Cyberevolution Book One: The Awakening: Fifty Shades of Dark Kaitlyn O'Connor by Kaitlyn O'Connor, Kimberly Zant, Marie Morin, Stacey St.James, Goldie McBride (10)

Koryn stared at him in surprise when he turned abruptly and left.  Shrugging he settled a hand on Emerald’s back and urged her toward the section of the ship that made up the galley.

It was a private luxury ship, unlike Tariq’s, which was a warship, and the galley was far more compact and included a lounging area.  He told Emerald to sit down on one of the chaises and headed into the food preparation area to see what was available.  Tariq returned while he was studying the fresh foods somewhat doubtfully.  He had Aeon with him.

“You let him go?” Koryn asked in surprise.

Tariq’s lips tightened.  “I’m sure as fuck not going to reward him for ripping Mylor’s head off for me by keeping him locked up!”

Koryn felt a little queasy.  As badly as he’d wanted to kill the son-of-a-bitch himself, ripping his head off seemed a little unnecessarily … violent.  “All the same, he was a lord.”

“Accident of birth,” Tariq growled.  “He had no honor and no nobility.  Somebody should have done the world a favor and killed the bastard sooner.”

Koryn had to agree.  “You don’t think it’s setting a bad precedent?”

“I don’t.  We aren’t bound by the laws of the Anunnaki any longer.  We’re dead men if they catch us.  We can never go back.  We need to try to adjust to that.  I believe I’m actually looking forward to it.  I don’t think I realized just how sick to death I was of everything about my life until I realized that wasn’t going to be an issue much longer.  Or maybe it was when we came through the sewer and I saw freedom?”

Koryn had thought much the same thing and it was still hard to accept that their fortunes had changed so radically.  He didn’t think he was going to have any easier time adjusting his way of thinking than Emerald had had.  “What about Emerald?”

Tariq turned to study her.  His lips curled into a slow smile.  “She’s my woman.  Aren’t you, baby?”

She smiled at him.  “And Koryn’s.”

Tariq frowned and flicked a hard look at Koryn.  Koryn wiped the grin off his face.

Shaking his head, he pushed Koryn aside and began looking for cooking apparatus.

Koryn moved out of his way, but he didn’t retreat.  “You aren’t planning to actually … prepare a meal?”

“That’s what I had in mind.”

“You know how to do that?” Koryn asked, more than a little doubtful.

Tariq snorted.  “Like I said—I went to the military academy.  They assume the possibility that we might find ourselves stranded … without servants,” he said dryly.  “Stick around.  You’ll want to learn this, too.  I doubt we’ll have servants where we’re going.”

Koryn stared at him in disbelief, trying to figure out how he was going to focus on his work if he had to do everything else besides.  “But … We have the androids!  Are they just going to drop us off and go back?”

Tariq shrugged.  “I don’t know, but I’m figuring they bought their freedom and they can make their own decisions.  That’s what I told them.”

Koryn’s lips tightened.  It seemed to have escaped Tariq that he was still making fucking decisions for everyone!  The flare of anger died after a moment as it dawned on him that he’d volunteered to give up everything long since when he’d told Tariq he would take Emerald to her own people to keep her safe.  He hadn’t considered what all ‘giving up everything’ entailed, but he could hardly blame that on Tariq.

Clearly, slavery wasn’t anything humans were very familiar with anymore or Emerald wouldn’t have had such a hard time grasping it.  It almost seemed strange considering it was the humans they’d adapted the practice from to begin with, but he supposed the advances in their technology had made it unnecessary.  The early humans hadn’t had androids for labor, after all.

He frowned as it occurred to him to wonder if the Anunnaki had given the humans the idea for slavery after all.  It was possible since they hadn’t known the androids they’d brought with them were their creations.

Well, they had, they just hadn’t grasped that the androids had been created in labs or the fine distinction between them and a completely biological entity.

Which made it all the more bizarre, to him, that Tariq had taken it into his head to ‘free’ them.

The meal Tariq cooked was surprisingly good.  When they’d finished Emerald offered to clean up, which almost seemed as strange to Koryn as Tariq cooking.  It annoyed him.  He was anxious to check her, but Tariq not only seemed pleased about it, he seemed to think it was some sort of rite of passage or something of the sort—that it was a pivotal point for all of them in beginning their new lives.

He discovered Tariq hadn’t exaggerated the extent of Seana’s sickbay.  Few commercial or even military vessels were as well equipped.  It heartened him beyond the fact that he discovered everything he needed to perform a careful and accurate examination of Emerald.  His life had begun to seem as if it had been turned completely upside down and was spiraling out of control faster than he could acclimate himself to the changes.  This, at least, was familiar ground.  Beyond that, it appeased the niggling fear at the back of his mind that he would discover his own knowledge and skills virtually useless to him or anyone else in the situation he’d found himself in.  It wasn’t that he wasn’t willing to learn or that he felt that he couldn’t, but it was comforting to know he wouldn’t be completely useless until and unless he did.

Just as importantly, he didn’t think Emerald would see him as being useless.

He completely forgot his discomfort by the time he’d examined her.  She’d lost more weight during her ordeal than he liked, but she was strong and healthy and mostly recovered from losing the baby as far as he could see—at least physically.

He studied her face when he’d helped her to sit up again.  “How are you feeling?”

She looked surprised and then smiled faintly.  “I thought you would tell me.”

He found himself smiling back at her.  “I can tell you that you’re in excellent shape and healing from the abortion, but only you can tell me how you feel.”

She sobered at the mention of the baby, frowning as if she was wrestling with something.  “It didn’t really seem real to me until Mylor was so pleased about getting rid of it that he had to gloat about it.  I hadn’t gotten far enough along to feel the changes.  Now … I think it hurts more to know it’s gone when Tariq was so happy about it.”  She met his gaze again.  “Mylor said that I was ready to breed again.”

Koryn felt a mixture of emotions at that comment—primarily rage at the thought that the bastard had intended to breed her at all and partly because he’d meant to replace Tariq’s seed immediately with his own.  Neither thought completely vanquished the excitement that she was right—she was ready to be bred again, fertile, and healed enough, he was sure, to make it safe to do so.

She looked distressed.  “I need it to be Tariq’s baby—we both do.”

His excitement crashed, leaving the taste of bitterness in his mouth.  He nodded, his expression taut.  Emerald caught his hand when he would’ve turned away, however.

“Tell me you understand that this is something I need to get over the grief of losing his baby—and that he needs to get over his own grief.  I love you, too.  I don’t want to hurt you anymore than I want to hurt him—and I want your baby.”  She smiled at him, lifting a hand to caress his cheek.  “We have time, now, and the chance to have a real life together.  I wanted to have your babies—yours and Tariq’s—when I thought that I would only be a slave to you two and I wasn’t important to either of you beyond that.   We can be a family now, though, have a family and raise our children together.

“Isn’t that why you and Tariq rescued me?  Isn’t that why you’re taking me to the colony—so we can be together?”

Koryn swallowed with an effort.  “That was what I intended, or at least hoped for, when we made the plans before,” he said slowly, but he hadn’t expected or particularly wanted Tariq to be part of that.

“It’s what I want, too.”

“Yes, well it’s entirely different,” he said irritably.

“Beyond the fact that it’s my choice, how is it different?”

He stared at her blankly.

“You aren’t a slave girl anymore.  That’s how it’s different!  It’s one thing to share a slave, and completely different to share the woman … you love.”

Emerald smiled at him and slipped her arms around him.  “You loved me before or you wouldn’t have risked your life to save me from Mylor and a life of slavery.”

He put his arms around her, holding her tightly.  “This isn’t some warped idea of avenging yourself on both of us for … what we did, is it?”

Emerald chuckled and leaned away, cupping his face in her hands.  “Of course it is!  I’m going to torment both of you forever by loving you as much as I can and having your babies.”

He grinned reluctantly and pulled her close to kiss her deeply.  “You’re going to have a hard time convincing Tariq that this will work,” he murmured when he broke the kiss.

“I convinced you it would.”

He sighed.  “Because I love you and I know that you love Tariq and I’d lose if I tried to convince you to be my woman instead,” he said wryly.

Emerald frowned at him in consternation.  “I don’t love you less than I love Tariq.  I just don’t think it’s fair or right of either of you to expect me to make a choice between you now when you didn’t give me a choice before.  I couldn’t help but fall in love with both of you.”

She shook her head at him.  “You know how stubborn I am.  I want both of you and nothing less will do.”

Emerald could tell just from Tariq’s expression that he’d monitored her and Koryn when Koryn had taken her to examine her.  Anger and determination glittered in his eyes.  “Well, what’s the verdict?” he asked when he’d studied her for a long moment and finally transferred his attention to Koryn.

“He says I’m ready for you to breed me again,” Emerald volunteered.

Chapter Seventeen

Tariq’s cock leapt at the suggestion and began to inflate faster than his mind could process Emerald’s announcement.

Not that he’d needed to hear it from her.  He’d monitored Koryn’s examination and had not only seen the results of Koryn’s tests himself, he’d seen and heard everything that passed between them afterwards.

It was the fact that Emerald had announced it herself that had his cock leaping to attention even though his mind was still churning with doubts regarding the wisdom of immediately impregnating Emerald again.

He didn’t think that he would’ve experienced quite as much turmoil if Emerald hadn’t said that she needed it to help her get through her grief over losing the other baby.  He realized it wasn’t in him to want to deny her anything—especially anything that would comfort her after what she’d been through because of him.  Beyond that, although he hadn’t consciously acknowledged it himself or even been aware that he felt the loss himself, anything beyond the fury and helpless frustration that had consumed him, he knew she was right.  He was angrier that they’d hurt Emerald and put her at risk than anything else, felt anger because of his guilt and remorse from having failed her, but he also felt the loss.

Their situation had changed dramatically, however, and although he was still trying to come to terms with it, he’d felt like Emerald belonged to him—still felt like she did.  He hadn’t wanted to share her with Koryn to start with.  Even though he’d acknowledged that it was a political necessity, even though he’d considered it essential to keeping Emerald, it had irked the hell out of him from the first.

He was ready to dispense with it now that circumstances had changed.  Unfortunately, there were two road blocks to that—his word, and Emerald’s announcement that she loved both of them and expected them to continue as a fucking threesome!

He was inclined to think the change in their situation relieved him of obligations that were directly connected to the situation at the time—giving his word to share—but he wasn’t as comfortable about it as he wanted to be.  And he didn’t know what the hell to make of Emerald’s insistence that she loved them both.

Actually, he did.  He knew just as well as Koryn did that they’d conditioned Emerald not only to accept them but to become emotionally dependent on them.  He’d been well aware that that was what they were doing all the time.  It hadn’t particularly bothered him that he was ‘conditioning’ her devotion—as long as he had it because he hadn’t expected their situation to change so radically and he’d known that, once she was under his control that would continue.

All he could think while he stared at Emerald was that he desperately wanted to leap at the offer and that, if he did, then he wouldn’t be allowing himself time he might well need to convince her she really did love him.

Because the very moment he got her pregnant, both her and Koryn would expect things to go back to what they’d been before.

He didn’t especially like the idea of gambling, either, gods damn it!  He thought it was probably unlikely that he could impregnate her as quickly as he had before.  The odds weren’t generally in favor of that, regardless of how fertile both parties were.

But he might and he didn’t harbor any doubts that Koryn would be fucking hovering over her with the gods damned scanner like he had the first time!

Actually, considering how badly he was backed up, the odds were probably very much in favor of impregnating her instantly.

If he did, though, wouldn’t that insure her as his?

He knew damned well it wouldn’t, not considering the fucking mess he’d created!

He cleared his throat, glancing from one to the other, trying to think of some way to stall for time until he’d had time to consider the situation and decide upon the best course—or find some gods damned birth control method—other than abstinence!

“That’s … great news!  Thing is, though, our situation is rocky right now and I have to wonder if it wouldn’t be better, for everyone concerned, to wait … at least until we have some idea what we’ll be facing once we reach Centaurian.”

Emerald blinked at him, her face slowly turning red and then the color completely receding to leave her pale, although he couldn’t decide what emotions inspired the fluctuation.

Koryn merely gaped at him a moment before he frowned thoughtfully.  “I hadn’t considered that,” he said slowly.

Relief flooded Tariq.  “Exactly!” he said, warming to his theme.  “I mean, we’re not sure we’re completely out of the woods as far as pursuit goes, and we don’t know what’s ahead of us.  I don’t want to add any risks to the situation.”

Koryn nodded.  “I’ll head back to the sick bay and see if, by chance, Lady Selena had any birth control available.  I intended to do a thorough inventory anyway.”

Tariq glared at his back as he retreated, realizing he’d created just the fucking situation he’d wanted to avoid—since there was no reason they couldn’t share Emerald if he wasn’t trying to breed her and they had birth control.

“I thought you wanted me to have your baby,” Emerald said neutrally.

