Not the Man She Thought (3 page)

Karsten snorted. “If he’s even on New Ashanti at all.”

Laken had to bite her tongue to keep from saying something
she shouldn’t. “This was a mistake. I’d like you to turn around and take me
back to Tellune!”

“No.”

She blinked. “What do you mean, no?”

He shrugged. “You decided to stow away on board a cargo ship
and cargo ships have schedules to keep. Which means I don’t have time to go
back to Tellune just because you changed your mind. You’re stuck on here until
I can find someplace to dump you off.” He reached out and a button on the
computer console. “Dev, I need you to escort our...” he hesitated, glancing
over his shoulder at Laken before continuing, “...passenger to her quarters.”

“Sure thing, Captain,” came a woman’s voice.

Laken was incredulous. “You can’t keep me here against my
will. That’s kidnapping.”

He turned on her, dark eyes glinting. “Actually, it’s not.
I’m the captain of a ship you decided to stow away on, sweetheart, which means
I can do anything I damn well please. You should be grateful. If you were a
man, I’d treat you like the criminal you are and have you locked up in the hold
instead of putting you in a cabin.”

Arrogant bastard. Snatching her purse off the table, she
pulled out her com. “My father is a very influential man back on Tellune. When
he finds out you’re keeping me prisoner...”

Her tirade came to an abrupt halt as Karsten grabbed the com
from her hand and snapped it closed. “Don’t be an idiot. We’re in deep space,
so that communicator won’t do you any good. Not that I’d let you use it
anyway.”

She’d never been in deep space before, so she didn’t know if
he was lying or not, but she was damn well going to try. Undeterred by his
glower, she reached for her communicator, trying to wrestle it from his strong
grip. “Give that back to me. It’s mine, dammit.”

One minute, she was struggling with him for possession of
her com, the next she had pulled it out of his grasp, only to have the stupid
thing slip out of her hand and fall to the floor with a metallic clatter as
pieces went everywhere.

Laken stared down at what was left of her com in stunned
silence for a moment before she lifted her head to glare at him. “Damn you!
Look what you did.”

He clenched his jaw. “I didn’t do anything. You did. Now,
stop acting like a brat and start behaving yourself.”

For some reason, she was more furious with him calling her a
brat than she was by the fact that he’d broken her com. Her eyes narrowed as
she spied something on his desk.

  
“Fine.”
she snapped. “I’ll just use yours, then.”

 
Laken brushed
past him, intending to reach for the communicator on the desk, but he grabbed
her arm and spun her around to face him. She struggled to free herself, but his
grip was like iron. She had never been manhandled like this in her entire life.
She had made men so angry before that they’d turned red in the face, but not
one of them had never dared lay a hand on her. “Let go of me!”

“It seems I didn’t make myself clear before.” Karsten’s
voice was soft. “While you’re on board my ship, you will do as I tell you, when
I tell you.”

She glared up at him. “Is that so? Well, I have a newsflash
for you, you arrogant bastard. I’m not one of your crew. That means I don’t
take orders for you.”

The muscle in his jaw flexed and for a moment, she thought
he might back down, but then the corner of his mouth quirked. “We’ll see about
that.”

Before Laken could ask what the hell he meant by that, he
turned on his heel and dragged her across the room.

  
“What
are you...?”

The words came out in a rush of breath as he sat down in the
chair behind the desk and yanked her over his knee. The position was so
humiliating that Laken couldn’t do anything but lay there, her bottom in the
air. It didn’t help that she had to put her hands on the floor just to keep her
balance. Or that he put a strong hand on her back to hold her in place when she
finally tried to push herself upright.

She craned her neck to glare at him over her shoulder. “Let
me up right now!”

“Not until we get a few things straight,” he ground out.
“First, I’m the captain of this ship, and you’ll treat me as such. Second, as a
stowaway, you can and will be punished as I see fit. And third, if you continue
to act like a spoiled brat, this spanking will only be the first of many.”

Her eyes went wide. Spanking. He was joking, right? She’d
never been spanked in her life and she wasn’t about to get one now. She opened
her mouth to tell him to go to hell when his hand came down hard on her
ass.
 
She gasped as heat spread
across her bottom.

“Owwww!”

  
She
struggled to push herself upright, but it did no good. Thinking it might help
if she squirmed instead, she wiggled around, but all that did was make her
short skirt to ride up even higher so that the next smack landed on her
partially exposed cheek. The sting made her go rigid across his lap.

  
“Let me
up right now, you...”

Another smack interrupted her. It was followed by another
and another until she couldn’t think about anything but each stinging spank and
the heat that came with it. The embarrassment of knowing he was getting a look
at her panty-clad ass was almost as bad as the spanking itself.

Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew she should be
concerned that the crew would hear her protests and be able to figure out
exactly what was going on, but the spanks stung so fiercely that she didn’t
care. She just wanted it to be over with.

Then, as quickly as it had begun, and much to her relief, it
was over and Laken was back on her feet, Captain Karsten towering over her.
Face flushed, she glared up at him. She was torn between slapping that smug
look off his handsome face and rubbing her freshly spanked ass, but decided
giving into the urge to slap him might earn her another trip over his knee, so
she reached back to cup her sore bottom instead. She could feel the heat coming
from her poor cheek even through the material of the skirt.

“How dare you spank me like I’m a child!”

His dark eyes were hard as flint as he glowered down at her.
“Then stop acting like one. I won’t put up with it on my ship, Ms. Andara.
You’ll behave yourself while you’re on board, or I’ll do it again.”

