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13
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” Aidan growled as he returned to the mess hall.
His entire crew had retired there, gathered around the communal table as they gobbled up Caryn’s food like starved beasts.
Onnika leisurely strolled in beside him as though she hadn’t a care in the world. Her impish smile told him she knew exactly how her sexy voice and enticing words had affected him back in the infirmary. Lust tripped through his blood like a drunken, randy lad. Luckily, she’d twisted his guts with her parting words, and he was able to tamp it down.
She brightly addressed the crew. “Didn’t I tell you she could cook? Admit it, your tongues are in heaven right now.”
Zeek licked sauce from his lips. “Sooo good.”
Asher reached out for seconds, or maybe it was thirds, who knew?
The others mumbled unintelligible words of agreement with their mouths full. Caryn only sat quietly, blushing from the praise and nibbling from her own plate.
“Shouldn’t someone be flying the ship?” Aidan sounded disgruntled, even to himself.
“Well,” Zeek replied, “the ship is outfitted with a pretty cool state of the art AI auto pilot, but no need. We landed on Nazzu five minutes ago. Just in time for dinner!”
A glimpse at Onnika’s profile told Aidan that didn’t come as good news. Her eyes darted for a second. Then she locked gazes with him. The fire that had lit her lovely, devious eyes in the infirmary was snuffed out, and he knew he must be seeing the first authentic emotion from her: worry.
The moment he felt a tug of sympathy for her, he cut a sharp gaze at his crew. “Stop stuffing your faces. We have work to do.”
Their chewing paused. They glanced at him, then longingly at the food still steaming on the table, then back at him.
“Now,” he ordered.
With that, they dropped their utensils and fell in line. Lear was the only one to take his time, wiping his hands and mouth before pushing away from the table.
Caryn went to Onnika and the two clasped hands, looking so crestfallen one might think they were about to be executed. Aidan glanced away, but the image stuck in his brain like a prickly barb. In that brief moment, they looked so small and helpless. Innocent. He wasn’t sure about Caryn, but he knew Onnika to be anything but. She was shrewd, scheming, and surprisingly insightful. He feared she’d been right about his initial jealousy, and the reason he’d sequestered her alone. Her cut had not been deep at all and had already been in the process of swift healing, as many races were capable of, including his own. But any desire for her had been stamped out of him the second she’d put on that little act for him. She’d ferreted out his weakness for her all too quickly, and had jumped at the chance to exploit it.
Thief turned seductress with a bat of her eyelids.
Long ago he had accepted the fact that he was a ruined man, no good to anyone other than the talent he’d cultivated at the helm of a ship. But for one second, a fleeting moment in time, he’d wanted to lose himself in Onnika’s game. To flirt with a beautiful woman and have her flirt back and pretend his heart wasn’t a shredded, tattered organ that somehow still lived in his chest. That something like passion was still possible for him.
Luckily, she had inadvertently reminded him of his family with her offhanded comment:Life is a dangerous game, and no one gets out alive.He’d played the game; his family had paid for it. The pain of their deaths, still so fresh even after all these years, was a burden he could never escape. Yet, for once that pain had saved him from doing something monumentally stupid.
Like kiss her.
With Caryn by her side, Onnika headed toward the docking bay along withDragoon’screw. She was still filled with confusion over her encounter with Aidan. For the first time in a very long time, she’d been genuinely turned on.
And she could tell Aidan had been, too.
He’d wanted to kiss her. Even if her magic hadn’t alerted her to that fact, she’d read it on his face, in his heated expression, and in the language of his body. He’d been seconds away from making his move…and she’d been desperate for it.
But then it was like a switch had flipped in him. Now he was icy once more, ready to leave them…wherever it was they’d just landed.
“I don’t like this planet,” Caryn muttered ominously to Onnika, but her voice carried in the ship’s confined space.
Asher glanced back at them. “You don’t even know where we are.”
“She prefers spaceports,” Onnika said, covering for her.
It was always concerning when Caryn said stuff like that. Was her gift shooting off warnings? Trying to direct her to leave this place?
At the loading doors, Onnika held Caryn’s hand as the heavy metal creaked apart.
Stifling hot air whooshed into the room, as though they’d just opened a giant oven. Harsh sunlight blasted in, followed by the noxious taste of cinder and dust and baked soil. Instantly her mouth felt dry and sandy. She breathed through the fabric of her sleeve as she shielded her eyes with her other hand. The others did the same.