Tariq’s anger flared upwards a notch.  That was a prime example if he’d ever needed one, he thought bitterly, that it was never a good idea to act on impulse on anything of importance.  It was on the tip of his tongue to order her to the cabin to assume the position.  He struggled with it a moment and finally took a step forward, hauled her into his arms, and strode purposefully toward the rear cabin.  If she wanted proof of his devotion, by the gods, he was damned well ready, willing, and able.  She was going to be gods damned lucky if he didn’t blow her head off when he came!

Although it flickered through Emerald’s mind that Tariq had decided to continue their discussion in a more private place, his hard, purposeful expression was unnerving to say the least.  “Tariq?” Emerald said uneasily as they reached the cabin and she emerged sufficiently from her surprise to find her voice.

He didn’t acknowledge the question in her voice by more than a hard glance and a tightening of his lips and Emerald’s uneasiness mounted as he strode through the door of the cabin and it closed behind them.  Instead of setting her on her feet, he crossed the room and deposited her on the bed, following her down.  She was still trying to gather her wits when he dragged her beneath him and opened his mouth over hers.

A jolt went through her when he captured her lips beneath his hard mouth.  It created a fresh wave of pandemonium within her, but as brief as it was, it left her completely vulnerable, defenseless against the warmth she instantly felt waft through her as her senses burgeoned.  His taste and scent, the urgency of his touch, decimated the last of her defenses.   She sank beneath a tidal wave of heat, floating, drifting, anchored only by his bulk to the bed beneath her.  The last of her doubts as to whether his actions were motivated by anger that she’d questioned him or desire vanished as she felt the raw need emanating from him in heated waves, felt it in the tremors of his hands as they skated over her, and the hunger of his mouth.

Within moments, he divested her of the flimsy, hated sheathe she’d been forced to wear as a slave of the house of Mylor.  She shivered at the faintly rough texture of his palms and fingers as they glided over her, awakening every nerve ending and spreading the pleasurable warmth.  The possessiveness of his touch comforted her even as it aroused her.

She’d begun to despair of ever feeling his touch again.  Despite reason, despite her denials both to herself and to him, she’d begun to think of Tariq as being as close to god-like as a mortal could be and yet Mylor had shaken that deep core of certainty that Tariq could and would triumph over anything thrown at him.  Whenever he’d come to her, he’d gloated over Tariq’s imminent execution, regaling her with the nightmarish details of what that entailed until she’d begun to fear there was no hope for him or Koryn or herself.

Sleeping in the shelter of his body the night before had appeased her need for reassurance and comfort, but it had done nothing for the barely acknowledged fear that he no longer wanted her, that she’d been so tainted by Mylor’s touch that it had turned Tariq’s desire for her to disgust.  She’d been certain it had when Tariq had politely refused her offer to shelter and nurture his child within her body, certain she’d lost that tenuous hold she’d had upon his affections, that it was as dead as the child she’d lost.

The play of his mouth and hands over her did far more than arouse her senses to a fever pitch of excitement and anticipation.  It began to heal the wounds within, soothed fears even while it thrilled her.

She began to tug at his clothing after a few moments, desperate to feel his bare skin beneath her palms and against her.  He struggled for some moments to remove them without breaking off his exploration and finally gave up.  Rolling from the bed, he stripped impatiently and dove at her again.  Her excitement reached a new level when she felt the brush of his bare skin against her own and for a few minutes she was too focused on gathering the scent of his skin on her own and the feel of it inside of her to think of anything else.

“Tariq … come inside me,” she gasped when he’d pinned her to the bed to explore her breasts with his mouth.

He tensed, releasing the nipple he’d been tormenting and burrowing his face between her breasts.  “Baby,” he muttered, his voice hoarse and tinged with self-depreciating amusement, “I won’t do you any good like that.  I’ll come before I even get in.”  He lifted his head and played with her other nipple, nipping at it with his lips.

Emerald clutched him tightly.  “I don’t care.  I need to feel you inside of me.  Please?”

He lifted his head and met her gaze, swallowing with an effort.   His expression tautened.  “Don’t say I didn’t warn you,” he growled, shifting over her abruptly and curling his hips to press the head of his cock against her sex.

She braced the soles of her feet on the bed, pulling at him impatiently in response.

Heaving a heavy breath of defeat, Tariq curled his arms tightly around her and thrust his hips.  The moment the tight band of her flesh engulfed the head of his cock, a red haze of mindless need enveloped him, shattering his control and what little remained of the battle with his conscience.  A modicum of reason remained, a small voice in the back of his mind urging him to take care, reminding him of her frailty beside a hulking brute like himself, but the raw need to drive inside of her and expel his seed was so insistent it took all he could do to pay that any heed at all.  Truthfully, he wasn’t certain afterwards that he had.  He was so focused on the war he was waging with his body to keep from coming instantly and the battle to claim the channel of flesh beckoning to him and, at the same time, resisting every effort to gain ground, he feared his slow claiming was more a matter of an inability to do what he wanted than the consideration for her that it should have been.

He lost even that much reasoning ability once he’d managed to burrow deeply enough to feel her flesh fist around his cock like a vice.  He paused to try to drag in a breath of air when it felt as if his chest was going to collapse and tried to decide whether he’d driven deeply enough to withdraw at all without being shoved completely out again.  Deciding after a moment that he was going to lose it and come all over the bed if her muscles squeezed him completely out, he sucked in a reviving breath and struggled to seat himself a little more deeply.  His balls drew up … all the way to his throat, threatening to choke him.

Expelling an explosive breath, he pumped his hips experimentally to see just how much movement he could allow himself and promptly lost his train of thought when he felt the muscles gripping him ripple in response.  Beneath him, Emerald uttered a low groan and stiffened.  Goosebumps erupted along his back.  She bucked against him, pulling him deeper, and he felt her muscles convulsing around his cock like massaging fingers.

His body responded instantly by seizing up, forcing a choked groan from him as the spasm ejected a stream of semen.  Catching his breath, he began pumping into her frantically in short, deep thrusts until the spasms finally passed, leaving him feeling as if it took every ounce of strength with it.

Braced on his elbows and knees, he paused to catch his breath, to relish the release for a few moments and gather enough energy to lift himself off of her.  She grasped both of his buttocks when he tensed to move away.

“Don’t pull out yet.”

Tariq felt his heart execute a dizzying leap, felt the heat that had just left him center in his belly again, bringing his cock semi-erect.  Tightening his hold on her, he rolled over and carried her with him.  She scooted back along his belly once he’d settled, pushing his cock deeper.  He was more than a little inclined to pursue the promise of pleasure offered by the tight hold of her sex along the length of his, but he hadn’t caught his breath from the first time—yet.

She felt tiny draped over him, abruptly raising his awareness of the difference between them—because she was tiny compared to him—and yet her weight was substantial enough to dispel the flicker of uneasiness that came with the awareness.  She’d come.  He didn’t think she would have if she’d been in any kind of distress other than acute sexual arousal.

He lifted his hands and skimmed them lightly along her back, tracing her form, and finally settled them on her buttocks, pressing her more firmly down on his cock.  It sent sharper currents of pleasure through him and he felt himself grow fully erect inside of her.  She lifted her head to stare at him.  He tilted his own head to meet her gaze, wondering abruptly what was going through her mind, wondering why she’d been reluctant for him to pull out.  He knew why it had appealed to him.  He just wasn’t certain why it appealed to her.

“I’d kiss you,” he murmured huskily, “but I’m enjoying you right where you are way too much.”

Her lips curled in a knowing smile and she dipped her head to plant a kiss between his breasts.

“If I had my way I’d keep you there.”

She chuckled.  “There’s an image.”

He thought it over and grinned lazily.  Gripping her hips, he rocked her back and forth along his length until she caught the rhythm and began to move languidly.  He focused then on exploring her with his hands.  He’d forgotten how much pleasure it gave him just to touch her, but then again he’d never had the opportunity to grow as familiar with her as he wanted.  As arousing as he’d found it to discipline her when he’d thought he was training her as his slave, it had almost been as unsatisfactory as it was pleasurable.

Actually, it had been more unsatisfactory, he thought abruptly, and not merely because he’d felt compelled to ignore his own urges until he was nearly mindless.  He’d wanted to make love to her and he hadn’t dared allow her to see just how deeply she affected him.  He wasn’t sure he dared now and yet he knew if he didn’t give her something the chances were far greater, now, that he would lose her than they’d been before when he’d been so worried about it.

She had to want to be with him.  He didn’t think he’d fully assimilated that until that moment.  He’d trusted in the dependency that he’d woven into her mind when he’d pleasured her until it was torture and then rewarded her, but he’d known all along that that wasn’t true love.

What he felt was, though.  He would’ve realized it sooner if he hadn’t been working so hard to convince himself it was pure lust and the drive to produce an heir.

It was the scariest fucking thing he’d ever encountered and his dick thought so, too.  It deflated as abruptly as if it had sprung an air leak.

Emerald lifted her head and stared at him in dismay.  He could see she was struggling with whether to mention it or not, wondering if it was something she’d done, or not done.

Rolling to his side, he dumped her onto the bed.  He needed distance to consider both his situation and his feelings, but he realized immediately that he wasn’t going to get it.  If he left now, Em would be convinced he didn’t want her or care about her and beyond that, it would leave the fucking door wide open for Koryn to step in.  He wasn’t about to let that happen, regardless of his doubts.

“You didn’t … like the way I was doing it?” she asked after a moment.

Fuck!  It wasn’t embarrassing enough he’d lost his erection?  She wanted true confessions?  He cleared his throat uncomfortably.  “It wasn’t that.  I just … thought about something.”

She paled.  She didn’t leave him in doubt long, though, of what thoughts that comment prompted.  “Mylor?”

He clapped his hand over her mouth before he even thought about it.  Actually, that was what he’d intended.  It was a little disconcerting to discover his hand covered most of her face and not only silenced her, it cut off her air.  He removed his hand.  “Don’t say that or think it!” he growled.  “I tortured myself with that enough while I was in that stinking prison.”  He sucked in a calming breath at the look on her face.  “I want to forget it.  We both need to put it behind us.  Leave it in the past where it belongs.”

She looked more distressed instead of less.  Her eyes teared up, chasing his anger at the reminder of Mylor with a healthy dose of alarm.  “Gods, baby!  Don’t do that!  You know it tears me up when you cry!”

She swallowed convulsively, blinking her eyes rapidly to dispel the tears but that only made them roll down her cheeks.  Uttering an irritated breath, he slipped the arm he’d been propped on beneath her and drew her against his length, rubbing his hand soothingly along her back.  To his relief, it calmed her.

“What you said before … about the baby … that was really why you wanted to wait?” she asked tentatively after a few moments.

Tariq wrestled with himself.  “That was part of it,” he said finally.  “It was one thing to breed you when I thought ….”  He broke off, realizing that by the time he had gotten around to breeding her their situation was already looking dangerous enough he should have refrained then.  He could’ve spared her the ordeal Mylor had put her through if he hadn’t been so gods damned focused on claiming her—spared her that part, anyway.  He didn’t think he could’ve done anything to protect her except making the decision to send her away sooner, and it had taken all he could do to make himself let go of her then.  He tightened his hold on her reflexively at the memory.

“What was the other reason?”

“What?” he asked blankly.

“You said that was part of the reason.”

He mentally kicked himself.  “Most of it, really.  It isn’t that I want to wait.  I just think it could make things more dangerous for you and it would be better to assess our situation and find a place to settle before we breed again.”

She wiggled against his hold until she could look up at his face.  He met her gaze, trying to think of another argument to distract her, and finally released an irritated huff.  “Koryn will be all over you the very gods damned minute the test turns up positive!” he growled.

Emerald bit her lip and ducked her head again, brushing a kiss along his chest.  “It could take days of dedicated fucking before it takes, though.”

Tariq felt his pulse leap.  His cock wasn’t far behind.  Not that it didn’t rankle just a tad that she’d referred to it as fucking, but he didn’t see any way to argue about her terminology without making a confession he wasn’t sure he was ready to make.  It was bad enough she had him twisted in knots without giving her more ammunition until he felt a little more confident she wouldn’t turn it against him.

Instead, he dragged her up for a kiss.  “There is that,” he murmured huskily when he broke from her lips a few moments later to explore her throat.  “Gods, Em!  I’ve missed this.  I’d begun to think I wasn’t ever ….”

“Don’t think about it,” Emerald whispered when he broke off, seeking his lips again.

* * * *

Surprise and then anger washed through Koryn when he returned from checking the sick bay for birth control and discovered both Emerald and Tariq had vanished.  It didn’t take more than a moment to figure out where they’d disappeared to.  After glaring at the closed door of the cabin for several moments, he finally headed back to the sick bay to perform the inventory he’d planned.  He discovered it was far harder to focus on his work that it generally was, mostly because of the images that kept forming in his mind and the anger that arose each time it did.

It pissed him off to be sent off on a fool’s errand when Tariq, clearly, hadn’t had any intention of holding off on breeding Emerald again, regardless of what he’d said.

