Found (8 page)

A muscle in Xairn’s jaw clenched and his eyes
narrowed. “What just
happened
was that you were about to
become a splice whore for the Spider.”

“A spice whore? What the hell is that?”
Lauren demanded.

“A prostitute who offers her body to
prospective clients. They try you out and if they like you, they
can pay an extra fee to take part of your body to a lab and clone
you.”

“Part…part of my
body?”
Lauren could
hardly believe it. Suddenly she flashed back to Vlanka’s orange,
seven fingered hands. Some of her fingers had ended in sharp purple
nails but some had ended in…
In stumps. Oh my God!
“You…you
mean like fingers?” she asked in a trembling voice.

“Among other things,” Xairn said darkly.
“Believe me, Lauren, it’s not a life you’d want. And as beautiful
and exotic as you are, you wouldn’t have lasted a month on the
streets. Blix would have sold you piece by piece until there was
nothing left.”

Lauren shook her head. “But…but I don’t see
how trading food cubes for clothes would make me Blix’s, uh,
whore.”

“The rules of trade in
O’ah
state that
every transaction must be of exactly equal value. That is why it’s
so dangerous to barter here instead of just buying something with
credits. The Spider gave you very expensive clothing and in return,
you gave him nothing but a few food cubes—you owed him more.
Much
more. And he could have forced you to pay the
difference with your body.” He pinched the bridge of his nose and
closed his eyes tightly for a moment as though trying to hold back
a headache. “Gods, if you hadn’t given him the cubes with the
grieza worms…”

“What would have happened?” Lauren
whispered.

“I would have fought for you to the
last—please know that,” Xairn said in a low voice. “But there is no
surviving a physical confrontation with the Judge of the Market. He
is a Quinlow—they carry the power of life and death in their hands.
So I…I would have lost you.” Suddenly he pulled Lauren to him in a
crushing hug. “Gods, Lauren, I can’t lose you. I
won’t.”
His
deep voice was raw with emotion.

Lauren was so surprised she could barely
think. In the entire time they’d known each other, Xairn had hardly
ever touched her willingly. In fact, he’d even gone so far as to
ask her
not
to touch him. Which made his spontaneous display
of affection all the more rare and precious.

“Oh, Xairn…” She hugged him back tightly,
nuzzling her face into his neck, breathing in the warm, spicy scent
of his bare skin. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered in his ear. “You
were gone for so much longer than you said and I was so afraid…”
She choked. “Afraid something had happened to you. And then Blix
tricked his way into the ship by pretending to be Mr. Kittles—the
pet rabbit I used to have. And then he seemed so nice and
reasonable and he kept saying you would never come back and I…I was
so scared and I missed you
so much.”

“That is what thought thieves do.” Xairn’s
voice was soft and fierce in her ear. “They sense the troubled
thoughts of their prey and then they stalk them mercilessly using
their own fears against them. Forgive me for not warning you in
more detail but I did not want to frighten you.”

Lauren kissed his cheek impulsively. “That’s
okay,” she whispered. “And I’m sorry I disobeyed orders. I should
have known you had a good reason for me to stay inside the ship.”
She shifted closer to him, happy to feel his arms around her and
the comforting press of his muscular chest against her breasts.
“I’m just so glad you’re safe.”

As she pressed her body against his, Xairn
stiffened in her arms. Abruptly, he drew away from her, ending the
hug as suddenly as it had begun. “I am pleased and relieved that
you are safe as well,” he said formally. “And I have good news—I
have located an Alteration house that will perform the necessary
manipulation of our respective DNA.”

“That’s nice, I guess,” Lauren said
doubtfully. “But Xairn…” She closed the distance he’d put between
them and put a hand on his arm. “I still—”

“Please.” Xairn pulled his arm away. “Don’t.
And I believe it would be best if you would give me back my shirt
and go put on the other garment I bought for you before I
left.”

Lauren frowned, scanning the heavy muscles of
his chest and arms for chillbumps. “I’m sorry. Are you cold?”

“No.” He suddenly wouldn’t look at her. “I
just think it would be best.”

