The Hand of Vengeance: Alien Planet Romance
Date: 2015-10-07 00:00:00+00:00
Keywords: domestic discipline; Bdsm; scifi romance; alien warrior; discipline and punishment erotica
Description: **~Winner, Best Erotic Sci-Fi, The Romance Reviews Reader's Pick Awards~ ON HIS PLANET, WOMEN ARE PUNISHED WHEN THEY DISOBEY... ** Dr. Lara Simmons can handle difficult surgeries on the battlefield of a war-torn planet. She can even handle her capture by rebels who need her skills to save the life of an important figure-head. But she wasn't prepared for being stuck out in the wilderness with Blade Vengeance, the fierce tattooed rebel warrior with antiquated views of gender roles and corporal punishment. Dominant and unyielding, he doesn't hesitate to take her in hand when she disobeys his rule
Publisher: Burning Desires

The Hand of Vengeance

by

Renee Rose

The Hand of Vengeance

Copyright © September 2015 The Hand of Vengeance by Renee Rose

All rights reserved. This copy is intended for the original purchaser of this e-book ONLY. No part of this ebook may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without prior written permission from the authors. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s’ rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

Formatting by Wizards in Publishing

Editor: Kate Richards

This ebook is a work of fiction. While reference might be made to actual historical events or existing locations, the names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Smashwords Edition

2560 A.D.

Jesel, a human-populated planet

Chapter One

The electricity cut out. Again.

Dr. Lara Simmons groaned. Performing surgery in the dark wasn’t her forte, but it had been one of the many joys of volunteering on Jesel, a human-populated planet that had been third world even before the earthquake last week, mostly by choice. The original settlers had chosen it a hundred years ago for a “back-to-nature” lifestyle after Earth’s environment had been ruined.

She straightened her back to stretch and wait for the generator to kick in. It usually took about sixty seconds. The room sounded eerily quiet without the hum of machinery around her. Until the sound of breaking glass from somewhere in the medical center broke it.

“It’s an ambush,” Dasha whispered.

Lara whipped her head around to peer through the darkened window in the door. Well, hell. If that was the case, she needed to get this patient out of surgery before the shitstorm broke loose. She’d like to say this was the first time she’d operated while under attack, but her stint on the planet Macomb had groomed her for this tour.

Jesel had been at war for at least fifteen years. The original settlers from Earth, who were mostly now enslaved, were rising up against the current dictator in a bid for their freedom.

“Give me a light over here, stat,” she barked as laser fire erupted outside the surgery room doors. Her nurse assistant, Sleig, a young Jeselian woman—a girl, really—with zero medical experience, sprang into action, shining the light of her communication device over the patient’s open cavity. Like most of the Jeselians, Sleig was built of sturdy stock—healthy , strong, and outdoorsy. At age fifteen, she looked like a Nordic milkmaid. Lara had come to depend on the girl for quick thinking and action when needed.

The metallic clank of doors being barricaded sounded behind her. The rebels were probably here to steal medical supplies. It wouldn’t be the first time a medical bunker—or old schoolhouse, in this case—had been sacked while she was volunteering with the Interplanetary Samaritans. If they were lucky, the rebels would only take the drugs. Sometimes they took equipment, too, which made her job more difficult.

“They’re here for you, Lara,” Dasha warned in a low voice.

Lara resisted the shiver that threatened to run through her. Dasha, a humanoid from the Homo sapien planet Varusia, was an auric healer. Her healing abilities included forms of mind reading and mind control, so if she’d picked up on something with her extrasensory perception, Lara had to believe it.

Pushing back fear, she blinked to focus. If they were here for her, she’d cross that bridge when she got to it. Or when they kicked the damn door in. At this moment, she had a partial nephrectomy to finish on a patient whose kidney had been damaged when he’d fallen twenty feet onto a rock field. She’d been doing trauma surgeries for three months now on victims of the quake and its aftershocks.

She drew a deep breath and exhaled. Her hand remained mercifully steady while she unclamped the renal artery and vein. Back on Earth, where she’d trained, a surgery like this would be done robotically to prevent error, but years of intricate surgeries performed in primitive locations had taught her to fine-tune the movements of her fingers, even with an elevated heart rate, like now. She closed her mind to everything but her patient.

A laser cut through the titanium-reinforced doors, and someone screamed.

Lara removed another clamp before she whirled to face the intruders. Six men dressed in black combat gear carried enormous laser weapons into the room.

“Not in my operating room,” she snapped, ignoring the artillery trained on her. At least on this planet everyone spoke English—it made confrontations simpler. “You get the hell out of here. The drugs are in the east wing.” She made a shooing motion with her hand. Maybe Dasha was wrong and they weren’t here for her—except the twisting in her gut told her differently. Still, she pulled out her best bravado. “You can’t have any of this equipment—I’m using it. And get my power back on!” She dared to turn her back on them, returning to her surgery.

“Yes, we’ll take your drugs. But really, we’re here for you, Dr. Simmons,” a tall, wiry Jeselian said, stepping forward. “You have sixty seconds to finish up. The rest of you, start packing all the equipment and supplies necessary for an operating room.”

She didn’t look up as she used a pair of tweezers to insert thrombogenic material as a bolster to fill the place she’d cut and cauterized. “What’s your name?”

“Sergeant Donahue.”

“Well, Sergeant, I don’t work for you or the rebels. I am in the middle of surgery, on a mission to aid the survivors of Jesel’s earthquake. So if you need my services, you may get in line, behind the thirty other Jeselians waiting out there,” she said, lifting her chin in the direction of the schoolyard, where army-green plastic housing huts had been set up to house the injured.

“I thought Interplanetary Samaritans were non-political,” Donahue said. “Or do you work for Treedle?” His lip curled as if naming the current dictator sickened him.

Treedle had invaded the small human-colonized planet forty years ago, after diamonds had been discovered in their mountains. He’d turned the original settlers—a peaceful group of Earthlings who had moved to Jesel to live in harmony with nature, into slaves to work his mines.

A hulking man with black war-tattoos on his face circled into her line of vision. She had to bite back a gasp; he looked like he’d stepped out of a horror hologram. His hair was trimmed short, and his eyes were as dark as the markings on his face, which gave him a furious look.

“No, but I don’t take orders from you,” she said, pausing in her work long enough to give the sergeant a level stare. He didn’t need to know her heart had nearly reached tachycardia levels.

The tattooed man in front of her lifted his laser gun and trained it on the middle of her forehead.

“I’m no good to you dead.”

With a speed that belied his size, he snatched up Sleig and pointed his laser at her jugular. Sleig’s eyes popped, and she made a gurgling sound. Dasha edged sideways, but another rebel swung his weapon on her. None of them were foolhardy enough to look the Varusian in the eye and risk her mind control.

Damn. Lara wasn’t going to risk her colleagues’ lives to save her own. And chances were, the rebels wouldn’t harm her. If they’d come this far to get her, it meant they desperately needed her services. “I need ten minutes.” She lowered her head, moving with swift but precise movements to complete the operation.

“Five,” Donahue spoke. Lara ignored him as he began to direct the rest of the room, ordering them to pack boxes with equipment.

Mr. Tattoo eased his grip on Sleig, but didn’t release her. Nor did he remove his black-eyed gaze from her face. His intimidating presence made it hard to concentrate, but she managed to complete the procedure and stitch up the patient, inserting a drain and giving poor, trembling Sleig post-op directions.

She peeled off her surgical gloves and turned to Johanna, a Samaritan nurse. “Be sure to keep the guy with the broken leg from walking on it—tie him down if you need to. And the child with the contusions will need to have antibiotics every four hours for the next three days. I want you to—”

“Move,” Donahue interrupted. He took her arm and guided her forward, out the door.

She twisted to look over her shoulder at Dasha. “Will I be all right?” She hated herself for asking such a cowardly question, but her friend had surely read them. If they planned to kill her, Lara would rather die fighting.

“Yes.” Dasha trailed behind the cluster of rebels hustling her out. “They serve a cause, nothing more. They need you to help someone special to their movement.”

“Shut up, Varu,” one of the rebels growled, whirling on Dasha.

“Leave her.” Donahue grabbed the muzzle of the rebel’s gun in his fist. “She is of no consequence.”

They led Lara outside and boarded a small hovercraft. The narrow hull contained a row of seats against each wall. She pulled her hair out of the tight French twist as she always did when she finished operating. Taking her seat, she fastened the buckle on the old-fashioned seat belt. No three-point harnesses here, only simple shoulder straps that ran on a diagonal across the body.

Mr. Tattoo sat directly across from her. His broad shoulders stretched the fabric of the black combat shirt, leaving his muscled chest to stand out in stark relief. She caught her breath when she saw he bore the markings of a Jesel slave—the black barcode tattooed at the side of his neck. She’d seen them on many of the people she’d treated, but it came as a shock to see it on him. He seemed too aggressive, too assertive to have ever been in captivity. But that was stupid. Where did she think the rebels had come from? They certainly weren’t Treedle’s men, the wealthy members of his “Mining Republic.”

Something stirred in her. Not pity—certainly a fierce warrior like him didn’t need her pity. No, it was sympathy for his cause or understanding. Of course he should fight for the freedom of his people. Aside from the barcode which showed he’d been nothing more than property, the rest of the ink served as a form of primitive war paint, like the Native Americans wore long ago on Earth. While it made his visage look terrifying, even monstrous, she realized his actual expression was perfectly blank. No emotion showed on his face, nor had it shown since she’d first seen him.

Despite his size—he must stand over six feet, six—he had moved with the grace of a trained fighter. Sitting now, he didn’t move at all. Not a fidget, not a shift. He appeared ready to spring into action at any moment, his corded forearms and huge hands weapons capable of squeezing the life out of her in about two seconds flat.

A tingle ran up her spine as she remembered the basic briefing the Interplanetary Sams had given them about the Jeselian culture. Because the lifestyle was so primitive, the human settlers had reverted to ancient gender roles. Men were dominant and took care of the basic needs of the people as hunters, builders, and providers. Women served in subservient, domestic roles, preparing food and raising children.

The female volunteers had been warned they might find the gender roles on Jesel shocking, although, as Earthlings, they should be respected. She licked her lower lip, wondering just how dominant the men were. Everything about the huge, muscled warrior across from her screamed masculine power. She could imagine him returning from hunting with his shirt off and a bloodied animal draped over his shoulder. Not that she had any interest in such a thing. Her temperature rose.

The rebel caught her studying him, and she dropped her gaze, cheeks heating.

~~*~~

Blade watched the beautiful doctor blush as her long lashes lowered. A section of straight blond hair fell across her face and she left it there, as if hoping it might curtain her from his scrutiny. He’d found her tough, no-nonsense demeanor in the operating room all out sexy, but seeing this bit of submission made him go rock hard. What in the name of Universal God had made her color like that? Being caught staring?

With a mug like his, everyone stared, either with terror, or, if they knew of him and his exploits, with fascination. She hadn’t looked frightened, though. Not in the OR, nor here. He admired the hell out of her composure, especially considering the question she’d asked the Varusian.

Will I be all right?

She’d been unsure of her safety yet had agreed to go without a fuss. Or, at least, her only fuss was over her patients. A true Samaritan. He hoped her devotion to the ill and injured would extend to Sheel Black, their rebel leader, the deposed president.

The old hovercraft they’d rebuilt out of scrap parts lifted off, tilting left to make a shaky arc over the new seven hundred foot fissure in the ground.

The doctor closed her lids, blanching.

He understood the feeling. As a native Jeselian, he definitely preferred to stay on solid ground. His parents had settled on Jesel as part of the “back to basics” movement of the 2550’s. Many earthlings wished to return to the land—to eat food they farmed themselves, and live in harmony with nature. Earth had become over-populated, over-polluted, and stripped of all its natural resources. Jesel had been a Garden of Eden for many years, until Treedle arrived and ripped apart their democracy.

With her eyes closed, he took the opportunity to give the doctor his own examination. She was petite but perfectly proportioned, with perky, firm breasts that stretched the close-fitting shiny synth-fiber of her doctor’s tunic. She had a heart-shaped face with lovely arched brows and extremely kissable lips. Without the commanding bluster, she looked younger than he’d initially thought—maybe even less than thirty, although he knew from Bailey that she was considered one of the best hands-on surgeons in the galaxies. The International Sams provided the ultimate training ground, he supposed. He admired the hell out of her commitment to serve in this way.

Her eyes flickered open, and this time she caught him staring. She rubbed her berry lips together. “So, what’s the mission?”

He didn’t answer. Silence was his fallback in most situations. His job was to bring her back to the camp in one piece, not to be her handler. He hadn’t been chosen for his social skills. Bailey could do the smooth-talking and persuasion piece when they got there. If Blade tried, he’d only bungle it, anyway.

Deanis, the pilot, hit the alarm. “I have three bogeys coming in from the south.”

Blade leaned forward to peer at the instruments showing the incoming enemy craft. Two of the soldiers scrambled into position in the top of the ship to fire their weapons.

“Cloaking is impossible at this altitude.”

“Outrun them,” Donahue ordered, climbing the ladder to the top of the craft to oversee the weaponry. Deanis yanked on the controls, causing the hovercraft to dip and turn sideways to enter the canyon that had opened with the earthquake.

The doctor clamped her lips together, as if to prevent herself from puking.

Laser fire pierced the outer hull.

Donahue cursed, firing back from his position at the top of the airship. Their craft wobbled. They were going down.

Instinct sent him lunging forward to brace the doctor, but his damn seat belt locked at his sudden movement, trapping him.

One end of the ship struck the side of the cliff.

The doctor’s head slammed against the titanium wall behind her. She bit her lips closed on a scream.

“We’re hit!” Deanis yelled the obvious. By some miracle, he managed to pull the craft out of the canyon. The airship struck solid ground and tumbled, spinning upright as it skipped along the ground until it came to a stop.

The doctor unbuckled her seat belt.

One side of the craft burst into flames. He shoved past her to force open the emergency hatch. The bolt stuck. He threw his shoulder against it with all his weight. It budged, but only by a centimeter. Darian, another soldier, joined him, the two of them slamming the door open as flames heated the cabin to unbearable temperature.

No time to be gentle—he picked the doctor up by the waist and swung her out the door, tossing her through the air. She didn’t quite land on her feet, but tumbled to her hands and knees.

“Help me,” Corporal Jase screamed, yanking on his seat belt, trapped against the flaming hull. Blade whipped a dagger from his belt and cut through the material, sawing until it came free. Both men dived out of the craft even as the hot air and debris blasted out behind them.

His ears rang from the explosion as he skidded across rocks and gravel.

When he looked up, he saw the plucky little doctor one hundred yards off, running into the woods.

Damn it all.

“The package is on the run. I’m in pursuit,” he barked. Considering how much his ears rang, he doubted anyone heard him.

Her legs might be shorter than his, but Doctor Lara Simmons ran fast. Nimble little thing. He followed her through the trees, watching as she leaped over fallen logs and climbed small boulders, never slowing. He tried to get his bearings—no small feat while running at a breakneck speed through branches. They hadn’t flown far at all before they’d been shot down—ten miles max. Which meant...fuck.

“Doctor,” he yelled.

She didn’t stop.

“Doctor, wait.” He wasn’t sure of their exact location, but a two hundred foot drop into a canyon lay somewhere in this vicinity. And he had a feeling it was directly in front of her.

She broke out of the trees.

“Watch out for the—”

Her foot skidded as she tried, too late, to pull back. She glanced back at him then hurled herself forward, off the edge.

His stomach dropped to his boots. “Dr. Simmons!” He raced forward to peer down. Blue water winked below, but far below—at least one hundred feet.

His eyes swept the area for movement, anything. There. His heart began to beat again. Her head broke the surface, and she swam toward the shore. Before he had a chance to second guess the decision, he leaped from the cliff, following her plunge.

Chapter Two

She’d learned to swim in the recreation pools on Earth, but she’d never had to use the skill outdoors. The viscosity of the water here was different, or maybe it was the way the slightly heavier gravity affected her. Either way, her arms and legs had never kicked and scooped so hard in her life. Somehow, she found her way to the side and crawled out on the bank.

Her legs wobbled when she tried to stand, but she forced herself to move forward, into cover. She looked up at the cliff edge, but didn’t see her rebel warrior. Where had he gone? She doubted he’d be crazy enough to follow her into the pool, but she scanned the water to be sure. No sign of him.

If she wasn’t so freaked out, she’d admire the spectacular nature all around her. As an Earthling, she’d seen pictures of untouched beauty like this—from her own planet before all the natural landscape had been polluted, and from Planetary Geographic, but in person it seemed almost unreal.

She headed through a copse of giant trees growing along the bank, their thick branches twisted and gnarled together. Farther in, she met a wall of stone. Great. She’d jumped into a canyon and now she had no way out. She followed the wall. It had to lead somewhere. The canyon had to end at some point.

An opening in the rocks appeared, and she hesitated, torn between the instinct to keep moving and the fear that she might need to find a place to sleep for the night. She entered the crack in the stone but soon came to a dead end.

She spun around to retreat and screamed. Her knees buckled as she slammed into the barrel chest of the enormous tattooed rebel. Of course it would have to be him. The most terrifying one of them all. The warrior who looked like he could crack every bone in her body without breaking a sweat.

He didn’t speak. A dagger gleamed in his hand, and he drew his arm back to throw it at her.

She screamed again, slamming against the cliff wall in an attempt to dodge him, but he hadn’t aimed for her. His blade hit its mark with the distinct sound of metal puncturing flesh. The dead body of some wildcat dropped at their feet.

The realization it had been right above her head, probably preparing to pounce, made her sway on her feet. “Wh-what was that?”

He didn’t answer, just left the enormous cat and picked her up by the waist as if she weighed nothing.

“What are you doing? Put me down.” She kicked and twisted to free herself, but he ignored her.

He carried her by the waist, upright, out of the little cave. Settling down on a boulder, he tipped her over his knees. It took her two long seconds to understand his intent and, when she did, she was too stunned to move. Until his huge palm crashed down on her upturned ass and she found a new reason to kick and scream.

A spanking. Dear God, she was being given a spanking over wet leggings. His palm came down on her defenseless backside again and again with enough stinging force to cause genuine alarm. She tightened her buttocks and wriggled, but his arm around her waist was like a steel band, pinning her in place.

She’d heard Jesel’s culture was so primitive they still employed corporal punishment, but it had never occurred to her she would be the subject of such tyranny. Never in her life. And it stung a lot more than she’d imagined. It seemed the rebel warrior planned to spank the living daylights out of her. Her bottom blazed, and she knew from the way pain receptors worked, the sting would only increase in the next few minutes.

“Ow! What are you doing? Stop it this instant!”

He still didn’t say a word. The big Neanderthal let his hand do the talking, slapping her wet bottom over and over again with stinging blows. She attempted to stay quiet, but sounds came out of her mouth despite her intention. Whimpers. Oofs. Little cries.

Her G-string and thin skin-tight leggings did nothing to protect her from his heavy palm, which rained down with a steady beat, first on one cheek then the other. In fact, they probably made it worse, the wet fabric increasing the sting.

When he moved to the backs of her thighs, she bucked and wailed. “Please,” she pleaded, like a complete ninny. “Please stop. No more. Please, no more.”

She had now lost all dignity, thoroughly humiliated by this giant oaf of a man. To make things worse, her body seemed to think this was foreplay, because her sex swelled between her legs, hot and tingling. What in the hell was wrong with her? This was not sexy. Not. Sexy.

Abruptly, he lifted her from her prostrate position and plopped her down on his lap, facing away from him, one arm still secured around her waist. His clothes were soaked as well; clearly, he’d followed her from the bluff.

Her butt blazed, the flesh stingy and swollen. Her clit pulsed in rhythm with her ass. If her clothing hadn’t already been soaked, she probably would have left a wet spot from her damn arousal on his thigh. Thank the Universal God he’d sat her facing away from him, so he wouldn’t see her attempt to get her emotions in check. Tears had built just beneath the surface, but she wasn’t sure if they were from the humiliation of the situation, sexual frustration, or the actual pain of it.

And...her traitorous pussy still pulsed with need.

Damn. It had been a long time since she’d been touched by a man. Her five-year birth control shot was wearing off—she’d be due another one when she returned to Earth next month, so her hormones were probably rising. That’s all it was. Because having her bottom spanked like a naughty child did not turn her on. At all.

Static sounded from the warrior’s old-fashioned comms unit, making her jump and twist to look over her shoulder at him.

He touched a button and spoke into it. “The hand of vengeance strikes.”

“Come in, Vengeance.” The voice on the other end sounded breathless.

“The package has been retrieved, but we require extraction.”

“Uh, that’s a negative. We are currently under fire....” Laser fire sounded and the voice yelled, “Ten o’clock, ten o’clock!” A terrible crackle emitted from the device and then no sound whatsoever.

“Vengeance to Package Transfer Team. Come in, Transfer Team.”

No answer.

The warrior cursed and tore the comms unit from his ear, threw it to the ground, and crushed it under his boot.

“Why did you do that?”

“Our only chance of extraction just died. We don’t want the Republicans to track us.”

The Republicans. That was what the rebels called Treedle’s men. Well, he may not, but I do. She looked up through the trees toward the sky, as if one of Treedle’s airships might happen to be passing by. She needed to get away from this rebel who was clearly a maniac. Who jumps off a hundred foot cliff in pursuit of one ordinary female doctor?

“What do the rebels want with me?”

Once more, he met her question with silence. He stood, lifting her to her feet in one fluid motion. “Let’s move.”

“Where are we going?”

“We’re going to try to find a way out of here without getting ourselves killed.” Grasping her hand, he stalked forward, through the trees. Not in the let’s stroll through the woods together sort of way. More like, I’m in charge of you, honey, and if you give me any more trouble, I won’t hesitate to spank your ass again.

Damn if the thought didn’t make her knees go weak. Literally. She stumbled, and he pulled her upright, glancing back. She flushed, something fluttering in her belly. Her traitorous body became suddenly aware of him in a new way: as a sculpted mass of masculine virility and power. Her skin flushed and prickled.

It must be the atmosphere on this planet because she hadn’t felt anything sexual for any male—or female, for that matter—in years. Maybe not even since puberty. She’d been too busy in med school, and after she’d passed the boards, she’d worked insane hours on planets in every galaxy. There hadn’t been any time to date or get romantic with anyone, even if there’d been someone attractive to her.

She watched the muscles of his back ripple with movement, the broad shoulders leading into giant biceps. He even had ripped forearms. And those hands...she tore her gaze away from his huge hands, willing herself to stop thinking about the fact that they had just paddled her poor, blazing bottom. Her cheeks throbbed in response. She reached back to rub one with her free hand and caught the corner of the rebel’s mouth lifting in a smirk.

Damn his overbearing misogynistic arrogance.

They walked on a narrow animal path through dense foliage. The strip of land between the river and the purple canyon wall was choked with trees and undergrowth, making it difficult to navigate. They walked for over an hour, until her wet shoes had rubbed the skin raw on her feet and she began to limp. He glanced at her impatiently. “What is it, Doctor?”

“What do you mean?”

“Are you tired?”

“No.” She might have sounded a tad defensive.

He looked down her body, arriving at the offending shoes. “Your feet hurt.” It wasn’t a question; it was a statement.

“Yes, sir.”

The sir just came out. Okay, he intimidated her. Especially after that spanking he’d delivered. He cocked a brow, which had the effect of turning her insides to liquid.

“Okay, Doctor.” He looked annoyed as he pulled her toward the cliff wall. He pointed to a little clearing. “You gather wood and start a small fire. I’ll try to find us something to eat.” He tossed her a small metal cylinder.

She caught it in one hand and turned the little device over. “What’s this?”

He frowned. “A lighter. To start a fire. Please tell me you know how to start a fire?”

“Uh, yeah. Sure I do,” she lied.

His lips flattened. Yep, he knew she was full of crap. “I won’t go far. Holler if you need me.”

“I don’t even know your name. Is it Vengeance?”

He stopped and turned, his chiseled profile as beautiful as the rest of his body. “Blade.”

She held out her hand. “I’m Lara. Lara Simmons. I’m the doctor whose butt you thought you had a right to spank.”

The corner of his mouth quirked, and it made her belly flutter again. But. as quickly as it had appeared, it vanished, and the blank mask returned. “You ran,” he said, as if that excused his action. “You put yourself into enormous danger jumping off that cliff, and now we have no way out.”

“Right, and all your friends are dead now, so excuse me if I don’t think sticking with them would’ve been my best move.”

“I would have protected you.”

She meant to reject his sentiment, but something in his stance or the serious way he spoke the words made her believe him. He did seem to be the sort of man who could protect her, even from explosions or laser fire. And damn if that didn’t make her nipples tighten.

“My job is to deliver you to headquarters safely. As you said before, you’re no good to us dead.”

“What do you want with me?” she tried again.

He pointed at the clearing. “A small fire. Nothing too big or it will be seen. Understand?”

She rolled her eyes and turned away, picking up sticks and twigs from the ground. Building a fire couldn’t be that hard, could it? She waited until she no longer heard his footsteps before she turned around and stared at where he’d stood. Her fingers trembled, which never happened. What the hell was wrong with her? One bottom-warming by a huge, gorgeous warrior and she fell to pieces. This wasn’t like her.

She crouched down and arranged the sticks in a pile. Not too big, he’d said. But maybe she wanted it to be seen. She needed to get away from the rebels and back to her medical station where she could treat her patients. She had no reason to trust this man and every reason to keep running. Straightening, she worked to gather as much dry wood as possible. An all-out bonfire was what the situation called for. That would bring help.

~~*~~

He heard the craft first. Then he saw the flames.

“Doctor!” He dropped the field deer he’d shot and slung across his shoulders and ran at top speed. The laser fire began before he took three strides. “Get down,” he yelled over the sizzle of the weapons.

A bomb dropped right in front of him, sending boulders tumbling from the cliff wall. He surged left to avoid the rubble, hopping over the rocks. He found Lara standing on top of a boulder, looking up and waving both arms to signal the craft.

“Get the fuck down!”

Her body flew through the air as a bomb hit behind her.

He closed the distance between them and hauled her to her feet, shoving her forward. “Run, Doctor. Go!”

They ran downstream, as laser fire fell all around them, leaving trees and bushes in flames, blasting rocks. Seeing a crevice in the rock face, he yanked her inside it, pulling her past him and shielding her body with his own as another explosion struck just outside. Rocks tumbled down, and he prayed they wouldn’t be trapped within.

He held her pinned against the wall, his chest heaving with the exertion. Her little form trembled. It wasn’t the moment to notice how soft and curvy she felt against the hard edges of his body. It certainly wasn’t the moment to inhale her scent—the distinctly female musk that caused an instant reaction in his body. He eased back so she wouldn’t feel the bulge of his cock hardening in his combat pants.

The laser fire moved down river then back up, which was a good sign. It meant they were firing at random, just to cover the territory. The Republicans didn’t know where to find them. He waited until it stopped altogether and then another twenty minutes longer.

“Come on.” He grabbed her hand. “We have to put more distance between us and the site of your fire.” He tugged her out.

She dug her heels in, resisting.

“Dr. Simmons. Come the fuck on.” He pulled her forward. “They might come back. They weren’t here to save you, in case you hadn’t noticed. Republicans have only one mode: seek and destroy anyone found outside their slave camps. Women, children, elders. Entire villages. They don’t give a shit. They are not your rescue squad. Do not ever try to attract their attention again. Got it?”

He glanced at the sky. They only had a couple hours of daylight left. Jesel had only one sun, like Earth, and it made a full rotation every eighteen hours.

After a kilometer or so, the doctor veered off from the trail toward the water.

He stopped. “Where are you going?”

“I need a drink.”

“Do not drink that water. It’s polluted with toxins from Treedle’s diamond mines.”

She narrowed her eyes, her hands on her hips. Her lack of trust was getting old, not that he could really blame her. He had kidnapped her, after all. But she wouldn’t make it out of this canyon alive without his help.

“I will find us something to eat and drink when we make camp. Right now, we need to keep moving.” Remembering why they’d stopped the first time, he asked, “How are your feet?”

She blew a few blond strands of hair out of her face. “Blistered.”

He stalked toward her. She flinched when he reached for her, which didn’t come as a surprise. He was used to people being afraid of him. He scooped her up into a cradle hold and tossed her in the air to better adjust her weight.

She gasped and her arms came around his neck, out of perceived necessity he would guess. “Y-you don’t have to carry me.”

“It’s faster this way,” he muttered, focusing straight ahead. He really couldn’t look down at her lovely face only centimeters from his or he’d lose all focus. It was bad enough to feel how light and soft she felt in his arms and to inhale her scent again.

He walked another two kilometers before he stopped and dropped her onto her feet. He still needed to deal with her disobedience, and it was already dusk.

Shrugging out of his jacket, which had finally dried, he spread it over a fallen log. It was one thing to spank her little ass. It was another to cause her unnecessary scrapes and bruises. He caught the doctor’s wrist and tugged her forward.

She looked from his face to the log in confusion.

“Bend over.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Now, Doctor.” He didn’t mean to sound so terrifying, but he had no practice in soothing skittish females. He’d spent the last seventeen years perfecting his job as a death machine, to exact vengeance for the crimes of the Republicans.

She licked her dry lips, and he kicked himself for not finding her a source of fluids first. They’d been out here at least six hours now without food or water. Well, he’d get her discipline over with and then tend to their needs.

He watched her, waiting for the moment when she realized she had no choice but to obey. It didn’t take long. She stumbled toward the log, her jaw set. Resting her hands on the bark, she gingerly leaned over.

“Hands behind your back.” He took a loop of rope from his belt.

She glanced over her shoulder. “Why?” She paled when she saw the rope, and pushed back from the log and bolted.

He caught her up around the waist and carried her back. “I’m going to tie your wrists behind your back and whip you.” He didn’t know if his explanation would calm her or frighten her more.

She glanced up at his face warily. The uncertainty in her big blue eyes tore him through the gut. He didn’t want her afraid. Chastised, yes. Not terrified for her life. “Why—” she stopped, her tongue working. “Why tie my hands?”

“So you don’t reach back and try to cover. Your hands are your instruments, Doctor. I can’t risk damaging a finger with my belt. Put your wrists behind your back.” He waited. He preferred her to assume the position voluntarily. It built trust between them, for one thing. For another, it told him she accepted his punishment and acknowledged her misdeed.

When she put one arm behind her back, then the other, he released a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding. He made quick work of knotting them together at the small of her back, taking care not to make the binds too tight or too loose.

“Bend over, Doctor.”

“I really don’t think this is necessary.”

He waited. He didn’t need to threaten or glare. He knew his presence was frightening enough. Indeed, she lasted about twenty seconds before she thrust her jaw forward and folded her torso over the log. Without her hands to hold her, she toppled forward, off her feet. She grunted and kicked out, her legs flailing.

