In the Black (4 page)

She was lonelier and more sexually frustrated than she’d been in ten years of military service. She missed her men, the feeling of being part of a unit. No matter how much chatting and bantering she did with them, the crew of the
Belle
would never replace her fellow grunts, the ones she’d led and almost died with.

And that was good. That was just. Payment for her sins and her inability to keep them safe.

She yanked on the straps as she made her way down the hall, relishing the pain in her shoulders from the excessive force.

At least she could still feel something.

* * *

The bridge of the
Belle
comprised of a single command chair surrounded on three sides by panels, monitors and switches. The claustrophobic space was not for the faint of heart. The
Belle
pretty well flew herself but the Guild rules demanded a human at the controls, just in case something went wrong—in other words, the ship taking total control and killing the humans riding inside. There hadn’t been a single incident in the fifty-plus years the Guild had been running both Mercy and Charity ships, but there needed to be only one.

Everyone needed a human touch.

The irony wasn’t lost on her that her entire military career had been as a ground pounder, straight-up infantry. She knew as much about spaceships as she knew about choosing the right lip gloss to turn on a man—nothing. The crash course she’d received on how to deal with a shipboard emergency hadn’t been much more than hitting the big red button and waiting for a nearby ship or maybe one of the United Nations Service marshals.

Still, it was a paycheck for doing very little. She couldn’t complain about that.

She shouldn’t be complaining at all, accepting her penance in silence.

“Belle, give me an update on how things are going, please.” Sam pulled herself into the chair and buckled the four-way harness. Low/null gravity was nice for the first few days, but eventually everyone liked to have something solid under their feet. Or, in this case, her butt. Her feet still ached but at least she could wriggle her toes and let them recover from the stiletto abuse.

She plucked the earpiece free and slipped it into the charger. It was mandatory for the captain to wear it whenever she left the ship, to keep in touch with Belle at all times. With speakers set throughout the ship, all any of the crew had to do was call out for Belle and she’d answer back, even in the private quarters. The courtesans had a special safety word to bring Belle up out of her enforced hibernation in their rooms and alert her to a problem or emergency.

“Refueling is almost complete. Minor damage on the hull due to meteorite impacts is being fixed. Three engine hoses are being replaced, having shown signs of deterioration.” The low, feminine voice drifted out of the speakers, the computer AI sounding as human as it could. “Reservations are coming in quickly and we are at seventy-five percent full for the remaining time on this landing.”

“Good. Finish up the repairs and make sure we’re ready to pull out at the first sign of trouble.” She was too tired to avoid the obvious pun. Sam rubbed the back of her neck, her hand brushing up over the short-cropped red hair. Long hair was fine for the girls, who had various tricks to lock wayward strands in light gravity, but she didn’t need the trouble.

“Are you well, Captain?” Belle didn’t miss a thing. “Your voice is registering high stress. Should I call the medic? Maybe your blood pressure—”

“No, that won’t be necessary. I’m just tired.” Sam rolled her head back and forth, hearing the ominous crack and pop of neck joints. “Tired of being the class tease.”

“I don’t understand.” The artificial intelligence could calculate the value of pi up to ten thousand places but couldn’t get what she was saying. Maybe there was something to the idea of having a human on standby.

It wasn’t as if she didn’t have options. Hell, she was the captain of a Mercy ship and had full access to the services and personnel within.

She could purchase an hour from Sean or, if she were really desperate, Dane. A fast hour of quick, meaningless sex with no commitment, nothing but a financial transaction between a professional and a customer.

The option wasn’t unheard of. It’d even earned a short notation in the manual, detailing the costs and the discount offered to the captain.

There was nothing wrong with it.

Nothing, that is, other than the embarrassment of having to face him later on as his captain, not a client. She hadn’t slept with any of the men in her squad for the same reason, and even though she wasn’t wearing a uniform anymore the same rules still applied, at least in her mind.

Look but don’t touch. Save that for the long nights strapped in her hammock when she could fantasize about whatever or whomever she wanted without fear or guilt.

