Jackson didn’t know what to make of the woman, Raisa. It was clear she was in pain, as she limped down the metal corridor. The artificial lights flickered on the walls, some going out for several seconds before flashing back on. The ship was in bad shape.

Raisa placed her hand on the wall and closed her eyes. She took several deep breaths.

“Are you well? Do you need me to take you back?” Jackson moved as if to lift her into his arms but held back. Touching the woman had done something to his senses last time, something he didn’t want to explore. He wasn’t such a cad as to rescue a woman and then expect romance in return. She owed him nothing. “I should take you back to bed. You need rest.”

“Your ship isn’t doing so well,” she said, rubbing her hand on the wall. “The nerves are weak.”

“Nerves?” he questioned.

Raisa opened her eyes and looked at him. “Sorry, I meant wires. I tend to think of mechanics as living objects. The engine is the heart, the power lines the nerves, liquid tubes are like the veins.”

“Computer system would be the brain,” he deduced.

Raisa smiled and nodded. “Yeah, exactly. VR the imagination. And…” She let her words trail off with a soft laugh. “I sound delusional.”

“No more so than our pilot. He keeps calling the ship his girl and stroking it every time we’re docked.” Though, comparing her to Rick might not exactly be a compliment.

Raisa pressed her cheek to the metal wall. “What’s her name?”

“Bound Virgin,” Jackson stated.

Raisa pulled away and arched a brow as she eyed him.

“I didn’t name it,” he defended. “It came with the ship.”

“No one ever thought about changing it?” Raisa resumed her slow walk down the hall. “You know they have forms you can fill out for that.”

“We have better things to spend our money on than new registration papers.” Jackson didn’t bother to state the other reasons. It’s not like they told everyone they were pirates sailing the high skies, and a review from the ship registration office would have them poking around into ship logs, which were as fake as a pleasure droid’s boobs—to paraphrase Rick.

“We?” Raisa glanced around. “How many are on board?”

As if to answer her, the sound of laughter came from the dining cabin. Jackson led her toward the others.

“The married guys are ruining it for everyone,” Rick’s voice drifted out. “We can’t do anything fun. Viktor, back me up here. You know I just installed that extra-large viewing screen in my quarters. I haven’t had a chance to use it.”

“Rick, watching your transmission waves is not a vital life support system,” Viktor stated, sounding distracted. He and his brother Lucien were half human, half Dere, which accounted for the unusual red-green and red-brown of their eyes. Lucien kept communications running and Viktor worked as the ship’s mechanic. Since the two argued all the time, Jackson was glad only one brother was in the dining hall.

“The women will be lifelike in size,” Rick insisted.

“I’m not diverting the power from the corridor lights,” Viktor denied. “You’ll just have to imagine your female company like the rest of us.”

“It’s like I don’t even know you,” Rick said in mock horror.

“I can live with that,” Viktor answered, his teasing tone giving away the fact they were joking around. “I like breathing more than I like you.”

“What are you playing with anyway?” Rick asked.

Jackson turned into the dining cabin to find the two men were alone. Viktor had Raisa’s black bag on the table and had pulled out its contents, which was mainly some kind of portable mechanical device.

“Something I found in the hall,” Viktor answered. He slapped at Rick’s hand as the pilot tried to touch the metal device. “You wouldn’t understand it.”

“What are you doing?” Raisa gasped as she hurried toward the unit.

Viktor tried to shield it with is body, as if protecting what he’d found. “I’m just looking to see if there are any parts we can scavenge to fix the—”

“Ah!” Raisa inhaled sharply. “Parts?” She slapped at Viktor’s hands several times. “You will not touch my molecular gastro-spectrometer!”

“Is that what this is?” Viktor sounded more awed than scared. “I’ve heard about these but have never actually seen one.”

“Hey, Jackson, who’s the dirty star beam?” Rick asked quietly as he sidled up next to him.

“No,” Jackson stated in warning.

“But—” the pilot tried again.

“No,” Jackson repeated.

“Does it work?” Viktor asked Raisa.

“Yes—no. I was on Torgan trying to get a part to fix it,” she said. “Normally, yes, it works great.”

“Figures.” Rick gave a small laugh. “Everything on this ship is broken.”

“That’s a shame.” Viktor frowned. “Hey, maybe we can rig it with something and get it going again? I’d love to see it in action.”

“I tried. I can get it to run through the first process, but when it starts with the second it becomes unstable, and then the detector can’t read the final outputs. I narrowed it down to the…” Raisa and Viktor began talking in some kind of hybrid scientist-mechanic’s language. The words were understandable on their own, but strung together they made very little sense.

