Inrit’s body practically vibrated with recognition of Max when she stepped through the door of the dodgiest watering hole in Ohra. Instinct urged her to draw her hood tighter around her face, but she didn’t. Movements like that drew eyes faster than flashing signs and bright lights.

Besides, Max had already seen her. His eyes burned into her and she knew that he’d have a stack of questions. This hovel was the home of cutthroats and smugglers. Max should have stuck out like an angel among devils, but the hard lines of his face and his aggressive posture marked him as just another brute among the roughs. Next to him were several members of the security team and eyes kept flicking towards a Vrinlander guard who stood beside a back door.

Inrit put it together. The captain had a meeting with someone and he’d brought Max as backup. But whatever he wanted to do, he didn’t want his upright, staid cyborg to know. So Max had been relegated to the bar while business went down.

Smuggling. Kidnapping. Murder. Theft. What was Morvellan’s specialty? Inrit hadn’t realized the man had a dark side and she would put her skills to finding out what it was. Later. Right now she had her own work to do, ensuring there was a later to have.

She met Max’s eyes and held them for several seconds. The light from the door haloed her, practically shining a spotlight on her position. After a moment his eyes slid away, silently acknowledging her and letting her do her work.

The thing about any dusty space port town like this was that it was always possible to get in touch with the worst sorts of people. Not too long ago, Inrit had been one such person, but now she hoped to skirt the line and get information without calling any attention to herself. She’d never been to Vrinli II or Ohra before, but that was less of an impediment than it might seem.

Informants were informants and they all looked the same, no matter the species.

The Vrinlander she wanted was sitting at the far end of the bar, nursing a tall glass of something sludgy and green. It gave off a noxious smell that almost made Inrit gag, so when she sat down, she breathed through her mouth in hopes of lessening the stench. Instead, it just clung to the roof of her mouth and made it even worse.

A server bot slid her way and she selected a cheap, clean water that probably wouldn’t poison her. After depositing her credits into the machine, she received the thin bottle of water in less than a minute. For several minutes, she sat quietly beside the Vrinlander and drank. Every so often his eyes flicked her way, watching the bottle as it disappeared into the darkness of her hood. When she sat, his body had been facing away from her and towards the security team that loitered at the other end of the bar. But with each drag of her drink, his body pivoted closer until she had his full attention.

Good.

The light was almost too dim to see by, but up close Inrit could get a good look at her Vrinlander drinking buddy. He was big, at least twice her size, and would probably stand taller than Max, but the slump of his shoulders and the way he held his drink told her that in a fight, she’d be the one to come out on top.

This guy didn’t know how to play dirty, he only knew how to roll over and beg.

“It’s impolite to stare,” Inrit said in Interstellar Common, the language spoken in some form or another in most port cities.

“Didn’t ask for company,” the Vrinlander replied. His accent was thick and barely understandable, but it was good enough for the moment.

Inrit reached into a pocket and grabbed a stack of platinum coins. Most transactions were done through credit account numbers and digital swipes. But sometimes cold coin got the point across far better than an impersonal number written on a screen. She played with the coins, stacking and unstacking them, letting the metal clink as it fell. The Vrinlander’s gaze moved from her hooded face down to the money and back up.

He waved to the service bot and ordered another drink and a water for Inrit. She smiled and accepted it with a cool nod.

“What do you want?” he asked as he gulped down the last sips of his first glass of noxious sludge.

Inrit was doubly glad for the hood; he couldn’t see her wince as he drank.

“I’m shopping,” she said. One couldn’t just approach a jumpy stranger and say hi, have you seen any pirates around these parts. A woman needed a bit of subtlety.

“The market is down the road,” the Vrinlander replied.

Of course, subtlety only worked so well on the dense. “We have a mutual friend who let me know that you are the one with access to the… exclusive markets.”

The hand holding his drink froze halfway to his mouth and Inrit got a look at the thick, dirty claws spiking out of his fingers. He could do a lot of damage if he ever got riled up. “What friend?” he asked.

Inrit sipped her water and let the silence grow.

After several seconds, he slammed his drink down onto the bar and leaned close to her, hissing out his words. “I told that fucktoe that I was done moving anything. So you need to get out right now if you’re not going to make yourself useful.”

Wonderful, a retired snitch. “Then how can I get a message to Aryn?” she asked. The name meant nothing, no one in the business used it, but it worked as a simple code for thieves and cutthroats alike.

The Vrinlander pulled his drink close and huddled in on himself. He turned away from Inrit and muttered, “Aryn left, we don’t need no trouble here.” His posture made it clear that he had nothing more to say.

That didn’t matter. Inrit had everything she needed to know. This place might be dirty, but it wasn’t crawling with pirates. They’d avoided the worst.

For now.

***

Captain Morvellan sat with the boss for over an hour and Inrit was long gone by the time they left the bar. Though Max had planned the trip on the assumption that they’d be carrying cargo back to the boat, they left the place empty handed and the Captain said nothing about it. An hour later, they were at the lodgings that had been rented for the crew.

