Page 11 of Seduced By the Alien Mercenary

Chapter 7

Flack

It was a restless night; far worse than the others before it. I blamed it on the rapid healing my body was doing thanks to Dravion’s shot. More likely, it was because my body was feverishly hot for Irena. Her innocent, accidental touches had been engraved into my body. From the way she’d carefully, trustingly clung to my shoulder, to the brush of her hand over my cock. Stars, the image of her kneeling at my feet, so innocently petting my thigh, I would never forget it.

When the day cycle started, I was relieved, though I sensed it only by the changing sounds on the ship. Perhaps Dimon would visit again and give me someone to spar with, even if only verbally. If Xathena showed up, I might not manage to keep my cool; she had always gotten under my skin. Most of all, I hoped that Irena would manage to sneak into the brig area again to visit. She had a way out other than the door, that’s how she left last night. Naturally, that meant she had a way in too. Would she do it? Visit me beyond bringing me my meal and changing my bandage?

The even bigger question was: had she gotten to a comm device and called the Varakartoom? I should not have asked her to put herself at risk that way, not her. Unfortunately, Dimon had been smart enough to keep everyone away from me. Drugged and chained, he thought he had me under his thumb. He’d soon find out he was wrong, because I could feel myself getting stronger. The stimulants Irena had managed to give me were helping me combat the shift-suppressing drugs.

Unfortunately, Dimon did not show for some entertainment, and neither did Xathena. Worse, I saw neither hide nor hair of Irena all day. I didn’t do well with boredom, which was precisely why Dimon kept me so secluded in the brig. I fidgeted, tested my chains over and over. Tried out what exercise I could manage with just my lower body free. The wound in my side was almost healed by the time evening fell. I was practically bouncing on the cot with restless energy and still, no one came.

We’d leaped five times through FTL, all without much warning. Though perhaps that was because the intercom in the brig was broken, and such warnings simply did not reach me. They were working the pilot and navigator hard, as well as the engines, if they risked that many jumps in such short order. Each was a long one too, several minutes by my count. Dimon must be really strapped for time, trying to get the money together before Jalima killed him and his crew. There weren’t many places you could run to avoid the well-connected crimelord’s long reach.

In the boring evening hours, as darkness descended with the night cycle, my thoughts filled with all the things I did not want to think about. Memories of the past—of my life on this ship as part of its crew—and the explosive way it had all fallen apart. Worse, I found myself thinking of the life I’d led before Dimon’s crew: the stray I’d been on Sune’s gleaming white streets after my mother kicked me out for being a worthless little runt.

She’d had so many expectations, and I thought wryly that she’d be even more abhorred to discover who I’d grown up to be. “I paid for the right to have you,” she used to say. “The great Dyantos, the truest of true shifters, is your father. You’re supposed to be something, not this…” Her derision, her fury, her shame, all of it thrummed through my head in the dark. I had not just failed to be a true shifter; the strange genetic quirk true shifters like Dyantos, like Kitan had failed to pass on to me. I’d been an embarrassment. The smallest of small when I shifted, a runt, a weakling.

Irena arrived so silently I almost missed it. She entered through the brig’s entrance with a tray in her hands, food smells wafting my way. My eyes locked on her, and those feelings of inadequacy began to fade away. So I wasn’t what my mother had wanted, and I wasn’t what Dimon wanted, but I knew I could be exactly what Irena needed. That was all that mattered.

She looked better than when I’d first laid eyes on her. Her skin was pale from lack of sunlight, but the wound on her face was almost healed. Now, only a grid-like pattern of white lines marked most of her cheek. A very visible mark, that was true, but it no longer looked like the infection might kill her if she didn’t get treatment. That made me draw in a slow, measured breath of relief. One threat down; now there were just the dozen males on the crew left to deal with.

“Well, hello, beautiful,” I said in greeting. “How’s your day been?” I was itching to know everything, but my breath froze in my lungs when I saw the tight expression on her face. Something had happened, something bad. I swore, my body jerking against the chains as fury on her behalf rose hard and fast. Helpless, again. I hated that feeling, hated how I couldn’t do what she needed just yet, or free myself from these chains. The shift rippled under my skin, fur pressing up and claws digging against my finger pads. I felt the block, felt the pressure that kept me from completing that shift, but it was a very near thing.

“Flack,” she said softly, her tray of food rattling in her hands. She unlocked my cell as if it wasn’t a scary thing at all, like she’d begun to trust me. It eased something beneath my skin, settled the fur that wanted to burst forth. “Is… is your crew always so… terrifying?” The words, spoken in a high pitch that wasn’t quite a tremble and wasn’t quite incredulous, completely derailed me.

Aramon, that was my next thought. She’d managed to call the Varakartoom and hadn’t stopped at just calling and hanging up. She’d actually spoken to someone, and it was either crazy Aramon or someone like the Sineater or Thatcher who had answered the call. I opened my mouth to ask her what had happened, but she caught me completely by surprise that evening. Not just by arriving so suddenly, not just because she looked so damn good I could eat her. No, she dropped the tray on the cot next to me, and then she was reaching for me. Actually touching me in a willing, not forced, not coincidental act. Her hand touched my cheek, brushing warmly across it with the silky touch of her fingertips.

“Oh, what was that? That looked like fur for a moment!” The attempt to shift had shaken her completely out of her earlier state of shock. Now I saw a side of her that delighted, that made me want to smile and entice, and preen a little. She’d seen my failed attempt to shift, and it had roused her curiosity. It was, I had no doubt, a side of her she had not experienced in a very long time.

