Adrift (6 page)

He scowled at her in a very Lyrissian fashion and looked back to the ceiling.
It didn't look as if he was going to reply but just as she thought he wouldn't answer, he said, "Ten years ago."

"I call bullshit," she said in disbelief.
"No way a man can go ten years without having sex.
Or should I open the question up to include men and Duarrs?"

"I will never live that down, will I?"
he asked.

The question was rhetorical but she answered him anyway.
"Well you could be dead in the next few minutes so, no.
Why ten years?"

"Ask another question," he told her.

"No," she said.
"Answer the question Colonel Norik Jacobs, or lose a foot," she warned him.

"Just kill me," he said.
"I'd rather be dead and whole than have to answer that question."

"You realize you're building it up," she said.
"So that when you eventually do tell me, it'll be anticlimactic.
Just tell me Norik.
I promise I won't tell anyone.
And as you said, you could well be dead soon.
Can't care if you're dead."

Norik didn't reply, he kept his eyes fixed on a spot above him in the dark.

"Please?"
she asked.

"I almost killed my wife," he finally relented.

Jasmine stared at him wide eyed.
That was an answer she hadn't expected.
"How?"
she asked quietly.

"On our wedding night," said Norik, his voice sounded as if he were further away than what he was and Jasmine had to shuffle forward to hear him.
"I tried to kill her."

"Wow," Jasmine breathed at the confession.
"You sexed her to death."

Norik whipped his head around and glared at her.
"Lyrissian mating can be dangerous.
She would have died if her father had not intervened."

Jasmine tried to jump away as the man rolled over his injured side, ignored his physical pain and crawled toward her.
He was in front of her in a matter of seconds, the muzzle of the plasma blaster pointed at his naked chest.

"Do it," he said.
"Pull the trigger."

"What?"
Jasmine squeaked.

"I deserve it.
Kill me!"
he demanded and grabbed her gun hand.

She clawed at his fingers as he tried to force her to squeeze the trigger and do as he wanted.
"You're crazy," she yelled at him.

"You want to kill me," he reminded her.
"I want to die."

Jasmine stared at the point where the plasma blaster pressed against his flesh directly over his heart.
She dragged her eyes away, up to his own.
So much pain clouded them and it made her own chest tighten.
No man, no matter how good an actor could fake that look in his eyes.
He was haunted and it killed her.

"No," she said.

"No?"
he asked incredulously.

"No," she repeated, this time with more force.
"If you want to die, you can do it yourself.
Don't use me as a convenient excuse."

"You owe me," he told her.

"Yeah, you saved my life and I'm not going to pay you back by taking yours," she said.
At his puzzled look she explained, "I wanted to assure myself that you wouldn't kill me.
I wasn't going to kill you.
I've never killed anyone in my life."

"You are not going to kill me?"
Norik asked.
He sounded more like a lost child than the order giving Corps Officer who had twice saved her.

"No," she said and pulled his hand away from the plasma blaster.
The strength he had used in his anger quickly left him.
"Only thing I would do to you right now is give you a hug."

He frowned at her and asked, "Why?
I almost killed my wife with my own hands."

"You're a good man Norik.
I don't think you wanted to kill her.
If anyone thought that then you would be locked up somewhere and not free to command a starship," she told him.
"You saved me Norik.
Twice.
Thank you."

Jasmine put the plasma blaster down and, before he could protest, wrapped her arms around him.
It was the first time he had told anyone what haunted him.
Not one person involved at the time had responded in this manner and he had allowed no one this close to him since.
Now though, all he wanted was to be held.
He clutched her to him with his good arm and buried his face in her hair.
Then he cried.

Jasmine wasn't surprised at the outpouring of emotion.
She had cried in his arms yesterday after a headless body had fallen on her and people threatened to kill her, at least twice!

Norik had been forced to kill people, been injured and lost a lot of that strange orange blood of his.
Then she had turned a weapon on him, accusing him of some elaborate plot to harm her and she had pried this secret out of him.
She could easily imagine what he would have been forced to go through ten years ago, but she had no idea how it would have felt for a man who seemed as strong and controlled as he was.
On top of all that to not have been with a woman since?
The man was seriously repressed.

"It's OK," she said soothingly.
"Let it all out."

Norik did just that.
He cried out all of the anger, self blame and sadness that he had carried with him all of this time.
It took him awhile, there was a lot to get out.

"Norik?"
Jasmine asked softly.

"Hmm..."
he murmured.

"You done?"

"Yes," he sighed.

"Good.
Anymore of that and I'd have lost all respect in you as a man," she teased.
Jasmine felt Norik start to shiver and frowned.
He was also burning up.
When he didn't respond to her verbal dig she pushed away from him, worried.
He looked worse than he felt.
"Let's get you back to bed."