He considered that for a while and realized once he’d cooled off a little that he hadn’t actually been manipulated as he’d first thought.  Tariq had obviously been angling to outmaneuver him and had only intended to stall for time until he’d had time to consider a plan.

That pissed him off more when he realized Tariq had thought to keep Emerald to himself by refusing to breed her right off.  Short of reneging on his word, however, he was foresworn and Tariq was too much a man of honor to break his word.

No doubt that was like a knife in his gut now!  Just as clearly, he was trying to decide whether his honor required that he keep a promise made under completely different circumstances.

Well, he was right in one respect!  Things had certainly changed a great deal!  Class rank no longer applied to any of them when they’d broken from the society it had sprung from.  He was Tariq’s equal, not his social inferior.

He considered that angrily for several moments and realized that, regardless of social standing, he still didn’t feel like Tariq’s equal.

Because he wasn’t.  Tariq could kill him inside of five minutes if it came down to a deadly contest.  He would’ve liked to believe that wasn’t so, but he knew better.  If Tariq had let himself grow soft once he took his place on the lower council—maybe—but he hadn’t and Koryn doubted it would’ve made a hell of a lot of difference even if he had.

It wasn’t as if he had no idea of how to defend himself.  A certain amount of fight training was required of everyone—whatever their station or life goals.  He hadn’t particularly relished getting his face, or his ribs, kicked in, however, and he spent most of his time in his lab.  Barring the occasional verbal battles, he hadn’t actually had a lot of opportunities to use any of the training he’d had.

Tariq, on the other hand, had been in training or in battle much of his life.

It occurred to him rather forcefully that it might be time to brush up on his battle skills.  He and Tariq had already come to blows over Emerald twice and he had a bad feeling that there might be more battles ahead.

Unless he bowed out.

It didn’t take more than a second to realize he wasn’t going to.  Reason might triumph over pretty much any other obstacle, but he couldn’t give Emerald up without a fight.  He didn’t think he could’ve if she’d told him she didn’t care about him.  He sure as hell couldn’t when she’d made it clear she did.

He might not have any other choice but to continue to share her with Tariq as they’d begun, but he couldn’t give her up completely.

By the time he’d finished inventorying the contents of the sick bay, he’d decided that love might just have tainted his reasoning abilities.  He and Tariq had been best friends for much of their lives.  However possessive Tariq was of Emerald or unpredictable his temper where she was concerned, he didn’t think it was going to come down to a battle to the death and since beating him to a pulp wasn’t going to change Emerald’s mind and Tariq had to know that, there would be no point to it.

Except, possibly, satisfaction for Tariq.

It couldn’t hurt to brush up on his self-defense techniques, he decided, since defending himself was all he had any likelihood of accomplishing.  Tariq wasn’t just far more skilled than he was.  He outweighed him by a good fifty pounds—of rock solid muscle.

Tariq convinced him that reasoning, at least, was completely sound when he met up with him in the galley in search of food.  He hadn’t bothered to dress, proof, if he’d needed it, that Tariq fully intended to head directly back to Emerald as soon as he’d found food.

Tariq looked him over and scowled.  “We won’t be needing the birth control.”

Koryn’s lips tightened.  “I’d deduced that.”

Tariq narrowed his eyes.  “And before you trot down to sick bay to collect a scanner, I’ll tell you straight out—if you come near her with a gods damned scanner I’ll shove it so far up your ass you’ll play hell ever finding it again.”

Anger flashed through Koryn, potent enough that he had to wrestle with the urge to punch Tariq in the face.  “I guess that means you disposed of your word of honor along with everything else you left behind on Niribu,” he growled.

Tariq flushed, balling his hands into fists.  He looked so furious for several moments, Koryn tensed to duck and mentally reviewed the ship behind him in case he needed to find an escape route quickly.  “I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that,” he said after a long moment.  “If you were anybody else, you’d be spitting out your teeth right now.”

Koryn fought another round with his temper.  “She’ll only be fertile three days.”

Tariq looked more murderous at the reminder.  “True,” he finally responded tightly.  “She’ll probably want to rest a while after that.”

The taunt almost provoked Koryn into tossing aside all sense of self-preservation.  He wasn’t certain it wouldn’t have except that even as he tensed to spring, he saw that Emerald had come to the door of the cabin and was watching the two of them.

“You said you understood,” she said, drawing Tariq’s attention.

He didn’t recall saying anything of the sort!  In point of fact, he knew fucking well he hadn’t!  Emerald had distracted him by embracing him and telling him she loved him and he’d kissed her and lost what little brain function he had left.

“Go back to bed, baby,” Tariq growled.

She met his gaze for a long moment and then flicked a look at Koryn before returning her attention to Tariq.  Folding her arms under her bare breasts, she leaned against the door frame.   “I didn’t like it when the two of you decided to share me as if what I wanted didn’t matter—which it didn’t—to either of you.  I was nothing but a possession.  I fell in love with both of you because, despite your arrogance, despite the things you did, despite your complete disregard for my rights as a human being to make my own decisions, I realized that, in your own way, you were trying to protect me … because, I thought, I actually did matter to both of you.  I’m not your possession.  I’m not a thing.  I’m a person and I would love to be your woman—to both of you.  Because I love both of you.  It worked before.  It can still work, but you’ll both have to get past the belief that your wants and needs are more important than mine and that I only exist to be your possession.

“You can still hold me against my will.  I’m well aware of that, but you’re going have to decide whether you want to own me and not have me, or have me and not own me.  I don’t know—maybe it would help to consider how you would treat an Anunnaki woman?”

Tariq scowled at the empty doorway when she turned away.  When the door closed, he flicked a look at Koryn to see what he thought about Emerald’s announcement.  It made him feel better to see that Koryn was as outraged as he was.

“If she had a clue of how a woman of the Anunnaki would behave she wouldn’t have made that suggestion!” Koryn muttered after a moment.

Tariq frowned.  “She has a point,” he said slowly.

“If she did, she would already have cut your throat and mine, too!” Koryn retorted.

“I didn’t mean that literally,” Tariq said dryly.

Koryn glared at him.  “Even figuratively.  Setting aside the fact that she’s about half the size of an Anunnaki, does she seem like any Anunnaki woman you’ve ever met?”

“She isn’t Anunnaki,” Tariq said.  “Of course she doesn’t behave like our women.  Her society was completely different.”

“Exactly my point!  An Anunnaki of what rank?  Because it seemed to me that she was suggesting a woman of our class and no man in his right mind would chose a concubine of the same class.  There would be constant bickering over who outranked whom in the connection and whose decision was final!”

“Gods, Koryn!  You confuse the hell out of me, and I don’t need the gods damned headache!”

“You’re confused?  I’m fucking confused!  What the hell did she mean?”

“She wants to be considered an equal partner.  Love her and she will return it.  Try to possess her and you will lose it.”

Tariq and Koryn both turned to look at Aeon when he spoke.  Koryn couldn’t help but notice that Tariq didn’t look nearly as outraged as he felt when they exchanged a glance.  It wasn’t bad enough Emerald had decided to rebel?  Now the fucking androids felt like it was perfectly alright to stick their damned noses in where they weren’t welcome?  “I don’t believe I addressed that question to you,” he responded coldly.

Tariq shrugged.  “I think he put it fairly succinctly, though.”  He studied Koryn for a long moment.  “I’m still breeding her, though, gods damn it!  You can damned well wait until I’m done to scan her.”

Koryn took instant exception to the tone.  Fortunately, before he could voice his objections it occurred to him that Tariq had acknowledged their previous agreement and he decided to leave well enough alone.   In any case, Tariq distracted him in the next moment.

“We need to divide the cooking.”

He blinked at him in disbelief.  “I can’t cook.”

“Well, you need to learn!”

“Exactly how the hell am I supposed to do that out here in the middle of nowhere?  There aren’t any instructors!”

“I will prepare this meal and instruct you as I cook,” Aeon offered.

Koryn had to fight the urge to throttle the bastard.  “You’re an instructor droid?”

Aeon bowed his head.  “I was not given that task, no.  I have been assigned as a guard unit.  However, I was programmed to perform in whatever capacity needed.”

Even the gods damned androids knew every damned thing they might need to know about surviving, Koryn thought angrily, wondering abruptly if he should have focused his entire studies on the sciences.  It hadn’t occurred to him that he would ever need other skills, however.

“You need to get used to not referring to them as androids,” Tariq said evenly.  “We owe them our lives.  We owe them for saving Emerald when we couldn’t.”

Koryn wrestled with the urge to inform Tariq that he hadn’t had any part in the arrangements and that, therefore, he wasn’t obligated to anything Tariq had promised.  He tamped the urge after a moment.  As much as he resented Tariq’s arrogant assumption that he was still in a position to order everyone around, he was grateful and it was a meager repayment for what they’d risked.  “True,” he said finally.  “And I suppose it’s never too soon to get into the habit.”

Tariq nodded and glanced at Aeon.  “Bring me and Emerald a tray when the food’s done.”

Koryn glared at his back indignantly as he strode down the corridor once more.  “Maybe you need to adjust your attitude a little yourself?” he pointed out tightly.

Tariq halted and turned to look back at them, frowning.  After a moment, his brow cleared.  “Please?”

Aeon bowed.  “I am always honored to serve you, Lord Tariq.”

Rolling his eyes, Koryn stalked to one of the lounges and sprawled on it.

“It will be far easier to learn, I believe, if you watch,” Aeon pointed out.

Koryn sent the android a startled look and then glared at him, but he got up and followed him into the galley, watching him carefully as he selected the ingredients.

“What are you going to prepare?”

“Roast beef with potatoes, carrots, and peas.”

Koryn’s interest instantly peaked.  “Great!  I’m starving and I haven’t had anything like that in … I’m damned if I remember.  Since I left Niribu the first time.  I wonder why Lady Selena didn’t just stock the ship with space rations?  It would’ve been more convenient.”

“Her servants have said that she prefers the luxury of freshly prepared food to the convenience of her servants,” Aeon responded neutrally.

“Well, I prefer fresh food, too, but it doesn’t keep nearly as well.”

“There are space rations in the hold.  She had no idea how long our voyage might be.”

Koryn frowned.  “She risked a lot to help us.  I hope to hell she’s going to be alright.”

“She loves Lord Tariq.  She thought the risk was worth it.  In any case, her servants rebelled and stole the ship and left her bound and gagged.  It will be reported as a theft and they will be reported as rebels.  I’m confident she thought of everything … and she has a great deal of political influence.  Beyond that, I killed Mylor, who would’ve been her greatest danger.”

“You killed him for Lady Selena?” Koryn asked, surprised.

“I killed him for Lord Tariq and for his lady,” Aeon said.  “Lady Selena’s servants would have killed him if I hadn’t.  He was dead either way.”

“Our lady,” Koryn growled.

Aeon sent him a long look, but he merely bowed.  “I killed him for Lord Tariq and Lady Emerald because she is also his lady.  Also because he destroyed the child and Lord Tariq could not avenge the death of his child himself.”

Koryn felt his appetite vanish at the reminder, but his interest was fairly caught once Aeon began to prepare the meal.  “This is a bit like working in the lab, actually.  I don’t suppose the measurements need to be quite as precise.”

Aeon shrugged.  “It will not blow up if the measurements are not precise, but it may taste like hell.”

“Yes, well failed experiments are always a disappointment.”

“Particularly if it is one you intended to eat.”

Chapter Eighteen

Emerald studied Tariq’s sleeping face, enjoying the rare opportunity to examine him to her heart’s content.  Despite their own advances in slowing the aging process over the past several decades, she still found it hard to accept that either Tariq or Koryn were as old as they’d implied.  They appeared much the same age as she was.

Then again, they’d ‘resurrected’ her, and her age was as deceptive as theirs.  She’d been twenty eight when she’d fought her last battle, however, and she supposed they must have brought her to that age physically when they’d regenerated her.  She didn’t see that she looked any differently in the mirror than she remembered.

She’d always found it disconcerting when they called her child, although oddly enough, when they’d ceased and begun to call her baby that had pleased her, because it ‘felt’ like a term of affection.  She still thought it was … and she still had some doubts about the way felt about her.

She shouldn’t have.  They’d risked death to protect her—a horrible death if she could rely on Mylor’s gloating and she thought she could trust the bastard in that if nothing else.  She couldn’t imagine that they would have if they hadn’t loved her.

And yet … could she really trust that they looked upon death the same way she did?  As the ultimate sacrifice?

Beyond that, did they even have the ability to feel love as she perceived love?  She thought that was the main source of her anxiety, that their society hadn’t prepared them to perceive love in the same way.  They both still thought of her as something they could own rather than a person.  She wasn’t certain they would ever be able to really see her in any other light, regardless of what she saw as efforts on their part to do so.  She didn’t think it was because she was a woman.  From things she’d heard and seen in her brief stay on Niribu, it wasn’t any more uncommon for women to hold positions of power and wealth than men ... but those were women of the Anunnaki.  She was human and she had a feeling that was a preconception they would never really overcome.

