No Limits (14 page)
“Sweetness, try and understand. He’s from my world, not yours. Fluid transfer during sexual encounters is perfectly acceptable to our people. I’ll admit that I need his body and I need your emotions. But I have not harmed either one of you to suit my own needs.”
She still appeared wary, though the stubborn angle of her jaw seemed less severe. He rubbed a thumb over her cheekbone. “Once I get my body back, I’ll release Marshal into his and turn him over to the high council for trial. No harm will come to him while I’m in possession of his body. You have my word as a spiritual leader.”
Gen nodded. “Okay. I guess.”
Sensing he’d made progress with her, he leaned back against the seat. “Why did you agree to work for Illustra?”
She blew out a breath. “Thinking I could do that was beyond ridiculous. Have you ever wanted desperately to be something other than what you are?”
Rhys swallowed, remembering the night he’d fled his home world for the sanctuary of the abbey. He could still smell the coppery tang of blood, could still hear the man’s screams. Shaking off the unwanted memory, he focused on Gen. “I have,” he rasped.
She met his gaze as the engines shut off altogether. The shuttle shook as the station’s docking gear engaged. Though she’d been in a hurry only moments ago, now she seemed compelled to explain herself, and she moved in closer to him as the other passengers stood to disembark.
“Ever since I was little, I’ve been ... different. I like to blame it on what happened to my parents, that I was forced to grow up quicker to help Nana and Gramps with Tanny, but I have these memories from before. I worried over things normal kids don’t even think about.”
Despite her earlier protests, he took her hand, lacing his fingers through hers. “There is nothing wrong with you, Gen. You care about the welfare of others, not just yourself. It’s why you came with me, isn’t it?”
She searched his face, almost desperately. The intensity of her need gripped him hard. He didn’t know what she sought, but he felt compelled to provide whatever it might be. “I don’t know why I came with you.” Her confession was low and tinged with frustration.
“I’m glad you did. Come on, or we’ll miss our connection.”
His hand still clutching hers, he led her to the tunnel, a grin plastered on his borrowed face.
14
G
en thought she might keel over from exhaustion, but no way in this universe would she miss the bon voyage send-off party at the observation deck, even if Rhys had to prop her up like a dysfunctional marionette amid the falling balloons and confetti.
en thought she might keel over from exhaustion, but no way in this universe would she miss the bon voyage send-off party at the observation deck, even if Rhys had to prop her up like a dysfunctional marionette amid the falling balloons and confetti.
“It’s tradition in our culture to wave good-bye to our loved ones while the ship pulls out of dock.” Three blasts from the ship’s airhorn rocked the dock slightly as the cruise ship disengaged. Rhys grabbed her around the waist to keep her from pitching into the viewport.
“But you don’t know anyone here.” His tone, patiently indulgent, washed over her, the same way his touch made her long for things she’d be better off dismissing altogether. Off to the stern, the Mars station grew smaller and smaller as they headed to the Alpha Centuri hyperlane.
“That’s not the point.” She set her chin at a stubborn angle. “It’s a farewell to what we knew before, whether it is another person, a place, or a way of life. It provides closure.”
He remained silent for a moment, and she watched the station grow smaller through the viewport. “Humans are funny about closure. You seem compelled to identify concrete endings and beginnings,” Rhys mused, studying the people who hollered and chortled around them, a cacophony of voices united by excitement. “Always marking the passage of time, yet wasting so much of it.”
Gen turned to face him, scowling. “How do we waste time?”
He inclined his head to an elderly group of matrons chittering away around the banquet table. “Small talk, for example. What is the point of speaking when you have no information to relay?”
Gen watched the women fawn over each other’s fine dresses and upscale coiffures. “Talking helps us feel connected to one another.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I thought that’s what sex was for.”
A young mother passing by cast Rhys a shocked look and hauled her toddler farther down the deck.
“Lower your voice,” Gen hissed. “People are staring at us.”
He tilted his head in confusion. “Why?”
She groaned. “You’re like a child, you know? Why, why, why?
Because,
Rhys, there are certain things we don’t discuss out in public, where anyone can overhear.”
Because,
Rhys, there are certain things we don’t discuss out in public, where anyone can overhear.”
He didn’t bat an eyelash as he repeated, “Why?”
She huffed out a breath. “Look, I get that you don’t think much of humanity on the whole because all you’ve seen are horny people who want to come. That’s a strong drive, but it’s not all we are. We have relationships that have nothing to do with sex.”
Rhys scowled. “Of course you do. I’m not stupid, Gen. I understand about different kinds of connections. What I don’t understand is why you all hide the sexual part of yourselves.”
