Why on earth had she told him that about Cupcake… right when he’d been about to do what she’d been fantasizing about from the first moment she’d seen him? All she’d been able to think about in the bar was what those full, made-for-sin lips would feel like on hers. But when push had come to shove, she’d bottled it.

Jac sighed to herself as her companion reached around her, opening the passenger door so she could slide in. She couldn’t meet his gaze as she did. Her cheeks were hot enough to rival the surface of the sun, and she wasn’t sure she wouldn’t make a lunge for him and kiss the lips right off his face.

Which, after turning him down and practically setting old man Kilberson’s dog on him, would mean he’d probably think she was losing it. Totally sandwich short of a picnic insane. And she’d have to agree with him.

Him… him… she’d completely forgotten to ask his name. Shaking her head to herself, Jac got comfortable as he made his way around the truck. She wasn’t using the mirrors to track his movement at all. She was just… curious. Yes, that was it. After all, she didn’t know his name, he wasn’t local, and now she was trusting him to get her and Buck home.

He paused for a moment by the driver’s door, which gave her the chance to study him from the chin downward for a few seconds. He had dark blond stubble that proved his hair color didn’t come out of a bottle. She was fairly sure the streaks were from the sun. They were too random to be down to a hairdresser’s expertise.

Her gaze slid downward, over the broad shoulders, to visually caress the heavily muscled chest. She stopped, and a smirk quirked the corners of her lips. She hadn’t noticed before but the t-shirt he wore was stretched over huge muscles… well, she’d definitely noticed that bit… but it was also pink and had a cartoon unicorn on it.

A. Cartoon. Unicorn.

She blew her bangs out of her face and hid her smile as he opened the door and slid into the driver’s seat. A man wearing a pink unicorn t-shirt in Stanton? Now that was a man secure in his identity.

She didn’t say anything as he altered the seat, seeming to struggle a bit with where the slider handles were. But he managed it, setting the seat where he wanted it to be.

Then he sat there, hands on the wheel, like he was waiting for something.

After a few seconds he frowned, lifting the keys off his lap and waving them over the wheel. As expected, nothing happened, but he frowned and muttered something under his breath.

“Problems?” she asked lightly. “The key goes in the ignition,” she added helpfully.

His expression cleared for a second, and he moved. A jangle of keys later and the engine roared to life.

“I guess you’re used to those fancy electronic ignition systems,” she commented as he glared at the gearshift for a moment and then put it into reverse. “What with you being from the city and all…”

He slid her a sideways glance as they reversed and then smoothly put it into drive before they pulled out of the lot. “What makes you say that, my lady?”

A chuckle escaped her. “Seriously? You show up looking like that, with the…?” She motioned at his body and hair. “Wave keys around like you’ve never seen them before and keep calling me ‘my lady’? You have to be an actor, probably one into method acting, at least with the talkin’ and… yeah, the unicorn tee? Dead giveaway you’re not from around here.”

His expression didn’t alter, his eyes on the road as he drove in the direction she’d indicated. Then he looked at her again, something alight in the backs of his blue eyes. “Looking like what, with the what? Exactly?” he asked. For a moment she thought he was serious and was trying to frame a reply, but then she caught the tiniest curve at the corner of his lips.

“You asshole!” she chuckled. “You know damn well what I mean. You’re ripped as hell, and your hair? Dude, my hair doesn’t look like that even after the works down at Maggie’s on Main Street. Honestly, I have serious hair envy.” She flopped back in her seat, watching him out of the corner of her eye. She hadn’t been kidding. He had gorgeous hair. The kind of hair she wanted to tangle her fingers in, preferably to keep him still as he…

“So!” she said quickly because she was so not going down that train of thought. Not while she was in the car with him at least. That one was for later, when she was on her own in bed. “How long are you going to be in town?”

He shrugged. “Just a couple of days. Work. Then I’m gone.”

Disappointment made her pout, just a little. “That’s not long at all. I guess we’ll have to make the best of the time while you’re here. Left just up here.”

“We will?” This time he did smile, the muscles in his big shoulders and arms bunching as he turned the wheel. “What did you have in mind?”

“Well, for a start, I think you should tell me your name. The house up here on the right with the busted fence. Just pull up on the drive.”

He laughed. “Yeah, I guess that would be a good start. I’m Rynn.”

“Rynn,” she repeated, rolling the name over her tongue. “What a lovely name. Unusual.”

He shrugged and pulled the big truck to a stop in Buck’s driveway. “Not where I’m from.”

She chuckled at that. “Yeah. I’ve heard. Celebs call their kids all sorts of weird names. Peach… South… lord knows what else.” She leaned over to offer him her hand. “I’m Jac by the way. Pleasure to meet you.”