“I wouldn’t mind getting a little dirty myself,” Rick whispered, nudging Jackson with his elbow. “If you know what I’m sayin’.”

“No,” Jackson stated flatly. He found it best not to encourage Rick down his mischievous paths.

“Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance…” Raisa explained to Viktor, her voice enthusiastic, as if she talked about the most fascinating thing in all the galaxies.

“Ah, that’s too bad,” Rick said. Jackson arched a brow in question.

“…single mass analyzer…”

“Can’t be easy to see Viktor sweep in and steal your girl,” continued Rick. “If I were you, I’d be embarrassed.”

Jackson tensed. The two did seem to be getting along very well.

“…fragmenting molecules…”

“Maybe we should give them some privacy.” Rick tapped Jackson’s arm. “It’s kind of like watching a first date, isn’t it? They’re really cute together, don’t you think?”

Jackson inhaled sharply.

“…used for protein identification—”

“I thought you wanted to wash up,” Jackson interrupted.

Rick snickered behind his hand, and Jackson realized the man had been goading him into a reaction. Blasted stars, it had worked too. Rick’s words had wormed their way into his head.

“Oh, I, ah…” Raisa looked down at her clothes and then at Viktor. “He’s right, I’m a mess.”

“No more so than the rest of us.” Viktor frowned at Jackson when Raisa moved to go to the food simulator. He mouthed, “What are you doing?”

Jackson didn’t have an answer.

“How old is this thing?” Raisa asked, touching their food simulator, trying to move it so she could look behind it. The unit had been bolted down. “I haven’t seen this model in a long time.”

“We might be in need of a few upgrades,” Jackson muttered.

“Don’t you have some VR monsters to fight?” Rick asked Jackson, as if dismissing him from the room.

“Can’t,” Viktor inserted. “VR systems are down. They take too much power.”

“That explains so much,” Rick chuckled. It was no secret that Jackson spent an unusual amount of time in virtual reality training. He used to exercise with Dev, but since his friend had married, he’d been fighting solo. Though, could he call it sparring if he programmed more alien foes than was physically possible to defend himself against? Sometimes he didn’t even put up a fight, and he let the computer-generated warriors beat on him. The ship medic always healed him afterward, so it’s not like anyone knew how bad it could be.

She ignored the two men and turned to Jackson apologetically. “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded. I meant to say, this is one of the best models put out. They’re heavy, but they work much longer than their lightweight counterparts. My advice would be to keep it as long as you can.”

Viktor instantly moved forward, slipping his hand on top of the unit. “Are you a food simulator connoisseur?”

“Something like that,” Raisa said. “I’m an Intergalactic Culinary Specialist.”

“You cook?” Rick asked with interest. “Because I have to tell you, simulated food lives up to its name. It pretends to be edible.”

Raisa gave a tight smile. “I’m the one who deconstructs foods and creates the parameters that make food simulation possible.”

Rick arched a brow.

“I make the recipes,” Raisa simplified, her tone a little flat.

“Is that so?” Rick tried to lean in front of Viktor to block the man from the exchange. “So tell me, why can’t these things,” he banged the top of the unit, “make a decent piece of chocolate?”

Viktor pushed Rick out of his way to rejoin the conversation.

“I heard it was because the Lithorian monks have a monopoly on chocolate making, and they threatened the simulator people,” Viktor said. “It’s because it’s the food of the gods and they use it to lure people to their way of life.”

“I’ve not heard of monks outright threatening anyone, but they have been putting political pressure on the company not to use Lithorian chocolate in their experiments. It still happens because it’s the best chocolate in the universes. But no one can get it right. It’s not from lack of trying. It’s the one recipe none of us can figure out how to program. Every specialist I know is trying to conquer that beast. One of my colleagues came close, but it was not well received at a chocolate-tasting festival, and it had some adverse effects on a few alien species. Since then, Simulator Corp has been hesitant to release another version. It’ll be a huge payday for whoever figures it out.”

“Huge payday? How’s this work again?” Rick placed his hand on the unit.

Jackson didn’t move as he watched the two men make fools of themselves. He had no claim on the woman and she could talk to whoever she chose. That didn’t mean he enjoyed Rick and Viktor fighting for her attention.

“She is injured,” Jackson stated. “You should let her rest.”

Raisa looked annoyed by his statement. “Yeah, apparently I’m as delicate as I am dirty.” She turned to the food simulator.

Rick grinned, as if he couldn’t contain himself. He started to respond but Viktor slapped his hand over the man’s mouth and shook his head in denial.

