Hearts of Ishira (Hearts of Ishira Saga) (19 page)

“Sure,” Ri shrugged. “You might want to test Bev, too. I have the feeling that there’s more to her than meets the eye.”

“There is more to all of you than meets the eye,” Hunter murmured, turning a troubled gaze on Amy, where she was cursing and fighting the restraints the warriors had put into place. He looked at Jace. “You might wish to sedate that one, if the others are going to get any sleep this night.”

“Aye,” Jace said wearily. He gave Arianna a wink, hurrying off to carry out Hunter’s order.

“And you,” Hunter said, leaning down to inspect the small bloody spot on her temple, “should try to get some more rest. Do you need more pain medicine?”

“No,” she said, but felt her face heating as another ‘need’ made itself known. “Well, probably, but… I should use the bathroom first. Would you get one of the medics for me?”

Hunter laughed at that, shaking his head. Surprising her, he very carefully picked her up and took her to the small bathroom in the medical unit. She had the feeling that he would have willingly come in and taken care of everything, if she had let him, but she very firmly shoved the door closed in his face. His deep chuckle rumbled through the door as she quickly took care of business, but she was smart enough not to try to stand until he came in to support her.

Once tucked back into her bed, Ri watched as the officers present consulted. She seemed to constantly be in contact with Hunter’s mind, even if only peripherally. He was very much aware of her, though, and did not seem to mind her presence in his head at all. She sighed inwardly when another warrior, this one not a medic, showed up at the door, talking about a strange reading on the long-range scan. Hunter sighed then threw her an encouraging smile as he left the med center. Jace quickly administered another round of pain meds to all of his patients, then excused himself to go back to bed. He gave her a quick, cocky smile as he left, accompanied by a sexy wink.

Arianna fell asleep with that last sweet smile from them both firmly in her mind.

Hunter strode into the command center, his eyes immediately locking onto the deep-space scanners. One of Trey’s team members, Rom, was at the monitor, his brow furrowed.

“Report,” Hunter said, sitting down at his own monitor and bringing up the various maps and data inquiries for himself.

“Unidentified object,” Rom reported, leaning back. “It’s on the very edges of the scans, so it might be nothing. Sorry to have you awakened, but you wanted to be alerted to anything out of the ordinary.”

“No, that’s fine,” Hunter assured him. “Unfortunately, I was already awake. Size?”

“Roughly the size of one of our battalion transports.”

“Status?”

“It is either running silent or cloaking its systems,” Rom said, his voice heavy with the possibility of a threat. Hunter sat back, thinking quickly. “I can get the shape and size, but nothing else. Current speed and trajectory should have it here within the next three months.”

“Is there a chance it’s friendly?” Hunter finally asked, after running through all the possible scenarios that would bring a ship to this sector, so far away from trade routes and civilization centers.

“No way of knowing, since we are on radio silence,” Rom shrugged. “But it’s possible. When we left Thorsan, our ships were scattered all over the place. Space is big, but there’s always a chance, if infinitely small, that one of our ships got chased off course in the same direction as us. This ship is too small to be any of the known Solvari vessels, but they could have developed new craft by now. Or worse, it could be one of our own transports, repaired and used to try to trick our people into feeling safe. They must believe us to be fools if they think that any of us would fall for that more than once.”

“What do you think, Rom?” Hunter asked, the signal to Rom to end his status report and start analyzing the information.

“I think there’s a possibility that it’s a friendly,” Rom said, after a moment of thought. “Or at least, not Solvari, which I’d settle for. Our scanners just aren’t strong enough to detect more than what I’ve told you. However, it is also about the same size as the slave transport that brought the women. If the slavers sent out a distress signal, their friends might have tracked it and found us. Or, whoever fired upon them might have followed.”

