She gasped, seemingly surprised at first, but then she increased her pace, almost frenzied as she rode him, grinding into him. Her passion only increased his, and he was barely aware of himself growling her name, praising her beauty and perfection as waves of ecstasy flowed through him, her tight sweetness wrapped about him. They came together, crying out each other’s names, and he caught her when she collapsed against his chest, her limbs trembling.
“Come here,” he murmured, keeping her atop him and tugging the blanket over her.
He kissed her eyes, her nose, her lips, needing to hold her, to express the feelings of tenderness that swelled inside of him. She smiled, kissing him back and stroking his face.
“My life would have been empty without you,” he whispered. “You make me care about living.”
“Good.” She snuggled against his chest. “I don’t want to hear any more talk about my safety or being sent away for my own good.”
“No,” Viktor agreed, holding her to him, breathing in the scent of her shampoo—of
her
—and knowing he never wanted anybody else there.
• • • • •
Ankari woke up to the sound of Viktor’s stomach grumbling. She smiled groggily. That would teach him to walk out of the shower in all of his naked glory and distract her from her dinner preparations.
The side of her face was resting against his chest, so she slid her hand down to pat his stomach. She was hungry, too, but was reluctant to slide out of his embrace—one arm rested across her lower back, holding her to him. She still felt a happy glow from his attentive lovemaking, and from the tender way he had looked back at her when she had confessed that she loved him.
She hadn’t intended to speak so honestly, but she did not regret it. She wanted him to understand why staying with him meant so much to her, but at the same time she had been a little worried he might pull away or appear alarmed by the open display of feelings. After they had spent months together—albeit, months that were often interrupted by his work and hers—she had not thought he would, but one never knew with men. There was an art to making such confessions. Neither too soon, nor too late. Definitely not when the other person did not feel the same way. She did not expect Viktor to say the words aloud—after all, this was a man who responded to questions with grunts at least half the time—but she trusted that he cared about her too. Why else would he tag along with her to foolishly confront mafia men?
Another soft rumble came from beneath her hand.
“Your belly is demanding a food log,” Ankari said, expecting him to either be awake or to have woken when she started letting her fingers roam. He had those paranoid warrior instincts and never seemed to sleep deeply. “Have you eaten at all today?”
She was not sure if it was still the same day, but she sensed that she had only dozed for an hour or so rather than sleeping through the night.
“They gave me a ration bar early on during my jail time,” Viktor murmured, sliding his hand up her back and settling in her hair, massaging her scalp with his fingers.
Ah, now she
definitely
did not want to get up.
Unfortunately, her comm unit beeped from somewhere—wherever her trousers had ended up, most likely. She lay there, basking in Viktor’s massage, and might have ignored it, but he spoke.
“Did you ever reply to your mother?”
Ankari grimaced, a wave of guilt washing aside her pleasant feeling of languor. “No.”
Viktor did not say anything else to deepen her guilt, but she sensed that he thought she should make sure her mother knew she had survived the craziness at the station. After the loss he had suffered, he must believe one should treasure whatever kin a person did have. He was probably right. Maybe he would like to be part of a family again someday. She didn’t know if
her
family was the ideal one to be adopted into, but she ought to take him to meet her parents and siblings someday. Her mother might
think
she wouldn’t like a mercenary, but Ankari felt certain that in enough time, careers would be forgotten, and Mom would come to appreciate Viktor.
“All right.” She kissed his chest and pushed herself into a sitting position. “You talked me into checking on her.”
Viktor’s brows rose slightly, but he didn’t say anything.
“Yes, just like that.” Ankari slid out of the bed, her own stomach whining pitifully when she spotted the take-out boxes on the table. She checked the comm unit, saw that it had been her mother, and that it had been the eighth time she had called. She decided speaking to her mother had to come before food. She would look forward to eating though, a good meal purchased from one of the casino restaurants right before they had left in the shuttle. “Someday, you’re going to give me a birthday present, Viktor. A chef.”
She patted one of the boxes fondly on her way by, then headed to the lavatory where she kept a robe on a hook. One probably shouldn’t call one’s mother while naked.