And maybe, in many ways, the Anunnaki were superior and they were justified in thinking they were.

It made her wonder how women had coped with their roles as inferiors for so many generations on Earth when even women of the same class as their husbands were still considered beneath them simply because they were born women.

She shrugged the thought off.  She didn’t think it would be any great hardship to deal with—annoying—but not insurmountable simply because she didn’t feel inferior.  She also didn’t have a problem allowing them, mostly Tariq, to believe he was the ‘boss’ and his word was final.  There were always ways around that and she didn’t particularly care if she had to work around it.

“Now what’s running through that mind, I wonder?” Tariq murmured in a husky voice still laced with sleep, startling her.

She smiled when she focused on his face again and saw the curve of his lips.  “I was just thinking that you’re a beautiful man,” she said teasingly.

His face darkened.  He stretched and curled his arms around her, dragging her closer.  “Insatiable wench!”

Emerald chuckled.  “I’m sated.  My eyeballs are floating.”

Tariq uttered a snorting laugh.  “You’re fortunate your skull’s intact.  I had a hell of a backup that first time around.”

Emerald felt her belly clench at the reminder of his stint in prison, but she was more than willing to do her utmost to erase those terrifying weeks from her mind.  Lifting a hand, she stroked his hard cheek.  “As horrible as everything was, I’m glad it turned out like it did.  If your plan had succeeded I would never have seen you again and I don’t think I could’ve borne that.”

Several emotions chased across his features.  “I never wanted to send you away.  You know that, don’t you?”

Emerald nodded, tilting her head to brush her face along his.  “I know.  You wanted to protect your baby.  I understand.”

She heard him swallow.  “I wasn’t thinking about the baby when I made the arrangements.”

Emerald felt her heart skip several beats.  “You weren’t?”

“I ….”  He hesitated for a long moment.  “I care about you, Em.  I know it might not seem like it to you, but I’m trying … to adjust.”

Emerald closed her eyes, relishing the words even though it wasn’t quite what she’d hoped to hear.  “Maybe I should tie you up and torment you for hours on end with the most exquisite pleasure imaginable?” she said teasingly after a moment.

He drew back to study her face, but he relaxed when he saw she was teasing.  “Believe it or not, that was every bit as tortuous to me,” he said dryly.

She sent him a skeptical look.

“I see you don’t.  You wouldn’t look so doubtful if you had any idea how much I wanted you or how long I waited.”

She was inclined to be pleased about that admission and began to think, once she’d thought back over it, that maybe she hadn’t considered it from his viewpoint at all.  As beleaguered as she’d been, she’d been keenly aware of his arousal.  She doubted anything he’d done to her would’ve been nearly as exciting if she hadn’t sensed that it affected him as much as it did her.

“You can at least concede I wasn’t unmoved,” he said dryly.

Her lips curled in a smile.  She leaned toward him to nibble at his hard mouth.  “Maybe I’d still like to tie you down and torture you,” she murmured.

He rolled onto his back and laced his fingers behind his head.  “Baby, you can do anything you want.  I’m not stopping you.”

The invitation was too tempting to resist.  She straddled his waist and settled to exploring him with her fingers and her lips until she touched a spot on his ribs along his side and he let out a choked grunt, flinching all over.  Intrigued, she returned to the spot and dug her fingers in a little more deeply.  His reaction was more pronounced that time.

Emerald lifted her head and stared at him, suppressing the urge to laugh.  “You’re ticklish.”

“I’m not.”

She studied his face assessingly and abruptly dove for the tickle spot on either side of his chest.  He jackknifed, uttering a choked laugh as he grabbed her hands and held them.  “Gods damn it, baby!  That hurt.”

Emerald bit her lip, trying to look remorseful.  She knew damned well it hadn’t hurt.  He just didn’t want to admit that he was ticklish.  “I won’t do it again.  I promise.”

He narrowed his eyes at her but he finally released his grip on her hands.  The moment he did, she dove for the spot again.  He uttered a choked laugh, bucked her off and rolled over on top of her.  “You’ve no sense of honor!” he muttered with both amusement and irritation.

She shook her head.  “Not a bit!” she agreed cheerfully.  “Anyway, I had my fingers crossed.  It didn’t count.”

“Is that a fact?”

She felt smug until he found her ticklish spot and tickled her until she couldn’t catch her breath.  “Stop!  Stop!” she cried, laughing.  “I can’t breathe!”

He stopped.  Emerald sucked in a reviving breath and goosed his ribs again.  He laughed, grabbing her wrists and pinning her arms above her head, but he sobered as soon as he had, his expression becoming intent.  She stared up at him worriedly.  Instead of tickling her again, he abruptly dropped closer and covered her mouth in a heated kiss.

Emerald felt an instant response inside of her to the heat of his kiss despite the days they’d spent in a heated tangle, striving over and over to reach the pinnacle.  It almost seemed they reached fever pitch faster each time, and perhaps they did, she thought dreamily.  He was certainly no less desirable and he’d learned just how and where to touch her to stir her.  She welcomed him into her with love and joy when he reached a point of impatience to join with her, enjoying their deep connection on every level.  And when they both reached culmination within moments of one another, she yielded to exhaustion and sank beneath the blanket of bliss that beckoned her, buoyed by the certainty that she’d given as much as she’d taken.

She struggled to curl her lips into an appreciative smile when she felt Tariq arrange her against his side afterwards and begin to stroke her in wordless appreciation.  She’d almost reached the dark gateway when he rolled onto his side and tightened his arms around her.

“I thought I’d go completely insane when they took you from me,” he murmured raggedly.   “I was far more focused on getting too you than getting out or I might have managed it sooner.”  He paused and tightened his hold.  “I love you, Em.”

* * * *

Alarm instantly went through Emerald when she and Tariq finally emerged from seclusion and joined the rest of their party in the lounge for the evening meal.  Koryn didn’t just look as if he’d had little sleep in the past three ‘days’ since they’d escaped.  He was battered and bruised.  She couldn’t decide whether to comment on it or not, but she knew he hadn’t shown any signs of having been in a fight before she’d joined Tariq for a marathon breeding session.

Tariq noticed, too, and he wasn’t the least bit restrained in his reaction.  “What the fuck?  Did you get in a fight with the lab equipment?”

Koryn narrowed his eyes at him, his lips tightening.

“We have been sparing in the hold.  Koryn pointed out that we did not know what we might encounter and therefore it would be wise to polish our skills.”

Tariq lifted his dark brows and studied Koryn assessingly for several moments.

“I don’t have fucking nanos to help me heal faster,” Koryn pointed out tightly, clearly defensive about the fact that he looked the worse for wear when none of the others did.

Emerald felt her chest tighten in commiseration, but she resisted the urge to rush to him and fuss over his bruises, fearful that would wound his pride even more.  There was no doubt in her mind that he felt like he wasn’t ‘manly’ enough beside Tariq and she suspected he thought she loved Tariq more because of the way he was.  Well, she supposed in a way she did.  She certainly loved him in a different way.  Then again, they were different.  They would be if Koryn had been a soldier as Tariq was and even if he’d been just as skilled at fighting.

He still fulfilled her need to feel protected.  He still fulfilled her sexual needs.  And beyond that, he had a lot to offer in many other ways.

She didn’t think he’d want to hear that either, though, or that it would make him feel better.  “Unless something terrible happened on Centaurian, I don’t see that fighting skills would be crucial.  It’s certainly something one wants to have, and to feel confidence in, of course, but it should be a civilized place—even if it is a frontier colony.  Of course, you don’t need to concern yourself about your other skills, so there’s no point in focusing on polishing those.”

Koryn looked so much better when she’d finished that Emerald was glad she’d considered carefully before she spoke.

Although he relaxed considerably, his expression was wry.  “I can’t say that I’ve mastered food preparation either.  I’m damned if I can figure that out, though.  I always measure everything carefully and follow the instructions.”

Emerald smiled at him.  “I’m not terribly good, either.  I never had much opportunity to prepare anything but prepackaged meals.  I’ve always heard, though, that it’s technique as much as anything else.”  She frowned.  “I think we all need to practice that.  From what I heard, the colonists had all decided that a simpler way of life was far better in the long run.  It was part of the requirements of potential colonists—to be willing to live at a very basic level—growing most of their own food, making do with mechanical or manual tools, rather than electronics, and renewable energy sources.”

She discovered when she glanced around at the others than even the androids looked appalled.  It took an effort to keep from smiling.

Tariq frowned.  “What sort of economic system did they have?  Or do you know?”

Emerald considered it, struggling to remember what she’d learned when she’d been considering becoming a colonist.  It hadn’t just been a very long time ago, though.  It had been a lifetime for her and even though she’d regained bits and pieces of her memories, she had an uneasy feeling that she had ‘forgotten’ as much as she remembered.  “It’s primarily a barter system, I think.”

The men exchanged indecipherable looks.  “That might make things difficult in getting started,” Tariq said grimly.

Emerald looked at him in surprise.  “That’s not true—not necessarily anyway.  They’ll have to have a standing army—and a peace keeping force—and most of you have those skills.  And Koryn knows so much about science, I imagine his skills will be in demand, too—If nothing else, as a doctor.”

Koryn perked up considerably.  Tariq looked like a thundercloud.  “I have other skills beyond the military,” he growled.

Emerald flicked a dismayed look at him, realizing that the harder she tried to build up Koryn’s self-esteem, the angrier it made Tariq.  She forced a smile, giving him a heated gaze.  “I know you do,” she murmured.

Tariq’s expression went blank for a split second before color climbed into his cheeks.  He grinned, but it looked a bit more embarrassed than arrogant.

“The thing is,” she continued after a moment, “I don’t really know all of you that well and I don’t know what you can do or have done in the past.  I was just pointing out what I did know that would be useful.  Now that you’ve brought it up, though, I think it would be a good idea for all of us to work up sort of a resume of training and experience.  We’ll have to petition the council to become colonists and the more skills, the more desirable.

“I spent a lot of time with my great-grandmother when I was a child.  She taught me several different needle crafts that I think I could claim as a skill, at least, claim some familiarity with them.  I expect that would be in demand since no one’s really done much in the way of handwork in generations.  I’ve had military training, too—not like you guys, of course, but some and some battle experience.”

“You aren’t going to be a fucking soldier!” Tariq growled implacably.

Emerald gaped at him.  When she glanced at the others, however, she saw that all of the androids looked disapproving and Koryn looked as outraged as Tariq.  Her lips tightened with annoyance.

Koryn got up abruptly.  “I think we should run a scan and see if you’re breeding.  I’m going to faint if you aren’t when Tariq was so gods damned dedicated to the task,” he added, his voice laced with anger, “but we need to be sure.”

“I hadn’t planned to offer my services for the military—especially since I probably am pregnant!” Emerald said tightly.  “I was merely pointing out that I had that to offer as a colonist.”

She followed Koryn from the lounging area to the sickbay, however, more because she was irritated about their attitude than because she felt a need to know, immediately, whether she was or she wasn’t pregnant.

She discovered once she’d settled on the examination table and Koryn had scanned her, however, that he had far more on his mind than checking her or even concern about her taking a job as a soldier.  In point of fact, he didn’t seem to have but one thing on his mind.

Having scanned her, he set the scanner aside decisively.  “Yes.  You’re breeding,” he said briskly, and then climbed onto the examination table with her before she even realized his intent.

Not that she would’ve objected to his intentions, but she thought the examination table a precarious perch for two when Koryn was big enough to take up the entire bed himself.  His hunger was contagious, however.  Despite the fact that Tariq had satisfied her enough to prevent her from feeling needy anytime in the near future, Koryn himself, her anxiety to please him and make up for neglecting him, and the sense of desperation she felt in him were enough to thoroughly arouse her.

She wouldn’t have considered denying him anyway, or even demanding more foreplay, but fortunately she didn’t need it.  She was wet for him long before he tore at his clothing to dispense with the impediment.  It was a struggle to envelop his turgid flesh regardless.  She didn’t think there was a hair’s worth of difference in the size of the two men, unless Koryn was slightly larger, but it was thrilling enough to feel his slow possession that she was on the brink of coming by the time he managed to claim her fully.

It was as well she was.  He was too needy to have much control.  The moment she began to quake with her climax, he groaned like he was dying, shuddered, and began to pump frenziedly to spill his seed into her.  “I’m sorry, baby,” he gasped when he’d finally stopped shuddering.

Emerald stroked his back.  “Don’t be, baby,” she murmured.  “It was wonderful.”

He jerked his head up to study her face for a long moment and finally relaxed.  Scooting backwards carefully, he disengaged them and nuzzled her neck.  “I don’t know how I managed it,” he said wryly.  “I thought I was going to explode before I even got in.”

“Me, too,” Emerald said with a blissful sigh.

He chuckled.  “I thought I was going to fall off this fucking thing.  Remind me not to try it here again.”

Emerald smiled.  “I don’t know ….  Does this convert like the chair in Tariq’s quarters?  I was just thinking that might be fun—except with you pounding into me instead of that thing.”

