“Oh, her mate.”
“Yup.” She nodded. “And a skillet is a cooking utensil like a frying pan. A Slim Jim is a junk food type meat snack. They’re not very good but some people love them. This lady did, anyway.” She frowned up at him. “Hey, weren’t you stationed on Earth? Why don’t you know some of this stuff?”
Stav shrugged. “We were instructed to stay mostly in the HKR building. Kindred almost never mingle with a native species—we only go out to claim our brides.” He sighed. “Maybe if we had gone out to mingle your people would know us better and there wouldn’t be so many misconceptions about the Kindred and what we do.”
“What you do is make girls come up to the Mother Ship and do all kinds of sexual things whether they want to go or not,” she retorted, putting a hand on her ample hip.
“Have you thought about the fact that we might be required to do something of a sexual nature while we are pretending to be a couple in need of help at J’lorgon’s Mind?” he countered.
He had the pleasure of seeing her cheeks turn rosy pink but she shook her head firmly.
“I told you, we’re playing a couple on the brink of divorce. That means no canoodling.”
“No what?” Stav shook his head.
“No fooling around. This may be an undercover operation but there are limits. I mean, I had to dress up as a prostitute once for a vice sting but—”
“You dressed up as a female who sells her body for credits?” Stav raised an eyebrow at her, his imagination going into overdrive. “What exactly did you wear?”
Her cheeks got pink again.
“Never you mind. The point is just because I looked the part doesn’t mean I acted it. In fact, I think we need to set some boundaries right here and now.”
“All right.” Stavros was beginning to be a bit irritated but he held on to his temper. “You’ve already kissed me, sat in my lap and put your hand down my trousers—what further boundaries do you wish to set that you are not willing to cross?”
She rounded on him suddenly, hands on her hips, eyes blazing.
“I was under the influence of drugs when I did all that. Well except for putting my hand in your britches but I couldn’t help that because I didn’t want a mess on my granny’s quilt.”
“True.” He nodded. “But you cannot deny that you enjoyed the healing kiss that we shared and you were completely lucid then.”
“I most certainly did not,” she protested, a bit too quickly.
Stavros stopped in the hallway just outside the entrance to the vast docking bay.
“I scented your heat, Charlie,” he said softly, searching her eyes with his own. “Kindred have an incredibly sensitive sense of smell. You cannot lie to me about what you were feeling when I healed you.”
“You scented my what? Never mind,” she said quickly before he could explain. “Look, whether I enjoyed it when you, uh, healed me is not the point.”
“And what is you point?” Stav demanded.
“To save my planet! And I want it understood right here and now that is the only reason I volunteered to come with you on this mission. Not because I think you’re cute or because you have an amazing ass—”
“I do?” Stavros looked over his shoulder to examine the area in question. “What’s amazing about it?”
“Look, I’m trying to say I’m here in a professional capacity only,” she said, clearly exasperated. “So listen up, buddy—here are the limits: no kissing, no touching—at least not intimate touching—you know what I’m talking about, and no sex. Oh, and no more biting.” She eyed his fangs warily. “I’m your partner, not your personal pin cushion. Got it?”
“You seem to have a lot of boundaries for someone who wants so badly to save their planet,” Stavros said coldly. Though he tried not to let it, her personal rejection of him hurt. Why did she have to be so angry and mistrustful of him?
“Look, if it comes down to it, I’ll do what I have to do,” she said evenly. “But I really doubt that’s going to be the case. We’re probably just going to be sitting around talking about our feelings all day. That I can handle.”
“Can you?” Stav growled. “It might be difficult as it would require you to admit that you have feelings in the first place.”
“Hey, just because I don’t want to do that horizontal hokey-pokey with you is no reason to get nasty,” she snapped.
“I refuse to argue with you anymore,” he growled, at the end of his patience. “If you do not wish to be touched then fine, I will not touch you. As for biting, please don’t concern yourself about that. Blood Kindred bite only to heal their mates or during bonding sex—neither of which I intend to do with you. Now come,” He jerked his head in the direction of their ship. “The control room has already folded space for us to the crab nebula. It is a massive waste of energy to keep them waiting.”
Charlotte looked as though she wanted to say something but in the end, she kept her mouth shut and followed him silently through the cavernous, echoing docking bay to the waiting shuttle. They were both fuming silently as they climbed into the cockpit and Stav started it up.
It doesn’t matter, he told himself as he manipulated the controls and pulled back on the steering yoke. It’s not as if you could have any kind of lasting relationship with her. You’re Cursed, remember? She’s right—you’re just going to work together, nothing else.
Still, she could be a little less abrasive about it. He wondered what had happened to make her so distrustful and wary. The way she’d been staring at Commander Lock—could that have anything to do with it? She’d seemed to know him in some way—but how? Stav cut off the line of thought. Best put it out of your mind—you’re never going to find out. Just as you’re never going to have anything but a professional relationship with this female.
He cast a glance at Charlotte but she was sitting very straight and still, wrapped in a layer of silence so deep it was deafening. Her eyes were directed away from him and her pink lips had become a thin, white line. The tension in every line and curve of her luscious body told him she was still angry and probably would be for some time.
