Origin (7 page)

Clay and Anders were alive and they obviously loved each other.

As I turned my back on them and the screens and made my way back to my bunkroom, it hit me. I was alive too. Alive and free and I owed that to those two men.

The next day, banging and cursing through the wall pulled me into the passageway and into the open doorway of Anders’s bunkroom.

Anders, frowning, poked at the settings on a bolt gun in his lap.

“Can I help?”

He glanced up at my voice. “There’s not enough room for two over here, but you can keep me company.”

I sat on the bunk against the wall and pulled one of his blue pillows into my lap. Anders shot me a quick smile before returning his attention to the table he was bolting into another wall. Muscles flexed in his arms as he held the steel top and lifted the bolt gun with his right hand. The rods echoed with a loud boom in the nearly empty room every time he hit the trigger.

“How’d the questioning go?”

He was talking about my vidscreen interrogation from the enforcers early that morning. Clay had sat down with me for the entire thing. “About like I expected. I was too secluded to learn a lot. I did share passcodes I’d learned, that sort of thing.”

“I’m sure those helped.”

I shrugged.
 

“How are the wounds on your thighs?”

I touched my pants over the wounds, smiling when it didn’t hurt at all. “Nearly healed. There’s only a twinge every now and then. It would have been nice to have access to that sort of healing gel in the past.”
 

He scowled. “Don’t remind me of your past. Makes me want to punch things.” His blond hair fell messily in front of his eyes and he blew the long bangs out of his way. I liked the way he’d cut his hair. He hadn’t gone as short as Clay’s, instead hacking it off just behind his ears and leaving long layers on the top.

He tugged hard on the table to make sure it was secure, set the bolt gun down and strode across the room to sit next to me. He sniffed the air, leaned closer. “Your hair smells like strawberries,” he murmured, nose against my temple.

I’d used one of the shampoos in his box of lady stuff—the one I thought smelled the best. “What are strawberries?”

“Aw, your taste repertoire needs serious work, sweetheart. We’ll add strawberries to the list of foods I plan to feed you. They are small, heart-shaped berries that can be sweet and tart. They’re my favorite.” He pulled my heavy hair away from my neck and nuzzled his nose there.

My entire body snapped taut and he sighed, pulled away to scoot back on the bed so his spine rested against the wall. “Apologies. You, my sweet, are irresistible, especially smelling like my favorite berry.”

A low throb started between my legs and I was suddenly aware of my breasts because they felt heavier and I wanted his hands on them. “You do the strangest things to my body. So does your captain. I’ve never felt anything like it.”

“What sort of things?” he asked quietly.

Shivering, I closed my eyes to better concentrate on the sensations. “Warmth and this strange tingling.”

“Tingling is good. Where?” He held his arms open. “Come sit against me. I promise to be good.”

Fear tightened my muscles again. Frustrated, I twisted to look at him. “I want to do more than just sit against you.”

He shook his head. “Siri, you’re afraid. I can feel it.” His expression, so serious, made me desperately want that one-sided, sexy smile back.

“I’m not afraid. Not of you.”

“Clay?”

I shook my head. “Neither of you scare me. You make me feel things I don’t know how to deal with. But I want to—deal with them, that is. I want to feel these things. I might tense up and I can’t help it. I’ve spent years getting very few friendly touches and nearly all of the ones I did get were followed by pain. I think with you…and with your captain, I could learn—”

I broke off, overcome by my desperate need to feel like a female. To touch and be touched. To know what true pleasure felt like. But how could I get these things across?

“Damn, Siri. You are so beautiful, you make my heart ache, do you know that? And your loveliness isn’t just on the outside. I could see it instantly and I’m amazed with every moment I spend with you that you aren’t broken.”

“But I am,” I whispered.

“Not in the least. Wary, yes, but you must have one hell of a resilient core of inner strength to be handling things as well as you are. Most would be curled up hidden in their bunkroom.”