“All right.” Feeling hurt by his sudden
about-face, Lauren withdrew. How could he be so effusively glad to
see her one moment and so cold the next? Try as she might, she
couldn’t help wishing to be in his arms again. He was so big and
warm and she felt so completely safe when she was pressed to his
chest. But from the closed look on his face, she could tell that
wasn’t going to happen.

Sighing, she went to the bathroom.
So much
for new clothes.

She was so busy removing Xairn’s shirt and
replacing the silver-blue muumuu, she almost missed the fact that
she was still wearing the blue slippers with crimson red soles.
When she finally realized she still had the shoes on, she had an
uneasy feeling. Was this going to cause problems later on? Or were
the worm cubes enough to pay for the slippers as well as the
clothes Blix had given her? Would Xairn be upset when he saw that
she had kept them?

Deciding not to take a chance, Lauren took
off the slippers and hid them in a small storage cabinet under the
sink. Then, sighing, she went to return Xairn’s shirt.

Xairn was weak with relief—or possibly blood
loss. He’d gotten into one last fight at the base of the support
which held up the plasti-glass splicer tunnels. There had only been
two splicers this time but one of them had jumped on his back
before Xairn saw him. His knife had bitten deep—though thankfully
not deep enough to wound his primary heart, which was what he’d no
doubt been reaching for.

He looked down at his side, examining the
wicked gash where the knife had cut him. Dark red blood was welling
up from the slice but at least it wasn’t gushing out. Xairn pulled
the waistband of his black flight pants a little higher and
tightened his belt to put pressure on the wound. There was no time
to deal with it any further at present. He had to get the ship
powered up and moved to Slk’s parking accommodations before it got
completely dark. And before the Spider’s spies found out where he
was headed.

He walked stiffly to the front of the ship
and settled himself in front of the controls, careful of the wound
on his side. Though he didn’t want to admit it, his body was
throbbing and it wasn’t just with pain. His secondary shaft, which
for years had lain dormant between his legs, was so hard it was
painful. It pressed against the front of his pants,snarling for
release. Thank the gods, at least, that his primary shaft remained
unaffected. But it was necessary only for bonding—the engorgement
of his secondary shaft was more than adequate for other sexual
purposes. Not that he would ever do such things to Lauren. Still,
his body was urging him to, telling him to take her, to make her
his.

All because of one simple, innocent hug.

She has no idea what she does to me—how
she affects me,
he thought as he put the engine through its
warm-up sequence. For a moment he allowed himself to relive the
sweet sensation of Lauren’s full breasts flush against his chest.
He’d been able to feel her nipples, tight and ripe, rubbing against
him through the thin material of his shirt. All her warm curves
pressed against him as she came so willingly into his arms…it was
almost as though she
wanted
to touch him. As though she
wanted to be close to him despite what he was.

She wouldn’t be so eager if she knew how I
felt. The things I need,
Xairn thought grimly. He didn’t want
the desires inside him. Didn’t want to be like the rest of his
race…like his sadistic father. Closing his eyes briefly, he
remembered the many perversions he’d seen the AllFather perform.
He’d savaged them—the unwilling females he took to satiate his
monstrous appetites.
I’d rather die than hurt Lauren that
way,
Xairn told himself fiercely.

No, he decided as the ship rose above the
skyline of
O’ah
and nosed toward the splicing district, he
would never do that to her. Never use her that way. In fact, it
would be better if he never touched her again. Gathering her into
his arms had been stupid and impulsive, especially considering even
such brief contact made his body react so strongly.

From now on he would have to keep his
distance—it wasn’t safe to be near her again.

“What’s troubling you, my lady?” Lock’s voice
was soft as he washed Kat’s back.

“I’ve sensed it too.” Deep kissed her and
squeezed the sponge he was holding so that warm water ran down over
her bare breasts. “Tell us what’s wrong, little Kat.”

The three of them were in the huge bathing
pool in their bathroom, enjoying a relaxing soak after the stress
of Sophie’s wedding. And there had been considerably more stress
than Kat had expected.

“It’s Lauren,” she admitted with a sigh. “I
really liked her—really
felt
for her. And now I’m
worried.”

“I would say you have cause to be.” Deep
frowned. “If what Nadiah saw was accurate she could be in
trouble.”

