Enemy Overnight (20 page)

He penetrated her one slow, agonizingly delicious inch at a time. Peserin, with a grip this tight on his cock, he might not require any additional stimulation to come.

“I’m fucking your ass, Jasmine King,” he whispered.

“Yes.”

“This is just the beginning of your punishment.”

“I know,” she sobbed. “Ah God, it hurts!”

He sank even deeper. “And you want more, don’t you?”

“Yes!”

“All of it?”

Without waiting for her answer, he hilted, pressing the emerging tip of his spur hard against her tailbone.

“Yes!” she screamed, pushing her torso up off the table and throwing her head back until she hit his breastbone. Her feet flew up against the backs of his thighs to hold him against her.

“I told you not to move.” Shauss planted one hand between her shoulder blades and forced her back down to the table but allowed her feet to remain hooked behind his legs. Holding her in place, he began to move, earning a breathy grunt for every inward stroke and a guttural groan for every slow, dragging outward stroke. When things began to get sticky, he reached for the tube and squirted more lube on the rocking shaft of his cock.

He fucked her patiently, deriving brutal enjoyment from both the punishment and the unblinking stares of over a dozen ravenous warriors. Every one of them would sacrifice an eyeball to stand where he did at this moment.

Eventually Jasmine began to squirm and moan. “Please,” she gasped.

“Please what?”

“Harder. Please.”

He obliged, picking up his pace, slamming his pelvis against her. Her moans became frantic and she pushed up against his restraining hand.

“She’s actually enjoying this,”
Tiber said disbelievingly.

“She’s my submissive,”
Shauss replied, as if that explained everything—which for him, it did. Jasmine King might be the enemy but she was a genuine submissive.
His
genuine submissive, who would suffer at length for deceiving him. While he was tempted to wring her fragile neck for her treachery, he saw no reason to condemn himself to a lifetime of fucking the probe.

Jasmine became agitated, throwing his rhythm off with desperate thrusts of her own.

“By all that’s mighty, she’s nearing orgasm!”

Shauss ceased all motion. “What do you have to tell me,
aramai
?”

“No!” she screeched. “Please don’t stop!”

“Tell me what I want to know and then you can come.”

“I don’t know anything!”

“You know who you really are.”

“So do you.” Her voice trembled. “I’ve told you the truth about everything. My name really is Jasmine King and I’m an American. I was born and raised in Colorado and I consider myself a Terran. My parents may have been Narthani, but I swear to you, I’m a Terran in every—”

“Silence!” Shauss shouted, crowding her harder against the table’s padded edge. “Who are your parents?”

“It’s all in my records!” she screamed back, panting. Taking a deep breath, she continued. “My parents are Ragan and Dayree King. They were sent to Earth twenty-eight years ago to study the population and evaluate the planet’s readiness for contact with a more advanced civilization.”

“You mean they followed us to Earth to spy on us.”

“No! It was a scientific mission. They were supposed to be recalled after ten years, but no one ever came for them.”

Now that, he believed. “Crunus
interruptus
,” he speculated.

Jasmine nodded, and just for fun, he leaned all his weight into his hips, grinding the thick base of his cock into her virgin ass. Her squeal of pain was wickedly soothing to his ego.

“And how many Narthani are on Terra right now?”

“Just my dad and me,” she whimpered. “My mom died last year in an accident.”

Shauss grabbed a fistful of her hair and pulled her head up, twisting it on her neck until his face was millimeters from hers. “Surely you don’t expect us to believe that,” he breathed in her open mouth. “No operation of this magnitude would be launched with merely two operatives.”

“You have to believe me because it’s true—God knows I bugged my parents about it a million times and they always swore we were the only ones on the planet. My mother wouldn’t lie to me.”

“Find Ragan King,”
Shauss ordered Zannen.

“With all due respect, brother,
jurana
is still in effect and the secondary claiming period is nearing an end.”

“You still want her? An underdeveloped Narthani?”

Zannen shrugged.
“A fuck is a fuck.”

Too bad.
“Very well. It can wait a few minutes.”

Almost convinced by Jasmine’s claims and yet unwilling to chance another deception, he grasped her wrists and slid them behind his neck. In lieu of the cuffs he’d used to secure her in this position last night, he ordered, “Clasp your hands and do not let go.”

When she complied, he slid his hands around the fronts of her thighs. Grasping them by their tender inner flesh, he straightened and pulled her up off the table. Leaving her impaled on his cock, he turned, spreading her thighs wide and exposing her dripping cunt to the Garathani males who crowded the room.