He steadied her, holding her bound hands. “I won’t let you fall on your head.” He looked at the sight she made, her blue leggings stretched taut over her tight little ass. His cock hardened. The outline of a G-string showed over her sacrum. That’s right...the women on Earth wore only tiny scraps of fabric for panties. Which meant he could pull her leggings down to bare her cheeks and still give her the dignity of having her twat covered.

He grasped the fabric in one fist and yanked down.

“Hey,” she shouted in protest. “What are you—” She trailed off as the whoosh of his belt leaving the loops filled the air.

Universal God, she had the cutest ass he’d ever seen. He shouldn’t have bared her, because the sight made his head swim. Looking away, he wrapped the buckle end of the belt around his fist to shorten the length of the strap. He could do this. He drew a breath, searching for some form of lecture. “You disobeyed me, Doctor.”

“Don’t you think getting shot at is punishment enough?”

He drew his arm back and let it swing. The leather strap snapped across both her cheeks, leaving a raised mark on her bare skin.

She shrieked.

He squeezed her hands but admonished, “Shh, keep it down. There are predators in this canyon that hunt humans for dinner.”

He swung the belt again, making another stripe below the first. “I told you not to build a big fire.” He whipped her again, and she kicked her feet and shook her head, moaning. “I told you I would protect you.” He delivered several more welts as she howled. “We lost our dinner because of you. You nearly got us both killed.”

“Ow, stop it,” she yelled. “This is ridiculous.”

He swung the belt again. He really shouldn’t have bared her ass. His breath rate had increased. “I am waiting for an apology.”

“I’m sorry,” she screeched immediately. “In the name of the Universal God, is that all you wanted? I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

“Three more.”

“No,” she wailed. He interrupted her with a snap of the belt, putting a little more force into the swing.

She drew her breath in across her teeth.

He delivered another stroke across the backs of her thighs.

“Ow! Damn you,” she hollered.

He made the last one count, catching her at the juncture of bottom and thigh. And then he heard the growl.

~~*~~

Her vision blurred. She blinked the tears back. She wasn’t going to give the damn rebel the satisfaction of seeing her cry. Even if she never sat again. And, at this rate, she doubted she would. It felt like he’d flayed the very skin off her ass.

Suddenly, he pulled her to her feet, yanked her leggings up, and worked on the knot at her wrists.

Don’t cry. Do not. Cry. She had to stop thinking about how much her backside throbbed.

“Up the tree, Doctor.” Blade’s voice sounded urgent as he lifted her toward the branches of a huge tree.

Her muddled brain couldn’t dissect his meaning.

“Climb, Doctor! Get up there now.”

A ferocious growl shocked her out of her stupor. She looked down to see they were surrounded by a pack of snarling… she didn’t know what kind of animal they were. If they were found on Earth, she’d never seen them. They looked mostly like wolves, only taller, with ugly, broad foreheads and two rows of fangs. She screamed.

“Stop screaming,” Blade said through clenched teeth. “You’ll bring in more of them.” She clamped her lips shut. Catching hold of the branches, she scrambled up the tree. The bark abraded her raw cheeks, her leggings doing nothing to protect her. She ignored the pain, propelled only by the desire to get away from the fearsome beasts.

Blade swung around, picking up a heavy stick in one hand and holding his dagger in the other. He bent his knees.

“What are you doing? Shoot them! Don’t you have a laser gun?”

He inched around the tree, keeping his back to the trunk. “Laser fire will show up on the Republicans’ monitors.”

One of the animals leaped for his throat.

She screamed again then snapped her jaws shut. “Oh God.”

Blade stabbed the beast through the heart. He withdrew the bloody blade and whirled to slash the throat of the next one lunging. A cacophony of snarling erupted as the entire pack attacked. Blade brought the club down on the side of one animal’s head. Another he picked up and slammed against the tree, breaking its spine. Yelps and whines filled the air.

She might save lives on a daily basis, but, to her great shame, she did nothing to help the warrior. She simply froze there in the tree watching the scene unfold as if watching a hologram, and not a real man fighting off twenty wolf-like creatures.

We’re going to die. We’re going to die. We’re going to die...

Blade spun and slashed, in a silent dance with the pack of beasts. Fur flew and animals yipped in pain.

It might have been a minute. Maybe even less. Ten beasts lay bloodied and dying at his feet, and the remainder of the pack began to slink away. Blood dripped from his dagger. He dropped the club and wiped his blade on his pants.

“Come on down,” he said, without looking up.

As it turned out, her body wouldn’t move. Not even an inch. She clung to the branch she straddled, her body petrified with shock. The giant waxy yellow leaves shivered, as if reflecting to her fear.

Now he looked up, frowning. “I said, come down, Doctor.” Damn, if he didn’t have the stern command down pat.

He must have caught her expression because his brows lifted in surprise. “Are you scared?” He held out his arms. “Drop and I’ll catch you.”

She shook her head. She knew it was irrational, and yet she couldn’t convince her body to move.

“Dr. Simmons...Lara. It’s okay. They’re gone, but we have to get out of here before the smell of blood attracts larger predators.”

She gulped. Larger predators than those? What did they have on Jesel, dragons?

He put his hands on his hips, staring up at her. “Are you scared of me?”

It was a logical question. He had just whipped her till she screamed. But no, she’d take him over the wolf-things any day.

“I—” Her tongue didn’t seem to work. Her mouth was too dry. “I can’t move,” she managed to say.

In one fluid movement, he swung up into the tree, like a little boy rather than a giant warrior. He climbed to her.

She flinched when he touched her, not because she thought he would hurt her, but because she’d developed a sudden and irrational fear of falling.

“Come on,” he coaxed. “You’re okay. We have to go now, doctor.”

She shook her head, the tears that hadn’t come during the whipping now spilling down her cheeks. “I can’t.”

“You can.” He produced the same rope he’d tied her hands with and looped it around her torso, under her armpits. He tossed the other end over the branch above them and pulled down the slack. “I’m not going to let you fall,” he promised. “You’re safe. I can either lower you down like this, or you can try to climb down yourself and know that I’ll have you if you slip.”

She shook her head again. “I can’t climb,” she whispered.

He inched closer to her. The branch bowed under his weight. Reaching out, he wrapped one strong arm around her waist.

She screamed, but he had already pulled her against him, and they were in the air, sailing down at a rate tempered by the rope sliding through his hand. He landed on the ground and dropped her lightly to her feet, unwinding the woven fibers.

She picked up his hand and turned it, inspecting the rope burns he’d just inflicted on his palm.

He yanked it away so fast, she jumped. “I’m fine,” he said curtly. “We need to get moving and find a place to camp for the night.”

Her brain and body had shut down. She heard his words but barely processed them, the image of the snarling pack of wild animals still projecting in her mind. She hugged her arms around her waist.

Snatching up his jacket from the log, Blade wrapped it around her shoulders and zipped it. She realized she was shivering—he must have noticed. From shock, probably, not cold. It cooled off at night, but, in general, Jesel’s climate remained warm year-round. Blade removed his hat from his head and put it on her, smoothing the edges around her face with a gentleness that shocked her.

“Let’s go.” He picked up the smallest beast and heaved it up over his shoulders, walking briskly ahead. He didn’t hold her hand or wait to see if she’d follow. He must know at this point, she’d be too scared of being left alone in the dark with the wild animals not to trot along behind.

~~*~~

Twilight turned the purple canyon walls into glowing maroons, oranges, and pinks. In the sky, Jesel’s eighth moon rose. The other seven already spanned the sky in a perfect line, their silvery bodies growing brighter as the planet rotated away from their sun.

The doctor stared up at the sky, and her mouth opened with awe. “Wow.”

“Have you never seen it before? You’ve been on Jesel for three months already, haven’t you?” He knew the details of her stint on Jesel with the Interplanetary Samaritans from Bailey’s research.

She rotated a full 360 degrees, her gaze tracing the spectacular canyon with a look of appreciation. Blade’s people revered nature. Before Treedle had invaded, they’d lived at one with the bounty of the planet, which its original settlers had found so similar to Earth. They’d taken only what they needed, living in reverence of the beauty they had discovered here.

Something in his chest thawed to see her pay it the respect it deserved. He wanted to show her more, suddenly, as an ambassador of his country. He wanted to share all the secret places he knew—crystalline caves of rainbow diamonds. Twin waterfalls, one hot, one cold. Meadows of wildflowers.

He gave his head a shake. That was foolish. His mission was to bring her to the rebel camp. Immediately. This was not a nature hike.

He stooped and cut a stalk of sweet reed and handed it to the doctor. “Suck the juice out of the stalk to quench your thirst.”

Her hand was steady when she took it, but her color was still off, and her face was pinched and tight. “Thank you.” She put it to her dry lips and sucked.

His cock twitched, and he forced himself to look away before he had a full-on erection. Inappropriate, Blade. Completely inappropriate. Something about the little doctor fascinated him. No, not something—everything. He admired her pluck, even if she had caused him a world of trouble with that bonfire. And when he’d seen her so shaken by the rye-wolves, it had taken all his restraint not to wrap his arms around her to try to offer some comfort. But, of course, she wouldn’t want that from him. Especially not after the way he’d just punished her.

They walked downstream for another half-mile before he found a good protected area to make camp. “Collect some wood and kindling for a fire.”

She obeyed without answering.

He gutted the beast he’d hauled with them and built a little spit to cook it on, arranging the kindling she brought to him underneath it. “Hand me my lighter.” When she didn’t move, he looked up.

She licked her lips, her gaze darting nervously to his face. “I set it down when I made the bonfire.”

He scowled. “Do you know how hard it is to start a fire without flint?”

She winced.

“Of course you don’t,” he muttered. “Find me the smallest pieces of kindling. Something easily flammable, like dried leaves.” He picked a good stick and set it on top of a small piece of bark. Rubbing it back and forth, he created friction where the stick rubbed against the larger piece of wood, making a groove. Smoke began to rise as bits of sawdust flaked off and heat built. He was being an asshole. It had become such a habit over the years, it was hard to break now. Starting a fire with friction was a pain, but he could do it. Hell, he’d done it often enough in those early years on the run, after he’d escaped slavery.

The doctor brought the dried leaves and knelt beside him.

“Make a little nest of them on top of the kindling.” He tried not to bark the orders, but his words still sounded harsh. Right. Because he was missing the niceties like thank you or I’m sorry I’m such a dick. Being in the presence of the refined, educated Earthling made his own roughness stand out like an ugly scar.

He worked up a substantial ember and transferred it to the little nest Dr. Simmons had built. Her nimble fingers had made a tidy pile, layered for air.

“Well done.” There. He had said something nice. He shouldn’t have glanced over, because the softness the two words gave her face made his chest tighten. Universal God, she was beautiful.

He crouched down low to blow on the embers, helping them to catch fire. His first attempt failed—he blew too hard and the ember went out. The second one also went out.

The doctor crouched next to him, too close. Tension radiated from her, adding to his guilt. Finally, he got the little bundle lit, and, eventually, built a small fire.

The doctor watched his face, a crease of worry between her brows. He wanted to rub it away with his thumb. No, he wanted to kiss it away. “This will do.” He’d have to settle for gruff acknowledgement.

She relaxed and stepped back. “Now what?”

“Sit down and rest.”

He put the meat on the spit over the fire and let it sear. Darkness fell, leaving only moon and firelight to guide his movements. The meat cooked quickly, and he pulled it off.

When he kicked out the fire, the doctor gave him a wounded look. She sat huddled close to it, drawing warmth.

“We can’t risk attracting attention.” He handed her a piece of meat, watching as she put it gingerly toward her lips.

She took a bite and grimaced.

“Rye-wolf isn’t tasty, I know. I had caught a fine field deer, but I had to drop it back there when you got us fired at.”

Her jaw clenched, and she looked away.

What an ass. He’d already punished her; he didn’t need to keep throwing it in her face. Mule Goats had more cultivated manners than he did. He’d been living in war camps for too long.

He wasn’t used to being around women, other than those who sought him out. He’d had casual couplings with them—rebel women showing their appreciation or adulation. Or whatever. He didn’t really know their motivation. They would show up at his tent flap, and he’d use what they offered. There was no place for relationships on the battlefields.

He wished Commander Bailey was here to make the poor doctor feel at ease and look after her needs. Except the thought of another man taking care of her had him clenching his fists. He shook his head. Damn, how did she get under his skin so quickly?

The doctor didn’t eat more than two bites of the tough, sinewy meat, and he didn’t blame her. It had a strong, musky taste. “I’ll cut some more sweet reed. It will tide you over,” he said. “In the morning, I can hunt again.” He walked down to the river and rinsed the charred remains of the meat from his fingers. The sounds of the canyon echoed off the rock walls—the steady trickle of the water, the rustle of trees, insects calling their mates. From farther away, he heard the pack of rye-wolves howl to celebrate a kill.

When he walked back, he handed Dr. Simmons the sweet reed. She sat with her back against a tree.

“Try to get some sleep, if you can, Doctor.”

Her gaze swiveled to his. Exhaustion showed in her face, but she looked dubious about his suggestion. He supposed she’d be unused to sleeping without a bed and blankets. He wished he had more to offer her for comfort. Hopefully, by the following day he’d find a way out of the canyon and back to rebel headquarters outside Parth where the talented doctor was desperately needed.

He moved the remains of the cooked meat several hundred yards away from their camp so it wouldn’t attract scavenger rodents or birds. When he returned, the doctor’s eyes were closed, but she looked far too uncomfortable to be asleep.

He cleared a swath of rocks and lay down. He heard the doctor adjust her position. He woke several hours later to her movements. She had moved right up against the coals of the fire they’d used to cook the meat.

“Are you cold, Doctor?”

“Yes, sir.”

It was odd that she called him sir. She outranked him in every way. He was nothing but an escaped slave, with no education, and she was a highly accomplished medical professional. “Don’t call me sir. Come over here.” He patted the ground in front of him.

“What’s your title?” Her voice sounded beautiful in the darkness—slightly husky, musical. Intelligent. He didn’t know how a voice could sound intelligent, but hers did.

“No title. I’m nobody. I don’t exist.”

“You were a slave.”

He didn’t answer. He bore no shame over his past. In fact, it had become a source of pride, as his own rebellion had stirred the uprising that had taken the entire country by the nuts. But he had no desire to stir it up, especially with her. She didn’t need exposure to his darkness.

“I’m sorry.”

“Come here, Doctor. I won’t molest you.”

He didn’t actually expect her to come. After all, he’d done nothing but terrify the poor woman through gruffness and discipline. But, to his surprise, she climbed to her feet and walked over.

He reached for her hand to guide her down, helping her to settle on her side in front of him. His body spooned hers, his longer legs following the contour of her bent ones, his arm draped over her waist. He pulled her back against his chest. “Better?” he murmured, his lips not far from her ear.

She turned her head, looking over her shoulder at him. “Yes.” Her voice sounded husky, thick like honey.

His temperature rose, and all the blood rushed to his cock. She looked away, saving him from embarrassing himself by breaking his promise not to molest her because he’d wanted nothing more than to claim her full lips.

Her small form nested against his, so soft and delicate compared to his brutish size and features. He inhaled the scent of her—warm and sweet, like the syrup the women made from sweet reed juice. Like sugar cakes with melting butter. Her corn silk hair dropped back against his cheek, the glossy blond strands tickling his skin. He lay perfectly still, wanting to let her fall back to sleep, hoping she wouldn’t notice the thickening bulge in his trousers.

Chapter Three

She suffered from Stockholm syndrome. That was the only explanation. Because Blade’s muscled arm heavily draped across her waist should not have her feeling so safe and...dear lord—did she actually feel snuggly?

She barely remembered the first and only time she’d slept with a man. During her first year of higher education, when she’d been only eighteen, determined to try out this thing called sex. It had been horrible. Awkward and painful and followed by a long night of trying not to move with another person’s limbs flung over her.

She probably hadn’t slept any better last night, but she’d been warm and actually felt protected and safe. She still wore Blade’s jacket and hat, and the memory of him dressing her in them made something warm and gooey move in her chest. When was the last time anyone had taken care of her needs? Well, sure—her staff did. They’d do anything she asked, and they looked out for her, too, bringing her food or hot tea when she forgot to take care of herself. But not a man. Not like this. She realized Blade was acting the part of the Jeselian gender archetype—man as protector. And authority figure. She squeezed her cheeks together at the memory of his discipline. No residual pain. Her movement caused an answering stirring from Blade—his cock twitching against her buttocks.

She froze.

In a flash, he rolled away and stood up, towering above her. His coal-black gaze pinned her to the ground where she lay helpless to move. Something about the sight of him—the enormous, dominant size, the gorgeous ripple of muscle, the shocking markings on his face, made her limbs go weak. She literally couldn’t make herself swallow, much less speak.

Without a word, he bent and offered her a hand.

Somehow, she managed to take it and let him pull her easily to her feet.

He scanned the area of their camp, his eyes resting on a slender opening in the rocks she hadn’t seen the night before. Had he seen it? Walking with the grace of a panther, he peered inside then turned to her, a smile on his lips. “Doctor, come here.”

After the mountain lion or wildcat or whatever it had been nearly attacked her last time, she was loathe to enter any caves. But Blade beckoned, looking cheerful for a change, so she walked over.

Inside, she heard the echo of dripping water. The smell of sulfur tickled her nose.

“Too bad I didn’t see this last night—we would have slept in warmth.”

She realized then that the cave must be at least twenty degrees warmer than it felt outside. She frowned. “Hot springs?” She blinked as her eyes adjusted to the dimmer light filtering in from cracks in the ceiling as well as from the mouth of the cave.

“Yes.”

She looked around. The cave walls were a beautiful shade of purple stone, shaping a large, circular room. In the center, a dark pool of water glittered where a shaft of sunlight hit it.

Blade walked toward the water’s edge, stripping off his clothes.

She stared, dumbfounded by his lack of modesty. No, that wasn’t true. She was dumbfounded by his stunning physique. The man was built like a Greek God. She gaped at his bare ass, the muscles of his thighs. How big was his manhood? She just had to know…

Better sense gripped her. “I’ll...ah...wait outside. You know, for my turn.” Blade turned, already to his waist in the inky depths of the hot water. He shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

Was part of her disappointed at that response? Her knees wobbled as she walked back outside and gulped fresh air.

Glad for some privacy, she squatted behind a boulder to pee. With her pants still down, she twisted around to check her bottom, but couldn’t manage to see it without a mirror. She wondered if the whipping had left any marks. As a doctor, she knew that area of the anatomy had plenty of fleshy protection, which was the very reason it had been used in ancient times on Earth as the target for punishment. Rather than revulsion at the practice, which she’d previously experienced when hearing about it, fascination crept into her thoughts and dampened her panties. It hadn’t hurt so very much. Well, it had at the time, but now when she remembered it—being tied up and bent over the log, her bottom bared to Blade for his punishment—she found it more exciting than she cared to admit. What in the hell was wrong with her?

Blade ambled out, running his fingers through his wet hair and looking relaxed and refreshed. Damn. Now that he was dressed again, she wished she’d stayed to watch him coming out of the water. For the frontal view.

“I’m going to hunt. You have a turn in the pool.”

“Wait—” She hated the desperation in her voice, but she didn’t want to be left alone. “Can’t I come with you?”

His dark eyes narrowed. “No.”

He certainly was a man of few words.

“Why not? I won’t scream this time. I’ll be quiet.”

As usual, he chose to answer her questions with silence, walking away without answering.

“What if those beasts come back?”

“The rye-wolves?” He turned and looked over his shoulder at her, his face inscrutable. “You’re really afraid?”

“Yes.”

He pulled his laser gun from his belt and handed it to her. “Only use it if your life is in real danger because it will bring on a new world of trouble from Treedle’s army. You remember what happened last time you attracted their attention.”

She swallowed. Yeah, she remembered. And she remembered the consequences.

“Do you know how to fire a laser gun?”

She shifted her thumb over the red button. “Here?”

He moved behind her, reaching to shape his larger hands around hers. His body might have been made of steel or stone for the hardness of muscle that molded her. She inhaled his masculine scent—woodsy and clean.

“Yes, but your forefinger has to hold down this lever at the same time—it’s the safety mechanism.” His warmth and nearness sent a cascade of not unpleasant sensations through her body. “Got it?”

“Yes, sir.” Her face heated, and she kicked herself for calling him sir. His commanding presence made it impossible not to address him with respect. He had certainly flexed his authority over her more than once.

He removed his hands from hers, his brows drawn together. Pointing an oversized finger at her, he said, “Do not leave this area. Do you understand me?”

“Loud and clear.” Her eyes settled on his finger, which, for some reason, her brain sized up in comparison to a penis. It was the size of a normal man’s length. The muscles in her pelvic floor lifted and contracted. If his fingers were that big, how large was his manhood?

She turned away to hide the blush spreading across her face. Hurrying to the cave, she gripped the gun, alert for wild animals. She didn’t see any lurking and the water did look inviting, so she stripped and stepped in.

It was warmer than a bath, but not too hot. Perfect, actually. She floated on her back and wondered about the large rebel.

When had he been a slave? Where had he won freedom and how? How long had he been fighting on the rebel’s side? She wondered what they wanted with her. Why had they not taken her entire team if they required the services of a medic? Why only her? While she believed he intended to keep her safe until he delivered her to his superiors, she didn’t know if going along docilely with the rebel’s plans for her was in her best interest.

She thought about the weapon he’d left with her. Perhaps she should take the upper hand and demand he return her to her clinic. She scrambled out of the water and shook off the droplets, pulling on her clothes while still damp. Her hand fit around the handle of the laser gun. She walked to the mouth of the cave and imagined confronting him.

Hearing the snap of a twig, she lifted her head, listening for his return. Sure enough, she heard footsteps. She lifted the laser gun and held it with both hands. Widening her stance, she aimed it for the place she expected him to appear.

His large frame appeared through the trees. His step faltered only for a half-second when his black gaze fell on the weapon. “You’d better fire before I take that from you.” He continued to stalk toward her.

Her fingers tightened, her thumb hovering over the red button. She considered shooting near his feet, or in the air as a warning, but before she’d arrived at any decision, he snatched the weapon from her trembling fingers.

He picked her up by the waist and carried her to a boulder. Sitting with his back against the stone, he pulled her to the ground and arranged her over his lap.

The first strike of his large palm on her ass made her shriek.

“I’d be quiet if I were you.”

She recalled the snarling beasts—What had he called them? Rye-wolves?—from the night before and clamped her lips closed.

He yanked her leggings down. The cool breeze across her cheeks made her shiver. He slapped again, this time on her bare flesh. Her instincts for self-preservation sent her scrambling off his lap.

He caught her and hauled her back, forcing her to look at him. She knelt beside him, her leggings tangled around her thighs, her bottom tingling.

“You can take your punishment with my hand, or I can cut a sweet-reed and give you a caning you won’t soon forget. Now, which will it be?”

She glared at him, her bottom clenching convulsively.

Thankfully, he didn’t make her answer, just jerked his head at his lap. “Lie down for your spanking.”

Her heart slammed against her ribs. She sure as hell didn’t want to find out what a caning felt like. But she also hated being cowed by the rebel.

He raised an eyebrow, and she dived over his lap. “Spread your legs.”

She went still. Did his voice sound rougher than usual? What the hell kind of game was this?

He slapped the back of her thigh. “Now, Doctor.”

She inched her thighs open. At least she had the G-string to cover her private parts.

He lit her butt on fire, striking first one cheek then the other, harder than she would have imagined possible. His palm covered the entire swell of each globe, and he packed a power behind his swats that made her squeeze her bottom together to avoid the pain.

“Ouch, that hurts,” she cried. But of course he knew that. He meant it to. “Ow, stop it.”

He didn’t stop. He spanked on and on. The initial shock of pain turned into a burning throb.

“Never, ever point a weapon you’re not willing to use.”

“Oomph...oh!” She struggled to draw a breath. “How did you know I wouldn’t use it?”

“You’re a doctor. Your entire ethos is to save lives, not take them.”

Well, damn. He had her there.

“A split second of hesitation could cost you your life, Doctor. When you point a lethal weapon, you’re inviting reciprocation. That was a stupid, stupid move.” He punctuated each word with punishing blows.

“Okay, okay,” she cried. “It was a stupid move. I’m sorry.”

He still continued spanking.

She twisted and turned, trying in vain to dodge the blows. “Ouch, please.” She sounded like a child. This man had reduced her to this—humiliated, with her pants down, across his lap, completely at his mercy. The ridiculousness of it didn’t diminish the pain or embarrassment. Worse, her pussy seemed to register every smack on a different scale than her ass because it pulsed and leaked with excitement. And with her thighs open, Blade had a perfect view of the soaked gusset of her panties.

~~*~~

The lower half of the little doctor’s ass had turned pink, his handprints staining her skin. He paused and rubbed her heated flesh. Hi gaze traced the miniscule piece of pink satin nested between her cheeks to the place where it widened just enough to cover her twat. He drew in a breath.

The fabric was wet.

He squeezed his eyes closed, willing his raging libido into check. He wasn’t a stranger to women who liked it rough. No doubt the ones who chose him did so for his fearsome appearance and presumed dominance. Gentle wasn’t part of his sexual repertoire. But he hadn’t expected it from her.

She wasn’t the submissive type.

He gave her bottom a pat and pulled up her leggings. With a backward tug on her hips, he helped her upright. “Kneel up and look at me.”

Her bottom settled onto her heels, kneeling to his right. Her face was red, and her eyes blazed. She drew her head back and spat on his cheek.

He sighed and hauled her back over his lap. She fought harder this time, twisting and rolling away from him. He pinned both her wrists behind her back and yanked down the leggings once more.

With one finger of the hand holding her wrists, he yanked up on her panties, pulling the fabric taut over her cunt and anus. He didn’t hold back this time, spanking her with his full strength.

Still, she continued to buck and writhe, cursing him and fighting like a little wildcat. She kicked and thrashed.

“Lara, lie still or I’ll cut a switch.” It was the first time he’d used her given name, and her entire body shuddered when he spoke it.

She went still.

“Good girl.”

He started to spank her again, but not as hard as he had when she’d fought him. If she was the type of woman who found sexual gratification from dominance, this could be cathartic for her. He imagined the past sixteen hours ranked high on her stress meter.

He slowed down, giving her firm, steady strokes, watching her bottom flatten and spring back as he punished her.

Her breath steadied, though it still rose and fell at a rapid rate. She faced away from him, her cheek resting on the ground. He watched her expression. She set her teeth and squeezed her eyes closed with each smack, a resolute look on her face.

How long would it take to break her? He wouldn’t want to spank her long enough to leave lasting marks, but if he could give her the release of tears or submission, it would make their day much easier.

He continued on, noting the moment her shoulders eased. Her body grew heavy on his thighs as she gave herself over to the spanking, accepting the pain he administered. He went on, lightening the spanks still more but maintaining the same rhythm. He gave another thirty spanks then stopped and released her wrists, rubbing her swollen ass.

She started to scramble up, but he put a hand on her lower back to hold her down and delivered several more swift spanks.

Her breath came out like a sob, but she didn’t speak.

He ran his callused palm over her red-hot bottom. His finger brushed across her damp panties, and she stiffened. He repeated the tour: around the curve of her ass, across the back of her thigh, up between her legs. He let his middle finger linger there, rubbing lightly.

“Do you want help with this, Doctor?”

She appeared to be holding her breath.

He continued the feather-light caresses. “Yes, or no, Doctor?”

“Yes.” Her voice sounded strangled.

He slid his finger under the gusset of her panties to dip it in her juices. Stroking along her slickened folds, he explored the plump labia then flicked her clit.

She jerked and spread her legs wider.

He peeled her scrap of panties down to her thighs, where her leggings had bunched up.

Her pussy was fucking gorgeous. She must have had the hair lasered at some point before she came to Jesel, because the light brown silk was short, as if growing back in. Dew made her slit glossy. He wanted to throw her on her back and suck that little fruit until she screamed. But that might be taking too much. Instead, he worshipped with his fingers—two this time—stroking along her slit, circling up to flick her stiffened clit then back down again. The moisture was unbelievable. It was as if the little doctor was born and bred for sex. Or maybe just for spanking.

She arched her back, lifting and spreading her bright red bottom. He nearly went dizzy at the sight. His fingers plunged into her depths of their own accord, shoving into the knuckles, then drawing back and shoving in again.

She cried out, a wanton sound that made his hardened cock throb against her hip. He dipped the middle finger of his other hand into her sopping channel for lubrication, then brought it to her anus.

She jumped and squeezed her little buns together, listing to the side at his touch there.

He responded by pumping two fingers into her cunt fast and hard.

Gasping, she opened her legs wider.

He removed his fingers completely and circled her clit, rubbing and pinching it.

Her moans grew louder. She was making too much noise, but he didn’t care. He’d fight off another pack of rye-wolves again in a heartbeat to watch his little doctor come unglued. Lubing his left finger again, he circled her little rosette at the same time he rubbed her clit.

When her hips bucked, he pinned her down. “Let me in.” His voice sounded hoarse and ragged to his ears.

She gave a cry of protest.

“Open for me,” he insisted.

The tight ring of muscles tightened then relaxed, and he pushed inside.

She immediately squealed.

He shoved three fingers into her cunt, pumping them as he buried a finger deep in her ass.

Her entire body spasmed, and her vaginal muscles squeezed.

He alternated pushing his fingers into her cunt then her ass, back and forth as she bucked and shuddered in wave after wave of release. It lasted at least thirty seconds—the most glorious display of female orgasm he’d ever had the pleasure of witnessing.

When at last she lay collapsed and panting over his lap, he eased his fingers out of her and wiped them on a handkerchief.

She didn’t move, and he didn’t feel inclined to help her. She looked so lovely—thoroughly spent with her ass painted rosy and the juices of her sex smeared between her legs. If she was his woman, he’d lift her to her hands and knees and pound her gorgeous little pussy from behind.

But she wasn’t. She was a highly trained surgeon, crucial to the revolution. And he probably should have shown a little more respect. Bailey would kill him if he knew what Blade had just done.

It occurred to him she might not think she had permission to get up, since the last time she’d tried, he’d held her down and smacked her. He forced himself to pull her panties and leggings up and lifted her to sit between his knees with her back against his chest. He pulled a bloodfruit from his pocket and handed it to her, along with his smallest hunting knife. He figured she wouldn’t want him cutting her fruit without washing his hands first, and he wasn’t ready to leave her.

She accepted the fruit, turning it over in her hands.

“Cut it in half. There’s no pit in the middle.”

She obeyed, slicing the ruby red fruit down the middle and holding it away from her as the blood-red juices ran. She looked over her shoulder at him questioningly.

“Take a bite, it’s sweet. You’ll like it.”

