Judging by the dubious expression on Lauren’s face, she didn’t believe all of that. All Tick could think about was that insights was an entirely inadequate word. He didn’t believe for a second that the boulder on the ramp had simply chosen that moment to tip over. He’d moved it with his mind, and that terrified him. He didn’t want to be a freak. He didn’t want to move his species to a next level. He just wanted to have sex with Lauren, to read with her in bed afterward, and to maybe chomp down on some of that fresh bread for breakfast.
“I can’t have GalCon stalking me and killing the people I need for my experiments,” Hailey continued. “Please tell your captain to report my death, Ms. Markovich.”
“Hailey,” Lauren said, “you haven’t considered this thoroughly. How are you going to survive on your own? You would have to live out on the rim—that’s the only place where GalCon’s eyes don’t reach completely and where you can use gold for money instead of the banking chip embedded in your finger. You’d have to get that chip ripped out so you couldn’t be tracked, and you wouldn’t be able to access your savings, presuming you have any.”
“Afraid your company won’t get paid, dear sister? Don’t worry, the funds were already transferred to an escrow account. On my supposed death, they’ll be delivered.”
“That’s not it. I’m worried about you. That you haven’t considered everything. You could never again—”
“I have considered this, Lo. I’ve even considered asking your captain if I can stay on your ship.”
Lauren made a choking sound.
“What, you wouldn’t like to work with your little sister? You couldn’t share your lab?”
“I’d share my bunk with you,” Striker volunteered, his arm draped over the seat beside him. “There aren’t that many extra cabins on the Albatross, you know.” He patted the seat with his other hand. “Come over here, and let’s talk about it.”
Ms. Keys curled a lip at him. “Weren’t you the one drawing comics with mad scientists as the villains?”
“Uh, maybe. So?”
The lip curled higher, and she pointedly turned her back to him.
Ankari rubbed her face. “Viktor? We have a lot to discuss when we talk later.”
“I bet,” Mandrake said.
Still on the deck, Tick shifted his back so he could rest against the hull. Lauren and her sister kept talking—mostly Lauren as she tried to urge her not to do this—but he barely heard it. He kept thinking about that boulder and about the asshole that Hemlock had been turning into. Was that to be his fate? To become more and more of a freak? Would Lauren want anything to do with him if he was less than human? Or more than human, as the sister argued?
He closed his eyes. All this because he’d wanted a pretty woman to touch his butt.
Chapter 16
Lauren wasn’t sure whether to feel safer or not when the battered pink shuttle finally glided into its berth on the Albatross. She could return to her real lab and her work, but once that military ship reported back that Captain Mandrake had attacked it, wouldn’t the mercenaries be a target everywhere they went? Would she truly be safe if she stayed with the company? For that matter, would she be safe if she left? Through her actions, Hailey had brought Lauren’s work to the attention of the government, and it wouldn’t be the kind of attention that Lauren had hoped for. She’d wanted to improve human health, not give people strange mental powers. That was probably what the government would be interested in—and she wouldn’t be surprised if people all over the system tried to hunt her down for information on how those powers might be gained.
She sighed and looked over at Heath, tempted to ask his opinion or at least share her concerns. He sat in the seat next to her and had been quiet as the shuttle headed back into space, eventually catching up with the Albatross after the military ship had disappeared from the sensors. She remembered the way he had helped her into the shuttle, almost carrying her along with her sister, and how he had held her hand—held her—afterward. She didn’t know what the future would hold—probably far more drama and excitement than she wished—but she hated to contemplate leaving the ship if it would mean leaving him. She wasn’t sure she was ready to commit to a forever bond, but she would like to explore more with him.
Besides, did she want to be like Hailey? So obsessed that she brought harm to others and to herself and her career without even realizing what she was doing? Maybe it would be good for Lauren to learn how to step away from the lab now and then, at least long enough to share the good bits with others. And, for reasons she couldn’t quite fathom, Heath seemed interested in listening to her good bits.
