No Rules (10 page)

Unless she was exclusive with her man. The assassin dismissed it almost as soon as the thought came to him. Alison was predictable, even if she'd proved herself to be elusive. Sooner or later she'd want something her man couldn't provide, and then the next man with a full wallet would appear in her sights. Not many things were truly universal, but he'd learned to trust people to be who they were.

It was always their downfall.

After downloading the coordinates and the code for the shuttle's beacon, he headed to the aft of the ship, striding purposefully forward. His comm unit beeped, signaling someone was trying to get in touch with him. Only four beings had his personal comm code, three of whom had mysteriously vanished.

Ducking into an unoccupied alcove, he opened the device. “Yes?”

“Status.” The woman on the other end sat with her fingers folded neatly, the picture of innocence.

Pictures could be deceiving.

“I found her, but she wasn't alone.”

“She escaped?” Full lips thinned.

“A minor setback.”

“Alison knows too much. What's in her head could destroy our entire operation. She has the power to expose Illustra, the empaths, everything.”

The assassin thought the woman overstated Alison's importance, but he wasn't paid to correct her foolish notions. “I have her signal and am in pursuit.”

“You're sure she knows what you are?”

He nodded once, unwilling to repeat himself, regardless of her high rank or position.

“Still no contact from the board?”

Shortly before he'd been dispatched after Alison, the assassin had been recalled from a mission by the Illustra board members. He'd been irritated to be pulled off that assignment when he'd been so close. Just a few crossed wires on their transport and the stinger pilot and her space pirate would have been nothing more than cosmic dust. “No, ma'am.”

“Then proceed with fulfilling your objective. And contact me the moment you hear from them.”

The screen went blank and the assassin stowed his device. He had the sneaking suspicion that the Illustra board members were gone for good. Without the reigning figureheads, the company would begin to crumble. Killing Alison would only delay the inevitable.

But he'd do as ordered, because it was who he was.

He moved with purpose until he stood outside the suite the ships schematics indicated and chimed the door.

A middle-aged woman with orange skin holding some sort of small, fluffy creature answered. “Yes?”

The assassin stared down into her eyes until her jaw went slack and she sagged under his influence. “You and I are going to take a little trip together.”

“D
el?” Alison reclined against him on the bed. They'd each showered, separately, to listen for any alarms, but now they snuggled together under the shimmering bed coverings. Her head rested on his chest and she listened to the steady beating of his heart.

“No one has called me that since my sister died.” He stroked her hair, pausing to work some strands between his thumb and forefinger. She'd noticed that he liked touching her hair even if it wasn't captivating or attention grabbing.

“I'm sorry. If you want, I can just call you Fenton.”

He squeezed her to him. “No, I like hearing you use my given name.”

She turned her head and smiled up at him. “Good, because I like using it.”

Those luminescent blue eyes seemed to glow in the dim light. The cabin was dark, as he'd transferred all power other than emergency systems to navigation. The man might have no background with space travel, but he was an electrical genius. He shifted beneath her, and she felt his hardness against her leg. He didn't make a move for her, though, seemingly content to simply hold her close and talk.

One dark eyebrow went up. “You were going to ask me something?”

She was, but looking at him, lying there so content, had blanked her mind. The sight of him alone erased all intentions, all thought between one heartbeat and the next, and she simply existed, basking in his glow. Shaking her head as though she could rattle her senses loose, she composed her wayward musings. “Do you know where we are going? I know you've never been there, but I was wondering if you had a plan?”

“Not a plan, just a few things I set up in case my primary objective failed. Which it did.”

Because of her. This sensation of wanting to apologize for her actions was still new, but she went with it anyway. “I'm sorry.”

He pulled her closer, brushed a kiss on her lips, one designed to comfort, calm things down not rile them up. “Don't be. I'm not.”

“What were you going to do?” Perhaps she was a glutton for punishment for even asking but Alison wondered if he would come to regret her interference.

He stared at the ceiling. “There's an alchemist on the empath home world. He used to work for the overlord, before Xander banished him. I heard them talking once and he said he might be able to annul my phase split.”

She frowned. “Annul?”

“He would kill half of me.”

“But why would you want to do that?” Sure, his ability had surprised her at first, but she'd accepted that it was just something he could do. And it was magnificent, especially when he used it to save her life. Or pleasure her. And the way he phrased it, killing half of himself . . . she shuddered.

Tucking her into his side, he drew in a deep breath. “Imagine that anytime your equilibrium is upset for any reason, you have to fight not to react, to show no emotion at all, because if you did it would cause your body to split in two.”

