“Flying makes you nervous now? That seems hard to believe.”
“Not flying. It’s everything else. It’s like every heartbeat is dramatic. Everything I touch elicits an emotional response. The leather,” she began, trying to make herself clear. “The texture tickles my finger pads and heats under my hand. How do you function like this?”
“The leather felt that way before, didn’t it?”
“But now it’s distracting.”
Tarrel grew thoughtful. “You’re going through with this mission, aren’t you?”
She turned her head to look at him and nodded. “If I react this way about leather, what will happen to me after I seduce him?”
He reached across the distance and covered her hand with his. “You’ll be okay. And if you aren’t, I’ll make it okay. I know you think it’s a weakness, but feeling is a human strength. You’ll adjust. Maybe you’ll come to depend on it. You’ll definitely be able to understand what the king is experiencing. I think that’s going to help you.”
“I don’t see how,” she said.
“If you understand him emotionally, and he’s a man that makes decisions with both intellect and heart, don’t you think you need the same tools in your arsenal?”
“It’s a seduction. He wanted me, and he’s getting me,” she answered flatly.
“Well, now, that’s not the whole story is it? You’re giving him you because you plan to coerce a particular outcome from him. One that will benefit Elara and you.”
“Me?” Her pulse leapt as though he knew something she didn’t.
His smile widened. “I know you, Neela. You don’t do anything unless it suits you. There’s never been another time where you’ve used your body to gain information. Why do you think you’re allowing it now?”
She looked down at their hands. The heat from his seemed to spread up her wrist and she couldn’t quell the curiosity of what his hands would feel like on the rest of her. His lips. God, she’d always been attracted to him, admired him professionally, found him arresting, but now there was a deeper element she didn’t know how to qualify.
“It made sense. He doesn’t want anything in trade, except me.”
He squeezed her hand. “Admit it. You want him too.”
Her gaze had been fixed on his mouth, watching him form words like they were sex-sounds. Her thighs tingled as she made the mental leap from his mouth forming words to moving on her clit.
“If you keep looking at me like that, I might take it the wrong way,” he murmured huskily. “Especially now that you’re impaired.”
“I’m not impaired. I’m sensitized. I think all the same things I did before without being able to shut them off during working hours.”
He took a long breath. “I dunno, Pharr. I don’t remember you ever looking at me like I was dessert before. Even off the clock.”
Dessert? Yes, she could easily lick every part of him and sip from those lips until each aching neuron in her body was satisfied.
He pulled his hand away. “Yeah, and that look certainly never happened. If you hadn’t been shot up with anti-inhibitor we’d be talking about solar flares right now, or disarming techniques.”
“That doesn’t mean I wouldn’t be thinking about other things later.”
Tarrel lifted an eyebrow and grinned. “Really? You have those thoughts about me?”
Was it hot in there? She could swear her skin was flushing. “Don’t pretend you haven’t had your own thoughts. I may normally maintain my distinction, but I’m not unaware of your interest.”
“You’re a beautiful woman, Neela. I’d be an idiot not to notice.”
Admissions seemed to come more easily too. She’d be kicking herself for the frankness of their discussion later. For now, it felt perfectly natural for her to tell him exactly what kind of thoughts she’d been having, because she was pretty sure they’d be reciprocated.
She’d spent a number of nights looking out her apartment windows and imagining what Tarrel was doing. He was free with himself. If he wanted a woman, he took her. She’d seen it countless times on the Elaran base cantina. He’d smile and some human would wander over. Before long, they’d leave together, and Neela would think about all the ways he’d make his woman cry out.
Moisture seeped between her pussy lips. It seemed every thought generated not only feelings, but urges too. If this was humanity, it was a wonder the human ever learned space flight between sexual encounters. Her libido swelled the longer she sat with him, dredging up all the thoughts she’d kept to herself.
Just once, she wanted to be his woman. She wanted to know.
Neela licked her lips nervously. “Fuck me.”
He blinked. “Excuse me?”
“I’m going to go insane with the things this body wants. Please, fuck me.”
“Not that I haven’t always wanted to hear you say those words, but considering this is nothing like you, I’m-can’t believe I’m gonna say this-going to have to pass on that. You’d kill me later for taking advantage.”
“No, I want this.” She got up and straddled his lap. Dragging her nails down his uniformed chest, she looked up at him under her lashes. “I’d never be so forthright, but it’s what I want. And judging from the bulge in your pants, you want it too.”
“He wants a lot of things he’s not supposed to have.” He squirmed back in his chair, but there wasn’t much room for him to go. “What about the king? You’re supposed to spread those legs for him in a few days. Don’t you think he’d care that I’d been there first?”
“I’m not a virgin,” she scoffed.
He caught her wrists. “Neela. You’re giving your body to him, for however he wants to use you. That kind of matters to me.”
“He can have me without having me.” She hoped. Neela felt comfortable with the mechanics of sex. She worked at being good at it, like it was another mastery to learn. This time though, she couldn’t stay detached. Her heart raced, and her hands shook. The real fear of rejection, something she’d never worried about before, crawled icy fingers up her spine. “Are you saying no?”
“Ask me again when we’re back home and you’re you.” He sounded confident, but his gaze raked the exposed skin at her neck.
Neela twisted her wrists to free herself, then released the hidden eyehooks down her side. She pulled open her uniform top and shrugged it from her shoulders. For a man who wasn’t convinced they should engage in sex, he had no qualms admiring her barely concealed breasts. The filmy white garment cupped the underside of each, lifting her berry-colored nipples high enough to peek over the edge of the demi-bra.
“Sure, I’ll ask when we get back,” she offered agreeably. She wished she didn’t sound so breathless, so out of control. Was it needy? Desperate? Would he laugh at her? She didn’t remember ever having these concerns before.
“Damn it, Pharr. There’s only so much a guy can take.” His hands slid up her sides.
“I recommend you take all of it. I’m not ashamed of sex. Not as I am now, nor as I usually carry myself. I want you. Either you take what I’m offering, or you watch me while I think of you. What’ll it be, Lieutenant?”
“When you put it that way,” he breathed.
One of the reasons Neela appealed to Tarrel so much was her mystique. Her race had clear lines between appropriate behavior on and off the job. They were passionate people who tempered themselves with iron control. Today her control was failing. Today was a dream come true.
Neela Pharr had been a scuff-kneed, cockeyed ponytail-wearing brat when he’d first moved to Elara colony twenty years ago. The only part of that kid remaining was the long inky hair and fearlessness.
High emotion brought a rise of color along her spine. He’d seen it only once when Neela had been playing with a neighborhood boy, and she’d gotten angry. Tarrel never forgot the burnt orange arrows of her inverted chevron spinal column, running from skull base to the waistband of her swimming gear.