Sleeping With the Enemy (6 page)

    He eased away from her finally and looked down at her. She discovered when she lifted her head to look up at him that they were far closer than she’d realized and yet, once she’d met his gaze she couldn’t seem to look away. She felt the heat between them magnify.

    His gaze flickered over her face. “Curious?” he murmured in a deep, husky voice that sent a quivering through her.

    She swallowed with an effort, commanding herself to turn away, to pull away. Reluctance to do so filled her. “Yes,” she whispered.

    He expelled a heavy breath, seemed to debate with himself briefly and then closed the distance between them, brushing his lips lightly along hers. She waited for revulsion to set in, tried to summon it, and then licked her dried lips, tasting him when she did and feeling an instant surge of want.

    He nibbled at her lips with his, as if trying to decide if he also wanted more, and then abruptly covered her mouth. Her heart slammed into her ribcage, began to surge against it, but it wasn’t fear. It should have been, but it wasn’t.

    There was nothing threatening about his kiss, nothing to dredge up a sense of self-preservation. His touch appealed and his taste appealed even more. She opened her mouth to him in invitation and felt a drugging wave of desire flood her the moment he slid his tongue along hers and filled her senses with himself.

    It was wrong, she thought dizzily. She shouldn’t feel any of the things she felt, but she was more disappointed when he pulled away than she could recall. For several moments, he met her gaze when he’d withdrawn. She found herself hoping he would want to kiss her again and then he pulled away completely, stepping away from her.

    “That wasn’t wise,” he muttered-to himself, she thought, but he spoke English.

    And he was right. It had been stupid, really stupid.

    “I will take you back to the others and then see what I can find for you to wear.”

    She didn’t argue. Wryly, she admitted she wasn’t exactly cold anymore. She was far more conscious of her scanty attire than before, though.

Chapter Four

    Spencer was awake, completely alert, and bristling with hostility when they returned to the observatory. His gaze flicked over the two of them and then skimmed over her more slowly, insultingly… accusingly. She didn’t believe her ‘guilt’ had shown until he made her feel dirty from that look. Without glancing at Anka, she strode quickly across the observatory and into the room that had been set aside for her and Holly Rains.

    Holly had already claimed one of the bunks. She was sitting up, though, wedged in one corner as if she thought she might be absorbed by the wall behind her. Her gaze wasn’t accusing as Spencer’s had been-Powell’s, for that matter-but there was speculation in her eyes.

    Sybil climbed onto the empty bunk since there was no other place to sit and drew the cover up to cover herself.

    “Are you alright?”

    Sybil swallowed with an effort. She didn’t think so. She didn’t especially want to think about what she’d done, though. “Yes. I guess. I’d hoped to get my flight suit back, but it wasn’t there. Anka said the droids had probably disposed of it in case it was contaminated, but he said he’d see if it was still useable and get me something else if it wasn’t.”

    Holly’s brows rose. “
That’s
where you went!”

    Sybil grimaced. “Not that I think the guys won’t be able to control themselves-there certainly isn’t anything sexy about the t-shirt and panties!-but I’d be a lot more comfortable with clothes.”

    Holly nodded. “Why did they take it off, do you think? Did they…?”

    Sybil’s stomach rolled, more because she knew immediately that the others were speculating about the same thing than because she felt that she had. “It was droids that examined me. I doubt anything happened.”

    “But you were unconscious.”

    “What’s that supposed to mean?” Sybil demanded angrily.

    She could tell from the guilty look that Holly tried to hide exactly what was running through her mind. “Nothing. I’m just saying you don’t know and… maybe that’s a good thing.”

    Sybil’s lips tightened. “Suggesting they couldn’t contain themselves? I doubt very seriously that they find us the least bit attractive,” she said dryly, if not with complete truth. She’d felt Anka’s arousal. She didn’t think she was mistaken about that. “Anyway,” she added, looking away, “from what he said, there are women of their species here. I can’t believe they would consider fucking an unconscious woman-especially a different species and one, moreover, that they must consider of inferior intelligence given their advancement.”

    Shock registered on Holly’s face and Sybil felt a touch of satisfaction that she’d elicited it. “There’s no need for that kind of language. I find it offensive.”