Stav gave a silent sigh. As the shuttle lifted up and out of the invisible atmosphere bubble that protected the Mother Ship and into the blackness of space, he reflected that this looked to be a long and irritating mission.
Chapter Twelve
The demon inside Two buzzed like an angry insect trapped in a bottle.
“Why do you not shoot them down? Look—they are entering the fold! Do not let them escape!”
“Patience my friend.” Two smiled, baring his metal teeth as he watched the small shuttle fly free of the Kindred Mother Ship and slip into the vast red gash which had opened in space.
“You keep calling for patience but I am tried of waiting,” Ur snarled angrily from within him. “I want to see the Kindred of the Mother Ship suffer and burn! But instead of assaulting them or their pet planet, you’re allowing them to fold space and go in whatever direction they want while you just sit here and watch.”
“I’m not just watching my friend—I am waiting to see what they’re doing. And I am not just ‘letting them go’—there is a tracking device in place on that shuttle. The moment it arrives at its destination, we will have a much better idea of what they have planned.”
“Why do you care about their plans? Burn them! Burn them all and Earth too!”
Two shook his head and made a tsking sound.
“Now, now, you only feel that way because you’re all emotion and no reason. I suppose that is what comes of being an entity composed entirely of spirit.”
Two glanced again at the viewscreen where the rift in space was now closing. He knew to an outside observer it must appear that he was having a rather animated conversation with himself in two strangely distinct voices. The demon Ur, whom he had allowed to inhabit him, had a deep, distorted tone which sounded strange coming out of his own mouth but Two was used to it by now.
He was also growing used to
the demon. He’d had a few reservations at first and it was true that Ur’s rantings could be tiresome at times but he was mostly harmless. It had soon become clear that while the demon could use his vocal chords, he was helpless to control Two’s physical body. This was most satisfactory as far as Two was concerned—he had the demon with his store of knowledge about the Mother Ship and Earth trapped within where he could access his memories at any time but Ur could not escape or take him over.
Really, it was the perfect arrangement.
“How did you attach a tracking device?” Ur demanded. “Do you have an agent within the Mother Ship?”
“As to that, you shall see in time.” Two smiled, his thin, liver-colored lips curving up in a parody of amusement.
“Tell me!” Ur demanded. “You rifle my mind continuously in the search for information and you refuse me the use of your body—the least you can do is share what you know.”
“I think not.” Two’s grin widened. Really, having the demon captive within was most amusing. He didn’t know how he’d gotten along without Ur for so many years. It occurred to him now that he might have been…what was the word for that strange emotion? Oh yes, that he might have been lonely. Having a constant companion, even an angry one—especially an angry one—was nice.
As Ur continue to rant and rave, he turned away from the viewscreen and studied a small, handheld device.
So—J’lorgon’s Mind, he thought, taking care to put up a mental barrier between himself and the demon so as to keep his inner monologue private. I wonder what the Kindred of the Mother Ship want from there? Well, let’s just see—shall we? Let’s…just…see.
Chapter Thirteen
“We will be approaching the docking bay for the resort proper within the hour. Here—memorize this.”
Stavros thrust a thin, transparent tablet with information scrolling across it at Charlie without looking at her. She supposed his lack of eye contact might be because he was concentrating on the instruments to fly the shuttle but she knew better—he was still good and pissed at her.
Well, fine—she was still pissed at him too. They’d gone though the weird red gash in space and had been flying for the past thirty minutes in complete silence and Charlie wasn’t going to be the one to beg for a truce first.
Maybe you shouldn’t have been so sharp with him, whispered a little voice inside her which she tried to ignore. Maybe it would have been better not lay into him the way you did.
But she’d had to set some boundaries, hadn’t she? She couldn’t just let him walk all over her and assume he could play grab-ass any time he wanted once they went undercover because she was pretending to be the sweet little wifey to his big, burly breadwinner.
Still, you could have been a little nicer, whispered the voice. It sounded like Missy in her head—sounded like something her older sister would have said. Missy had always been the tactful one—the peacemaker between their parents when Momma and Daddy were fighting. Charlie was the bullheaded one—the one who was likely to dive headfirst into an argument and worry about the consequences later.
“Well? Are you going to take it?” Stavros growled, breaking her train of thought.
“Of course. What is it?” Charlie took the slender, clear tablet and began scanning it. It was written in some language other than English—perhaps it was the Kindred dialect? Luckily she could read it just fine because she’d been given a shot of translation bacteria when she was preparing for the mission yesterday.
“It’s our personal information,” Stavros said shortly. “The information we’re going to be giving to anyone who asks at the resort, anyway.”
“It has my real name here,” Charlie protested. “And my birth date. Freaking everything but my social security number!”
“Commander Lock told me he tried to keep names and dates as close to the truth as possible in order to avoid confusion.” Stavros was still staring straight ahead as he spoke. “That way if anyone suspects us, our stories will always align.”
“It says here we’ve only been married—er, joined— a few months,” Charlie said, still scanning.
