No Limits (25 page)
“Well, the pay isn’t as good as the secret-shopper gig, but you can’t beat the benefits with a stick.”
Gia threw back her head and laughed. Zan chose that moment to stride in, without knocking. He glanced at Gia but then focused on Gen. “I need to talk to you.”
Gia glared at his back. “Rude much?”
Gen didn’t want to have this argument again. “Zan—”
“We received a transmission from someone named Alison, directly to the captain of this vessel. She’s bringing all the empathic candles in their possession to a prearranged rendezvous point. She’ll trade them for you and Rhys.”
“What?” Gen couldn’t believe that her own stock had risen so much that she was worth all of those lives. “That’s totally screwy. Why would she do that?’
Gia hopped off the desk. “It’s a trap, Gen. She’s baiting it with what she knows Rhys wants, hoping he’ll act nobly and give himself up.”
“Not just what Rhys wants.” Zan glanced over at her. “The message also said she has your grandparents and your sister. They’ve already rigged the self-destruct sequence and abandoned the bridge. If we don’t show up there in one hour, they’ll destroy them all.”
26
“G
o easy, Rhys,” Gen murmured as she helped him maneuver down the corridor in the antigrav straps. “Take it slow.”
o easy, Rhys,” Gen murmured as she helped him maneuver down the corridor in the antigrav straps. “Take it slow.”
Her concern for him itched almost as much as the scarred tissue along his healing wounds. It came from her shiny pink love, though, and for that he would tolerate any discomfort.
“We don’t have time for me to take it slow, my sweet.” Until he built up enough strength to control his muscles, he would be forced to rely on others and mechanical devices. If he lived that long. “Are you sure we can trust this friend of yours to help us? She was working for Illustra.”
“No, she wasn’t. Gia’s military, a stinger pilot. She was ordered to protect the vessel, but no one bothered to tell her why or who was on board. Now that she does know the whole story, she’ll help us, even if it means dishonorable discharge. I trust her, Rhys, with our lives.” Sincerity coated every word, along with the sapphire blue in her aura.
“And I trust your judgment.” His movements were a little smoother now that he had practice working the antigrav strips. The medical bots had done an excellent job of patching up his surface wounds. He needed to gain weight, rebuild his muscle strength, but he was unable to do anything about those deficiencies right now. If not for the fact that he floated horizontally a foot above his lover’s head, he could almost imagine he was normal.
With Gen’s help, he eased around the last corner toward the main conference room. She held him while he righted himself, reengaging the armbands to sync with the ship’s artificial gravity. Gen gripped the front of his borrowed flight suit and stared into his eyes as she murmured, “You know they would have done this in the medical lab.”
Taking a moment to compose himself, Rhys righted his body with only the slightest bit of unfortunate lurching. “They’d view me as a victim in there, not part of the solution.”
Her worried gaze caught on his. “Do you have a solution?”
He did, though he didn’t wish to tell her about it yet. “Everything will work out, sweetness. Trust in that.”
Standing on tiptoe, she brushed her lips over his. “I trust in you.” Turning her back, she headed into the conference room, leaving him to make his way under his own power.
Rhys swallowed hard. Did he deserve her trust? Not even a little. The lives of her beloved family members were on the line, and she expected him to do the right thing. He’d do it, too, in an instant, if he could only figure out what exactly it was.
The only thing that was clear to him was that Gen deserved his best. She’d left him to make his own entrance, to show their unlikely allies he could take control and see them through this mess. Teetering on artificial gravity out here in the hallway wasn’t acceptable. Disengaging the antigrav strips altogether, he leaned heavily on the wall.
The pain had lessoned to a dull ache that covered his body. Reaching down into his spiritual reserves, he collected composure before pushing away from the bulkhead, remaining upright by sheer force of will. The doors hissed open at his approach.
Gen smiled at him as though she’d expected nothing less. Her expression of pride was worth the light-headedness, the burning in his atrophied muscles. Gia studied his every move as he crossed the conference room. Still dressed in her gray flight suit, she’d perched on the sill of the viewport, and he could tell from her colors that that move was designed for protection’s sake. Even though she sat among friends, Gia would present her back to no one.
Zan sat at the head of the table, his leather boots propped up on the polished surface. “’Bout time you got your lazy carcass out of bed to do something. Tell your girlfriend to release the lockdown on my ship.”
