The Star Prince (17 page)

Ian contemplated Tee's entirely too-kissable mouth. "Yeah," he said. That was exactly what he was afraid of.

On Padma Eight, Gann followed the leads Lara gave him, observing and often questioning throngs of permanent residents, starpilot students and instructors, as well as traders who arrived daily from the farthest reaches of the frontier. Lara's decision to come to Padma Eight was an excellent one; if the Dar princess was keeping company with an Earth dweller, there were plenty here, risk-loving entre-preneurs taking advantage of the business opportunities the unrestrained frontier offered.

His long hours seemed to suit Lara just fine. Though sociable by nature and upbringing, Gann was willing to leave Miss Sunshine to her eternal brooding. But not tonight. A nagging sense of loneliness combined with the fruitlessness of his mission had left him in need of cheering. His sulky starpilot was going to join him for dinner and conversation, even if it killed her.

He marched into the cockpit, where she was curled up in the pilot's chair, her fingers deftly weaving together a cluster of silver threadlike strands. Her incessant jewelry making. It seemed a frivolous pastime for such a cool, remote woman.

"Dinner's ready," he said.

She glanced up. As always, he saw something intense and unknown flash in her eyes before she blinked it away. It was as if, when surprised, she surfaced from a deep, dark place, a place that he had no desire to frequent if the pain she thought she was hiding was any indication of its nature.

"I already ate," she stated.

"That was lunch. This is dinner."

She returned her concentration to her silver-weaving. "Fraternization isn't covered in my contract."

He snorted.

She tried a different tack. "I'm not hungry."

"Then come; simply sit with me. I could use the company."

"That's what bars are for."

He straightened, spreading one hand over his heart. "I prefer your company any day over what I'd find in a bar."

She lowered her weaving and regarded him with unconvinced fawn-colored eyes. "Then you must frequent some pretty pitiful dives, Mr. Truelenne."

He laughed.

She frowned. "What?"

"You made a joke," he said with a surprising degree of triumph. "At your own expense, but a joke nonetheless. And I'll bet the rest of that bottled-up chat is ready to burst a seam. If for health reasons only, why not share a little of your word stockpile with a lonely spacehand?"

One corner of her mouth quirked, he thought, but he couldn't be certain. His humor always seemed to startle her. It was as if no one had ever dared to tease her.

Maybe no one else had.

To his pleasure, she put away her weaving. "I don't talk much," she admitted in a softer voice.

An insistent yowl interrupted him before he could reply.

"Crat. The ketta-cat." Lara jumped off the chair and scrambled down the gangway to the front hatch, where a thin, scarred ketta-cat waited.

It ran to her, gurgling, rubbing its side against her calves. She shifted her weight from foot to foot, but didn't reach down to stroke the ketta-cat. It mewed loudly.

"I thought I told you to leave," she said, nudging it gently with her leg. "It's been following me all over town. Then today it trailed me here." She spread her hands. "Go. There's no home for you here."

"Let it be," Gann said. "I'll bring out our leftovers later."

"And then it will think it can stay. Good-bye," she told the ketta-cat. But the pitiful creature continued to rub itself around and in between her legs, its fur swishing against the plush sea green fabric of her pants.

Lara stood still, her arms limp at her sides. She appeared utterly baffled by the cat's unconditional love. Gann was equally mystified by her apparent inability to accept affection of any sort. For that his heart went out to her— not in pity, but in stark admiration. To be so emotionally crippled, she must have survived something horrific. But instead of living the rest of her life cowering in the shadows, a victim of circumstance, she'd learned to be a repo pilot and a tracker.

"Dinner's getting cold," he said.

"I'll warm it." She appeared to jump at the chance to avoid the ketta-cat. Without another word, she left Gann and the stray alone on the entry ramp.

The creature watched her go. Then it lifted its mournful silver-green eyes to Gann and mewed.

"Dinner? Sure, why not?" he replied. "You're a lot more talkative than my partner there." He scooped up the ketta-cat with one hand. "Now, how about we go see if any of it rubs off on her?"

