Gateway To Xanadu (18 page)

The idea of Little, half Val’s size, forcing Val to do anything at all was ludicrous, just as ridiculous as the trapped expression on Val’s face. The need to have Little join us came strictly from the situation as it stood, but it suddenly struck me how funny it was. Val didn’t want to have anything to do with Little any more than I wanted to be a minor, but neither of us could do a thing to change the situation.

“Come to think of it, you might have a problem at that,” I drawled, folding my arms as I looked down at him. “You’re the one who’ll be making the opening move, and you can’t get huffy and walk away no matter what suggestions he makes to you. In fact, you might even have to go along with some of them.

But at least that will solve your other desperation problem.”

I made no attempt to hide my amusement, just as he had made no attempt on his own part earlier, but equal opportunity wasn’t Val’s style. Without any warning he moved as fast as he had on Tildor, coming up out of that chair and grabbing my arms with such speed that he caught me asleep at the switch. Once he had pulled me to him he let himself fall back into the chair which, of course, ended me up in his lap.

No more than seconds passed before I started to struggle, but then those hands closed on me.

Much as I would have enjoyed it after being pulled into his lap like that, killing him had to be out. There was no arguing against the fact that I needed him to get the assignment done, not to mention how upset the Council would be if they found out I’d permanently punched the ticket of- the authorized representative of another star-faring humanoid race. But just because I couldn’t do it the right way doesn’t mean I simply gave up without a struggle. I’m not built to give up without a struggle, and being grabbed like that triggered my urge toward self-protection. I managed to get an elbow into him as we landed back in the chair, hoping to loosen his grip enough to let me pull free again, but no such luck. He ignored the force of the blow, and then his arms were around me with his hands clamped to my wrists.

“Of all the desperate problems I have, you’re the biggest,” he grunted, forcing my left shoulder up against his chest as he tightened his right arm around me, trying to get me to stop pulling against his hands and kicking. “You don’t seem to believe me when I promise you something, and that’s not the way to make this partnership work. In order to rely on what I say, you have to know my word is good. I told you what would happen if you teased me about Little again.”

“Val, stop it!” I yelled, starting to get desperate. I couldn’t pull my wrists free, he had hooked one leg over both of mine to keep me from kicking out, and he had already done the same thing to me once before-or twice before, if you counted that brief episode at the beginning of our trip together. I couldn’t believe he would do something that mindless-and knew without the shadow of a doubt that that was exactly what he intended.

“You could have stopped it yourself simply by making an effort to behave,” he said, sounding so damned calm that I really began to worry. “If I tell you I don’t care for something, the information’s supposed to tell you to let it alone, not that it’s perfectly all right to continue to ride me.”

“But it’s just fine if you ride me!” I came back, a little mad moving in with the worry. “You were fast enough taking advantage of me because of this assignment, but now that something’s come up that makes you uncomfortable, it’s a case of hands-off, don’t touch. You can but I can’t.”

“Damned right you can’t,” he agreed, but much too dryly. “No other woman alive would have the incredibly bad judgment to do to me what you’ve done-and then expect to get away with it. There’s not one of them who wouldn’t know better-and be sure she watched her step. Well? Which way are we going to do it?”

I’d been getting a good view of the gold carpeting from the position he was holding me in despite the way my hair was hanging down, but staring at it wasn’t bringing me any ideas on how to get out of that mess. I didn’t particularly like what he was asking me to do, but that part of it made no difference; I still would have had a problem even if I’d really wanted to do things his way.

“Looks like you’ve given me another choice that’s no choice at all,” I said at last, very aware of his hand on my backside, but still helpless to change the answer. “I’ve made it a practice never to give into blackmail, Val, not unless something really important is at stake. The assignment may be that important, but my delicate sensibilities aren’t. If you feel the need to beat me you go right ahead, but no one forces me to give my word on anything, and that’s the way it has to be. ”

I said my piece and shut up, and then it was Val’s turn to consider in silence. His grip on my wrists hadn’t loosened, he hadn’t moved his leg, and his hand hadn’t left my prettily covered behind, but I suddenly had very high hopes. I hadn’t told him anything but the strictest truth, but my subconscious had obviously been working overtime to set up a con. Val might be feeling self-righteous and justified, but he clearly considered himself a man of honor. Would a man of honor punish a woman for standing by her convictions? Could he? My subconscious was betting he couldn’t, which was why it had made me phrase my refusal the way it had. I hoped to hell it was right.

