Stripper: The Fringe, Book 4 (3 page)

“You are safe, Mr. Jennings.”

Strangely sexless, the voice sounded computer-enhanced as it wafted directionless, like the annoying vanilla-musk. The omni-directional voice aroused his fight-or-flight instincts. Hell, that voice flat-out aroused him. Something in that droning monotone stirred memories he’d paid handsomely to have stripped.

Without warning, Diane popped into his head as vivid as a hologram. Tall, with golden-copper hair, narrow, tawny eyes, pale white skin dusted with freckles and a wide, sensuous mouth that he couldn’t seem to stop kissing when they’d been young.

Foolish.

In love.

Through the years, he’d thought of her coral lips against his mouth, against his neck, pressed to his ear as they tumbled together, panting and pressing, seeking climax in the dark corners of the slaver ship called the
Damn You
.

Against the walls, on the floor—they didn’t care. Careful touches erupted to violent passion. Duster found a physical release with Diane that he could not envision with any other woman. Their lovemaking had ranged from sweet to savage. Her body was a guitar that he sometimes strummed as gently as a singing poet, yet other times he unleashed a fury on her like a metal-head in solo. Always with her panting eagerness, her wanton encouragement—her ultimate betrayal.

Speaking of betrayal…

“Why haven’t I been stripped?” Duster found tormenting Diane memories laced with everything from Shadra MacKay’s tacky bridesmaid dresses to how he’d named planet Windmere. For 7Mil, he should have no memory of any of it. Especially not a teasing memory of Diane as his tawny temptress, on her knees, her lips parted as he stood over her.

“A problem presented itself,” the absurdly compelling voice said.

“What problem?” He’d agreed to these ridiculous machinations and done everything the stripper insisted he do, even paying the fee up-front in script.

Aw, hell. I just got conned out of 7Mil.

Duster stood, swayed and crashed down hard on the neoflesh padded table. “How much more script do you want?” Not that he had any more.

“It’s not about the money, Mr. Jennings. It’s about the memories.”

He almost laughed when the words echoed in his mind with music, as if that line were from a song he barely remembered.

“What do my memories have to do with anything?” He gulped air in a desperate effort not to throw up. A plethora of pharmaceuticals were coursing through his veins, and he didn’t need any more up his nose. “We’ve been negotiating this contract for over a year. Seven years for 7Mil. That’s the deal.”

“Seven years is a long time. The event you wish to eradicate must be extremely traumatic.” The dispassionate tone of the voice continued to arouse him as much as it annoyed him. How the hell could a computer-enhanced voice stimulate him so much?

“Again, we’ve been over this. I’m not discussing it with anyone but the stripper.” Leaning back, he looked up at the lights embedded into the ceiling. He’d read something about how concentrating on light could prevent nausea. Or sneezing. His muddled mind couldn’t remember which one, but it didn’t matter when it had the desired effect. Despite the rolling of his gut, he didn’t blow chunks. Although, to be fair, hurling his last meal around would add a bit of interest to the all-purple-and-pink decor.

“I
am
the stripper, Mr. Jennings. You need to discuss the event with me.”

“Stop calling me that,” he snarled. “Everyone calls me Duster. And if you
are
the stripper I hired, then why aren’t you down here talking with me face-to-face? How come you’re modulating your voice into that sexless drone?”

A long pause filled his belly with a slow-creeping paranoia. What if the stripper had begun her work, found out about Michael and Windmere, realized Duster was the head of security and now plotted to sell him to the IWOG? Duster thought of the carefully worded contract but realized he couldn’t very well force the stripper to hold to their agreement if he were imprisoned by the Inner World Government.

He’d been a damn fool for even thinking he could protect Windmere or Michael from the IWOG. Darting his critical gaze around his girly prison, Duster looked for weakness. If there was a way into the room, there was a way out, and he would find it. He looked to his feet and saw his sharp-shined boots. Relief flooded him when he flexed his ankles and felt his narrow blades were ready.