Rhys glanced at Gen, who sat on his immediate left. Bless her, she’d saved the closest seat to the door for him. Force of will could only extend so far, and it took every ounce of effort for him to not just collapse into the chair. “What is he talking about?”
Gen shot Zan a dirty look. “He’s blaming me for his inability to communicate with his own ship. It’s not my fault he would rather respond directly to another sentient being than take orders from people too scared to talk to him.”
Zan pointed a finger, encompassing both of them. “Here’s how it works. I tell the ship where I want him to go and he takes me there. There ain’t never been a need for communication other than that. I’ve got nothing but a whole heap of trouble since I took you two on board.”
Gia snorted. “Maybe that will teach you not to kidnap people.”
Zan glowered at her. “I seriously doubt it.”
Gia shrugged her slim shoulders and swung one boot-clad foot idly. “If you don’t want to play by the rules, you shouldn’t whine when things don’t go your way. It wastes time and irritates people.”
Rhys watched the two of them spar, saw the white-hot sparks of charged feeling flying between the two dominant spacefarers.
“That never worried me none. Besides, what else have I got to do?”
Gia rolled her eyes. “I don’t know, learn the rules of grammar? Or maybe work on your personal hygiene? Just because all the other space monkeys throw their own sh—”
“This is getting us nowhere.” Gen’s quiet interruption was full of steel. “Hundreds of lives are in jeopardy, and we have to figure out how we can help them.
All
of us.” The last was directed at Zan, who scowled but didn’t contradict her.
All
of us.” The last was directed at Zan, who scowled but didn’t contradict her.
Analyzing what little he knew about the man, Rhys offered the one caveat that might net them the pirate’s willing participation. “On my home world, there is a treasure trove of valuable items. They are kept by the members of my order. You and each of your crew are entitled to any items of your choosing if you help us all return home.”
Zan linked his fingers together and leaned his head back against his clasped hands. “And if we want it all?”
“Don’t be an ass,” Gia snapped. “It’s part of their cultural heritage. You can’t just abscond with that.”
Rhys ignored the waves of outrage springing from Gia’s small form, the first true emotion he’d sensed from her. Why was she so upset? “You may have whatever your ship can hold.”
“I want it in writing.” Zan sat forwarded, ignoring Gia’s squawk of indignation.
Rhys studied the other man. “I’ll draw up a contract, and Gen will give it to you as soon as we’ve accomplished the mission.”
Gen’s soft hand touched his arm, warming him through the thin material of the flight suit. No way could he look on her as he stated his intentions, so he focused on the others as he explained his plan.
“I intend to set Gia’s stinger on a collision course with the Illustra vessel. They can’t destroy the hostage ship if they are already gone.”
“What?” Gen’s voice was low. Not a shriek of outrage, but more of a deadly displeasure.
Rhys turned to face her. “What other choice is there?”
Her eyes narrowed, all hope vanishing like matter through a black hole. “You don’t know for sure that will even work. They could fire on you before you get close enough. Or the explosion could trigger the autodestruct codes.”
“If you have a better plan, now’s the time to voice it.” There was no snideness to his statement, but Gen looked as if he’d slapped her.
Zan whistled low. “You really do have a death wish.”
Rhys frowned at him. “Death doesn’t scare me.”
The pirate pointed to where Gen sat. “Yeah, but she should.”
“Would you two excuse us for a minute?” Gen’s voice contained barely suppressed rage. Gia and Zan exchanged a loaded look and as one moved toward the door.
“Hurry up. We can’t wait on this much longer,” Zan called over his shoulder. The doors hissed closed behind them.
“This won’t take long,” Gen muttered. As soon as the door closed, she was on her feet, pacing the length of the room. “You just can’t wait to be rid of me, huh?”
The brilliant red from her anger almost blinded him. “Sweetness—”
Pressing her knuckles into the table, she leaned forward, her nose an inch from his. “Don’t you dare sweetness me, you bastard. Again, Rhys, again with the deceptions and the lies. You’d think I would learn! But apparently I’m too fracking stupid to figure it out. Rhys is on a mission. Period. Nothing else matters.”
“That’s not true. You know how much I love you. I’m doing this for you, Gen, so you can have your family back and so that what’s left of mine will be safe. If there was another way—”
“You aren’t even
looking
for another way. It’s like you can’t wait to die.”
looking
for another way. It’s like you can’t wait to die.”
