Arin heard a sigh of relief from Baraka.
“What ship?” Suspicion clouded Kail’s hard voice. “We can’t see you on our tracking system.”
Rykal shrugged. “We shouldn’t be too far away. Human vessels can’t travel very fast.”
A bright idea entered Arin’s head. “This vessel has some sort of cloaking on it, and I have no idea how to deactivate it. I’m not a tech-head or a navigator. TheSilvermistwon’t be visible on ordinary tracking screens, so why don’t we eject the ship’s escape pods? They’ll send out an alert to all Federation ships in the vicinity, and you’ll be able to track their trajectory from this exact point.”
“Sounds feasible,” Baraka muttered.
Kail grunted in assent.
“Well, let’s do it then.” Rykal came up behind Arin, wrapping his arms around her torso, his sneaky hands snaking in between the straps that held her guns in place. He nuzzled her neck, nipping her gently with his fangs. “Not that I’m allowing you to get anywhere near the inside of an escape pod again. Not after what happened last time. Your species are an untrustworthy bunch, myashika.” He whispered in her ear, so softly only she would be able to hear him.
Arin shuddered in a good way as Rykal pulled her against him, planting soft kisses along her neck. “They’re still on the comm,” she mouthed silently, feeling self-conscious all of a sudden, even though nobody could see them.
“Kail,” Rykal called, bringing his hands up so that they grazed Arin’s sensitive breasts.
“Yeah?”
“You got that?”
“Yeah.”
“Coming?”
“Yeah. Don’t do anything stupid in the meantime, pretty-boy. I’m tired of chasing your silver ass around this backwater galaxy.”
“Don’t worry, dark one. Barring another gas leak, explosion,Xargek infestation, or missile attack, we’re not going anywhere.”
“Hm.” Kail cut the comm with an irritated grunt.
Arin turned and looked up at Rykal. “He’s a surly one, isn’t he?”
“Kail has his moments,” Rykal said cryptically. “Let’s go down and eject these escape pods of yours, then I believe there are still humans to be found on this vessel.” He tightened his arms, wrapping Arin in a warm embrace. “Even though I just want to stand here and hold you for a while.”
“You can do that afterwards,” Arin murmured, a warm, fuzzy feeling rising up inside her.
She was madly, hopelessly compromised, and she wouldn’t have it any other way.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Voices drifted through the walls, tickling Rykal’s sensitive hearing. “Found you,” he whispered. He tapped on the wall and was rewarded with a hollow echo.
There was a room on the other side, and there were humans inside.
“In there?” Arin frowned, scrutinizing the section Rykal was pointing to. Her blue eyes flicked up and down, searching for an opening. “Are you sure?”
“I’m rarely wrong about these kinds of things.” The other warriors thought he was a bit insane, but sometimes Rykal thought he couldfeelthings; hunches and so on.
Arin tapped gently along the wall, looking for some kind of door or entry point, but it was seamless.
Rykal shrugged. “We’ll wait until the others get here, then I’ll just cut it with something made from Callidum. They can’t escape. I just want to have a little chat with the woman who thought she could blow me into oblivion.”
“Little chat?” Arin’s tone was skeptical. “I suspect your idea of a ‘little chat’ differs from my definition of a ‘little chat’.”
“Yes, but we have the same goals in mind, don’t we?”
Arin shot him an exasperated look. “My goal isn’t to kill every human or alien who rubs me the wrong way.”