Lauren laid her hand on his forearm, looking for a way to tell him that she wanted to spend time with him, and that she might even be interested in having sex with him. Her urges had cooled since their dalliance in the lab, but he had already proven that he had a knack for stirring them to life. Even more than sex, she found herself thinking of coming home to him at the end of their workdays, of snuggling with him in bed while they read, and of having him at her side as her friend and protector as they faced whatever the future brought.
“Heath?” she asked quietly at the same moment as he turned toward her and said, “Lauren?”
He smiled and touched the edge of his fur cap, as if in salute. “You first.”
“No, you go ahead.” Lauren was aware that Ankari, Jamie, Striker, Hailey, and Sparks were all still in the craft with them. They would depart as soon as the shuttle bay pressurized, but for the moment, she and Heath lacked privacy. Her proposition might be better delivered with nobody else around.
“Do you think…” He drummed his fingers on the armrest, then dipped into his pocket and pulled out his tin of gum. He popped a piece into his mouth, then offered her one.
She shook her head, having never been fond of the strong scents and flavors of gum. Another reason to avoid kissing. She smirked, glad that he was good at other things.
Heath absently returned the tin to his pocket. Whatever was on his mind, she doubted it was sex. She never would have imagined a scenario in which she was more likely to think of sex than a man.
“You, ah, saw the thing with the boulder, right?” he asked softly, glancing toward the front of the shuttle.
“How it magically fell out of the way when we needed it to?”
He winced. “Magic. Yeah.”
“I saw.” Lauren kept herself from saying it had been an impressive feat, even more impressive than what they had seen Hemlock do, because she sensed his unease. He’d admitted before that he didn’t want this power, that it made him uncomfortable. Like a freak. That’s what he had called himself.
“I can’t deny that there have been times when seeing things has come in handy during this mission,” Heath said, touching a finger to his temple, “but I’d be more comfortable than a pig in a wallow if it was someone else who had the power.”
“Striker, perhaps.”
“Dear Buddha, no. He’d spend all his time developing it so he could see through women’s clothes.”
“Yes, I don’t think that’s what Hailey was imagining when she spoke of making human beings better.”
Heath removed his hat and pushed his hand through his hair. He was fidgeting a lot, like he had ants in his pants. She wondered if he knew that those around him were likely relieved that he was the one developing these powers. Hemlock had been a disaster, thinking only of his own selfish need for revenge. The best person to wield power was the person who didn’t want it.
But her mission was different from her sister’s. She had never intended to make supermen or for her subjects to develop previously unknown abilities. She’d been thinking only of eliminating as many diseases as possible, improving health, and increasing longevity. The intestinal microbiota could still lead to that end—with time, she ought to be able to figure out which bacteria combined with which gene expressions had led to the Grenavinian… quirks. Perhaps she could eliminate those and refine her strain to somethi
ng that truly would help humanity as a whole.
Judging by the tortured expression on Heath’s face, he would rather not be a part of those refinements. That was fine with her. Now that she had an emotional interest in him, he was a completely inappropriate test subject for her.
“Heath,” she said, patting the back of his hand. “Come by my lab later, will you? I’ll prepare something for you.”
His expression turned dour. “Tests?”
“No. An answer to your concerns, I believe.”
His eyebrows rose, and a hint of hope gleamed in his green eyes.
“We’re clear to exit,” Jamie said from the pilot’s seat. “Lieutenant Sparks, I’ll start working on a list of repairs. Ladybug has had a rough couple of days.” She patted the helm.
“Ladybug.” Lieutenant Sparks made a choking noise.
“It’s too bad none of the fuzzy, spotted seat covers were damaged,” Striker said under his breath.
“I heard that,” Ankari said, pushing herself to her feet. “If you malign our decor, we won’t let you ride in our shuttle anymore.”
“Darn.” Striker ambled toward the hatch, his eyes lighting up as they took in Heath and Lauren, sitting side by side. “You two going to get together for raucous sex soon?”
“Uh?” Heath said.
