Of Blood and Angels (The Two Moons of Rehnor, Book 3) (17 page)

Chapter 14

Leesa

I used to dream about the MaKennah.  Even
when that dunce Mariya and my other girlfriends called him ugly and a dirty
Karut, I wanted him.  Even when I was barely old enough to realize what this
wanting was, I would touch myself and pretend it was his hand.  I would kiss my
pillow and pretend it was his lips.  I didn't care that he was raised on the
streets of Old Mishnah and half Karut.  If anything that made him sexier, more
exotic, more desirable if that could even be possible.  I would stare at the
pics that lined the walls of my dorm room, especially that one with him on the
rearing black stallion and I would vow that someday, somehow I would have him.

It’s funny how life happens.  First he was
dead.  Poor idiot Mariya, who was sure she would be Queen, because she was his
closest Mishnese cousin, saved herself for nothing.  She should have been a
Sainted Lady and spent the rest of her days on her knees praying for world
peace and good weather or some fucking thing.  Not me.  I screwed every guy
with a dick and some without.  Then my dad lost his company to Akan and pals
and instead of fighting back, he swallowed a bullet. 

Where did I go?  Not home to Mummy who now
got to pick which of her many limp wristed lovers would become her next
husband.  No, instead I went to the Child Moon to hang with Mariya and watch
the muscles ripple on their merry band of half-naked men prisoners. 

And, what did we find there?  We found the
golden ticket of course.

I called the Palace.  Me!  I called the
secret number the other Karut gave me and asked to speak to Captain Loman.

“Who are you?” Captain Loman demanded.  He
was a huge Lightie with a fist big enough to break my neck.

“He's alive on the Child Moon,” I gasped
because at this point, I was so scared I could hardly speak.  What if Akan
found out about me doing this?  I'd be forced to swallow a bullet too.

“Where on the moon?” Captain Loman barked.

“The quarries,” I whispered.  “He’s a
prisoner in the quarries with another Karut.”

The vid clicked off and I was standing
there in the middle of the decrepit ruins of the Clock Tower Mall looking at a
blank cell.  No, thank you, sweetheart.  No million dollar reward.  I just
saved him.  I just saved Rehnor and not even a
fuck you
.

Shit!  I walked home to my flat.

I decided to go back to school and then
graduate school to get an MBA.  I had this ridiculous notion that I would get
hired on in my dad's old company, rise to the top and then buy it back again. 
Stupid maybe.  I knew it wouldn’t bring my dad back, but maybe it might bring
me a little satisfaction.  Nothing tastes sweeter than a little revenge. 

Instead, four years later, I was hired on
by a brand new company that just razed the old mall and put up a huge office
complex and hospitals throughout Mishnah.  It was called SdK Corporation and
well, you know who was behind that venture.

I was hired in as a Financial Analyst and
quickly worked my way up.  I had a new goal in mind.  I looked at the huge pic
of him that adorned the side of the old clock tower and I wanted him like never
before.  I was going to get into that exclusive executive suite of offices.  I
was going to be standing there in my business suit and slowly unbutton each
tiny little button of my blouse.  I was going to slip off my tight form-fitting
skirt and he would see why I had no panty lines.  Then I would walk over to him
and climb into his lap and I would tell him that he owed me.  I saved his life
once and now he was going to pay me a big time thank you.

Mariya was dead and the MaKennah was
married to a Human.  A fucking Human, whatever in the hell that was!  To make
matters worse, he declared that she, the fucking Human was going to be his
Queen!  Why wasn’t anyone else as upset about this as I was?

“Because if you don't like it, he'll
fucking kill you,” Mummy said in her deep cigarette scarred voice.  “You'll end
up with a chandelier in your head like your little friend Mariya.”

I didn’t care.  I didn’t have to be
Queen.  There was more than one way to skin a cat and tell me which King didn't
have a harem full of mistresses?  Even old Yokaa Kalila, who probably couldn’t
get it half way up anymore, had a few living the good life in the Palace, waiting
for that witch, Queen Moira, to fall over dead. 

It might be more fun being a mistress
anyway.  I wouldn’t have to stand around waving at the huddled masses or
holding diseased infants.  All my jewels would be new stuff too.  He couldn’t
give crown jewels to a mistress, but he could commission them to make me anything
I wanted.  The Human had that ancient ugly rock which the Saint's wife wore.  I
would get something new, swirly gold and platinum with three or four enormous
stones.  I would have a few tiaras made too, bigger than the ones the Human
would wear.  I wouldn’t wear traditional Mishnese gowns either.  I would wear
something low cut from the top down and high cut from the bottom up so he could
gaze at my tits and ass as much as he wanted. 

One thing was for certain.  I had way
better tits than the Human and he was going to want to see them all the time.

Chapter15

Caroline

“What do you think she's doing here?”
Jerry asked.  He was watching Katie from outside her new office on Deck 11. 
Commander Markson was leaving, shutting the door behind him.