“Hastion, your protected claiming time draws to a close in fifteen minutes. If you wish to finalize your claim, free your cock and use it to show your mate the error of her ways.”

Tiber’s heart thundered with equal parts alarm and arousal. Jasmine’s head lolled back against Shauss’ shoulder, the golden collar gleaming against her skin. Her pupils were so dilated, the blue of her eyes had nearly disappeared. Her chest rose and fell in shallow panting breaths. If it weren’t for the shiny slickness coating her open labia, he would have said she was terrified. And she probably was, but that terror was definitely secondary to arousal.

Hastion stepped forward and Tiber noted the significant lack of bulge at his crotch. He advanced slowly, almost painfully. His face was chalky and beaded with sweat.

“Although I deplore the idea of losing my claim, I might be unable to perform at the moment.”

Tiber took a step toward him. “Get to a bed before you—”

Hastion lurched to one side and regurgitated under another of the exam tables.

“Pass out,” Tiber finished, rushing to prop the man up before he slumped any farther. Ensign Verr helped him get Hastion up onto the exam table. “It’s obvious our scans are somehow overlooking a significant head injury.”

“It appears to me he merely suffers from an aversion to female flesh,” Zannen said scornfully. “Have no fear, Ensign, I’ll take care of claiming the Narthani for you.”

“No!” Hastion tried to roll off the table and groaned. “You can’t have her, you bastard!”

“Tiber, I hope you’re up to the task,” Shauss said.

Having spent the previous twenty minutes fighting off an unwilling erection, Tiber now found himself anything but aroused.

“Ten minutes,” Shauss prompted. “Then Zannen will no doubt drag her off me and fuck her until she can’t walk.”

Jasmine spoke. “Tiber, please.”

He looked into her dazed, pleading eyes and felt a spark of arousal that was immediately doused by a flood of guilt. Striding over to them, he took her face in his hands. “Are you well?”

She nodded.

“I won’t rape you,” he whispered fiercely.

“It’s not rape if I want you,” she whispered back.

“You’re being coerced.”

“I want to be coerced. I
love
being coerced.”

“You’re desperate to avoid being bound to Zannen.”

Her eyes slid to Zannen and fire kindled in them. “He doesn’t scare me anymore. But I
like
you.”

Lust tickled his insides once more. “Are you certain?”

She focused on him, and said clearly, “Tiber, please fuck me. Please. I’m begging you.”

Tiber heard the rasp of a zipper and turned in time to see Zannen’s cock drop out of the front of his suit. The bulbous purple head hung nearly to his knee—obviously he was willing and able to rise to the occasion. Tiber felt a shameful surge of excitement at the sight.

“I really don’t think I have room for him,” Jasmine said with remarkable calm. “Especially not with Shauss already inside me. Please, Tiber—hurry.”

Tiber looked into Shauss’ impenetrable black eyes as he pulled his zipper tab downward. Shauss was right—Zannen would take what he wanted however he wanted it. Tiber, on the other hand, felt compelled to beg Shauss to lay Jasmine down and let him have her to himself, both for her sake and his. But it would be fruitless. Shauss had never seemed more unreachable than he did right now.

“But what if she can’t take my spur?”

“If she can take mine, she can take yours.”

Shauss sounded certain rather than pitiless, and Tiber relaxed marginally. Lowering his gaze, he stroked his lengthening cock while he concentrated on Jasmine’s slumberous blue eyes…on lips that were cherry-red from being bitten…on sweet, round breasts that heaved with fear and desire.

Zannen stepped closer, stroking his own monstrous shaft, and Hastion cried out, “For Peserin’s sake, Tiber, just claim her. Now!”

He leaned forward and captured her lips in a brief open-mouthed kiss before whispering, “I’m sorry.”

Then he grasped his penis and pushed the head into her tiny opening. Her thin, high squeal made him glad he was only half hard. It felt strange to be standing balls to balls with another male, and Shauss’ satisfied smile made him feel as if he’d just committed himself to something far beyond his ability to cope with. He felt less like he’d claimed Jasmine than like he’d been claimed by both Jasmine and Shauss. He almost wouldn’t be surprised if Shauss grasped his head and kissed him.

Shauss’ grin deepened.
“
Tiber, your expression is giving me ideas I’ve never had about another male. Perhaps we’ll have to explore your latent homosexual tendencies.”

“Peserin damn you,” Tiber whispered as his cock surged to aching hardness inside the incredibly snug haven of Jasmine’s cunt.

“Maybe I’ll fuck your ass after I’ve finished with Jasmine’s.”

“Have mercy!” Tiber wheezed.