“Any strong feelings?” She hadn't realized how affected he was.

Del nodded. “Fear, lust, anger, anything that affects my adrenaline levels causes the split. I've learned to control it well, but during combat, sleep, or sex, it's almost impossible. The only way the bounty hunters can track me is through the phase split. I thought ridding myself of it would help us hide.”

She shivered again at the way he said
us
, as though it was a natural assumption that anything they'd take on would be a joint effort. “But your ability saved me from the assassin. Saved us both.”

He nodded. “Right. And if he has access to the ship's passenger manifest he'll know exactly where I'm heading, which means we can't go there anytime soon.”

Relief coursed through her and shame nipped on its heels. “I'm sorry, but I like you exactly the way you are.”

The kiss lasted longer, was slower, more sensual but still full of tenderness. Fenton rolled her to her back. She reached to activate her shield, but he stopped her.

“Not now. We need to make a new plan. Tell me all you know about the man hunting you.”

Her ardor cooled instantly as she recalled their pursuer. “He's called the assassin. I don't know his real name or anything about his background.” He'd cloaked himself in shadows, rarely speaking but always drawing notice. She shivered.

Fenton rubbed her arm as though trying to warm her. “What about his abilities?”

“He's a mind warrior. One of the strongest my planet has ever produced. The Cerebral Advancement Institute, or CRA, was founded in the beginning of the last century by the United States government. It was a specialized program designed to encourage the development of underused portions of the human brain. Sometimes drug experiments were used to advance people's natural abilities, but mostly it was training and conditioning. Some people were telepathic, able to read minds. Others were telekinetic, could move objects with only their thoughts. Mind warriors are both.”

“So he read our minds earlier.” Fenton didn't look pleased by this information. “I've never experienced anything like it, such an invasion of self.”

“It doesn't have to be painful. He delights in making it hurt. He can also command a mind, take over, like in a possession, or embed images that will drive his victim insane.”

“What's his range like?” Fenton's face looked grim, understandable after hearing news like that.

“I'm not sure. Relatively close, a few meters or so.”

“Do you know why he's after you?”

Alison nodded, but didn't say anything else.

He tilted her chin so she couldn't avoid his gaze. “You say you trust me, but you don't, do you?”

She jerked her chin away. “It's not that I don't trust you, more that I don't want to tell you about all the mistakes I've made.”

“Alison”—he laid back and folded his hands behind his head—“we're being hunted. The sooner you trust me with the truth, the better our chances of survival.”

Anger welled up and she threw the covers back, needing to put some distance between them. “You think I don't know that? Really, Del, I'm not some fluff-brained idiot. If you don't want to help me, that's fine. Just let me off at the next habitable world and I'll make my own way.”

His face closed down to the expressionless mask she was beginning to detest. “You know I can't do that.”

Stepping into her dress, she yanked the fabric up. It was wrinkled but she didn't care, needing some sort of covering between them. “Now who's the untrusting one? You expect me to bare myself to you completely, yet you're still hiding things from me, aren't you?”

“We just met,” he protested, reaching for her. “It'll take time to learn everything about each other. A lifetime perhaps.”

The last three words, spoken almost hesitantly in his rough bass, chilled her to the bone. Through the darkness, she made her way to the bathroom door. “I'm going to take a bath.”

“You just had one. Our resources are finite. We should conserve the water.”

Pausing at the door she called over her shoulder, “Get a clue, Del. I need some space from you.” Without waiting for an answer, she locked herself in the pitch-black bathroom.

 

Fantastic.
With nothing else to do, Fenton redressed and moved into the other room to check on the pod. The glow from the bioluminescent stasis chamber lit the suite in a soft pulsing blue light. He touched the smooth surface, checked the readouts, anything to stall the miasma of thoughts swirling in his head.

Alison was upset with him. Again. He was beginning to see a pattern to her behavior. They didn't communicate well, their species or perhaps even their genders too different to reach a compromise. She hid things; he'd ask for the truth, she'd distract him with sex. Not that it was difficult, since he wanted her endlessly. Their carnal relations would escalate, but just when he thought she'd lowered her guard, she resurrected the walls at light speed. Almost as if she was afraid to let him in.

She'd risked her life for him. That had to count for something. Perhaps he just hoped it did, hoped that he was getting through to her and she was as affected by him as he was by her.

The ship's proximity alarm let out a warning blare. Fenton rushed back to the controls, just as Alison emerged from the bathroom.

“What is it?” she asked. “An asteroid?”