“Bad?” I asked.

“Watch out for the horsewhip,” he
grumbled.  “Are you on budget?”

“Yes.”  Jerry nodded.

“Then you'll be fine.”  Markson wiped his
brow.  “I'm going to have to do an all-nighter to rework all my figures. 
Damn.  Somebody ought to do her a favor and remind Captain Dragon Lady that
Staff Captain is not equivalent to God.”

“I'll do it.”  Jerry winked and strode
into Katie’s office.  I followed and shut the door.

“Hey guys,” she said without looking up. 
“Your budget looks good.  You don't need to meet with me about it.”

“We're not meeting with you about the
budget,” Jerry said and took a seat.  He used a finger to push his glasses up
his nose.  “We're meeting with you about you.”

Katie looked up.

“I spoke to your OB back at SdK
Kalika-hahr and she's updated me on everything, but your BP is running high, so
I want you to drop in on us every day so we can monitor it.”

“Okay,” Katie agreed calmly, but her eyes
were cold.  “Will you be able to deliver the baby on board?”

“I think so.”  Jerry nodded. 

“You think so?”

“I think so unless there is some
complication we can't deal with.”

“What kind of complication?” she demanded.

“The kid's half-Rehnorian, Kate,” Jerry
reminded her.  “That's not something I'm all that familiar with.  You sure you
don't want to go back to Rozari when it gets a little closer?”

“No,” Katie snapped.  “I'm staying here,
so figure it out.”

“He screwed you over, didn't he?” Jerry
said.

“Jerry!” I shrieked.

Katie turned back to her screen.

“There's no other explanation for you
being here now,” Jerry continued.  “You were afraid of this.  We discussed it
before you left.  He doesn't want the baby, does he?”

“I don't know,” Katie replied, still
staring at her screen.  “But I do.  So that's the way it is.”

“I am so sorry, honey,” I said.

“I'm done being sorry,” Katie replied,
glaring at me.  “Anything else business related?”

“No,” I mumbled.  “Not from me.”

“Not from me either,” Jerry said and we
got up and left.

“My word!” I gasped, once the door was
safely shut behind us.  “How the heck did that happen?”

“I knew he was going to do it,” Jerry said
smugly, taking off his glasses and wiping them on his shirt.

“You did not,” I declared.  “Do you think
he was sleeping around on her, getting a little sugar on the side?”

“Yep,” Jerry replied, leading the way back
down to sickbay.  “While she was pregnant.”

“How incredibly sleazy,” I sighed. 
“Somehow I always thought that man was better than this.”

Katie seemed fine those next few months
though.  The baby grew and was healthy as far as we could tell and even though
she was pretty crabby, occasionally she would smile and meet us in the pub for
dinner, just like old times.  The ship was in the dark most of that time so
even if poor old Dr. Ron wanted to talk to her, he couldn’t.  I was kind of
hoping that he would come beg her forgiveness and take her back home.  It just
didn’t seem right that she was here about to give birth to his first born son
and he was nowhere around. 

About a week after we emerged from the
dark and settled in at Spacebase 41 for supplies, Katie came down to sickbay
accompanied by a couple of those Andorians gals who were always following her
around. 

Now, that was another mystery to me. 
Those gals and a couple of guys just wanted to spend their whole off-duty time
waiting on Katie hand and foot.  Jerry and I surmised it had something to do
with Dr. Ron and all those Rehnorians that kept trying to kill him.  We figured
Dr. Ron had hired them to be Katie’s personal security force.  Jerry had said
he’d seen a whole army of SdK security people back at their offices on Rozari. 

The thing was, if Dr. Ron and Katie were
split, it didn’t make sense those Andorians were still following her around
everywhere, unless they were there to protect the baby.

“Do you think he’s going to take the baby
away from her after he’s born?” Lynne whispered to me.

“He didn’t want the baby to begin with,” I
replied, watching the Andorians assist Katie into the bay.  “That’s why she’s
here and not there.”

“Will you get the hell away from me,”
Katie snapped at those blue girls and then proceeded to collapse against the
door.

“Andorus serves the MaKennah ka Rehnor,
our Overlord,” one of them girls said.

“I don't give a shit who you serve,” Katie
screamed.  “Just leave me alone!”

Lynne and I raced over to her with a
chair.

“How bad?” I asked.

“Bad,” Katie gasped.  “And I'm all wet.”

I wheeled her into an OR and yelled at
Lynne to ring Jerry.

Jerry was in his cabin taking a shower. 
By the time he got down to the bay, Katie was fully dilated, fully effaced and
her BP was 180/110.  Lynne was starting a drip.  I was dealing with the fetal
monitor, which was starting to show signs of distress, when Jerry calmly told
us that Katie had gone pre-eclampsic and might even be having a stroke.

“We had better do a C-section,” he said,
getting himself scrubbed.

“And how long has it been since you did
that,” I asked, prepping Katie's belly while Lynne put her under, which was
fine because she was out anyway.