She leaned forward and bit into it. Even from where he sat, he had the view of her full lips closing around the juicy meat of the bloodfruit, and he longed to be holding it for her, feeding her himself.

She twisted to offer him a bite.

“You eat it, I have another in my pocket.” He’d given her the only ripe one—the other two he’d found were still sour—but he didn’t mind. Watching the eager way she bit into the fruit again made it worth it.

She ate the whole thing. and he offered her one of the unripe ones. She ate that one, too, then licked her stained lips. Fucking gorgeous.

~~*~~

Lara’s entire body still trembled from both the spanking and the orgasm. She hoped the fruit would calm the tremors, but having the burly warrior so close made it hard for her to pull it together. Her brain kept short-circuiting every time she thought about what had just happened. Both her pussy and her anus were sore from use, but the euphoria from her climax had the rest of her body languid. She didn’t understand what had made him pleasure her. One minute he’d been punishing her, the next… Well. Yeah. That happened.

She screwed up the courage to talk about it. “Why did you do that?”

Behind her, it seemed Blade stopped breathing. “You said yes.” His tone was slightly defensive, as if he thought she might feel violated.

Hell, she did feel violated, except he was right, she had said yes, though she hadn’t even understand what exactly she’d said yes to, at the time.

She scrubbed her face. “Yeah, but what made you think I wanted that?”

Again he stilled. “You’re the doctor.”

She nibbled her lip, turning his words over in her mind. What did he mean?

“I saw evidence of your need,” he explained. “If you’re asking why a spanking aroused you, you’ll have to ask yourself that.”

Inexplicably, she burst into tears.

Blade’s muscled arm snaked around her waist and pulled her back against his barrel chest. “Shh, it’s okay.”

She gulped in air, embarrassed at her tears. She had no idea why she was even crying. It was as if the shell of Dr. Lara Simmons had been cracked and some other self she didn’t know had been dumped out. She felt weak and needy. She wanted to crawl into Blade’s arms and beg him to hold her. She wanted his approval, wanted to hear him call her “good girl” again. And none of that made sense to her, unless it was more of the Stockholm syndrome.

“Are you scared? I promise I’ll get you out of this canyon in one piece.”

She sniffled.

“Do you believe me?”

“Yes.” A sob choked her and she snuffled.

“Are you crying over your spanking?”

“No.” Her voice wobbled. Yes. Maybe.

“Are you worried about what will happen to you?”

She didn’t answer.

He cupped the back of her head to turn it and thumbed away her tears. “They want you for a surgery. For someone crucial to the revolution.”

She drew in a breath, blessed focus returning with this nugget of information. “Why me? Aren’t there other surgeons on the planet?”

“None sympathetic to our cause. And it’s a tricky surgery. So it requires someone with your skill. Someone with knowledge of the latest medicine from Earth, but also with hands-on experience. You’re one of five like that in all the galaxies.”

She mulled that over, her foolish ego preening at his words. She loved being needed. To a fault. It was what made her risk her life to work as an Interplanetary Samaritan. Her professional curiosity had her mind spinning, wondering what type of surgery it might be and the identity of the patient.

“We’d better keep moving. I need to find a way to get you to the camp. Hopefully today.”

“Where is camp? Is it far?”

“Yes. We can’t walk there. We’ll have to find our way out of this canyon and take a ship.” He lifted her to her feet as he stood. “Let’s move.”

He stalked off ahead, and she watched his impressive figure—the solid muscle bulging and rippling as he walked.

He turned back, his dark gaze traveling over her face. The fierce hardness she usually saw there was gone, replaced with...what was it? Concern? He took two long strides back toward her and held out his hand.

Surprised, she met his gaze, her tummy fluttering as she placed her palm in his. He tugged her along, holding branches away for her and pointing out fallen logs and holes to keep her from tripping.

He stopped to wash his hands in the river and cut them each another length of sweet-reed to suck on. It was like a straw, filled with a thin nectar, refreshing and sweet. The canyon itself was beautiful—jagged stone walls striated with shades of pink, orange, blue, and purple. The river sparkled turquoise blue, begging her to drink from it. What a shame it had been polluted like all the rivers on Earth. She imagined that hurt the original Jeselians more than anything.

They walked in silence for the remainder of the morning and into the afternoon. Days were shorter on Jesel, and she still hadn’t grown accustomed to how fast they went by, although the shorter nights suited her. She’d always suffered from insomnia. Here, she didn’t have as long a stretch of lying awake, worrying about how she should be asleep.

Blade stopped and crouched beside a planted decked with fat orange berries.

“Lemonberries.” He held one up to her mouth. It seemed too intimate to let him feed her, but hunger won out over compunction and she parted her lips for him. He popped the berry onto her tongue, and she bit into it. A sweet-sour taste exploded in her mouth.

“Mmm.”

He grinned, holding out his cupped palm, which he’d filled with them. “You like them?”

She accepted the handful. She’d never tasted anything so magnificent. The flavor overwhelmed her senses. Like a child, she shoved the entire handful into her mouth at once, her cheeks full as she chewed.

He chuckled. “I guess that’s a yes?”

She crouched down, picking them as fast as her fingers could fly, shoving them in her already full mouth, juice dripping down her chin.

Blade didn’t eat any himself, just gathered them and held them out to her, his dark eyes glittering with amusement.

She reached to pick more, but he made a quiet noise in his throat and caught her hand. Pointing at a beautiful flying creature sitting atop a berry, he smiled. It blended in, its wings the same color as the lemonberry.

“Berryhawk.” His voice came low but filled with warmth or even reverence. “They change color depending on which berry they land on. Like the chameleons on Earth.”

She smiled, watching the tiny bird-like insect with its glittering wings. “She’s beautiful.”

He held his palm out flat beside the creature and she stepped onto it, her wings changing to the color of his skin. “You see?”

“Amazing,” she breathed.

A breeze blew, and the little creature took off, flitting above their heads while they watched.

Blade took her hand in his once more. “Come on.”

She looked longingly back at the lemonberries but didn’t want to be disagreeable. Not when he’d shown her his sweeter side.

The canyon walls grew lower, and her confidence in Blade’s ability to lead them out of it increased. Blade, however, became more cautious as they lost their cover of the high cliffs and overgrowth. He insisted they inch along in the shadows while he constantly swept the area with his attentive gaze.

“Come on, we’ll crawl out here.” He stopped when the walls reached about ten feet in height.

She looked at the rock face dubiously.

He pulled the coil of rope off his belt and tied it around her waist. She flushed, remembering the way he’d knotted her hands behind her back before he whipped her. Her pussy clenched.

He must have caught her blush because his gaze lingered on her face, a trace of curiosity there. One corner of his mouth hinted at a smile, but it disappeared as quickly as it had come. “Let’s go.” He touched her back.

Holding one end of the rope, he quickly scaled the rock face, as if the effort was no more challenging than climbing a ladder. “Okay, now you climb. If you slip, I have you,” he said, tugging the rope.

She curled her fingertips around the edge of stone in the rock face the way she’d seen him do, and found a toehold. Drawing a deep breath, she reached for the next one. And slipped.

Blade’s rope caught her, cutting into her waist as she dangled backward in the air. She swung back and hit the rock again. Before she could even try to find another handhold, Blade began to lift her dead weight, pulling the rope hand over hand.

“Wait—I can help,” she offered, but he’d already pulled her to the top. She flushed, feeling stupid. “I’m sorry. I’m no good at this stuff.”

He untied the knot at her waist with deft movements. “We don’t need you to be good at this stuff. We need you for your skill with a scalpel.”

“What kind of surgery is it?” she asked, but, of course, he ignored her, walking away and looking all around.

If she’d thought he’d taken long strides before, he walked even faster now, so that every few steps she had to jog to catch up. “Where are we going?”

He didn’t answer. It seemed he was back to the gruff, uncommunicative boor from the day before. She supposed he was like this when focused, but, even so, it hurt her feelings. That was stupid. She should not be forming an attachment to this man. She’d let him give her pleasure in a moment of weakness, but that didn’t mean he had feelings for her. She needed to stop thinking like a little fool.

They crested a hill, and Blade stopped. Something about his posture and stance made her tense and, when she reached his side, she saw why. Below them lay the ruins of a small city.

Metal and concrete lay in piles of rubble.

“Sansimon.”

“What?”

“This used to be Sansimon. A peaceful settlement with dairy farms and cheese factories. The Republicans hadn’t enslaved the Jeselians because they needed the food grown here.”

“What happened?”

His black gaze swiveled to her, the hard fierceness returned. She remembered the name they’d called him on his comms unit: Vengeance. It fit the man before her. “What do you think?”

“The Republicans changed their minds?”

He gave a single nod and started down the hill, the set of his shoulders making him look like a man never to be crossed.

~~*~~

He’d heard of Sansimon’s demise a year ago, but this was the first time he’d seen the devastation. Sansimon had managed to exist as a free territory largely because they claimed complete pacifism. But as more escaped slaves sought refuge there, it had become an underground rebel camp. By outward appearances, it was primitive and simple—farmlands and pasture, rickety old wooden structures with outhouses. Treedle’s army had bombed it after they found two escaped slaves there, but they hadn’t known to look for the underground tunnels and buildings secretly used by the Jesel, or they surely would have destroyed them, too.

He found an intact airship in an underground bunker. Unfortunately, the solar tubes had cracked, so he couldn’t power it up.

“I’m going to see if there are any intact solar tubes in the settlement. I want you to stay here. Do not leave this bunker. Do not touch anything.” He gave her his sternest look. He couldn’t risk her wandering around—there might be explosives anywhere or even other scavengers around.

She scowled.

He reached for the rope at his belt. “I can tie you up.”

Her eyes narrowed, but she took a step back.

He unclipped his laser gun and held it out. “Stay right here. It may not be safe out there.”

She took the gun. “What if something happens to you?”

“Look for a comms unit and identify yourself as a Samaritan. But I’ll be back.” He turned and ducked his head to walk out the hatch. The pinprick heat of the sighting laser of the gun touched the center of his back. “Very funny,” he said, without turning back.

“Hmmph.”

He almost chuckled. He found her feistiness sexy as hell.

When he returned with an armful of solar tubes scrounged from the wreckage, he found her still in the ship, emptying cabinets. “I found these MREs.” She held up several packs of ready-to-eat meal rations from Earth. “Do you think they’re safe?”

He liked that she’d grown more cautious. Or maybe he just liked that she’d asked him before tearing into them. “Yes.”

She extended her arm to offer him one.

“Later. You go ahead and eat.” He hated packaged food from Earth. Jesel didn’t have any industrialized farming or food production. Here, they ate from the land as hunter-gatherers. They used to farm, too, before Treedle and his mines demolished their peaceful way of life.

He searched for a toolkit and carried it over to the control dash. He’d worked on this make and model before, and while the airships themselves were slow and clunky to fly, the engineering was blessedly simple. He had a fair degree of confidence he’d be able to get them in the air by nightfall. He detached the casing and pulled it off to expose the workings of the engine. The positioning of the solar tubes required him to crawl underneath and lie on his back to install them. There hadn’t been an illuminator or any kind of light in the toolbox, so he’d have to go by feel.

Forty minutes later, he had just finished installing the first tube when a low growl reached his ears.

“Ah...Blade?” The doctor’s voice had a tremor.

He moved slowly, easing out from under the dash. A bluehound stood in the doorway, its ears folded back, teeth bared. The red light of his laser gun danced on its forehead. “Hold your fire, Lara,” he said softly, unfolding his long limbs to come to his full height.

The dog had a worn collar around its neck, but if it had come from Sansimon, it had been running wild for at least a year. “Easy, boy,” he said. He held out his hand. “I’ll bet you’re hungry, aren’t you?”

He advanced, and the canine took two steps back, head lowered, growl still rumbling in its throat.

“Hand me an MRE,” he said, without taking his focus off the canine. Lara passed him the meal, and he opened it, slowly lowering it to the floor at his feet. If the dog wanted it, he’d have to come in close to get it.

The animal stopped growling and sniffed.

“Here, boy. Come and get it.”

The bluehound took one step forward and stopped, sniffing again.

“Come, boy.”

His ears pricked forward, the bluehound darted forward, catching the edge of the MRE between his teeth and dragging it backward.

Blade and the doctor watched as the canine gulped the meal in about ten seconds flat.

“I thought you were hungry. Want another one?”

The dog wagged his tail.

“Sit.”

He sat immediately, as if remembering the command, then popped back up uncertainly.

Blade held out his hand for another MRE. “I said, sit.”

The dog sat.

“Good boy.” He unwrapped the meal and set it on the floor in front of his feet. “Come.”

The dog lunged forward and grabbed the meal, this time not retreating quite as far with it.

~~*~~

Lara inched closer to Blade, and the vicious dog bared its teeth at her and growled.

“No.” Blade’s deep commanding bark made her jump and nearly shriek. It took her a moment to realize he was pointing a finger at the dog. Not her. She’d laugh if she wasn’t so terrified.

The animal lowered his head submissively. Apparently it knew to acknowledge the alpha in the room. Smart creature.

Blade reached out and took his laser gun from her hand, slipping it back into the holster at his belt.

“A-Are you sure he’s safe?” Her damn voice quavered.

Blade contemplated the dog. “No. He’s probably still dangerous. But I believe I can handle him.”

A shiver ran down her spine. Something about the way he so expertly tamed and dominated the dog seemed too familiar. Like with the stupid dog, he triggered some instinctive submission deep within her, becoming her master, reducing her not only to obedience, but to an eagerness to please him. It made him both irresistibly attractive and completely odious to her at the same time. She didn’t want to be lowered to a groveling canine.

She stepped behind him to shield herself from the dog.

The corner of Blade’s mouth had kicked up. “Wild animals aren’t your thing, are they, Doctor?”

She blew out a breath. “We don’t have many of them left on Earth.”

The dog finished eating and wagged his tail again. Blade pointed out the door. “Go on,” he said. “Out.”

The dog lowered his head and slinked toward the door, looking back a few times.

“You can shut the hatch, if you want. He won’t go far.”

“Are we keeping him?” She wasn’t sure what she thought of that plan.

“Yes.” Blade spoke from under the dash again, where he’d returned to his work. He’d removed his shirt before resuming his position, giving her full view of his washboard abdominals and the chiseled chest muscles above them.

There was something so sexy about a man who fixed things. Well, also about a man who fought off wild animals. And protected foolish women from enemy attack. And started fires by rubbing twigs. Yes, Blade oozed masculine prowess of the most basic kind.

Earth men no longer knew how to do any of the things he’d done. Spending all their time indoors, they sat and worked with robotics and machines. Smaller, and pastier, and wimpy, they wouldn’t last two hours in a Jeselian canyon. Maybe that’s why she’d never had an interest in dating. No man could ever pull her focus away from her work.

But this man...he affected her on some deep, primal level. Her rational brain played little part in the attraction. It was more like her body had been wired to respond to an alpha male, and now that she’d finally met one, every cell was waking up, sending messages of arousal and submission zinging along her neural pathways. Her body responded with heat, moisture, and weakness. Surrender. Pliancy. If the Neanderthal under the dash ordered her to her knees to suck his cock at that moment, she had no doubt she’d do it. And damn if that idea didn’t wind her crank even tighter.

She paced the length of the control deck, trying to clear her scrambled thoughts.

Blade hoisted himself out from under the dash and hit several buttons on it. The screens lit up. “Get the dog,” he said without turning.

“Me?”

He ignored her and crossed the room, opening the hatch. “Come, boy.”

The canine trotted in, lowering his head and allowing Blade to scratch his ears.

She took a step forward, and the dog growled.

Blade cuffed it lightly. “I said no. She’s with me. You will protect her with your life.” He put his palm under the dog’s snout to lift it while he gestured in her direction. “Protect. Her.”

The dog had lowered its head again.

“Doctor, come here, please.”

She drew in a shaky breath and stepped to his side.

“Hold out your hand, palm down.”

She did as he instructed, and the dog sniffed her.

“Protect her.”

The dog actually licked her fingers. The same damn dog that had wanted to eat her when it showed up less than an hour before.

Blade touched her back. “Okay?”

She wasn’t sure if he was talking to the dog or her.

“I won’t let him hurt you. Stick close to me, and it will be fine.”

There was a theme to their time together. She nodded her agreement.

“Okay. Buckle up. I’m going to try to get this thing off the ground.”

As it turned out, there was no trying necessary. The hovercraft lifted into the air, wobbled, and soared into the air.

Blade’s fingers moved on the dash, punching in coordinates, adjusting altitude and speed. Was there nothing the man couldn’t do well?

The canine whined when their world tipped and swooped, but it seemed to trust Blade. She had no choice but to do the same.

They’d flown for forty-five minutes when the comms unit lit up.

“Ship number 80953, identify yourself.”

“The hand of vengeance strikes.”

“And justice will be served.” The voice over the comms unit held a note of glee, as if Blade’s transmission came as a victory.

“I have the package in hand. Rendezvous at Bravo Six. Repeat, Rendezvous at Bravo Six.”

“Copy that, Vengeance. Welcome back.”

For some ridiculous reason, the dispatcher’s familiarity with Blade sent a spike of jealousy ripping through her gut. Not because the voice was female, but because they seemed to share a camraderie, which she hadn’t even thought Blade capable of. Or maybe it was the realization that once she, aka “the package,” was delivered, he’d be through with her. Because bringing her in had been nothing more than a job to him, and he’d succeeded at it, like he succeeded at everything.

She watched as he landed the craft in what appeared to be the middle of nowhere. She peered out the windows. “Where are we?”

“Just a rendezvous point. This craft doesn’t have cloaking abilities, so we’ll need to get into headquarters on one that does.” He flicked a button, and the hatch slid open. The dog bolted outside, sniffing and marking his territory.

A knot of worry tightened in her gut. She resisted the urge to twist her fingers together. “So...what happens now?”

His gaze held sympathy, which she hated. Did she sound that scared? “No one will hurt you. I told you already, you’re needed for a surgery. When it’s done, you’ll be free to go. You have my word.”

She ought to be relieved by his statement, but, stupidly, all she felt was loss. She’d be parting ways with this man, and every cell in her body screamed it was wrong. They had unfinished business. Of the mating kind. Well, that was stupid. Just because her hormones had finally kicked in at the ripe old age of thirty-two, didn’t mean she needed to act on them. It wouldn’t be wise, for sure.

An electrostatic energy filled the craft, and she heard the faint hum of a cloaked ship arriving. The air shimmered in front of them then the outline of a small Nudercraft appeared.

“Let’s go.” Blade stood and unbuckled her harness. He took her hand in his and led her out.

A young man and a boy not more than fourteen years old walked toward them.

“Vengeance,” the young rebel soldier exclaimed. A wide grin split his face. The boy looked even more enthusiastic, hero worship shining in his gaze.

Blade gave them each a man-hug, clapping them on the back. He whistled to the canine, who trotted over as if he’d always been Blade’s trusted pet.

“I knew you’d make it,” the boy said.

“Did anyone else return?”

The young man sobered and shook his head. “No, sir.”

Blade closed his eyes for a moment and looked grim. “I didn’t think so.”

The young man’s gaze shifted to her. “But you brought the package.”

“Leeman, Alyx, this is Doctor Lara Simmons. She’s been through a lot, so take good care of her.”

She’d been walking alongside the men, but she stopped in her tracks at his words. “Where are you going?”

“You’ll be all right. You have my word.”

It was foolish, but her nose burned and she had to suck in a deep breath to push back the wedge of emotion that threatened to release.

“Tell Bailey I’ll report for debriefing by nightfall.” He’d already dismissed her and spoke now to his young soldier.

Her throat closed.

He turned to the boy. “Alyx, I want you to be the doctor’s shadow. Protect her. Serve her. Make sure she has everything she needs. If she says jump, what do you say?”

“How high, sir,” Alyx exclaimed.

“That’s right.”

Blade looked at her. For the first time, she saw discomfort on his face. He hesitated then offered her his hand. “Doctor.”

It was childish, but she lifted her nose in the air and ignored the proffered palm, stalking away to the Nudercraft. She sensed Blade’s eyes on her back but didn’t turn, simply climbed in the open hatch and took a seat, buckling herself in. When she finally had the courage to look over, all she saw was Blade’s back as he and the dog walked back to the hovercraft and stepped inside. Their eyes met through the windshield, but she couldn’t read anything in his expression—not hurt or anger or irritation. Why would he care, anyway? Just because she sat there trembling like a leaf didn’t mean he felt anything at all about their parting.

She said nothing on the short flight into headquarters. When they arrived, she forgot everything because a young woman met them at the hatch, breathless. “Dr. Simmons, a transport ship just arrived with three hundred wounded. Can you help?”

She surged to her feet, the familiar zing of adrenaline already pumping through her veins. “Take me to them.”

Chapter Four

Blade walked through the rows of bloodied and injured Jeselians illuminated by the light of torch flame. There had been a time when each senseless act of violence on the part of Treedle’s army, every innocent’s death, every needless bombing like the one that caused all these injuries fueled his inner rage. He’d used it to stoke the indomitable fire that had made him a legend and leader among the rebels.

But, now, with the possibility of a new, peaceful Jesel so close, with the final battle of the revolution planned, he no longer wanted to be that man. Or was it something about being around the civilized little doctor that had changed him?

He’d been trying to forget her for the past thirty hours, since they’d parted without so much as a handshake. She hated him for what he’d done. He didn’t regret it—he’d disciplined her in order to keep her safe. He’d known it wasn’t done on Earth and that physical punishment would shock her, and he’d done it anyway. Even so, her rebuff had wounded him in a way he hadn’t thought possible. He’d barricaded his heart years ago, when he watched his sister, Tarin, die at their slave-master’s hand. He’d shut off all emotions but rage, denied all urges but the quest for justice and retribution.

Now, all he could seem to think about was Lara Simmons, the one doctor capable of restoring the health of Sheel Black, lynchpin to the revolution. Except he wasn’t musing on her talent with the scalpel, which was said to be excellent. No, he was thinking about the intelligence behind her cornflower blue eyes, her steadfast courage and pluck despite being so very far out of her comfort zone, and, dammit, yes, the way her body felt pressed against his own. The way her pussy had plumped and opened like an exotic flower to his touch, her bewilderment at what had transpired between them. Somehow, his time with her had left him tangled up in her threads. Every thought led him back to her.

She was the reason he was winding through the canvas medic tents instead of asleep in his own. He had to know how she fared—to make sure her needs had been met, although he knew for certain Bailey would have already done so, if Alyx had failed. He dropped a hand to Dog, who trotted by his side, ever faithful.

He heard her quiet voice before he saw her. She was giving orders to Alyx, who she had playing nurse, in the same capable and efficient way she’d handled the surgery they’d barged in on. A natural leader, her confidence and intelligence shone through.

Bailey stood beside her. “Dr. Simmons, we are infinitely grateful for your service to the wounded, but I must insist you get some rest. You’ve been working for two Jeselian days without sleep.”

“I cannot sleep when there are still critical wounds that have to be tended. I’ve lost too many lives already—and many of them could have been saved.” Her voice held a note of desperation. If she hadn’t slept the night before, she must be keyed up and half-sick with exhaustion.

“You are no good to them if you cannot see or think straight. We need you at your best, Doctor, for a critical patient.”

Lara rounded on Bailey, and Blade saw fire flash in her eyes. “Commander Bailey, I appreciate that you have some secret plan to use my skills, but I am a doctor. I do not discriminate when saving lives, except by prioritizing those in most critical need. And, right now, there are still at least thirty-five trauma patients whose lives are dangling by a thread, so if you’ll excuse me...”

He’d heard enough. Lara would keep working until she dropped dead on the dirt floor, if he didn’t stop her. He swooped in and tossed her light frame over his shoulder. “I’ll see that the good doctor makes it to her bed, Commander.”

“What the—?” Lara pounded her little fists on his back and kicked her legs. “Let me down, you big oaf!”

Dog trotted behind.

“Stop licking my face, you mongrel!”

He chuckled that his new pet understood his feelings for the doctor, despite the fact she fought him.

He ignored her antics, striding inside the main building, where he guessed they’d given her one of the few, coveted indoor bedrooms. He swung open the door and carried her inside then dropped her to her feet.

“Out.” He looked at Dog and pointed at the door. Dog gave him a forlorn look, but dutifully trotted out. “Stay.” He snapped and pointed to the floor outside the door. Dog lay down. “Good boy.” He went back in and shut the door behind them.

Lara stood glaring with her hands on her hips, her face flushed an enchanting shade of pink.

His cock twitched. He loved her feisty. “Now, are you going to go to bed quietly, or do you need me to help you?”

He didn’t expect acquiescence of any kind from her. She’d been running on adrenaline for almost two planet rotations, which he knew from personal experience made it impossible to settle down, much less sleep.

Her lip curled as she regarded him with a mixture of shock and disbelief. Even so, a blush crept up her neck. She opened her mouth then closed it again. He suspected she wanted to ask how he intended to help her, but had thought better of it.

She moved for the door, but he stepped to block her path.

“You have until the count of three to get yourself in that bed. One...two...three.”

Lara hadn’t moved. She gaped at him.

One corner of his mouth turned up as he reached for her waist and lifted her into the air. “I kind of figured things would go this way.”

“Wait.” She kicked her legs and gripped his wrists. “Put me down.”

He plopped down on the cot and angled her over his knees with her torso resting on the narrow bed. Someone must have provided her with a change of clothes because the leggings were different, and, when he peeled them down, the scrap of fabric she’d worn as panties had been replaced with a lacey purple pair.

He smiled at the sight and pulled them down, as well, caging Lara’s flailing hand when she reached back to catch them. He clapped his palm down on one cheek hard then rubbed away the sting. He repeated the action on the other side. “This isn’t punishment, Doctor. It’s tension release. You’re too wound up to sleep.” He smacked her again.

“Damn straight I’m too—”

He picked up both the speed and intensity of the slaps, which made her gasp and choke on her words.

“The sooner you relax into this, the sooner it will be over.”

“You can’t march into my clinic, throw me over your shoulder and—ow! God, that hurts! Stop it!”

She twisted to the side enough to reach back with her other hand to cover herself. He grabbed it and pinned it to her other wrist against her lower back.

“Naughty, naughty, Doctor. You are hardly cooperating.” He kept up with the spanking, slapping one side then the other, aiming for the lower half of her cheeks. He was enjoying himself—too much, he knew, but he could hardly help it. He loved taming her, it seemed.

With her panties down, he had full view of her little pussy. Dew glistened at her entrance, begging his touch.

His cock went rock hard, his heart beating erratically. The fact that Dr. Lara Simmons grew aroused by his spankings did something to him. As if she was the greatest conquest of all—of a battle he hadn’t even realized he’d wanted to fight. She represented something so unattainable, so far removed from his existence, and yet she responded to him this way. He stopped spanking and ran his palm over her beautiful buttocks.

She opened her thighs.

He stopped breathing. “Is that an invitation, Doctor?”

She went still. They both remained motionless, tension crackling in the small room. She didn’t answer.

~~*~~

Blade released her wrists and wound his fingers into her hair, gripping the roots to pull her head up. It didn’t hurt but had the effect of proving his easy dominance over her. “I asked you a question.” His voice was low and gravelly, but not flinty hard. No, it carried a deep, rich warmth that entered through her ears and slithered all the way down to her curling toes.

“Yes.” It came out as no more than a whisper, but Blade heard it. His fingers slid between her thighs, rubbing up her slit. God, she’d never been so wet. Never in her entire life. Her eyes rolled back in her head as he stroked, the stinging of the slaps he’d landed seeming to increase with the pleasure.

He shifted and angled one hand underneath her, the pad of his finger directly over the swollen button of her clitoris.

She wriggled against it, wanting more, but his other palm slapped down on her ass, sending sparks of pain mingling with the pleasure. She let out a little cry. He spanked her slowly while he worked her over with his other hand. She bucked and moaned, need and desire winding up like a tight coil. She lifted her ass to meet his hand, wanting more of the spanking—the solid slaps somehow grounding her, prolonging her time to orgasm, even as they drove her closer to it.

“Oh, God,” she gasped.

She wrangled her hand under her hips and covered his fingers with her own, urging him to bring her to completion.

He chuckled but spanked harder, catching her on the back of her thigh.

She arched like a plank, her bottom squeezing together.

He removed his fingers from her pussy and pushed hers against her mons. One of her fingers slid in, guided by her natural lubricant. Holy hell, in her entire thirty-two years, she’d never finger-fucked herself. Sure, she’d rubbed her clit, but this was so...dirty… Her mind scrambled.

“Please,” she whimpered.

His hand continued to rise and fall, blistering her quivering cheeks as she shoved her fingers in her own twat. When his thumb pressed against her anus, she shattered. Lights danced before her eyes as waves of pleasure rolled through her. She let out a continuous moan as her muscles contracted around her own fingers and her inner thighs squeezed.

Blade stopped spanking and squeezed her burning globes, his grip possessive and hungry. A blissful languor spread through her limbs, easing her aching muscles and slowing her breath. Her body seemed impossibly heavy as she lay across his lap, limp as a rag doll.

Blade pulled up her lace panties, which felt too rough and scratchy against her raw cheeks. Her leggings followed.

She wanted to offer him something in return, even though her ego craved giving him a piece of her mind. But the pleasure coursing through her overruled pride. The thought of dropping to her knees at his feet sent a renewed pulse of lust straight to her pussy.

Before she could make herself move, Blade rolled her up into his arms, standing and rotating to lay her on the cot with her head at the pillow. He pulled a chair up beside the bed and sat in it, dropping a large hand onto her head. His fingers moved in her hair, massaging her scalp with a slow, unambitious pulse.

“You’ll feel better in the morning, Doctor,” he murmured.

She literally couldn’t keep her eyelids open. She still had half a mind to argue that he had no right to put her to bed, and certainly had no right to spank her ass rosy red. She wanted to ask him how the hell he always seemed to know what she needed, whether it was what she wanted or not. But, most of all, she wanted him to lie down beside her with an arm around her waist, the way he had that night they’d spent in the canyon.

None of those things happened. Or, if they did, she missed them as dreams took over her consciousness and she slipped into the most restful sleep of her life.

Chapter Five

He wasn’t sure how Bailey had harangued him into attending the ’president’s examination. His job had been to deliver the doctor to camp, nothing more. If Bailey thought he had some kind of persuasive power or sway over the surgeon, he’d be disappointed to know that Blade’s diplomacy relied on nothing more than his use of a leather belt across her delightful little ass.

She sat beside Sheel Black’s hospital bed, studying the holographic results of all her brain scans. She touched the image and rotated, magnifying the area with the dark blob. Turning to their deposed president, she asked, “When did the symptoms begin?”