She felt his cock rise against her thigh.  He hesitated.  “I think we need to get back before I end up having to fight Tariq.  Not that I’d mind on several levels, but I might not be in any shape to make love to you for a while afterwards,” he said with self-depreciating amusement.

“Well!  We can’t have that!”

Tariq gave both of them a hard look when they returned, but he forbore commenting on the length of time they’d been gone or the fact that both of them looked like they’d been doing exactly what they had.  “I’m going to assume the test was positive,” he growled.

Emerald grinned and rushed into his arms.  “Yes!  We’re going to have a baby!”

To her relief, the tension left him.  He was grinning at her shakily when she pulled away to look at his face.  “Seriously?”

She chuckled.  “Absolutely.”

“Damn I’m good!” he said jokingly.

Koryn glared at him.  “And you only had to fuck non-stop for three days to accomplish it!”

Seeing that they were bristling at one another again, Emerald searched for something to distract them.  “I wonder if it’ll be a girl or a boy?”

It distracted them.  “It’s bound to be male,” Tariq said a little indignantly.

“You never know,” Koryn retorted.

“I guess we’ll find out!” Tariq growled.

“I guess we will!” Koryn snapped.

Emerald glanced at the androids a little unhappily.

“I would not care,” Aeon said.  “It would be enough to know that I’d sired a child.  But I will never do so.”

Tariq turned to look at him uncomfortably and flicked a glance at the other androids.  “Fortunately, Koryn’s one of the best geneticists we have,” he said pointedly.

Koryn glared at him, but once he’d glanced at the other androids, he relented.  “It’s not impossible.  You were engineered not to have that capability, but I might be able to do something about that—I emphasize might!  I’ll just have to see if it’s doable.”

“It would be far more likely that we might find a woman who would have us if that was possible.  No woman will want us if we cannot give them a child,” Aeon said.

“Oh!  That’s not true!” Emerald objected.  “Even if Koryn can’t fix the problem—and I’d be willing to bet he can—you have a lot to offer, besides being very handsome!”

That pleased Aeon, but both Koryn and Tariq narrowed their eyes at her and then looked Aeon over with hostility.

“Let’s eat!” Emerald said abruptly.  “Whatever that is smells wonderful and I’m starving!”

* * * *

There were days when Emerald actually thought they were making a lot progress in learning to function together as a family unit and days when she despaired that they would ever find a comfortable alliance.  She made the mistake of deciding to join the men one day when they’d all gone into the hold to spar.  It not only inspired both Koryn and Tariq to dispense with friendly rivalry and try to kill each other, but the androids showed an inclination to be more violently aggressive, as well.

She’d fled as soon as she realized that her presence was all it took to inspire all of them to try to ‘show off’ their killing skills, but even the androids looked the worse for it for days and Tariq and Koryn were too banged up to feel much interest in sex for a couple of days.  The respite was nice.  It was exhausting trying to appease both men and she didn’t dare beg off when they were just looking for excuses to tear into one another.

In point of fact, she began to suspect they were going to fuck her to death trying to outdo each other.  After the second week of their journey, she finally told both of them that she was going to expire if she didn’t get a little rest and she damned well didn’t believe their needs were that damned frequent.  They were going to have to stop fucking her as if the pussy was going to dry up or vanish.

They’d been indignant, of course, but to do them justice, it at least brought their attention to the fact that she really was exhausted—either that or they were both exhausted and decided it was a good enough excuse to preserve their ‘manliness’ and give her a little breathing room.  She didn’t care as long as she could have a full night’s rest from time to time.

They were fortunate enough that they escaped without incident beyond the nightmare of the escape itself.  Although they kept a keen eye on their wake the first week, there was no sign of pursuit and Tariq decided it was safe enough to alter course for the star system that was their ultimate goal.

They reached the outer rim after four weeks and Emerald didn’t think she was alone in considering it a very good thing that it hadn’t taken longer.  The fresh foods hadn’t lasted much past half the trip and they’d switched to space rations, which were tolerable enough except when compared to the fresh foods they’d had before.  Beyond that, although the ship had seemed really spacious when they’d begun, by the fourth week the walls had begun to close in on everyone.

Emerald viewed their arrival at the Omega star system with a mixture of hope, relief, and fear, the first two of which waned after a few days while the other grew when they weren’t hailed and saw no sign of any other crafts.  It wasn’t until they’d settled into orbit around Centaurian that their attempts to make contact were successful.

All of them were gathered on the bridge waiting anxiously as Mikail, one of the androids, tried to illicit a response from the ground.  Emerald felt weak all over when a call was finally met with a crackle of static and they could hear a weak transmission from the planet.  “Identify yourselves!”

Emerald surged forward before Mikail could respond.  “Tell them we’re refugees seeking asylum.”

When Mikail glanced at Tariq for confirmation, Emerald looked at him questioningly.  He was frowning, clearly considering the advisability of it.  “It would be admitting we have a price on our head,” he said grimly.  “If others find their way here, they might consider it in their best interests to simply hand us over.”

Emerald hadn’t thought of that.  “But they won’t know about Centaurian.  You said ….”

“We are at war with the Dinjin.  There is no saying they won’t manage to get the information from them or some of the slaves they free.  I don’t think we can afford to take the chance.”

“They’re going to know you aren’t human,” Emerald said uncomfortably.  “If it was only one of you, they might just think you were really big—but all of you?”

“Tell them we’re lost,” Koryn suggested.  “Tell them we had to divert from a radiation storm and it damaged our systems.”

“We’ll have to fucking damage the systems!” Tariq growled.

“Maybe we should have considered this a little earlier?” Emerald said uneasily.  “I honestly hadn’t thought about it being a problem, though, until we didn’t get hailed before.  But they either didn’t have anything strong enough to pick up the signals, or, and this is the part that worries me, they think we might be a threat.”

“If they thought that, they would’ve already launched a ship to intercept!” Tariq pointed out.

“They have launched two,” Aeon offered helpfully.

“Shit!” Tariq snarled.

“Gods damn it!” Koryn seconded him.

“Tell them we’re lost and seeking asylum,” Tariq said abruptly.  “We’ll think of an excuse to cover it before we land—or damage the fucking ship to cover the lie if we have to.”  He glared at Koryn.  “Take Emerald back to the lounge and see what the two of you can come up with that won’t involve fucking up what might be our only backup plan.”

Chastened, Emerald retreated with Koryn.

“If he hadn’t been so gods damned preoccupied with fucking he might have considered it before!” Koryn said loudly.

“And you weren’t preoccupied with fucking?” Tariq bellowed after them.

“It isn’t my job …!”

Emerald caught Koryn’s arm and tugged until he followed her to the lounge.  “You’ve been saying for weeks that he wasn’t a lord anymore and he wasn’t in charge!” she reminded him irritably.  “It isn’t going to help if you two start arguing again.  The problem is all of ours!”

Koryn flushed, but he began pacing the lounge, his brow furrowed in thought.  Abruptly, he halted and turned to look at her.  “I’ve got it!  We’re from a different universe and we got sucked through a black hole and ended up here and we can’t go back!”

Emerald frowned.  “Is it possible to go through a black hole without getting crushed?”

Koryn stared at her.  “Some of them—theoretically.  If they’re small enough and the ship is well enough protected.  Do you think they’ll know that?”

Emerald considered it.  “If they don’t know the theory, they’ll just think it’s a lie.”  She thought about options.  “They’ll know I’m human.  I think we need to focus on a story that will cover that.”

“We picked you up on Earth and decided to take you to your people!”

Emerald sent him a look.  “Supposing they swallowed that, how are you going to explain a petition to become a colonist?”

He frowned at her.  “I was never any good at lying.”

She smiled at him.  “I know.  I love that about you.”

He crossed the lounge and dragged close for a kiss.  Unfortunately, Tariq arrived at the lounge about that time.  “Can you get your mind off of fucking long enough to focus?”

“What did they say?” Emerald asked breathlessly when she’d pulled away from Koryn.

“They’re going to let us land,” Tariq said tightly.  “But that’s only because they could see the ship is a yacht and not armed—nothing visible anyway.  I don’t think they bought the story about us being lost.  It’s gods damned hard to navigate a ship without a computer and nothing else would explain ‘lost’.”

“You should’ve just told them we were seeking asylum and that would’ve given us time to think of something before we landed!” Koryn said tightly.  “Now we’re stuck with the ‘lost’ story!”

Tariq glared at him.

“You were the one that suggested it!” Emerald said irritably.

“We have agreed that we will claim that we rebelled and took you three captive,” Aeon said, joining them.

“No!” Emerald said immediately.  “They might decide to imprison all of you for being rebels.  It’s too dangerous.  After all you’ve already done, we can’t ask you to do that!”

“And they might decide we’re the bad guys and throw us in prison!” Koryn added indignantly.  “I don’t think I want to end up in another prison.”

Tariq studied all of them and finally shook his head.  “I think we’re going to have to go with the truth and hope for the best.”

“I can’t help but notice you don’t look very hopeful,” Koryn said dryly.

Tariq shrugged.  “They’re bound to think, whatever we say, that we brought trouble.  We might have an advantage if they decide to imprison us until our pursuit catches up with us, though.  They won’t know half of our group is androids and, hopefully, the prison won’t be strong enough to hold them.  We’ll just have to play it as it unfolds.  I don’t see any option—now.”  He moved to Emerald and pulled her close.  “Truthfully, I don’t think we could’ve come up with anything that wouldn’t be questioned.  As Emerald pointed out, we’ll stand out as aliens among them and they’ll know by now that this is an alien craft.”

* * * *

Emerald was too anxious to appreciate her first view of the colony of Centaurian—not that there was much of a view from the back of a military transport.  There was no longer any doubt in her mind, unfortunately, that the Centaurians viewed them as a threat—the Anunnaki, anyway.  She’d grown accustomed to their size.  She rarely thought about it anymore except when something happened to draw her attention to it.

The guards that had met them at the foot of the gangplank as they disembarked brought it sharply to mind, however.  She wasn’t certain they’d even noticed her.  They’d taken one look at Tariq and Koryn and visibly recoiled, holding their weapons far more threateningly.  She didn’t think they’d felt any less threatened by the androids.  Although they were noticeably shorter than the Anunnaki, they were still nearly a head taller than any of the soldiers that had met them.

She remembered thinking the first time she’d seen them that they had to be a race of giants.  No doubt that was what was running through the minds of the soldiers and they weren’t happy about the possibility of having them as enemies.

They were taken to holding cells and told that they would be informed when the council was ready to review their ‘story’.   Neither Tariq nor Koryn had said anything up until they were escorted to separate cells, but both balked at that.  “She stays with us,” Tariq said implacably.

Emerald sent him a pleading look.  “It’s alright, Tariq.  I’ll be fine.”

“She’s breeding,” Koryn said tightly.  “If you harm her ….”

The soldier in charge glanced from one to the other and finally studied Emerald.  “She’s human.”

“I am,” Emerald said.  “I was a soldier of the federation.  We’re here because of me … because they wanted to protect me.”

The soldier looked at Tariq and Koryn skeptically.  “You can explain everything to council.  In the meantime, you’ll occupy separate cells.”  He unbent slightly, however.  “You won’t come to any harm.  I’ll see to it.”

She glanced at Tariq and Koryn again.  “I’ll be alright.”

She could tell they still wanted to argue, but Tariq, at least, seemed to realize that it was pointless and might create problems for them when cooperation might not.  He nodded stiffly at the soldier and watched them as she was escorted to a cell and locked it.  To her relief, Tariq and the others allowed themselves to be imprisoned without argument.

As soon as the majority of the soldiers had filed out, leaving a half a dozen within view to guard them, Tariq spoke to Koryn in their language—which she, unfortunately, didn’t understand any better than the guards.

“No talking!” one of the guards barked.  “We’ll move you if necessary.”

Quiet fell over the building except for the occasional sounds of the soldiers as they shifted or coughed or spoke between themselves.  Emerald turned finally to survey her cell and moved to the hard cot along one wall.  After examining it, she decided it was clean enough and sat down to wait.

Hours passed.  Despite her anxiety, Emerald dozed off.  She was roused a little later as food was brought around.  It was pretty horrible stuff, but she nibbled at it and lay down again.  The next time she woke, the artificial lights were off and sunlight was filtering into her cell through the small window in the door.  Groggy, she wondered if it was the light that had awoken her for a moment before she realized that the sounds she heard were the rhythmic tramp of feet.

Realizing their escort had returned, she rubbed her eyes, smoothed her hair the best she could with her fingers and got up.  A face appeared at the window of her cell.  She recognized him as the solder who’d been in charge the night before.  “The council has convened.  We’re here to escort you and your party.”

Emerald nodded and stood waiting while the door was unlocked.  She saw when she entered the corridor that the others had also been removed from their cells.  They’d been placed in restraints and she felt her heart sink.  Trying to tell herself as she was fitted with a pair of cuffs that they were merely being cautious, she fell in between Tariq and Koryn as they were escorted out and loaded onto the same transport, or one just like it.