But would it be enough for the rest of her contract? Or should she make an appointment with Sean and get it over with, shut down the longing and the need to be touched?

It wasn’t like he’d use it against her, not like Dane would. That bastard wouldn’t let it go and would be rubbing her face in it every time he had a problem and Sam ruled against him.

No, it’d have to be Sean.

But the risks still outweighed the benefits.

For now.

Sam sighed. She wasn’t at that point yet. But it was on the horizon and she knew it.

She shifted in her seat. It wasn’t so much the sex; it was the basic need to touch and be touched. Held, stroked, hugged.

Not that there was anything wrong with hot, sweaty, crazed sex. But her skin ached for the simple sensation of being caressed, fingertips drawing lazy circles on her back until she fell asleep. Goosebumps rising from a gentle kiss, gasping at the sensations traveling over her body from a simple touch.

Damn it, she had it bad.

She wasn’t going to pay Sean to just cuddle, not at those rates.

Time to shift gears before she got beyond frustrated and said or did something she’d regret.

“Belle, is there any hot water left? I could use a shower.” She wriggled her toes.

“Unfortunately, April and Bianca are using the showers at present. I calculate the next surplus of hot water in an hour for a zero-g bath.” The computer voice waited a minute. “Unless you’d like to choose a full-gravity shower instead.”

Sam looked out the small viewport. She couldn’t afford to pay for a full-gravity shower as often as the courtesans could. A zero-g bath was at the bottom of the rate chart, cheap and aggravating. It was more of a workout than a bath, swiping and flailing in hot water bubbles swirling around you in an annoying dance.

The Guild demanded payment for every bit of luxury, every little extra. Cutting costs every way they could to maximize the profit. The clients were charged for everything up to and including having full gravity for whatever they wanted to do with the men and women of the
Belle
.

And in turn the Guild charged the courtesans for everything they could. Jenny’s renovations to the personal quarters came at a price, along with each and every use of items beyond the bare essentials, and that didn’t amount to much more than bread and water with a damp washcloth once a week. It might have suited her when she was on duty in a live-fire zone, but it sure wasn’t enough for men and women looking to sell their services.

She didn’t know what it cost the courtesans, but she knew that sleeping in full gravity for eight hours in her small room could run her paycheck into negative numbers.

It was close to the old company store scam but Sam wasn’t a soft rookie on her first trip off planet. Her bank account was in the black and growing with every extra she denied herself. She didn’t need the luxuries the other girls did and didn’t want most of them.

“I’ll get to the shower later. Not like I’m entertaining anyone.” She turned her attention to the data scrolling over the multiple screens around her. “Let’s talk about what we’re going to do after the vital maintenance work’s done—any extras Jenny thinks we need. Call and link her in. I want to hear her thoughts on what we need now and what we can put off until our next landing. Branson Prime’s a rock and they’re going to charge us top rates for whatever we get here. If we can delay something until our next landfall safely then let’s do so.” She leaned back and touched the small fan attached to one of the control panels. The lukewarm air fluttered over her bare skin, reminding her again about how long it’d been since she’d kissed a man, let alone done anything else.

Sam pushed that sad statistic to the back of her mind and listened to Jenny chirp through the speakers, interrupted every now and then by Belle making a neutral comment.

* * *

Six hours later Sam considered asking Sean to put her into deep sedation so she could sleep straight through the next two weeks. She peered over the top of the paperback in her hands at the small black-and-white surveillance camera screen showing the line of men waiting in the corridor to get onto the ship. Some held thick books, some had boxes containing God-knows-what, and one miner made motions with his hands that both intrigued and terrified her. They all chatted as if they were in the meal line waiting to get a tray of rehydrated slop, not waiting to pay a courtesan for an hour of bliss.

She’d seen very different attitudes in the lineups for the Charity ships docked at the military bases. Back then she’d always volunteered for guard duty because the bonus money came in handy at the weekly poker games.

It was a different world than this, the men and women shuffling their feet and not daring to look at each other, the only reason to be in line being for sex, no other. Charity ships didn’t offer sweet conversation or anything else other than fulfilling the basic human need. Cheap, yes. Classy, no. Pay your fee, go in and either fuck or be fucked. Wham bam thank you ma’am and don’t forget the tip jar at the door.