“The headaches and nausea started about two years ago,” Sheel said. She looked ancient. She must be eighty-five in Earth years. He’d discovered her hidden by her people in Treboth. When Treedle had overthrown her democratic rule, she’d been rumored to have been killed, but her most loyal supporters in the capital had managed to squirrel her away. He’d caught wind she was still alive five years ago, and it took him another year and a half to find her.

“The vision loss as well?”

“No, that’s only been this past year.”

“Has anyone given you a diagnosis yet?”

President Black waved her hand in the direction of the hologram projected in front of them. “Well, it doesn’t take a genius to interpret the big black splotch inside my skull.”

“Right. It’s a mixed glioma tumor. The pressure on the optic nerve has caused your vision loss.”

“Can you remove it?”

“Yes. With the right equipment.” She turned around and looked at Bailey. “I assume if you have these diagnostic machines, you also have a full surgical suite? I was told in the clinic you lacked both local and general anesthesia. Are you keeping some in reserve?”

Bailey looked uncomfortable. “Actually, anesthesia’s the one thing we do not have. Our supplies were blown up and other attempts to procure drugs have failed. I believe you witnessed the most recent failure.”

Lara shook her head decisively. “Then it’s impossible. Not until you get the medication.”

Sheel grasped her arm. “We cannot wait. Time is running out. I need this surgery now.”

Lara looked back at the hologram. “President Black, your time is not—”

“Not my time,” the old woman interrupted. “The revolution’s. It is time to rally my people, and I cannot do it blind and unable to think straight. The Jesel people need to know I am alive and well to lead them if they succeed in overthrowing Treedle. I want you to do the surgery without anesthesia.”

“Impossible. I can’t do it.”

Bailey cleared his throat. “My understanding is the anesthesia is simply for pain management. Does it stand to reason that the president will be completely unconscious from the pain, anyway?”

Lara’s face paled, and she appeared disgusted. She stood up. “Commander, Madam President, with all due respect, if you think I’m going to saw open someone’s skull and cut a tumor out without the ability to slow her vitals and eliminate the pain, you are insane.” She stepped toward the door, but Bailey blocked it.

He shot Blade a look of entreaty. Blade answered with a shrug. Bailey was the mastermind behind the revolution, not Blade.

“We’ll numb her with grain alcohol.”

Lara’s lip curled.

“Please, Doctor,” the president croaked. “I understand there are risks. I know I may not wake from it. But I want to try. Please don’t turn your back on me and my entire planet simply because something has never been done before. I thought you were known for making do with few resources.”

Lara rolled her eyes and paced the tiny room. “Making do and sawing someone’s—” she broke off, looking at the president. “I’m sorry.”

President Black waved her hand. “I’m not bothered by it. You may speak as graphically about the procedure as you like. It will not scare me. To be honest, Doctor, the pain in my head has been so bad, I’ve wished I were dead more days than not. So even if you end up killing me, you’ll be doing me a favor.”

Lara groaned, but she stared at the floor as if thinking. When her eyes lifted, they were directed at him. “Dasha.”

He raised his eyebrows in question.

“Pardon me?” Bailey asked.

“The Varusian healer.”

Understanding dawned. “One of your Samaritans.”

“Yes,” she said, turning to the president. “She might be able to put you under using mind control.”

President Black winced and held her hands to her skull as if the pain had suddenly become intense. “Let’s do it,” she said in a strangled voice.

“I’ll get a team together,” Blade said, striding for the door. “Anything else you need from that clinic?”

She nodded. “I’ll make a list. Too bad your team lost our anesthetic when they were shot down.” Her eyes lingered on his face, with some kind of question.

He’d avoided seeing her since he’d spanked her and put her to bed two nights before. He supposed he felt some guilt for the liberties he’d taken, both in spanking and in pleasuring her, even though he’d obtained consent for the latter. While he could rationalize that correcting her had been necessary for their survival out in the canyon, taking charge of her here at camp was another story. He wasn’t her husband. Not even a boyfriend or lover.

He couldn’t imagine what had come over him, except for the certainty that since that first time she’d come, dripping and pulsing all over his fingers, the most irrational part of him considered her to be his. He’d taken her welfare on as his responsibility, when, in fact, she’d probably prefer he jumped off a cliff. So he’d kept out of her sphere until Bailey had summoned him to the meeting.

He gave her a slight bow, acknowledging her elevated position among them. Educated and civilized, she sat much higher on the social strata than an escaped slave like himself.

She dropped her eyes, and he made his escape before he said something stupid.

~~*~~

Lara scanned the treeline for the incoming airship. Blade should have been back with Dasha by now. She knew from Bailey that he’d left the day before and had planned to be back by nightfall. So something had gone wrong—again.

At some point since the big warrior had captured her, she had become a sympathizer with the rebel cause.

More than one night that week she lain in bed, too wound up from all the medical crises to sleep, and half-wished her fierce warrior rebel would come put her to bed with a warm bottom and well-stroked pussy. Because that seemed to be the cure for her insomnia.

She remembered the spankings he’d given her. Replayed that whipping in the canyon, her wrists trussed behind her, his belt smarting her bare skin until she screamed. Only, in her fantasy, it didn’t end with him shoving her up the tree and fighting off rye-wolves. It ended with his banging her from behind. Hard. Sometimes she even imagined him parting her cheeks and shoving his cock into her back hole. And she’d never before been interested in anal sex. Hell, she hadn’t even been interested in regular sex. Not until now.

She’d been too career-oriented for relationships or even recreational sex. She’d been the geek—graduating from both high school and college early to pursue medicine. She’d lived in the labs, consumed the latest studies like candy. Once she began working, she lived on the adrenaline of crisis and trauma. It was an addiction, she supposed. Her dreams were only of attending to trauma victims. Until the past few nights, when she’d been visited instead by images of Blade using her body as he pleased.

What would it be like to be a Jeselian wife? To have a dominant, protective man like Blade in charge of her. To live under his hand.

The airship fully materialized and landed. She watched the hatch open and a big dog run out. Her heart jumped in her chest. Dasha came out next, followed by several soldiers then Blade.

Lara ran to meet her colleague, who jogged toward her with a smile.

“Dasha, thank you for coming!”

The Varusian laughed. “I wasn’t aware I had a choice.”

“No, you didn’t. But I wouldn’t have asked for you if I didn’t truly need you here. And we’re safe enough.”

Dasha nodded, her violet eyes full of wisdom. “I know.” She lifted her fingertips to touch Lara’s sternum and cocked her head. “You’ve changed, my friend.”

“What?” But she shook her head, blushing. She really didn’t want Dasha to elaborate on that statement. Not out there on the field, anyway. Maybe in private, later. But, even then, she wasn’t sure she’d want to hear how she’d changed. “What took you so long? We expected the ship back yesterday.”

“They couldn’t get into the clinic because the Republicans were on heavy patrol, so they had to land quite a distance away and travel on foot.”

“On foot? Are you well? Do you need food or drink? Or rest?”

“I am fine. Your warrior took good care of me.”

“My warrior?” Once more, she didn’t care to hear her friend explain why she considered Blade to be her warrior. “Never mind.” She took Dasha’s arm and led her into the single low-slung mud-brick building, built into the side of a hill so it was hardly noticeable to anyone flying over. Of course, the sprawl of canvas sleeping yurts, medical tents, and dining tents didn’t blend quite so well, but she understood the place was cloaked using the magnetic waves from a large airship buried underground.

Come in and I’ll brief you on the situation where you are most needed.”

She told her about the surgery for the exiled president of Jesel, as well as the lack of proper anesthesia as they walked to Sheel Black’s quarters. She tapped lightly on the door and opened it.

Her patient sat at the window, her forehead resting against the glass. She didn’t turn when they entered.

“President Black? My colleague has arrived. This is Dasha Sunman.”

The woman turned slowly, her eyes unfocused, the muscles of her face taut. “Thank you for coming.”

Dasha bowed. “The pleasure is mine.” She walked forward and stood before the president. “I normally look into a patient’s eyes to redirect their mind. I know you have lost most of your vision, but can you try to focus on my face?”

The president’s eyeballs turned and lifted slightly in the direction of Dasha’s voice.

Dasha looked at her for a few moments then shook her head. “May I touch your forehead?”

“Of course.”

She extended two fingers and placed them between President Black’s brows then shuddered at the contact, as if electrocuted. “Ah, yes, this will work.”

Sheel Black drew a deep breath, and her shoulders relaxed. “You took the pain away,” she said, wonder echoing in her voice.

Dasha gave a serene smile. “Good. Now, if you’ll go to the bed, I’m going to see if I can put you to sleep.”

The president settled herself on her hospital bed, and Dasha once more touched her forehead. The president’s eyes slid closed, and her body slumped back against the pillows.

“Do you want to test her pain threshold somehow?”

Lara cringed. Purposely causing injury to someone went against her every fiber. But Dasha was right; they had to be sure. She unwrapped a sterile needle and jabbed it mercilessly into the back of Black’s hand. Nothing happened.

Dasha nodded. “I can slow heart rate and respiration. I can control blood flow to some extent. We do not execute invasive procedures like this on my planet, but I believe this can work.”

“Good. That’s good news. We’ll do the surgery in the morning, then.”

The ground beneath them shook, sending supplies flying off the counter. Lara grabbed the handle of the door to stay upright. Get out into open air. That had been the advice for surviving a quake. Staying inside increased their chances of being crushed. Before she managed to yank the door open, the quake stilled. She exhaled in a long gust. Her legs shook.

Dasha’s amethyst eyes were round. “I hope this doesn’t mean more injured.”

“So do I,” she said grimly.

Chapter Six

“Major fault line opened near Brunnick,” Bailey reported, turning from the screen. The Republicans and their irresponsible mines had emptied many of the planet’s underground aquifers, causing Jesel’s core to become unstable. “Republicans aren’t responding since most of the inhabitants are Jeselian.” He glanced down at the canine sitting at Blade’s feet. “What the hell is that animal doing in here?”

He ignored the question about the dog. “I’ll get teams out there to provide basic first aid and bring the seriously injured in right away.”

“You bring the injured in here, and your doctor will be distracted from the mission.”

The words your doctor did something strange to his chest. He started to say, “she’s not my doctor,” to ward off the painful tightening there, except he found he wasn’t willing to release the thread that still connected them. “Have her perform the surgery as soon as possible. Today, if you can, so it’s done. Either it will work or it won’t. We have to know. The rebellion will happen regardless, but we need to know how to play this.”

“I wasn’t aware she took orders from me. She seems to march to her own beat. Sort of like someone else I know.” Bailey’s sea green eyes studied him with open curiosity.

“You can be persuasive.” He wanted Bailey to charm her with one of his intelligent explanations. The poor woman had had enough of his uncivilized ass.

“So can you.”

Somehow he didn’t think his form of persuasion—namely, spanking, would be the way to tell her how to do her job. “This isn’t my area, and you know it. I belong in Brunnick,” Blade said.

Bailey handled the inner workings of the revolution, the underground movement and communications, the strategizing. He’d been hatching this plan for the revolution for eighteen months, and having President Black as a figurehead, urging her former constituents to fight for the freedom of their planet had been a crucial part. Bailey had masterminded it all, while Blade...well, he had been the steel.

Bailey stood and Dog growled. Bailey froze.

Blade cuffed the bluehound’s ear lightly. “Stop that.” Dog lifted his ears and wagged his tail in apology. “He’s still a little feral, but he’ll come around.”

“Looks about as loyal to his master as they come.”

He burrowed his fingers in the animal’s fur and drew his huge head against his thigh. “He’s a good dog underneath the bluster. He’s just had a rough time of it.”

“Sounds like you again.”

He didn’t dignify that with a response. Turning, he headed toward the door.

“Be careful out there,” Bailey said, serious once more.

Blade turned and covered his heart with his fist, bowing.

Bailey mirrored the gesture. “Go with the Universal God’s protection.”

~~*~~

Lara peeled the bloody gloves off and rolled her aching shoulders. The surgery had taken six hours, but had gone as well as possible. Once inside, she’d found not one, but three tumors, one large one and two smaller pea-sized formations. She’d been able to cut them all out without severing any nerves. They’d had to circulate the brain with a blood bath to keep things alive while she had it out of the skull. The bleeding had been minimal, and, thanks to Dasha, the president had remained stable throughout the entire procedure. Black lay in recovery now, with constant monitoring by both equipment and volunteer aides.

They had bumped the surgery up because Bailey expected another wave of injured to arrive from the quake. She got the sense he wanted her to do the surgery before she got distracted by those in more critical need, which she could appreciate.

Overall, other than the never-ending work, she’d been treated like gold. Only she, the president, Dasha, and Bailey slept in the mud-brick building. Everyone else lived in makeshift yurts, tents, or temporary housing, without plumbing or running water. Their building had been plumbed years before when it had served as a transport station.

She made her rounds, checking on the scores of patients in the tents. She’d just stopped to see how an eight-year-old girl fared from her laser burn when the ships with the new patients arrived.

Though she’d been exhausted only a moment before, adrenaline kicked in as she jogged forward and started giving orders. The clinic had limited supplies, and she’d run out of all the basics like oral and topical antibiotics. Some local women had brought her jars of unguents, which she’d been loath to use, but Dasha had held each one, examining them with her extrasensory perception and deemed them to be useful. So now she carried a tin of salve in her pocket for wounds, and jars of tea to give patients orally. She felt like an old witch doctor, rather than a highly trained surgeon.

But, in this instance, she handled the bloodier cases, stitching and rebuilding flesh while Dasha set bones and bandaged wounds. It relaxed her to have her colleague by her side again.

Four hours later, sometime in the middle of the night, she caught sight of Blade hobbling as he carried yet another injured person into her clinic.

“What happened to your foot?” she demanded.

He played deaf, turning his back and limping away without even acknowledging her question.

Her lip curled as she watched his retreating back, but she didn’t have time to chase him down. Later, she’d make sure to examine his injury.

Later ended up being the following day. She’d slept a few hours and had checked on Black, who had regained consciousness briefly enough for them to verify her brain functions all remained intact. Dasha put her back to sleep to help her body recover and to keep her from experiencing the post-operative pain.

Hurrying down the hall, she bumped into Blade, who looked as if he’d never slept. “Let me take a look at that foot of yours,” she said.

He started to pull his ignoring her trick again, so she caught his forearm.

He whirled, his onyx eyes narrowed. “Get off me, woman,” he growled.

Her fingers opened reflexively; her breath caught in her chest. She’d forgotten how terrifying he looked when provoked. He was no different from the huge dog at his feet.

Blade’s face softened, probably because her face showed genuine fear. He pointed toward the clinic. “You have more pressing injuries to attend to.” Without waiting for her reply, he made his way out of the building, still limping.

“He doesn’t like to be touched,” Alyx said, throwing her a sympathetic look.

She looked down the hall and caught Blade’s black gaze. He’d stopped and turned at the door. They both stood motionless, eyes locked for what seemed like minutes but was probably only a few seconds. Then he broke the gaze and exited.

“Have you heard the story about why he’s called Vengeance?” Alyx asked.

“Tell me.”

“He was a slave. Well, anyone can see that.” The boy touched the place on his neck where his own slave markings were found. “He was born into slavery. He and his sister were separated from their parents as children and forced to work in the mines. When he was sixteen, the mine foremen took turns publicly raping his older sister. They ended up unintentionally killing her, which was probably merciful because she would probably have suffered a slow, painful death or had permanent disfigurement from their attack. Vengeance saw the whole thing, and he went nuts. He killed every one of them with his bare hands and freed all the slaves. They destroyed the mine. Bombed the entire settlement, destroyed all the equipment.

“After that, he dismantled settlement after settlement, setting our people free. I was nine when he brought down the Sheenaw who owned me.”

The blood must have drained from her face because she felt cold. “Sheenaw ran your mine?” She hadn’t realized Treedle had brought other life-forms in to manage the mines. She’d assumed all the foremen were human. Sheenaw were notoriously cruel, blunt beings from a hardscrabble planet without resources. They knew hard work. They also probably knew how to exact it from humans. In terrible ways.

The boy shuddered. “Yes. Most of the mining foremen are Sheenaw.”

No wonder the kid worshipped Blade.

“Sounds like Blade is quite a hero.”

Alyx nodded solemnly. “He’s a celebrity to our people. The Republicans have been hunting him. He’s their most wanted, but they’ve never even come close to finding him.”

Lara’s stomach turned hearing Blade’s horrific story. No wonder he seemed so hardened. Her heart ached for him—for his sixteen year old self who had suffered so greatly and snapped.

“So he doesn’t like to be touched now,” the boy said, as if all that led to this one simple fact about the warrior.

She blinked back tears for him. “I don’t blame him,” she said. But it made her even more resolved to care for his injury, whatever it might be. He deserved that much.

~~*~~

“Blade, may I see you for a moment?” His petite surgeon cornered him, her forehead a wrinkle of concern. She looked tired but no less beautiful, cornflower blue eyes standing out against her pale skin and hair.

He grunted in response and followed her into her exam room, the pain in his foot a dull roar.

She closed the door behind them. “What happened to your foot?”

He rolled his eyes and reached for the door handle, but she placed her body in front of it.

She drew herself up to her full height—five foot three, tops—and fixed him with an authoritative stare, which he found really fucking hot. Her arms folded across her chest, she lifted her chin. “I have tended to my other patients. It’s your turn now. Let me have a look.”

“I can’t show you—I don’t even think I can get the boot off. It was crushed by a rock when I was pulling people out of the rubble.”

Damned if the sexy little minx didn’t snatch a dagger from his belt and kneel at his feet to cut it off. His cock twitched for her. He didn’t know which part he liked better, the boldness, or the kneeling. Or maybe both together.

His foot had shattered. He’d known that the moment the damn rock fell on it. The thing had been two feet in diameter and must’ve weighed two hundred fifty pounds.

Lara cut the nuk-skin boot from his foot with an expert hand. The thick leather fell away, revealing a blue and purple appendage that hardly resembled a foot. The bones were bent at grotesque angles, the flesh swollen like a balloon.

He would’ve preferred not seeing it. The pain had been bad enough he’d thrown up several times since the injury and hadn’t slept at all.

His little doctor closed her eyes and sighed. “This will require major reconstructive surgery. You should have let me see to it immediately. The fact you’ve been walking around on it makes me question how it’s possible that you—”

“No, thank you.” The thought of having anyone touch it made him want to puke again. He reached for the door and pulled it open, but not before he caught her look of frustrated fury. He appreciated her instinct to help, but he’d tough it out. The bones would heal eventually. They might not be straight, but they would knit nonetheless.

“Dammit, Blade. Don’t you dare walk away from me!”

She was sexy when she was mad. He really loved when she got feisty. Still, he ignored her. He made it four steps down the hall when he heard her feet dashing behind him. She grabbed his elbow, probably intending to turn him, but he was determined to walk away. Ignoring her, he pulled her full weight along with him as he continued down the hall.

“Blade.” She vaulted onto his back with her arms around his neck.

The full body contact scrambled his already sleep-deprived brain. Fuck. Yes. His body responded of its own accord, misconstruing her attack as some kind of sex game.

In a flash, he rotated her body to his front and pinned her against the wall. Her soft breasts flattened against the pressure of his ribs, the nipples hardened points. Before he could stop himself, he caught her lips in a bruising kiss, punishing her mouth with his own, claiming her, invading with his tongue. Hard and demanding, he tore at her lips.

She accepted his discipline, tightening her arms around his neck and kissing back. Their tongues dueled, and lust exploded within him.

Oh hell. The throbbing bulge in his pants shoved directly against the heat of her core, and he rocked against her. Only thin fabric kept him from plunging into her without mercy. He sucked down her neck until he reached the graceful curve of her collarbone.

When he came up for breath, he growled, “Why the fuck do you care?”

What he saw in her eyes shocked him. Genuine pain.

“You do,” he murmured with wonder.

A muscle in his face twitched, and a shudder ran through him. Could she care? Could she possibly care about a former slave? A Jeselian rebel, as coarse and unsophisticated as she was refined? He traced her eyebrow with his thumb, still holding her pinned between his body and the wall. She was so damn beautiful, all delicate-boned and smooth-skinned. The opposite of his blunt features and darker coloring.

He returned to kissing her, slower this time but still open-mouthed, still with passion, dragging his lips across her face, consuming her. “I can’t understand why.” He eased back from the wall, wrapping one arm under her hips to hold her up.

“Put me down,” she whispered but didn’t sound very convincing.

He carried her down the hall.

“You shouldn’t be putting any weight on that foot, much less adding mine.”

His blood roared with dark need. Nothing in the world could pry her from his arms. He nipped at her neck. “You should’ve thought of that before you jumped on my back.”

“Are you going to let me operate?”

He carried her across the threshold of her room and shut the door. “You’ll have to earn it.” He dropped her onto her feet and yanked off her top. Reaching behind her back, he fumbled with her bra hooks then simply rent the damn fabric in half. Some measure of self-censuring returned because he opened his mouth to apologize, but she just gave a husky laugh which sent him right back over the edge.

She toed her shoes off and shed her own pants.

He groaned when she dropped to her knees and reached for his belt buckle, need for her and her alone so strong now. His head spun as he watched her deft fingers loosen his belt and unbutton his trousers, freeing his length.

Her eyes widened at his size, but she didn’t balk. Instead, she licked her lips, looking at his cock greedily right before she took him into her mouth.

He jerked at the incredible sensation of her moist heat, nearly coming undone at being engulfed in her mouth. The head of his cock rubbed the inside of her cheek and she fisted him and squeezed hard, sliding her hand in concert with her lips, making it feel like the entirety of his cock was in her mouth, swallowed in the depths of pure heaven.

“Lara.” His voice sounded low and guttural. He caressed the back of her neck, overcome with wonder.

She sucked and slurped, licked under the rim of the head of his cock then took him deep into her throat.

He wound his fingers in her hair, and tightened them as control spun away with each gasping breath. Somehow, he managed to stop her before he came.

Pulling her to her feet, he shoved her gently toward the bed. “Get on your hands and knees.”

Nothing in the world could be more beautiful than the sight she made. Hair mussed, cheeks flushed, his woman—yes his woman because he could think of her no other way—crawled up onto the bed. He drank in the picture—her naked body so petite and perfectly proportioned. She spread her knees and presented her ass to him, the pink heart of her glistening pussy gloriously beckoning.

He crawled up behind her. He wondered, briefly, if he should find a prophylactic, but remembered that women on Earth took a shot every few years to control their cycles completely, only going off hormones when they were ready to bear children. He found the thought disappointing. The idea of giving Dr. Lara Simmons his child violently appealed to him.

He rubbed the head of his cock over her pussy, and it slid easily between her plump folds, so wet and ready for him. “Oh yes God,” he breathed. She felt so. Damn. Good. He gripped her hips, pulling her gorgeous ass roughly against his loins. “Oh, hell, yes.”

“Yes,” she gasped, and it was all the encouragement he needed.

He slammed his hips against the soft cushion of her ass, pumping into her with rough abandon.

Her moans grew louder, the pitch more desperate. Somehow, through the haze, he had enough wherewithal to reach around the front of her and rub her swollen clit.

She bucked, her muscles clamping down on his cock.

“Do that again,” he said hoarsely. He flicked her clit, pinched it. She gave a wanton cry, and her knees slid out from under her as her cunt gripped his cock in spasms of release. He followed her hips down to the bed and stayed buried inside her as she came, his own orgasm following right on the tail of hers and seeming to last forever.

~~*~~

Lara sighed as Blade dropped down on top of her, holding his weight on his forearms. Despite the fact they’d both come, he hadn’t stopped the onslaught, biting at the back of her neck, sucking, kissing. Still moving his enormous cock inside her with slow rocks of his pelvis.

“Lara.” His voice sounded hoarse, threaded with need. There was a questioning in it—almost a pleading. Her body re-ignited in response.

“Blade.” She whispered his name like an answer to his question.

He eased out of her and dropped to his side, rolling her back against his front. It wasn’t typical spooning, though. His aim clearly wasn’t for a cuddle. Searing hot hands traveled over the front of her body, squeezing her breasts, palming her belly. His breath came hot in her ear; his teeth claimed her shoulder. He cupped her mons, dipping two thick fingers inside her sopping channel.

She wanted to tell him it was too soon—she’d just come and was hardly ready to climax again, but his fingers tormented her. The heel of his hand undulated over her clit as he plunged his digits into her, driving her mad with need.

“Stop,” she croaked. “I...I can’t—”

He didn’t stop, but his lips were at her ear as he fucked her even harder with his fingers. “You want me to stop?”

“Yes—no! God, no. Wait. Please.” Her brain had scrambled. She heard the babble coming from her lips but hardly knew she was speaking. Lights exploded behind her eyes, and her hips thrust so far forward she arched like a bow to meet his thrusting hand.

Her muscles clamped down on his fingers, squeezing, wringing her out as pulse after pulse of pleasure washed over her until it seemed nothing was left. She floated, drifting in and out of consciousness. It probably only lasted a minute or two. Or maybe ten. She couldn’t be sure.

Blade pulled his fingers from her and pushed her back to her belly. She sank into the mattress, her limbs heavy and boneless. She didn’t even protest when Blade parted the cheeks of her ass and dragged his tongue up the length of her perineum to her anus.

She meant to protest. Or at least ask him what the hell he was doing. But no sound came out of her. No movement either. She lay there passively allowing him to touch her in the most intimate and embarrassing of places.

He rimmed her while stroking her swollen slit once more.

Holy hell, this man took no prisoners in bed, did he? Had he started this way, she probably would have run for the hills. But now, flattened by two orgasms, with bliss still coursing through her, she simply parted her legs to give him better access.

He shifted over her. Dear God, was he really going to—? He parted her cheeks again and pressed the head of his cock against her back entrance. It felt moist, as if he’d used ample saliva to lubricate.

Something deep in her belly fluttered— a little fear but not enough to make her protest. Her sphincter squeezed, but he waited, not pressing forward, not backing away. The moment the tight ring of muscle relaxed, he thrust.

It burned at the entrance, but the intrusion also felt delicious. And wrong. And so delicious. He stayed buried in her, as if he knew she was an anal virgin and he needed to give her time to get used to having him inside her this way.

She quivered, inside and out.

He lowered himself onto his forearms, his hard muscles at her back. One hand slid under her hips and he found her clit. He worked it slowly, stroking lightly as he rocked his pelvis against her ass. Each stroke sent flames of fresh desire scorching through her—too intense for her to relax into them but too wonderful to protest.

The stimulation on her clit was so feathery-light that it wrenched her focus from her ass, forcing her to concentrate on the sweet sensation.

“I’ve wanted to do this since that first time I took you over my knee.”

The reminder of his high-handedness should’ve killed the mood, but it didn’t. And she probably shouldn’t take it as a compliment. But she’d never felt so desirable in her life. She’d never been the object of someone’s lust, especially not of the intense, animalistic passion he’d unleashed.

She wanted more of it. She wanted him to take her harder, faster. She pushed her ass up to meet his slow thrusts.

He groaned and shoved in deeper, timing his thrusts with pinches of her clit.

She bit the sheet on the bed, muffling her own cries, tears of need welling up in her throat.

His movements grew erratic, and he choked on a breath, burying his cock so deep inside her, she thought he’d split her in two. He jerked. The hard muscles of his thighs squeezed and pressed her thighs together and down. The hot stream of his cum filled her ass just like he’d filled her vaginal cavity before.

And she did weep. Only a few sobs of release, but it was weeping, nonetheless. Real tears wet her cheeks. She felt well-used in every sense of the word. Forever ruined, even. Because she was pretty sure no man could ever compete with that performance. The euphoria sent her floating on a cloud high above the bed.

When she became aware of her heartbeat and her breath and her brain returned to her body, she found herself tucked up against Blade’s enormous body. He lay on his back, holding her curled against him, her head on his shoulder, her hand on his sculpted chest. She ran her fingernails across the soft, curling hairs there.

She had truly been fucked six ways to Sunday. Her hair must be a disaster, her body was limp, and the sheets were damp with bodily fluids.

“I’m sorry,” Blade said. His chest rumbled beneath her hand as he spoke.

She blinked, trying to understand. “For what?”

“Doing all those things to you,” he said hoarsely.

“Why?” she asked, leaning up on one elbow, incredulous.

He shrugged. “I mean, if you are.”

She dropped her head back to his shoulder, too exhausted to keep it up. “Did I earn the right to operate?”

He smiled a slow smile, lightly tracing her areola. “Yeah. I guess so. If you have to.”

“I have to.”

~~*~~

He spent the night with his little doctor. He thought about leaving several times—he figured she might prefer it, especially considering his dog lying outside her door announced his presence to all who passed. But his body revolted every time he tried to ease away from the soft, sleeping form of his lover.

He stroked her hair back from her face, thinking how angelic she looked sleeping. And young. She projected a much more mature image when she was awake. In repose, she appeared so innocent. The stress usually present in her face had disappeared, leaving only a peaceful look. Or was that a well-fucked satisfaction?

His ego would like to think so.

It was Jeselian tradition to consummate marriage by taking a bride in every orifice. It was not tradition to ravish a woman that way while still courting, but it seemed he’d done exactly that. Not that he’d even courted her. He’d simply carried her to her room and had his way with her.

He doubted the sweet doctor had ever had her ass taken before last night, and the fact that she’d given herself that way humbled him. He hadn’t intended to take her so roughly and in so many ways. Hell, he hadn’t intended to take her at all. But once his lips had claimed hers, all self-control crumbled. His lust for her had carried him away, and he’d forgotten everything—including how much his foot throbbed. It was the reason he’d apologized when he finally had slaked his thirst.

Universal God, he hoped he hadn’t hurt her. He leaned up on one elbow to inspect her body for bruises in the daylight. He’d brought a washcloth to clean them both up the night before and had given a cursory check then, but the lights had been off. Not finding any marks, he dropped back to the pillow and palmed one of her breasts, flicking her nipple with his thumb.

Her eyes flickered open.

He held his breath. He wasn’t sure what to expect. Embarrassment? Awkwardness? The stiff formality they’d shared in the canyon?

The corners of her mouth lifted in a sleepy smile.

He had no idea a simple expression could fill him with such warmth. He grasped her nape and pulled her toward him, meeting her lips in a demanding kiss.

She melted into him, soft and pliant, her lips yielding to his tongue, her thighs parting to allow his thicker leg to nudge between them.

He kissed harder, his erection already pulsing. Cupping her ass, he pulled her hips in. The scent of her arousal filled the tiny room as she rubbed her pussy against his thigh.

She reached for his cock, taking it in her fist with a firmness that set him on fire. Three pumps had him desperate for her. When she guided him between her legs, he practically pounced, rolling her from her side to her back and positioning himself directly over her with his cock quivering at her entrance.

“Woman, you drive me mad,” he growled. “I need you again.”

“What are you waiting for?”

His eyes rolled back in his head as he slid inside her. The position sucked for his foot, but his need for her outweighed any concern he had for his own comfort. He rocked his hips in rhythm with her and lifted his foot into the air, taking weight on his knee.

