Hers To Cherish (Verdantia Book 3) (13 page)

“Umm? Oh, yes, yes. Something new every day.” Nissler joined Veacon. He examined the hologram, flipped a few pages on his datapad and jotted down some notes. “Interesting variation on the fear of penetration, don’t you think? One of my assistants suggested this after reviewing the woman’s personality graph. Devilish mind, that young man.”

Narr
shuddered. “Yes. How much longer before she is ready? I would like to have at least half of Strom Kella’s order available before the games are over.” Narr looked expectantly at his head scientist.

The man tapped a pen against his pursed lips. “
I would think after this feed, we will have stripped her mind down to the id. We can build it back up again quickly – usual stuff – restore the ego to the preconscious, conscious and unconscious mind, re-establish personality. Although, I do have to caution you on this particular unit. She might be somewhat...fragile.”

Narr
raised an eyebrow. “How is that?”

“Another Verdantian woman, one of their aristocrats.
Their minds resist our probes and conditioning. They enter a mental state that has proved difficult to crack without leaving them vegetative. I fear we may have pushed the limit with this unit. We have noted that this intensive a mind-strip often results in total disintegration of the personality within a year.”

Narr
laughed. “Doesn’t matter. After a year with Kella, they are useless anyway. Makes the man one of my best customers so I’m not complaining.” Narr shrugged. “I’m really here for Alessa. Please tell me you have made her more ‘amenable’ to my will.”

Nissler hemmed and hawed nervously. “Within the parameters that you gave me, we did what we could. You will have to tell me if we succeeded or not. You said you didn’t want to wipe her and
...you know…”

“Yes, yes,
she’s a tough Verdantian. I don’t want you to mind-wipe her with your machines. I just want her more – vulnerable.” Narr’s smile was unpleasant. “I want the pleasure of shaping her personally to my will. Using a machine lacks the same challenge as doing it hands-on, so to speak.” Narr chuckled, then walked down to the third silver coffin from the end. “How did she respond to sensory deprivation?”

The scientist perked up. “Quite well.
In addition to the sensory deprivation, we suffocated and revived her randomly – never long enough to create brain damage, of course. Her anxiety levels escalated beautifully.”

Nissler put down his
datapad and fussed with the control panel. With a pneumatic hiss, the clamshell opened to reveal a lovely, black-haired woman bound into place. Sensation-depriving monitors sealed her eyes, ears, nose and mouth. A breathing tube led to a portal on the outside of the stainless steel bullet and her chest rose and fell in shallow, anxious pants. A feeding tube with a white liquid ran into her nose. Catheters for bodily waste ran to collection recyclers.

Disconnecting all the tubes and wires took Nissler some t
ime. Narr drummed his fingers impatiently on the stainless lid.
This time she will break.
In some perverse way, he almost hoped she wouldn’t. The Verdantian woman had been his only challenge for the last year or so.

Finally, Nissler removed the eye coverings and the woman opened her
blue eyes. Narr smiled in satisfaction. It was like looking into a drowning soul trembling on the verge of dissolution. “Hello, Alessa. Time to pop you out of your box. What do you have to say, my sweet
slaaf
?”

Ram lay wakeful
in a rare introspective mood. Early morning light filtered into the bedroom and illuminated the ivory skin of a sleeping Captain Steffania Rickard. Her long lashes fanned out onto porcelain cheeks. Her glorious breasts rose and fell regularly with the quiet breaths that passed through her lush, barely-parted lips. Flame-red hair surrounded her well-honed body in silky, disordered clouds. A firmly muscled thigh and trim calf lay elegantly outstretched where the bedding had slipped away from her lower body. She was a most unlikely soldier, and he simply could not get enough of her. The gods knew he had tried last night.

Ram couldn’t afford
regrets and considered second-guessing a waste of time. His life had been brutal and he had become brutal to survive it. But in this one instance, if he had to do it again, he would have insisted several galaxies separate Steffania Rickard and the twisted sadists populating Vxloncia. She awoke a protective streak in him wider than the Gamma star system.
How did you do that, Captain? I could hate you for it.