The bottom floor of the building was open to the elements and housed a restaurant for the boarders. At night and during bad weather, metal shutters unfurled and blocked the place in. Inrit sat at a table with Krayter, with no sign of the cloak she’d been wearing earlier and no hint that she’d ventured into one of the most dangerous parts of town.

The captain dismissed him along with the rest of the crew to take their free time. Max wanted to go directly to Inrit and take her away to the cliffs she’d told him about. But dirt was caked into his skin and his clothes were made for busting heads, not holding hands. With great reluctance, he ran up the stairs at the back of the building and took the world’s fastest shower.

Ten minutes later he was back, cleaned, dressed, and ready to run. He looked toward the table where Inrit had been sitting, but now Krayter sat alone.

Max didn’t pause to question the Detyen man, instead following his instincts and the almost psychic pull that led him out the back door of the building and down an alleyway so narrow that the tops of two red stone buildings almost touched. He popped out of the other end onto a street that fed into the main market and found Inrit standing there with a small bag slung over one shoulder and a smile on her face.

She held out her hand and Max took it silently, pulling her close and tipping her face up to capture her lips in a light kiss.

There was no cover on the street, but Max didn’t care who saw them. Kissing his denya was an act of celebration, of worship. There was no room for shame.

Discretion, however, always had its place. Inrit pulled back and rested her hand against his chest. She grinned up at him, her red eyes even and full of something he could almost call happiness. “No pirates,” she whispered.

“No duties,” Max replied, his grin just as silly as hers.

“I’ve decided to keep you,” Inrit told him, playing with the edge of his cloak. “Even if you run away, I’ll chase after you.”

“I’m never letting you go,” he replied. Not now that he had her, that she was his. “You’re mine.”

A public alleyway was no place for their first bout of sex. Max had to tell himself that twice before he stopped eyeing the sandy brick behind them and judging just how much any passerby would see from the street.

Inrit entwined her fingers with his and pulled him into the public street. How she had the discipline, he didn’t know. His mind still circled on plots to dip his fingers into the band of her pants and stroke her sex until she purred with want.

Later.

They had all night. And forever.

But now that they were hours, or less, away from sealing their bond, Max couldn’t keep himself under control. Touching her was sweet torture, the feel of her flesh against his essential to his being, yet a constant reminder that his cock wasn’t yet buried balls deep within her.

He’d never wanted a woman more, not even in the moments he’d already shared with Inrit.

His soul exploded with light every time she was near, the emotion swelling with every pound of their feet and each clench of her fingers. Her hand wasn’t soft; it bore the scrapes and callouses of hard work and the tone of strife. But he wouldn’t know what to do with a gentle woman. His life was meant to be lived in the harsh climes of space and war. A pirate was the perfect fit.

A few passersby glanced at them as they walked together, but the sight of aliens of different species walking together, embracing, or more, wasn’t out of place on the streets of Ohra. Port cities were known for their diverse populations and freer attitudes to interspecies relationships.

“Do you plan to finish up your contract with Morvellan?” Max asked Inrit as the thought occurred to him that they hadn’t made any plans past this night. Where she went, he would follow gladly, even into all the hells in the galaxy, and he hoped she felt the same.

Inrit glanced up at him, expression quizzical. She shrugged. “He’s not the worst, as far as captains go. And I did give him my word. But…” She looked away as she trailed off.

Max squeezed her fingers. “There’s no need to figure everything out tonight.” He raised her hand to his lips and kissed it. “But from this day forward, we do it together.”

A grin tugged at her lips and bloomed into a full-blown smile and she nodded. “I like the sound of that.” She pointed to a small two-seater vehicle parked on the side of the road. “This is our ride. Ready?”

The motorized bicycle looked one minute away from falling apart. It was pieced together with tubes and anti-grav repellers and hovered half a meter in the air, chained to a rental stand.

Max had visions of the anti-grav giving out and splattering them across the pavement, or worse, thrusting them over one of the cliffs. He’d never been overly cautious before, but his body could take a beating. Inrit wasn’t made of the same metals and fibers that were interlaced with his every cell.

He must have stood too still for too long. Inrit tapped on his arm and then rested her hand against her knuckles, amusement spreading from cheek to cheek. “You’re not scared, are you?” she teased. “Because if you want to stay here, I can go alone.”

Max narrowed his eyes. Someone who didn’t know her might have taken her seriously, but he recognized a taunt when he heard one, especially from her. If he turned and walked right now or insisted on a more stable vehicle, she’d go with him.

But she wouldn’t let him hear the end of it for a decade or more.

Max put the credits into the machine and waited for the bike to be freed. Then he scooped Inrit off her feet and plunked her onto the back passenger seat and swung his own leg over the front. “I’ll drive,” he said.

Inrit wrapped her arms around him and laid against his back, her breasts pressed flush against him. “Then I’ll give you the directions,” she said against his ear, her breath sending shivers down his spine and his cock responding with vigor.

Max engaged the engine and sped off, leaving a trail of dust in their wake. His mate tipped her head back and laughed as he took a corner almost fast enough to flip them. But she didn’t tell him to slow down.

She just held on harder.