Ricochet (12 page)

Stratton stared, a muscle in his jaw jumping like a caught fish. Somehow, he got the impression she wasn’t talking about the damned ship anymore. Guilt tore up his insides. An apology for his earlier words sat heavily on the tip of his tongue, but pride kept him from uttering it. Why the hell should he? It wasn’t as if she’d come out of this situation smelling of flowers. Trapped in her scrutiny, he shifted his weight, his soul as vulnerable and naked as his body.

After endless seconds slid by in silence, he cleared his throat. “Sometimes a battle-scarred ship can surprise you with the things it will do.”

“I hope you’re right.” The tension eased. Willa slipped behind him, and he felt her nimble fingers work the knots of his bonds. “Though I’m tempted to leave you tied, I figure even the worst-behaved dog should be allowed freedom once in a while.”

Her warm breath skated over the skin of his back. He sucked in a breath as awareness prickled every hair on his body. Need heated his blood, flirting with his groin until he wanted to whip around, shove her against the hull of the ship and get lost in her sweet pussy. Saliva evaporated in his mouth, and he swallowed.
Say something, you idiot! Pour on your trademark charm.

He couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe. Gentle fingers massaged his wrists as the ropes dropped to the ground; then they moved away, taking the warmth of her body with them. A cry of protest hovered on his lips. At the last second, he bit it back, loath to show how she affected him.
Don’t give her a weapon to use later.

“Remember the datapad.” She delivered a friendly slap to his ass that sent shock waves to every nerve ending. “And get some clothes on. You might injure that thing, what with all the sharp, hot metal around here.”

The back of Stratton’s neck heated. He glanced down at the front of his jockeys. Of course his arousal had sprung, rampant and ready, from her little show of victory. “Yeah, I’ll do that.” At least she’d noticed. The knowledge made his chest tighten. “I’m still not getting in this piece of crap. There has to be another way.” His shoulders ached as he flexed them. A soft sigh escaped him at the joy of the simple movement.

A shadow of annoyance flickered across her face. “We’re using the ship.”

He yanked his slick gear, as well as the datapad, from the ground. “It’s not exactly what I want to do at this moment.” In fact, the desire to bury himself deep in Willa’s core had ratcheted into cataclysmic levels.

She shrugged and stuck a boot on the first rung of a metal ladder attached to the side of the ship. “I wanted you to go float in the middle of a space-junk debris field. I guess we don’t always get what we want.” She disappeared into the ship. “I’m leaving in five—with or without you.”

“Too bad you need a two-person team.” He’d never been with someone so irritating. “I get to be the pilot!” He stalked to the ladder and glanced up.

Willa poked her head out. “Hmm, that’s a little hard to do since you’re still mostly naked with a boner the size of a small missile. Get your ass up here and stop goofing around.” Again she vanished into the cockpit. The roar of firing engines filled the air. Apparently, Willa wasn’t kidding.

“Yes, ma’am.” At the last second, he resisted the urge to salute her. If she wanted to give him the cold shoulder, he could take it. Sure, he hadn’t slept with a woman for months now. No big deal. He could shake it off. His reaction to her was nothing more than desperation—and not for her personally. Couldn’t be. He’d be insane to take her on in bed—or anywhere else.

Yanking on his slick gear, he growled out an obscenity when he realized he’d put it on over his damned gravity belt. Almost ripping off the suit, he tore it off, removed the belt and redressed, carefully maneuvering the suit around a cock that refused to settle down. Stratton zipped the suit, grabbed the belt and the datapad, then climbed the ladder. Once inside the dated cabin, he groaned at being presented with Willa’s rounded backside as she bent over the pilot’s seat, searching for a lost object, from the sounds of her cursing.

His groin renewed its quest to leave the suit. The slick gear did nothing to hide his personal compass that pointed at Willa’s true north. “Uh, you know, the sooner we get to the checkpoint and take the MRP, the better. I’m, uh, real tired. Need the rest.” Sleep was the furthest thing from his mind. Thoughts of playing infinite rounds of mattress-wrestling with Willa, however, couldn’t be shaken.

“Don’t worry, Ace, we’re on our way.” She righted herself and attached the safety harness over her chest.

