Page 25 of Alien's Luck
The female straddled his torso and held a knife to his throat.
The screen across the port window had been left open to enjoy the night sky. Now clouds obscured the moon. In the dim light, he could not read her expression—in so much as he could decipher human expressions—but her posture told him that she was upset.
The dagger was also a clue.
“I’ve awoken to worse predicaments,” he said, a purr in his voice. “That’s an ornamental blade, by the way. Gold is far too soft to damage me.”
“Shut up,” Carla snapped, pressing the tip of the knife into him.
He was not overly concerned. His skin hardened to stone in that area and the blade really was ornamental. It barely held an edge. To threaten him with such a useless object was pointless. He was taller, stronger, and could easily overpower her. Although he did not mind the way she straddled him. That was pleasant.
Was this Carla’s version of flirting? He approved.
“Whatever you’re thinking, stop it,” she said. “I wanted to make a point.”
“Intriguing,” he replied, tail thumping against the mattress. His hands yearned to touch her, to stroke her thighs and grip her hips. She wore the utility jumpsuit he printed for her. Shame.
The flat edge of the blade smacked him across the cheek.
“If you renege on our bargain or if you pull a tricky trick, just remember that you have to sleep sometime, and I got into your cabin without waking you.”
His tail stilled. “It’s a good threat but lacks flair. Brute force will not work against me. My skin can shift to stone in a heartbeat. You know this.”
To demonstrate his point, he grabbed the blade and squeezed with stone-hardened fingers, bending the metal. It really was an ornamental piece.
“Poison. Violent and sudden decompression. Lack of oxygen. Pushing you overboard and letting you sink to the bottom of the ocean.” She raised her fingers one by one as she spoke, as if ticking items off a list. “There are so many interesting ways for you to die on a ship.”
“I am far too heavy to simply push overboard, and I question your mechanical knowledge to implement the other threats.”
“Honey, my daddy was a mechanic, and breaking something is a hell of a lot easier than fixing it.”
There it was. Flare.
“You are not a murderer.” A thief, yes. A con artist, absolutely, but taking a life was vastly different from taking credits.
A grin broke across her face. The moon broke through the clouds, casting shadows across her face. She leaned in, her lips a breath away from his. “My dad was bigger and stronger than my mom, too. He thought just because she couldn’t hit him back, that he was safe.” She planted two hands on his chest and pushed herself upright. “You don’t have to be bigger or stronger to use rat poison. Think on that.”
The mattress shifted as she climbed off him. Ari watched, awestruck, as she left his cabin.
He was captivated.
CHAPTER 7
ARI
Ari needed to be patient.
Nothing good happened when he acted impulsively.
It only took a moment to let his anger and resentment at his father change his position in life from Khargal aristocrat to fugitive, though he could not admit any regrets. He accepted Miriam’s poisoned bargain on an impulse, which left him with a debt of honor he struggled to pay. He impulsively bought Carla’s freedom on the street, and now they were in the midst of this farce.
With a look of smug contentment on his face, he strolled through the lobby of the Ocean’s Seven Club. This was the plan. Parade his new human like a nestling with a new toy and be seen.
Ari glanced down at the human female. She clung to his arm, her golden hair gleaming under the lights.
Again, he had no regrets.
Carla tightened her grip, subtly steering him toward the bar.
