Page 46 of No Strings Attached

“To come back down herewith me?”

“Yes.”

He whispered, “Next time…facing each other.”

“Yes.”

“Um…why was Caussus wearing one of your new coveralls?”

“Hmm? Oh, we had a meeting in our room after we got back. Me, Acken, Caussus, and Trak. I found the coveralls and pan-tees when I got up to run to the bathroom. I was so happy that I squealed, and Acken ran in thinking we were under attack. I grabbed them to put them on—I was so happy to take off the Trallian coverall I was wearing, you know, since my ass was in the breeze through the tail hole. I thought Caussus might like the same thing, to not have his ass hanging out, either. So, I offered. Acken was pressing for us to go on an inspection tour of the asteroid, so there wouldn’t have been any time for Caussus to find something else to put on.” She looked up at him and asked, “Did it upset you? I know you made the gift for me, and I love them, but I felt bad that I was able to cover my ass and Caussus wasn’t.”

Bahbi shook his head, “No, not upset. Simply confused.” He had heard everything she said, but on some level his mind stopped listening at the words “our room.”

She said in a low voice, “Trak didn’t tell us you were being held hostage until we were almost done with the asteroid. I’m really pissed at him. We sat, ate, and discussed plans in our room, then went on a fucking tour of this stupid rock, and all the while that asshole was holding you with a shock stick to your neck. I camethe second Trak told us, but we could have rescued you hours earlier if we had known.”

Bahbi listened to the emotion in her voice. She was furious. For him. Furious that he had been in danger, and no one had told her.She’d come running the second she found out. He pulled her close then moved them to a vertical position, taking her face in his hands and kissing her until she was breathless.

“I was fine, Vi, no need to worry. I guess all I needed was to see the concern on your face to get out of the situation myself. And Trak doesn’t realize that I’m special to you. No Trallians are special toanybody. We’re disposable. They say, ‘one Trallian is as good as the next.’ And the Trallians believe it themselves. It’s going to take everyone here some time to understand.”

He thought of Trak and his apparent sympathy when he believed Vi had been demanding that Bahbi give her pleasure. His willingness to take Bahbi’s place since he had previously received such demands and had experience. But then, he thought of Trak’s assumption that Vi had randomly picked Bahbi and was likely going to randomly select other Trallians to meet her needs. And hiseager willingnessto be first of that group. Vi broke into that train of thought.

“But you understand that it’s true, right? That youarespecial to me?”

“I think I’m starting to.” He wanted to believe it, but nothing in his life experience or cultural background held a precedent for it. There was no familiar hook in his mind to hang it on.

“Ready for surprise number three?”

He nodded, smiling.

“For the whole trip there and back, I practiced holding my breath to build my lung capacity.”

He looked at her, grinned, and tightened his grip while she pulled in a huge breath, and they dove.

They had wound each other up to a frenzy with the diving, between Vi shouting excitedly, “Faster!” every time he broke the surface for her to catch her breath and the undulations of his whole body under the water as he worked hard to propel them at speeds that practically felt like flying. His body was a blur of motion under the water, every movement transferred directly into the place where they were joined.

On the last surface, Vi had panted, “Shore,” and Bahbi took them over to the shallow water at the edge of the little beach. Once he was laying on more sand than water, Vi began a fevered grinding motion against him, panting and moaning out unintelligible words, with her hips tilted so that the grinding movement brought her little button in contact with his pelvis. But she was too far away for Bahbi ‘s liking.

He rolled her over onto her back and leaned in close, so their arms could lock around each other, then took over her frenzied grinding motion, ensuring each press of his body made contact with her button. They quickly fell into a rolling, rocking rhythm in the shallow water, a tangle of limbs, that had them both contracting and then exploding into pieces together.

Bahbi looked down into Vi’s dazed green eyes and said, “Sing me the song about the little dancer.”

“Can’t…breathe…yet…Bahbi.”

“I can wait.”

Her breathing was normalizing a little, now, as she said, “I really need to tell you everything that’s happened since we last saw each other, you know. There are big changes that you need to hear from me, that I need to make sure that you understand.”

“Like what?”

“Like we’re now one of the richest organizations in the galaxy. Didn’t you see those boxes of gemstones in the bedroom?”

“No, I couldn’t take my eyes off of you.”

She smiled, tilted forward, and kissed him. “And we’re an organization, now, too. That’s major. Although, I don’t know that we’re going to end up so much as a crew than as a very specialized mafia.” At his look of confusion, she said, “I better start from the beginning.”

He had taken them back out to float and Vi had sat perpendicular to him as she explained all the events and discussions since they had left on the ship with Malachite. Bahbi had been careful not to interrupt, although many things confused him, to let her tell it all. He had hoped that some of his confusion would be cleared up by the full hearing, but it hadn’t been.

Vi said, “Then Trak told us that you were being held hostage in the bunkroom, and you know everything that happened after that.”

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