    “Too bad,” Sybil said tightly. “I’m an adult and free to say whatever the hell I like. And
I’m
offended by your insinuations. You think you’re the only one entitled to be offensive?”

    Anger flickered across the other woman’s face. “I didn’t mean to be offensive. I was just… concerned.”

    Liar, Sybil thought. Titillated, more likely. “Well I appreciate that,” she said caustically.

    Holly’s lips tightened. “We won’t get anywhere being hostile to each other. We need to stick together.”

    Except they’d already closed ranks, leaving her on the outside. They’d decided she was ‘tainted’. They’d seen her flight suit was missing and instantly drawn their own nasty conclusions, and it hadn’t helped that she’d willingly followed Anka off.

    Fuck her! And fuck them! “I won’t argue that, but I’m damned if I can see that it’s going to be much help. There are only five of us and no telling how many of them. Aside from the fact that not one of us has a damned weapon, exactly what do you think banding together is going to do? You think we can overpower them? Escape? Where the hell to? Don’t tell me they conveniently brought the lander with them so we’d have a way to escape.”

    She could tell from the look on Holly’s face that they hadn’t.

    “They have ships,” Holly said pointedly.

    Sybil uttered a laugh that lacked humor. “And you think there’s a chance we could get to one, steal it, and actually pilot it home?”

    “It isn’t beyond the realm of possibility,” she said stiffly.

    “But it isn’t likely either.”

    “What do you suggest, then?” Holly demanded.

    Sybil frowned. “Negotiation. If they wanted to kill us, they could have. There’s some reason they’re keeping us alive.”

    “To study us?”

    Sybil’s belly clenched but she rejected the idea. “I’m not saying that isn’t a possibility, but why bother? What do you think they haven’t already learned? They can speak our language. They understand it and that means a lot more than simply being able to translate from their language to ours. They’d have to understand us-our customs, our civilization-all of it for the language to make sense to them. Think about it! If they didn’t know what a… home was, they wouldn’t use that word and Anka did.”

    “He told you his name?”

    Sybil looked at her in surprise. “You didn’t hear that?”

    Holly shook her head. “I was staying as far from him as I could and neither of you were speaking very loud. We were wondering what the conversation was about.”

    Sybil frowned, thinking back, but she hadn’t realized that none of the others had been close by when she’d spoken to him. She’d been too focused on him, she realized. She shrugged after a moment. “He’s Commander Anka l’Kartay. That’s what he said anyway. I don’t know why he’d lie.”

    “Or tell us anything.”

    Sybil had wondered at that herself, but she didn’t acknowledge what Holly was suggesting. She didn’t see any point in arguing when neither one of them really knew if he was being truthful or not.

    “What else did he tell you?”

    Sybil frowned, trying to recall. The truth was she’d been so on edge she couldn’t remember anything very clearly. “He just said it was cool because they’d moved the facility to the dark side to cool it from the heat. He said sometimes they would pull into the sunlight because they missed home and it was… depressing to always be in the dark.”

    Holly didn’t say anything for several moments. “It seems like he said quite a lot.”

    She was fishing and it irritated Sybil. “Yes, we took a stroll around the facilities and he explained everything-even told me how many soldiers were stationed here and where they were stationed,” she said sarcastically. “He was just being… polite.”

    “If you say so.”

    Anger flickered through Sybil. “Why don’t you just go ahead and let me in on the workings of your mind? I like to know what I’m being accused of. It makes it a little fucking easier to defend myself.”

    “You don’t have to be so defensive. It was just a comment.”

    With undertones. Sybil wondered if Dr. Rains just thought she was too stupid to catch the subtle insults and insinuations. “He was courteous enough to take me to look for my clothes,” she responded tightly. “I don’t see that responding with hostility will get us anywhere.”

    “I’m not sure being friendly is a good idea.”

    There it was! The accusation she’d been expecting. “Why don’t you handle things the way you think you should and let me worry about my behavior? You aren’t my mother or my superior.”

    Her lips tightened. “I’m just saying it could put you in more danger-all of us.”

    Sybil stared at her in disbelief. “You’re telling me you think being friendly is
more
dangerous than being hostile?”

    “I don’t think being hostile is a good idea either. Being cautious
is
.”

    Sybil sighed, leaning her head back against the wall. She supposed a lot of her anger was aimed at herself. Being cautious
was
the best idea-not being friendly to the point of offering an opening for sexual congress! Maybe it had been an unconscious prompting of her survival instincts?