She caught a glimpse of a crowd of gawkers as she climbed into the transport.  Most of them were gaping at the Anunnaki, although she heard a woman’s voice speculate on her presence among them.

There was another crowd waiting when they were allowed out of the transport, larger than the first.  Despite everything, Emerald couldn’t help but feel her spirits rise to see so many of her own people, all appearing strong and healthy and prosperous.  The building they were escorted into was a boon to her spirits, as well.  It was a large, well constructed building that had clearly stood for some time.  She managed to catch a glimpse of the city as they reached the portico and pleasure filled her at the sight of it.  It could’ve been most any small city on the Earth that she’d known.  Her chest tightened with a sense of homecoming she hadn’t expected.

The hearing room inside was hardly vast, but it was a large room that also proclaimed Centaurian as a colony that had been well established.

They were escorted to the front, just beneath the dais where the council members sat.

She lifted her head to study them when she’d been seated, trying to decide from their expressions just how much trouble they were in.

The high councilor, a mature woman of indeterminate age, spoke first.  “Which of you wishes to speak for your group?”

Tariq stood immediately.

Her brows rose almost to her hairline.  “Where are you from?”

“Niribu.”

The woman stared at him hard for several moments, almost as if she was trying to place the name.  “This isn’t one of the Earth colonies,” she said finally.  “Not but what it’s clear you aren’t one of us.”

“We are called the Anunnaki.”

“And you are?”

“Lord Tariq.”

Surprise flickered in her eyes again.  She leaned closer to one of the other councilors who spoke to her.  “Since you aren’t from one of our colonies and we’ve never heard of Niribu, I’m assuming that you’ve traveled a great distance?”

Tariq nodded.  “We have, Lady.  We hope to become colonists of Centaurian.”

The councilor frowned.  “I think we need to have a few questions answered before we get to that.”

“I will be happy to answer whatever I’m able to.”

“Who is the woman and why is she with you?” one of the other councilors asked abruptly.  “She isn’t Anunnaki.”

“No.  We took her from Earth.”

“And she led you here?” another councilor demanded, clearly angry.

“She did not.  She didn’t know of this place.  We found the information within the computer of one of those who attacked Earth.”

That caused a general commotion and not just among the councilors.  The high councilor banged her gavel until the room quieted.  “What attack?”

Tariq frowned.  “It was long before we arrived.  We hadn’t determined when it happened when we left Earth and returned to Niribu.  All we know is that Earth was attacked and there were few survivors.”

“But the woman was one?” the high councilor asked sharply, an odd hitch in her voice.  “Stand up and approach!”

Unnerved at the abrupt order, Emerald stood up, glanced at Tariq uneasily and then strode purposefully toward the dais.

The high councilor looked down at her, slowly rising from her seat.  She’d turned so pale Emerald wondered for several moments if she was ill.  “What’s your name?”

“Emerald.”

The woman swallowed convulsively several times.  “Emerald?” she asked faintly.

“I was Corporal Emerald Johnson of the 11th Earth reserves battalion.”

The woman’s chin wobbled.  “Mother?”

Emerald stared at the woman blankly for several moments, feeling as if the floor had fallen out from under her.  She’d thought she was imagining things when she’d noticed the woman seemed familiar.  “Cara?”

“Oh my god!” she exclaimed.  “It is you!”

She pushed her chair out abruptly and raced toward the end of the council table.  Emerald met her there, flinging her arms around her daughter and hugging her tightly.  Both of them were sobbing so loudly that it wasn’t until they managed to compose themselves a little that they thought about the room filled with people.

Cara mopped her face with her hand and glanced around and then addressed the rest of the council.  “It’s my mother!  She was one of those who stayed behind to fight the invaders!”

Glancing distractedly at the others, she met Emerald’s gaze again.  “Who are they?”

Emerald reddened.  “Tariq and Koryn are my men.  They rescued me and brought me here.  The others are … their friends who helped us.”

Cara shook her head and turned to the council members again.  “I’ll speak with her in my office.”

“What about them?” Emerald asked when Cara took her hand and tried to lead her away.

Cara looked at the men.  “They’ll wait here until you’ve explained everything to me.”  She hesitated.  “Remove their restraints.”

Emerald threw Tariq and Koryn a reassuring glance as Cara led her from the hearing room through a door at the back the councilors used to access the room.  As they made their way down the corridor outside, she studied Cara, as appalled to see her daughter was older than her as her daughter no doubt was.

It was unsettling, dismaying to think of all the years they’d missed even while it thrilled her to see her daughter when she’d never thought to see her again.

It was disturbing on another level, as well, she realized when Cara had dragged her into her office and caught her shoulders to study her face.  “You look just like you did when I last saw you,” she said after a moment, wariness in her eyes now.  “Tell me how that’s possible.”

Emerald swallowed with an effort, but there was no point in trying to lie.  “I died there, Cara.  They resurrected me.”

A look of horror crossed Cara’s features and then anger and disappointment.  “You aren’t my mother!”

Emerald felt tears clog her throat.  “I am your mother.”

“You’re a clone of my mother!” she said angrily.

“I know how everyone feels about cloning, Cara, but I am your mother.  I’m not just a copy.  I remember everything.  I remember the way you looked the day I sent you away to protect you.  I remember before that when you and I talked about coming here so long ago to become colonists.  Please … don’t look at me like that when I’ve waited so long to see you again.  I would never have had the chance if it wasn’t for them.  The aliens overran us.  They killed everyone they could find.”

Doubt flickered in her eyes.  “How could you remember … any of those things?”

Emerald shook her head.  “Don’t you see?  I couldn’t if I wasn’t your mother.  They could’ve simply cloned me and I would have been just a copy, but I’m not.  I’m Emerald. They resurrected me.  I remember the day you were born.  I remember your first tooth—your first crush.  I remember the terrible argument we had when I told you I’d gotten a ticket for you.  You begged me to stay.  You threatened to run away.”  She swallowed with an effort.  “And I locked you in your room so you couldn’t.”

“I was so angry with you!” Cara said.  “And angry with myself that I’d warned you.”

Emerald opened her arms hopefully.  “I didn’t want to send you away, baby, but I wanted you to have a chance at a life and you didn’t have one there.”

Cara hesitated and embraced her again, weeping.  “I want you to be my mother.  I know you aren’t, but I want it to be so.”

Emerald stroked her hair, trying to sooth her as she had when she’d been little.  “I feel like me.  I couldn’t remember much at first and I was so afraid, but then the memories began to come back and … I felt them all.  I didn’t just remember them as if they’d happened to someone else.”  She leaned away after a moment to study her daughter’s face, saddened that they’d missed so many years.  “Did you meet a nice young man?  I never dreamed you’d become a high councilor!  I had such hopes in sending you here, but I didn’t know you’d do so well!”

Cara chuckled abruptly.  “Neither of us were terribly young by then.  I kept waiting and hoping you’d come.  Finally, I accepted that you wouldn’t and I started my family without you.  I’ve got three children—and three grandchildren.”  She shook her head.  “You know what?  I’ve just realized that I’ve got nothing to complain about!  I’m glad they resurrected you and gave me the chance to see you again.  I don’t care how it was done.  I feel like I have my mother back and that’s all that matters.”

Emerald was so relieved she cried all over again.  Finally, they both dried their eyes and settled to talk.  Cara had barely been in her teens when she’d sent her away, though, and she was leery of how much her daughter might have changed over the years, so she was careful in explaining what had happened.  Unfortunately, there was no way to avoid explaining why she’d been resurrected.  She glossed over the slavery issue, however, and told her that a more powerful Anunnaki lord had decided to claim her and that Tariq and Koryn had decided to flee with her rather than lose her.  It was close enough to the truth, she decided.  No one needed to know that the Anunnaki thought that it was their right to enslave the human race and it wasn’t likely to win friends for any of them if it was known.

She just hoped she would have the chance to tell the others her slightly revised version of the truth.

To her relief, she did.  When her mother decided she’d heard enough to make a decision, she escorted her back to the hearing room and cleared it of spectators so that she and the other council members could discuss their situation and come to a decision.  She was allowed to leave with the Anunnaki and they were taken to a hotel near the council building to rest and wait to hear their fate.

Koryn, she discovered, true to form was more preoccupied with the ‘science’ of the development than anything else.  “Even considering that time is unpredictable from one place to another in space, it doesn’t seem to me that your daughter would still be alive after all this time.  Of course, we never did figure out how long it had been since the invasion, but even so ….  What is the typical lifespan of humans now?”

Emerald shook her head at him.  “It’s been a while—I don’t know what it is now.  The average life expectancy when I was alive before, though, was around two hundred.”

Both Tariq and Koryn looked startled.  “That long?” Tariq echoed.  “Humans didn’t live nearly that long the last time we studied them.”

“I guess that would explain it then,” Koryn said thoughtfully.  “They don’t extend by resurrection I don’t suppose?”

“I don’t think so.  Everyone was opposed to human cloning in my time, although they did clone species of animals that were endangered, and Cara wasn’t especially pleased when she realized I had been.”

“Why the hell not?” Tariq growled.  “She seemed happy to see you—hysterically happy.”

“It’s just the way we look at it,” Emerald said tiredly.  “I think she’s still having a hard time accepting that I’m really me.”

Chapter Nineteen

It had been a long, tiring day for all of them and Emerald was looking forward to a long, hot shower and bed when she finished cleaning the kitchen.  Hearing voices outside the window, she looked out, surprised to discover Tariq and Koryn were on their way back in.  Either they’d made short work of their own chores or it had taken her longer to clean up than she’d thought.

Drying her hands, she went to the table to collect Anna from her chair.  She’d just lifted the baby to her hip when the two came in.  Tariq’s eyes lit instantly when they settled on the baby and he crossed the room to take her.  “She’s too heavy for you to carry around now,” he said chidingly, grinning at the baby as she smiled at him and began jabbering, as if she was trying to tell him something.

Emerald smiled at both of them indulgently.  “You just use that as an excuse because you like holding her.”

His eyes gleamed with amusement.  “I need an excuse?”  He returned his attention to the baby, disentangling her little fist from his hair.  “That’s daddy’s bad girl.  Aren’t you, Anna?”

She grinned at him, wrinkling her nose.

Emerald chuckled.  “Quit telling her that!  She thinks it’s a compliment!”

Koryn had joined them.  He slipped around behind Emerald and pulled her back against his length, running his hands down over her belly and cupping the growing mound.  The baby obligingly kicked and then began to do jumping jacks.  It was almost as if she knew it was her daddy and she was so excited she wanted to leap into his arms.  “Don’t get her stirred up!  I’m tired.”

He bent down to kiss the top of her head.  “It’s nice outside.  Come sit with me on the porch and I’ll rock the baby to sleep.”

“Which baby?” Emerald asked with amusement.

“Both of my babies,” he murmured against her ear.

She was tempted.  She might have declined except that Tariq apparently liked the idea.  He’d headed toward the porch with Anna.

Taking her silence as an assent, Koryn tucked her under one arm and guided her through the house and out onto the front porch.  Tariq was already occupying one of the huge rockers, Anna perched on his lap and watching the movement of his finger as he pointed out the stars in the sky that were distant galaxies and named them off in his own language.

“That’s why we can’t understand a word she says,” Emerald said, vaguely disapproving.  “She’s trying to speak your language and mine at the same time.”

Tariq sent her an indulgent look.  “She’s smart.  She’ll learn both.”

Koryn planted himself in the other rocker and pulled her down on his lap, carefully arranging her so that her back was to Tariq.  It was one of those ‘subtle’ moves they still made to exclude each other whenever the opportunity arose.  Not that she was complaining!  They almost never got into really heated arguments anymore and they hadn’t come to blows since Anna was born.  She sent him a chiding look and turned around.

Irritation flickered across his face, but he relaxed when she settled her head on his shoulder, curling an arm around her and splaying his hand on the mound of her belly.  “It didn’t take you guys long to do your chores,” Emerald murmured lazily as Koryn set the rocker into motion.

“Aeon had already done everything.  We just stayed to talk a bit.”

Amusement flickered through her.  “To avoid kitchen duty, I don’t doubt.”

Tariq didn’t even have the grace to pretend that wasn’t the case.  He grinned, but he focused it on Anna.

“It was your night,” Koryn reminded her.

Aeon came around the corner of the house about that time, still dripping from a fresh bath—which she didn’t doubt he’d performed under the hose in the yard.  She didn’t know if it was purely out of courtesy to make sure he didn’t track anything nasty into the house or because he wasn’t comfortable with their living arrangements.  She thought it was a little of both.  It was hard to ignore the fact that he avoided the house—and her—as much as possible.

Maybe it was just her imagination, though?

If he really did want to avoid her why had he moved in to start with?  Loyalty to Tariq?

Possibly, she decided.  Unlike the others, who’d found a woman and settled down within the first year after they’d arrived, Aeon hadn’t seemed to have any luck with the opposite sex—which baffled her.  To her mind, he was far more handsome than Mikail or Daris or even Nicholas.  He was quieter than they were, though, seemed shy around her so maybe that was it?

