GALLANT (The Innerworld Affairs Series, Book 3) (25 page)

She completed the task Mar set for her in about fifteen minutes but took an extra quarter hour to re-check her work before letting him
grade
her. It only took him fifteen seconds to confirm that she had passed.

To Gallant, Mar said, "We are back on course to Lore, Captain."

Gallant bit his cheek to keep from smiling. "And what does our apprentice navigator predict will be our time of arrival?"

Cherry straightened her shoulders as if standing at attention. "At our present speed, we should dock on Lore in eight hours, forty-five minutes, Captain, sir."

"Well done, apprentice," he replied, and held out his hand to congratulate her. As soon as she gave him her hand, he stood up and pulled her along with him. "Now let's see how well you can navigate your way out of here. Our rest period should have begun an hour ago."

"Mar," Dot said with a smile. "Do you remember the captain ever before requiring so much rest? Perhaps he is ill."

"Or getting on in age," Mar offered helpfully. "He should probably have this constant state of fatigue checked by a physician."

Cherry giggled at the half-hearted glare Gallant gave the both of them before they left the bridge. The moment they were out of Mar-Dot's sight, he pulled her into his embrace. Remembering her decision to try to slow them down, instead of kissing his mouth, she pressed her lips to his chest and got a surprise. "What's this?" she asked, brushing her fingertips over the spot she had just kissed. "It feels like stubble."

He made a groaning sound and captured her hand. "I'll take care of it. You go on in the room. I'll only be a few minutes."

"Gallant Voyager! You know better than to say something that cryptic to me. Explain."

With a shake of his head, he said, "Will you allow me no secrets from you at all?"

"What do you think?" she asked with a sly smile.

"I think that if I don't explain, we'll be standing in this corridor for our entire rest period. All right, you win again." He took a breath and made his confession. "I have an excessive amount of hair on my chest. And it's...
abnormally
coarse."

She wrinkled her nose at him. "So?"

"So, I was too... concerned about what might be deduced, to have it permanently removed like my beard. I have to do it myself."

"Why?"

He took another deep breath before answering. "Because it makes me look like the primitive being that I am."

"Oh phooey! That has to be the single most assinine statement you've ever made. I happen to be crazy about chest hair on a man."

Gallant couldn't help but grin. "Yes, my pet, but we've already come to the conclusion that you're a barbarian at heart, so your opinion doesn't count."

"Hmmph. Flattery won't get you anywhere. Well, if you insist on removing it, let me do it for you."

"I might if I could use a depilatory but I haven't found one strong enough to work that doesn't burn my skin. I have to shave, the old-fashioned way... with a razor."

Her eyes lit up and she wiggled her eyebrows at him. "Ooh. What a wonderful way to show how much you trust me." She ignored the look of horror on his face as she pulled him into the facility chamber and over to the sink. "Okay, where do you keep your stuff? I've been in and out of the storage drawers a hundred times and I've never seen a razor."

The worried look seemed to be frozen on his face but he opened a cabinet beneath the sink and withdrew a small cedar box from behind the supply of linens. Opening it, he revealed a brass, double-edged razor, shaving mug, soap, brush and a supply of razors. "It was a gift from my mother—an antique actually. I was able to find someone who could make the razors. Are you sure you want to do this?"

She took the box from him and set it on the counter beside the sink. "Absolutely. I think it will be very erotic. And I'll do my best not to draw blood."

He rolled his eyes but removed his vest for her.

"You have got the most beautiful body," Cherry told him, not able to resist stroking his chest and abs. She smiled when his nipples instantly tightened for her. Her fingers followed a line of stubble down to his waist. "You'll have to take the pants off so I can get this too." He groaned and she added, "Don't worry, I know where to stop."

As he shed his boots and slacks, she got out two fluffy white towels and a hand cloth and covered the counter with one of the towels. "You sit on this, and I'll protect your
valuables
with the other." When he turned around and she saw the condition he was already in, her smile broadened.
This was going to be great fun!