“I’ve seen you getting cozy back here. Dr. Keys was in your lap earlier.”
“When I was on the deck after falling through the hatchway with the women?”
“You have to get ’em in your lap any way you can.” Striker elbowed Heath as he stood up, then gave Lauren a leer. “Did you manage to get a nice grope while she was falling on top of you?”
“You’re a rutting animal, Striker.”
Ankari shoved Striker in the back. “Get your tactless mouth off our shuttle. Your empty bunk is calling to you.” She wrinkled her nose. “As is your shower.”
“What’d I say?” Striker asked as more than one set of hands shoved him toward the hatch. “Nobody else likes your seat covers, either. I was just speaking my mind, like a man should.”
“I’m sorry about him,” Heath told Lauren as the others filtered past. He slipped his cap back on and offered her a hand up. “I hit him in the head as often as I can when we spar, hoping to jar some sense into him, but it never seems to help.”
“I just assumed he was raised by wolves.”
“He’d be a lot more polite if he had been. Alpha wolves don’t take crap from the pups in the pack, so they all grow up knowing their place. As far as I can tell, Striker doesn’t have a place.” He tilted his head as they walked down the mangled and creaking ramp. “When should I come to your lab?”
“It’ll take me a few hours to prepare my solution. Wait until tonight.”
His brows twitched upward, some of the grimness fading from his face. “You’re not planning to seduce me, are you?”
“Would that solve your boulder problem?”
“No, but it would make me forget about it for a while.”
She prodded at a grimy stain on his armor. “Change and shower before you show up, and we’ll see what happens.”
His eyebrows did far more than twitch this time, shooting upward and almost disappearing under the rim of his cap. He opened his mouth to say something, but tripped before it came out. To be fair, it wasn’t his fault—the ramp had been severely damaged, and the end hovered several inches above the deck instead of sitting flush. It thwarted his attempt to recover, and he ended up on the deck on his side.
“Are you all right?” Lauren blurted, crouching to reach for him.
“Oh, yeah,” he breathed, as if he hadn’t even noticed that he’d pitched to the deck.
Striker’s snicker drifted back to them as he paused at the shuttle bay exit and looked in their direction. “Somebody’s getting sex tonight. I can always tell.”
Ankari shoved him again. “Maybe when you’re alone in your rack tonight, you can contemplate why it won’t be you.”
Chapter 17
Tick slid his finger under the collar of his shirt. It was just a T-shirt, but that collar felt ridiculously confining at the moment. And he was sweating. Damn it. Lauren had told him to shower, and he had, vigorously and thoroughly, scrubbing his skin until it glowed red, determined that she would find nothing unappealing about him. But he’d no sooner than stepped out of the ladder well on her deck than he had started sweating.
Though he hadn’t completely rehearsed what he planned to say—coming across as casual and witty took a lot of rehearsal—he knocked on her door, anyway, figuring a less than smooth delivery would be preferable to armpit stains.
“Come in,” Lauren’s voice drifted out. The door slid aside.
Tick stepped inside, his heart thudding so loudly that he imagined he could hear it beating against his eardrums. He forced himself to loosen his grip on the plate of cookies he had talked Ying into making, cookies that still smelled of warm chocolate.
The flowers he had plucked from the ship’s grow room were in even more danger from his tense grip. He should have put them in a vase. What was she going to do with flowers without a vase? Did she keep a vase in her lab or something that could be used as one? He peered around, half looking for a vase and half wondering why his mind wouldn’t stop gibbering. It was a good thing she wasn’t the one with the mental powers. His thoughts would do nothing to impress her.
“Hello, Heath,” Lauren said brightly, turning away from a counter full of lab equipment.
She wore a silky blouse under her loose white lab coat, one that hugged the curves of her breasts nicely, and for a moment, he couldn’t find his voice as he imagined unbuttoning the blouse and sliding his hands—and maybe his lips and tongue—over her breasts. The rest of her looked nice too. She wasn’t dressed any differently than normal, but she looked like she had found time to shower, too, and that familiar scent of oranges drifted to his nostrils. He longed to walk straight up to her, bury his nose in the warm skin of her throat, and inhale deeply. Maybe he’d bury his face in her hair too. She wore it down, the dark locks framing her face and dangling down to the curve of her breasts. Somehow, his gaze always ended up back on her breasts. Nobody would accuse him of being a butt man.