Jasmine wasn't sure if she preferred getting him back to the bunkroom while he was conscious or unconscious.
On the one hand he was able to use his feet but it soon became apparent that he was delirious, which made it harder to convince him to return to the bunks.
One such entreaty was met with his informing her that no one ordered a Corps Commanding Officer around.
She'd promptly 'Yes sir'd' him and tried another tactic, which she gave up as well, after he slapped her.
He also received a bruise because of it.

Norik was not the best patient.
Even his Medical Chief rued having him in her medbay, although he had never been so bad before that his medic had to resort to sitting on him to keep him confined to bed.

Jasmine passed the time reading the tablet that Norik's crew had left for him.
She found the stick figure illustrations that accompanied the lesson on temporal mechanics to be quite charming.
The romance novels were very racy and had her shifting her precarious position on top of Norik whenever she came across the good bits.
Norik for his part grunted in complaint while his fever-riddled body tried to fight off the infection.

Norik's fever broke just as Jasmine started on the second biography.
His breathing became more regular.

Jasmine, who now lay beside him, lifted herself up onto an elbow and studied his face.
The creases around his eyes and mouth had smoothed out.
It comforted her to know his sleep would be more peaceful.
She reached out and brushed his hair back, it was damp with sweat like the rest of him, but it didn't bother her.
Instead of recoiling in disgust at a sweaty man, she wanted to get closer to him.
Something about him drew her in.
A sheen of sweat on a half naked, half Lyrissian made her want to do very naughty things, like trail her fingers down to his navel.
Jasmine lowered her gaze to find she had done just that.

Jasmine shivered and glared at him for having very bad timing.
If he weren't unconscious right now she'd have...
She stopped and asked herself what would she have done?
The man denied himself sex because of a tragic accident that had happened the last time he had been close to a woman.
The very last thing he needed right now was a woman throwing herself at him, especially after she had been the one to rip that scab off.

Jasmine rolled out of the bunk and put her hormone fueled thoughts down to the seven romances she'd just read.
She stretched and pondered what she could do to help take her mind off the devastatingly attractive, yet emotionally vulnerable man that lay half naked behind her.
As much as she wanted to take advantage of him, it would be the absolute worst thing she could do to repay him for saving her life.
Twice.

Feed the prisoner
, she decided and picked up the plasma blaster.
Its larger size was much more reassuring than her own weapon had been.
Jasmine smiled at the thought of pointing it at the prisoner.
Although he hadn't threatened her like the other two, she looked forward to asserting her authority over him with it.
Maybe she would offer to save his foot if he would undo whatever it was he had done to the ship.
They were still in the dark and life support needed to be turned back on.
She had no idea how much breathable air they had left.
The thought that she had survived what the General had thrown at her only to be killed by CO2 poisoning pissed her off.
No, she would take matters into her own hands and prove Norik wrong.
She would get them out of this mess and not run to him for help.
The sulky prisoner was going to do as she ordered, or else.

Sulky proved to be more of a challenge than she had thought.
The threat of losing body parts did not work on him.
He decided to adopt the same approach as Norik and dared her to do it.
Sulky goaded her, to the point where she was screaming at him to stay back.
When he didn't, his own screams became shrieks of agony when she'd been forced to act on her threat.

Jasmine ran all the way back to the bunkroom.
Tears almost blinded her as she tore into the room and threw herself onto Norik.
The sudden weight woke Norik and thinking he was being attacked, he defended himself.

Jasmine found her face squished into the deck plating and a very heavy weight on her back trying to press her through to the deck below.
She choked as she tried to call mercy to Norik.
He had her arm wrenched so far up behind her she thought it would snap.

It took Norik several blinks of his eyes to realize his attacker wasn't an attacker at all, but Jasmine and he quickly let go of her.
He lifted his knee from her and sat heavily on the floor.
"I am sorry," he said, bewildered as to what was going on.

Jasmine scooted away from him, across the floor.
Her crying hadn't abated, only quieted in shock.

"I'm sorry," he repeated and reached for her.
She jerked away from him and the fear in her eyes cut through him just as surely as the knife had his shoulder.
He dropped his hand and put more distance between them.
He had scared her.

Jasmine's heart felt like it was trying to escape her ribcage.
The physical strength that she had admired in Norik had just been used against her.
She had been so sure that he wasn't a threat, until he had done that.
She had convinced herself that he was the good guy in this giant mess.
She didn't want to be wrong but the man had just scared the shit out of her.

"Good reflexes," she breathed.

"Sorry," he said again.

"Stop doing that," she told him.
"You only apologies if something is your fault and if you really mean it."

"Sorry," Norik said before he could stop himself.
He raised a cautious eyebrow at her and said, "I must mean it."

"You must," she agreed slowly.
Jasmine continued to stare at him, waiting to see what his next move would be.

Norik watched her just as intently.
The look in her eyes, which eerily matched Lilah's after he had attacked her, was slowly starting to dissipate.
He found he was able to breathe a little easier as it did.
He licked his lips and asked, "Was there a reason for you jumping on me?"

"Jumping on you?"
Jasmine asked, confused.
The tears started to spill quietly down her cheeks once more.
"I shot him."