Lara froze. “Your foot,” she gasped.

He pushed into her, hard. “Come for me, Lara, and I’ll let you fix me.”

Her forehead wrinkled. “I can’t come in the morning.”

He gave a short bark of laughter. “Oh yeah, says who?”

“I’m too relaxed. I mean, it feels nice, but I won’t come.”

“I’ll take that as a challenge.” He pushed up to his hands and knees and crawled down between her thighs. Parting her labia with two fingers, he licked a slow line along her slit, swirling around the hardened nubbin of her clit. She jerked and let out a little moan. He sucked the little bud and her thighs tensed, clapping closed around his ears.

“Ooh...mmm.”

He slid two fingers inside her, stroking her inner wall, searching for the elusive bundle of nerves tied in with the clit. He found the tissue that stiffened under his fingers and teased it.

Her ass shot off the bed, back bowed. His beautiful doctor screamed around the knuckles she’d shoved between her teeth. Her heels lengthened out, her legs tight and straight as her pussy gushed, walls quivering around his fingers, tightening and releasing.

He waited until she’d finished her glorious climax, drinking in the exquisite sight of her in the throes of ecstasy. Easing his fingers out of her, he smiled. “My work is done.”

Chapter Seven

Blade lay on the operating table wearing loose-fitting hospital pants, with one pant leg pushed up to his thigh to reveal his horribly misshapen foot. Lara would need to re-break many of the metatarsals and, because she had a limited amount of bone glue, she’d be using the old-fashioned method of titanium plates and screws where she could. She buckled his leg to a platform that held it at the right height for her to work.

As if his dog knew he was about to undergo a trauma, he whined outside the closed door.

“No,” Blade said, his voice deep with authority. “Lie down.”

Of course, they couldn’t see the dog, but she had no doubt in her mind that the dog promptly dropped to the floor.

She pulled on her surgical gloves. “Clean the skin of the foot, please,” she instructed Alyx. Although he’d not had any medical training, she’d put him to work immediately, and he’d learned fast out in the field. They had no antiseptic, but Alyx picked up a bottle of homemade grain alcohol which he poured onto a cotton swab. He cleaned the skin on his foot with as light a touch as possible, watching his superior’s face for any sign of discomfort. Of course, he remained stoic, as ever.

Looking over at Dasha, she nodded. Dasha walked to Blade’s side and gazed down at him.

His body jerked as if he’d been punched. He threw his head to the side, looking away from her. “Get the fuck away from me. You’re not getting into my head, Varu.“

Her eyes met Dasha’s over her patient then she looked back down at him. “Blade, you said I could operate.”

“I didn’t say I’d let her put me under.”

Lara spread her hands. “You know I don’t have anesthesia. I don’t even have local anesthesia or any kind of pain blockers. So I can’t cut your foot open to reset your bones if you’re awake.”

He flexed the muscles in his arms and chest, pushing himself upright. “I don’t need meds.”

With anyone else, she might have laughed, but, with Blade, she actually believed it. She’d never seen a man walking around on a broken foot the way he had. The pain must be excruciating, and yet he’d gone on as if nothing had happened.

She touched his thigh. “Yes, but you won’t be able to hold still. Even if you can take the pain, your foot will jerk, and your discomfort is going to distract me.”

“I will keep my foot still.”

“Dammit, Blade.” Tears burned her eyes. The thought of cutting someone open while he was awake nauseated her. She couldn’t do it.

“Hey.” His face softened, and he reached for her hand. “Why the tears?”

She gave an exasperated sigh. “Why do you have to be so damn...unyielding?”

He traced tiny circles on the back of her hand with his thumb. She hadn’t experienced such gentleness from him before, and it surprised her. He studied her, and she allowed her full frustration to show.

“Leave us,” he commanded without looking away from her. As if it was his operating room, not hers.

Her staff looked at her for approval. She sighed and nodded, and they exited the operating room, leaving her alone with her stubborn warrior.

He tugged her closer to the table where he lay. Without releasing her hand, he wrapped his arm around her waist and lifted her to sit beside him—an impressive move for someone fully reclined. “What is it that bothers you more, the actual surgery without hypnosis or losing this contest of wills with me?”

Her shoulders sagged in defeat. “Both,” she muttered.

He leaned up on one elbow and kissed her upper arm, again showing tenderness she hadn’t known he was capable of. “Please don’t make me do this.” Had he actually said please? To her?

“I was under the impression no one could make you do anything.” She couldn’t keep the bitterness out of her voice.

He closed his eyes. “That’s why I can’t do it. I simply can’t. I need you to understand.”

“Explain it to me.”

He didn’t answer, but something pleading in his look unnerved her. She didn’t like seeing her big, strong hero begging. She wasn’t sure if his hang-up was more about trust or control. He seemed like the type who didn’t trust many, and that fit Alyx’s assessment that he didn’t like to be touched. But it also might be about ceding control to anyone else. After all, it was her operating room, and he was still giving orders like he ran the place. In her experience, the authoritative types were the worst patients. President Black had been an exception to that rule, but Blade was proving to be the worst she’d ever had.

“Fine,” she snapped, her stomach twisting. “Let’s get on with it, then.” She opened the door and called Alyx, Dasha, and Janey, her nurse, back in the room.

“We’ll do it with the patient fully alert.”

Janey looked at him dubiously. “Shouldn’t we strap him down? Or put a piece of leather between his teeth?”

Sheesh. Such ancient methods had not been used in five hundred years on Earth. Apparently, here on Jesel, they were still known.

“No straps, no leather.”

Why wasn’t she surprised at Blade’s pronouncement?

Janey held out the tray of sterilized instruments, and Lara picked up the scalpel. She kept her fingers from trembling, but her eyes smarted with tears again as she made the first cut. True to his word, Blade did not jerk. He did not even make a sound, although she saw all his muscles tighten and heard his breath stop.

She opened a flap of flesh and settled onto her stool to reconstruct the bones. She tapped an orthopedic chisel to re-break the first metatarsal. It had been broken in four places.

Blade’s breath left in a whoosh and then he gulped it in and held it again.

A wave of heat rushed through her—her own body reacted as if the surgery was happening to her. She couldn’t make it stop sympathizing with his plight. Her stomach ached. A tear streaked down her face.

She aligned the first two fragments and applied a fast-drying bone glue, holding the bones in place until they set. She repeated the action on the next break.

Blade made no sounds—no grunts or groans. But the intense labor of his breath unnerved her. Every time he sucked in a breath, fresh tears streaked her face. And, dammit, despite her years of practice and her particular pride in never getting rattled, her fingers began to shake. She could make a serious mistake if she didn’t pull it together.

She sniffed and stood up, turning away from the staff to hide her loss of control. What the hell was wrong with her? Her patient was the one suffering, not her. Get a little distance, Lara. Empathy is not your friend right now.

When she turned back, Blade’s black gaze burned a hole through her. He looked anguished. She wiped her cheek on her shoulder because her hands were covered in his blood then sat back down on her stool to work on the next break.

She couldn’t distract herself, though. Painfully aware of every twitch or tightening Blade made, her own distress only grew until the tears streamed down her face, unchecked.

“Damn it all,” Blade growled, glaring at her. He lifted an imperial hand and beckoned Dasha to his side. “Do it. But any funny business and I’ll yank your tongue right out of your skull, Varu. Got it?”

Dasha gave her serene smile and touched his shoulder. “No funny business, you have my word. My friend cares about you, rebel, so I must care, too.”

Blade didn’t have a chance to answer before his eyes slid closed and the tension left his body. He slumped back on the table, his head rolling to the side.

Lara exhaled. Janey held a handkerchief to her face and she blew her nose. She drew several breaths, still embarrassed at her meltdown. “Well, this should be easier now,” she said to no one in particular.

She returned to work. A calmness settled over her, and she fell into the familiar zone of stillness and concentration for surgery. Her fingers moved deftly and surely again, the way they should.

“He only did that for you, you know,” Dasha said. “He couldn’t stand your suffering.”

“My suffering?” She made a derisive sound, but a tingle traveled up her spine. She didn’t miss the fact that he could stand the most intense physical suffering, but in the end it was her tears he couldn’t abide. It almost made her want to weep anew. He must care about her, too. To deflect the emotion, she snorted. “Only the most insane of men wants to have his foot operated on while awake.”

Dasha didn’t comment, and her words hung in the air, spiraling around Lara as she worked. Her rebel couldn’t be commanded, not by anyone, as far as she could tell. But he’d done something that went against his very fiber. For her.

~~*~~

Blade walked through the camp, the hard cast distorting his normal gait. His foot throbbed still, but was nothing compared to before. The cast helped immensely, and he was sure when it came off, he’d be amazed at how his genius doctor had repaired his foot. She’d looked happy when he’d awakened from surgery, her normal confidence returned.

Actually, she’d looked downright radiant. So it made giving up control for a short while worth it. And his mind didn’t seem changed, although he still didn’t trust the Varu. She could implant any thought, any direction into his mind with her powers. It was hard to believe anyone trusted even being around her. Not that she seemed malicious.

He hadn’t seen Lara much since the surgery. He longed to touch her again, to feel the softness of her skin, see the way her eyes rolled back in pleasure when he caressed her. It was as if, now that he’d had her, rather than slaking his thirst, it only made it stronger. He found himself drawn into the building, looking for her.

Alyx was inside, pushing a mop. He dropped a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “You’re doing a fine job.”

Alyx snorted, probably thinking he was being facetious.

“I mean it. Cleaning floors is important work in a medical building. But what I meant is that you’re following my orders and taking care of the doctor. I appreciate that.”

The boy’s chest lifted. “I’m learning a lot about medicine. Maybe I can be a doctor someday.” He said it wistfully, as if he didn’t really believe it. Slaves weren’t raised to believe they could do much of anything.

“If you want to, you will,” he said firmly. “After we win back our planet, anything will be possible.”

The boy brightened. “Well, then, I’m going to study surgery, like Dr. Simmons.”

He nodded in approval. “Good lad. Now, where is our favorite doctor, anyway?”

Alyx jerked his thumb toward the sleeping quarters. “In the shower, I think. She was covered in blood.”

His cock hardened thinking of Lara Simmons naked and wet. He strode down the hall, well aware Alyx was watching him. Well, was it wrong to show a boy to go after what he wanted when he wanted it?

He checked the door handle. Unbelievably, it was unlocked. Slipping inside, he stripped off his clothes. The room was steamy and warm. Lara hummed softly. He slid the shower curtain open.

Lara stood in the spray, her head tilted back, eyes closed. Her peach-tipped breasts were lifted and separated with the graceful arch of her upper-back. His gaze traveled down her flat belly to ogle her trim little mons and, below it, the slender shapely legs. He drank in the sight of her as if it, alone, might nourish him.

Her lids opened then flew wide.

He clapped a hand over her mouth. “Don’t scream,” he murmured. It would damage his ego if Alyx thought she didn’t want him in here. Of course, there was a good chance she didn’t.

He eased his hand away. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

She blinked, still looking confused.

He stepped all the way in, trusting the cast on his foot was as waterproof as she’d promised. He gave her the full view of his rather eager manhood. “May I help?”

Her blush charmed him and, when she stepped back, as if to make room for him, he claimed the victory.

He picked up her wrists and pinned her back against the shower wall, the spray of water catching him across the shoulders. He twirled his tongue over her nipple, licking it into a stiff point before sucking, hard then lifted his head to look at her face. Her flush wasn’t of the innocent kind this time—she had pure passion written on her face.

“More.”

He smiled. Bending to her neglected nipple, he nipped it with his teeth. She jerked in surprise. He laved it with his tongue, then flicked it with the tip.

He spun her around. “Hands against the wall; stick your ass out.” His voice sounded rough and growly.

Amazingly, she obeyed. He wondered how he’d missed the exact point at which he’d won her submission. Or maybe he hadn’t. Maybe she simply wanted him as much as he wanted her. He tested it. Drawing back his hand, he landed a sharp smack on her left cheek, watching as it flattened and sprang back under his hand.

“Ow!” She sounded indignant and frowned over her shoulder, but he noticed she stayed in position. “What was that for?”

“My pleasure.” He smacked the other cheek.

She gasped.

When he slid his fingers between her legs, he found her folds slick and swollen. “And yours.”

She made an indistinct sound. He thought it might be of confusion. She still hadn’t reconciled her own attraction to domination and pain.

“Spread your legs.”

She widened her stance. He brought his hand up, between her legs, spanking her pussy.

“Oh,” she squealed. “What are you doing?”

“I’m spanking your beautiful little pussy. Do you know why, Doctor?”

She shook her head.

He slapped her again. “Answer me with words.”

“No, sir.” Her voice sounded choked like the words had raced each other out her mouth.

Damn, there was that sir thing again. It seemed less strange to him this time. He hadn’t wanted or deserved her respect before; he’d only required her compliance so he could keep her safe. Now, he reveled in her deference, as if he’d earned it.

He leaned forward and put his lips near her ear. “Because you love it.” He rubbed two fingers over her slick entrance again. “Don’t you?”

She whimpered.

He spanked her little pussy again then slid his fingers into her moist heat and pumped twice. “Don’t you?” He withdrew his fingers completely.

“Yes.”

“Tell me what you want.”

“You. I want you.”

“How?”

“However you want to give it to me.”

His knees nearly buckled. Dear UG, he really had won her submission. The growl in his throat was all animal. All his plans for a long, drawn-out seduction fled as his blood traveled south of his brain. To buy himself time to pull back, he applied himself to spanking her ass properly, clapping his large hand down on the lower half of her cheeks and the backs of her thighs. The water increased the sting to his palm, and, judging by her cries, she felt it, too.

He’d never thought of himself as much of a sadist, but the plaintive quality to her mewls only made him harder. Maybe this wasn’t helping him regain his senses.

“Turn back around.”

She rotated, and he pushed her ass back against the tile. Dropping to the knee of his good leg, he picked up her leg and bent it all the way up, until her foot rested on his shoulder, which pushed her knee to her chest and splayed her beautiful cunt wide. He licked around her anus.

Her fingers wound into his hair, and she tore at it, grunting and gasping.

He dragged his tongue across her perineum and plunged it into her slick channel, penetrating her.

She moaned.

He moved higher and sucked her clit.

She squealed and stood on her tiptoes, pulling his face against her even closer, rocking her hips the moment he released the suction. He breathed in her feminine scent, which came at him like a heady perfume. He sucked her labia, shoved a thumb in her pussy, and reached back for her anus with his middle finger.

She would have fallen if he wasn’t holding her up. Her standing leg had gone completely weak, and she sagged against the wall, her eyes glazed, cheeks painted with bright spots of color.

“I want you,” she whispered.

He smiled, feeling more than a little smug. “You have me.”

“Please.”

He knew what she wanted, but he wanted her to say it. “Tell me, angel.”

“I want you—your cock. I want it inside me.”

He might have lost consciousness for a millisecond there. Blood roared in his ears and his rock-hard cock stuck straight out. He surged to his feet. “Give me that sweet little ass of yours.”

Her eyes widened in fright, and he gave her a feral grin. “I meant I wanted you from behind, but if you want me to take your ass again…”

“Ah...no thank you...sir.” She turned around and braced her hands on the wall in the position he’d had her earlier.

“You did say any way I wanted.” He was testing her. Teasing, really. He hadn’t planned on taking her ass again, but now he wondered how far she was willing to go. She let him do it last time, but she’d been practically drunk on orgasms then.

“Yes, sir.”

His cock pulsed painfully. “Yes, sir? Any way I want?”

“Yes, sir.”

He lost it then. Truly lost all control. Thankfully, he had the wherewithal to wrap one arm around her waist to brace her, because he was the definition of coming in hot at that moment. The second his cock hit her cunt, he pounded away, hard and fast.

The slapping sound of their wet flesh striking again and again echoed against the tile walls, filling his ears the way her scent filled his nostrils. She came almost immediately, her muscles gripping and squeezing his cock, which sent him plunging over a second ledge. He braced his free hand beside hers on the wall, afraid he’d pump into her so hard he’d crack her head on the tile. When she moved her hand on top and laced her fingers through his, he knew he was lost.

Somehow, in the course of a mere eight days, this little doctor had caught him by the balls. She had him body, heart and soul. Wrapped so tightly around her finger, he couldn’t imagine ever being free. And that knowledge came like a lance of pain through his heart.

“Lara.” He came, his semen hot and furious as it charged down his cock, filling her depths as his orgasm went on and on and on.

He pushed her upright against the wall and sucked at her shoulder, traveling along her neck to bite her ear.

“Lara,” he repeated. It felt like a loss, not a gain. He hadn’t wanted to love again. Love meant losing, the way he’d lost his parents and then his sister. Love meant living in fear of losing again, and Lara Simmons was way too precious for him to ever want to risk losing.

He brushed her wet hair to one side and kissed her bare shoulder. “My sweet little doctor. You don’t belong here on Jesel. You should go back to Earth, where you’ll be safe.”

~~*~~

Lara’s shoulders stiffened. What the hell did that mean? She’d never been so consumed by someone and so rejected at once. How could Blade murmur words that sounded like endearments but actually mean he wanted her gone, out of his life?

He must have noticed her change in mood because he released her and stepped back. She turned to find him holding out a towel, his dark eyes hooded, gaze indecipherable. She pulled the towel from his hands, even though he looked like he wanted her to step into it.

“I’m scheduled to go back in a week.” She lifted her chin as if she’d said something defiant. She’d been ignoring the timetable because her return date had seemed all too soon. For one thing, she still had an endless stream of patients who needed her help. For another...there was Blade. But, obviously, he hadn’t been feeling the same way.

His face still showed nothing.

Well, they weren’t relationship-building here. She shouldn’t have imagined they were. It was sex, pure and simple. They both wanted it, and they’d both had it. End of story. Period. The sooner she got her mind wrapped around that, the better.

Just because she was lonely didn’t mean she needed to...well, she needed to shut off the part of her that was running off making plans for a future involving Blade Vengeance. Or whatever his real name was.

And, dammit, she’d never been lonely before. How had he ruined that for her as well?

She rubbed the water off her skin and handed the towel back to Blade, since there was only one in the shower room. He took it but tossed it onto the hook.

Figures. Outdoorsy men like him probably never used towels.

They were different. As different as night and day. That was another reason to dissolve any fantasies she had about a long-term relationship with this man. Besides, she didn’t want to stay on Jesel forever. She had a career on Earth. And her very proud parents. And other planets to visit with the Samaritans. And...fuck. Nothing. Jesus fuck. She had nothing. How had Blade reduced her to nothing?

Tears smarted her eyes as she bent to pick up her clothes. She hunched over to put them on, her back to the giant warrior behind her. When she turned, he had dressed but still gazed at her speculatively.

Her lips pressed into a thin line.

She didn’t know what she wanted from him in that moment. Certainly not an attempt at a hug or a kiss. Or even a thank you. But when he turned and opened the door without a word, she knew for certain that hadn’t been it either.

Maybe she’d wanted an explanation. Or an apology. For him to ask why she seemed upset, because she knew he’d noticed. He might be a man, but he wasn’t oblivious. No, her rebel—damn, not her rebel, just Blade—Blade read her very well. He might not say much, but he always seemed to know.

And didn’t that make it hurt all the worse?

Chapter Eight

Blade had a bad feeling all day. An underlying itchiness worked him over, leaving him on edge. He’d checked and rechecked the borders, cloaking bubble and security measures, but nothing seemed amiss. None of that was his responsibility, anyway. He’d refused all leadership roles offered to him. Bailey had found others to serve as commanding officers, sergeants, and generals. He was more of a lone wolf. Special assignments kind of guy. High ranking, but no rank. As he’d told Lara when she’d first called him sir. He was nobody. He slid in and out of the rebels’ operations, inserting himself where he could be useful, pulling out when things got interpersonal. He guessed it was fair to say he didn’t do people.

An alarm sounded, broadcast through amplifiers to the entire settlement. Blade flicked on his comms unit. “What’s going on?”

“I have multiple incoming, I repeat, multiple unidentified incoming. Shields are activated, but the incoming ships are not slowing.”

Bailey’s voice came through, barking orders to his captains.

The air crackled, and every hair on his body stood on end. A blinding light flashed overhead as their shields shorted out under heavy fire.

Blade pivoted on his cast and ran toward the main building, Dog at his heels. He found Lara with Dasha and Alyx at the windows, peering out.

“You three,” he barked. “Follow me.” He led them at a jog down the corridor toward the command room. The hatch in the floor outside it had already been opened, and President Black was being hustled through. “Get down there. Do not come out until I come for you. Understand?”

Lara looked frightened, which was probably good. This was no time for her to be brave.

“Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir.” It was Alyx who answered him.

“Thank you, son.”

Lara still didn’t speak. Her eyes were round and her face pale. He wanted to kiss her, but the moment was wrong. She’d been cold to him since the day he’d suggested her departure. He’d hurt her. He hadn’t meant to, but he couldn’t take it back because he did need her to leave. This attack only proved that. He should have made her leave sooner, as soon as she’d finished the president’s surgery. Now, her life was in danger.

He grasped her shoulders. “I will come back for you. Wait here for me.”

She nodded.

He handed both a laser gun and a dagger to Alyx. “Protect them.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Dog.” He snapped his fingers and pointed at Lara. “Stay. Protect her.”

Dog trotted to Lara’s side and sat down, wagging his tail as he looked back at Blade. Damn smart animal.

“I’m shutting you in. I promise I’ll be back.”

No one looked panicked. They were probably more used to small, indoor spaces than he was. He would’ve gone apeshit locked in that confined area.

He jogged back out and flicked on his comms unit to figure out where he was most needed.

~~*~~

An explosion rattled the trap door to the hideout. The artificial lighting flashed and went out, leaving them in utter darkness. Screams sounded overhead.

Lara paced back and forth. She couldn’t stand the waiting. It sounded like she might be needed to provide emergency care to people outside, and yet she was hiding down here like a coward. It was logical for the president to be sequestered, but it didn’t make sense for her to be.

When she’d signed up as a Samaritan, she’d known she might put her life at risk on the front lines of war. She hadn’t been afraid. She wasn’t afraid now. Squaring her shoulders, she marched toward the circular metal staircase.

“It is not safe,” Dasha murmured, sensing her intention without needing to see her movements.

“I don’t care,” she gritted. “My services are needed.”

“If you’re going, I’m going,” Alyx said immediately. “Vengeance said I’m to protect you.”

“No,” she said quickly. “Vengeance said you’re to protect this group. You must stay with the president.” She appealed to his sense of heroism rather than tell him she didn’t care to risk his young life out there. She sensed the boy hesitating. “He told the dog to protect me. Dog will come.”

She climbed the stairs. The click of the dog’s toenails sounded behind her then the sound of a boot on metal.

“Alyx, you must stay. The president is our number one priority. You must protect her.” She didn’t know when the rebel’s cause had become hers, but it had.

The footsteps stopped. She reached the top and pushed at the hatch. It didn’t budge. For one panicked moment, she thought Blade had locked them in, but she shoved again with all her might and light shone through, bringing with it a cascade of limestone.

The explosion they’d heard must’ve been right above them. There might be rubble on top of the trap door.

“Alyx, come and help me lift this door.”

The boy jogged up the stairs two at a time, angling past the dog. He positioned himself beside her with his hands against the warm metal.

“On three. One...two...three.” They both heaved, and the plate popped open. Something on top of it slid to the side and tumbled off. She pushed the trap door all the way up as Alyx stuck his head out and pointed the gun.

He popped back in. “It looks clear.”

“Thank you. I’ll cover it back up. Guard them well.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

On an impulse, she grabbed the boy and pulled him in for a hug. He froze and, when she pulled away, he was blushing.

“Be careful.”

“I will.”

Dog pushed past her, scrambling out and sniffing, ears flattened.

“Come on, boy, let’s go.” She grabbed her med-kit and jogged down the hall and out onto the field.

“Doctor!” a voice yelled.

She turned to see someone waving her over. Running to them, she found a man drawing his last breaths after having half his body blown off. She knelt beside him and wished Dasha had come. She’d be able to ease his pain. He lasted only ten more seconds. His body twitched as the life went out of him. “I’m sorry,” she said to the young woman who had beckoned her.

Explosions sounded all around them. Ships plunged from the sky, crashing in flames. She stopped and stared, wondering if Blade rode in one of them. The thought turned her cold. He would be in the thick of it, she knew that for certain. But he also seemed impossible to kill, so that gave her hope.

Seeing two people dragging a body out of a flaming ship, she ran over. “Put him over here. I’ll take care of him while you get the rest out.”

They did as she instructed, and she examined the victim, who had suffered a head wound and multiple burns but looked like he’d survive. “What’s your name?” Lara asked as she sprayed a cooling chemical on the burns.

“Jean,” the young soldier croaked. He looked over Lara’s head and paled.

Lara whirled. A Republican airship hovered right above them. It landed, and the hatch opened. Sheenaw soldiers streamed out like a swarm of wasps. They had bodies much like humans, walking upright on two legs, but their heads were larger and more round, their eyes beady and mean. They had fang-like teeth.

Within seconds, a small group surrounded her as the rest fanned out, shooting all rebel soldiers and rounding up the civilians.

“Onto the ship,” one of them barked, prodding her with a laser gun.

Dog bared his teeth, upper lip lifted to reveal his sharp fangs.

The Sheenaw flicked his gun at Dog and shot him. Dog gave a high-pitched yelp, which trailed into a whine as he flew off his feet onto his side. She lunged for him, but the damn soldier wrapped his fist around her upper arm and yanked her back with bruising force.

“Get off me,” she snarled, anguish over the damn dog giving her more courage than brains.

He smacked her head with the butt of his gun, knocking her to the ground. Stars sparked before her eyes. When her focus returned, the limp form of Dog came into view beside her. Still breathing, thank God.

Her attacker kicked her in the ribs. “Get up. I told you to get on the ship.”

Out of nowhere, a huge figure in black flashed toward them. His foot landed square in the middle of her attacker’s chest, sending him to the ground. As his foot returned, the toe of his boot hooked under the man’s gun, kicking it into the air. Blade caught it in one hand.

Of course it was Blade, not slowed in the least by the cast. “Stay down,” he barked as someone fired at him and he jumped out of the way. He fired back, sizzling the soldier with a laser in the middle of his forehead. He wore a look of pure fury. If she’d found his visage with the tattooed war paint frightening before, he was doubly so now.

She crept toward Dog and wrapped her arms around the shaking beast.

Laser fire came from all directions, but Blade dropped and rolled, firing as he came up, taking out five behind her then three to her right then four more. Alyx’s story about Blade’s single-handed destruction of an entire mining operation might not have been exaggerated.

He tucked a hand under her armpit and hauled her up, firing right, left, and center as he hustled her behind a waste receptacle. He didn’t look at her once, his eyes roving, tracking the enemy. He pointed at her, still without looking. “Don’t. You. Fucking. Move.”

“I won’t move,” she whispered.

He darted back out, leading the fire away from her. She watched as his body count went from ten to twenty then forty. He claimed new guns from the fallen, firing two at a time then capturing an atomic blaster, which he used to send their ship into a zillion pieces of dust. He aimed and shot down every one of their ships in the sky and kept firing his weapons until the battle had been completely won.

Silence fell. The rebel soldiers jogged around the camp with their weapons drawn, checking for any remaining enemy, but it seemed that Blade had single-handedly dispatched them all.

She wanted to come out of hiding, to check on Dog and tend to the wounded, but she knew, now, she’d erred the first time. She didn’t want to make the same mistake twice.

When Blade finally stalked over, he looked as furious as he had when he’d arrived like her knight in shining armor. “Are you hurt?”

She shook her head. “Not hurt.” She kept it short and clipped. Just the facts for her angry rebel. “I’m sorry about Dog,” she said, her voice cracking.

Blade slammed his hand against the metal trash receptacle behind her head. “I put you in a safe place. I told you to wait for me. What part of my orders did you not understand?”

She shrank under his black gaze. “I’m sorry.”

He kicked the receptacle. “Do you know what the Sheenaw would’ve done with a prisoner like you? Do you have any idea what they do to women?”

She shook her head, tears welling.

“No. You don’t want to know, Doctor. You don’t fucking want to know. Because it isn’t pretty. And they wouldn’t give a shit that you came from Earth, or that you have a medical license. All they would see is a beautiful woman to be used for the pleasure of their troops before she was put into slavery, if they didn’t kill her in the process.”

A tear spilled down her cheek.

His comms unit crackled. “Evacuate settlement immediately. Repeat, evacuate settlement immediately.”

He ducked and put his shoulder in the crease of her hips, tossing her over his back and running for the bunker where they had built a large transporter in case of an attack like this. People streamed toward the bunker, some carrying or helping wounded.

She ought to be helping them instead of being carried like a sack of potatoes, but she didn’t dare argue with Blade. Anger came off him in waves and she would do anything at that moment to make things right with him. She may have killed his dog—if so, she’d never forgive herself for it. She’d made him risk his life to rescue her, and she’d disobeyed him—again. The realization that she felt guilty over disobeying came as a surprise. At what point had she given him the authority over her life?

As he stalked with long, determined strides and she dangled against the rippling muscles of his back, face to face with his built ass, she realized it didn’t matter. He had become an authority over her from the moment they first met, and her acquiescence wasn’t even part of the equation.

But the change was that she’d finally accepted it. She didn’t want his anger or irritation. She wanted...hell. She wanted that fiery passion he’d shown her when he shoved her against the wall and took her mouth. She wanted the tenderness he’d offered when she’d cried over his operation. She wanted his regard, even his love. But that wasn’t going to be part of this picture.

~~*~~

Blade dropped her to her feet on the ship. Catching the back of her neck, he pulled her face up to his. Her baby blues were wide and frightened. He needed to get a grip on his anger—he knew how terrifying he looked when mad—but rage still coursed through his veins. He’d turned to beast. Again. Universal God, it had been like he was sixteen all over again. All thought had left his mind, replaced only by pure emotion—pure hatred, the desire to make everyone pay for taking someone he loved. Thank God, in this case, he hadn’t lost her forever.

He glared down at her. “If you set one foot off this ship—”

“I won’t.” She spoke quickly, trembling under his touch. She looked so young and vulnerable. He should be moved by her temerity, but instead it only made him more angry, thinking what they would have done to her. To his little doctor.

The place he’d gone when he saw her in their clutches had been too black. His heart had been poisoned from the beginning then finished, burned to a crisp the day his sister died. He’d never thought to use it again. But apparently it had beat again, had moved, had breathed. Because when fear had snapped its ferocious jaws on his heart, something in his chest had screamed in agony.

He held her captive, punishing her with a look meant to make her think twice about ever again taking any action that put her at risk. “We aren’t through with our discussion,” he hissed.

She shivered.