She’d never partaken. Her favored option had been the cheap, old-fashioned date with her own hand.

Right now she could understand the appeal and practicality of the Charity ships. No commitments, no judgments and no disappointments.

She still couldn’t bring herself to call Sean to see if he had a space open.

Sam tossed the well-thumbed mystery novel toward the wall. It bounced off the viewport and back toward her, the limp pages fluttering open. All she could imagine was the male detective getting it on with his female partner, with plenty of hot and heavy sex as he slammed her against the office wall and had his way with her even as she owned him, body and soul. Her mind ran through the last few pages, adding her own twist to the scenario.

She devoured his mouth as he thrust into her, filling the hollow spot in her heart even as she raced toward orgasm...

* * *

Sam blinked awake as the monitor in front of her flickered, the black-and-white images dancing across the screen as she shook herself back to full awareness. Catnapping in the cockpit wasn’t against the rules but she rarely dozed off in the middle of a daytime shift.

Her eyes went to the monitor as it stopped on the landing bay and the line of waiting customers.

No tough street detective there. No ruggedly handsome space cowboy either.

Just a line of needy men. No hot and heavy sex, nothing but a crappy mystery novel floating in front of her with a raggedy cover and bad writing.

The ache between her legs subsided to a low throbbing as she shifted in the seat, resisting the urge to rub her thighs together.

Maybe she could work a trade with the base’s library. It couldn’t be stocked with only pornographic magazines like the last two had been. Get her head into some military history books or—

The alarm bell erupted from a nearby speaker. For a moment she was back at the Hub and she broke into a sweat, her pulse shooting skyward. A blink of an eye and she was back on the ship’s bridge and safe.

Relatively speaking. That wasn’t a call to the galley for more of Kendra’s fruit salad.

“Belle.” She slapped the harness release mechanism and pushed herself up out of the chair. Her hands flailed in the air for a second before she grabbed one of the straps on the wall. Moisture beaded on her forehead as she anchored herself in the here and now. “Belle!”

“The disturbance is in Halley’s suite,” her voice answered. “April is the one who activated the alarm.”

Sam yanked on the door handle and swam out into the corridor, heading for the courtesans’ quarters. “Initiate lockdown. Shut the entire damned place down. Command access only.”

The alarm bell echoed in her head, triggering memories she’d hoped never to deal with again. One of the reasons she’d chosen a Mercy ship was to get as far away as she could from any type of stress—the Guild had told her it was rare to have any sort of emergency on a Mercy ship.

After all, everyone loved a Mercy woman. Or man.

“Affirmative.” Belle answered in the same neutral tone. “Lockdown procedure underway.”

She yanked the hatch open and hauled herself down toward the galley, flying through the corridor as fast as she could. Around her the grinding and snapping of gates and grills being closed and locked sounded, the
Belle
turning into a sealed fortress. Wherever Jenny was, she was being sealed in as well, trapped in her quarters or in the undercarriage.

The bolts engaged behind her as she dove through the galley and swam into the main hallway for the private quarters.

April hovered there, hand clamped over her mouth in what Sam hoped was a successful attempt not to vomit. Her trembling finger pointed at Halley’s open door.

“I was about to ask if she wanted to get lunch before her next appointment, and...” She swallowed hard. Her head dropped down as she pressed her hand tighter against her lips, trembling from head to foot. Her sheer purple gown shook back and forth, her slippered feet a few inches off the floor.

“Stay here. Don’t go anywhere.” Sam glanced up. “Belle, where are the other girls?”

“Everyone has called in safe from their quarters except for April, Halley and yourself. The clients on board are waiting to be released from their courtesans’ rooms and the remaining customers are sequestered in the landing bay.” The tone in Belle’s voice left no room for interpretation. Few people, including Sam, wanted to risk being gassed by her always-ready tear gas dispensers by disobeying a direct order. There was also knock-out gas available but it’d leave bodies around and wouldn’t disperse the crowd as effectively.