He did the same while tossing the belt beneath the console.
When will the Nebulon Trike be over?
Time to redouble his efforts to capture Chaf.

Stratton flipped through screens on the datapad, reading off coordinates for Megaris-8 as Willa guided the
Stellar Drift
through the remainder of the asteroid belt. In the late-model Scout ship, there was no such thing as an HUD or even the star-map display on the windscreen. They had to do things old school, which they would by following triangulated blips on a radar screen, as well as by relying on the datapad.

Throughout the few hours they’d been aboard the craft, Willa had maintained a frosty silence that Stratton couldn’t—or wouldn’t—break. Now, the quiet had turned oppressive, and he needed to hear her voice, if only to banish the erotic thoughts that looped through his mind. “Rally rules state all race participants need to check in to the Hive. It’ll be the tallest structure on the asteroid. Racers in the top three slots get the penthouse suites. All others are assigned standard rooms. Don’t look for many amenities. Marker should be attached to the entry door.”

Willa snorted, jerking a cracked, leather-covered joystick. The ship responded to her touch, albeit grudgingly. “Can you get any sort of reading on our position in the pack? That delay with the thieves really hurt us.”

He pressed a couple of buttons. “Nope. Too much interference from the Belt itself.” Worry gnawed at him. If Chaf had gotten one of the top slots, had pocketed the money that should rightfully belong to him, he’d need some serious alcohol to soothe his frazzled nerves. Chasing Chaf, riding around in a junker and spending time with a woman who tripped his sexual trigger had set him on the razor’s edge. Something had to give. Soon.

“There’s nothing we can do about the delay.” She flipped a red switch on the dusty console. The ship surged forward with a burst of speed and a more ominous series of creaks and groans. “Thrusters have been engaged. Prepare for descent in fifteen minutes.”

“That’s my job.” As much as he detested being relegated to navigator for a second time, the fact she overstepped her bounds set him off. “Does your need for control extend to everyone you’re with, or is it just me you want under your thumb?”

Under her thumb, under her body…

“If the people I’m stuck with can’t do their job with a degree of intelligence, of course I’ll step in.” She turned and glared at him. He felt every ounce of the bitter chill in that blue gaze. “Look, I want to win the Trike. That’s it, all right? I don’t care what you want. I don’t care about anything you’ve got going on. It doesn’t matter. Got it?”

Something inside Stratton snapped. “What the hell is your problem, Willa? Your attitude sucks, and it goes beyond being the only girl in your family. It wouldn’t kill you to be friendly once in a while.” He waited, but she didn’t respond. “Contrary to what you think, all men aren’t out to get you. All men don’t hold you in low esteem.”

“You do.” The words were so soft he almost missed them. She kept her gaze focused on the windscreen.

“No, you just think that.” He rapidly went through his interactions with her and couldn’t come up with anything that would have given her that impression. “Is it the pet name? You hate it, right?”

Silence met the question. Any minute now, the inside of the cabin would ice over.

Stratton sighed. “I’m sorry you feel that way, but you need to understand that sooner or later, you have to let it go. Start doing stuff for yourself, because you’re going to run out of people to blame for your unhappiness.”

She moved her hands restlessly over a few buttons, but never pressed any of them. As he looked at her profile, his insides tightened when her chin wobbled and a tear coursed down her cheek.
Damn
. He’d made her cry. Her body tensed, every muscle taut until she fairly vibrated, screamed out for release. If she thrust her chin out any farther, it would hit the windscreen.

The woman was stressed, that much was evident, but unless she looked at herself with some measure of worth, she’d never be free. Usually, he excelled when the female was vulnerable. A few sympathetic words, a tender brush of the fingers, and they were willing to do anything he asked. With Willa, he couldn’t move in for the kill. She brought out his protective instincts, made him see beyond himself to interact with her, help her meet her goals while working toward his.

You’ve gone soft, Sin.

Then the self-loathing kicked him in the chest. No matter what he said or did, in the end, he’d leave her, and if the chance came to nab Chaf before the last checkpoint, he’d do it. Hands down. Money was money. Females were trouble, and they certainly weren’t permanent; yet Willa…

No exceptions to the rule.

He glanced at the datapad, watched the countdown to interception with their target. “Eight minutes.”