First, she filled the sink with hot water and dropped in the hand cloth. Then, after adding a few drops of water to the soap in the mug, she used the brush to work up a lather. Her actions apparently convinced him she had some idea of what she was doing because he sat down as instructed.

She stepped in between his knees and draped the towel over his lap, as if she didn't notice the obvious protrusion. To prepare his skin, she partially wrung out the heated cloth and wet the areas she would be shaving. With the mug in one hand and the brush in her other, she began lathering up his chest. "Does this tickle?"

"Yes," he hissed.

"Then why aren't you giggling?"

"I don't giggle."

"No, you growl." She teased his nipple with the brush and he couldn't hold back the grin any longer.

"If you don't get on with it, you're going to get more than growling," he threatened, but couldn't quite erase that grin.

She worked the lather down the center of his abdomen and laughed again when those muscles automatically contracted. "Now, be nice. There's something I wanted to talk to you about." She exchanged the brush and mug for the razor. "You know I like having sex with you."

His chest rose with the deep breath her words made him take.

"Don't do that. You have to stay very still." With a smooth stroke, she scraped the razor down the center of his broad chest, lightly ran it back up the same line using the other side of the blade then dipped it in the sink to rinse off the lather. As she repeated the procedure on another strip, she got back to the subject she wanted to discuss. "Anyway, I want you to know that I'm not really complaining but I have noticed a decided lack of foreplay in our relationship."

Only the fact that the razor was skimming the edge of his nipple kept him from proving her wrong immediately. Each stroke of the blade reminded him not to move while it teased him to do just that. "Cherry, don't you think this particular subject could be discussed
after
you put down the razor."

She noted the twitching movement beneath the towel on his lap. "No. This is the perfect time to discuss it. Sit up straight so I can get your stomach." He did as he was told and she added a little more lather. The feathery swipes of the brush caused him to suck in his muscles even more than he already had. Careful not to touch that part of him that was making a tent of the lap towel, she ran the razor over his navel.

"You see, this is a perfect example of what I'm trying to say. I know how much you want me right now, and that's very exciting. In fact, I'm so hot, I could get off just by rubbing against your leg a few times, but I won't. Fighting the temptation to do something can be more erotic than the act itself. That's why I covered you. I like to look at you, but when I do, I have to touch and taste." Her gaze caressed him and she was rewarded with the sight of dampness on the peak of his mountain.

His hands balled into fists, yet he kept them at his sides.

"There," she said, rinsing the razor for the last time. "First part's done. Don't move yet, though." She drained the sink and wet the cloth again. As she wiped away the remains of the soap, she taunted, "Are you counting the seconds, Gallant? Are you sitting here imagining yourself plunging into me? Are you thinking about how tight and slick I'm going to be around you?"

His only answer was a low growl as he devoured her with his eyes.

She set aside the cloth and got a bottle of moisturizing oil out of the drawer. "Imagining and thinking are good. The ending is incredible. I just want to postpone that ending a little longer." Holding one end of the lap towel, she dragged it slowly away from him, causing him to inhale with an audible gasp. "Everything is better when you have to wait for it."

Pouring some oil into her palm, she prepared to add more fuel to the fire. The moment she placed her oiled hands on his chest, she knew her case for waiting would soon be lost. His flesh sizzled beneath her touch and the crazy tingling burst up her robotic arm. Through sheer willpower, she forced herself to massage every inch of his chest and stomach before giving in to the ultimate temptation. Adding a little more oil, she brought her hands closer and closer to the heart of his fire, until finally, as slowly as she could, she wrapped her fingers around it.

His eyes closed and his jaw clenched as she slid her hand along his length, drawing his foreskin upward then back again. Regardless of her manipulations, he kept his hands at his sides, proving to them both that he could indeed control his primitive urges as well as, if not better than, any civilized man.