“But that’s the thing.” Kat sat up a little
straighter, splashing water. “Do you think it was?”

“Sylvan seemed to believe in her power,” Lock
pointed out. “Apparently it’s a rare but recognized phenomenon on
Tranq Prime. A manifestation of the goddess in a few chosen
females.”

“But couldn’t she be wrong?” Kat pleaded. It
wasn’t that she didn’t want to believe Nadiah had some kind of
psychic ability—it was just that she didn’t want Lauren to be in
danger.

“I don’t know,” Lock murmured.

“Well, she
did
think that Detective
Rast was a Kindred,” Kat pointed out, feeling a spark of hope.

“Yes, but you can’t blame her for that,” Deep
objected. “Lock and I thought the same thing. He
looks
Kindred.”

“He does,” Lock agreed. “And it’s not just
the truegreen eyes. It’s his build, his bearing—”

“Though he
doesn’t
treat females with
the respect they deserve,” Lock pointed out, frowning.

“Not exactly,” Deep agreed. “Although I got
the feeling he wasn’t upset at Nadiah so much as at the application
of her gift, which he claims not to believe in.”

“But that’s the thing,” Kat said, feeling
frustrated. “Can we believe that she’s accurate? Oh, I
wish
we had some way to check on Lauren but I know the Maw Cluster is
way too far away for us to do a joining.”

Deep looked thoughtful. “Ordinarily I’d say
you were right about that, Kat. But there
might
be a
way.”

“Really? There might?” Kat asked
excitedly.

Deep’s voice was grave when he nodded. “Yes,
but I don’t think you’re going to like it.”

“What do you mean?” Kat frowned.

“Well, as you know, sexual energy generates
the power that we use to propel ourselves as seeker, finder, and
focus into the astral plane,” Deep said. “The higher the tension
between the three of us, the more energy is generated.”

Kat smiled. “Of course. But I thought we
generated more than enough energy. Hell, we could probably light up
Yankee Stadium for a year if we could bottle what we put out.”

“Be that as it may, it won’t be enough to
reach the Maw Cluster,” Lock said softly from behind her. “Not
unless we try something new. Something guaranteed to boost our
output.”

Kat frowned warily. “What exactly are we
talking about here?”

“Something we haven’t tried before.” Deep
looked into her eyes. “I think you know what I’m talking about,
little Kat—double penetration.”

Kat’s mouth was suddenly almost too dry to
talk. “I…” She cleared her throat. “What do you mean? We always do
that. Every time the three of us make love when you and Lock fuse
together to, you know, enter me.”

She could feel herself blushing as she spoke
the words but she couldn’t seem to help it. No matter how often she
made love with her two new mates, she still felt a little shy about
what the three of them did together. Deep and Lock might consider
it perfectly normal to share a woman but it still counted as kinky
in her book.

“That’s not what I mean and I think you know
it,” Deep said gently. “When Lock and I fuse our shafts together,
we enter your pussy. But we’ve never tried filling both your pussy
and your back passage at the same time.”

“You mean one in front and one…” Kat cleared
her throat again. “In back?” Her voice ended in a squeak.

“Deep and I would like to make love to you
that way, my lady,” Lock murmured in her ear. “While we enjoy
fusing our shafts to enter you as one, we also crave the sensations
of filling you individually.”

“You…you do?” Kat swallowed.

“Does that bother you?” Deep asked softly.
“Do you not want to be touched here?”

Kat felt his finger brush lightly between her
cheeks, caressing her rosebud as he spoke. She gasped and jumped,
splashing water out of the bathing pool all over the bathroom
floor.

“Kat, are you all right?” Deep’s concern
washed over her. At the same time Lock said, “My lady?” And she
felt his tenderness and affection as well.

“Fine, I’m fine,” she said, backing away from
the two of them. “I just…I think I’ve had enough time in the bath.”
She climbed out of the bathing pool quickly and wrapped herself in
a long crimson bathing robe. It had been specially developed by the
Kindred to instantly absorb water so it dried her immediately.
Trying to look as though nothing was wrong, Kat swept out of the
bathroom and curled up in the middle of the huge, three-person
bed.