“I apologize for not meeting with you face-to-face.” The sexless drone came from every soft edge of the room. “I worried you would become agitated by this change. Obviously, you are.”

“Agitated? No, I’m pissed.” He swayed even as he sat on the table. “I paid 7Mil for what has amounted to a ride in a whore ship.
Den of Iniquity
. Catchy name. If you’re not going to fulfill the contract between us, then I demand you set me free and return my money.”

After a long pause, the voice said, “You are in no position to demand anything, Mr. Jennings. If you would calm down, we could discuss a different mode of treatment.”

“I paid to be stripped, and that’s exactly what I want.” For a moment, he considered that Michael had a hand in this, since the argument rang reminiscent, but Duster dismissed the notion. Michael would get to the point, not dance around. Whoever this con artist was, he or she wanted more than money.

“If there was a way to reconcile your painful memories without stripping you of them, would you be interested?”

Despite the modulation, the voice had a desperate tone, almost as if the person behind the speaker were personally invested in his choice.

“I didn’t enter into this decision lightly.” Duster repeated the same words he’d said to Michael. “I’ve carefully considered it for the last three years.”

“And what triggered that event? Why did you begin contemplating a stripper three years ago?” The voice echoed deep compassion mixed with dispassion, and the conflicting sentiments exasperated him.

“Is this really pertinent?”

“Yes.”

He rolled his eyes, and it made him waver a bit, so he reclined onto the neoflesh table. “I met a woman.”

“And?”

“That’s it.” Duster refused to spill his guts to some nameless, faceless person. He hadn’t even told Michael all the particulars about Rena, and he told Michael everything. “You want to know the nitty-gritty details, you’re gonna have to come down here and face me.” Duster put his hands behind his head and closed his eyes.

“I’m afraid I can’t do that for security reasons.”

“Gee, that’s too bad.” He crossed his ankles and settled himself more firmly into the soft table. Touching one of the pockets on his vest, he hoped for a handful of seeds to munch, but his pockets were empty. And then he remembered getting stripped would have relieved him of his crackleseed addiction, so he’d deliberately gotten rid of all the seeds he had. Crud. “I guess that means we’ve got nothing else to say to each other.”

Reasoning in that weird, sexless drone, with a direct and disturbingly composed tenor, the person behind the voice tried again and again to get him to speak. Arguments of logic gave way to accusations that he was behaving like a child. None of it moved him to respond.

Melting in his drug-induced haze, Duster dozed off.

He had nothing to say at the moment, and nothing the voice could say would change his mind. He wouldn’t open his mouth to speak until he had a real, live person standing in front of him.

And that was final.

Chapter Three

Arms crossed, reduced to childish arguments, Diane finally gave up and cut the com. From her place of safety on the bridge, she left the vid part of the audvid on, but if she had left the audio component on, Duster would have heard her grunting and groaning in frustration. Duster had not been like this seven years ago. Back then, he’d responded to reason and logic. How could he calmly fall asleep when she held his very life in the palm of her hand?

Not an idiot by any sane person’s estimation, Duster had to know trouble loomed. He’d paid a hefty price to be stripped, then willingly let himself be drugged and placed aboard a registered courtesan ship. He’d awoken to find he’d not been stripped, and his only contact with the outside world was a carefully modulated voice. If she stood in his sharply shined black boots, she’d be terrified out of her mind. But Duster refused to beg, bargain or barter. He wanted to talk to someone face-to-face and wouldn’t be moved to respond otherwise.

“Bastard.”

Diane hadn’t considered this possibility when she’d laid her plans. She expected him to peacefully remain in the stripping room while she treated him via the audvid. It was the only way she thought she could help him while keeping herself safe. She never dreamed he’d refuse to participate without an in-the-flesh meeting. His obstinate stance defeated her plan.