Raisa didn’t appear to notice as she pushed several buttons on the food simulator. She waited a few moments before pulling out a large bowl of steaming liquid. The smell of flowers filled the room. She eyed Jackson. “I’ll need a cloth to wash with…and privacy.”

“You can use my quarters,” Rick offered. “I don’t mind.”

“I was thinking more the room I woke up in,” she said, her eyes widening slightly as if to convey some kind of secret message to Jackson, only to add, “if it’s not a problem.”

“It’s fine.” Jackson lifted his hand to the side and gestured for her to walk before him from the room. She did, and he hovered his hand behind her back as if to protect her even as he needlessly guided her.

“Let me know if you need me to help wash your back.” Rick grinned more at Jackson than Raisa. He knew he was getting under Jackson’s skin.

Raisa chuckled, and he heard her mutter, “That man is a handful of trouble.”

“You have no idea,” Jackson answered. Lights blinked in the corridor, a constant reminder of the tin can of a broken ship they were currently flying in. The sooner they were out of Torgan airspace the better. If some unsavory characters—or the Federation Military—decided to attack, they wouldn’t have the power to evade capture or defend themselves. It wasn’t an ideal situation for space pirates to be in.

“It’s obvious you don’t like him,” Raisa said. “Did something happen between the two of you? Or is it just a personality clash?”

“Who said I didn’t like him?” Jackson stopped walking. The soft lights illuminated her face in small bursts, drawing his eyes to her mouth. It had been a long while since he’d been with a woman. All the females on the ship were spoken for. The places they’d landed as of late provided little opportunity. On Qurilixen, the population of shifters was predominately male, so no luck there. On Torgan, they were all thieves and outlaws, again no luck. On the last three fueling docks, the only woman he was physically compatible with had been a lykan, and she had more hair than grugs during their winter season. He and Dev had fought grugs in the VR, and Jackson had no desire to be reminded of the howling, slashing beasts while in someone’s bed.

“Jackson?”

He realized he’d not heard what she had said. “I was thinking of battle and not listening. I apologize.”

“Uh, okay.” She gave him a quizzical look. “That’s surprisingly honest of you.”

“Who said I didn’t like Rick?” he asked, prompting her to resume where he’d drifted off. He really needed to stop thinking about sex when talking to her. He had more self-control, and self-respect, than that.

“It was rather obvious by the way you looked at him. If I had to guess, you want to throw him off the ship,” she said. “He annoys you, at the very least.”

That is because the charming spacehole was flirting with you, he thought.

“Rick is family,” Jackson stated so there could be no mistaking what his loyalties were. “He is like my brother, and I love him like a brother. I would give my life to protect any member of this crew.”

Raisa hugged her bowl closer to her stomach and took a step back. “I apologize. I spoke out of turn.”

Jackson didn’t know why everything that came out of his mouth toward her sounded gruff. He wanted to say nice things, be charming and friendly. He wanted to tell her how pretty she looked, even with the dirt on her face. Or how he liked the way her animated voice lifted and dropped with enthusiasm when she spoke of scientific stuff. Or how light she was to carry in his arms. How he was sorry he’d brought her onto a broken ship. How he wanted to kiss her. How he wanted to brush the hair from her cheek. How he wanted…her.

He wanted her.

“Your dirty face…” He hesitated. That wasn’t coming out right. What was it Rick would say to women he liked? That man somehow seemed to have luck with the ladies.

“Saddle up, sweet cheeks, big Rick is ready to take you for a torpedo ride.”

Okay, maybe charming wasn’t the right word to use to describe Rick.

“Without washing, you…” Again, he hesitated. Blasted space balls. What in the fiery depths of Bravon was wrong with him?

“Come to Rickie, baby cakes, I got everything you need right here.”

“Come to…” No. He could not say that to her. How the hell did any of those lines work?

“I’ve heard about people having a condition where they’re extremely bothered by, or even fearful of, dirt and germs, to the point they scrub themselves raw and can’t think rationally,” she said. “Until you, I never met anyone who had it though.”

Jackson grimaced. “I’m a trained soldier. I’m not afraid of dirt.”

He wanted to say he wasn’t afraid of anything, but that wasn’t true. He was afraid of losing his crewmates. They were the only family he had.

“Okay, if you say so.” Her voice lifted in a way that said she didn’t believe him but wasn’t about to argue the point.

“You’re pretty, just like that,” he said.

“Are you…?” She arched a brow. “You know what, never mind. It’s not important. How about you show me where I can clean up?”

Jackson nodded, deciding it was best if he didn’t say anything else.