After a minute or two the thigh under my stomach shifted, and I thought I heard a sigh.

“I see you really do think more about the assignment than you do about yourself,” Val commented, his tone blessedly neutral. “And you have principles, too. Are you sure there’s nothing I can say that will make you change your mind?”

“Nothing,” I confirmed, trying to sound both unwavering and martyr-like at the same time.

“I’m glad to see there’s hope for you after all,” he said, his tone noticeably warmer. “You can’t be taught to be principled, that’s something you are or you aren’t, but you can be taught proper values. Treating people the right way is a value, and one you’ll be much better off for learning. Then you can apply your principles to the right thing.”

“Val,” I began slowly and unbelievingly, “You don’t mean you’re still going to-Ow! Stop it! You can’t do this to me!”

“Sure I can,” he answered, giving my seat another hard whack. “I can’t force you to make a promise that goes against your principles, but that doesn’t mean I have to let you do whatever you please to me. You were right when you said I wasn’t one of your group, Diana, and you may have been right when you said I never would be. First I’m going to have, to see something to make me want to be, and so far I haven’t. ”

That big hand came down hard on my seat again and then again, giving me the best motivation there is for breaking free, but motivation is useless when that’s all you have. I pulled again at his hand around my wrist, found I still couldn’t get loose, then fought hard against the wave of intimidation that rolled over me. It didn’t matter how he could do it, he was doing it, punishing me just the way he’d said he would. No one had ever done that to me before, and I knew without doubt that it wasn’t my role character he was reacting to, it was me. I swallowed down a yelp as he really began reaching me, and then there was only one question left: how long would he keep it up?

My question was answered when my wrists and legs were freed, and the answer turned out to be both not too long and much, much, too long. I don’t think he spanked me as long as he had on Tildor, but it had been long enough and hard enough to bring an ache to my bottom and tears to my eyes. I ignored the tears as I pushed myself to my feet, damned if I would cry in front of him no matter what he did to me, and made sure not to look at him even when he immediately followed me erect-until he took my hand.

“What are you doing?” I tried to demand when he began leading me through the sitting room, but there wasn’t enough snap in the question to offend an ant. No matter how hard I had tried to fight against it he had managed to intimidate me, and even though I hated the feeling there was nothing I could do about it.

I wasn’t up to fighting him or even challenging him on a non-physical level, and the worst part about it was that I was sure he knew it.

“I’m putting you to bed,” he answered, not even glancing back at me. “You had a hard day today, and we have things to do tomorrow.”

“But, Val, that’s your room,” I protested as I was led across the threshold into a melon and silver copy of the other bedroom and the door was closed behind me. “You said you wouldn’t . . . ”

“I should never have said anything like that,” he interrupted, dropping my hand as soon as I stood next to the big bed and immediately started getting out of his suit and ruffles. “You were right about my not understanding the position we were in, about how unfair it is to keep someone from a good time when that might be the last good time they’ll ever have. I don’t want to be done out of my last good time, and I don’t think you should be either. Get out of your clothes, Diana. ”

“I don’t want to get out of my clothes,” I mumbled, unable to take my eyes off him. He wasn’t wearing anything under the suit and shirt, and my breath caught. “If you force me into that bed it’ll be nothing but rape, and I won’t sit still for rape. ”

“I hope you won’t lie still for it either,” he said with something of a grin, leaving his clothes where he dropped them to come and stand in front of me, looking down into my eyes. “If you didn’t want to be raped you shouldn’t have worn an outfit like that, a glittering, irresistible second skin. I’m not made out of lifeless metal, Diana, and you should know that by now. If you won’t come to my bed voluntarily I’ll carry you there and toss you in, but this is one night I won’t take no for an answer.”