“Thank you.”

“This hotel, the Hive, I have to warn you, it’ll be very cramped quarters. Prime opportunity to get to know me better.” He sank back into the familiar womanizer routine. It was safe, and if she ended up hating him, great. He’d hardly notice their parting.

“You can sleep on the floor, same as last time.” Her voice, still bogged down with emotion, cut through his crumbling defenses. “I know everything I need to know about you, which you confirmed back there on the other asteroid.”

“I said that stuff in the heat of the moment.” He threw the datapad on the console. “I’d been tied and beaten up. Doesn’t that count for something?”

Willa merely shrugged.

This was the exact reason he couldn’t wait to turn the bitch loose, but…maybe she’d never been treated like a lady by any man in her life. If it was true and every male she’d been in contact with had used her or had considered her unworthy in some way, no wonder she didn’t trust him or wouldn’t let him past her barriers. Of course charm wouldn’t work.

“Once we land and enter our info at the marker, there’s something I want to show you.” He retrieved the datapad, thrilled to see they’d arrive in less than five minutes.

“Spare me, Stratton. That line may work on brainless women, but
I
don’t want to see what’s in your pants.”

Heat streaked along his skin and lodged in his cock. “The good news is you’re thinking about it. However, that’s not what I meant.” He grinned as optimism lifted his mood. “The Hive is situated in the dark part of Megaris-8. At this time of year, certain space insects congregate in the Belt for mating purposes.”

“And I’d be interested in this information why?”

“Trust me, all right? For once.” It would be just the thing to thaw the ice around her heart. Women went all goo-goo for shit like this.

“I’ll be the judge of that.” But in the darkened cabin, her eyes sparkled.

He buckled on the gravity belt once more. For the first time since the race had begun, Stratton couldn’t wait to linger at a checkpoint.

Willa tamped down on her frustration as they learned their ranking a few minutes later. They’d arrived at the Hive, a many-storied, round tower made of tan stone and vaguely resembling a beehive. The walls of the building glowed with lamplight, yet there were no windows except in the penthouses on the top level. Shadows of the guests were shown in silhouette, and their activities did put one in mind of bees. She shivered to think of how close the quarters would be once they finally got to the room. It towered over the other structures on the asteroid’s surface, including a dilapidated hangar. Everyone docked their ships at random intervals, contingent upon arrival. There’d be no other choice about where to stay.

She yanked the datapad from Stratton’s hand, convinced he’d made a mistake in the readings. When she jabbed at the display screen, her heart plummeted into her boots. It was true. They’d clocked in second to last. Not only that, but they were almost two hours behind the leader’s time.

The one saving grace was that Chaf and his partner had come in second. They hadn’t won the prize purse. In silence, both she and Stratton exited the craft and headed across the dusty surface to where the hotel gleamed. She slid a glance to Stratton. His jaw worked. Bruises colored one cheek. He said nothing, but the livid gleam in his dark eyes gave away his feelings. Guilt crept over her. She hated the feeling and rolled her shoulders to banish it.

She sucked in a deep breath, then choked, remembering the thin atmosphere on the asteroid. “I’m sorry. If I had listened to you, we—”

He held up a hand. “Don’t.” Turning abruptly around, he stalked toward the
Stellar Drift
, moving with a slight limp from the wounds he must have suffered. “We’re not last, and we’re not kicked out. That’s got to count for something.”

“Where are you going?” When it became apparent he wouldn’t stop, she blew out an annoyed breath and trailed after him.

“Oh, now you’re interested in what I’m doing?” His broad shoulders remained rigid as he walked. “I have news for you,
kita
. You missed your chance.”

“What chance?” She clenched her hands into fists. “To apologize?” When he didn’t answer, she rolled her eyes and focused instead on the muscles playing along his back beneath the tight-fitting flight suit. A narrow waist gave way to lean hips and an ass she’d love to bite, under the right circumstances.

The thought brought her up short. A rush of heat slammed into her body, tingling in places that had been shocked to life upon meeting the arrogant man. She flung the musings from her mind. Getting involved with a man like Stratton meant intense excitement, and while that could be useful, it would be followed by heartbreak. She had no time for a messy situation. Didn’t their poor showing in this leg of the race confirm that?