Dark Solstice (12 page)

Annoyed with Raathe or not, Rhea didn’t like putting that much distance between herself and her watcher. It didn’t seem that she had any choice, though, and she headed toward the trestles before the guard could say anything else. The prisoners stared at her. She felt their curious gazes crawling over her as she grabbed a tray of plants and turned to head back to the planting bed the other prisoners were creating.

The guard grabbed her arm when she paused beside Raathe, jerking her around and pointing to the far end of the bed where still other prisoners were already forming rows for planting. Throwing Raathe an uneasy look, she stumbled forward when the guard gave her a shove, caught herself, and struggled to shake her uneasiness.

The guards were everywhere, as evidenced by the bastard that seemed to have made it his duty to make sure to keep her separated from Raathe. She tried to convince herself she had nothing to worry about. No one was likely to try anything with so many guards watching. Still, her flesh crawled with the certainty that she was being either surreptitiously or blatantly studied by every man she passed. She hadn’t felt as uneasy when she’d been working on Mars, even though the guards hadn’t been as close by, but then she’d had the protection of her PEC,
known
that there was no way any of them could touch her when it was death to remove them.

In time, though, her focus on the work and her physical discomfort redirected her thoughts somewhat. She was given the task of transplanting the tiny plants from the pots to the larger bed, a job that had her back and everything from the waist down aching within a very short length of time from the bending and squatting. The smell of the soil wasn’t terribly pleasant, for that matter, since it was a mixture of Martian soil, rotting vegetation and, she suspected, processed, sterilized human manure.

Nothing was wasted in an off-world habitat. Everything had to be recycled.

It still seemed odd that they were using the soil mixture when most of the plants in the garden were grown with hydroponics, but she supposed water was as precious as air and space for the warden’s private garden limited. Or maybe he had a taste for soil grown vegetables? There
was
a difference, although most people preferred the cleaner taste of hydroponically grown food.

She hoped the sterilizer broke down and the bastard died of some vile disease or maybe heavy metal poisoning.

The viciousness of the wayward thought startled her.

She didn’t even
know
the warden, hadn’t set eyes on him since she’d been thrown into the prison. He certainly wasn’t responsible for her presence. If she wished evil on anybody it should be the bastards that had had her sent here.

She resented the fact that he had real food, though, and she had to subsist on that awful mess they slapped on her tray at every meal—and had to help
grow
his food on top of that insult.

And it was still seriously harsh to translate that resentment into a death wish on the man.

It occurred to her, forcefully, that she wasn’t going to be any different from the men around her that she thought of as animals if she had to live like they did for very long. Such a thought would never have crossed her mind before she’d landed here.

True, wishing evil on somebody was still a far cry from doing evil, but how many steps away was it? How long before she descended to the level where she thought as they did?

Shaking the thought off, she shoved a stray wisp of hair out of her way and glanced around as casually as she could for a glimpse of Raathe. He was well ahead of where she was working, she saw, but almost as if he sensed her gaze, he glanced toward her as he straightened.

The icy blue of his eyes pierced the distance like a pair of lasers.

She found it oddly comforting, which surprised her almost as much as her vile thought from before. When, she wondered, had those cold blue eyes come to mean security to her and not a terrible threat to paralyze her?

She frowned at the soil as she returned her attention to her work, gouged a small hole for a plant and tucked it in, considering, but she realized it had been a subtle thing, too gradual to pinpoint a specific time. All she did know for certain was that she wasn’t really afraid of Raathe anymore and whenever the fear had finally left her it had left a tentative trust in its wake, a burgeoning certainty that he would protect her.

She shouldn’t feel that. He’d made it abundantly clear that her importance to him was only slightly higher than the comfort of his bunk—maybe not even that high.

He still called her his munch—dehumanizing her, relegating her to unimportance.

He hadn’t said it like that, though, when he’d asked her what she did before. He’d said to deliberately provoke her, she realized in surprise.

He’d been teasing her!

She thought.

He was a hard man to read.