When Lara walked out of the galley holding a crock of stew in her hands, Gann was already waiting for her, his booted feet crossed at the ankle, his fingers laced over his stomach. The ketta-cat darted out from under the chair and began rubbing itself against her legs. She set the crock so firmly on the table that he expected the cookware to break. One of Lara's bracelets jarred loose, and he caught it before it rolled off the edge.

He noticed she said nothing about the ketta-cat. She sat and held out her hand. "I'll take the bracelet," she said.

He studied the delicate bauble before giving it back to her. "It's a lovely piece," he admitted. "You're very good."

Her expression vacillated between annoyance and pleasure as she ladled stew into her bowl and then Gann's, belatedly, as if it were an afterthought. "I've woven silver for years."

"You're always wearing different pieces. Where do you keep them all?"

"I don't. I pull them apart and begin again."

"Hmm," he said between bites of stew. "That fits."

She raised a brow. "Is that supposed to mean anything?"

"It fits your personality." He tore off a hunk of bread and used it to soak up broth. "You don't appear to be attached to anyone or anything."

She sputtered. "If this is your idea of conversation, I— "

"Lara." He spread his hands. "I am trying to get to know you, for no reason other than that I want to."

She contemplated him for a long moment, her gaze searching, as if she were truly seeing him for the first time since they'd struck up their odd partnership. Using his heightened instincts, honed from years of training and practice, he sensed the wounded soul within her.

"I don't mind solitude," she said, then went back to eating with pointed concentration.

His ruefulness of late invaded him. "I don't, either. It's why I chose this life. I've long and willingly put my personal wishes aside for my duty. Yet, with each passing year, I become more aware of what I lack in my life."

He noticed that she'd stopped eating. "And what is that?" she almost whispered, searching his face.

"Someone with whom I can bare my soul."

Reflected in her eyes, he saw his own desperate loneliness. He blinked. "No family?" he inquired after several minutes of silence ticked by.

"No."

"Husband?"

She began eating again, in earnest. "No."

"A lover, then?"

Her outraged eyes gave him the answer he wanted. "Ah. Where Eston fit into your life, I wasn't sure, other than that he's responsible for losing your precious ship."

"Don't remind me, Vash." For the first time, he detected a trace of teasing in her tone. Was that the first step in her softening armor? Perhaps it was. And maybe that meant there was more to come. If he could make her laugh, lovemaking couldn't be far behind. He smiled. A night of pleasure would do this woman a world of good.

As only he could give it.

Chapter Twelve

"Now aim like you mean it!" Gredda called to Tee'ah.

Eyes narrowed, arms extended, Tee'ah held her laser pistol in front of her. Frost-covered grass in the field behind the Sun Devil caught the rising sun's first rays, and a breeze numbed her ears and fingers. Concentrating, she waited until threadlike crosshairs centered on her target— a produce box sitting on a tree stump. Then she pressed the trigger. The shrubs behind and several paces to the left of the stump exploded.

"Dear heaven," Tee'ah groaned, lowering the pistol. "Not again."

Gredda grabbed a fire extinguisher and drowned the flames. "That was better, Tee. But you need to practice."

Tee'ah wiped her forearm across her forehead. "I will." She'd been working on improving her previously nonexistent marksmanship all week. During that time she'd hit Gredda's boxes only twice. But she was determined to hone her skill with a pistol. Now that they were hunting for Randall's associate, such skills were critical for her to prove she was an indispensable member of Ian's crew.

She and Gredda pocketed their weapons and returned to the ship.

Quin met Tee'ah in the galley. The expression of delight he wore on his face made her instantly suspicious. She poured a mug of coffee and did her best to ignore it.

"I've divvied up chores for the week and you drew galley duty."

Coffee sloshed out of her mug. Hastily she mopped it off the counter.

"You look like you just swallowed an oster egg," he said "Don't tell me you can't cook."

Nerves tightened her neck muscles. Cooking was a basic skill most people knew how to perform. But she hadn't been raised like "most people." She'd never once entered the kitchens in the palace; the thought of doing so had never crossed her mind. Now, if she were to confess that she didn't know how to prepare a simple meal, it might raise unwanted suspicions about her background. "As I recall, you voiced similar doubts about my flying abilities— and look, I kept you alive."