“That’s not good,” Hunter murmured. Rom nodded. Hunter thought a moment. “If it is more slavers, we wait for them to land then go in. We’d need to disable their systems and rescue anyone aboard. If it’s a friendly, then we need to find out who they are and bring them in safely. I know I don’t need to, but I’ll stress the need for secrecy. If the Solvari find out about our colony here…”

“Understood,” Rom said, his voice conveying the gravity of the situation. “We don’t want to be found, other than by our own people. Commander, if it is one of ours… they could be running silent because they’re being followed or watched. ”

“True. Keep an eye on it. You know the approach patterns as well as I do. If they use one of ours, I want to be notified immediately. If that happens, send one single burst to confirm our position, then continue radio silence until they’re closer and we can get more information on them.”

Hunter stood, stretching and yawning hugely. “If you don’t need me, I’m going to go back to bed. It has been quite a day.”

“Yes, sir,” Rom said, then hesitated a moment, just long enough for Hunter to pick up on the need to talk. Though Rom would never ask, Hunter decided to stick around for just a bit longer.

“What’s on your mind, cousin?” Hunter asked. Rom was one of his best men, on par with Trey, and a friend as well as a relative.

“Hunter,” Rom said quietly, using his first name now that they were talking as family instead of officers. “What do you think of the women?”

“I think that they’re going to be a handful of trouble until we can get things sorted out and get used to one another,” Hunter answered with a rueful grin. He and Rom had grown up together and had managed to get into quite a bit of trouble together. Fun trouble, mostly, but definitely trouble. And as they grew older, it was usually trouble of the female variety.

“Trey is really interested in the second-in-command, Beverly.” Rom said.

“And how does the rest of your team feel about that?” Hunter asked, Reading his cousin to find out what, exactly, Rom was getting at.

“We like it,” Rom said, shrugging. “He brought her by the command center a few hours ago and we got a chance to interact with her, though none of us could understand her yet. We showed her some of our equipment, a few of our historical videos… enough to show her where we’ve come from and how we came to be here. She was so interested in everything, so eager to communicate. We’re all enchanted with her. I’m just curious what happens if she only accepts one of us.”

“We don’t know enough about their culture yet to make that call,” Hunter admitted with a sigh. “From what Arianna was telling us earlier, there’s the possibility that the girls will only accept one male apiece.”

“That’s going to cause a lot of new problems,” Rom pointed out quietly. Hunter nodded, not wanting to think about it, but having no other choice.

“Aye. But we can’t force them, no matter how frustrated we get. They are an unknown species, and we must abide by their cultural and religious wishes. You know that as well as I do.”

Rom sighed as well, sitting back and staring morosely at his screen.

“Well, then, I can only hope that theirs is a very permissive culture,” Rom growled, then tossed Hunter a rueful scowl. “Because frankly, my balls are about to explode with the wanting.”

Hunter barked out a surprised laugh at his normally taciturn cousin’s words.

“Agreed!” he exclaimed, clapping Rom on the back as he stood. He nodded toward the monitors. “Keep me informed. If anything
at all
out of the ordinary happens with that ship, let me know.”

“Aye, sir,” Rom grinned, saluting.

“Oh, and Rom?” Hunter said, stopping in the doorway. Rom looked up. “You might want to start courting early, so that when the time comes to choose, Bev will have a very hard time picking just one of you.”

“Aye, sir!” Rom said enthusiastically, laughing.

When he stepped out of the command center, Hunter realized that there were only a few hours left of the night. He was concerned about the strange vessel on the scanners. He hoped to all his gods that it was his people, not the Solvari. The possibility of impending danger to all he’d worked so hard to build the last ten years kept his mind working far into the wee hours of the morning.

Deep in the throes of drug-induced slumber, Arianna dreamed of a coming presence. Something strong and bright and powerful. Something more devastating than anything she’d yet experienced. It was enticing and seductive at the same time. As it morphed into a living person’s spirit, she sensed its surprise at her presence.

Green eyes with a darker green ring around the iris. Hunter’s eyes.