He hesitated when he saw them on the porch and then continued as if he hadn’t, moving around the porch and finally settling on the steps with his back against one of the posts.

“You still planning to go into the city tomorrow, Aeon?” Tariq asked lazily.

Aeon glanced at him.  “Yes.”

“I don’t suppose I could prevail upon you to take Em and the baby?  She wanted to do some trading for a few things.  I have to go to Middlebrook tomorrow to inspect the fortifications they’ve been working on to discourage the natives from pilfering.”

Aeon glanced at her, his gaze settling on her face for a long moment and then sliding down to her belly and Koryn’s hand resting there.

“I’d take her,” Koryn volunteered, “but I have a dozen appointments tomorrow.”

Emerald saw the reluctance in Aeon’s face.  It stung, but she dismissed it.  “Stop it!  I can manage just fine by myself.  Don’t bother Aeon.  He’s got enough to do.”

He looked away.  “I would be honored to escort your lady,” he said after a long moment, his voice tight with reluctance.

Emerald’s hurt deepened.  She couldn’t for the life of her figure out what she’d done that made Aeon so reluctant to be around her.  She was always friendly, always had been.  It wasn’t just gratitude that he was the one who’d rescued her from Mylor—and been beaten and thrown in a cell in the hold of Lady Selena’s ship for his pains by Lady Selena’s men!  That was part of it, but most of it, she thought, was because she saw that he was miserably lonely and she wanted to banish that look from his eyes.

Except he wouldn’t let her.  She always had the feeling that he was holding her at arm’s length—she supposed because she was Tariq’s lady, but she didn’t see why that prevented them from being friends!

Actually, he confused her.  He’d never once returned from the city without bringing her something—usually another flower for her flower garden.  He’d been bringing her flowers since they’d received their land lot—even before they’d built the wood frame house.  In fact, he’d helped Tariq and Koryn build the house and when she’d mentioned that she’d always loved flowers and wanted to make a flower garden so that she could be surrounded by flowers, he had noticed—not Tariq or Koryn—Aeon.  And although he’d only moved in a few months earlier to help them around the farm, he’d visited them often before that and brought her flowers.

It was just odd that he went out of his way to find beautiful, exotic flowers for her and trade for them and yet he was so … distant.  It was almost as if he was afraid to get too close.

Of course, she supposed that was because of Tariq—maybe Koryn, too, but mostly Tariq, she thought because he still thought of Tariq as his lord.

She released a pent up breath.  “It’s alright, Aeon.  You don’t have to take me just because Tariq asked.”

“He wants to take you,” Tariq murmured.  “Don’t you, Aeon?”

Aeon turned to look at Tariq hard.  “Yes,” he said after a moment.

“He just doesn’t trust himself around you,” Koryn added.

Aeon surged to his feet abruptly and sent Koryn a hard look.

Emerald was startled by the comment herself, but Aeon’s abrupt move distracted her even as she glanced at Koryn and she turned to look at him instead.  Dismay flickered through her.  She hadn’t seen such a look of rage on Aeon’s face since he’d confronted Mylor about hurting her.

“Koryn!  Don’t tease him!  It’s alright, Aeon.  He didn’t mean anything by it.”

“No.  I just wanted to see if Tariq was right ….  And I see he was.”

“I have not touched your woman,” Aeon growled.  “I have not looked at her in any way that was disrespectful.”

“Don’t get too bent out of shape about it,” Tariq drawled easily.  “A man has needs.  It isn’t as if we don’t know that.”

Even with the shadows of darkness, Emerald could see Aeon flush.  She felt her own face heat.

“I manage my … needs,” Aeon said through gritted teeth.

“Not very fucking well when you can’t be around Em without staring a hole through her,” Tariq said dryly.

Emerald sat up abruptly.  “Tariq!  What in the world has gotten in to you?”  She glanced reproachfully at Koryn.  “Both of you!”

“Well, there’s no subtle way to handle this,” Tariq said somewhat irritably, getting to his feet.  “You’re part of the family if you want to be, Aeon, and if Em wants you to be.”  He paused beside the chair where Emerald sat.  “If you can find it in your heart, Em, I’m not going to object.”

Emerald gaped at his back as he went into the house to put his sleeping daughter to bed.

Koryn got up and set her own her feet.  “I’d say three was a crowd—well, it is a fucking crowd, but so is two and Tariq’s right.  The poor bastard is miserable and only you can do something about it.  It looks like he’s here to stay anyway.  If he’s going to be sharing all the work and helping us take care of you, he deserves a little more than a roof over his head and food to fill his belly.”

He glanced at Aeon.  “Anyway, we’re never going to find out if my efforts worked any other way.  He sure as hell isn’t going to get any other woman pregnant when he won’t touch one.”

Emerald turned to look at Aeon uncomfortably when Koryn had stalked inside.  “I don’t know what to say,” she murmured after a moment.

Aeon stared at her for a long moment, seemed to debate with himself and stepped onto the porch.  Emerald held her ground with an effort as he moved closer, halting only when he was hovering over her.  He studied her for a long moment and finally lifted his hand to caress her cheek.  “Say that you want me … or that you do not.  They have said that I can have what I have wanted since the first time I saw you.  I know I should not leap at what they have offered, but I find I cannot resist.  The gods know that I have tried not to love you.  I tried to tell myself that I could not love you, that I had not been designed for such things, and yet I know that I do.  Do you feel that you could love me … even a little, lady?”

Emerald felt the breath leave her.  Remorse filled her at that last, chasing the shock and filling her with warmth.  “Oh Aeon!” she whispered, regretful that she’d so taken his friendship for granted that she hadn’t considered that she might have wounded him many times in her thoughtlessness.  “I already love you … and more a little!”

He released a pent up breath and slipped his hand to the base of her skull, shifting closer until his body brushed hers.  She lifted onto her toes to meet him when he bent his head toward hers and matched his lips to hers.

His kiss shook her to her core.  Right up until she felt his lips on hers, until she breathed his breath and took his scent inside of her, she’d thought she merely cherished him as a dear friend and the hero who’d saved her from the villainous Mylor.  His touch dispelled any notion she’d held that she felt nothing but friendship, however, admired him only because of that one moment of heroism or even for the fact that he was pleasing to her eyes.

They were both shaking with need by the time he lifted his lips from hers.  Without a word, he scooped her into his arms.  Instead of taking her inside and to the room that was his, however, he carried her down the steps and into the garden he’d made for her—with love, she realized at last—settling her on the soft grasses at the center and following her down.

Regret and discomfort filled her when he’d undressed her and exposed her body, misshapen with advanced pregnancy.  She wondered how he could possibly find her the least bit attractive, but he bent his head to kiss the mound as if it was his child housed there and not Koryn’s, and his expression when he lifted his head and looked at her was filled with heated desire.  “I want to watch my child grow here as I have watched Lord Tariq’s and Koryn’s,” he murmured as he dipped down again and kissed his way upward to her breasts.

Emerald was torn between delight at his touch and anxiety right up until he began to suckle her breasts hungrily.  She forgot everything then.  Even her perceptions narrowed to that one point where his mouth pulled at the sensitive nub that tipped her breast, sending electric charges through her that took her breath away.

He rolled onto his back after a few moments, carrying her so that she was splayed on top of his chest and belly and urged her to sit up and take him inside of her.  She needed no urging.  She was nearing a sense of desperation to feel him inside her and she sat up at once, settling on her knees as she grasped his turgid flesh and stroked it for a moment before she lifted away and aligned his body with hers.

Her eyes drifted closed of their own accord as she felt the pressure build against the mouth of her sex and then her flesh yield reluctantly to his possession, but she watched his face from beneath her lashes in the moonlight, saw it grow more taut as she slowly engulfed his flesh.  It sent a surge of anticipation through her.

He sat up abruptly, coiling his arms around her tightly and pressing her down until he was so deeply inside of her she could scarcely catch her breath.  He sought her lips again, spearing his fingers in her hair and guiding her mouth to his, holding her while he sucked hungrily at her lips and then her tongue when he’d coaxed it into his mouth.  He broke the kiss almost as abruptly as he’d begun it, pressing his forehead to hers.  “It feels … like heaven inside of you, Em.”

Emerald’s heart leapt, hammering with a fresh burst of excitement.  She nuzzled his face.  “It feels like heaven to have you inside of me, Aeon.”

He expelled a ragged breath and began to move, lifting her and pressing her down again faster and faster until he attained the rhythm he needed.  Emerald was past awareness of anything but the feel of his flesh gliding back forth along her channel and the climb of her body toward ecstasy.  She sucked in a sharp breath when the first wave hit her, jolting her so hard she tensed all over.  Aeon shuddered, uttered a hoarse grunt and began driving into her faster.  She felt his cock buck inside of her and then the scalding heat of his seed bathing her channel.  It sent her soaring to a higher level, seemed to intensify the convulsions of her climax until she was gasping and moaning incessantly.

For several moments afterwards, they simply leaned together, shivering in the aftermath.  Aeon leaned back after a moment, carrying her down with him.  She was too weak for several moments to move, but the baby had other ideas.  It began to kick at the restriction.

Aeon uttered a husky chuckle and rolled to his side.  “She objects to the blunt rod poking her,” he murmured.

Surprise flickered through Emerald, but she smiled against his chest.  “Apparently.”

“Does she always do that?” he asked after a few moments.

“She doesn’t like being crowded,” Emerald murmured sleepily and then yawned.

“I have worn my baby out?”

“Your baby was already worn out,” Emerald muttered ruefully.  “A fantastic climax was all I needed to put me in a coma.”

Aeon’s arms tightened around her.  “You are my baby.  I did not think that I would ever touch you as I wanted to.”

Emerald nuzzled his chest and kissed a spot above his breast bone.  “If you’d said something sooner you wouldn’t have had to wait.”

He shifted away from her to study her face.  “Truly?”

Emerald roused enough to touch his face.  “Truly.”

“Now and forever,” he murmured.

Emerald smiled ruefully.  “Just the four of us—and the babies, of course—one very large, and hopefully very happy, family.”

“I am happy.”

“It doesn’t take much to make you happy,” she said teasingly.

“Only you.”

* * * *

Emerald hadn’t realized just how big her happy family was until they all gathered at the farm to celebrate the day of settlement and her daughter Cara, and Cara’s daughters and their men and their daughters arrived.

Cara looked at her askance when Aeon finally got up, settled her in the chair they’d both been occupying, and strode away to ‘help’ the other men gathered around the spit where they were roasting a pig.  Emmy, her namesake and Cara’s eldest daughter, sent her a look of amusement.  “I know it’s none of my business … but when did he become part of the family?”

Emerald caressed her belly.  “Years ago—unofficially.  Officially about nine months ago—just before I had Koryn’s daughter, Sybil.”

Emmy chuckled, shaking her head.   “I thought that sappy look he had on his face the last time I was here was telling.  I would’ve spaced the ‘happiness’ out a little more, though.”

Emerald shrugged.  “I wanted to wait until Sybil was at least a year old to breed again, but Aeon wanted to ‘practice’.  I have to say Koryn’s fertility treatments are … effective,” she added ruefully.

“I think half the colony would agree with you,” Cara said.  “The other half is just grateful he came up with something non-chemical to use as birth control that didn’t involve abstinence. Speaking of which ….”

Emerald reddened.  “Like I said,” she said pointedly.  “None of us had anticipated such a quick turnaround.   I informed all of them that there wouldn’t be any more babies in this house … not for a while anyway!”

“I take it that Koryn and Tariq were a little outdone when they discovered Aeon had planted a boy?” Emmy asked, chuckling.

Emerald grinned.  “They tried to pretend they weren’t—not that they don’t dote on their girls—but you know men!”

“Not as well as you do, clearly,” Emmy retorted.  “I don’t know how you handle having three Anunnaki!  Both of my men annoy the shit out of me most of the time and make me wonder why I agreed to two!  Mom always said you were a hell of a woman.  I just thought she was exaggerating.”

Emerald smiled and reached over to squeeze Cara’s hand.  “It’s a hell of a job, but someone has to do it!” she retorted, laughing.  She saw when she glanced their way that her laughter had drawn her men’s attention.   She sent them all a smoldering look and blew them a kiss. “Anyway, I love them and they love to love me … and they’re very, very good at absolutely everything they do.  They’re Anunnaki after all—and naturally perfect in every way.”

“Mom!” Cara said, exasperated.

Emerald laughed.  “I was wondering when you’d express your disapproval.”

“I don’t disapprove … exactly,” Cara said.  “You’re a lot wilder than I was, though!”

“I doubt that!  You were thirteen going on thirty and a regular little hellion before I sent you here.”

Cara shrugged but reddened.  “I knew I shouldn’t have told you all of that!  Alright, so the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.”

“They rarely do.”

The End.