“Med school,” Jerry replied.  “But don't
worry.  It'll come back to me.”  Jerry made the first cut and blood spurted all
over him.  “I hit a vein,” he growled.  “Damn it.  Hang on, Goldie.”

“That's alright,” a voice behind him
said.  “It'll bring her blood pressure down.”  Damn, if it wasn’t Dr. Ron
scrubbing himself up right in the nick of time.

“Well, look who’s here,” Jerry said
snippily, but I bet he was plenty glad to hand over the scalpel and just
assist.

“Did Katie know you were coming?” I asked
as he cauterized the bleeder and then cut into the uterus.

“No,” he replied, making another cut and
there was his little baby boy.  He carefully lifted him out and handed him to
me.

“What's his name?” I asked, taking the
little sweetie and wiping him down.  He hollered good and turned up pink right
away.

“Shika,” Dr. Ron replied, birthing the
placenta.  Jerry clamped the cord and was about to cut it.

“Isn't that the daddy's job?”  I stopped
him.

“Here, Ron,” Jerry said all grumpy and
stood there with the surgical scissors in his hand like a sword.  “Are you
going to be this kid's father or not?”

Ron didn’t answer.  He just held out his
hand, so Jerry had to lay the scissors in it.  Ron cut the cord and then I
wrapped baby Shika up good and snuggled him for a moment.  He opened his little
rosebud mouth and stuck his tiny fist in it.

Jerry sewed up all the incisions nice and
neat while Ron got busy checking Katie's head and adjusting monitors.

“Did we stroke her?” Jerry mumbled while
he stitched.

“Yes,” Ron replied.  “Just a small one
though.  There is an insignificant bleeder under the temporal lobe which will
clear up on its own.  You can let her wake up,” he instructed Lynne and then
headed over to the sinks to wash up.  When Jerry had finished stitching, Lynne
wheeled Katie into recovery.

“Can I give little Shika a bit of water
until his mama wakes up?” I asked Dr. Ron.

“Sure,” he said, taking off his mask and
gown.

He looked a mess.  He had a nice beard
growing there but his hair was long and looked like it hadn’t seen a brush in a
week or two.  He also looked like maybe he forgot where his closet with all the
nice clothes was. 

I gave Shika a bottle of water, which he
sucked on like a real pro, and then I tried to hand him to his daddy.  Dr. Ron
was just standing there next to Katie’s bed, gazing down at her.

“Here you go, honey pie.  Here’s your
daddy.”  Dr. Ron backed away.

“Come on now,” I said.  “Don't you want to
hold your baby son for a bit?  My word, if he doesn't look just like you.”

“He's got beautiful blue eyes though,” Jerry
said, gazing down at him with his own big puppy dog eyes.  Jerry would take him
in an instant if I let him.

“What a little doll,” Lynne said, joining
us.  “He does look just like you, Dr. Ron.  He's going to be a heartbreaker too
when he grows up.”  Then she giggled when she realized what she had just said.

“Go clean up the OR,” Jerry ordered her.

“Come on now,” I said again and placed the
little guy in Dr. Ron’s arms.  I showed him how to prop the little head in the
crook of his elbow and hold the little bottom with his hand so that he could
hold the bottle with his other hand.

“Now you all come sit down over here.”  I
led him to a chair on the other side of Katie's bed.  “And when Cap'n Mama
wakes up, she'll be so happy to see her two boys together.  Maybe she'll even
stop being Cap'n Dragon Lady for a bit.”

“Are you insane, Caroline?” Jerry
whispered loudly but Dr. Ron did as I said and he sat there holding the little
one even after the bottle was drained and the baby fell asleep.

A while later, nobody had moved including
Katie who was still in dreamland. 

“Why don't I go change your little
prince's nappy,” I said, taking the baby from Dr. Ron.  He studied me curiously
and I felt a warmth and a heaviness in my head for a moment.  I must have been
more tired than I realized.  “I'm going to take a few minutes and do some
measurements too,” I continued after my head had cleared again.  “When we come
back, maybe we can get Mama to wake up and feed this little man.  Was she
planning on breast feeding?”

“I don't know,” Dr. Ron replied morosely,
looking about as sad as any man could look.

“Yeah well, that's what happens when
you're off doing things you shouldn't be doing and leaving your pregnant wife
home alone by herself,” I said.  “Now, I sure hope this beautiful little boy
whom your wonderful wife just delivered to you doesn't grow up and think he can
just spit in the face of his marriage vows like his daddy did.  I don't care
what you men do on whatever hell planet you're from, but on our planet, we
expect our men to keep to their word, even if it means they have to live
without any loving for eight or nine months.  Ain't that right, Jerry?”

“Don't bring me into this.”  Jerry backed
away from the door.  “I had nothing to do with any of this.”  He scampered in
to his office.

I shut the door to the recovery room and
left Dr. Ron to think about that.