He started when Shauss dropped one of Jasmine’s legs and grabbed his neck in an iron grip, pulling his forehead against his hard chest. Although he put his mouth against Tiber’s ear, he continued to use the cerecom.
“
She’s not claimed until you spill your seed inside her, so fuck her quickly. If Zannen tears you away before you finish, I’m going to ream your ass in front of all of them while he claims her.”

Tiber hooked Jasmine’s dangling leg over his forearm and leaned into her as he thrust deep again and again. Her whimpers fed his arousal and he wanted to sob at her tightness and the knowledge that Shauss’ cock was a thin barrier of flesh away from his. Shauss’ grip on him never relented and Tiber gave up control completely, bucking inside Jasmine.

His spur erupted and found her nook unerringly. Her scream made him grind to a halt.

“She’s fine. Come inside her. Now,” Shauss ordered in his ear.

Tiber groaned and barreled ahead, angling his hips for the deepest penetration possible as he reached desperately for release. When Zannen’s thick arms slid around his chest and pulled, Shauss locked his grip even tighter, fighting for him, and Tiber erupted with a howl of satisfaction like he’d never felt before, bathing Jasmine’s cunt with his seed.

When he opened his eyes and looked at her, he recoiled with cold horror. A single bloodstained tear dripped from the corner of her left eye.

Jasmine blinked at him. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Clear the infirmary,” he ordered. Zipping himself back into his suit as all the warriors thundered out, he barked, “Empran, scan Jasmine King for
sbrova
hemorrhagic pathogens.”

Shauss’ arms tightened reflexively around her. “No,” he said hoarsely.

“No
sbrova
pathogens detected,” Empran reported.

He and Shauss both let go gusty sighs of relief. Shauss laid her on one of the tables and Tiber covered her with a thin blanket.

“What are
sbrova
pathogens?” Jasmine asked drowsily.

“Display vital statistics and complete blood analysis,” Tiber ordered. Wiping the tear gently from the corner of her eye, he showed her his bloodstained fingertip. “
Sbrova
pathogens were used in the biowar attack.”

“You thought I had…” Jasmine’s eyes widened as she glanced between their grim faces. “I don’t, do I?”

A readout appeared on the holoscreen.

“No. Your tear ducts are inflamed.” Tiber said. “Hormone levels indicate you’re well into the early stages of transition.”

“Peserin, she’s emitting—that’s why she smells so delicious. Why I lost control…” Shauss’ frown deepened. “What about the pheromone blocker?”

“I ran out before the demonstration incident,” Jasmine said.

“So why didn’t our pheromones intoxicate her yesterday?”

“Perhaps it takes time for effects of the spray to wear off,” Tiber speculated.

“Actually,” Jasmine said hesitantly, “Monica used galathene barrier on me.”

“Really.” Tiber tipped her head back and peered up her nostrils.

“It’s not there now. Monica extracted it last night.”

“Ah, yes. She’d replicated the spray by then, but apparently it was too little, too late. You’d already been heavily exposed at the demonstration.”

Jasmine looked at Shauss and said nothing.

“You realize,
aramai
, that your punishment is far from over.”

“I know.”

“What’s most unforgivable is that you involved Monica in your deception and now she’ll suffer punishment as well.”

“I know! Don’t you think I feel awful about that?”

“Then why did you do it?”

Jasmine didn’t answer.

“Tell me about your father.”

Jasmine squirmed a little. “I’ve already told you all there is to tell.”

“Please. Do you think I failed to notice that your
mother
wouldn’t lie to you? Obviously you believe your father would, and if a father will lie to his daughter, he is not worthy of her loyalty. So I order you again, tell me all you know about your father.”

“Shauss, please don’t ask me to betray my only living relative,” Jasmine begged.

He grasped her chin. “Jasmine, people are dying. Millions of people died and millions more stand to die if we don’t get to the bottom of this conspiracy against us.”

“My father wouldn’t do that! He considers Earth his home now, just like I do.”

“Have you never heard of Hiroshima? Earthlings themselves terrorize their own people with mass murder.” Shauss turned to Tiber. “There’s only one way to ensure we’re getting the truth from her.”

Tiber dipped his head in acknowledgement and got a syringe of
corai
serum. It would render Jasmine unable to dissemble.

“What is that?” she asked, trying to squirm away. Tiber didn’t hesitate to shoot it right into her neck. “Ow.”

“You’ll be fine,” Shauss said. “Now tell me everything you know about your parents.”

* * * * *

After Shauss left to verify her story, Tiber took the time to thoroughly clear away the debris of her clitoral implant, wincing with remorse as he resealed the wounds he’d torn open when he claimed her. Since she was still under the influence of the
corai
, he probed more personally.