She was a contradiction
– fiercely independent, a skilled fighter, and yet... His memory supplied her luminous brown eyes filled with erotic pain as she stood before him a few hours past. She had surrendered herself, offered her most vulnerable desires with the unspoken plea not to abuse her trust. Evidently, a particle of decency remained in the cynical, black void that passed for his soul, for he had discovered within himself a curious unwillingness to violate her trust.

S
teffania stirred him on a subliminal, elemental level – male to female, dominant to submissive. He had always understood that the passive yielding of a ‘Pansy’ failed to arouse him. The surrender of the strong, the bending of the knee from the soul of a warrior – that lit all the fires within him, especially when they came packaged like Steffania Rickard.

Ram studied Steffania’s face and confronted his thoughts with stark, unflinching honesty. He respected her
.
Hell’s breath.
Worse – he had
feelings
for her. With a disgruntled snort, he lay back and closed his eyes. He wished they had come together at another time, in another place. For the first time in fifteen years, he wanted a woman for more than just temporary gratification.

What
the fuck are you doing, DeKieran? No second-guessing. Remember who you are.

For her own safety, Steffania needed to be on the
Estella Racha
returning to Verdantia – captain’s bars or no captain’s bars – and Ram disagreed with her fear that her early return would mean the loss of her rank. DeTano would never strip her of rank, regardless of the outcome of this mission. Her pride would suffer and that was all. The only one who would take the fall should this mission not succeed was Ramsey Melborn DeKieran. Doral DeLorion had made that quite clear. With a groan, he sat, swung his legs over the bed and walked into the bathroom. His thoughts turned in his mind as he relieved himself. He knew what he would do.
I really am a selfish bastard
. Well, one of them would be happy.

When he returned to the bedroom
, Steffania blinked at him through drowsy lids.

“Take care of your needs then come back to bed.” Ram lay back and watched as she nodded and staggered sleepily into the bathroom.

Several minutes later, she rejoined him in the bed with a question on her face.

“Lie back,” he said in answer.

Rolling on top of her, Ram tried, one more time, to fuck her out of his system.
He drew it out until both of them trembled on the edge, until her pants of, “Please, Ramsey, please,” became frantic whispers of, “Now, damn you, now!”

Steffania muffled her
sobbing cries of completion against his chest. Hilted deep in the tight grip of her pussy, his cock twitched with every fluttering, velvet contraction. Ram finally allowed the message battering his self-control to penetrate his brain. He ground his teeth together with a primal growl as he followed her over, emptying his aching balls into the hot welcome of her.

Reality clamped its j
aws on him with razor-sharp fangs and tore massive chunks from his soul. He would never have enough of this woman – never. She was a luxury he could not have. He couldn’t afford Steffania Rickard. She made him want more than a casual lover.

Steffania caught the questioning, fearful glances that Pansy directed toward her across the breakfast table. When Steffania knew Ramsey would not notice the gesture, she shrugged. He had been snapping and snarling all morning. Steffania had no idea what prompted his surly disposition. Hour upon hour of astonishing sex last night should have sapped his prickliness. Unless she was completely misled, he had found it as stunning as she had. Her mind still reeled. Ramsey DeKieran was an impossibly virile lover.

Steffania occupied herself with applying a
creamy spread to the warm
panis
sitting on her plate.

{
DeKieran?}

He glared at her
from where he hunched over his meal as if he were a raptor protecting his kill from theft. His upper lip pulled back in a silent snarl. {What?}

{
I don’t care how much you stomp and growl at me, you ass, but you are frightening Pansy.} As she finished garnishing her
panis
, she ventured a peek at him.

He sat with
closed eyes. A small muscle at the corner of his eye ticked regularly. Every muscle in his jaw stood out in high relief. His eyes opened to regard the tiny beauty. A forced smile broke the tight line of his mouth.

