Greenshift (8 page)

He seemed eager, then his
expression changed and her heart fell even before the words came out of his
mouth.

“I don’t know. I have to
write up this incident for the dockmaster and the local contractors’ guild,
though I’m sure my accusations will end up in a bureaucratic mound somewhere,
never to be heard of again.”

“That shouldn’t take too
long.” She tried to nudge him without seeming desperate.

He rubbed her shoulder. “I
want to know if you’re okay after what happened tonight.”

She flirted briefly with the idea
of saying, ‘No,’ to see if that would make him change his mind about the drink,
but was ashamed of herself for the thought.

“I’m fine.” She fixed a
smile on her face and decided to leave the night with her dignity intact.
“I’m tired anyway. Thanks for a great evening, David.”

She stood on her toes to kiss his
cheek. He leaned down to meet her halfway and captured her kiss with his lips
instead. Yearning spread through her entire body. It took all her reserve not
to run her fingers through his thick hair and rub her body against him. She
wanted him badly. Every nerve in her body tingled as she thought of where this
kiss could lead.

Didn’t he feel it, too? The heat?
The pull of their bodies toward one another? The passion?

Her answer came when he broke
away from her.

“Sleep well, Mari. I’ll see
you in the morning.”

The bridge used to be a good
spot to think
.

David had always found solace in
a nav chair, looking out upon the vastness of the system and its six
planet-moons. But tonight, watching the stars from the confines of Tampa Quad
instead of from the freedom of space, his mind wouldn’t quiet. Maybe because he
was on a modified pleasure cruiser instead of his warship. Or maybe the set up
by the contractors still replayed in the back of his head. Or maybe he was just
a little lonely tonight.

On the
Protector
there was
no real night. Soldiers and technicians and diplomats, adjusting to multiple
time zones on multiple planets, allowed for activity during the entire 25 hour
cycle. But he wasn’t captain of the
Protector
anymore, so he went to
work on freeing his mind from the brawl with the dock workers by recording the
events exactly as he remembered them. His mind drifted, though, to the real
reason he couldn’t shake his restlessness. He wanted to be with Mari right now.

Was she still awake, thinking
about what happened tonight? He could tell she was putting on a brave front, so
he respected her need to show her courage and tried not to coddle her. Yet
every instinct inside him screamed for him to go to her, to hold her and kiss
her and whisper words of comfort.

She had invited him to continue
their evening and he almost accepted. It was exactly what he wanted up until
the moment she made it a reality, then he….

Then you ran away from her.

The thought pissed him off. What
the hell was wrong with him? He’d led thousands of men into battle, broken
countless bones, endured hellacious conditions but was now afraid of one little
blonde? Ridiculous.

Maybe he should call her room to
be sure she was okay. Then he could tell by her voice if she was still up for
company. And if she wasn’t, he would be right back where he started, only more
frustrated. He needed to stop this kind of thinking, tamp down his overactive
hormones and concentrate on this damn report.

Yeah, right
.

He was out of his chair before he
could talk himself out of it. As he headed down the commonway, one by one he
dismissed all the reasons why this wasn’t a good idea, why he should find
someone his own age, why he needed to emotionally distance himself from Mari, why
he shouldn’t be standing in front of her door at this hour.

He pressed the halfmoon sensor
of her door chime. When he could hear it sound loudly inside, he swore under
his breath, feeling certain he had woken her. For what? He didn’t have time to
think of an excuse.

The door slid open.

“Hi.” Mari’s lazy smile
and tiny green nightie made him want to dock her right there in the hallway.

“Hi.” He felt a tad
foolish, but more than a little excited. “I was working up the incident
report and thought I should get your take on what happened. You do have that
photographic memory.”

Still can’t admit why you’re
here, can you, Anlow?

“And to make sure you were
really okay,” he added.

Mari slid her arm through
David’s. “Nothing a drunken coffee won’t fix. Do you want one?”

Say no.

He’d had more than enough alcohol
tonight. Another drink and his judgment might be impaired. That was one of the
reasons he didn’t take the stims she offered from the med suite.