“Why would you deliberately choose to remain in an adolescent’s body?” he asked as he worked between her legs.

Refusing to look at him, she clutched at her blanket. “It’s not an adolescent’s body on Earth—not with the implants, anyway. And if I’d matured, I wouldn’t have fit in.”

“Your mission was that important to you?”

“I didn’t have a mission!” She shivered, pulling the blanket around her neck. “Good Lord, why do you even care?”

“I’m simply…curious. And for some reason, I still feel compelled to try to protect you, if I can.”

“Don’t bother. Look where trying to protect me got Monica. God, I hope she’s okay.” She sounded near tears again.

“The commander loves her.” But even as he said it, he knew that sometimes love could make a man even more violent if such love was betrayed. Which was why he suspected Shauss had reacted so strongly. There was more than ego involved, as evidenced by Shauss’ fear at the sight of her bloodstained tear.

“I hope so,” Jasmine said. She cringed and put a hand over her eyes. “God, I don’t know what you gave me, but I’ve got a massive headache now.”

Concerned, Tiber glanced at her readings. She had a fever and her pain levels were, indeed, increasing.

“Are you having body aches?”

“Well, let’s see.” She peered at him from beneath her hand. “I just had sex with Shauss, engaged in hand-to-hand combat with Shauss, and then had sex with you and Shauss at the same time, so yes, I’m kind of achy.”

Setting aside the regen sealer, he gently laid her legs together and pulled the blanket down to cover her. Removing her breast and dental implants could wait until after the
corai
finished its job. “So if your mission meant nothing to you, why wouldn’t you want to mature?”

“Because at thirteen, fitting in was more important to me than just about anything. That’s how old I was when my parents told me I wasn’t human, and God, I just freaked. I was already kind of an oddity because of my intelligence. I was two grades ahead of the others my age by then, and only the fact that I was…was
pretty
and athletic and a cheerleader kept me from being a complete outsider. Peer pressure is a big motivator for most Terran teens, and I was no different. As far as I was concerned, I was Terran. I didn’t want to be Narthani. I wanted to grow up and marry a nice man and have two point four children and drive a minivan and—”

“How can you have two point four children?” he asked, eyes wide.

“It’s just a statistic,” she said with yawn. “And that’s not the point. The point is, in my heart, I was a Terran. That’s all I ever wanted to be. If I’d matured into a seven-foot alien Amazon, I would never have gotten to live that life, so I chose to remain…as I was.”

Tiber frowned. Seven-foot alien Amazon? Why would she think that? The average Narthani was only slightly taller than the average American. If she actually turned out to be seven feet in height, she would be taller than ninety-nine percent of Narthani females. Surely the Narthani would send spies who were better able than that to blend in with the population.

“Empran, how tall are Jasmine King’s parents?”

“Ragan King is six feet three inches tall. Dayree King was five feet eleven inches tall.”

After considering how to approach the matter, he said carefully, “Your parents evidently didn’t have any trouble fitting in.”

“My parents were both the shortest members of their families, but Dad said I inherited taller genes. Lucky me,” she said glumly. “I could have lived with the nook, but not with being seven feet tall.”

Tiber’s mind raced furiously. Where was she getting this?

Jasmine sighed. “You know, Tiber, I lived my whole life as a lie. From the minute I found out I wasn’t human, I was playing a role as convincingly as I could. I focused all my energies on being as human as I could so that no one would ever suspect.”

“And now that the role you’ve had to play has disappeared, you don’t know who to be.”

She nodded sleepily. “I belong nowhere. I have nothing. I
am
nothing.”

He paused and then told her, “When Nelina and my daughter Shrea died, I felt much as you do now. I felt lost and without purpose. But I still had a daughter and two sons who needed me, so I carried on. Eventually I found myself again, and I found new meaning in my life. You will too—if you haven’t already.”

“If I haven’t already?” she yawned.

He tucked her under the blanket and kissed her forehead. “Say goodnight, Jasmine.”

* * * * *

“She’s definitely transitioning,” Tiber said as they watched her sleep. “She’s already three inches taller than she was at her last physical.”

Shauss frowned. “As tall as she is, I would have guessed her transition must have been progressing slowly for some time.”

“I imagine it has—she’s lost two of her molars over the years, so I suspect the pheromone blocker wasn’t one hundred percent effective. But there may be another explanation for her height. While I was healing her, I asked why she would have chosen to delay her transition and she said that she wouldn’t have fit in on Earth if she grew to be a seven-foot Amazon.”