Warmth curled in her belly, though, and she felt some of the tension she hadn’t realized still gripped her slip away. He was watching her, watching over her even if the guard had separated them.

Was she lying to herself because it was what she needed to believe?

Maybe. She acknowledged that it was a possibility. She knew, despite certain knowledge that the tenderness Raathe had shown her wasn’t intended for her at all, that she still subconsciously clung to the hope that it was, or that she at least had some hope that it eventually might be.

She wasn’t even certain that it was entirely from a need for assurance for survival anymore, because it wasn’t just relief she felt whenever she met Raathe’s gaze or felt his attention and knew he was looking at her.

Truthfully, she was thoroughly confused all the way around.

* * * *

It had been a long time, if ever, since Rhea had hurt in so many places, but then she wasn’t accustomed to working so many hours without a break to stop and ease the strain on her muscles. Even the detail on Mars hadn’t worn her down as much or made so many different muscles hurt from overuse. She crept to the bunk stiffly as soon as they returned to the cell, lay down, and stretched out with great care, hoping, for once, Raathe wouldn’t have any interest in sex.

He didn’t seem in any great rush to join her on the bunk. She’d almost managed to dose off before she felt the shift of the mattress with his weight. He settled beside her on his side with his back to the wall of the cell like he usually did, a precaution, she thought, to make sure he was facing any trouble that might come through the cell door.

She uttered a groan when his hand settled on her back.

His hand stilled. “Too tired to do your job, munch?”

She frowned without opening her eyes. “Not if I can just lay here,” she muttered.

He uttered a sound that was close enough to an actual amused chuckle that she opened her eyes in surprise. It was too late to see his expression, however. He’d already pushed himself upright. She felt his buttocks settle lightly on hers as he straddled her hips.

More than a little irritated that he’d decided to take her up on her suggestion, she lifted up enough to twist her head around to glare at him. He forestalled her. Grasping the back of her head, he turned her to face the pillow she’d had her cheek on, applying just enough pressure to tell her to stay put. His hands settled on her aching shoulders, curling and applying pressure. She gasped, tensing at the pain, and he eased his grip, kneading her shoulders with just enough pressure to hurt so good it felt almost orgasmic. Her skin pebbled, lifting the fine hairs on her body and making a shiver rake through her as he shifted his grip from her shoulders to the back of her neck.

He worked his way all the way down her spine, pressing and rotating his palm in a circular motion until he reached the tip of her spine and then he worked his way upward again, this time kneading the muscles on either side of her spine. She didn’t want him to stop. His hands felt wonderful,
more
wonderful even than they felt when he was caressing her sexually, and that was saying something.

She hadn’t considered, before, that the hands that gave her so much pleasure were the same hands that had killed, many times. It flickered through her mind as he massaged her arms and then trailed his hands lightly down her back to her buttocks again, but she found it impossible to reconcile one with the other. Shifting downward, he massaged her buttocks briefly and then worked his way down her thighs to her calves. Warmth stirred in her belly as he massaged her thighs. She tried to ignore it, far more interested in the healing touch of his hands than sexual arousal.

Settling finally at the foot of the bunk, he bent one of her knees and began massaging the bottom of her foot. It tickled. The urge to giggle surged through her. She tried to jerk her foot from his grip. As if oblivious to her dilemma, he tightened his grip and continued rubbing until he was satisfied and then released that foot and reached for the other.

She couldn’t contain the laughter that time, mostly, she suspected, because he’d very deliberately tickled the sensitive sole of her foot. Uttering a choked laugh, she rolled to her side and looked down at him.

His expression was solemn but there was a gleam in his pale eyes that was equal parts suppressed laughter and desire. They studied one another for a long moment. He looked away first, leaning down over the end of the bunk. When he straightened, she saw he was holding a deep red spherical object in the palm of his hand like a magician.

She stared at the vine ripened tomato blankly.

