Trapped On Talonque: (A Sectors SF romance) (29 page)

“There might be fish,” Nate said. “Did you see anything we could use to try and catch a few?”

“All kinds of junk out there we couldn’t examine in the dark. I’ll go check.” Thom headed for the rear of the hut.

“Watch for tolokon.” Bithia gave her warning with a serious undertone and a furrowed brow. “The slitherers hide in places such as the pile of discards. We no longer have the healing chamber to save anyone who gets bitten. I’m not special to the wretched species, no matter what these people insist. The creatures wouldn’t hesitate to bite me again, let alone you.”

“I’ll be extra careful.” Thom drew his Mark One and trudged behind the hut. Nate heard him whistling as he explored the one small outbuilding and the sprawling junk pile next to it.

Bithia sat on the porch edge and fumbled with her hair, which was escaping in spots from the arrangement of braids Celixia created the day before. Nate stood a few paces away, watching the ocean and the birds, lost in his own thoughts, not paying much attention to what she was doing.

“Do you think you could help me?” Bithia asked finally, apparently frustrated by the tight weaving the other girl had done.

Nate was sure he’d heard wrong. “You want me to help with your hair?”

Blinking at his surprise, Bithia bit her lip, stifling a chuckle. “I need assistance loosening the strands from the braid. If we’re going swimming later, I want to wash my hair, or at least rinse it out. I prefer to wear it loose on my shoulders. It was nice of Celixia to style it, to make things easier when we were escaping the city, as she said, but I don’t need it braided today. I rarely wore it this way before, and the crown of braids is too much weight on my head.”
 

Nate came to the porch and sat behind her. He had started unraveling the one thick braid hanging over Bithia’s spine when Thom came around the end of the cottage, still whistling.

“Found some good stuff.” He held out a fishing pole in one hand and clutched the rim of an oddly shaped basket in the other. Gesturing with the basket, he said, “I’m guessing this is the local equivalent of a net. If you don’t mind, I’m going ahead to the pond, try my luck at catching a few fish for lunch.”

“Sure, go on without us,” Nate said. “I can see we’re going to be here awhile, trying to undo Celixia’s handiwork on Bithia’s hair. Walk straight north from the house, through the dunes, and as soon as the sand ends, there’s the pond. You can’t miss it. We’ll join you soon.”

“Fine by me. No rush. I think we’ll probably have all day by the time Atletl and Celixia hike into town, do the shopping and get back out here. Even if they buy kemat with the bracelet, bargaining takes a long, long time on these pretech worlds. In my experience, all the parties involved enjoy the process too much. See you later.” Shouldering the pole and swinging the basket jauntily, Thom departed. Nate heard his whistling fade in the distance as the sergeant ascended the dunes, heading for the pond and the fish he hoped were waiting.

Nate concentrated on his unaccustomed task. “Your hair is so soft. I was sure it would be.”

Stretching like a cat, she turned to give him a flirtatious glance, although her words were prosaic. “It’s so beautiful here and peaceful. I feel as if all the problems and troubles are behind some invisible barrier, kept away from us, by the ocean maybe, you think?”

“Like the barrier in the healing chamber kept everyone away from you?” Nate said. “Even in my own damn dreams I couldn’t touch you.”

She was silent, gazing out to sea. He’d worked the thick braid loose and was now unraveling the crown of smaller braids, one at a time. Her lavender-blue hair was lustrous and shining in the morning sun, revealing itself to be composed of many variations on the two basic hues.

A man could be content here, for a while anyway
. Raising his eyes from Bithia’s hair for a moment, he watched the ocean. He’d get impatient soon enough, but right now, it was like being on a well-deserved leave.

Bithia’s voice jarred him out of his reverie.

“So you did wish to touch me? In the dreams?”

“Of course.” He answered without thinking, then felt his face redden. He was glad she had her back to him. “I wished I could get close enough to offer comfort, human contact. I hated to see you, paralyzed and helpless on the damn, cold couch.”
Truth, but not the whole truth
.