She didn’t know what to do next. She couldn’t meet with him in person. He’d
never
let her treat him. Not only that, he’d likely attack her, commit extreme violence against her person and toss her out an airlock after wringing her neck.

Not that she could blame him.

After what she’d done to him seven years ago, she expected him to launch himself at her the moment he saw her. Not a chance in the Void he’d be pulling her into a long-lost lover’s embrace.

“He’s still wearing the ring.” She touched its mate on the chain around her neck. The ring nestled close to her heart, and she pressed it tight with a worried hand. “Is he wearing the ring out of love or hate?”

She turned her gaze to the audvid. Duster snoozed, his hands cupped behind his head, his shiny-boot-clad feet crossed at the ankles. Between, he wore canvas-and-leather pants, vest and shirt, all riddled with pockets, most now slack because he’d been forced to empty them before he’d been allowed to board her ship. His considerable amount of gear awaited him in a locker aft.

After setting the
Den of Iniquity
on autopilot, she ensured the autofire weapons were armed, then left the bridge for the cargo bay. Once there, she opened his locker. Empty. Puzzled, she clanged the door shut. A dark fear compelled her to open every locker. Her heart thudded when she found them all empty.

“Sharply shined black boots. Crossed at the ankles.” She remembered watching him perform that casual gesture. “I never looked in his boots. Did the screeners remember to check?”

Diane returned to the bridge, biting her nails along the way. Clearly, she remembered that he’d pulled a veritable storage house out of his pockets.

She yanked the clipboard of reports to her lap and flipped through them, looking for his possession list. Finding it, she shook her head. He’d arrived with his pockets empty. He’d told the operative he’d placed his property in an independent storage facility. Then why could she so clearly remember him unloading his pockets?

Perhaps because she’d then turned her mind to imagining him stripping away his clothes. Emptying his pockets was foreplay. He’d done it several times when they snuck trysts while on the
Damn You
. Duster had removed anything sharp when they were in a hurry, but almost inevitably, he ended up removing all his clothing so there were no barriers between them. Watching him unload his pockets predictably led to him removing his clothes.

“Wishful thinking.”

Duster wouldn’t be taking off his clothes for her hungry gaze any time soon. If she couldn’t compel him to speak to her, it was even more unlikely he’d undress for her.

“And he’s not here for that!” she reminded herself. “Duster isn’t here for another round of sex and intrigue.”

But it had never been just that between them. Their brief liaison had been so much more. Her body came alive under his touch. Every muscle, every bit of skin surged forward in the hopes of luxuriating in his contact.

His big, calloused hands always drove her to delicious madness. Fighting against her mind, which was driven only to achieve her goal, her body responded, and she constantly found herself trapped between lies and truth. A need so profound made her repeatedly lose sight of her mission as she indulged herself, over and over, in the passion he compelled with his barest touch.

With a shake of her head, Diane stopped the lusty direction of her thoughts. In her haste, she’d forgotten to check his boots for blades, and she couldn’t do it now. All she could do was attempt to protect herself from Duster’s wrath.

Once he sobered up, it took Duster all of five minutes to break out of the makeshift prison. When he did, he realized he was on a 3xBasic. A good-sized ship with an average crew of forty. A smart crew, he figured, because he found armed autofires around every corner. But in another way, they were not so smart, because the sensors had no protection.

Thunk
by
thunk
, his narrow blades shattered the electronic eyes as he worked his way to the bridge. Once there, he hacked the main controller and shut down all the defense systems. With a flick of his talented fingers, he unlocked every door on the ship.

Right off the bridge, he found a bedroom that pressed all his hot buttons. Dim lights, multi-textured fabrics, everything feminine and soft. Colors of cream, brown sugar, peach sherbet—he took a deep breath, and his body responded with painful intensity to the lingering note of vanilla-musk.

He methodically checked each room for occupants and weapons. When he didn’t find either, only that infuriating scent of vanilla-musk, he began to wonder if he was on a remotely controlled droid ship that only
looked
like a whore ship.