“Got it.” When he hesitated, I added, “I promise not to go anywhere.”
“I will hold you to that promise, female,” he growled, and ran out of the room, the doors sliding back together to make a solid oval of metal, with only a faint seam to indicate that it was not a wall. Another hard jolt had me stumbling to the side and landing on the foot of the bed. If a perfectly round bed could have a foot.
It’s going to be fine, I told myself. You’re on a Vandar war ship. They’re known for being some of the toughest ships in the galaxy. No one ever talks about Vandar ships being blown out of the sky. Do they?
I gave my head a brusque shake, as if ridding myself of the fearful thoughts crowding my mind. It didn’t do any good to be scared. There was absolutely nothing I could do about it. There was nothing I could do about any of it.
Kratos was right. My life was on the Vandar warship now. It had been my decision to take the Raas’ deal, and I had to accept it. All of it.
As the ship trembled from what I suspected was more weapons fire, I rubbed my sweaty palms down the front of my dark pants. Part of me had hoped that the Vandar had taken me as a slave, even though I knew his people didn’t do that. Even though I’d seen the desire in his eyes, part of me hoped I was wrong. The other part of me I tried to ignore because I knew it was stupid to be attracted to a creature so deadly.
Kratos expected me to sleep with him in this bed, and do plenty more than sleep. I tried to calm my breathing and keep the panic from choking me.
What would happen when he found out that I’d never been with a man—or alien—before? How would he react when he discovered that I wasn’t some experienced woman who knew how to pleasure him, but instead, a twenty-year-old virgin, whose total sexual experience consisted of some fumbling kisses and awkward groping?
“Crappity crap!” I wished I could curse as eloquently and vividly as my sister, but the words felt foreign on my tongue. I stood and walked across the glossy, black floors, the movement helping to slow my brain’s frantic ping-pong of thoughts. Even though the siren still droned, I began to hum as I walked, holding my fingers in my ear so I could hear the soothing sound.
Since the Vandar didn’t take prisoners, I couldn’t imagine what they’d do to one who was deemed useless? Would I be put out an airlock, or dropped off alone at some remote outpost? Neither option was appealing. I hummed louder.
Kratos wouldn’t discard me. Not after he’d broken his own rules to take me. Right?
“You can do this, Astrid,” I told myself. It was the same pep speech I’d given myself so many times over the years, usually before I had to do something I knew I’d be horrible at.
I clenched my fists. This time I didn’t have the luxury of being bad or losing focus. If I wanted to survive, I needed to make this Vandar happy. Whatever that took.
“You don’t have to love him,” I reminded myself. “Or even like him. You just have to screw him.”
That advice sounded eerily close to advice my sister had given me once about holding on to my virginity. She’d thought I needed to just do it so I could move on from the bad, first-time sex to the good stuff. At least that was how she’d put it. Tara didn’t have many hang-ups when it came to her sexuality. She didn’t have many hang-ups, period. Unlike me. I was basically a bunch of hang-ups held together with body fat.
When I reached the end of the room, my gaze was drawn through a wide arched doorway. Since the siren had stopped sounding, I dropped my fingers from my ears and stepped into a spacious bathroom, almost sighing out loud when I saw the half-moon-shaped, sunken tub to one side.
My sister’s freighter only had a handful of shared crew bathrooms, with broken faucets and dodgy water pressure. I’d gotten used to cold showers and hair that never felt thoroughly rinsed, but the sight of the tub filled with steaming water made my heart leap. I didn’t know how long it had been since I’d had an actual bath.
Not that this Vandar tub looked like any I’d seen before. The unusually-shaped tub had four different sections—each filled with a different color of water, and each large enough for one or two people to sit in. Steam rose up from the red water at the end, and bubbles covered the surface of the orange water next to it. The green water was too opaque to see through, but the blue water at the other end was crystal clear.
I glanced behind me at the arched doorway to the room beyond. Kratos was busy on the bridge, and I didn’t expect him to come running back right away, even though the ship was no longer shaking. He was busy with his duties as warlord, and I was going to take advantage of his absence.
Acting quickly before I could change my mind, I peeled off my clothes and left them in a neat pile on the black-stone counter. I gave another furtive glance around me, glad that no one could see me dipping a toe in the blue water, completely naked.
I almost yelped from the cold sting, pulling my toe out just as quickly as I’d lowered it in. “Who sits in water that cold?”
The Vandar Raas, obviously, although I guessed soaking in ice water wasn’t close to the toughest thing the huge alien did. I shivered, not from the cold water, but from the memory of his hard muscles pressed up against me. And the very hard and very large thing I’d felt on my ass when he’d held me to him on the shuttle.
I moved to the green water, forcing myself not to think of how large the Raas was, as I dipped my foot cautiously into the murky water. It wasn’t freezing, but it wasn’t warm, either. It was the same temperature as the room, but the water itself was viscous, my foot slick on the bottom when I pulled it out.
Moving to the bubbling orange water, I was pleased to find it warm. I sat on the edge and dropped down into the pool, my toes reaching the bottom when the water was over my breasts. Now that my face was closer to the water, I could smell a warm, spicy scent emanating from the bubbles as they broke the surface. There was nothing feminine about the perfumed water, but inhaling it made my shoulders relax and my mind drift.
Memories came flooding in.
I was on Parnisi III with Tara. It was after our parents had been killed, but before she’d won the freighter. We were huddled around a table in the back of a bar that had long since passed “seedy.”
She’d motioned to a crust of bread left on a plate from the last occupants of the table, a bone picked white next to it. “Eat.”
I’d eyed it, starving but not willing to eat the only scrap we’d seen all day. “We should share it.”
She shook her head. “You need it more.”
I’d felt the gentle rebuke, but was too hungry to care much. She was right. I hadn’t taken to deprivation like she had. Tara had gotten sinewy and lean over the past months. I had miraculously not lost my curves, as I’d gotten weaker and weaker.
She’d pushed the crust toward me—the plate leaving a trail of grease across the grimy, wood table—then her gaze had settled on a well-dressed male sitting by himself, and her jaw had hardened. “Don’t worry. I know how to get more.”
I shook my head, forcing the memory to fade. Tara had always done whatever it took to survive—for both of us to survive. I hoisted myself over the barrier between the sections and slipped into the red water, flinching slightly from the heat, but welcoming the pain. Although my skin burned for a moment as it adjusted, I let out a moan as the water covered me up to my chin.