He checked the readouts. “It looks like a ship. How do I disengage the autopilot?”

She moved to his side, showed him the sequence. “Should we hail them?”

The shuttle shook violently. Fenton threw his arms out to brace himself against either side of the wall, with Alison wedged between the console and his body. “What's happening?”

Her fingers flew over the controls. “They've locked onto us with a magnetic web. They're pulling us aboard.”

His heart beat against his rib cage. “Do you have any idea who they are?”

She turned to look up at him just as a bright light emanated from the docking bay, casting her features into shadow. “This isn't my sector of space. I don't know the rules any more than you do.”

His throat had gone dry. “Pirates, perhaps. Or military patrollers. Regardless, don't use my name or mention Hosta or the assassin. If they ask, we're just a couple out for a pleasure cruise who got lost.”

“What if they try to return us to the pleasure cruiser? The assassin might still be there.” She cracked her knuckles and he noticed her hands were shaking, the only sign of fear she allowed herself to show.

He took her hands in his, brought them to his lips. “Trust me?”

Her head bobbed just as the ship scraped along the metal decking and ground to an earsplitting halt. The doors were pried open in a shower of sparks, rendering their craft useless for further space travel.

Sure to keep Alison safely behind him, Fenton blocked her body with his own as the door became nothing but a gaping hole. At the last minute he realized the chamber containing the pod was still unsealed. He shifted, ready to bolt for it, but a hooded figure appeared in the doorway, weapon aimed at his center mass.

The phase split took hold but Fenton fought the urge. Alison needed him to keep himself together in every sense of the word. “We appreciate the rescue.”

The armed invader moved closer. “Name, cargo, destination.”

“My name is Axe and this is my mate, Lorna. This is a passenger shuttle from the cruise ship docking code 4587. We were out for a recreational star voyage and got turned around. Thank you for the rescue.”

Alison nodded mutely, her eyes wide and trained on the sharp-bladed staff the newcomer carried.

The hooded figure didn't move and Fenton waited patiently. He'd played enough
demjong
to know that half of selling a bluff was outwaiting the other players. Alison's breathing was shaky, but her response could easily be construed as a distraught woman having a weapon pointed at her for the first time in her life.

“I wasn't addressing you, breeder. Lie facedown on the floor.” The voice was soft but rang with command.

Fenton wondered if he'd overpaid for his translation chip because the words made no sense. “Could you repeat that?”

An energy beam leapt from the muzzle of the stranger's weapon. Fenton dove to protect Alison, knocking her to the floor, but the beam curled like the lash from a whip and connected with his back. He hissed in pain as an acid-like substance burned through the fabric of his shirt and seared the flesh below.

“Stay down, breeder.” A small booted foot pressed down on the back of his neck, even as a hand reached out for Alison. “Are you injured, mistress?”

Her eyes filled with confusion as she looked from the hand to him and back. “Release my companion.”

“He didn't show the proper deference to a patroller.” The foot on his neck didn't budge.

“We didn't know who you were,” Alison replied, though she was careful to keep her tone soft and undemanding. “Please, he's hurt.”

The patroller pushed the cowl back, displaying a feminine face shaded orange. Her hair was a deeper hue of the same color and her eyes were emerald green. “He'll heal. This breeder is insolent and ignorant of our customs. Pain will teach him his place.”

Fenton closed his eyes, trying to will away the burning on his back and holding himself together. Obviously they'd stumbled into a matriarchal society of some sort. Though it chafed, he'd have to rely on Alison to get them out of this. Any move he made would only result in further lessons and his flesh had been marred enough for one lifetime.

“Where is the third life form we detected?” the patroller asked.

Alison frowned. “It's just the two of us.”

“Our scans clearly identified three unique life forms.”

No.
This was not how Fenton wanted her to find out about his cargo. He should have told her earlier, prepared her so she didn't end up blindsided. Ignorance would get them killed.

Risking the patroller's ire, he made a sound of pain to attract Alison's notice. When she looked to his face he cut his gaze to the door to the other chamber, hoping her human eyes could see the small movement. Her lips parted and he could see the question written on her face.

“Through there,” she mumbled.

The patroller gestured with her head. “Open it.”

Alison swallowed and backed toward the door. Removing what looked to be a master override key from the pocket of her dress, she held it over the scanner. Of course, he'd wondered how she'd escaped the room earlier. She must have lifted the override from the server. Clever minx. It wouldn't have worked if he'd remembered to seal the chamber with his personal passcode, but his oversight worked in their favor.