“I’ve spent a lot of time in there.”

“You know what I mean.” He framed my face with his big hands. “It kills me that you’ve been mistreated and I’m just as scared as you are to take this further.”

“But you want to?” I whispered the question.

“Want is too tame a word for what I feel for you.”

“And what you feel for the captain?”

A shadow passed through his eyes. “I’ve been in love with Claybourne Canfield for years.”

“Then why do you torment him so much?”

“Can’t help it. I’m afraid if I let any moment get too serious with him, all I feel will spill out and I’ll have him up against a wall so fast, he’ll hate me forever.”

“Oh no,” I breathed, putting my palms on his chest, reveling in the strong heartbeat against my skin. “That man could never, ever hate you. I think he might love you too.”

“You’re sweet, but no, he doesn’t. He cares for me. We are friends—or we used to be before I screwed up.”

“Have you ever tried to…” I trailed off, not sure how to ask such a nosy question. Always before any sign of interest from me was considered rude—not my place—and earned me pain.

That grin, the one that made my entire lower body knot up with heat, came back. He blew a hunk of blond hair out of his eyes. “Have I ever tried to what?”

I looked down briefly, but forced myself to raise my face and meet his gaze again. “Touch him.”

“Yeah, I’ve tried to touch him. Done more than tried.”

I shivered and his grin stretched wider.

“You like that idea.”

Nodding, I bit my lip.

“So,” he breathed, his hands cupping my shoulders. “That’s something you’d like to see?”

I didn’t answer. I couldn’t.

“What would you like to see me do to him?” He turned me so I was facing away from him, then flattened his hands on my stomach to pull my back to his chest. He nuzzled my neck, this time my hair had to be all in his face. “Tell me.”

“I want to see you kiss him.” I couldn’t imagine how beautiful they would look together. Clay, so dark, compact and intense. Anders, so tall and fair. “Have you ever kissed him?”

“I have. At one time, I kissed him often. He’d even started to return them despite constantly harping on the fact he’d only been into women in the past. He used to say his brother got all the bisexual genes in the family.”

“Bisexuality is a gene?” I frowned. That’s not what I’d been taught. Gwinarians believed all kinds of love were perfectly natural as long as everybody consented.

“It’s a joke.”

“When was the last time you kissed him?”

“Recently actually. A Gwinarian Tracker and another ship’s captain took over our ship and locked us in a room together. I got bored, tried to kiss him and received a nice black eye for my trouble.”

I twisted around again. “He hit you? Is he violent?”

“Siri, do you think he’s violent?”

“I think he could be violent. I think you could be too. Everyone is capable of violence—even me. I suppose I didn’t think he’d hit you, his friend. He does care for you, I can tell.” I smiled. “I even saw him looking at your backside.”

One blonde brow lifted. “Backside? I do love the way you talk.” He kissed my nose and leaned back against the wall again. “Looking at my backside, eh? Progress.”

“Yes, progress.” I turned, and this time I snuggled back against him. Immediately, I felt the hard ridge of an erection against my own backside. I started to pull away, then bit my lip and forced myself to settle in more. The faint groan that rumbled into my hair filled my belly with those lovely tingles. I clenched my legs together, suddenly achy between them. Shock filtered through my system when I realized I wanted him to touch me. I wanted to tear off our clothes, straddle his lap and see what it felt like to be the one to choose. Holding my breath, I tried to stop the shaking that started in my limbs and couldn’t.

“Siri,” he breathed. “Siri, sweetheart, I won’t hurt you. Please don’t be afraid of me.”

“I’m not afraid of you.” I turned, unable to stop my stupid legs and arms from shaking, and I knew right then that if I didn’t do this now, I might never be able to get past my own fear. “I want you to shut the door.”

Like that, his eyes narrowed as he studied me, his big body tense.