“It was,” I agreed mildly, and I tried again, pushing against the chemical bindings with as much force as I dared. Fur shifted and rippled beneath my skin with an itch so sharp it was almost pain. I ignored it; it didn’t matter, because Irena responded with a delighted gasp and touched my face again, brushing the whiskers that briefly sprouted and the pristine white fur that momentarily covered my face.

“I am Sune,” I said proudly, my chin lifting so I could meet the curious glow in her eyes. “A shifter. I exist in three shapes: two legs like you see now, four legs, much like a fox from your planet, and a hybrid-form that blends the two.” Her hand lingered against my skin, though I’d given up on the shift. It drifted down my throat, along my shoulder, and made a chill shoot down my spine, pleasure coiling in my gut. My reaction to her was powerful and impossible to hide. My cock grew hard beneath the tight confines of my armor.

“And the drugs, they stop the shift, don’t they? That’s why you want me to stop giving that injection?” Her head tilted toward the tray on the cot next to me, and we both stared at the tarnished metal of the injector. It was so close to wearing off; in a few hours, I could shift and slip these shackles.

I nodded slowly. “Yes. Without the drugs, I could shift and escape.” I jerked my chin toward the shackles that held my wrists, which I would be able to slip once I shifted my hands into paws. Dimon knew just how easy it would be for me to escape, and there was no chain he could put on me that would hold me the moment I could shift.

Irena’s continued curiosity made me deeply aware of how little she knew. She’d only learned about those around her by using her eyes and ears, and there were no Sune readily shifting aboard the Vidu for her to witness. Would she be scared or amazed when she saw one of the other shapes I could take? The humans on the Varakartoom thought foxes were cute and pretty, and that was the shape my four-legged form most closely resembled. Would she think so too? Normally, cute was not a description I coveted, but cute was better than scared in Irena’s case.

“Okay,” she agreed, and rather than asking more questions, she lifted the injector she was supposed to give me and emptied it with a hiss into the air, away from us. The pale liquid of the drug lurched into the dark and disappeared against the grimy, smeared flooring of the brig. A wave of relief washed over me at the sight, and tension uncoiled deep inside my gut. I hadn’t realized how much I’d loathed the inability to change, the vulnerable state it put me in. Now, it was over. Not much longer, and the previous dose would fully wear off.

My fingers tightened, curling into fists. What would I do the moment I could get out of here? As strong as I was, and as ragtag as the crew was, I couldn’t take them all on at once. It was very tempting to sink my claws into Dimon’s gut, or to tear into Xathena’s throat and make her pay for her cowardly attack. I burned to make them all pay for what they’d done to Irena, how they’d treated her. It was unforgivable.

“It’s done,” she whispered, and it drew me out of my spiraling—and considerably violent—thoughts. Irena. She was the only person who mattered on this rust bucket, and vengeance would have to come second to ensuring her safety. My mind already spun with options, but there was no escaping the Vidu while in space. None of her shuttles functioned well enough to use for an escape, so we’d have to make our move down on the planet where the diamond was. The Verana diamond that had once slipped through my grasp, but which I’d gladly let go again if it meant rescuing Irena. Of the two, she was by far the greater treasure.

“Thank you, sweetheart,” I said, and forced a smile onto my face to banish the darkness in my mind. I had my priorities straight, but that did not mean the desire to use claws and teeth on my enemies had abated. “Shall we eat now? Trixom’s food is certainly nothing to write home about, but it fills the belly…” And it would bring her closer to me. I could not wait to feel the tentative brush of her hand on my shoulder once again. My body ached just remembering that, as if it had been a kiss, a passionate embrace.

She gave me a long look that made my muscles tighten beneath my skin. Just yesterday, I didn’t think she would have managed to hold my gaze this long, but she was holding it now, her eyes clinging to mine as if she were trying to see straight into my soul. Was she still deciding whether to trust me? To believe Dimon’s word or mine?

Then she did this little thing where she nibbled on her lush lower lip, and I found myself jerking forward, all instinct and no thought. The shackles tightened around my wrists, rattling dangerously, and the cot groaned beneath me as if it was about to give. “Stars! That’s hot,” I growled, a voice at the back of my mind screaming a warning. Too much, this was too much, and I’d scare her away. Irena, though, she was made of bolder stuff. I didn’t once believe it was because I’d done that good a job convincing her she could trust me.

Pink stained her cheeks. The grid-like scar had taken on a more defined shape since healing, now forming pale white lines across her skin. Her eyes grew wide and shimmery, mirrors of deep, soft brown that reflected my image back at me. “Are you crazy, Flack? You keep saying things like that, but… have you seen me? Really seen me?” She flung her hands wide, then gestured at her body, inviting me to look.

I jerked against my chains again, fighting the urge to reach for her when I couldn’t. Touching her as much as I wanted would definitely scare her off, so it was a good thing I was still bound, even if my instinctive struggle was drawing red welts across my wrists where the shackles tightened.

“Have I seen you? Stars…” I said, mouth dry, pulse spiking, and all that tedious boredom of the day banished. Lust pounded through my veins, and there was no hiding a desire that powerful. My cock grew firm beneath my black armor, pressing against the tight confines with a delicious ache for her. “I have not seen nearly enough, and yet I know all I need to know. You are the most divine creature I’ve ever laid eyes on. In you, I see all the things I thought I’d never have. In you, I see a home.”

Damn it, that was not nearly a good enough declaration; it barely skimmed the surface of the immense things I felt when I laid eyes on her. Home, that was true, though. Seeing her made me think I could be the right thing, the right male, for just this one person in the galaxy. It was frustrating to be trapped, to want things that were just beyond my grasp, and then to fail at the one thing that normally never failed me: my way with words.