“What, like you would go talk to your sister about the intimacies we’ve shared?”
He shocked her by nodding. “If she required the information for some reason, yes.”
Gen blanched and grabbed his hand. “Come on.”
“Where are we going?” He let her tug him down to the connection tubes that ran between levels.
“To our cabin. If you insist in delving into these personal subjects, we need privacy before I kill you in public and we both end up with our faces on the evening news vids.”
Thankfully, Rhys remained silent as they descended into the belly of the ship. Since their reservation had been last minute, their assigned cabin didn’t have a private viewport. She’d probably sleep the whole time anyhow. Gen yawned and pressed her thumb against the scanner. The door slid open with a small hiss.
Struggling out of her jacket, she entered the cabin, dragging Rhys in her wake. “I cannot believe you’d feel comfortable discussing the intimate details of our sex life with your sister! Or anyone else for that matter! That sort of thing should be private.”
He stepped toward her, reaching out to hold the jacket she struggled to remove. “Not on a world full of empaths who can sense your desire the moment you feel it. There is nothing shameful about pleasure, Gen. Everyone needs it, craves the touch of another’s hands on his body. As I am craving yours right now. One of the many reasons I wanted to get you alone.”
Now it was her turn to ask, “Why else?”
“Being around so many people ... disturbs me. I am unused to crowds, and the barrage of emotion was overwhelming. I apologize if I acted inappropriately.” He reached out to stroke her cheek. “Besides, you need to rest.”
His consideration touched her. “You’re right. And I’m sorry if you were uncomfortable.” Tilting her head to the side, she winced at the crick in her neck.
“Let me massage the tension from you,” Rhys offered.
A massage sounded heavenly; so much rigidity had bunched her muscles, and fatigue made every twinge sharper. But could she really stand his hands on her body again? “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”
“Why not? Do you not trust me to keep from touching you intimately without your invitation?”
She stared into his eyes, gauging the risk and weighing it against the benefits. “No sex. Underwear stays on.”
He nodded in agreement. “Get undressed and lie on the bed.” Before she could ask, he offered her his back.
A real gentleman?
Though she wouldn’t admit it out loud, Gen loved the fact that he didn’t feel entitled to view her naked body, even though he’d caressed almost every inch of it in some form or another. It made her want to show it to him all the more. What was her damage?
Though she wouldn’t admit it out loud, Gen loved the fact that he didn’t feel entitled to view her naked body, even though he’d caressed almost every inch of it in some form or another. It made her want to show it to him all the more. What was her damage?
She stripped down to her panties—of fracking course it had to be a thong
—
and settled facedown on the large mattress. “Okay,” she mumbled into the pillow.
—
and settled facedown on the large mattress. “Okay,” she mumbled into the pillow.
Rhys bent to rummage through Marshal’s duffel. He produced a bottle of the coconut verbena oil.
She smiled at him. “Where did you get that?”
His grin warmed her. “No sense leaving everything in the cabin, right?”
“I just hope my grandmother doesn’t get it in her head to go there and discover all that stuff. She’ll never let me live it down, and I shudder to hear what all she’ll do with it.”
Rhys poured the oil on his hands and rubbed them together, activating the warming agent. He started by running his palms along her spine, working in smooth circles outward, his touch light and tender at first, then going deeper, kneading the muscles beneath.
Gen couldn’t keep her moan of bliss inside if her life depended on it. “Oohh, that feels wonderful... .”
“So, where does touch like this fall in the spectrum of human relationships?” Rhys asked, running his palms along her sides.
“Any kind of touch is intimate but is not necessarily sexual in nature. Some people actually provide massages for a living.”
He didn’t say anything for a time, working deeper into her shoulders and neck. She gasped when his thumb discovered a particularly tight knot. “On my world, this kind of contact is reserved exclusively for lovers.”
She stiffened a bit, but when he didn’t try to mess with their dynamic, she relaxed more fully. “Any special reason for that?”
“You can ask a straight man to touch a member of the opposite sex and not have a physical response to it, but the outcome might be disappointing. It is too difficult to separate touch from sex. Lovers are supposed to know each other’s bodies, inside and out, to increase the pleasure output for both.”
“You mean they feed off of each other, like you’ve done with me?”
He made an irritated sound. “Putting it crudely, yes. It is all about filling needs for each other, wanting to give of one’s self and have someone who wishes to give back equally. A real connection, unlike that hollow display above us or the sham Illustra offers.”
An awful thought manifested in her gray matter, and she needed the answer as much as she dreaded it. “Do you have one? A lover back home?”
