Chapter Seven
The door chime interruptedthem right about the time Allie was starting to think about sex again.
“I’ll get it.” Shank dropped his reader on the bed and went for the door.
“They locked it. They can open it themselves,” Allie said, but she kept her complaint quiet. Shank grinned at her anyway. Despite the fact that they were prisoners, the person on the other side didn’t open the door until Shank hit the internal release.
“Caj!” Shank seemed genuinely pleased to see the man.
Allie moved to sit on the arm of the couch so she could keep an eye on Caj. “Come to tie us up again?” Allie demanded. She knew she was trading in guilt, but the asshole had tied her up and locked her in a room. He should feel guilty. Unfortunately, the ploy seemed to fail rather spectacularly.
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” he said with a disingenuous smile.
Allie crossed her arms.
“So, are we close to Mom’s ship?” Shank sounded a little too cheerful and bright. He wasn’t by nature a perky person. Allie looked over, and Shank gave her a desperate look that made it pretty damn clear he was trying to make up for the fact that she was acting like an ass.
Annoyed with herself for losing control of her emotions, she took a deep breath. “Honestly, being locked up puts me in a rotten mood, and when I’m unhappy, I tend to share the feeling,” she said in an almost apology.
Caj took a few seconds to look at her, and she had the definite impression she was being judged. Finally, he shrugged. “Then I feel bad for Shank being locked in here, but I’m still not going to let a second crew run around on my ship. And no,” he answered Shank directly, “we aren’t near your mother, but she did send word. I thought you and I could take a walk and discuss things.”
Shank glanced at Allie, but she just turned around and went back to the couch. She was going stir-crazy, but Shank couldn’t help that. Instead of resenting him for getting to leave the room, she decided to invest her time in finding a video that wasn’t totally horrible.
“Is this a catching up on all the stories of when I was five, or do you want to talk strategies and plans?” Shank asked.
“How about both?”
Shank didn’t answer, and Allie turned to look over the back of the couch to try to figure out the reason for his silence. He was looking at her.
“If you want to talk strategies, take Allie for that walk. She handles our strategy or at the very least signs off on it. If we make plans, then I have to come back here and explain it all, and then if she doesn’t like whatever I negotiated, it’s my neck on the line. So you talk strategy with her directly.”
Allie immediately objected. “This is your stupid plan. “ If she was alone with Caj, she would be too tempted to explain all the ways she thought he was an asshole.
Shank smiled at her. “No, my stupid plan ended with getting on a family ship and asking my mom for help. I’m flying blind now.”
“You never were one for long-term planning,” Caj said with a laugh.
Shank ducked his head and shrugged. “It always worked out okay.”