Laken opened her mouth to tell him there was no way in hell
she was going to let him spank her again when the door abruptly slid open.
Startled, she turned to see a pretty, dark-haired woman standing in the
doorway. She gave Laken a curious look, her brow furrowing slightly. Suddenly
realizing that she was still cupping her bottom, Laken colored and quickly took
her hands away. Glancing at the captain, Laken found his gaze on her.

She wasn’t surprised when he didn’t bother with polite
introductions. “Devorah will show you to your quarters.”

Laken didn’t reply. Giving him a scathing look, she turned to
follow the woman.

“Wait a minute,” Karsten said.

Almost against her will, Laken turned at the command in his
voice to see him holding out her purse.

“Don’t forget this,” he said. “And don’t forget to behave
yourself, either. I expect you to keep to your quarters and the common areas of
the ship. Which means I don’t want to catch you wandering around anywhere
else.”

Laken wished could have come up with something sharp and
cutting to say, but nothing came to mind. Settling on a glare instead, she
snatched the purse out of his hand. As she followed Devorah out of the room,
she couldn’t resist glancing over her shoulder at Karsten again. He must have
been waiting for her to do just that because he flashed her a mocking grin as
the door slid closed.

Chapter Two

Laken tried to ignore her stinging bottom as she walked down
the ship’s passageway with the other woman. Devorah was a bit taller than she
was, and her figure was a little more on the boyish side, but she looked to be
about the same age as Laken.

Though Devorah wasn’t looking at her oddly, Laken couldn’t
help but wonder if the other woman had heard her getting spanked. The smacks on
her ass had sounded incredibly loud to her. The thought alone of being held
down over Karsten’s knee while he punished her poor bottom made her blush. Not
to mention angry as hell.

“So, has your captain always been such a people person?” she
asked the other woman.

Devorah’s lips curved into a small smile. “You got off easy.
He usually puts stowaways out the airlock.” She laughed at the look of horror
on Laken’s face. “I’m kidding. You two just got off on the wrong foot. I mean,
you are a stowaway, after all. Things will get better once you’ve been on board
a while.”

Laken seriously doubted that. From everything she’d seen,
the man was a complete ass. It probably wouldn’t be wise to say that to one of
his crew, though, so she made no comment as Devorah led her up a set of metal
stairs.

“Why did you sneak on board anyway?” the other woman asked
as they rounded a corner and walked down another passageway.

Laken tucked her long, red hair behind her ear. She had
already told Karsten the reason, so there was no need to hide it from the crew.
Not surprisingly, Devorah was much more understanding of her situation than the
captain had been. The woman even went so far as to say the whole thing sounded
romantic.

“Well, here we are,” Devorah announced with a smile, coming
to a halt outside a door. She pushed the button alongside it so that it slid
open. “All the comforts of home.”

Laken almost smiled at that as she stepped inside the tiny
cabin. Actually, it had none of the comforts of her luxuriously decorated room
back home, but she supposed the narrow bed, small desk along one wall and the
wash basin in the corner would have to do while she was on board.

“We take our meals together in the crew’s mess. Just follow
this passageway, make two rights, and you’re there,” Devorah said from the
doorway. “You’re welcome to join us if you want.”

Laken thought a moment. “Does the captain eat with the rest
of you?”

The other girl shrugged. “Most of the time.”

Not really crazy about the idea of sitting across the table
from the man after he’d just put her over his knee and spanked her, Laken gave
Devorah a rueful smile. “Then maybe it would be better if I just got something
to eat and brought it back here.”

“Don’t be silly. If you spend all your time in this cabin,
you’ll be stir-crazy by the time we get to Marlon Prime. Besides, I want to
introduce you to the rest of the crew. They’ll all want to meet you.”

Remembering the looks she’d gotten as Finn had dragged her
through the ship earlier, Laken doubted the rest of the crew would be as
friendly as Devorah. Nevertheless, Laken found herself reluctantly agreeing.
The dark-haired woman was right. She couldn’t spend the entire journey in the
small cabin. Besides, she’d never been the type to shy away from confrontation.
If the captain didn’t like her taking her meals with the crew, that was his
problem.

Devorah smiled. “Good,” she said. “It’ll be nice to have
another woman on board to talk to for a change. My cabin’s two doors down on
the right if you need anything. If I’m not there, I’m usually in the
communications room.”

Glad to have found a friend on board, Laken assured the
other woman she would stop by if she needed anything. Which she just might. All
she had on her was the dress she was wearing and whatever was in her purse. Of
course, Karsten would probably say such meager living served her right for
sneaking on board his ship.

Laken’s lip curled as she thought of the man. Her bottom was
still tender from the spanking he’d given her, damn him. Just who the hell did
he think he was, putting her over his knee like that? Wait until she told
Mallin. He would be furious. He might even call Karsten out. She couldn’t help
but smile at the vision of Mallin knocking the arrogant captain off that high
horse of his.

But for now, at least, she would have to deal with Karsten
herself. She wasn’t afraid to stand up to him, but she didn’t want to get
another spanking, either. The best way to avoid that was to stay out of his way
altogether and give him no reason to make good on his promise to put her over
his knee again if she did anything he didn’t like. That shouldn’t be too
difficult on a ship this size.

With a sigh, Laken walked over to the wash basin and gazed
at her reflection in the small mirror above it. After her run-in with Karsten,
she’d been half afraid to see what she looked like, but apart from her long
hair being a bit tousled and a smudge of dirt on her cheek, she looked none the
worse for wear. She wished she could say the same for her bottom. She reached
back to rub the offended area with her hands. Brute. What kind of man spanked a
woman, for heaven’s sakes?