“Likewise. A pleasure to meet you too, Lady Jac.”

His hand engulfed hers, and she had to fight the shiver that rolled down her spine as he shook it. His grip was light and firm but she could feel the latent strength there. He could easily break her in two if he wanted, but she got the feeling he would never use that strength to hurt others. He didn’t seem the type.

“So… what do we do with our slumbering friend?” he asked, jerking his head toward the back seat where Buck had begun to snore.

“We leave him there. Make sure to take the keys out the ignition and throw them onto his lap. He’ll find them when he wakes up and make his own way to bed.”

Jac was utterly delightful and possibly the most beautiful female he’d ever seen.

Rynn dragged his mind off the need to haul her over the seat and into his lap and cast a glance at the sleeping male in the back seat. Leaving him there was totally fine by him. He’d been worried she expected him to carry the male inside and put him to bed or something, so relief that they were leaving him here to sleep it off rolled through him.

“So, what now?” he asked as they both climbed out of the vehicle. As vehicles went, it was okay. No anti-grav or flight capability that he could find, but for a primitive method of transportation, it seemed to work just fine. And he hadn’t crashed it or given himself away again, which was a double bonus.

She shrugged, hands in her pockets. “It’s not too cold. We walk.”

He smiled. “No arguments here, my lady.”

Matching his stride to her shorter one, he followed her down the domicile’s driveway and onto the path. They walked in silence for a few seconds until he noticed her watching him.

“So… you must be doing a historical or something?” she asked, tucking a few wayward curls behind her ear. The movement dragged his gaze to the delicate arch of her neck and he had to bite back a moan, the need to slide his hands through those soft curls and tilt her head up to accept his kisses almost getting the better of him.

“Why do you say that?” he asked, hiding his confusion. He’d spoken at length with the human women at court, but decoding Terran while on Earth was proving to be a lot harder than he’d thought. Although he understood the words she’d said individually, he hadn’t a clue what she actually meant.

“You keep addressing me as ‘my lady.’ It’s very old-fashioned so I figured you must be an actor in a historical movie or something. Maybe fantasy? All elves and magic, stuff like that?

“Oh! No, I know! A Viking warrior!” She smiled at him. “I can just see you in leather and armor…”

“Got it in one, my lady.” He inclined his head with a smile, grateful for the out she’d given him.

He understood the term “movie” having watched a few from the Sentinel’s archives. So she thought he was a player in such a fiction and his… oddities were down to his character leaking over into real life. He could work with that.

“It’s a Viking warrior movie. Hence the…” he waved vaguely at his hair, taking a guess and hoping to the goddess he was right. When she grinned and nodded, he knew he was, and a small sigh of relief rolled through him. Although he wanted nothing more than to reveal what he really was, a warrior of the Lathar, and carry her off to claim her, he had to think of the mission. His primary objective was to secure the Kallson sister and get her back to the healer’s hall on Lathar Prime.

“I thought it would be something like that.”

She rubbed her hands against her upper arms as they walked, and a slight shiver rolled through her frame. He eyed her thin jacket from the corner of his eye. The temperature didn’t bother him in the slightest. It would have to drop a long way below freezing for him to be remotely worried, but it seemed humans were a lot more susceptible to temperatures.

“Are you cold?” he asked in concern, looking down at himself. He could strip the shirt off but it wasn’t likely to provide much protection. It was too thin. Body heat, however… that was a different matter.

“A little, yeah,” she admitted. “My fault. I didn’t wear my thicker coat tonight.”

Something about the way she said it made him suspect she didn’t have any other outerwear, and her comment was one of the polite excuses he’d noticed humans made. That and her clean but obviously well-worn clothing made him suspect that working at the entertainment facility didn’t leave her flush with funds.

“Come here,” he ordered, dropping an edge of an order into his voice. He’d had his vocal chords altered early in his career, allowing him to reach frequencies most species couldn’t hear consciously. But they could subconsciously, which meant they were susceptible to his suggestions. He lifted his arm, expecting her to slide beneath it without a second thought.

She didn’t move. Not toward him anyway. Instead, she kept walking.

“No, it’s okay. I’ll warm up on the way,” she said, wrapping her arms around herself tighter.

He frowned, confused. What the hell was going on? She should have responded to the subliminal order, not just completely refused it. Instinct raised all the hairs on the back of his neck as he studied her again out of the corner of his eye.

Could she be a non-Terran agent planted here? For what though… to foil his mission? No, it couldn’t be that. From the way she spoke and the relationships she appeared to have built, she’d been here a while. Certainly long before the emperor had even thought about assigning him the retrieval mission.

Draanth. If she was non-Terran, it would mean another species had discovered Earth before the Lathar. That could cause all sorts of intergalactic diplomacy issues… maybe even start a war.