“What kind of bourbon do you
have?” he asked.

“Koley’s Reserve. What
else?” She winked.

“You’re kidding.” He
let his skepticism show. “Do you know how difficult that is to get? It’s
only made in the Koley Mountains, and in very small batches.”

Even as an Armadan captain, he
sometimes had to wait months for a bottle and he’d given his last one to the
dockmaster as a bribe.

She just smiled that big smile of
hers. “I wouldn’t kid an Armadan about bourbon.”

“Well, then how can I refuse
a taste of home?” David took another quick survey of the strappy emerald-colored
nightie draped over Mari’s curves.
Or you
.

Once inside, the glowing vibrancy
of her living quarters bombarded him.

“That’s a lot of blue and
green,” he said.

“My favorite colors. It’s a
work in progress because you would not believe how much it costs to remodel one
of these suites.”

Now that she mentioned it, he
could see traces of the original décor peeking from around billowing curtains
and beneath thick area rugs and under an abundance of shiny pillows. For a
soldier used to basic quarters, or even a man used to living alone in a sizable
but modestly decorated lake house, the loud, plushy world Mari lived in was overwhelming.

It smelled great, though, thanks
to all the flowering plants. In one corner of the foyer several large pots
spilled over with blooms in varying shapes and sizes of white and turquoise
petals while a blossoming vine twisted down from a wall-length stone planter
inside the living room.

“You have a way with
foliage. Or do you have some kind of secret grow lights?”

“I do monitor the lighting,
but it’s just the same lights you have in your suite.”

Minus the aquamarine fringed
lamp shades.

“I’ve been growing plants
all my life. But this was the first time I ever tried in space. You’d think
with the artificial gravity and light that it would be pretty much the same,
but the plants know. So they take a little extra coaxing to flourish.”

“Your coaxing is working
quite well. They’re amazing. And so many different varieties.” He wanted
to ask her specifics about a couple of plants on a stand nearby, but she had
disappeared into the kitchen.

Being within her living space
brought those waves of warmth back in a big way for David. Everything in this
suite had been touched by her—bare toes on the cushy rugs, a brush of her hip
as she passed by an end table, a subtle caress from her delicate hands as she
cared for each bit of flora. David ran a finger down a hanging vine whose
leaves looked like upside down hearts. They even had veins of red shooting
through the waxy green exterior. He swore an electric tingle moved through his
whole body from just this one little touch.

Get it together, soldier.

“I forgot I was out of
coffee, but how about a drunken chai?” She handed him a mug.

He took a sip and almost couldn’t
swallow it, but forced the cloying liquid down his throat. “You like lots
of sugar in your chai, don’t you?” The sweetness nearly masked the
aftertaste of alcohol.

“Like my mother always told
me, everything is better with sugar.” Mari sipped her drink and made a
face. So maybe she was realizing not
everything
was better with sugar,
like expensive small batch malt.

“Sorry. Give me that.”
She grabbed his mug. “I really should have tasted it first. I’ll sweeten
it up a little.”

David took both mugs from her and
sat them on the counter. “I think I’ve had enough to drink.”

“Really?” Her sly look
burned right through him, impacting him below the belt. “Then I have
something to show you.” She took his hand and pulled him toward a room in
the back. His mind immediately filled with images of bare skin sliding across
bare skin, running his hands through her blonde hair, kissing parts of her he
had only fantasized about, and…

She flicked on the lights with
her wrist reporter. “How do you like my lab?”

David laughed, glad she hadn’t
been able to read his mind.

Mari’s expression said she
couldn’t see what was so amusing.

He rubbed her back and tried to
make the laugh seem like a natural response. “I can’t believe how
great
this lab is.”

Her eyes narrowed and he could
tell she wasn’t buying his feint.

“I’m sorry.” He kissed
the top of her head. “I wasn’t expecting a lab back here.” He looked
around for the first time, taking in all the equipment and more plants.
“Especially one so well-equipped. This must have cost a small
fortune.”