“But you can’t!” I all but begged, silently cursing the way he was making me feel. “Not after what you just did to me. It isn’t fair!”

“I know I have you at an unfair advantage right now,” he said very softly with a gentle smile, reaching out an equally gentle hand to smooth my hair before putting the arm around me. “If it had been any other night I would have put you to bed in your own room, but tonight I can’t do it. I’d intended honoring your choice and finding someone else to sleep with, but you made that impossible. You’re responsible for the way I feel, so you’re the one who has to do something about it. Take your shoes off.”

He had changed his order from clothes to shoes because he was already seeing to my body suit, both hands working carefully but quickly as he slid it down off my shoulders and arms to my waist. I closed my eyes with a shudder as he chuckled, knowing he was chuckling at the sight of my hardened nipples. I couldn’t ever remember being as aroused as I was then, or as confused. I wanted to turn and walk away from him, slamming the door as I left, but I couldn’t move. It was as though I’d been fed a zombie drug, and couldn’t refuse him no matter what he ordered me to do. I didn’t want hire to take me to bed, not the way I was still aching, but I wasn’t being given any say in the matter. He pushed the suit down over my hips to my ankles, crouched to slip off the silver sandals while I held onto his shoulder, and then the suit was gone and thrown away.

“Val, don’t, please,” I whispered as he picked me up and began putting us both into the bed, my hands involuntarily going to his impossibly broad shoulders. “You don’t know what you’re doing to me. You can’t know.”

“Tell me what I’m doing to you, Diana,” he murmured, settling me down beside him with his arms around me. “Is it anything like what you do to me when I touch the softness of your skin?”

“No, don’t, don’t,” I begged as he raised himself above me, separating my legs with his knees, still holding me in his arms. He’d been ready even before he’d taken his clothes off, and I couldn’t stop the tears that were running down my cheeks.

“You know I won’t hurt you, Diana,” he said softly as he kissed my face, the words nearly a soothing chant, his desire finding and entering me even as he spoke. I cried out almost with fear as he took complete possession of me, his hand stroking my hair, his lips touching my throat. “You also know you want me as much as I want you, only you’re too stubborn to admit it.”

His own words ended then as his lips took mine, but that was all that ended or stopped. His body kept thrusting into mine, demanding a response that I couldn’t refuse, overwhelming me so completely that I thought I might faint. He had made me horribly vulnerable and then had taken me to his bed, ‘and I knew the tears of fear continued even after coherent thought abandoned me completely.

“It’s all right. Diana, wake up. It’s all right.”

I heard the words for some time before they got through to me. The first thing I became aware of was Val’s arms around me, the second that I was shivering violently. The dream was still enough with me so that I knew why I was shivering like that, but I wasn’t up to stopping it yet.

“Diana, can you hear me?” Val persisted, his voice disturbed as he held me tight to his chest. “Try to wake up.”

“Am . . . up,” I managed through clenched teeth, burying my face in his chest and starting to try for control. “Give me . . . a minute.”

He made a sound of agreement and began stroking my hair, trying to calm something he didn’t understand. Val and I were still in his bed with the cover over us instead of beneath us, and I should have felt cozy and comfortable with his arms around me. That was a hell of a time for the shakes to get me so badly, but it wasn’t hard to understand why it had happened.

“You seem to be coming out of it now,” Val said after considerably more than the minute I’d asked for. I was still holding tight to him and breathing as though I’d been going uphill for hours, but I was finally making some headway in pulling myself back. “That must have been some bad dream.”

I shuddered at the memory of it and put my face into his chest again, but I didn’t lose the control I’d gained back. It wasn’t the first time I’d had that dream and I should have been used to it after so many repetitions, but even pretending to be blase didn’t dull the edge of the memory. It had to have been my mindless thoughts of the night before, that had triggered it, dragging me back to that time on Circlonet.