He stared a moment longer then released her too abruptly, causing her to stumble back. “Medical kit is in the aft closet,” he said as he stalked away, knowing tending to the wounded would be her primary concern.

He ran back out and found three soldiers hustling the president, Alyx, and Dasha onto the transport ship. At least they’d had the damn sense to stay put when their lives were in danger. He found Dog still alive, and handed the animal to a soldier to bring to Lara for medical care.

Jogging back onto the field, he scooped up a young woman from where she’d been crawling on her hands and knees, blood dripping down her front. Her glassy eyes widened when she took in his face, the look of hero worship coming over her. “The hand of vengeance is swift,” she murmured.

He ignored her and carried her in, handing her off to another soldier. He continued with his hunt, scouring the field for anyone remaining before they left this settlement forever.

Five minutes until takeoff. A countdown projected from the ship, warning of its imminent departure. He jogged back into the building to do a check of the interior then out onto the field, checking wrecked hovercrafts for any survivors.

One minute until takeoff. Fifty-six, fifty-five.

He spotted an old man struggling to stand, panic on his lined face. Blade hooked a hand under his armpit and hauled him to stand. He would carry him but he knew how much it would hurt a Jeselian male’s pride. Instead, he dragged him forward, toward the ship.

Twenty-nine, twenty-eight…

“Vengeance!” someone yelled from the closing hatch. “Run!”

“Vengeance is still out there! Open the hatch!”

The hatch would not be reopened, though. Once the countdown began, only the captain could stop it, and there wasn’t time to notify him. He’d have to forget about the old man’s pride. He scooped him up and jumped for the rising gangway, catching the edge of it with his foot and lunging forward. He spilled his cargo, but both of them were propelled forward as the gangway folded closed toward the remaining gap between the metal jaw-like doors.

Soldiers pulled the old man from his grasp, yanked them both in safely, just as the doors clamped shut and the craft lifted off the ground.

Bailey jogged out, his forehead creased with concern. He relaxed when he saw Blade and the old man sprawled on the floor. “You made it.”

Blade climbed to his feet.

“It would have weighed on my conscience to leave behind the man who single-handedly won that battle for us.”

He scrubbed his face with his hand. He knew this was Bailey’s way of thanking him, but he wanted no part of it. He’d never enjoyed the legends that surrounded him, and he didn’t want today’s story added to the tales. Not Lara’s story. Because dammit, he didn’t want to be that man anymore. Especially not with her.

~~*~~

Lara worked for hours re-assembling a makeshift clinic and treating the wounded. Sadly, the number of patients was small, as almost all had been slaughtered, with very few wounded. Dasha had treated Dog, boosting the animal’s vitals until the shock wore off. It seemed like he would live. Even so, threads of insecurity and regret swirled around her psyche.

She knew the moment he entered the room. The air left it in a rush. Blade stood in the doorway, dark and imposing, holding a long piece of sweet-reed. Somehow she doubted it was to quench her thirst.

He said nothing, simply lifted his chin and brows to signal to her.

She didn’t know what it said about her, but her body responded before she’d even made up her mind. She bowed her head and walked to him, and, in doing so, made the particulars of their relationship clear to everyone in the room. She belonged to him, submitted to his authority, accepted his discipline. It was humbling, but not as humiliating as she’d thought it should have been. After all, he was clearly the most dominant male on the rebel ship and a hero to all his people. Was it so terrible to bend a knee to a man like him?

He turned when she reached him, walking away, apparently trusting she’d follow. Of course, she did. He didn’t look over his shoulder to make sure, didn’t wait for her to catch up. He walked to a room and placed his palm against the key screen. The door slid open. She hadn’t been assigned a chamber yet—or if she had, no one had shown it to her. She looked around the tiny compartment with interest. White molded walls gave it a clean feel. The bed attached to one wall was larger than the small, single cot she’d had at the rebel camp. This one appeared to be made for two people. Two built-in pillows lay at the head of it. Drawers and cabinets were built right into the walls, almost invisible to the eye. The door slid shut behind them.

“This is our chamber.”

Her eyes jerked to his in surprise. Since when did they share a room?

He flexed the sweet reed between his two hands. “Take off your clothes.”

She gaped.

He met her stare evenly, his face hard but not brutal as it had been before. The aura of anger had left. Now she felt only sheer, uncompromising determination from him.

She forgot how to breathe, a fact which she didn’t note until she swayed on her feet.

Dropping her gaze, she heel-toed out of her shoes then pulled down her leggings and panties in one swoop. If he wanted to punish her, she’d accept it. The Universal God knew she owed him that much after almost getting his poor dog killed and forcing him to rescue her.

She pulled her medical tunic off over her head and dropped it on the pile of clothing at her feet. Something about stripping for discipline had her heart in palpitations. What it lacked in eroticism, it made up for in submission. And she already knew—although she didn’t understand it—that her body craved his domination. Blade’s face could have been made of stone for all the expressiveness she found there. Even so, her pussy leaked for him. Damn her traitorous body.

She unhooked her bra and released her breasts, heavy and aching with need. Lifting her chin, she conveyed a little splinter of defiance, as if to show him that his order to strip had not daunted her. Which wasn’t remotely true. The trembling in her legs would soon become apparent as it traveled higher and higher.

He pointed with the cane to the bed. “Bend over.”

She didn’t want to. She really didn’t want to. Although she’d never been caned, she was a doctor and scientist and she understood about surface area and velocity. That thin rod would hurt a lot more than his belt or hand.

“Show me your obedience, and I will show you mercy.”

His words made her belly tumble in a somersault. She didn’t want to need his mercy. Grown women—respected doctors, Earthlings who had lived with the equality promoted by the Unified Countries, should not have to plead for mercy from grown men.

But she was scared of his cane. Her inner thighs vibrated together now, moistened by the dripping of her overactive pussy. She swallowed and walked to the bed. Placing her hands on the bed, she eased her torso down. The blanket was of spider silk, an incredibly soft silky fiber found only on Jesel. A blanket like this would cost at least a thousand IPCs on Earth. She didn’t have time to marvel at the fact that the standard issue blankets were made of spider-silk, though, because Blade had moved to stand behind her.

“Are you going to keep your arms tucked under you like that, or shall I tie your wrists?”

She hadn’t even realized she’d pulled her forearms underneath her torso, as if to hug herself for comfort.

She licked her lips to moisten them. “I’ll keep them tucked.” Her voice sounded hoarse.

“If you reach back, I’ll double your punishment. It’s for your own safety. Are you sure you don’t need help?”

It was silly, but she took a little satisfaction in the fact that he still cared about her hands even now that the surgery on his people’s president had been completed. “I won’t reach.” She cared about her fingers, too.

Even so, she found herself grasping her own wrists to keep her hands from flying back when the first swish of the reed came down. The cane left a line of fire burning across her buttocks. It hurt. It hurt so badly, it made her want to run from the room. It took a solid three seconds before she could exhale the breath she’d gasped. Blade seemed to be waiting for her to recover because he didn’t deliver the next stroke until she had.

The next one came down below the first, just as excruciating. She panted into the fine-fibered bedcover, wishing the punishment were over. How many strokes would he give her? Could she take it?

The swish of the reed slicing through the air again reached her ears a split second before the third line of pain erupted across her backside. Her brain began to fog.

He struck her with the crop again. On the fifth stroke, without any conscious thought, she surged up, crawling onto the bed, away from him.

“Back in position.”

She froze in place, the room silent save for the rasping of her breath. He wanted her to willingly place herself back in position. She couldn’t seem to move—she didn’t want to go back there, didn’t want to be whipped any more. She should have opted to be tied up—it would have been easier that way.

Now he was asking her to go back of her own volition, just as she’d stripped and bent over the bed and offered her ass up for his caning of her own accord.

“Please...Blade.”

He didn’t speak, but she felt something from him. Some deep emotion—not anger. Something else. Anguish, perhaps. His breath sounded raspy now, too. When he still didn’t answer, she found herself backing up, putting her feet back on the floor and presenting her welted, quivering cheeks for further punishment.

“Is it too late to ask you to tie me up?”

He didn’t speak but grasped one wrist then the other, bending them into the small of her back. He held them caged in his large palm, his touch gentle but firm.

He whipped her with the cane again.

She rose up on her tiptoes, tightening her buttocks as if that might somehow ward off further assault. Hot tears welled.

Another stripe then another.

The tears spilled. Her compliance turned to anger. Where the fuck did he get off anyway? Never mind that she had consented to it by offering up her bare bottom; now she only wanted it to be over.

He gave her two more searing stripes then released her hands, dropping the sweet reed to the floor with a clatter. His large hands fell on her shoulders, tugging her up, but she twisted and shoved at his chest.

“Get away from me,” she spat.

He didn’t allow it. Scooping her up, he held her against his chest.

She struggled against him, turning again to glare, but when she saw his face, she went still.

Blade’s face was twisted in anguish, and his lashes were wet.

Chapter Nine

His tight chest ached and his breath came in ragged gulps. It had nearly killed him to cane her. What had happened to him? Everything had changed. Discipline had always been a simple matter—if someone under him disobeyed, he punished him. End of story. It was not a savory activity, but it had to be done.

Punishing Lara had torn his heart right out of his chest. And to have her angry with him made it all the worse. Despite her rejection of his comfort, he refused to let her go, clutching her fiercely to him, as if even now the damn Sheenaw might come and try to take her away from him.

Lara reached for his face, and he jerked at the contact, so unused to allowing anyone to touch him. Instantly sorry, he grasped her hand and placed it back on his cheek, holding it there, savoring whatever urge had caused her to touch him that way. Did it mean she forgave him?

His nose burned. He knew he was squeezing his little doctor too tight, crushing her against his body, but he couldn’t make himself ease the grasp.

“I can’t—” He cleared his throat as if it would make the words come out better. “I couldn’t stand to see you harmed.” He wanted to explain to her why he had been so angry, why he had thought it necessary to give such a harsh punishment, but his words sounded too simple, too vague. How could he possibly explain the pain he’d felt when he saw her being taken by them? The blackness that bubbled out of his heart? The blind fury that turned him into a killing machine?

“Dog is all right,” she whispered.

“I don’t care about Dog.” He didn’t mean to snap at her. It seemed he only knew how to make things worse. “I mean, I’m glad, but I’m not angry about my pet getting shot.”

“Why are you angry?” she whispered.

He stared over the top of her head, seeing his crying sister being dragged by the mine’s drunken Sheenaw foremen. He should have acted then. He would have saved her. Vengeance and justice meant nothing when you had no one left to love. Empty constructs that would never, ever satisfy, never fill the empty space between his ribs.

“I didn’t want to lose you,” he whispered back. “I couldn’t stand to lose another—” He stopped. It was too much to explain about Tarin, and he didn’t want to bring her into this, anyway.

“I heard about your sister.” Her soft voice fell like a blanket over his shoulders.

Tears threatened again. Universal God, he hadn’t cried once in the last thirty years. Not even over Tarin. What was it about this day that had cracked him open and let all his darkness pour out?

He leaned his forehead against hers. “I was afraid—” He stopped again. When had he ever uttered those three words in his life? Never. But here he was confessing the ultimate weakness.

“You saved me,” she said firmly, as if knowing that the demons were playing a terrible “what if” game with his head at the moment. “And I’m sorry I put you in that position.”

He cradled her head in both his hands. “Forgive me.” He’d been biting back an apology since the moment he dropped the sweet reed. One didn’t ask forgiveness for doling out well-deserved discipline. But he needed things to be right with her more than he needed to be right.

“For caring about me? I can’t resent that, can I?”

He kissed her lightly on the forehead then moved his thumb to kiss her cheekbone on the right, then the left. He brought a reverence to the act, as if by making it holy, he might purify them both.

“But if you mean for that horrible caning, then not yet.”

A smile tugged at his lips, because, despite her words, he felt her forgiveness. “I will allow you to sulk, just this once.”

She laid her cheek on his shoulder, which made his heart constrict. “So damn imperious. What would happen if you didn’t allow it?”

He kissed her nose. “Don’t test me, little girl.” He turned and laid her face down on the bed, her welted bottom on display. From her discarded tunic pocket, he pulled out a little tin of local salve the rebel women had been supplying her with. He’d seen her pull it out and use it for all sorts of abrasions. The little metal tub had a screw on top and a sticker with a hand-written label. He scooped a dollop of the yellow-green balm with his index finger and slathered it on one of her welts with a feather touch.

Lara flinched then relaxed, as if by will. She rested her cheek on her hands, her face turned toward him watching. “Everyone in my clinic knows I got a spanking.”

He smiled. Her sulking actually turned him on. It conveyed her acceptance of his authority. It had meant a lot to him that she’d offered herself up for punishment. He wouldn’t have forced her. If she’d folded her arms and refused to strip and bend over, he would have given her a piece of his mind, but he wouldn’t have punished her without her consent. Not this time. She was no longer his captive, nor under any obligation to him.

He shrugged. “Corporal punishment is not unusual on Jesel.” He continued his application of the salve.

“I’m their boss.”

“And I’m the man who cares about what happens to you.”

“So that gives you the right?”

“On Jesel, it does. But, regardless, I’ve never been one to wait for someone to give me rights.” If he had, he’d still be a slave working in a diamond mine for Treedle. He buttered the lowest welt and filled his hand with the back of her thigh, which God had made the perfect width for exactly that purpose.

“Are you going to fuck me?”

His brows shot to his hairline. Was that an invitation? Or trepidation speaking? She didn’t look scared, though. Her cheeks had flushed and she was licking her lips. He ran a hand ever so lightly over her welted ass. “I’m not sure you’d like it much.”

She bit her lip, making him want to claim her mouth. Perhaps she needed release. He slid two fingers between her legs. “Do you need some help?”

She parted her legs and lifted her ass for him, stealing his breath. “I want you to fuck me.”

~~*~~

Blade swept her hair from her shoulder and kissed it. She never would have imagined a man like him, constructed only of flint and steel, could be capable of such tenderness. As much as it had hurt, she would take a thousand canings to feel the closeness they shared at this moment. He had admitted he cared for her, had claimed her as his own through the harshness of his punishment as thoroughly as he’d claimed her that first day they’d had sex.

Now, with her ass still burning on the surface and throbbing on a deeper level, she felt thoroughly owned by him. She’d never felt so connected to another being in her life. Her attention had been spent lost in science and medicine. She’d kept herself impossibly busy so she never had to connect on more than a superficial level with other beings. And at this moment she wanted—no, she needed—to connect with Blade in the most physical of ways. She didn’t care if it hurt her swollen ass. In fact, that might even heighten the experience for her. Because she loved this man’s dominance.

Blade stood and pulled his body-hugging combat shirt over his head. He kicked off his boots and shucked his trousers. He wore no underclothing. His cock jutted proudly, as ready for her as her weeping pussy was for him.

“On your knees, facing me.”

His command sent a heady thrill through her core. She pushed back to her knees then lifted her torso and shifted to face him where he stood.

He reached out and clasped her nipple between his thumb and forefinger. Rolling it, he urged it into a stiff peak. He tugged it forward, causing her to gasp. He immediately released it, cupping the entire breast and squeezing as his other hand found its way between her legs.

“Spread your knees wider.”

She eased them farther apart.

“Who do you belong to?” He ran one finger along her dewy folds.

She licked her lips. “You. Only you.”

His eyelids drooped and one corner of his mouth lifted. He stroked a slow circle around her clit.

Her inner thighs trembled. She ached for more. “Please, Blade.”

He hooked his arm around her waist to brace her and slid two fingers inside her.

She grasped his shoulders and dug her fingernails into his flesh, her head falling back. “Yes...please.”

He pumped his fingers in and out roughly. “You want more of that?”

“You...I want you. Please?”

She was sloppy wet, her juices leaking down her thighs and making smacking sounds as he finger-fucked her.

He pulled his fingers out and slapped her pussy. “Show me.” He slid onto the bed on his back.

Ass throbbing, pussy pulsing, she crawled over him and grasped his huge cock in her fist. A flick of her tongue had it bobbing. A slow trail around the rim brought his groan. Enjoying the shift in power, she opened her lips wide and took him into the pocket of her cheek, sucking hard.

He grasped her head, burying his fingers in her hair.

She hummed as she took him in and out, slid her fist along the root of his cock in concert with her mouth.

“Enough, woman.” Blade’s voice came low and guttural. “Climb on me.”

She smiled and crawled over him, impaling herself on his straining dick. She understood he’d chosen the position for her comfort, and she loved him for it.

He wrapped his big hands around her waist and pulled her forward and back.

She ground her clit down on him, arched her back and rode. Despite the fact that she was on top, he did all the work, propelling her with a speed and force she didn’t dare interrupt.

She watched his face contort, and he yanked her down hard and held her. His hips lifted both of them into the air, and his head dropped back. “Bad girls don’t get to come,” he said without any breath leaving his chest.

His hot cum filled her as her mind processed his words. Her cunt pulsed around his cock, or maybe his cock was pulsing inside her, but either way, she experienced the sensations as all possibility of reaching orgasm trickled away.

She almost wanted to cry. Or to crawl away, thoroughly humbled. She felt about two inches high.

Blade opened his arms. “Come here.”

Despite her disappointment, she didn’t even think about resisting the order. She needed his reassurance more than anything. Matching her torso to his, she laid herself over him like a blanket and let him hold her.

He stroked her hair and her back, and kissed the top of her head. “Don’t sulk, angel. If you’re beside me in this bed tonight, I won’t make it to morning without taking you again.”

She wasn’t sulking. She just felt thoroughly chastised. More so than after her spanking—because, of course, then, she’d been angry. It was truly an effective punishment.

Blade continued to soothe her, stroking and kissing as his spent cock slipped out. He ran both hands down the length of her back, lightly cupping her hot, swollen buttocks.

She wondered if this, too, was a Jeselian punishment. Did all Jeselian men humble their naughty women this way, withholding pleasure while they took their own? The funny part was that she didn’t even consider trying to finish herself off. She was certain Blade would put a stop to it anyway.

She laid her cheek against his chest and listened to the sound of his steady heartbeat, letting it lull her into slumber.

She dreamed Blade’s hands were all over her, hot and possessive. In every sequence, he was handling her—picking her up to place her in a tree, folding her over a surgery bed to spank her in front of her patients, pushing her legs back to lick into her feminine folds. She woke on her side facing away from him, his cock bobbing at her ass as one hand squeezed her breast. He tugged at her nipple, rolling it between his fingertips. The room was dark. Her pussy was swollen and wet. She reached back to guide him in.

“If you were my wife,” he murmured in her ear, “I’d never let you sleep. I’d force you to sleep naked beside me so I could have my way with you any time I liked.”

Her pussy contracted around his length at the idea of being his wife, a Jeselian wife owned and dominated by her man. Backwards, but definitely arousing.

He rolled her to her belly and thrust deep inside her, the pressure from his loins confirming her buttocks still ached from his punishment. It was a good kind of pain, though—a dulled reminder of his earlier dominance. Her pussy released a fresh issuance of lubricant, welcoming him.

He laced his fingers over hers and nuzzled her neck, his breath hot as he rocked inside her. “If you were my wife, I’d insist you remove your panties any time we’re alone. I’d make you spread your legs and show me your sweet little pussy while you ate or studied or read.”

She moaned.

He reached a hand underneath her and found her swollen clit. He diddled it.

She arched.

“If you forgot, I’d punish your little pussy. I’d spank it until you were sore and swollen and then I’d pound into you and make you scream.”

She bit the bed covering, ready to scream already.

He continued to rub her clit as he thrust with deep, steady strokes. “Do you think I should let you come this time, Lara?”

All she could do was whimper. She was at his mercy. She didn’t wish to declare whether she deserved his reward or not, didn’t wish to consider it. She would accept whatever he had to give her.

“Hmm?”

“Blade,” she gasped.

“You may come, Lara.”

Her muscles contracted around his cock, squeezing it as her buns tightened and she arched beneath him.

He shoved in deep and stayed, his hot essence shooting into her.

~~*~~

In the morning, Blade pulled Lara over his lap to inspect her welted bottom. She looked over her shoulder at him, her cheeks coloring. Her body was so relaxed—none of the usual stiffness or stress was present in her limbs or face. The dark circles were gone from under her eyes.

He ran his palm over her little bottom. Despite the ointment he’d applied, she still bore some marks. He didn’t know if the salve would do any good hours later, but he reapplied it, enjoying playing with her perfect ass. He rubbed it all over, letting his fingers trail down her crack. She jerked but didn’t tighten, still offering herself up to his hand. He circled her tight bottom hole. The little rosette contracted.

“When you’ve been naughty and had your little bottom punished with a cane, you’ll take my cock in your ass.”

She moaned, her eyes glassy. He knew by the way she lifted and lowered her hips, the idea excited her.

“Reach back and pull your cheeks apart for me, Lara.”

She hesitated only a breath before she did as he instructed, parting her twin moons to expose the dusky pink pucker.

“Good girl.”

He pushed one finger inside her, massaging around the stretched rim of muscles.

She held perfectly still, arching her back, lifting her buttocks to him.

He moved in and out, added a second finger.

“This is what happens to naughty girls who disobey their masters. Right, Lara?”

“Yes, sir.” Her voice sounded breathy, lust echoing in the two syllables.

He removed his fingers. “Get on your knees and forearms.” He helped her by lifting her hips, steadying her as she assumed the position. Gripping her thighs, he pulled them apart and lowered his head to lick into her folds. Her delicious nectar flowed as he flicked his tongue over her clit. He pulled back and slapped her pussy, her wetness making a sticky sound when his fingers contacted it.

“Does your little pussy need a spanking?”

“I-I don’t know.”

He chuckled at the desire-roughened words, happy she was beginning to admit she liked spanking. He spanked her glistening pussy lightly, a dozen times. “Reach back and touch yourself, Lara.”

“What?”

“Touch your pussy. Show me how you pleasure yourself.”

She threaded her arm down between her legs and cupped her mons, undulating her fingers over it.

“That’s it.”

He kneeled behind her and rubbed some of the salve on the head of his cock. Parting her cheeks, he pushed at her back entrance. It took all his self-control to go slowly, to enter her gently, because his passion for her roared in his ears.

She accepted him, gasping and mewling, her fingers working frantically on her cunt.

He gripped her hips and fucked her ass, so tight and warm. “You feel so...fucking...good,” he growled.

“Please, Blade, please, please, please.”

“I like it when you beg. But you’ll wait until I’m ready to come.” The truth was he was on the edge, holding back to prolong both their pleasure. He reached around the front of her hips and helped her fingers, rubbing her swollen clit. His cock swelled, and a roar rose in his throat. Shoving in deep, he came, jerking against her soft ass.

“Now, Lara.” With the cone of his fingers, he penetrated her pussy, fucking her hard and fast.

She came immediately, the walls of her pussy contracting around his fingers, her anus tightening around his cock. She let out a keening cry, her fists wrapping in the spider-silk blanket. He stayed buried in her until all the tension in her body disappeared and she went limp beneath him. Easing out, he cleaned them both with a washcloth and dropped beside her, pulling her soft form against him. “I’ve got to get you off Jesel, Doctor. Right away. I can’t risk your life again.”

~~*~~

She watched Blade’s hulking form stalk into camp, a large deer-like animal hanging around his broad shoulders. She couldn’t deny the tingle of attraction shooting down her inner thighs and curling her toes. Man as hunter. It was as archetypal as archetypes get. Something never seen anymore on Earth. Men were the same as women. Jobs were interchangeable. Equality ruled the sexes as much as democracy ruled the Unified Countries. People worked indoors, with machines and computers. The air was not clean enough to work outside and no wilderness, other than the vacationer-packed designated land-parks, was left.

His eyes found her across the field, and he lifted his chin in greeting. No smiles or waves from her warrior, but it incited a riot of excitement in her nonetheless.

It had been four days since the attack on the other camp. She’d expected the transport ship to go out into space, but, when the next morning came, she’d found they had already landed at an alternative rebel camp. The rebels were more organized than she’d suspected. They kept the ship in cloaked mode and used it as their home base, still sleeping on it, but, otherwise, they sprawled out into the wilderness.

During the day, Blade was at work, although never part of the military-like organization of the rebels. No, he was a lone wolf, finding his own projects or hunting. They continued to share a room at night. The first two nights, he’d come and collected her from the medical tent by tossing her over his shoulder and carrying her off. Last night, she grew wise and quit working before he came for her. The moment she’d walked out of the tent, his eyes had found her and he’d met her at the ship’s entrance.

He had ravaged her as thoroughly as he had their first time every night. He took her in a variety of positions, made her come more times than she thought possible. He woke her in the night, tasted her again in the morning. Her body had never been so thoroughly used. She was sore in all her secret places and the feeling carried her through her days. For the first time, ever, she thought about something other than her work.

Blade didn’t come to her now—he never did during the day. Instead, he brought his game to those in charge of meals and then vanished back into the trees.

She turned to find Dasha watching her thoughtfully. The Varu’s eyes slid down her torso and rested on her belly.

“What?”

“You already know.”

She hadn’t. Not until then. But she had suspected. Unfortunately, she didn’t have the lab equipment available to test her blood for hormone levels. Her birth control shot should have lasted until she returned as scheduled, but she’d felt...different. Of course, she’d never had so much sex in her life, so feeling different made sense. Why had the shot not lasted? Had the shorter days on Jesel counted as full Earth planet rotations?

Goose bumps stood up on her arms, and her surroundings began to spin.

Dasha reached out and caught her elbow to steady her. “You should eat. Rest more.”

She nodded dumbly and walked toward the mess tent. What should she do now?

Blade wanted her gone. He had made it plain. And while she’d been offended the first time he told her, she’d since come to realize that he might know something about the timing of the revolution that she did not. He had arranged for her to be transported to the capital in two days and, from there, the Samaritans would transport her back to Earth.

She ran a hand over her still-flat belly. She had all the more reason to leave now, if the planet would be in unrest. A new life to protect. But the question was—did she tell Blade before she left? A lick of pain shot through her heart as she realized that imaginary life—the one where she was his Jeselian wife and she brought him this good news—would never be.

She was not Jeselian. Jesel was at war, or would be soon. And Blade was as much a lynchpin to the revolution as their precious President Black. Distracting him right now would be a mistake. Besides, she hardly knew the man. Telling him she carried his child would bind him to her when he would not have done so on his own.

Sure, he had murmured things like, If you were my wife..., but they had been teasing, because he knew how shocking his Jeselian ways would sound. Or perhaps he knew how they fanned the flames of passion for her, even as they offended her better sensibilities. He seemed to know things about her and her particular passions that she had yet to discover for herself.

No, it would be better to say nothing for now. It was too early in the pregnancy anyway. Thirty percent of pregnancies were lost in the first term. Despite all the scientific advancements they’d made in medicine, that figure hadn’t changed since before interplanetary travel began in the early 2100s. If the pregnancy went to term, and the baby was healthy...well, she could think about contacting Blade then. At this point, she had no idea if he even wanted to see her again after she left. She would never obligate him or bind him to her simply because she had a child. On Earth, people were parents in all kinds of ways. Some still followed the traditional family structure, but so many people raised children in alternate ways. She would have no problem rearing a child on her own. Besides, she wouldn’t be all alone. Her parents would be overjoyed.

Thinking of them gave her a pang of homesickness and she was glad she would see them soon. Tonight she would send them a message letting them know her arrival time.

Chapter Ten

It felt like his heart had been ripped from his chest and pinned to a tree for archery practice. Lara was leaving that morning. He had arranged it, had wanted it, yet none of that lessened the pain behind his sternum.

The air between them was charged with unspoken grief. She pulled on her tunic and brushed her hair, standing with her back to him.

“Come here, Lara.” He sat on the edge of the bed.

She turned with her brows raised, but when he said nothing, she walked to him, placing herself between his knees.

He tugged her over one of them and began to spank her with the flat of his hand.

The air left her with a whoosh, but, otherwise, she made no protest, nor did she struggle against him. Each crack broke down the tension between them, eased the thickness in the room.

He remembered the first time he’d spanked her. Her leggings had been wet, and they’d made such a sting for his hand. She’d kicked and fought him that time, his little she-tiger, his sexy little spitfire.

He spanked her now until she could no longer hold still and take it. He spanked her until she began to wriggle over his lap and her breath became labored.

He stopped and lifted her to sit on his lap. Her cheeks had flushed a delightful shade of pink; her nipples stood erect under her tunic.

“What was that for?”

“Ruining my pleasure at being alone.”

Tears sprang into her eyes, but she blinked them back. His girl was ever brave. He hadn’t expected less on this day.

He lifted her from his lap and stood. “Come on. I’ll walk you to the hovercraft.”

She laced her fingers in his and walked close to his side as they exited the transport ship and walked across the field to the small hovercraft readied to take her to the capital. It would be dangerous getting her there. Jamis, the pilot who was taking her, had volunteered, knowing he risked his own neck flying into the Capitol’s airspace without official business. But he was an Earthling, originally, and had a license to fly off-planet, so he had a cover to use.

Jamis sat in the open door of the craft, waiting.

Blade pulled Lara to a stop twenty-five meters away. “Lara…” His voice was thick with emotion. He had no words for all the things he wanted to tell her. Instead, he pulled his only possession of worth out of his pocket and pressed it into her hand.

She opened her palm and gaped at the monstrous diamond, pink in color and as big as her fist.

“Blade,” she gasped. “What is this?”

He closed her fingers around it. “I want you to have it. Make a good life for yourself on Earth.”

Once more, her eyes brightened with tears, but they didn’t spill. She thrust his gift back at him. “Blade, I can’t take this. It’s worth millions of IPCs.”

It was probably worth closer to a billion. “I know. I want you to have it.” His heart rate had inexplicably increased; his neck felt hot.

“But Blade—wouldn’t this be put to better use by the rebels? To fund the revolution? Or for a fresh start afterward?”

He shook his head. “When we take back our planet, we will own all the diamonds in the galaxy. We don’t lack wealth, we lack control...for the moment.”

He pulled a second gift from his pocket. “This one you probably can’t take back to Earth, so eat it on the ride and think of me.”

Her smile held a world of sadness as she accepted the bloodfruit. “I will think of you always,” she whispered. “Do you think...will I see you again?”

He cupped her face with one hand and ran his thumb over her lower lip. “I hope so.”

“How?”

He hadn’t asked for her direction-code, had no way to get in touch with her once she departed the planet. Nor had he offered his, not that he had one. The truth was he didn’t know if he’d live through the revolution. He planned to give his life to ensure freedom and liberty for all. He didn’t want to promise Lara he’d contact her, only to have her waiting for the rest of her life.

“If it’s meant to be, we’ll find each other.” He could offer her no more than that.

Her lips trembled, but she nodded. “Good-bye, then.”

He lifted her face and kissed her forehead then each of her cheeks and finally her lips. Not a sexy kiss. A flat, dead kiss. A good-bye forever kiss.