“No, I will.” I scrambled off his lap, crossed the room and palmed the door closed, hitting the lock mechanism and turning back to him. He’d sat up straight, gaze so damned penetrating—I felt it inside my bones. “I’m sorry that I’ll be shaking for this.”

“For what, Siri?”

I climbed back onto his bunk and straddled his lap. I shook so hard, I was kind of bouncing on his thighs, but I stayed there, closed my eyes and willed my limbs to stop.

“Siri?”

“Put your arms around me,” I whispered. “Please.”

He slid those huge, warm arms around me and I expected fear at the first sign of his strength, but quickly realized that a part of this shaking wasn’t fear at all but a sort of fluttery anticipation that was taking over my whole body. I started to put my hand on my stomach but Anders pulled me closer until my sex was nestled firmly over the hard ridge in his pants. I watched his face as he closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the wall. I placed my palms on either side of his head, leaned close until his eyes flew back open. His breath brushed over my lips and I licked them so his air was cool on them.

He groaned.

He wanted to kiss me and was holding back. He was waiting for me to make the choice.

“It is always your choice, Siri.”

“I said that aloud?” I couldn’t help but smile when the corner of his mouth twisted up.

“Are you sure about this, baby?”

“I just want a kiss.”

“It’s already more than merely a kiss or do you not feel between your legs how very, very much I’m enjoying this?”

“I feel that.” Instinctively, I moved my hips back and forth. Just slightly, but enough to feel the slide of his rigid cock against me. I expected my healing thighs to complain, but they didn’t. In fact, it felt good, so I did it again, pushing my hips a little farther back until my clit started to tingle. That hadn’t happened before, not even with the ones who’d used me, showed where it was and what I was supposed to do with it. “Oh,” I breathed. “That’s different. I want…I need to…” I breathed out as I moved my hips again.

Anders made a strangled noise. “That’s it. Gods! Move on me.”

I looked down to where I was grinding on him; saw that he’d tightened both fists on the bed beside my thighs. I poised on my knees, took my hands off the wall and reached for his. I put them on my hips and couldn’t stop a small smile when he made that long, drawn-out groaning noise again.

“You’re okay with my hands on you here?”

“Yes,” I whispered. Without even realizing it, I had returned my palms to the wall so I could get the balance I needed to start rubbing on him again. The tingle grew to something I couldn’t explain—a heat, a need to rub harder.

Nobody had ever let me do the exploring. Things had always been done to me, things I never asked for and certainly never wanted.

“I want you.”

This time I knew I said it aloud, knew my voice showed every bit of the shock I was feeling.

“Now?” he asked.

I started to nod, then stopped and shook my head. I amused myself and couldn’t stop the actual laugh that spilled from my mouth. “No. I mean, I do, but I know you’re celibate and I’m not going to be the one to change it. But if you don’t mind—” I broke off, fire on my chest and neck.

“Sweetheart, I don’t mind any of this. What do you want?”

“Can I just do a little more?”

He nodded, leaned his head back again. “You’re gonna kill me, but my body is yours to explore.”

And suddenly it was like a whole world opened up to me. I unhooked a few fasteners on his shirt, spread the blue material open to find that he didn’t have another shirt on under this one. A soft mat of blond chest hair appeared and I slid the fingers of one hand over it, into it. The hair was soft and curly against my fingers—his skin beneath, hot. Anders closed his eyes.

I liked that better. Liked him not watching me with that stare that did more to me than I thought his body could. I’d been wrong. I wondered if he felt how damp my pants were now, wondered if he could smell the strange sweet fragrance scenting the air—something appealing, something that caused my hips to start that slow glide back and forth again.

The heat in my stomach and in between my legs grew until I gasped and clenched my fingers on his shoulders. His eyes flew back open and that intensity was back, blazing and capturing me, pulling me in. This time, I groaned and couldn’t stop myself from leaning forward to press my lips to his. I gasped at the first touch, then tasted his bottom lip with my tongue.