He continued walking, but now he was on high alert, trying to figure out what species she could be. Not oonat. They were cattle, barely able to think for themselves. Some were enhanced, their brain power boosted way beyond the norm for their species, but that was pricey. No way would any slave owner pay out for a cognitive boost like that and then send their property out alone.

She could be Seratovian. The shapeshifters were elusive and damn hard to kill, but they weren’t overly fond of travel outside their own systems. So what would one be doing on Earth? Rapidly, he ran through all the humanoid species he could think of and came up blank. Most couldn’t conceal their true, definitely non-human appearance for very long, which left only… a Krynassis.

Double draanth. If she was one of the lizard people, they really were in trouble. Females were rare and if one was on Earth, she was looking for a new hive home. Which meant humanity were about to become extinct. A breeding hive queen wouldn’t allow any other species on her nest planet and would wipe out any that couldn’t leave fast enough.

“Are you sure you don’t want to share body heat?” he tempted her again, holding his arm out and offering a small smile. As he spoke, he modulated his voice again to the tone that should have any lizard responding.

Again, she shook her head, a frown between her brows as she lifted a hand to rub at her temples. “No, I’m good. I have a blinding headache, though. Must be the stress of dealing with Buck.”

Interesting. His hypnotic frequency must have affected her. Instantly, he felt shame for causing her pain and moved closer, trying to offer her his body heat without actually dragging her into his arms. Not Krynassis then, unless they’d figured some way to block subliminal suggestion, or she was a new variety of hive queen. He’d have to watch her carefully. One hint of scale under that delicate skin and she was in the cells in the bottom of his ship quicker than he could say the word. There was no way he could leave a breeding female on Earth.

“I’m just up here.” She stopped on a corner, nodding to the road that branched to the left. “Town motel is that way.” She indicated the road on the right. “I guess that’s where you’re staying.”

He smiled. “I am indeed. But I’d prefer to walk you to your door, my lady. Safety and all that.”

Her small chuckle filled the air. “I’ve lived here all my life.” He highly doubted that. “I’ll be fine. I promise.”

He shrugged, not willing to give up that easily. “It sounds like you have a…” draanth, what was the human word… “A migraine. They can be very nasty. I’d prefer to make sure you got inside safely. I’ll remain outside. You have my word.”

She watched him for a moment, pain evident in her pale eyes, and he felt a complete and utter shit for being the cause of it.

“Okay, if you don’t mind. I don’t get them often but when I do, they can take me off my feet.”

As though to prove her point, she swayed a little. He hissed between his teeth and scooped her up into his arms before she could argue.

“Hey! Put me down,” she squeaked, wriggling against his hold. “I’m way too heavy to be carried. You’ll hurt your back.”

“You think carrying a little thing like you is beyond me? I’m insulted, my lady.” He lifted an eyebrow as he strode up the street. Picking her up had answered one question anyway. Her body temperature was human-hot, not cooler like that of a Krynassis. So that cut out the lizard people. “Which one is yours?”

She sighed, but seemed to accept the inevitable, wrapping her arms around his neck. He liked it. Liked the feeling of her nestled against his chest as he walked. She was a perfect fit, as though she’d been made to be there.

“120. Just up on the left. The one with the outside light,” she said softly, her breath washing against his ear and neck. Lower down, his body tightened, his cock hard and at attention. Again. Sheesh, it seemed she only had to touch him, or be near him… or hell, he only had to think about her.

He distracted himself by focusing on her home. Like her clothes, it was obviously looked after but well past its prime, reinforcing his feeling that she was only just getting by.

“Keys,” he ordered as he walked up the tiny path to the door, keeping his voice normal to avoid making her headache worse.

She nodded and looked in the tiny pouch she carried cross-wise across her body to remove a bunch of metal that looked nearly identical to the ones he’d used to pilot the vehicle earlier. “The ma…” he searched his memory quickly. “Buck has keys to your home as well?”

She shook her head. “No. Not for a long time now. Besides, he won’t be up until well after lunch tomorrow, not the way he was acting. Why?”

He shrugged. “I don’t like the idea of him being able to get in while you’re not well.”

“Huh.” She looked surprised. “Don’t worry. He knows he’s not wanted. You can put me down now.”

With a nod, he did as she asked, careful to ensure she didn’t realize the state of his body. Settling her on her feet gently, he tucked her hair back behind her ears. “Get some sleep,” he advised in a low voice. “It’s the best remedy. I’ll check in on you tomorrow.”

“Yes, doc,” she teased but her voice was strained as she turned and put her keys in the door. He turned to walk back down the path as she pushed it open.

“Rynn?”

He looked over his shoulder.

“Yeah?”

“Thank you. It’s nice to finally meet a decent guy who’s not just after one thing.”