~~*~~

Lara clutched the bloodfruit in her hand. She didn’t realize her fingers were digging into the flesh until the crimson juice dribbled down her forearm. Hot tears speared her eyes. This time, away from Blade, she let them fall.

It’s only because of the pregnancy. I’m more emotional than usual.

She prayed for her rational, scientific side to return.

Buckled into the craft, she dashed her tears with the back of her hand and nibbled at the bloodfruit. She wasn’t hungry. In fact, nausea had been turning her gills green all morning, but having a little food in her belly would help. She licked at the juice running down her wrist and tried to forget the way Blade had fed it to her, the way he’d caged her intimately between his arms and knees, caring for her as thoroughly as he’d reminded her of his dominance. A man’s man. Thinking of him now, even amidst her grief, her attraction to him flared.

Maybe she should have told him. The thought had been nagging her since the moment they’d parted. It wouldn’t have changed anything. She knew that. He had a revolution to lead, and she needed to get off Jesel for safety. But it was his child, after all. And now she had no way of telling him.

She supposed she’d expected them to make a plan. A time and way to communicate with each other. Something beyond his promise to find her if he survived. Because, frankly, that wasn’t cutting it. It left her completely helpless to contact him. Which is probably how it had to be when you were the hero of the revolution.

What if she never had the chance to tell him she was having his child? What if he died in the revolution? The thought made her nausea return full force.

Maybe knowing he had a child would keep him alive. Maybe he wouldn’t be the madman in battle. Or maybe, if he died, he’d die happy, knowing his legacy would live on with their child. She sniffed.

Damn the tears that spilled down her cheeks without end.

She hadn’t cried so much in the past ten years as she had since she met her rebel. But that was love, wasn’t it? It awakened a depth of emotion she’d forgotten she had. And if she knew she loved him, then she shouldn’t have left without at least telling him that.

“Unknown air unit, identify yourself.”

Jamis spoke into his comms unit. “This is Transport Craft number three eight three five, interplanetary taxi unit seeking to land in Jesel City.”

“What’s your business?”

“I’m transporting a doctor from the Interplanetary Samaritans, sir. She is scheduled to embark on an Earth-bound ship this afternoon from Jesel City.”

“Name of the doctor?”

Jamis glanced back at her, as if he was worried about her safety.

Her hand instinctively dropped to her belly.

“Dr. Lara Simmons, sir.”

A long silence ensued. Jamis tapped on the control panel, muttering.

“Does it usually take this long?”

He pursed his lips. “I’m sure everything’s fine,” he said in a way that made her think the opposite was true.

At last the voice returned. “Number three eight three five, you’re cleared for landing.”

They both exhaled, but the tension in the pilot’s face didn’t ease, making her think they weren’t out of the woods yet.

“Jamis?”

He looked over his shoulder at her, his hands on the controls. “Yes, Doctor?”

“I changed my mind. Please take me back to the rebel camp. I need to tell Blade something.”

Jamis’ eyebrows shot to the ceiling. “What?” He pulled up on the controls then shook his head. He flipped several switches. “Dr. Simmons, I’m sorry, but they’ve already magnetized us in. I can’t disengage now. As soon as we land, I can get clearance to take off again and I’ll take you straight back. Okay?”

Her mouth had gone dry. She attempted a swallow. “Okay, yeah. That’d be great. Thanks.”

As it turned out, he never had that chance, because the moment they landed, military police swarmed the craft and took her into custody.

~~*~~

Numbness crept through his veins, turned his body, mind, and soul translucent. Without noticing how he got there, he found himself back at camp, near the medic tent, of all places. How stupid of him to come to the precise place that would cause him more pain.

Lara’s colleague, Dasha, stood in the doorway, looking at him thoughtfully. She had another month left for her Interplanetary Sams stint and had agreed to stay with the rebels for it.

“Get out of my mind, Varu.”

“I don’t have to be in your mind, Jesel. Your grief fills your entire aura.”

He lifted his upper lip in a sneer. Auras weren’t something he put much belief in.

“Why would you release the one woman worthy of holding your heart?”

His chest tightened. Pain lanced through his chest.

“For the baby?”

His brain stuttered a dozen times and came to a screaming halt. His mouth went dry. “What?” The syllable sounded distant to his own ears.

Dasha blinked her wide, violet eyes then turned and moved away, seeming to realize her blunder.

He closed the distance between them and grabbed her elbow, tugging her around to face him. “What did you say?”

She shrugged.

His throat worked. “Did she know?”

Dasha nodded once, slowly. “She knew.”

He shook his head in disbelief. “But how—? Never mind.” He whirled, leaving the room before the Varusian read anything more from him.

He paced the tiny room they’d shared. Why had she not told him? Did she not plan to keep it? Or did she not wish for him to take an active role in the raising of their child? That thought hurt. He knew they were different. Jeselian men were far less civilized than the men back on Earth. Maybe she feared he’d control her or the baby.

He smashed the wall with his fist, splintering the plastic. Damn. He should have tried to behave in a more gentlemanly way with her. He should have shown her he was not all beast, all the time. He leaned his forehead against the cracked plastic wall, the sharp edges cutting lines into his skin. Fuck.

He glanced at the time. Maybe she was still on Jamis’ ship. He found the frequency on his comms unit.

“The hand of vengeance strikes.”

“And justice will be served.” Jamis answered the rebel code.

“Package delivered?”

“Ahh…”

He stiffened, fear leaping up his throat.

“That’s semi-affirmative. The package departed my craft, but did not make the scheduled transfer.”

What the hell had happened? He would rip Jamis in pieces if any harm had come to her. “What in the hell do you mean?”

“The package is in military custody, sir.”

White rage flushed through his body, and he palmed one of his swords, as if he might fight the enemy away from her from a distance. He spluttered.

“I fear—”

“Do not continue on this frequency,” he barked. It was a private channel, but he was too worried about what the Republicans knew. Because they fucking have Lara!

Jamis wisely remained silent. He’d already said too damn much, showing anyone listening that his relationship with the doctor had been more than mere taxi driving.

He clicked off his comms unit and gulped in air. Every cell in his body yearned to jump on a craft and crash his way into the capital, knock down every living being in his way and snatch up his bride.

His Bride.

The words had slipped into his mind, but they sounded so right. That’s what she was. If they left so much as a bruise on her perfect body, he’d kill every last breathing Republican on this planet. Unfortunately, he couldn’t smash down their walls today. Not tomorrow, either. To do so would jeopardize the revolution. But, damn, he hardly cared about it anymore. All he could think about was his beautiful doctor, his woman, and the tiny being growing inside her that belonged to both of them.

His hands were tied until their attack in two days.

~~*~~

“Step this way, Doctor.” The soldiers weren’t rough with her. In fact, they didn’t touch her at all, but they did crowd around her, leaving her with zero chance of escape. They led her onto a small hovercraft, and one of them indicated a seat for her.

“Where are we going?”

No one spoke. She hadn’t really expected an answer, but it had been worth a try.

The flight lasted precisely four minutes and, while she couldn’t see out any windows, judging by the change in light, they’d landed indoors or underground.

She unbuckled her harness and stood when the soldier who appeared to be in the lead beckoned to her. Again the group swarmed around her, not touching but staying close. They exited into what appeared to be an underground bunker.

A trim man in a crisp uniform stepped forward. “Dr. Simmons. I am Colonel Furce. Come with me, please.” He ushered her into what must be his office. A family photo hologram glimmered in the air above his control panel. He gestured to a chair. The room—the entire place—seemed decidedly “Earth-like.” After four weeks on outer Jesel, with only the basics in furnishings, this place seemed opulent with the newest man-made materials and deco-art styling. The cushioned polycarbonate chair molded to her bottom and low back.

The colonel got right to the point. “You were kidnapped by the rebels.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Where did they take you?”

“To their camp outside Parth. To tend to their wounded.”

“And did you?”

She lifted her chin. “Of course. I am a doctor. I swore the Hippocratic Oath.”

A smile flitted across his lips. “I see. Did they harm you at all? They are heathens, the Jeselians.”

She forced her breath to remain calm. “I was not harmed.” She may have been spanked by her fierce warrior, but it had not been to harm her. It had only ever been to keep her safe. She understood that now. Her heart twisted painfully, thinking of him.

“And after the camp was attacked? Where did you go then?”

“I do not know. A wilderness camp—very primitive. And then I asked to leave, and they allowed it.” That was truth. Blade had been very careful not to give her any information that could be tortured out of her. They would have moved locations again by now anyway, so even if they impounded Jamis’ craft and downloaded the coordinates, they wouldn’t find the rebels.

“You have no political views on Jesel?”

“No, sir. I’m a Samaritan. I’m here to provide medical aid, nothing more.”

“So you would treat anyone, no matter their political leanings?”

“Of course.”

“Your assistance is required in the presidential palace.”

She stared, stunned. This she had not expected. She’d thought she’d be interrogated, possibly tortured. She expected reprimand at treating the rebels. That her services were in need came as a surprise. “Surely the president has his own doctors?” This could be a trick.

The colonel nodded. “He does. But the surgical equipment malfunctioned, and a member of the president’s family is in need of immediate assistance. Transport to Earth is out of the question.”

She stood up, finally on solid ground. “Take me to him.”

“Her. It’s the ’president’s daughter.” The colonel also stood. “You will treat her, then?”

“Of course I will,” she snapped. “That’s what I do. That’s why I’m here. Take me to her.”

“We will resume the debrief about your abduction later, then. I will require all the information you can give me, including names and descriptions of all the rebels.”

“I treat the wounded. I do not spend my time memorizing faces,” she snapped, although she instantly regretted it. She didn’t want to come off as a rebel supporter. It could cost her her life. But for the time being, someone’s health problem had bought her time, and she planned to take full advantage of it.

The colonel called to the soldiers guarding the door. “Take her up.”

Chapter Eleven

Blade checked and rechecked his weapons. He’d walked around breathing in cold dread for two days now. Lara was in the capital. Somewhere. Lara and his unborn baby. They could be killed during the rebel’s full-scale attack. And there was literally nothing he could do to ensure that didn’t happen.

Every Jeselian on the planet had mobilized for a simultaneous strike. All power sources would be cut through a magnetic jamming system developed by Bailey. This meant no one—including the rebels—would be able to use lasers or airships or any of the “civilized” methods of engaging in war. It would be an old-fashioned hand-to-hand combat-style war, with old-fashioned fire explosives, swords, fists, and primitive weaponry from the mines like chisels and hammers. Some even had the ancient weapons handed down from the original settlers from Earth—guns that fired copper alloy bullets.

The rebels would prevail because native Jeselians knew how to defend themselves on this level. They knew the terrain; their bodies were better equipped for fighting. The Republicans were soft. They didn’t know hard work or how to use brute force. The Sheenaw did, but he could defeat them in a fight.

T minus fourteen. Bailey’s voice blared over the small craft’s comms unit.

The plan was for all ships to fly—cloaked—right up to the capital’s shield, just beyond where they would show up on radar, cloaking or no. At that point, the ships would simultaneously land at the same moment Bailey engaged the magnetic jammer to disable the shield and everything powered. Any ships still in the air would have to use manual controls to land. Some had chosen to do so on purpose, planning to coast farther into the capital and parachute out, leaving their ships to cause destruction when they crashed.

T minus ten.

He’d opted to go in a ship that wouldn’t land. He’d told Sam, the pilot, to get him as close to the Capitol building and presidential palace as possible, so he could parachute right down into the fray. The pilot had taken them to five thousand meters above the ground in order to give them enough time during the freefall to get over the city. He hoped it worked.

T minus five.

He hefted the parachute onto his back and double-checked the second chute for Sam, the pilot.

Sweat dripped down Sam’s forehead, and he gripped the controls with white knuckles, but the young man’s jaw was set with grim determination. So many would offer their lives for the revolution today.

A few days ago, he would have gladly done the same, but now not even the precious revolution was as important to him as securing Lara’s safety. And, to do that, he had to stay alive. It was a different mindset. He’d never cared whether he lived or died before, and that lack of interest in his safety was what had made him indestructible. Somehow, it gave him three hundred lives. He’d survived time and time again, against all odds, when he should have been long dead.

Now, though, for the first time, he knew real fear. Not for himself, but for the woman he loved. It weakened him as a weapon of the revolution. He hoped to the Universal God he would keep a clear mind and sharp instincts to get them both through this.

T minus one and counting. Fifty-nine...fifty-eight…

Sam was breathing in rapid bursts. He shot Blade a terrified look.

Blade gave him a solemn nod, meant to calm him. The plan was in play. If they followed it, they might live.

Twenty-two...twenty-one...twenty…

He slid into the co-pilot chair, not because he knew how to manually fly an airship, but for moral support. To let poor Sam know he wasn’t going to jump off this ship without him.

Five...four...

Sam thrust the lever that switched to manual controls.

Three...two...one...jamming unit en—

Bailey’s voice cut out at the same time the power did. Not even sound frequencies could be transmitted with the jammer engaged.

Sam gripped the joystick and shoved it all the way forward, intently watching the old-fashioned monitoring dials they’d installed for this mission. “We’re falling at a rate of one thousand meters per minute.”

“That’ll give us plenty of time.” He attempted to make his voice soothing.

It was odd not to be shot at or engaged by other crafts. In fact, despite the loud rushing sound of air against the ship, everything seemed eerily silent.

He flicked open the ancient compass and glanced at the coordinates for the Capitol building. “Destination lies at three o’clock.”

Sam pushed the joystick to the right. “Roger that, sir.”

He overshot it.

“Adjust back by fifteen degrees.”

Sam’s face had turned as white as the clouds they cut through. With trembling fingers, he adjusted the joystick back.

Blade made a sharp halting noise when he reached the right angle and Sam exhaled and pushed the stick forward.

“We’re at twenty-five hundred meters, sir.”

“Stay with it, Sam. Just a little longer.”

Sam wiped the sweat from his face with his shoulder. “Yes, sir.”

As the city came into view, the sensation of plummeting increased, taking his stomach on a loop-the-loop.

“One thousand meters, sir.”

“Get up,” he barked, surging to his feet. He picked up the parachute and held it out for the shaking pilot. Treating him like a child, he turned him around and fastened the buckles then placed the pull-string in his hand.

He kicked open the hatch, which wouldn’t open without power, and held onto Sam’s arm. “On three. One...two…” He didn’t wait for three, but yanked the young man forward, leaping out of the falling craft.

“Good luck,” he shouted. Not wanting to take any chances, he pulled Sam’s cord for him before he pushed away from him with a friendly wave. The pilot’s parachute deployed, opening up and catching air, slowing his descent.

Blade waited a little longer for his, trying to get his bearings. He’d never been to the capital, but he’d studied the maps before they left. Catching sight of the diamond tower top of the presidential palace just below him, he pulled his cord. Destination reached. Now he just had to find his woman.

~~*~~

For the second time that month, the power went out. She’d been standing beside her patient, Treedle’s daughter Saraya, who was recovering well from her surgery. She’d had an ectopic pregnancy, but Lara had been able to do a salpingectomy, which removed part of the fallopian tube but reattached the remaining ends so future fertility should not be affected.

“What’s going on?” the young woman asked, sitting up.

Lara listened to the sounds around them, unsure whether power outages were routine here in the capital or if this meant something bigger.

Saraya gripped her arm. “Dr. Simmons?” Her voice held fear, which answered Lara’s question about whether this was routine.

She forced her voice to remain even. “I don’t know, Saraya, but why don’t you get out of bed and put some clothes on, in case it’s an emergency?” Part of her wanted to open the door and run for her life, but she had a responsibility for her patient, and she wasn’t about to leave her helpless down here.

“I don’t know where my clothes are,” the young woman wailed as she shuffled around the bed.

Lara felt around to the counter where she remembered seeing them neatly folded. Her hands found the pile. “I have them here. I’m bringing them to you. Stay where you are.”

The room was pitch black, as they were on a lower level. Not even any emergency lights flashed on, which seemed strange. She wondered how the rebels had managed to cut all power.

“Miss Treedle. Miss Treedle!” A knock pounded on the door.

Ah. Here come the guards. Maybe she could slip away now.

“Yes, I’m here!”

The door swung open, but still no light entered, not even the tiny lights on comms units. She thought about Blade’s old-fashioned incendiary device—what had he called it? A lighter?. That’s what she needed right now.

She attempted to slip past the guards, but one of them grabbed her. “Miss Treedle?”

“No, I’m Dr. Simmons.”

“Stay right with me, Doctor. We’ll protect you. We don’t know what’s happening, but this is highly unusual. We’ve been ordered to evacuate.”

The sound of thuds and breaking glass from the floor above reached them, and her guard tightened his grip on her. “Let’s go,” he said, tugging her forward. They felt their way along the blackened corridor and up a flight of stairs she hadn’t known existed.

When they emerged on the ground level, she had to blink from the sunlight burning her retinas.

“I’m not even dressed,” Saraya whined behind her.

“Get them!” A mob of angry Jeselians rushed toward them, surrounding them. They attacked with fists and hands, pulling hair and punching.

Lara fell to the ground and crouched, covering her head with her arms.

If she’d ever tried to guess how she would die, she never in a million years would have predicted this.

~~*~~

Blade tore through the Capitol building, a sword in each hand, slaying Republican soldiers almost without seeing them. He had only one thing on his mind.

Find Lara.

He fought his way to the prisons and used explosives to open the steel doors. The jamming device must have caused all the cell doors to automatically open because, the moment he blasted open the doors, a mob of prisoners poured out.

“Jamis,” he shouted, catching sight of the pilot who’d brought Lara to the Capitol. He must’ve been detained after Blade had spoken with him.

Jamis pushed his way through the throng.

“Where is she?”

The young man shook his head. “She wasn’t down here. Maybe they released her?”

Doubtful. But he allowed that flicker of hope to light the blackness in his chest. He gave Jamis a sword, and the two men jogged together through the building.

“Treedle is dead! The Republicans surrendered.” The cries of the crowd reached them as they neared the outer doors.

Republican soldiers had dropped to their knees, their hands on their heads. Treedle’s dead body had been hoisted into the air by the crowd, and they were parading through the central plaza outside the Capitol building.

He wasn’t stupid enough to think it was over. Containing the Jeselians and getting order would be a struggle at this point, not even taking into account that every Republican had to be neutralized and put somewhere where they couldn’t cause any harm.

But none of that was his concern.

He had to find Lara.

He ran through the crowd, barking orders in the hope that some might follow them. Without any communication possible among the rebels, chaos had descended. As much danger now existed from the rioting Jeselians as from the Republicans still on the loose. The jamming device had a limited life cycle. Bailey believed it would last for six hours.

He didn’t know what would happen when power returned, but he did know this mess needed containing, and fast. He followed the roar of the crowds into the rear gardens of the presidential palace where he found an old-fashioned firing squad had been set up.

He recognized top advisors to Treedle, members of the dead dictator’s family, the ambassadors from Earth, Sheenaw, Varusia, and other planets, and...oh Universal God.

Strung up with the rest, dangling from her bound wrists, was Lara.

His Lara.

~~*~~

Even as she hung there, rope biting into her wrists, waiting to be set on fire, or have her throat slashed or however they planned to execute her, she knew he’d come for her.

Blade would come.

He was that sort of extraordinary hero. The kind who lived when others would have died. The kind who won in battles against all odds. He would somehow know she needed him and come.

It was a fairy tale, yet she believed it with her whole heart. Not one part of her scientific mind cared how unrealistic this faith in her warrior might be.

And so, when she heard his voice booming through the crowd—not amplified by any means, simply carried by the deep command and natural volume of a hero—she knew she’d been rescued.

“Stand down,” he roared.

She blinked, searching for him.

There. He pushed through the crowd, his eyes locked on her. “Hold your fire. Stand down this instant.”

The crowd parted for him, their hero. Blade was famous. The slave who got away. The liberator. Their vengeance.

He mounted the platform and drew his long dagger blade, slashing through the rope that held her dangling from the overhead beam. He tossed the loop of her arms around his neck and swung her up into his arms, cradled.

“Hold your fire,” he boomed.

The crowd went silent, all eyes on Blade, the symbol of the revolution.

“This is not justice.”

Not even a whisper rose from the people gathered.

“I know I have exacted vengeance like this. I have led you all to this very moment. But this isn’t justice. This isn’t due process. We have a leader. Her name is President Black. You have heard that she lives, and the rumors are true. Allow our true leader to lead. Allow her to get systems back online for fair trials and punishment.”

He thrust his arms forward, lifting her body away from his torso as if offering her to the crowd. “This doctor saved President Black’s life. She was taken by the Republicans from the transport station two days ago.” He hugged her back in tight against his chest. “Does she deserve to die like this? For no crime other than being in the wrong place at the wrong time? No.

“How many others here might be innocent like her?” He swept his hand to indicate the row of prisoners strung up for execution. “You do not know for sure. That’s why we must put systems in place and trust them. President Black has the expertise to reinstate a fair and peaceful government on Jesel. Will you allow her to lead?”

The people nodded. A murmur of approval went through the crowd

He jerked his head toward the rest of the prisoners. “Cut them down and bring them to the prisons below the Capitol building for due process.”

He walked away without waiting to see if his orders would be followed. As he stalked toward the palace, he crushed her to his chest. His eyes stared straight ahead, his face seemed made of stone, but a single tear streaked down his cheek.

“Blade?”

He neither looked at her, nor answered. Was he angry? His sheer physical power radiated through her body. He carried her as if she weighed nothing, stalking with long strides into the palace.

As if to punctuate the entire scene, power suddenly came back online. Lights came on, locks engaged, motor gears turned.

President’s Black’s voice sounded, amplified through the space.

“Jeselians, you are free. Democracy has been restored to our peaceful planet. We shall return to the good life many of us once knew.”

A great cheer rose up. Blade did not stop but carried her into the palace, kicking open rooms until he found a bedroom. He carried her in and sat down on a chair, holding her in his lap. He ducked out of the loop of her bound arms and took out a blade to cut the rope. Only then did she realize her great warrior’s hands were shaking.

“Blade,” she whispered.

He sawed at the rope, freeing her and rubbing her abraded skin. He kissed the inside of her raw wrist and, once more, she saw tears glimmer in his eyes.

“I knew you’d come for me.”

He closed his eyes and bowed his head. “I should—” He stopped and cleared his throat. “I should have made sure you got back to Earth before the revolution. This was inexcusable. I almost lost you out there.” He crushed her body against his the way he had after the caning, as if still afraid someone would tear her away right in that moment.

He loved her. Every cell in her body knew it. Even her logical mind knew it. This great, fearless warrior loved her and had been afraid of losing her.

She touched his cheek. “I love you, Blade.” Her body shuddered at the rightness of the admission, as if speaking the words opened some magic portal in her frozen heart. Suddenly, she was crying too—not silent tears like Blade, but big hiccupping sobs. Messy, sniffly, ugly tears.

If possible, Blade held her even closer, his muscles shaking with the effort. He rocked her back and forth, kissing the top of her head. Finally, when her sobs had subsided, he peeled her away and looked into her face. “Are you hurt?”

“Bruises. Nothing serious. Are you?”

He gave his head an impatient shake, as if the idea of him being hurt was preposterous. Rising to his feet, he carried her to the bed and gently arranged her on her back. Carefully, he eased up the edge of her tunic, scowling at the bruises that already darkened her ribs. His eyes traveled lower and rested on her belly. Tentatively, as if afraid his mere touch would hurt her, he reached out and traced a finger over her lower belly.

Her eyes flew to his.

“Were you going to tell me?” The misery in his expression nearly destroyed her.

Her nose burned. “Yes.” Tears swam in her eyes, although she didn’t know what she was crying over this time. “I’d decided not to go. When I reached the transfer station, I asked Jamis to bring me back. I couldn’t leave without you knowing, and without having some way to contact you again. I couldn’t leave with things so up in the air between us.”

He settled on his side, molding his body around hers, careful not to disturb her. Agony still etched in the lines of his face.

“I don’t want to do this without you, Blade. Why did you send me away?”

In a flash, she was in his arms, cradled on his lap, his face buried in her hair, teeth nipping her neck. “I didn’t want to lose you, that’s all,” he said, his voice rough. “I didn’t want you here during the revolution.”

“I know that part. But why—” She sounded so pitiful. Well, hell, she should have asked this question before they parted. She needed to know. “Why didn’t you make an arrangement to see me again? After the revolution?”

A muscle in his face jerked. “I figured you were better off without me. I didn’t know about the child.”

“Why would you think that?”

He shook his head slowly. “We come from two very different worlds. You are educated. Civilized. You live in a planet where men and women are equal. I know I’m not like the men on Earth. I—”

“You’re the man I want.”

He stared at her, his mouth still open from when she’d interrupted.

“I mean,” she backpedaled, “I know you’re different and I’ve grown accustomed to your ways. And I...well, I love you.”

He stroked her cheek with his thumb. “You mean everything to me. More than the revolution. More than Jesel’s freedom. More than anything. I love you, Dr. Lara Simmons. Do you…” He swallowed, looking for the first time ever, uncomfortable or nervous. “Would you...uh...would you stay here on Jesel? With me? Will you be my bride?”

Her nose burned again. She rearranged her position, moving to straddle him and twine her arms around his neck. “Do husbands on Jesel spank their wives?” she asked, giving a teasing quality to her voice so he’d know she had become inured to the idea.

~~*~~

Blade caught the spark of desire in Lara’s eyes with amusement. His little doctor who had been so confused over the fact she loved his dominance. “Oh yes.” He flicked his eyebrows with mock sternness. “When their wives are naughty, they peel down their panties and smack their bottoms red. And afterward they have their way with them in any way they please.”

Actually, it was all true, but he had no problem turning truth into dirty talk for her, if that’s what she wanted from him. He yanked her warm core closer to his hardening cock and squeezed the cheeks of her ass, lifting her pelvis to rub her clothed sex over his.

“If you were my wife, I’d have to give you very strict rules.”

Her smile wavered. “Like what?”

“No more than seven hours of work per day. Period. Less, if I think the pregnancy is taking a toll on your health.”

The smile returned.

“And if I worked seven point five hours?”

He shook his head, feigning regret. “I would have to march into your clinic, throw you over my shoulder, and carry you out. When I got you home, I would spank your little bottom raw.”

She bit her lip, eyes dilating. “So you don’t mind me working? You wouldn’t expect me to stay home and cook and clean and raise your children?”

He cupped her face, letting his expression show his sincerity. “Of course, not, my love. You are a gifted healer. It’s who you are. I couldn’t take that out of you if I tried. And Jesel needs doctors of your caliber and integrity.”

Her pussy rocked over his cock of its own accord.

“I will have to monitor that you don’t overdo it, since you have trouble self-monitoring. I will not hesitate to put you to bed with a bright red bottom.” He angled his head to nip at her breast through her clothes. “And any time I have you punish you, you’ll have to take me in your ass afterward, so I know you’ve fully submitted to my dominance.”

Lara’s cheeks turned a lovely shade of pink, and she ground harder.

“Little girl,” he growled, lifting up her tunic. “You are wearing far too many clothes right now.”

She helped him, tossing the tunic over her head and peeling down her bra straps. “So are you.” She yanked uselessly at the neck of his shirt.

He chuckled, and their bodies separated as they each disrobed with alacrity. “That’s better.”

She moved to straddle him again, but instead he pulled her over his lap and gave her bottom a sharp slap. “I owe you a punishment.”

“Why?” she yelped, sounding panicked for a woman who had just practically begged him to spank her.

He stilled and lowered his head to peer at her face. “Are you okay, my sweet? Can you take this right now?”

She blushed and nibbled on her lip. “I’m okay.” Her voice was small and submissive. “Why am I in trouble?”

He straightened and brought the flat of his hand down on her upturned bottom again. “Why indeed? You tell me.” He slapped the right cheek then the left then the center, right over her sex.

“Ooh!” She wriggled under his continuous spanks. “For not telling you about the baby?”

“That’s what I was thinking, yes.” He spanked rapidly, right, left, center, right, left, center.

“I’m sorry.”

“I know you are, sweetheart.” He watched as her creamy white skin turned a soft shade of pink, his handprints standing out white against the blushing canvas.

His cock grew painfully hard as she squirmed over it, her little body bobbing and dancing under his slaps. The idea of her truly agreeing to belong to him—had she agreed? He thought she had. The idea of it made him dizzy. Power coursed through his veins, his love for the little doctor overwhelming. Had she truly given herself to him? Forever?

He stopped spanking and rubbed her reddened cheeks then gripped them roughly, a sense of possessiveness taking hold.

“What happens to this little ass?” His voice sounded rough and low.

She sucked in her breath but didn’t answer.

He slapped the back of her thigh, making her yelp and squeeze her little buns together.

“You...you fuck it?”

He rubbed her sweet little ass, kneaded the flesh under his work-roughened palms. “That’s right.” He slid two fingers between her legs, not surprised to find her sopping wet. “My little girl loves her spankings, doesn’t she?”

Lara squirmed and turned her face into the covers to hide it.

He gave her a light spank then returned to the slow stroking of her slit. “Don’t hide from me.” He burrowed his fingers into her hair and used it to gently tug her head back to face him. “You don’t ever get to hide from me. I’m the man who loves you.”

Tears glittered in her eyes, and she sucked her lower lip into her mouth, making him want to claim it for himself. Later. He would thoroughly kiss his bride later. Right now, he had an ass to claim. He circled her clit then shoved his fingers deep inside her.

She gasped and opened her legs wider, arching her little ass up for him.

He pumped his fingers in and out. “You like that?”

“Yes, sir,” she gasped.

He pumped a little harder. “I like it when you call me sir.”

She thrashed on his lap, humping it, arching to meet his fingers on each inward thrust. “I… thought you didn’t,” she gasped.

“I didn’t deserve it, then.”

She moaned, her growing need evident in the pitch of her cry. “You always deserved it...oh!” Her inner thighs shook, clamping closed around his wrist. He shoved in harder and deeper, triggering her release. The walls of her vagina contracted, squeezing his fingers in a pulsing rhythm. “Ohhhh.”

He waited until she’d finished and collapsed over his thighs. He slid his fingers out of her and wiped them on her still-glowing ass. “Do you have any of that salve in your pocket, today, love?”

“Mmm?” Her eyes had glazed over with the orgasm. The relaxation on her face made her look more beautiful than ever.

“The salve you sometimes carry? Do you—”

“Oh, yes.” She came to life, scrambling off his lap and lunging for her tunic on the floor. She pulled out the little tin of salve and tossed it to him.

“Bring me that ass.” He pointed to the center of the bed in front of him.

She looked unsure but dutifully crawled up on the bed and presented her perfect posterior, resting on her knees with her face buried in her arms on the mattress. The position lifted and spread her cheeks, making it easy to access her little rosette.