Odin Stone

 

By

 

Marie Morin

 

(C) Copyright by Marie Morin, October 2005

Published by New Concepts Publishing

ISBN 1-58608-626-x

New Concepts Publishing

Lake Park, GA 31636

www.newconceptspublishing.com

 

 

This is a work of fiction. All characters, events, and places are of the author’s imagination and not to be confused with fact. Any resemblance to living persons or events is merely coincidence.

 

The Odin Stone lies just outside the circle of stones known as the henges that dot the island of England, built so long ago that no one really knows what the original purpose of these monolithic stones were. Of these mystical places, Stonehenge is the most well known.

 

Legend has it that an oath made on the Odin Stone can never be broken.

 

Chapter One

 

The car began its usual dance of death as Anna pulled to a stop beside the guard shack of the gated community. Coughing, spluttering and belching noxious gas from the tail pipe, it idled like an animal in its death throes, the engine shuddering so violently it bounced the entire car up and down hard enough to rattle her teeth together. Slipping the car into park, Anna put a foot on the gas pedal and eased down on it until the engine idled a little more smoothly and ceased threatening to die altogether. As it stopped sputtering and coughing, her fear of being stranded at the gate and having to be pushed out of the way subsided and the cold sweat that had popped from her pours dried in the scorching heat of the late summer’s day in the deep south.

The guard looked Anna over suspiciously after he’d examined her business card.

“Wait here. I’ll need to call Ms. Bridgewater and verify your appointment with her.”

Anna nodded, tamping her irritation. He was new and she hadn’t been to see Liz in a couple of weeks. She checked her gas gauge while she waited. Alarmed when she saw the needle dropping before her eyes, she eased off on the gas pedal, trying to calculate just how much gas she’d put in the car and how many miles she’d driven since. The gas gauge wasn’t very accurate, which was why she always kept a gas can in the trunk with a gallon of gas in it, but if the tank went dry, she wasn’t certain a gallon would get her to a gas station.

The wealthy families that lived in the gated community she was trying to get in to didn’t want anything so low class as a gas station within miles of their mansions for fear they might catch a view of it if they happened to glance out of one of their windows.

“She was expecting you at three o'clock sharp,” the guard said disapprovingly when he passed her card back to her.

“I had car trouble,” Anna retorted sharply, losing her cool when the comment suggested she might have to turn around and drive back to the city without even seeing the woman. “If she’s too busy to see me, she’ll have to make another appointment, but it’ll be at least a month before I can get back out this way.” Or maybe never, she mentally amended because if she didn’t get paid it was going to be tough coming up with gas money for another trip.

The guard looked a little taken aback by her reaction. “She said to come on back to the house.”

“Good.” Snatching her ragged business card from his fingers, Anna stuffed it into her jeans pocket and put the car in gear. She’d been too agitated to realize she still had her foot on the gas, though. The car bucked like a bronco, giving her instant whiplash as it jolted forward with a screech of bald tires and nearly died again when she slammed her foot down on the brake.

Thoroughly rattled by now, Anna shoved the car into neutral, gunned it a couple of times, and then put her foot on the brake before she put the car in gear again and chugged away from the guard shack. “Die on me you piece of shit and I’ll set fire to you right here and walk back,” she muttered under her breath as she fought the car around the first turn and gunned the engine again.

Between the horrendous heat and humidity, and frazzled nerves, she was wringing wet by the time she pulled up to the speaker outside the gates of the Bridgewater mansion and pushed the button. “Anna Lindstrom,” she answered when a female voice with a Hispanic accent responded to her buzz.

The only acknowledgement was a mechanical whirr as the electronic gates began to open slowly inward like a theater curtain going up. Impatient with the delay, Anna studied the gates until they’d opened wide enough to admit the vehicle she laughingly referred to as a car and shot forward, almost taking out a bed of snapdragons beside the curving driveway. The gate that protected the service entrance was already open, she saw with relief when she finally reached the mansion itself and drove past the main entrance. Driving through the wide arch, she parked the car beneath the only shade she could find and dragged in a breath of super heated air, trying to calm her nerves a little before she got out. Grabbing up the bottle of tepid water she’d brought with her, she took a long drag at it and leaned out the open window to pour a small puddle in her palm to cool her heated face a little. It didn’t help much, but the upside was it didn’t take long to dry either and she didn’t feel quite as sticky. Twisting the cap back on the bottle, she set it down on the seat and crawled across to get out of the passenger side.

The driver’s door hadn’t opened in several months. The handle on the passenger door was threatening to give up, too. Pretty soon she was going to have to climb through the window to get into or out of the damned car.

She counted her blessings. She was short and small boned, and thanks to her diet, or lack thereof, looked like someone from a third world country. If it came down to having to climb out a window, it wasn’t going to be that difficult even though the car was a miniature compact that looked like a kiddy car--or more accurately since it looked like it would fall apart in a strong breeze, a clown car from a circus act.

Nan, her favorite foster mother, had always been fond of saying one could find a silver lining to anything if one looked hard enough. Growing up, all being undersized had meant was that any time she took it into her head to try to defend herself, she usually ended up getting the shit kicked out of her.

She was pleased that she’d finally found a silver lining.

She didn’t doubt that she was on camera, but she scarcely gave it a thought as she raked her fingers through her hair and straightened her clothes.

It was amazing the things one could get used to with repetition. Abject poverty had a way of freeing a person from embarrassment over the ‘little’ things.

When she was satisfied that she was as presentable as she was going to get, she headed for the kitchen door and pressed the buzzer. A maid appeared after about five or ten minutes, just long enough to emphasize the fact that she was not important, and for the sun to begin scorching her back and buttocks through her clothes.

She shivered as she stepped into the climate controlled interior of the house. After the heat of the afternoon and being cooped up in her hot car for the long drive out, entering the house was like stepping into a freezer. Her skin all over her body puckered and tightened, forming goose bumps on top of goose bumps.

By the time she was shown into the great room, she was clenching her teeth to keep them from chattering together.

A blond woman of indeterminate age wearing a brightly colored lounging jumpsuit awaited her. Curled on an ornate, overstuffed chaise that sat before the long row of French doors that opened onto a wide back patio, her fingers were tapping impatiently on the arm of the chair. “You’re late,” Ms. Bridgewater said chidingly by way of greeting.

“Sorry. I had a little car trouble.”

The woman’s thin, exquisitely maintained brows rose a notch as if in surprise.

She shouldn’t have been. Every time Anna came she was late and it was always because she’d had car trouble.

“Maria, get Ms. Lindstrom something cold to drink. She looks like she’s about to have heat stroke. What would you like?”

“Water, thank you.”

Waving the maid off, Liz Bridgewater sat up in her chaise, drawing her legs up and indicating with a gesture that Anna should take a seat on the couch that sat at an angle to her chaise.

Anna looked at the couch a little doubtfully. Her clothes were still damp and the couch was white. “I’ll just stretch my legs a minute if you don’t mind,” she said after a moment. “I’ve been driving for hours.”

Liz’s eyes narrowed speculatively. “So--you had another appointment?”

Anna glanced at the woman sharply. She might have known the woman would interpret that to mean that she’d been kept waiting for another client. Irritated, Anna decided to ditch the polite lie. “No. But the heat index is about a hundred and ten outside. My air conditioner is on the fritz, and I’m sweaty. I thought you might not like it if I got anything on your couch.”

To her surprise, Liz chuckled. “Sit down. I’m not worried about it. Maria never has enough to do around here. She can clean it if you get anything on it.”

Blushing, Anna sat. The rich were always so incredibly rude. More accurately, she supposed it was that they never seemed to realize they were being totally insensitive.

She pushed the thought aside. Today she was going to get paid and that meant she wasn’t going to have to sleep in the car tonight. That was all that really mattered.

Maria returned with the glass of water and carefully placed a coaster on the coffee table before she set the glass down. Anna’s throat instantly closed as her gaze zeroed in on the tall glass. Reaching for it as soon as the maid moved away, she took a couple of quick gulps. It was icy and brain freeze instantly set in. She set the glass down, resisting the urge to drain it and idly rubbing the pain between her eyes.

“You had some new pieces you wanted me to look at?”

“Just one.”

Anna’s heart dropped to her toes. One. She’d driven all the way out here and she might not even get enough money to pay her damned rent up to date.

With an effort, she pushed the thought from her mind as Liz picked up the case that lay on the table next to her chair and held it out. Jumping up from the couch, Anna moved close enough to take the case the woman held out, then returned to her seat and settled the box on the coffee table in front of her before she sat again. For several moments, she simply stared at the case, feeling tension coil tightly inside of her.

Whatever was in the box must be powerful, she decided. She rarely got this kind of vibe only from being close.

Was it whatever lay in the box? Or was it just that she was still jumpy from the ordeal of getting to Ms. Bridgewater’s and worried now about how she was going to make rent?

She hardly ever felt uneasy about a reading any more, unless the piece had a particularly nasty history.

Scrubbing her clammy palms against her equally damp jeans in a lame attempt to dry them, she unfastened the latch and flipped the top back. The heavy wooden top slammed jarringly against the coffee table, which under other circumstances would have made her cringe. She scarcely even registered the noise or the possible damage.

She could do nothing but stare at the necklace inside, trying to catch her breath.

She had never seen anything quite like it. After a few stunned moments, she collected herself and dragged her gaze from the gleaming gold and jewel encrusted piece and looked at Liz Bridgewater.

Liz was sitting forward eagerly on the chaise now, her eyes almost feverish with excitement. “It’s authentic, isn’t it?”

Anna studied the older woman, realizing belatedly that she had noticed far more tension in Liz from the moment she’d come in than ever before. She’d just thought it was annoyance about her being late. Apparently, she’d misread the reason behind Liz’s tension.

It occurred to her then that if Liz hadn’t been so anxious, she most likely would have refused to honor the appointment on the grounds that Anna had been a good thirty minutes late in arriving.

When she saw a flicker of impatience entered the woman’s eyes, she looked down at the necklace again, wondering at her reluctance to touch it. From out of nowhere, the temptation to refuse to read the piece had coiled in her stomach like a knotted fist. The piece was probably priceless, but she’d handled other pieces that were likely just as valuable and, despite the intricacy of the design, and its antiquity, it did not appear particularly fragile.

It didn’t matter if it was. It didn’t matter if touching made her ill, faint or gave her nightmares. Short of stopping her heart and relieving her of all her worries, she had to read it.

Without answering Liz’s question, she took another gulp of water, wiped her hands on her jeans again and reached out to touch the piece. A jolt went through her instantly as her fingers made contact, as if she’d grabbed an electrified fence. Gasping at the magnitude of images and emotions bombarding her, Anna jerked her hand back.

“What is it?” Liz demanded in a harsh whisper. “You saw something, didn’t you?”

White faced now, Anna turned toward the woman, but her mind was focused inward and she scarcely registered Liz or the room around her. Images moved around her mind’s eye in a kaleidoscope of blurred colors. Torn between a reluctance to touch it again and some strange compulsion that made it impossible not to, she reached a shaking hand into the box again after a moment and grasped the piece more firmly. She would’ve thought it would be impossible to feel more than she’d felt before, but the shock that went through her the second time seemed almost to stop her heart in her chest before it set the muscle to racing at a frantic pace. Again, she was bombarded by a myriad of images and an avalanche of formidable emotions. This time, however, because she had gripped the piece in her palm, she could not fight the images off. They poured into her so rapidly she began to feel as if she was drowning.

* * * *

She jumped all over when the door crashed open, banging back against the stone wall. Around her, her maids tensed, too, a chorus of sharp gasps emphasizing their starts of surprise.

No one relaxed when they saw that it was the lord. In point of fact, she tensed even more, searching his face for some sign that he suspected, that he was angry with her.

He surveyed the room briefly, but his gaze lit almost at once upon her where she sat on the bench before her vanity table, dismissing the other women as if they were no more than a part of the room’s furnishings. His harsh face softened perceptibly and she almost sagged with relief. “My lady,” he said, nodding, his voice gruff, loud in the chamber.

It was a voice accustomed to roaring over the noise of battle; the cries of the dead and dying, the howls of fury and growls of exertion of fighting men, the clang of metal blade against blade and bone and flesh, and the terrified and furious screams of war horses. He had difficulty taming it to a more civilized timber.

Ignoring the nervous women who skittered out of his way like a startled flock of birds, he strode purposefully across the room to loom over her. “What is all this, then? Ye did not hear my arrival?”

She looked up at him uneasily wondering if her relief had been premature. “Aye, I did, my lord. I did not want to go down until I had made myself presentable.”

He grunted, but some of the tension seemed to ease from him. “I would have been--pleased if ye’d come to greet me below like a wife anxious for her husband’s return. I would not have been left to wonder then if ye’d missed me.”

He shifted uncomfortably under her steady gaze, as if he’d suddenly become aware that she seemed more unnerved by his return than pleased and was seeking something to say to break the tension. His eyes lit at last on the tub before the hearth. “Ye’ll catch yer death bathin’ in the dead o’ winter,” he said gruffly.