Chapter Four: Tom
For the first few days after they left the planet behind, Sara didn't leave the bedroom. Tom's ship was a one-person luxury vessel, equipped with bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, training, and entertainment rooms. Yet, with Sara squirreling away in the bedroom and not by his side, the space suddenly felt too big.
Tom wasn't certain what to do about the situation. It wasn't as though he had never been with a woman before, but none of them had been his Starmate. The T'shav believed that souls were born of stars before they were placed into physical bodies, again and again, until the star had learned all it needed to and grew cold. Sometimes there were two souls belonging to one star, or one soul split in two, depending on who you talked to. Those two souls would always find each other, no matter what life they were born into.
Sara wasn't T'shav, though, and she might not understand the concept of being Starmates. She was human. He hadn't told her that he had figured out that she was originally from Earth, although it had been fairly obvious after spending only a little time with her.
Human DNA was universal, meaning that it shared all its elements with the other species. Thus, it was in high demand. Anyone knowing she was human would put her in grave danger. He wanted to tell her that he knew and she was safe with him, but it would be best to wait until there was a little more trust between them. Being killed by his Starmate because she was afraid of what he'd do to her wasn't something Tom wanted to experience.
He was cutting up the tender shoot of a hissu plant, considering how to approach her with this knowledge. The sound of the door opening heralded her approach, and Tom turned, giving her a brief smile. "I hope you're hungry."
"Starving." Sara pulled herself up onto a stool and put her elbows on the counter he was working at. Her brow furrowed. "Doesn't this thing come equipped to deliver ready-made meals?"
"Yes, it does, but I like the sensation of cooking my own food. There's an art and grace to it. Like dancing."
"Maybe to the way you do it," Sara mumbled, focused on his hands as she watched him work. Her cheeks took on a faint purple tinge.
Tom had to smirk at the slightest sweet scent coming from her. When he first noticed how much he turned her on simply by doing menial tasks, he thought for sure that they would be pledging themselves to one another before they reached the next planet in his course. Sara was stubborn, though, and didn't let her deliciously curvy body dictate her actions. He admired that about her, as much as it pained him to wake up in the morning, stiff in more ways than one, frustrated by the lack of her body in his arms.
"There's something I have to ask you," Sara said, then hesitated.
Tom turned to put the hissu in a frying pan. It was a tactic he learned from his father. When a woman wasn't sure she wanted to say what she was going to say, continue about your work so that she didn't feel pressured to speak.
"Hey, can you look at me?" Sara slid off the stool, marching to block his path. "I told you I have something to ask you and you walk away?"
Tom opened his mouth to tell her he was listening but closed it. "Sorry. What did you want to say?"
"Well, first, I never thanked you. For, uh, killing that other T'shav. And fighting for me in the arena, I guess. I mean, you did sort of save me."
"I did," Tom agreed, grinning at how reluctantly she admitted it.
"But why did you? I mean, I could understand not backing down from the T'shav if it was a territorial thing or whatever. And I could understand wanting me for your musth—"
"I told you, I would never—"
"It wouldn't take much to get me to consent pre-musth right now," Sara interrupted, wrinkling her nose. "You're damned sexy. It would be a terrible idea, though, so don't start getting ideas. I don't have any birth control and I've looked through your cupboards. You don't either. But we're getting off track. Do you think I'm your Starmate?"
Tom cleaned off his knife and began sautéing the plant, giving himself time to think. Obviously, he was going to tell her the truth, but how exactly should he go about doing so? "Do you know what Starmates are?"
"Soulmates. Something about stars and belonging together. Pre-determined destiny."
"Something like that. Yes. I think you're my Starmate."
"Crap."
Tom winced, though he tried to cover it. She had only known him a few days, there was no reason to believe that she would just stay with him. There was no logical reason to, and she was a logical person. "I have other reasons for wanting you with me, though."
"Other reasons?"
"I'm on a mission to retrieve a ship filled with humans in stasis." He glanced up; Sara's eyes were huge, her jaw hanging slack. "I need a Corps officer to help me get through security checkpoints."
Sara swallowed. Looking dazed, she nodded. "What do you want the humans for?"
"I have been tasked with bringing them to a planet they can colonize once they're woken from their sleep. A human sanctuary, I guess you could say."
"Humans. How many? Where are they?" She leaned forward, her golden eyes looking into his intensely.
They had the distinct over-shininess of bionics, and his hands clenched. What had happened to make her need the prosthetics? Something natural? An illness, maybe? Perhaps an explosion or a faulty ship entry had damaged them. Or it could be that those who woke her from her own stasis pod took her eyes for the DNA inside of them, to sell to one of the various corporations interesting in human DNA.
"Bond, come on. You need my help, so there's no point in keeping the information from me."
Tom started a little, shaking his head to clear the anger from it. Sara apparently took it as a denial, because she folded her arms across her chest–he longed to see what that would do to her breasts without her baggy clothes in the way–and glared at him. Her nostrils flared.
"Tell me, or when we get to one of these checkpoints you're worried about, I'll tell them that you kidnapped me and they'll disintegrate your ship."
"Threats don't do well with me, Sara," Tom said, narrowing his eyes. "If I don't find those humans, somebody else will. Somebody who will sell them as slaves or worse. Do you really want that?"
Sara stiffened. She leaned back, trying to wipe the interest from her face. Tom watched her attempts with amusement. His Starmate was not the type that liked to be manipulated or admit her weaknesses, he saw. It just made him admire her more.
"Why would I care what happens to a bunch of humans?"
Tom couldn't help but chuckle, which earned him another glare. "You care because you are also human."
The blue stain on Sara's face paled to turquoise. Her chest rose and fell rapidly, her hands began to tremble, and her eyes darted to the knife laying on the countertop. Tom kept his distance, not wanting to frighten her even more by invading her personal space.
"I'm not a human."
"You are. Aphrosian women have narrower rib cages, and you're taller than any Aphrosian I've seen before."
"That doesn't mean anything. I'm not human. If you're planning on selling me or whatever else you might be thinking of, it's not going to work. Because I'm not human and it would be very easy to prove you a liar if you tried to pass me off as one."
Tom sighed, shaking his head. "Sara, you made a James Bond reference when I told you my name and I've heard you singing Somewhere over the Rainbow. We don't have The Wizard of Oz, that's an Earth thing."
Sara stared at him, realization creeping over her face. "How do you know about James Bond and The Wizard of Oz?"
"My mother's human."
Sara's eyes were so round she looked like they were about to pop out. Which, given that they were bionics, was entirely possible. "What?"
"I know hybrids usually aren't possible, but with your human DNA, you share the same genetic markers as all the species, we just have extra ones, which makes it so that human women can carry and give birth to other species."
Sara held up her hand. "Back up a minute, there. Your mother is human?"
"One of the first to be discovered."
"Wow." Sara blew out a breath and shook her head. "I didn't expect that. So… you're not going to try to sell me?"
"I told you, you're my Starmate." Tom leaned forward, brushing the back of his hand over her cheek. The contrast between the blue of her skin and the red of his made them look like fire and water, clashing together. "I would never allow anyone to harm you."
"You don't even know me."
She didn't understand the ways of the T'shav. That was fine. Tom withdrew. He'd give her time to adjust. He was sure she would come to feel the same way about him as he did for her. They were Starmates, after all. But he wasn't going to frighten her off by being too intense.
"So, who else knows you're human?"
Sara shook her head. "Nobody anymore. I've worked hard to build a new identity. But… it has been a little lonely, with nobody to share my life with."
Tom turned back to the food. "You can tell me."