He swirled his finger in the salve and circled the right ring of muscle.

She flinched, starting to squeeze her cheeks together, but stopped herself halfway and relaxed for him.

“Good girl,” he encouraged. “Open for your master.”

He expected some sort of reaction to his words, which were far from the political correctness of gender-equality on Earth, and he got one—the clenching of her pussy. She liked being mastered by him.

“Naughty wives get their back holes punished.” He continued the humiliation, wanting her turned on and ready when he entered.

Another clench of her pussy.

He gripped her hips and positioned the head of his cock at her anus. “Show me how sorry you are. Open up for your master.”

~~*~~

Lara willed her sphincter to relax.

Blade eased in, giving her time to get accustomed to the intrusion.

She panted at the stretching and the sense of fullness, but it felt incredibly erotic and Blade’s words were quickly pushing her back to the edge.

He held her pelvis and pulled her ass back to meet his thrusts, controlling everything.

She gave herself over to him, trusting he would know exactly what she could handle. He thrust harder, and she moaned.

“I don’t...believe...you answered...my question,” he said with each demanding thrust.

“What question?” she gasped. Her legs trembled beneath her, barely holding her up, her toes curled tight.

He wrapped an arm around her waist, as if knowing she’d gone weak, and continued to thrust into her without mercy. “Wrong answer,” he growled in her ear.

In the chaos of sensation—her bottom still tingling from the spanking, her anus stretching wide, Blade filling her again and again—her brain scrambled to understand his question. And then she understood.

“Yes,” she gasped. “The answer is yes. I will stay here and be your wife.”

Blade shoved deep in her and stopped moving. He hadn’t come. She had a feeling he was overwhelmed by emotion.

Close to orgasm and wanting him to go on, she threaded her hand between her legs and rubbed her own clit.

“Did I say you could touch yourself?” The sharpness of Blade’s tone made her draw in a breath, even though she knew it was all a game.

“No, sir.” Her voice sounded tiny.

Still buried deep in her ass, he pulled her torso up so her back met his front. With one arm firmly wrapped around her waist, he brought the other hand between her legs and slapped her pussy.

She squealed but literally couldn’t move to get away. Not with his cock pinning her in place and his arm locking her against him.

“Spread your knees wider, little girl. Now I have to punish your pussy.”

The organ in question dripped with excitement at his words. Her mind, however, rebelled.

He slapped it again. “This pussy belongs to me, now. You just gave yourself over to my care. That means...” He slapped again, harder.

“Ooh,” she squeaked.

“That means, you do not get to touch it without first asking permission. You do not get to come unless I say you can. Understand?” He slapped again.

“Yes, sir.”

“Now open your knees wider.”

She let out an unintelligible sound—a sort of mewl—but obeyed. Her pussy pulsed with the thrill of what he planned to do and she was just a few strokes away from orgasm.

He slapped her poor pussy, taking his time. Each slap made a sticky flesh sound from the moisture leaking over his fingers. By the fourth slap, she orgasmed, her ass quivering, her pussy going into overdrive as wave after wave of release came over her.

She reached her hands back and clasped them behind Blade’s neck, hanging from him, unable to see straight.

Blade’s breath rasped hot and irregular in her ear, and he groaned. “You’re so fucking hot,” he whispered as he lowered them both to the bed, his body covering hers. He rocked his pelvis, stroking in and out of her willing ass until he found his own happy ending, giving a shout as his hot seed spurted into her.

Epilogue

Blade gripped the Varusian by the waist and lifted her six inches off the floor. “Do something,” he snarled.

His wife rocked on her hands and knees on the bed, moaning. She’d been in pain for the better part of twelve hours, now and he could see she was growing weary. Dog lay on the floor by the bed, guarding her.

The violet-eyed Varusian simply smiled. He had never seen the female look anything but serene. Right now it made him want to shake that serenity right out of her. Of all the medical professionals Lara had brought into the capitol for her new hospital, she had chosen only this one to be in attendance at her birth.

“Lara wished to birth naturally. Your tension does not help her.”

He dropped the infuriating little female back to the floor and looked over at Lara, whose shoulders were hunched.

“Perhaps you could help her.”

“How?” He didn’t mean to thunder.

Lara whimpered, and he wanted to smash his head against a rock.

“How?” he asked more quietly.

“On my planet, females find birth an erotic experience.”

His eyes narrowed. What kind of woo-woo crap was she laying on him this time?

“Babies are born at the height of orgasm.”

“Not human babies.”

She looked down at her body, which, admittedly, was remarkably similar to a human frame. Varusians were built slighter and had hair and eye color not found on any human. Their eyes were huge in their faces, adding to their “all-knowing” look. “We are not so different. I assure you, the anatomy is almost identical.”

He folded his arms across his chest. “So you want me to have sex with her? Now?”

The infuriating female smiled. “No. Not unless she wants that. But you might use a little oil and stroke her clitoris lightly. It will help her relax and open for the baby to come out.” Dasha held out a little bottle of oil.

He snatched it from her hands and stalked to the bed. Drawing a deep breath, he tried to calm his nerves. The protector in him wanted to rip someone apart over the pain Lara was in, but he knew he was making things worse. At least the Varu had given him something to do.

He was about to bark at her to give them privacy when he saw her already slipping out the door with a secret smile on her face.

“Lara...angel? I’m going to stroke you now. Did you hear what Dasha said?”

Lara’s hair fell over her face like a curtain, but she made an affirmative grunt.

He stroked his hands across her hips and around the swell of her buttocks. Her muscles trembled from weakness or exertion as she rocked back and forth in the only position that gave her comfort.

Squeezing a little aromatic oil onto his fingers, he slid them between her legs, stroking her outer lips with a light touch. Her pussy already seemed swollen, but it appeared to plump even more under his hand.

He worked his finger into her folds, caressing her with no more pressure than he’d put on her eyelid.

“Mmmm.”

That was the first positive response he’d heard from her in hours. Encouraged, he found her clit and began to stroke one side of the little nub. It stiffened and swelled. He moved to the lower portion, stroking and caressing. Adding more oil, he worked his way to the other side and finally the top.

Lara did seem to relax and open. The shaking in her limbs stopped, and she rested her cheek on a pillow she hugged in her arms.

“That’s it, angel. You’re doing so well.”

Lara gasped as another contraction visibly tightened her middle.

He returned to his study of her clitoris, lightly teasing, stroking.

“Yes,” Lara breathed.

“Does that feel good?”

“Yessss.”

Her breath hitched.

The door opened, and Dasha breezed in.

He glared at her.

“Well done, warrior.” She moved swiftly to the bed and stepped into his personal space.

He blinked in shock at the head of their baby. The blood left his head, and he swayed on his feet.

“Stay strong, Papa,” Dasha said, laughter in her voice. She caught the babe on the next push. A little cry burst forth from the infant. “A girl. A beautiful girl. Well done, Mama. That’s good strong work.”

His lips trembled at the tiny, delicate thing cradled in the Varusian’s hands. “Give her to me,” he whispered.

Dasha’s violet eyes crinkled as she smiled and held the child out with all the reverence the baby deserved.

Shaking, he took her. The sweet little thing stopped crying and blinked at him, staring.

Lara dropped to the bed and rolled to her back as Dasha tugged gently on the cord, helping with the afterbirth.

With awkward movements, he bundled one of countless handmade blankets they’d been given as gifts around the infant and carried her to Lara. “She’s perfect. Like you.”

Lara took the baby and put her to her breast, laughing in surprise when the clever infant suckled on her first try.

He wrapped his wife up in his arms, soothing away the tremors of shock running through her body, kissing the sweat from her face. “I love you, angel. You were amazing. So brave.”

Lara laughed, her face as serene as her Varusian friend’s. “We’re a family now.”

Something in his chest burst open. A family. Something he never thought he’d have again.

“What should we name her?”

“How about Tarin?”

He choked on a breath, overcome. “Yes,” he managed to croak. “Thank you.” His eyes burned as he pressed his lips to the top of his wife’s head and gazed down at their precious infant who would bear his sister’s name. Yes, they were a family, and he couldn’t be happier.

“How about Tarin Justice?”

Goose bumps raised on his arms. “Justice has been served,” he murmured, his throat closing with emotion.

“The hand of Vengeance can rest.” Lara beamed at him before returning her smile to their daughter, who would live in freedom and democracy on Jesel.

Thank you for reading The Hand of Vengeance! If you enjoyed it, I would really appreciate if you would leave a review. Your reviews are invaluable to indie authors in marketing books so we can keep book prices down.

Coming December 2015…

Stepbrother’s Rules

LuAnn’s had a crush on her older, rebellious stepbrother since the year he lived with them—his last year of high school. Now, four weeks before graduating from Sarah Wharton Women’s College, she’s been kicked out for having boys in her dormitory, and he’s the one who shows up to collect her. With her parents away in Europe, he brings her to his place, because leaving a young woman unchaperoned isn’t done in 1957.

Brad makes it clear she is not to emulate the wild behavior of his youth, and he starts things out with a long, bare-bottomed punishment. Soon, though, he discovers his stepsister is all grown up, and having her under his authority makes her a temptation too delicious to resist. Before long, he’s strayed way past what is acceptable, turning her into his little girl and bringing her to the peaks of pleasure during her numerous punishments.

LuAnn brings out the dominant side of him, but with it comes the desire to take care of her and nurture the sweet innocence she’s been trying to cover up. He wants her for keeps, which means risking their parents’ disapproval and leaving his rebellious side behind forever.

Publisher’s Note: The book contains spanking, elements of ageplay and graphic sexual scenes. If such content offends you, please do not buy this book.

1957

Sarah Wharton College for Women

Janet Post Dormitory

Chapter One

LuAnn Walters had sobered up at least an hour ago and now she found herself fighting back tears. Mrs. McCormick, their dorm mother had ordered her and her three roommates to pack up and evacuate their dorm room at Sarah Wharton Women’s College. She sat in the parlor of the dormitory and drew her knees up to her chest, the remaining liquor in her stomach churning. The words of the new hit Everly Brothers’ song “Wake Up, Little Susie” kept running through her head. Yep, she was definitely in “trouble deep.”

“Remove your feet from the chair,” Mrs. McCormick snapped, her thick brows lowering over beady eyes. “A young lady does not sit like a six-year-old.”

LuAnn dropped her feet back to the floor and shifted. Her eyes burned from crying and her tongue had dried up in her mouth. Just a month from graduating, she’d really blown it this time. Her father would kill her.

Mary, a first-year student, still sniffled next to her, her handkerchief wound tightly in her fingers, her blond pin curls hanging limp. The door swung open and a short, portly man came in.

“Daddy!” Mary jumped to her feet.

“Not one word,” the man boomed, his expensive tweed jacket straining at the shoulders. He smelled of pipe smoke, which turned LuAnn’s stomach. He looked at Mrs. McCormick. “Where are her things?”

“They are already packed and standing in the hallway, Mr. Anderson.” Mrs. McCormick sounded pleased with herself.

“I am deeply ashamed that a daughter of mine has been expelled from Sarah Wharton College,” he said.

“As I said on the phone, Mr. Anderson, the girls have not been expelled from school, only evicted from the dormitories, since they have repeatedly broken the rules here. They will, however, be on probation.”

“Same thing.” Mary’s father took his daughter by the upper arm and tugged her roughly toward the door. “She won’t be coming back. Obviously, she doesn’t take the education I’m spending a fortune on seriously. I knew letting a girl go to college was a mistake. Good night, Mrs. McCormick.” He pulled Mary out after him.

Mary cast a panicked glance over her shoulder at LuAnn, who shrank down further in her seat. She was the only one left now. Who would pick her up? Her father and stepmother were in Europe and Mrs. McCormick wouldn’t say who she had contacted in their place. Her Aunt Betsy and Uncle Roger? She couldn’t remember who had been listed as her emergency contacts on her application and registration forms. Would they have listed her oldest stepbrother, Brian? He lived and worked nearby in Hanover as an attorney. She chewed her lip. What would her parents do when they found out? Surely they wouldn’t pull her from school when she only had a month until graduation. But she could hardly commute from home, which was two hours away.

The sound of a motorcycle roaring into the parking lot made Mrs. McCormick glare out the window. LuAnn’s heart jumped. Could it be—?

A tap sounded on the door and it swung open. She looked up and caught her breath.

Her stepbrother appeared, but not the one she’d expected. Brad, Brian’s younger brother, the rebel of the family and the object of all her teen fantasies, walked through the door in his leather motorcycle jacket. His motorcycle helmet had tousled his wavy, dark hair. He scanned the room, his gaze arriving on her face. “Hey, mouse.”

The pet name he’d given her when she was in middle school made something flutter in her belly. She stood up on wobbly legs. “Hi Brad,” she said, her voice cracking.

“Mrs. McCormick, I presume?” he asked, turning on his easygoing smile.

The housemother narrowed her eyes to scrutinize Brad. LuAnn imagined he looked a bit too much like the young men Mrs. McCormick had caught in their dorm room and not enough like a responsible adult here to claim his kin. “Yes...” She drew it out so it sounded more like a question than a response.

He held out his hand. “Brad Stanford, LuAnn’s brother.”

“Stepbrother?” Mrs. McCormick asked. “Or brother-in-law?” Clearly the different last name was taxing her brain.

“Stepbrother. You called our older brother, Brian, but he’s working through the night on a legal case and couldn’t get away. He sent me instead.” Turning to LuAnn, he asked, “What happened?”

She stared into Brad’s ocean blue eyes, her breath catching in her chest, as it always did when he was around. She’d had a paralyzing crush on him since the day he’d moved in with them when she was thirteen years old.

Brad raised an eyebrow, shifting subtly from the carefree rebel to the authority figure he represented.

LuAnn swallowed. “I broke some dormitory rules.”

Brad said nothing, as if waiting for her to elaborate.

“We were, uh, drinking. And smoking. And we sneaked boys into our room.”

Brad’s face grew serious. “I see.”

“It was not her first violation of rules, either. She’s been written up a few times already for smoking, sneaking out after hours and missing curfew,” Mrs. McCormick was happy to interject.

LuAnn pressed her lips together.

Turning to the older woman, Brad said, “I’m sorry for the trouble she’s caused.” He beckoned to LuAnn with a quick curl of his index finger. “Let’s go.”

She stumbled forward, still shaky from both the liquor and the disastrous evening.

The moment they stepped out of the office, Brad shocked her by smacking her backside, hard.

She jumped and scooted forward, out of his reach.

“You’re in big trouble, mouse,” he said.

She looked over her shoulder to see if he was serious. He had a way of teasing that always confused her.

He didn’t appear angry. In fact, he wore the same nonplussed expression as always, but her bottom sure stung.

“I know.” It was a safe enough answer. She’d be in big trouble with their parents when they showed up. But did he mean she was in big trouble with him? Her bottom tingled where he’d spanked her, heat flowing not only to the smarting skin, but to her sex as well. She didn’t know what to expect from her stepbrother. Worse, Brad’s stern demeanor embarrassed her more than if it had come from some other family member. Even though he’d never thought of her as more than a silly little girl, she’d spent years tongue-tied in his presence, trying to show him she could be as cool as he. To be treated like a child by him in this situation stung more than the slap to her bottom, which she reached back now to rub.

“Where are your things?”

“Over here.” She led him down the corridor to what used to be her dorm room. Her trunk and three suitcases stood packed outside the door, the stuffed bear Brad had given her for Christmas when she was thirteen sitting on top.

He picked it up and looked at her, cocking a brow.

She snatched it away, bending to pick up a suitcase to hide her flushing face.

Brad lifted the trunk as if it weighed nothing and marched down the hallway and out the front door, passing Mrs. McCormick without comment.

“Will LuAnn still be attending Sarah Wharton?” Mrs. McCormick asked.

“I don’t know,” he said, without turning back. “That’s up to her dad, I guess.”

LuAnn picked up the smallest suitcase and followed him as he marched through the parking lot, straight to her light blue Thunderbird. Her father had bought it brand new for her when she went off to Sarah Wharton so that she’d be able to drive home on weekends to visit. He’d always been generous with money—not so much with his time or approval.

“Keys, mouse.” He set the trunk down and held out his hand.

She lowered the suitcase and fished in her purse, pulling out the keys and promptly dropping them at his feet. “Sorry,” she said, breathless again as she stooped to pick them up. She bumped his arm with her head as she came up. “Oh.” She staggered back. “Oops.”

The corner of his mouth twitched, but otherwise he ignored her antics, still holding out his open palm for the keys.

She dropped them into it. “Brad—”

He hefted her trunk into the backseat of the T-bird, then placed her suitcase in on top of it. “What?”

“What are you...where are you taking me?”

“I’m taking you home to Surry, I guess. Wait here,” he said, turning to head back to the dorm.

She watched his back as he walked away, his wide shoulders strong and sturdy, the leather jacket giving him bad boy appeal. Brad had always been a ladies’ man. He’d had one year of high school left when he moved in with them, and he’d gone dancing with a new girl on his arm every other weekend.

While Brian had lived with them to attend a local college and all through law school, Brad had moved out right after high school, preferring to work his way through an architecture degree, living on his own. She’d overheard their parents conjecture that he wanted his own place to bring girls home, which had only enhanced his mystique in her eyes.

She looked around the parking lot until her eyes fell on his Ducati parked near the door. What was his plan? To drive her the two hours home and come back for his motorcycle? And did he plan to just drop her off to stay at her parents’ house unchaperoned for the duration of their vacation? She wouldn’t be able to attend her classes, and she was so close to finishing her two-year Associate’s Degree with a teaching certificate.

Brad returned with the last two suitcases and fit them in the trunk.

“Get in.” He lifted his chin toward the passenger side door.

“Wait, Brad,” she said, turning her best puppy dog eyes on him. “Let’s just discuss this for a minute. You can’t very well take me home and leave me there unchaperoned until my dad and your mom return.”

He pursed his lips, considering.

“And you know my father’s health isn’t good. The doctor told him to take a vacation before he has another heart attack. He will go ape over this. Do you really want to worry him?” Her father was owner of a chain of appliance stores across New England. While the business had made him wealthy, it required long hours and constant supervision.

Brad raised an eyebrow. “You should’ve thought of that before you got yourself kicked out.”

“I agree. I really messed up. I’m sorry. But please... please reconsider taking me home. We only have a month left of classes. I could stay here, finish out the year, and head home when my parents return.”

“Stay here, where?”

She winced and lifted her shoulders. “May I stay with you?”

Brad gestured impatiently toward the passenger side door. “Get in.”

***

His adorable little sister probably thought living with him would give her a free pass to continue the partying and bad behavior. Her memories of him in high school must include his numerous missed curfews and long lectures from their parents about leaving fast girls, fast cars and motorcycles behind and getting serious about a career.

Still, her concern over her father’s health was legitimate. And there was only a month left until she graduated. But if she thought he’d let her get away with drinking, smoking and cutting classes while staying with him, she’d be sorely disappointed. He could wield a paddle just as readily as her father. In fact, he was rather fond of spanking a girl when she acted up. Not that this would be the same. LuAnn may be drop-dead gorgeous, but she was a sister, not a girlfriend. Too bad his cock couldn’t remember that. He’d been avoiding his sweet sis for years because she provided too much of a temptation. Her rather obvious crush on him hadn’t helped matters.

She picked her nails as she sat in the passenger seat. “I’m really sorry you had to come and get me,” she said in a small voice.

Brad regretted being gruff. Despite all her efforts at acting cool and joining the fast girls, her underlying nature was cherry-sweet. Reaching over, he cupped her face.

Her full, berry lips parted. Sensual lips that made his pulse quicken. He realized he was stroking her cheek with his thumb in a rather un-brotherly way, and he dropped his hand, starting the car. “So who were these boys you invited into your room?” he asked, in a voice tinged with authority.

LuAnn drew in her breath. “They’re from Battleton College. My friend Mary invited them.”

“Are you seeing one of them?” The thought of little mouse being sexually active made him want to take her home and lock her up for the next five years.

“No.”

He frowned. “Then why were they in your room?”

She turned to gaze out the window. “It was a mistake, okay?” Her voice cracked on the words.

“Hey,” Brad murmured. Had something happened? His blood began to heat on her behalf. “Look at me.” He glanced back and forth from the road to her face as he drove. “Did something happen?”

She blinked rapidly and her hand slid to her breast, as if she remembered someone pawing at it. “No,” she said, her voice tight.

Brad pulled over and switched off the ignition. When she didn’t turn to face him, he cupped her chin and forced her to meet his gaze. “Something happened, didn’t it? Were you...violated?”

More tears spilled, but she shook her head quickly. “No...no. One of the boys was getting handsy with Mary and she didn’t like it so I—I kicked up a fuss. That’s why we got caught.” She dragged in a stuttered breath as the sobs broke free.

“I see,” he said. “So it was trouble with the boys or eviction from the dormitories.”

“Well, I didn’t know we’d be kicked out.”

“I know, mouse.” Brad handed her a handkerchief, wanting to kill the boys from Battleton. “You made the right choice.”

“Did I? I’m not so sure. I got all three of my friends kicked out, too, and Mary may never be able to return to Sarah Wharton. She had another year to go for her Associate’s Degree. Maybe I should’ve just let things happen.”

His jaw tightened. “No,” he cut in. “Your mistake was inviting them in to begin with. After that, you made the best choice you had.”

She pulled her face away and buried it in her hands.

Brad watched LuAnn cry for a moment, his fingers flexing into fists. “What are their names?”

“W-what are you going to do?”

He shrugged. “Have a little talk with them about their manners.”

“I, um, I’m not sure.”

His eyes narrowed.

“Honest. One was called Derek and the other John. I never heard the other two guys’ name and I didn’t get any last names.”

“Hmm.” He didn’t fully believe her. Starting the car, he drove to his place.

LuAnn looked out the window when they arrived. “Where are we?”

“My abode.” He stepped out of the car and grabbed two of her suitcases, leading her up the stairs to his little apartment, which sat over the garage of his landlady’s house.

“Thank you for bringing me here,” she said in a small voice.

She seemed so diminished, he wanted to wrap her up in his arms and make her forget her rough night. But if he was going to let her stay with him, he needed to play stern.

She’d been right. He couldn’t very well drop her off in Connecticut and leave her unattended for several weeks until her parents returned. His brother Brian would make a far better chaperone than he, but Brian was so wrapped up in his big case, he might not see the outside of his office for weeks. Besides, after what had happened with the Battleton boys, Brad needed to know she was safe.

“Just because I’m not telling our parents doesn’t mean you’re getting off scot-free.” He brought her suitcases to his bedroom. He would sleep on the couch—it was the gentlemanly thing to do. He walked back out to where she was standing, looking rumpled and contrite. “Mrs. McCormick said this wasn’t the first time you’ve broken the dormitory rules.”

“No.” Her face flushed and she lowered her eyes. “That’s true.”

“So you love college because it’s one big party, right? Boys and cigarettes and liquor?”

“I like my classes.”

He almost laughed. “You’re lying.” He watched as fresh color bloomed across her cheeks. Before he could stop himself, he said, “I will punish you for lies, little girl.”

Her eyes widened and she swallowed, but something made him think his words excited her. The quickened breath perhaps, or the way her plump lips parted.

“Do you have a brush in your purse?”

“Yes, why—?” She rummaged in her handbag for it. Before he could answer, understanding dawned on LuAnn’s face and she drew the hairbrush she’d retrieved tight against her ribs.

“Because I intend to spank you for breaking the dorm rules.” He pried the brush from her fingers and led her by the elbow to the couch, where he sat down and pulled her over his thighs.

“You can’t spank me,” she insisted, struggling to get up.

He wrapped an arm around her waist to hold her in place. “No? Would you rather I let your father do the job when he gets home?”

She went still. “No. Does this mean you won’t tell him?”

“I won’t tell him, mouse. Just like you never told on me all those times you watched me climbing in and out my bedroom window late nights in high school.”

“Doesn’t that mean you should skip this spanking now? Because you owe me?”

He chuckled. “Probably. But I’m not going to.” His cock gave a surge of interest at the enticing sight she made. Spanking naughty girls was a pleasure he’d been indulging in since high school, when he’d given his first spanking to Angela Jamison, who had literally thrown herself at him afterward. But he shouldn’t think about those kinds of spankings now. This was LuAnn, his little sister, and this was real discipline, not something sexual. Or at least he’d keep telling himself that.

He pulled her skirt up and let it drape over her back, exposing her white lace-trimmed panties. She froze, lifting her head as if to listen for what he would do next. He picked up the wooden hairbrush and aimed it for the lower part of her right cheek, smacking her sit spot.

She jerked, tightening her buttocks. She had a lush bottom, he realized, as he smacked the other sit spot. Curvy but muscular, her twin globes had a perkiness that made his blood heat. He’d bet she did wonders for a swimsuit. He picked up his pace, spanking one side then the other in a steady rhythm, wondering idly whether her breasts were as magnificent as her ass.

But it was wrong to think of little LuAnn that way. She was his stepsister, not a girl he intended to put the moves on. Except the lovely young woman did not resemble the skinny thirteen-year-old he’d lived with for a year and called mouse. And the way his body reacted to spanking her was definitely not brotherly.

LuAnn cried out, writhing over his knees. He yanked her waist in close, pinning her down as he continued to paddle her bottom.

“Ouch, stop!” She reached back to cover up.

“Remove your hand or I will pull down your panties and spank you on your bare bottom, little girl.” He wasn’t sure where that came from—it certainly wasn’t appropriate.

She tucked her arm back under her chest, but a few minutes later it came flying back again, her hips rolling and listing to dodge his punishing blows.

He grabbed her wrist and pinned it behind her back. “I warned you.” He peeled her panties down to her thighs.

LuAnn gasped, squeezing her legs together.

He went a little dizzy at the sight of her perfect, round and reddened cheeks. Even with her legs pressed together he could see a glimpse of her pink sex below, dewy with moisture. He stared at her pussy as he began to spank again, lust kicking through him. The display of her arousal leaking between her thighs made his cock turn rock hard. He bounced his knees to shift her away, hoping she hadn’t noticed his erection jutting into her hip.

“Please,” she cried.

He continued mercilessly, wanting to be sure he established his position of authority with her so she would follow his rules while living in his apartment. Or maybe it was just that he liked the sound of her little cries.

“Ow, please stop.”

He wanted her tears. This was a real, disciplinary spanking, and if he wasn’t going to tell her father, he needed to do a thorough job of it.

She kicked her heels, forcing him to clamp one leg over hers to pin her in place. She fought even harder, but he had her locked in position, her upturned bottom perfectly angled for punishment.

He continued spanking and she continued struggling, until at last he heard a sob and she collapsed over his knees, defeated.

Relieved at her submission, he lightened the spanks, but still paddled on, not wanting to teach her that a spanking ended as soon as she cried. He gave her twenty-five more, knowing he would leave her sore enough to remember the spanking the next day.

She lay over his lap, her body limp.

He pulled her panties back up and smoothed down her skirt. When he lifted her to sit beside him, she immediately jumped up, heading for the bathroom.

As he heard the click of the lock, a wedge of guilt tweaked him. He’d humiliated her. He’d been her childhood idol—the epitome of “cool” in her eyes, and he’d just bared her bottom and spanked her like a naughty child. How stupid of him. Without the kissing, cuddling or sex that usually followed spanking a girlfriend, she’d be left with nothing but tatters of her pride.

He walked to the bathroom door and put his ear against it. All he heard was the soft sound of crying. He tapped on the door. “LuAnn?”

She didn’t answer.

Cursing, he stuck his thumbnail in the keyhole and turned it, hoping he wouldn’t find her on the toilet. She wasn’t. She was standing, looking in the mirror at her tear-streaked face. She whirled around and he caught her wrist, pulling her up against his body.

“LuAnn.” He wrapped his arms around her. She stiffened at first, but he held her close until she softened against him. She smelled sweet, like freshly baked bread and banana splits with a touch of brandy on the edges. Her brown hair spilled out of her ponytail like strands of silk. He liked the sensation of her body melting into his, the soft curves of her breasts meeting his ribs, her wet cheek pressing against his chest.

He felt compelled to reassure her, to reward her for her submission to his punishment, yet he didn’t know how. He’d planned to be very stern and lecture her about his expectations, but now he found himself only wanting to soothe away the embarrassment he’d caused.

He kissed the top of her head.

She lifted her face, looking surprised and before his better sense stopped him, he bent his head and kissed her on the mouth. She kissed him back, moving her impossibly soft lips against his. Electricity tingled every place he came in contact with her, his cock surging against his trousers, his hand moving to cup her nape.

Oh, hell, what am I doing?

With effort, he pulled away and released her. Propelling her into his bedroom, he hefted the suitcases on their sides. “Which of these has your nightgown in it?” he asked.

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Other Titles by Renee Rose

Regency

The Darlington Incident

Humbled

The Reddington Scandal

The Westerfield Affair

Pleasing the Colonel

Contemporary

The Professor’s Girl

Mob Mistress

The Bossman

Safe in his Arms

Saved

Coming to Terms

Milestones

The Elusive "O" (FREE)

Western

The Devil of Whiskey Row

The Outlaw’s Bride

Medieval

Lords and Ladies: Two Medieval Spanking Novellas

The Knight’s Prisoner

Betrothed

Held for Ransom

The Knight’s Seduction

The Conquered Brides (5 book box set)

Paranormal

His Captive Mortal

The Alpha’s Punishment

The Alpha’s Hunger

Deathless Love

Deathless Discipline (FREE)

The Winter Storm: An Ever After Chronicle

Renaissance

Loving Lucia

Courting Celia

Ageplay

Her Hollywood Daddy

Stepbrother’s Rules (coming in December!)

BDSM under the name Darling Adams

Medical Play

Yes, Doctor

Master/Slave

Punishing Portia

About the Author

Named Eroticon USA’s Next Top Erotic Author in 2013, Renee Rose is a naughty author who writes romance books centered around her favorite kink: spanking. She won Spanking Romance Reviews’ Best Historical Romance, has often made the list of Amazon’s Top 100 Erotic Authors and is a regular columnist for Write Sex Right. She also pens BDSM stories under the name Darling Adams.

Renee loves to connect with readers! Please visit her on:

Blog | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads | Pinterest | Instagram

Acknowledgements

I am infinitely grateful for beta reads from Aubrey Cara, Lee Savino, Casey McKay, Rose Marie, and Sue Lyndon. Thanks, also, to Sue Lyndon for her sci fi workshop which made me believe I could do this!

And of course, thank you, readers for taking the time to read and indulging in my fantasy!

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Table of Contents

- Chapter One
- Chapter Two
- Chapter Three
- Chapter Four
- Chapter Five
- Chapter Six
- Chapter Seven
- Chapter Eight
- Chapter Nine
- Chapter Ten
- Chapter Eleven
- Epilogue
- Chapter One
- About the Author