“I don’t want to train again. I’ve already showered. Besides, I want to spend actual time with you.” She smiled sweetly. “Xer would have watched the show with me. Since you’re always off doing gods know what, I guess I could find him and ask him to—”
Kedar vaulted over the sofa. “You will do no such thing,” he growled. “If I ever meet this Xaal, I will challenge him. His death will be long and painful, over the course of weeks. First, I will take his—”
He detailed, not for the first time, exactly how he would make him suffer. She may or may not have ever corrected the fact that there was no Xer. Kedar knew that she hadn’t been with this other Xaal, but it truly kept him vigilant to think that therecouldbe another Xaal out there that wanted her. Besides, she enjoyed getting him riled up.
She supposed she would tell him one day. Honesty and all that. But for now, she would enjoy the possessive way he pulled her across his lap while placing a pillow on the other side for her head. The way his big hands kneaded her curves before landing a stinging smack on her backside.
She sucked in air through her teeth. “That’s hardly a massage.”
“Perhaps you should call Xer if you do not find my hands satisfactory,” he grumbled. Then he smacked her a little harder on her other cheek before rubbing the stinging pain away with his palm.
Heat pooled in her core, but she needed to focus. She finally had him right where she wanted him. “Don’t be sour,” she murmured. “You know I love your big, rough hands on me. I just can’t believe this is finally happening.”
“It is truly a miraculous day,”Liv monotoned. “Would you like me to add it to the growing list of firsts, such as the first time you fucked in a bed, the first time you fucked oneach cushion of the couch, the first time you yelled at him for devouring two jars of jam?”
“This middle cushion, when was that?” Kedar asked as the show’s dramatic intro music started. He was squeezing Vessa’s thigh, his fingers entirely too close to the juncture for it to be considered a massage.
“That one was three days after your arrival. It was the fifth time you knotted on board the Jax, and Vessa chanted ‘harder’ approximately nine times, suggesting—”
“Oh, gods save me.Enough, Liv.”
“As you will, overseer.”
After three episodes, Vessa was thoroughly massaged. He’d systematically rubbed out each knot and tight spot. Her body felt like warm butter. “So?” she asked.
“I do not understand.”
Her hope dwindled. A frown pulled at the corner of her lips as she sat up beside him.
Kedar ran a hand through his hair, only to pat it down again. “The Erodian Emperor says he will destroy all the Vectran, but then he gives the one he has in his dungeon a golden fruit from her planet? He doesn’t know she’s the one who killed his brother, either, and there’s that—”
Vessa cheered, and Kedar looked even more confused by her reaction. “We got him!”
“Wooo,” Liv droned.
“Just wait until Braxon the Dark comes in. It only gets wilder from here. Welcome toBetween Dimensions!” Vessa kissed his cheek affectionately multiple times until he smiled at her enthusiasm.
“I do need to know what happens next,” he rumbled, “but I have a surprise for you that can’t wait for another episode.”
She lifted a brow. The last time he had a surprise for her, he’d given her a plasma dirk. “Another weapon?”
Kedar stood up and didn’t look at her as he said, “You’ll find out in ten minutes.”
Suspicious. Pursing her lips, she followed him around the sofa. “Why are you putting your mask on?”
Kedar didn’t answer her question, instead telling her that she would need shoes, too, and disappearing the moment she turned around. Very suspicious.
While she waited, she tried to imagine what it could be. He’d certainly been working onsomethingthese last few months, but she’d kept her promise not to follow him or try to pry any information out of him about it. Perhaps all his work was finally finished.
Minutes later, dressed and armed, they wound their way to the open hatch of her ship. “Go ahead,” Kedar said as he moved to the side so she could pass him. She shook her head at his demeanor. He was acting bizarre.
At this time of the day, the twin suns were high in the sky, and as she stepped out, she had to shade her eyes to see what it was Kedar had brought.
But it wasn't what. It waswho.
Their backs were to her as they looked at something in the treeline, but she knew the woman’s long, dark silver hair, knew the exact broadness of the man’s shoulders.
“Mama? Papa?” she breathed.