“It did, and until Dale offered
me that job, I didn’t have enough money to keep it. Look at this.” She
dragged him over to a mini-hydroponics unit enclosed like a greenhouse. Three
white pipes hung down from a square unit in the ceiling. Small sprays of leafy
plants stuck out of the pipe on all sides at ten centimeter intervals, each one
holding a different type of greenery. Mari went about identifying them for him,
but David’s attention remained with her previous words.

For once, he didn’t focus so much
on Dale, but on the fact that Mari was struggling to keep her livelihood, her
hard-fought independence. He couldn’t imagine the pressure she had been
feeling. Maybe Dale’s appearance at dinner really was lucky for her. And David
needed to control his jealousy, be happy for her. It’s not like their
relationship was serious. A couple of kisses and ambiguous innuendo didn’t
exactly show true progress, yet tonight he thought their connection deepened.
Maybe it was the alcohol.

Mari laughed, startling him out
of his thoughts. “I get it,” she said.

He regarded her, wondering what
he missed.

“You thought I was dragging
you to bed,” she said over her shoulder as she walked toward the door.

David smiled. “Maybe.”

She waited for him in the
doorway. “Well, the bedroom’s this way.” Grabbing his belt, she led
him across the hall. He barely noticed the color surrounding him in this new
space, just the flush of color that slid up Mari’s bare back when he ran his
fingers along her arms.

She dimmed the lights with a tap
to her palm, activating her wrist reporter, then slid it off and threw it on
the lime green rug. David snatched her off her feet and laid her on the bed,
his gaze finding those beautiful coral eyes before his mouth covered hers.

Mari couldn’t catch her breath
because David stole it with each kiss. His hands were all over her—so were his
mouth and his body. She hadn’t expected him to be this aggressive, but she was
thrilled by every second of it. Even the feel of his weight pinning her legs
and hips to the bed.

His body was solid and muscled
and the hardness of his arousal pressed through his pants. He covered her small
frame until she felt cocooned by him and his wonderful scent. It was unlike
anything she had ever felt before. Of course, anything dealing with coupling
was new to her. Realizing that she would finally be with a man sent shivers
down her spine.

That her first time would be with
a man like David thrilled her.

Seeing him take on the six men at
the dock stirred her desire even more than the memory of that beautiful kiss
they’d shared. He easily handled situations that scared her silly. None of the
men from her hometown commanded that kind of presence. Thinking about David
dispatching their attackers made Mari kiss him with a fierceness she didn’t
know was inside her.

He responded by swirling his
tongue into her mouth. Ever so slowly he slid his tongue over hers. She grabbed
fistfuls of his thick, dark hair, becoming hyper-aware of certain parts of her
body—her lips, her breasts, her….

“David,” she gasped his
name without completely breaking away from his skilled mouth. Her fingers
fumbled for the buttons on his shirt. He worked from the bottom up until they
met in the middle and she shoved the soft cotton away from his chest.

She had touched his chest in
greeting dozens of times, but always the boundary of clothing kept her from his
skin. The smooth feel of him now beneath her fingertips sent electric bolts
through her body. His was the kind of body she and her sisters fantasized
about. But here she was touching him, living the fantasy. She outlined his
pectoral muscles, marveling at how his soft skin could cover such hard muscle.
When she reached his nipples, she ran her thumbs over the erect little nubs,
but shyness got the best of her, so she moved on, outlining the tops of his abs.
She’d be happy just to touch him like this for the rest of the night.

David’s hands were busy sliding
the nightie from her shoulders, his mouth covering each centimeter of skin just
after the fabric exposed it. He definitely knew what he was doing. Would he
notice that she didn’t? The thought suddenly bothered her. What if she
disappointed him?

Determined that she wouldn’t, she
feigned a confidence that dwindled by the second. Reaching for his belt—the one
she had no problem taking hold of earlier in order to lead him in here—she
fumbled with the buckle. Her hands shook a little, but she managed to unfasten
it and worked on the button of his pants next. That’s when David’s mouth found
her breast, and she forgot all about his pants.