“Pansy, you needn’t accompany me to the training complex today.” His gravelly voice came out remarkably level. “You may have the day to yourself.”

Ram raised a steaming cup of kaffé to his lips and took a sip.

{
I’m impressed, Ramsey. That smile had to hurt.}

Kaffé
spewed from Ram’s mouth, and Pansy leapt up in alarm. She grabbed a towel and daubed at Ramsey’s chest.

“Oh! Sir! Is something wrong with the
kaffé
?” Pansy took a cautious, tasting sip. “Shall I make another pot?” Pansy dithered around Ram, unhappy chirps of concern accompanying her anxious ineffective swipes of the towel at his chest.

Steffania sat
decorously and took a dainty bite of her breakfast pastry, wondering what mental defect rendered her incapable of leaving well enough alone. Her brain must be wired incorrectly. She lacked the caution gene, the discretion gene or the prudence gene. Or maybe, she just
enjoyed
crossing swords with Ramsey.

“No, the
kaffé
is fine, Pansy. I merely swallowed wrong.” Ram wrapped a large hand around Pansy’s delicate arm, stopping her from removing the pot. “Leave it. I am out of time in any case. Steffania, attend me.”

Curiosity overcame caution and
Steffania’s glance rose to meet Ramsey’s. She expected to glimpse anger or the promise of retaliation. His face still bore the same cold, dispassionate appearance it had worn all morning. But his eyes, those orbs that betrayed the secrets of his inner life, they sparkled with an unexpected emotion – humor. Their comm-linc remained suspiciously silent.

She slipped out of her chair and followed him to the door. Ram turned and she stopped, facing him.

{
How extensive is your knowledge of Interspatial Net access?}

{
It used to be quite good. I’m probably not up on the latest advances but from what I’ve seen of the Vxloncian technology, neither are they.}

{
Could you find a way to access the security layout in, on and around Narr’s estate from the villa’s intella-system? Get me a schematic? Can you do it without anyone knowing?}

Steffania paused, considering the problem. She frowned.
{Possibly. I can try.}

Ram nodded. “I have changed my mind. I won’t need
either of you with me today. I will see you this evening.” Some emotion softened his eyes as he studied her.

Did she see c
oncern? Regret? She must be mistaken. DeKieran disallowed emotion. The tiniest hint of a smile teased the corners of his mouth. His hand lifted as if to touch her face then fell back to his side and the nascent smile vanished. His eyes became as bleak as his expression.

{
Do I see concern about me, or about our mission, DeKieran?}

{
Don’t leave a trail, Captain Rickard.} The comm-linc vibrated with his cold command. Ram turned, walked out the door and never looked back.

Feeling unaccountably rebuffed
, Steffania watched him get into a waiting transport vehicle. With a final puzzled glance, she shook off the feeling of rejection and turned back into the villa.
Finally, some real work.
Pansy glanced up in surprise as Steffania walked back into the kitchen.

“
Dominus
DeKieran forgot something?”

“No. He decided he didn’t need me. Both of us have a lovely day free of his demands.” Steffania smiled at the other woman. “I think I’m going to enjoy a restful morning with my
holo-reader. I have several new titles. Surely, one of them will interest me. I’ll see you for lunch?”

Pansy nodded
mutely and Steffania walked back to the master suite. She closed the door behind her and quietly engaged the lock. The first order of business was to disable the villa’s spy system in such a fashion as to make it look accidental.

Walking by the disordered bed, she grabbed a handful of covering and casually draped it over the vid-corder lens hidden in the corner statue. Turning, she
dropped to her hands and knees and pulled a long case from under the bed. She snapped open the locks and raised the lid. A smile of satisfaction pulled at her mouth as she removed the gleaming silver
UniLinc 4.5
from its bed of waffled insulation. She loved her personal gateway into the galaxy-wide network but had not touched it in several years. Verdantia’s magnetic resonance screwed any hi-tech device to the point of uselessness.