Until her tongue teased his lips and he tasted the essence that was Cherry's alone. With a growl that rose from deep within his chest, he came off the counter and pulled her to him. In a heartbeat he assaulted her mouth with savage intent and she willingly met him on their private field of battle.

Suddenly he broke the kiss and twisted her around so that she was facing the mirror over the sink and he was behind her. His hands grasped her hips and moved upward to capture her breasts. Dipping his head, he nipped her ear and murmured in a voice heavy with urgent need.

"You want foreplay?" His hands roamed over her jumpsuit, from her breasts to her hips, massaged her stomach and eased between her thighs. "I thought that was what we were doing every time we looked at each other. Every word out of your mouth, every breath you take, arouses me. It doesn't have to be planned or discussed.

"You're the one who insists on the truth. Be honest with me now, Cherry. When we're on the bridge, talking with Mar-Dot or playing cubit, when you're eating a meal or washing your face, aren't you really thinking about how long it will be until I'm inside of you again?"

She watched his fingers find the nerve center of her sex and press and rotate until the only reason she was still standing was because he was holding her so tightly. "Yes," she whispered, barely able to breathe let alone talk. "All the time. I can't stop thinking about you and your body. No matter what you give me, I want more."

"And I want to give it to you, whenever and wherever you want it. You seem to be under the mistaken impression that I'm a sheep in wolf's clothing. I'm not. The clothes I wear suit me perfectly. And like the wolf, when I'm cornered, I bite." Remaining behind her, he stripped her naked and, in seconds, recommenced his stroking and kneading, all the while making her feel him, hard and swollen against her back.

Clinging to his thighs, she rode the waves of desire higher and faster until she crashed to the shore, and still he would not release her.

Wordlessly, he placed her hands on the counter's edge in front of her and urged her to lean forward. As his fingers quickly returned her to a state of desperate hunger, she parted her legs to ease his way.

He wasn't slow or gentle. And she didn't want him to be. She saw the truth in the mirror and accepted it.

They
were
a pair of wild animals in heat, equally driven, equally matched.

* * *

Sometime later, Cherry lay nestled with Gallant on his bunk, watching a crackling campfire beneath a clear, starry sky. "This is nice. Too bad we didn't bring any marshmallows." She had to explain what she meant by that before he could grant her wish.

Once she described the image for him, a stick appeared in his hand with a plump white marshmallow on the end. "Would you like the honors?"

She sat up with a giggle and pretended to take the imaginary stick into her hand and hold it close to the fire. When the treat was just the right shade of toasty brown she brought it to her mouth and blew on it. "You have to be very careful not to burn the roof of your mouth, you know." She pulled the invisible marshmallow off the stick with her teeth and made a show of savoring the sweetness. "Mmmm. Wonderful. You ought to try one."

"No thanks. I never eat my own creations." He pulled her back down beside him. "I used to do things like this all the time when I was a boy. I forgot how much fun it could be to play pretend."

Cherry kissed his chin. "Well, I must say, your little talent certainly adds a new dimension to the game. You'd be very helpful as a teacher in a mime class." She trickled her fingers over his chest and stomach. "Smooth as a baby. But I'd still like you to let it grow." She felt him chuckle silently. "I'm curious. Why weren't there any images in the chamber before?"

"Probably because I never took my eyes off you and that razor."

"Scared ya, huh?"

"Cherry, I—"

She clapped her hand over his mouth and propped herself up on her elbow. "Let the image go and look at me." She waited for him to bring up the room's lighting enough to see him. "I just want to warn you that if you are thinking of apologizing, or asking if you hurt me, or frightened me, I will be forced to give you a demonstration of precisely how well I can defend myself with this arm of mine. If you ever do anything I don't like, I am capable of stopping you, the same way I stopped Frezlo from shooting you on Zoenid." She took her hand away and gave him a peck on the mouth to make up for silencing him.