He saw the tears in her eyes spill over and reached forward to brush them away. “Let me love you now, just once in the flesh and it will be enough.”
Her hands were already working the fastenings on his borrowed pants. “It will never be enough.”
Rhys silently agreed as he cupped the back of her head, lifted her onto the table behind him. Her crimson dress rode up her long legs, and as he captured her lips, his fingers explored the silken flesh that was foreign and familiar all at once. All his frailty was forgotten as he derived strength from their burning passion.
Their tongues mated, and he groaned when her hot little hand wrapped around his throbbing shaft. Unable to wait another second, he shredded her panties, eager to explore her wet heat.
She tore her lips away as he thrust two fingers into her. “Rhys, now. Don’t wait.”
He kissed the smooth column of her throat, nibbled on her ear. “You don’t have your shield up.”
“No,” she agreed, wrapping her legs around his hips. “And I’m not putting it up either. You promised me once that you would fill me, and that’s what I want. Us, together, with nothing between our bodies. I want you to come inside me, fill me with your seed. Mark me yours.”
He couldn’t hold back, not after her intense words of invitation. Yet he didn’t want to rush, so he bent over her, slowly feeding his cock into her body. Watching her puffy pink folds swallow his engorged shaft inch by inch. Her lube made him glisten as he pulled slowly out and then crept back inside. Her eyelids fluttered, her breathing hot, heavy, and she moaned his name.
Slowly, he withdrew again, but the tight grip of her legs locked around his waist wouldn’t let him go far. “My beauty,” he rasped, surging back into paradise. Her musky arousal filled his nostrils, the heady scent of sex making him slightly dizzy.
Her nails sank into his shoulders, her hips undulating beneath him. “Harder, Rhys. Please, I’m so close!”
Instead of complying, he rotated his thumb over her throbbing clitoris, gasping as she hugged his cock harder, demanding that he give her everything he had. He closed his eyes, held very still, clinging to his control. But it had been so long since his body had had this pleasure. “I wanted this to last, but I’m going to—”
Her heels pounded against his ass, spurring him on and shoving him deeper inside her. Willpower vanished and he pistoned into her wet depths, losing himself in the sweet heat of her body, the bold colors of her release. Her cries of ecstasy in his ears. “Yes, Rhys, oh yes!”
Her orgasm hit, a blinding wave of brilliant color that swept him up in it. No way to deny himself, he cupped her face and claimed her mouth, even as his seed spurted deep inside her. Perhaps it was irresponsible to hope, but he wished he planted a life there in her womb, something of himself that would love her always. As he would even beyond his dying breath.
He flinched. Something sharp was jabbing him in the hip. He glanced down to where she’d stuck him with a small hypodermic and then back to her tearstained face, still rosy from their union.
“It’s not just about you anymore, love. You won’t listen, so I’m doing what I have to. To make sure all the people I love are safe.”
Her face filled his vision as his sight tunneled into nothingness.
Gen had just fixed her clothes and arranged Rhys back in his when Gia returned.
“He wouldn’t listen?” was Gia’s only comment as she helped her friend activate Rhys’s antigrav strips.
“You called it right.” When Gia had pulled Gen aside while Rhys was dressing, she’d advised that Gen find some way to subdue the empath. At first Gen had balked, but when she’d discovered that Rhys had once again kept vital information to himself, she was glad she’d snagged the hypo. “How did you know?”
Gia raised one eyebrow. “He’s a man in love. Reason is not his forte right now.”
“Is everything set on board this ship?”
Gia nodded. “As soon as I drop him off, I’m heading out.”
“Thank you, Gia.” Gen didn’t escort the unconscious Rhys back to medical, instead returning to the living ship, to the bridge where her link to the vessel was the strongest. Zan grumbled once again about trusting Gia. Closing her eyes, Gen sent up a silent prayer that her half-baked scheme would work, that she hadn’t doomed all the people she loved.
Within moments, all three ships were ready to enter the wormhole.
A vast starfield opened up before them. Though no planets or moons appeared nearby, there was a giant asteroid field to the left of the screen. An old freighter hovered at the periphery, looking decrepit next to the pristine Illustra cruiser. Gen took it all in in seconds as Gia’s stinger emerged from the wormhole.
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