“Why would she imagine that? Were her parents extraordinarily tall?”

“Empran reports they were only slightly taller than average Americans,”
Tiber said.
“There’s no reason to believe she would be any taller, and yet her parents told her they were short by their families’ standards and she was a throwback.”

“That doesn’t make any sense—the Narthani aren’t much taller than Terrans.” His frown deepened. “Could she be immune to the
corai
?”

“I don’t see how—we can’t even induce immunity in our own agents and she fell into a light coma the minute I stopped talking to her.” Tiber cocked a brow at him. “Shauss, what if she’s not Narthani?”

Shauss gave him a look of wide-eyed disbelief.
“Why in Peserin’s hell would she profess to be Narthani if she weren’t? If she were going to lie, wouldn’t it make more sense—not to mention be a damn sight safer—to masquerade as one of the hybrids?”

“I agree completely, and if we hadn’t overheard their conversation, I would have assumed Jasmine was a GaraTer just like Monica. But Shauss, if she’s Narthani, then she’s the tallest delayed-development case on record. Granted, there have only been seven on Narthan that I’m aware of, but considering she was raised on Terra, one would expect her to be shorter than average rather than taller.”

“So what are you suggesting?”

“I’m not suggesting anything at this juncture, but simply pointing out a possible inconsistency in her story.”

“What is going on here?”
Shauss demanded, raking his hands through his hair as he paced.
“Is she deluded by her own lies?”

“Or has she been lied to as well?”
Tiber asked. “What if her parents aren’t really her parents? Just wild speculation here, but what if the Narthani somehow spied on our reconnaissance team and managed to secure one of their hybrid offspring?”

“Why would they do that?”

“To use as a weapon against us.”

“That would explain why Ragan King displayed no fondness for her,” Shauss said. “And why he placed her in a hazardous situation.”

“Empran, compare Jasmine King’s DNA to all Garathani reconnaissance team warriors. Are any of them her father?”

“Negative.”

Tiber sighed. “So much for that theory.”

“I don’t know,” Shauss said. “I think you might be on to something here. We need a sample of Ragan King’s DNA. I’ll speak with the commander about obtaining one.”

“Very good idea. Perhaps we’ll know more after her transition is complete. Based on her history and current state, I’d say full transition is imminent. I’ve already started nutritional infusion, and after you leave, I’ll deepen her coma and remove the breast implants.”

“Leave her under.”

Tiber frowned. “Leave her under? You mean leave her sedated?”

“That’s exactly what I mean.”

“Do you think that’s wise? Transition is a rite of passage she might—”

“Tiber,” Shauss said in a deceptively mild tone that caused immediate tightening in Tiber’s scrotum. “Who is the primary in this bond?”

Fighting breathlessness, Tiber crossed his arms and braced his feet apart as he stared at Shauss. “That is irrelevant. I am the physician in this bond.”

Shauss stared back for so long, Tiber might have wondered if he’d become lost in his own thoughts—that is, if he hadn’t felt the man’s will bearing down on him with a force that was almost physical.

Then Shauss reached out in a very casual way and touched Tiber’s cheek with his fingertips. Tiber jerked slightly but stood his ground as those fine fingers moved down and traced his lips. Shauss’ black gaze was mesmerizing, and though somewhere inside Tiber was jumping up and down and screaming at him to move, to knock Shauss’ hand away, all he could do was stand there and feel.

“Who is primary in this bond?” Shauss whispered.

Tiber swallowed, his heart racing. “You are.”

“If I tell you to leave her under, what are you going to do?”

“Leave her under.”

Shauss leaned closer. “And if I tell you to take down your suit and bend over this bed so I can work my cock into your ass like I did Jasmine’s, what are you going to do?”

Tiber nearly whimpered. Taking a deep breath, he said, “Take my suit down and bend over.”

He leaned even closer. “And if I tell you to scream when you come for me, what are you going to do, Tiber?”

This time he did whimper. “I’m going to scream.”

His lips within a micron of Tiber’s, Shauss breathed, “And come for me.”

“Yes!”

Shauss retreated slightly. “That day is coming, Dr. Tiber. Do not doubt it.” Then he turned to leave, and Tiber cursed the disappointment that left him feeling weak.

Pausing by the door, Shauss told him, “Leave her under until the worst of it has passed. I saw what Monica went through and I don’t want her conscious for it.”

* * * * *

The Council convened before the conference with the Narthani monarch.

“Do we believe Miss King infected the
steripod
?” the minister asked.

Shauss shook his head. “At this point, no. Analysis confirms that the virus’ host DNA is not hers.”