“A chef?” Viktor asked. “On a mercenary ship?”
“Don’t you think your men would fight harder if they had good food in their bellies?”
“The Dekaron VI ration logs have all the vitamins, minerals, and calories that an active man needs.”
“So the wrappers tell me.” Ankari tied the belt on her robe, wrestled a brush through her hair, and walked back out to the table. “There’s no mention of the word
good
on them, though.”
“I wouldn’t object to a chef if he had combat training and could be useful in the field.”
Poor deluded Viktor—he truly didn’t seem to think culinary skills would be “useful” to his company.
“I’ll put out a flier,” Ankari said.
He eyed her suspiciously. Despite the squint, he looked quite appealing lying over there, propped on one elbow, his broad chest bare, the sheets gathered around his waist. Ankari supposed it was because she was dreading another lecture from her mother that she wanted to crawl back in bed with him.
Her stomach issued another pitiful whine. She would crawl back in bed with him—and with some food—after she took care of this task. Since Viktor’s cabin did not have another room and she didn’t feel like leaving, she decided to talk to her mother with him there. As she picked up the comm unit, a new thought occurred to her.
“Would you like to talk to my mother?”
“Why?” He didn’t sound like he loathed the idea, but he did seem puzzled.
“So she can see that you’re a nice man.”
“How would me talking to her result in that conclusion?”
Ankari snorted. “You could just stand behind me and hug me in a supportive way.” She waved at his bare chest. “Though you might want to put trousers on first. Or... maybe not. If Mom saw you naked, she might be less mystified as to why I’m here.” She grinned at him.
“She knows you like scarred men with gray hair and tattoos?” He slid out of bed, looked around, seemed to remember he had never had any clothes to toss off, and walked to his closet.
“You only have a few gray hairs. They’re barely noticeable. And the scars go perfectly with your attitude. All those disaffected grunts wouldn’t sound right coming from some young model who’d never endured anything rougher than a cross word from a cameraman.”
Judging by the sour look he sent her way, he did not think much of her description. Nonetheless, he dressed in trousers and a tasteful black shirt that accented his musculature nicely. She was the one who felt ratty in a bathrobe, but she would simply tell her mother it was late and that she had been headed for bed. Not entirely untrue, because she intended to return to it after dinner.
When the call went through, her mother answered instantly.
“Ankari,” she blurted, as if she could pounce on her through the link.
“Hi, Mom. I’m sorry I couldn’t call before,” Ankari rushed to say, before a lecture had time to blossom, “but the station was quarantined, and there was a whole mess of trouble going on. I couldn’t get away.”
“I
saw
.”
“Er, you did?” Had the news already gone out to the rest of the system? She supposed it had been hours since she left the station, so it must have. What version, she wondered, prepared to wince.
“The story was on at seven and again at nine. The whole system saw you climbing up those trees with your men and rescuing the station owners, honey.” Her mother clutched a hand to her chest. “I had no idea you were that—I mean, I knew you were capable, but dealing with those bombs. And your mercenary. He was so... fierce.”
Feeling dazed but willing to go with this new enthusiasm from her mother, Ankari looked up at Viktor, who was, as usual, standing next to the table instead of sitting. He wasn’t in range for her mother to see yet.
“Yes, he’s fierce,” Ankari said, meeting his eyes, “but loyal and good to his men and, uhm, me.”
Viktor was wearing his wary I’m-dealing-with-an-unknown-situation-so-I’ll-give-nothing-away look.
“The news said he’s from Grenavine, that he lost all his family,” her mother went on. “Tell him... Tell him, we understand. Your father—” She lifted her shoulders. “You know.”
“Yes. He’s right here if you want to meet him.”
Viktor did not walk over—he actually looked a little worried—so Ankari leaned to the side and grasped his hand. She tugged him closer, then pushed the comm unit back so he would fit into the vid pickup.
Her mother fell silent. Ankari had to remember that, whatever her image of Viktor was, he
did
intimidate most people. Fierce, indeed.
“Mrs. Markovich,” Viktor said, nodding once.