“Oh.”

There was silence. Nate couldn’t decide if he’d answered her question the way she expected.
I’m so ham-handed at expressing my emotions—I probably disappointed her
. Not knowing what to say next, he finished the unbraiding and combed out the inevitable snarls with his hands, gently stroking through her hair like a ten-fingered comb, pausing from time to time to massage the back of her neck and head. All the while, he racked his brain for a way to start their conversation over again, to tell her what was in his heart where she was concerned. The last thing Nate wanted was to say something dumb or awkward. So he said nothing. He checked their mental link, glowing in the corner of his mind in the way he was now accustomed to.
So we’re okay.

Conversation with her—about anything—had been so damn easy in the dreamspace. Nate wished he could re-create the seamless state of rapport right now.

“The massage is soothing,” she murmured, leaning against his chest, which effectively stopped him from doing the very thing she’d just said she enjoyed. He drew her close, and they sat, companionably leaning on each other.

“You know, I can’t read them all.”

Confused by the non sequitur, he asked, “Read all what?”

“Your thoughts. I can’t read them all. I know my ability worries you. I know you don’t like to let anyone see what you’re thinking, or the depth of your emotions. Not Thom, not even me.” She faced him, her hair swinging softly around them both like a silken blanket. “I wish I understood what’s in your past making all the self-protection so essential. Maybe someday you’ll tell me. But it shouldn’t worry you so. There’s nothing to fear from either of us, you know. I think the sergeant would gladly die for you—I read immense loyalty in him.”

“I’m not afraid.” His instant denial cut across her words about Thom. “I’m not used to talking about things. Feelings. It’s hard for me to do. Most of the time I manage to get along fine without having to talk about it.”

“But in the healing chamber you expressed—”

“The hardest thing I’ve ever done,” he said honestly. “I never said things like that to anyone before, not ever.”

She rested her hand on his cheek. “I’m touched.”

He knew her well enough by now to hear in her voice how genuinely pleased she was. The idea warmed his heart, but immediately he worried about disappointing her in the future. “Don’t expect self-revelation from me daily. I’m trying hard here, and I can’t promise any more,” he said a bit harshly.

“I can only read the surface of what you think,” she went on, determined to reassure him about their mental link. “You have many barriers and blocks in your mind. I can’t go there, can’t see what you think behind them without your permission. Nor would I try, but I do sense them there.”

“Was there someone on your expedition, or at home maybe—someone waiting for you?” He’d speculated during the long months of captivity.
 

Now she was startled and sat up, turning to kneel before him as he unlocked his arms in automatic response to her movement. Resting her hands on his shoulders lightly, she looked him in the eyes. “No. I was too focused on my schooling, on being accredited for fieldwork, to be seriously involved with anyone. There were certainly interesting people in my life, but I assumed there’d be time for pursuing the happiness of a lifemate later. Why do you ask?”

Uncomfortable as always with conducting a conversation that revealed his innermost emotions, he refused to meet her eyes. “I wondered.”

“And you? Is there someone waiting for you in your Sectors, as you call them?” It seemed she’d been as curious about that subject when it came to his life. “Am I displacing someone who thinks she has your heart?”

“No.”
 

“I’d be sorry for her,” Bithia said, “but I wouldn’t step aside. You mean too much to me, our link is too tight.”

“What I do for a living is dangerous. The Special Forces has a high mortality rate. I couldn’t ask anyone I cared about to sit and wait while I was on a mission, and then maybe I’d never come back, you know? A lot of Team guys wait until retirement to get serious about anyone.”

“Was there ever someone who tempted you to change your mind?” Eyes narrowed, brow wrinkled, her face was set in serious lines.

Nate lowered his own eyes, toying with a long curl of her hair, twining it between his fingers. “Not until I met you,” he said finally, meeting her steady gaze.