His hands stilled. “Of course not. My people bond for life. I was still young when I sought refuge at the abbey. Being with you, Gen, is the closest I’ve ever come to having someone to connect with on that level.”
She let out a relieved breath she hadn’t even realized she’d been holding. “What is it like, bonding like that?”
He took a deep breath and moved down to massage her lower back. “There is no way to describe it in your language. No ceremony or official record. To bond is to let go of yourself entirely, merge with your lover and re-form as a stronger unit, two halves to the whole.”
She sighed at his description. “It sounds lovely.”
“My father and mother have been bonded for many years. I envied their bliss.” He took a deep breath. “I find myself ... frustrated, Gen, because I cannot fulfill you the way you need.”
Her heart rate increased, though his hands remained soothing, almost impersonal where they touched her. Had she gotten it all wrong? Here she believed Rhys was using her, and in a way he was, but not because he wanted only to take from her. She’d denied him the chance to show her affection almost every time, thinking distance would keep her detached. “Why do you want to do that?”
“Because you have given me so much. I wish to give back, yet you refuse to let me pleasure you or see to your needs.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t know any other way to—”
“Shhhh, relax.” He swept her hair to the side, rubbed her scalp. “You are human—it’s all you know how to be. I didn’t tell you this to make you feel guilty or press demands on you. I only want you to better understand how I feel because you cannot sense it. Sleep now, talk later.”
Sighing, Gen surrendered to oblivion.
Rhys covered her with a blanket and settled into the armchair across the room to watch over her. Every time he looked at her, she seemed to grow lovelier. If she had been of his kind, he was certain the bond would have settled between them already. The warning signs were all there. Growing attraction, reorganization of his priorities, and a desperate need to pleasure her body and feed her soul in every possible way. All symptoms indicated he had started to think of her differently than any other woman he’d ever been intimate with.
Bonds were sacred, not something one entered into lightly. Several potential life mates in modern society refused to bond at all, instead choosing to stay together in a less demanding relationship. Rhys had been taught from birth that bonding was paramount to happiness—a belief only made stronger with his time spent in study and worship. A bond was not necessary to life, but it made life worth living.
Gen wasn’t an empath. From what little he’d witnessed, humans didn’t stay with one partner for very long, sometimes not even until sunrise. He couldn’t bond with her, because he had no kind of future to share with her. His mission had to be his top priority, and Gen deserved more from a bonded mate. Could she even accept the sort of commitment that level of intimacy entailed?
As he watched her sleeping form, an idea took root in his mind. He’d promised Gen he would not try to emotionally influence her, but he’d said nothing about reading her emotional state. When they’d talked on the transport, she had admitted to having a burning desire to belong. And she’d also admitted pleasuring Marshal had unnerved her because she felt loyalty toward Rhys. Perhaps she was capable of bonding, even if her peers weren’t.
He waited until the captain of the star cruiser announced they had entered the first warp current tunnel. She’d slept several hours already and lay curled on her side facing him, her breath coming out in little puffs of air.
Forgive me, sweet, but I have to know what you really think.
Forgive me, sweet, but I have to know what you really think.
Rising from the chair, he stripped off his clothes and climbed into the bed beside her, molding his front to her back. She snuggled in deep, murmuring something incoherent.
Swallowing, Rhys focused part of his attention inside himself, listening to Marshal’s heartbeat, steady and true, and focused the rest on the heat of the woman in his arms.
His essence divided neatly, one part holding down the fort in Marshal’s body and the other flowing into Gen. This time he didn’t try to seize control, just shared the space with her, happy to float nearby.
Who’s there?
her voice asked, so strong and clear.
her voice asked, so strong and clear.
Rhys
.
.
He’d expected some sort of resistance and was stunned when she lit up, clearly excited to have him within her again. Her body snuggled into his as her mind whispered,
I missed cohabitating with you.
I missed cohabitating with you.
Really?
The part of him still in Marshal’s body grew hard, wanting to be inside her in every way.
I like being within you, hearing your thoughts, sharing your feelings.
The part of him still in Marshal’s body grew hard, wanting to be inside her in every way.
I like being within you, hearing your thoughts, sharing your feelings.
Her body grew wet with need. He felt the ache in her breasts, and his hands moved to cup them.
Oh, so good.
She sighed, relaxing against him. He dabbled with her hardened nipples, tugging, rolling the nubs until she squirmed.
She sighed, relaxing against him. He dabbled with her hardened nipples, tugging, rolling the nubs until she squirmed.
Will you let me make you come?
Oh, yes
, she breathed.
I’d love that.
, she breathed.
I’d love that.
I’m going to activate my germ shield—otherwise you’ll be angry with me when you wake fully.
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