He nodded. “It was an arranged marriage. My father was a wealthy Havoc—a magistrate from Xander Prime. The Havoc are an offshoot of the Kindred from a distant galaxy so that won’t arouse suspicion. Anyway, according to our story he chose you for your bloodlines. You came from a proud but impoverished family and you didn’t want to join with me but your father forced you to in order to get the bride price. Now we’re trying to find some kind of harmony in a joining which neither of us planned or wanted in the first place.”
“Wow, Commander Lock really was thorough,” Charlie murmured, scrolling through the document which seemed to contain a lot of backstory. “Look at all this—he should be a freaking romance author! I’m not sure I can memorize all of it in an hour.”
“You only need to know the basics,” Stavros rumbled. “It is forbidden to speak of your past to the other pilgrims at the resort. We are supposed to be concentrating on the future.”
“Then why bother with all these details?”
“This is the form that must be sent in to the priests and priestesses who council the pilgrims. That way they will know what to expect when advising and guiding us. They may allude to it from time to time but as I said, the emphasis is on the future and moving forward, not looking back.”
“That’s weird.” Charlie frowned. “Every therapy I’ve ever heard of is all about working through your past—not ignoring it.”
Stavros shrugged. “That is not their way. Look—we are beginning our descent now. See on the viewscreen-? J’lorgon’s Mind is just below us.”
Charlie looked up from the scrolling information and caught her breath. The resort looked like a net of colored lights interspersed with glowing white bubbles spread out in the blackness of space. In the very center of the huge web was a sphere that looked almost as big as a small moon. It gleamed in the darkness like a vast pearl with a pink light at its center. The light seemed to pulse as she watched, almost like a heartbeat.
“That’s our target—the Temple of Learning,” Stavros said, nodding at the huge central structure. “The Heart of Love it at its center. The smaller spheres are other, lesser temples and administration offices. The lights are individual rooms for the various couples who stay here during their instruction. They’re all connected by plasti-steel corridors. That’s the ‘webbing’ between them.”
“It’s beautiful,” Charlie murmured. “Is that pink pulsing light in the center the Heart?”
Stavros nodded. “I think so. We’ll have to ask to be certain. Unobtrusively, of course.”
“Of course. What’s that?” she asked, pointing. There was a single sphere on the outer edge of the colored web that gleamed a deep bruised purple-blue. It stood out among all the pearlescent orbs looking almost ominous compared to the soft golden and pink glow of the other bubbles and brightly colored lights.
He shook his head. “I don’t know. Commander Lock didn’t mention it in his report. But it’s out on the periphery of the resort—not our concern. We need to concentrate on getting to the very center.”
“We’ll get there,” Charlie said grimly. “Just give us a little time.” She sighed and unbuckled her safety harness.
“Where are you going?” The big Kindred looked at her sharply. “I told you we’re about to start our decent.”
“Keep your pants on,” Charlie snapped. “I just want to visit the ladies room and powder my nose.”
Stavros nodded. “I know that euphemism—I heard it often at the HKR building. You can find the fresher at the back of the ship but please do not be too long. I want you safely strapped in before we land.”
“Aye-aye, Captain.” Charlie gave him a snappy salute and walked past him, trying not to brush his broad shoulder with her hip as she went to the rear of the Kindred shuttle. Still, she couldn’t help a little contact and the feel of his warmth radiating against her side, however briefly, sent a
shiver down her spine. Ignore it, she told herself grimly and kept walking. What she couldn’t ignore, however, was the warm, spicy scent of his skin. Why did he have to smell so damn good? She tried not to breathe too deeply until she was past the cockpit area.
The back of the ship was lit only by a strip of dimly glowing dots that ran along one wall and Charlie walked carefully, not wanting to trip. She had to pass the small but serviceable kitchen area which had a single counter and sink and a microwave looking thing and there was a tiny bedroom in the back as well as the bathroom she was looking for. She wondered if all Kindred shuttles were similarly equipped. You could live here if you had to. It would be cramped but it wasn’t much smaller than the apartment she and Missy had shared in college. That was right before Missy—
No, don’t think about that! Pushing the thought to one side, she slipped inside the bathroom and took care of business. After washing her hands, she splashed a little cool water on her face and the nape of her neck and looked in the weird viewer-mirror thing on one wall.
“You’re going to be fine,” she told herself in a low voice. “It’s just another undercover op and he’s just your partner. So what if it’s in another galaxy and your partner happens to look hot and smell amazing? Just ignore all that and do your job, Charlie. Everything is going to be fine.”
On the way back and feeling much better after her little self-pep talk, she saw something from the corner of her eye that made her jump. In the back of the tiny kitchen, just below the counter something moved.
“What the—!” Charlie scooted hastily backwards, banging her hip on the postage stamp-sized table and stared into the gloomy corner. For a moment she thought she saw a pair of red, beady eyes looking back at her. But when she dared to step closer, they were gone. Was that some kind of a space rat or am I seeing things?
She thought about telling Stavros that they needed to get an exterminator in here but just then she heard him calling for her.
“We’ve been directed to land in the Temple of Registration,” he said as she made her way back up to the front. “Strap in so we can land.”