    And maybe not. She just damned well didn’t know. All she did know was that her reaction to him disturbed her more than his reaction to her… if possible.

    She dismissed it, tried to eject the memory from her mind even though she knew she wasn’t going to be able to. So it was stupid! It wasn’t as if she didn’t know that herself. In any case, Holly Rains was just worried about her own ass! The comment about endangering all of them was telling and at least part of it, she thought, might be hostility because she thought Sybil might be trying to use sex to save herself and it might not work for her.

    Not that she thought for a moment that it
would
for her!

    So maybe, deep down in her subconscious mind, she’d resorted to the age old weapon women had always tried to use to protect themselves, but it certainly hadn’t been conscious!

    What worried her was that it might not have been that subconscious prompting. She hadn’t really been aware of any attraction to him. She hadn’t acknowledged it anyway, but there was no getting around the fact that she was
acutely
aware of him. She’d put it down to fear, understandable fear, and yet even though she’d been scared she couldn’t recall even a moment of being repulsed. Shouldn’t she have been?

    Alright, she
had
been scared shitless when he’d first entered her cell, but it had been mostly the lighting. That had added an eeriness to his alien appearance that had further unnerved her, and it had vanished as soon as she’d seen him in full light.

    She could’ve understood that better if she’d discovered he looked like a human. He didn’t-close, but definitely alien. The impression, she realized, was almost cat-like. Not that he looked like a cat and she couldn’t think of any feature in particular that gave her that impression, and yet, overall, it was there and it should have bothered her even if it didn’t repulse her.

    It certainly shouldn’t have appealed to her and yet the truth was, he was fascinating- exotic in a way that was a lot closer to appealing than repulsive. She would’ve liked to think it was just the fact that he was the first alien she’d ever encountered. She knew that was probably part of it-and completely understandable. The problem was, that wasn’t the only level of appeal-scientific curiosity. His
maleness
appealed to her-his build. He was tall-very tall, well over six feet in height, she was sure, muscular-in a raw-boned sort of way, as if he should have been a good bit heavier-but his build was still undeniably appealing to her.

    Maybe that was partially responsible for the sense that he was cat-like? The leanness? Maybe. The thick mane of hair that fell to his shoulders and grew down his forehead in a wedge-shaped V added to it, certainly. It was no widow’s peak, that was for sure, and his hair was gorgeous, thick and streaked with gold, brown, and dark auburn.

    It reminded her of a lion’s mane, she realized abruptly and maybe that was why her mind said ‘cat-like’? The hair and the lean build?

    Even his eyes, she realized, were oddly cat-like, slightly tilted, heavy lidded-like a lion.

    He had striations on his tan skin she thought abruptly, lighter streaks like stripes along his forearms, even along the column of his neck.

    The image that instantly rose in her mind with that memory was… disturbing, mostly because it was undeniably arousing.

    She lifted her head and looked at her roommate. “You’re right-caution.” She hesitated. “That means in all dealings with them, you know.”

    “What are you getting at?”

    Sybil considered whether she should say anything at all and finally decided, as long as Holly had thought it was alright to lecture her, tit for tat. “We don’t know anything about them-and I haven’t seen anything to make me believe they’re aggressive or cruel-but we don’t know that they’re a lot different from us either.”

    “Meaning?”

    Sybil gave her a look. “It’s safer to be passive.”

    Holly stared at her blankly for several moments before that sank in. The look of horror and revulsion that crossed her features made her sorry to have spoken at all, but she thought the woman should try to prepare herself mentally. Captive women always had to worry about rape. “I don’t believe they would,” she added hurriedly. “I’m just saying, it’s safer to be passive. It’s usually more an act of aggression than anything else and fighting is the wrong thing to do. It only encourages them to more violence.”

    “Did he…?”

    Sybil resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “No. He didn’t try anything.” She wasn’t sure it would’ve constituted rape if he had, because she was uncomfortably aware that he wouldn’t have had to try very hard to convince her, but that was beside the point. “I have the feeling he hasn’t really decided what to do with us… yet, but I don’t think he’d encourage that or allow it-if he knew. We don’t know that everyone agrees with him, though.”

    “You said he was the commander!”