to the bar at the bottom of the screen, which indicated how long the disc would run for. He shook his head. Almost thirty-six hours of footage and he’d only watched about two hours of it.
He pushed a button on the tabletop. There was a soft pop, and he picked up the monitor, bringing it to bed with him. His paperwork was all but forgotten. All that mattered now was delving further into the mind of Rena. A part of him wanted to return the disc to her, but a wicked, curious side of him wanted to see what lay beyond the sensible exterior. The disc would finally allow him to get to know the sensual, sexy woman that she kept so carefully hidden.
Drogan placed the monitor on an armrest next to his bed. With a push of a button he was able to arrange the monitor so that he could watch while lying down. He was now able to take hold of his cock without feeling crowded. Leaning forward, he pushed the play button and watched the scene unfold.
Drogan came so many times that night that he began to feel light-headed. He’d watched Rena get taken by three men all at the same time. She’d been tied down and slowly aroused by just one man, then taken by two at once. She’d had five men on her—two to suck her nipples and three to fill every orifice she had. Drogan had never seen her so wild, free, and open before. He felt dirty for watching such intimate moments, and yet he couldn’t stop himself. Greedily, he watched every frame, burned every fantasy she had enacted into his mind, and stored them away for later.
At Drogan’s Command (Hades Helmet Crew) Page 3