Bithia raised a gentle hand to his cheek, lifted her chin and parted her lips, extending an unmistakable invitation. Without thinking about it at all, with no hesitation, because the time and the place were right, and this was the woman he loved with all his closely guarded heart, Nate leaned forward and kissed her.

She smelled like fresh air and flowers and some exotic spice he couldn’t name. She placed her arms around his neck as he licked her lips, seeking entry. She parted for him, her tongue testing his tentatively at first, then drawing him farther into her warm mouth, adjusting her position to more effectively stroke and suck. His arousal hardened to steel as she shifted on his lap, her bottom pressing on him. He raised one hand to cup her breast through the thin fabric of the ancient nightgown, finding her nipple pebbled and hard under his thumb.

So we’re more alike than we are different.
As she spoke mind to mind, Bithia rolled her hips on his cock. She reached between their bodies with one hand, massaging him through the kilt before sliding her hand upward on his thigh, under the fabric, gripping him through the thin cotton loincloth.
 

“Too many clothes,” she said aloud, breaking off the kiss. She climbed off his lap and reached for his hand. “I’ll never forget the first time I saw you in the chamber, half naked, in chains, full of anger, ready to seize any opportunity to fight for your life. Dangerous was the word that came to my mind. Then our minds linked, and I felt it here as well.” She laid a hand on the vee between her hips.
 

In response to her tug on his hand, Nate rose. “Here?” he said, pulling her gown up to run his hand between her thighs and stroke his fingers through the soft curls and velvet skin, wet with desire for him. “Would this be the spot?” He inserted first one finger and then a second, massaging the delicate tissues and nerve endings.
 

Bithia threw her head back, eyes closed. “The exact spot. You’ll have me screaming in a moment. It’s been so long since I—I experienced these sensations.”

“There’s no rush. We have all day.” He withdrew his hand and picked her up, hands under the soft curves of her butt.
 

“I’m the one who’s been waiting thousands of years for you to arrive and set me free,” she said with a smile, wrapping her legs around his waist. “I say enough anticipation.” She captured his mouth, tongue darting between his lips and exploring him boldly.

He had to brace himself against the cottage wall as the embrace continued. His cock tented his kilt, aching to plunge into her. Breathing hard, he finished the kiss. “Shall we take this inside?”

Bithia kissed his neck, alternating between featherlight caresses and tiny nibbles. She took his earlobe delicately between her teeth and murmured her pleasure. “What about Thom?”

“He’s a smart guy. He knows his job is to stay at the fishing hole until he sees us again.” Making sure he had his balance under control, if not his raging hard-on, Nate carried her into the cabin, setting her on her feet inside the threshold. Atletl and Celixia had left the place neat, all the blankets folded away on the makeshift shelves. He grabbed the entire stack and spread them on the floor as there was no bed or even a thin mattress. Bithia helped him.

“Not exactly where I’d have chosen for our first time together,” he said apologetically, reaching for her.

She drew his tunic off over his head, tossing it aside. “The important thing is us, together, not the surroundings. Someday I’m sure we’ll have the opportunity for the flowers and silk sheets I see in your mind. Although I enjoy the mental pictures.” Head tilted, she batted her eyelashes at him, smiling. “You have quite the imagination.”

“I’m not usually a romantic guy,” he said, struggling with the kilt, impatient to be free of the clothing. “You have that effect on me, though, and I like it.”

Bithia ran her hand over his bare front, tracing his abs, moving her hand higher, pausing to tease his nipple for a moment. She frowned at his various scars. “Let me see your back.”

He hesitated. “It’s not pretty.”

She walked behind him, running her hand over the tattoo on his bicep and across his shoulder, maintaining contact. There was a gasp of indrawn breath, and he felt her lips brushing softly over the network of scarred, ravaged skin. “I’m so sorry I couldn’t do a better job of healing you.”

“Hey.” Turning, he clasped her hand, drawing her into his arms. “I’m fine. I wouldn’t be here if not for you, so I can stand the scars if you can.”

Her eyes shimmered in the dim interior of the cottage. “Do they hurt?”