He looked stiff. Because fifty-five-year-old women intimidated him? That hardly seemed likely, but maybe he worried he wouldn’t make a good impression? Could that matter to him at forty? It wasn’t as if he was a teenage boy going to meet his girlfriend’s parents. But maybe he didn’t want to disappoint Ankari’s mother for her sake. That touched her, even if it was possible she was thinking far too much here.
“Viktor, isn’t it?” her mother asked, her smile on the wan side. At least it was there.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Well.” Her mother looked at Ankari, a hint of humor in her eyes. “He’s politely fierce, at least.”
Ankari swatted Viktor on the stomach, hoping to draw some humor—or personality—from him. “Stop being fierce.”
He looked at her out of the corner of his eye. “I thought I had.”
Perhaps personality would have to wait for an in-person meeting. Besides, if her mother had so far only seen him as the news portrayed him, mowing down enemies like so much grass, then seeing him smiling and cheerful might be alarming. Not that cheerful was ever a word Ankari would attribute to him, but he did occasionally smile. Not always fiercely.
“Think of it this way, Mom. You wouldn’t want me out here in the dangerous part of space without a suitable protector, would you?” As soon as Ankari made the argument, she worried it had been a mistake to remind her mother that she
was
in a dangerous part of the system. That had been the reason for the earlier objections, after all. “But he’s quick to send me away if the ship is heading into trouble,” she rushed to add. “Our business has its own shuttle. Nobody would mistake it for a combat unit and target us, not anymore. I painted it pink. And renamed it
Ladybug
.”
Viktor opened his mouth, as if he meant to make his usual objection to the name, but he closed it again, doubtlessly seeing that she was trying to assuage her mother’s fears. However ineptly.
“A pink shuttle named
Ladybug
?” her mother asked. “Are you sure that will
deter
people from wanting to destroy it?”
Viktor’s eyes glinted.
“Er. Was that a joke, Mom?”
Her mother had a sense of humor, of course, but it rarely came out when she was worried. Maybe this meant she had relaxed an iota?
“I’m not entirely certain.”
“I’m sure nobody would want to target a flying medical clinic, Mom. As I was saying, Viktor sends our shuttle away if the ship is going into trouble, so you really don’t need to worry.” Remembering that her mom had seen the Midway 5 news and that it had included her climbing that two-hundred-foot-tall oak tree, she added, “He wasn’t responsible for anything that happened on that station. I found that trouble by myself.”
Her mother snorted. “Oh,
that
I believe.”
The glint in Viktor’s eyes turned into a full-fledged gleam. “I like her,” he murmured.
Well, she had wanted personality.
“As you can see, Mom, I’m doing well. There’s no need for you to worry. Not any more than usual. How’s everyone back home? Has Dad found work?”
The door chime rang, and Viktor walked over to answer it, leaving Ankari to finish the catching up without an observer. Her stomach rumbled again, prompting her to keep the conversation as short as she could without being accused of being a standoffish daughter. When she signed off, she was glad she had succeeded in introducing Viktor and toyed again with the idea of finding a way to take him home someday, especially if her mother took the family house-hunting and
home
became a pleasanter place to visit.
“Oh, you’re having dinner?” came a man’s drawl from the doorway. Sergeant Tick poked his head inside, oblivious to the fact that Viktor had not stepped aside in invitation. “Good,” Tick added. “I was afraid I’d catch you two, ah, celebrating your victory on Midway 5.”
“What do you want, Sergeant?”
“Well, I got the short straw, you see. Actually it was a cherry stem that had been painted black. I think the others rigged the draw. Back home, there would have been a possum race, and I would have had much better odds, on account of me having a way with critters and races like that being tough to rig, but I reckon that’s enough by way of introduction.” Tick cleared his throat and looked his captain up and down, perhaps noticing that Viktor hadn’t stepped aside. Tick looked—and sounded—nervous. He always trotted a few backwoods references out of his stable, but those sentences had been denser with them than usual. “May I come in, Cap’n? The men are a mite fidgety, and as I was saying, I got elected to visit you and represent them. On account of us being so close.”