He brought his index finger and thumb together. "Barely."

"Then I suggest you go on a dietary fast." Perhaps the entire crew would have to do so, she thought as she looked around the small room. Surrounding her was a bank of ion-burners, a chiller, an atomic oven, and shelves of computer-categorized food supplies. It was a vastly more intimidating array than the instrumentation she used to pilot the ship. Swallowing hard, Tee'ah strode to the galley computer, opened the viewscreen, logged on, and spent some time familiarizing herself with the stored data. There was a long list of basic supplies, all requiring creativity if she were to create and then cook a meal with them.

Although she considered herself reasonably inventive, she might fare better if she were able to purchase fresh ingredients from the merchants in town, sticking to those food items that looked reasonably familiar, taking into account the differences in produce of foreign worlds. The market… fresh air… shopping unimpeded by an entourage— the idea appealed to her.

"There's hardly enough here to put together a proper meal," she said with feigned annoyance, closing the viewscreen. "I'll need credits to purchase supplies at the market."

As if he'd anticipated such a request, Quin handed her several currency cards of various denominations. "Remember," he said in his overprotective-father voice, "this is to be used for food only. Not for any recreational beverages you might be tempted to purchase on the way there or back."

"No 'recreational beverages'? Oh, Quin, please." She threw up her hands. "With such limits placed upon me, how am I supposed to prepare my famous whiskey-soaked Mandarian chicken?"

"We've had our fill of whiskey-soaked fowl on this ship," he shot back, his tone warming.

She grinned. "Not the least of them pilots, eh?"

Ian walked into the galley. He glanced from Quin to Tee'ah and back again. "Don't tell me she's torturing you again?" he asked his mechanic.

Tee'ah beat Quin to a reply. "I've drawn galley duty. And now Quin's worried that I'll spend all the credits he's given me to shop in the first bar I see."

Ian poured coffee into a mug, this one decorated with tiny conifer trees and a cheerful red-nosed man sporting an abundance of white facial hair and a long, floppy red hat. Sipping, he studied her thoughtfully. "I don't know. Barring a few notable instances, I'm beginning to think you're all talk."

"Meaning?"

"I don't think you're half as wild as you'd have us believe." His playful grin invited her to challenge his allegation. "Or… are you?"

She sniffed, tugging on her sleeves. Then she gave him a coy look. "Well, I don't dare cause trouble with that threat of yours hanging over my head."

"Threat?" Quin asked. "What threat?"

Ian's eyes dared her to reveal the details of their private conversation in the woods the night they'd spoken to Randall in the bar. Her heart raced with the exhilaration of flirting so openly with someone to whom she was so very much attracted, and she snatched the chance to continue the dalliance.

"The captain said he'd make me pay," she told Quin out of the corner of her mouth. "But when I asked him what he meant, he said he didn't think I'd want to know." She paused for effect. "I've spent many a night since pondering those words."

Ian's eyes turned a deeper green, as they had that night before he'd almost kissed her.

"Captain." Push's voice shattered the moment. The cargo handler waited in the hatchway. There was a black smudge on one cheek, and his fingers sported matching stains. "You ought to take her out, Captain. And don't be gentle or nothing… I think she'll go as fast and hard as you want."

Tee'ah wanted to sink into the alloy flooring. Was she so obvious in her feelings for Ian?

"I wasn't planning on taking her this morning," Ian replied matter-of-factly, as if Tee'ah weren't cringing next to him, her face hot with embarrassment. "But I will if you think I should."

Push nodded, wiping his dirty hands on a rag. "I do."

"You do?" Tee'ah managed. Her own opinion didn't matter, apparently.

Maddeningly blase, Ian set his empty mug on the table. "All right. Afterward I'll let you know what I think. She might need tweaking."

"Tweaking?" Tee'ah coughed out.

"Yeah." Ian shrugged.

She couldn't believe he would talk about her in such a cavalier manner. She wanted to be made love to— not tweaked, or whatever Ian had called it, the results of which he apparently had no qualms about sharing with the crew.

Ian explained, "Push is helping me repair my Harley."

She felt her heart stop. "Your two-wheeled Earth transport?"