They talked, in her dream, for quite awhile. She couldn’t remember what they said, nor anything else but those beautiful eyes, so like Hunter’s. She didn’t understand the dream itself, but the presence left her with a strong, almost overwhelming need for more. For something she’d always yearned for but could not even imagine yet. It made no sense. She was new to this ‘Reading’ thing, but she
knew
that something significant had just happened.

With a heartfelt, wistful sigh, she rolled over and went back to sleep.

“How are you feeling, Commander?” Jace asked the next morning, when Ri’s eyes opened to greet the day. She blinked at him uncomprehendingly for a moment, then recalled everything from the day before and sucked in a deep breath. Her ribs reminded her of their deplorable state, and when she tried to sit up, her right shoulder, back, and side of her neck all denied her their use. Crying out softly at the unexpected pain, Ri flopped back to her pillows. Jace gave her a sympathetic smile.

“A little sore?” he asked. She rubbed her face with her left hand.

“Did anyone get the description of the asteroid that hit me?” she asked ruefully. Jace arched a brow at her, his smile widening into a grin.

“How’s our patient?” Hunter inquired, striding into the med center, his eyes immediately locking onto Arianna.

“Sore, but still smiling,” Jace said admiringly. He cocked his head at Ri. “Do you need something for pain?”

“Please,” she said gratefully, “But if it’s something that doesn’t knock me out, that would be nice.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” Jace said with a wink.

“And maybe a muscle relaxer? My shoulder is killing me.”

“Shoulder?” Jace said, furrowing his brow and stepping closer. He nodded to Hunter and they helped her to sit up. Urging her to lean forward just a little, Jace ran her through several movements of her arm, noting where she whimpered and the motions that actually made her cry out. He ran his fingers down the affected muscles and shook his head.

“I think you will be very sore for several days, Commander,” he told her apologetically. “I’ll order some heat for your back and shoulder, and scheduled massages to loosen the spasms. And a muscle relaxer, though that might knock you out.”

“I’ll be okay with that,” she sighed, resigned. “I wanted to stay awake, but… this really hurts!”

“As tight as those muscles are, I would imagine it does,” Jace sympathized.

“Let me see if I can loosen them up first,” Hunter said quietly. Jace nodded and moved away to check on his other patients before ordering meds for them all.

“Any excuse to touch me again, huh?” Ri grinned up at Hunter, her eyes warm. He raised his eyebrows in surprise at her outright flirting, then laughed, his eyes sparkling.

“Little warrior, I need no excuse to touch you. If I wish to do so, I will.”

“Oh, will you?” she asked, arching her brow at his certainty. He nodded smugly.

“Aye,” he said, his grin turning wicked. “And you will enjoy it.”

“What happened to all the respectful deference of yesterday?” she asked, sighing in mock disappointment. He sat on the bed with her, carefully picked her up and set her between his legs, her back to him.

“It faded a bit more with every mental image you sent me, of your body in my hands, your reaction to my every caress.” His hands slid down her arms, his touch electric, hot, searing. She shivered as he slid them back up her arms to rest on her shoulders.

“Oh,” she breathed. Troubled that he might have gotten the wrong impression, she started to say something else, but Hunter leaned forward just a bit, his lips at her ear, his big, strong hands already moving in ever-expanding circles on her shoulders.

“Rest assured, little one,” he breathed, “That I will never do anything you do not wish for me to do. If you do not want me to flirt with you, then just say so. I will stop, and I will treat you with the same distance that I treat your women.”

Ri’s heart clenched at the thought of him distancing himself from her. Hunter felt it and his hands tightened on her shoulders.

“You see,” he whispered, his lips grazing her ear. “You do not wish that, any more than I.”

“No,” she admitted, closing her eyes against the desire that was building in her. It was sluggish because of how much pain she was currently in, but it was still there. “No, I don’t want that. But I… I don’t know what I want right now.”