“Hi,” he said, realizing she was waiting for a response. She’d also noticed the cookies and flowers, so he stepped forward and offered them to her. “I didn’t know if you liked sweets or smelly things, so I brought both.”
“Smelly things?” She smiled and sniffed, though she waved her nose at him rather than at the plate of cookies.
“I showered,” he promised, willing the pricks of incipient sweat in his armpits to go away. Maybe if they both got naked, he would be less likely to sweat. Or maybe if they were both naked, it wouldn’t matter, because they would be busy doing things where sweat was expected, maybe even desirable. Would she ever run her tongue along his damp skin, enjoying the taste of him?
His groin stirred at these thoughts, his cock pressing against his trousers. He pointedly did not look at it and hoped Lauren wouldn’t notice it, either. She’d mentioned helping him with his problem. While she had hinted that she might be willing to have sex, or at least to share some kind of romantic moment later that night, she probably wouldn’t have asked him to come to her lab if that was all she had on her mind.
“Thank you.” Lauren accepted the plate of cookies and the flowers. The cookies went on the counter. She considered the flowers—a few colorful tulips and roses plucked from the tiny section of the grow room that wasn’t dedicated to growing fruits and vegetables for the crew—a little more doubtfully, then went hunting in the cabinets.
Idiot. He should have found a vase somewhere. Not that a vase was an easy thing to locate on a mercenary ship full of burly men with a predisposition toward breaking things, but surely, he could have foreseen this problem and come up with a solution.
Lauren pulled out a tall beaker with measurements printed on the side, filled it with water, and stuck the flowers
inside. There. A solution. He sagged against the counter in relief, feeling foolish for his concern. And for worrying about it so much that his armpits were constantly in danger of breaking out in sweat. So what if it had been years since he’d had a relationship with a woman that hadn’t involved a brothel visit? That was no reason to panic.
“I have something for you also,” Lauren said, gazing up at him.
She looked calm, serene. Definitely not panicked. Maybe she wasn’t thinking about sex with him and worrying about getting it just right. Maybe she knew she didn’t have to perform well to impress him. He would be beyond delighted just to see her naked and to be allowed to touch. Well, visiting her orifices, as she had mentioned, would definitely be desirable too.
“What is it?” Tick asked, making himself look her in the eyes instead of allowing his gaze to dip to her breasts again. She had probably already noticed all of the peeks he had sneaked at them. He couldn’t help it that she was wearing something that snugged up against her curves so nicely.
She pulled a small round tin off the counter and held it out to him. “I apologize that these don’t look as professional as they would if they came out of a pharmacy, but they should do the trick. Out here near the rim worlds, it’s questionable what kinds of offerings pharmacies would have, anyway. You’re probably safer in my lab.” She quirked a smile at him.
“Of that I have no doubt,” he said, though he was puzzled as he accepted the tin. He opened it and stared down at a bunch of capsules. Pills. “Uh, if you’re hoping to avoid getting pregnant tonight, I think you’re supposed to take these.”
He’d meant it as a joke, but from the confused way her face wrinkled up, he didn’t think she understood it. Or maybe she was puzzled—or annoyed—that he had assumed they would have sex.
“Sorry,” he said. “I just meant—”
“They’re antibiotics, silly. As for the rest, I’ve had a birth control implant since I was thirteen.”
“Oh,” Tick said, staring down at the tin and willing understanding to come over him. His first thought was that he’d picked up some odd infection down on Sturm and that she somehow knew about it before he did. Then the gears slowly started turning, and he mouthed another, “Oh. To kill the bugs you gave me?”
The Tracker's Dilemma: (A Mandrake Company Science Fiction Romance) Page 21