Having riveted her attention, he closed his fingers on the fruit and lifted it to study it as if he had no idea where it had come from. “These were called love apples when they were first discovered in the ‘new world’,” he said musingly. “They were believed to be poison since red, in nature, usually indicated poison and were only used for decoration for years. I was always curious to know how it came about that they discovered the tomato wasn’t poisonous. Some poor, starved soul, no doubt, took the chance for humanity.”

He lifted the tomato to lips. Rhea watched, mesmerized, as he opened his mouth and his even white teeth sank into the flesh of the fruit. Juices spurted, running down his chin, and she felt her belly clench. Wiping his chin with his hand, he turned to look at her for a long moment and finally shifted onto his side and moved closer, holding the tomato enticingly near her lips.

Her uncharitable thoughts about the warden and his garden flickered through her mind, briefly, along with the oft repeated warning of her mother—‘
There is balance in the universe, good for good, evil for evil, and nature will always assert itself to achieve complete balance.’

She flicked a glance at Raathe, wondering if he was only teasing her with the possibility of a taste. He moved it closer, rubbing it lightly along her lips and she opened her mouth to take a bite. The explosion of flavor on her taste buds caught her by surprise. Her salivary glands cramped and she squeezed her eyes closed at the pain, pausing for a long moment with the flesh on her tongue before she chewed and swallowed. When she opened her eyes again, she saw that Raathe had taken another bite. He held the last morsel out to her temptingly, pushing it into her mouth when she obediently opened to receive it.

She sucked the juices from his finger tips. Heat curled in her belly, desire tightened her throat, making it nearly impossible to chew and swallow the morsel.

His gaze sharpened on her lips. Slowly, he leaned toward her. His lips parting to nestle over hers, he sucked the juice from her lips as she had his fingertips. Eagerness flashed through her. She shifted closer, lifting a hand to his side and gripping him tightly.

He caught her upper leg just beneath the crook of her knee and dragged her leg across his hips, rolling to press her to her back as he deepened the kiss. The tart taste of the fruit lingered in their joined mouths and along their dueling tongues, adding the thrill of stolen pleasure to the essence of themselves they shared. Heat flashed through Rhea, warming her from her core outward until she felt fevered. Jolts of pleasure thundered through her with the lazy stroke of his hand along her body from breasts to hip and back again, the brush his legs along hers, the pressure of his engorged cock against the soft flesh of her belly as he moved restlessly, ceaselessly against her.

She dragged her legs upward, spreading them wide to accommodate his hips, lifting against him to counter the delightful pressure of his sex against her own, anxious to feel him deep inside of her. Either her eagerness communicated itself to him or he was as anxious as she was. He broke the kiss, reaching between them to align their bodies, striving for the same deep connection she yearned for the moment he found the mouth of her sex.

She gasped, squeezing her eyes tightly to savor the sensation as his flesh plowed along the passage that wept for his possession. “John! You feel so good inside me!” she gasped breathlessly when he’d claimed her completely and paused to catch his breath.

She felt the jolt that went through him and opened her eyes warily to look up at him. His gaze flickered over her face. Abruptly a smile that was almost more of a grimace curled is lips. “Jesus, baby! That’s the wrong thing to say to a man if you want him to hold his seed long enough to pleasure you,” he growled.

Her lips parted in dismay. He dove for them, kissing her with a wild abandon that stirred the fire inside of her higher, that tore her ability to remain still and passive from her grip. She lifted her legs from the bed and curled them around his hips, cupping her hips at the same time to bring him more deeply inside of her.

He tore his lips from hers with a sharp inhalation. Scooping his arms beneath her, he tightened them almost suffocatingly around her and began to move in a thrust and retreat that spoke of the same desperation as his kiss a moment before. She clung to him as tightly, panting for breath as she tried to keep pace, her entire focus on the waves of exquisite pleasure that washed through her at the intimate stroke of his flesh along hers.

He froze abruptly, stiffened all over. She felt the jerk of her flesh inside of her as he reached his limit. A groan erupted from her throat that began in disappointment and ended in rapture as her body pitched from the precipice and joined his in shattering bliss.