Tee-ani's Pirates (10 page)

“Have you managed to locate the toy you sought?”

“Yes,” Ben groused impatiently. “We were getting ready to play with several new toys when you interrupted. What is so damned important that you would disrupt us?”

Again, the harsh laugh. “Sounds like I’m missing all the fun, but I have a job I need done and you and your brother are the only ones who I trust to do it right. Put your cocks back in your pants and get back here pronto.”

“Oh, you impatient
Quintarkian
fucker, can’t it wait a day?”

“Bring your toys with you. Grab a couple for me while you’re at it.

It’s a long time since I had some fun myself. Maybe we could make it a party.”

“Fine. We’ll speak to Keytark and leave the planet shortly.”

Ben closed the connection and threw the communicator across the room in feigned annoyance.

“Pet,” Trey spoke loudly. “Prepare the other slaves for transport.

We leave in twenty standard minutes. Be ready or your ass will be so red you won’t be able to sit for days.”

God help her, even the empty threat had her pussy pulsing.

“Yes, Master.”

* * * *

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Less than a standard hour later, Ben and Trey barked orders at Tee-ani and six female slaves as they boarded the small craft. An obscene amount of money had changed hands, but for the first time in days, Ben felt like he could take a full breath.

With the women shackled together, it had been necessary to secure them in the cargo area until they could safely explain the situation. Tee-ani stayed with them, her concern for the soon-to-be former slaves very clearly conveyed in her emotions. Ben closed the door to the small craft and then started the ship and prepared for takeoff. They only waited for clearance to leave this place and hopefully carry their passengers to a safer future.

The next words through the ship’s communications system made Ben’s heart beat much harder. “Please power down your ship. Master Keytark requests your presence.”

Ben glanced at his brother. Stay or go? Stay and keep their cover or run and risk pursuit and possible attack? Jordan and the rest of the pirate crew were close, but were they close enough to assist them in time?

“Fuck.” Trey breathed the word as he leaned over and killed the ship’s start-up sequence. Ben knew they could help more people if they managed to keep their cover, but the knowledge didn’t stop his heart from beating double time. Taking a deep breath, he moved to the cargo area.

“Pet,” he barked, “Master Keytark wishes to see us. You will stay here and keep the slaves under control.”
And fly away from here if our
cover’s blown
. Goddess, he needed to say the words out loud, needed to hear her agree to run without him if they couldn’t get back. He felt her fear and her apprehension, but he also felt her strongest emotion…determination. Thank the goddess. She would do what was necessary.

He stepped forward to touch her face lovingly, but his words were for anyone else who listened. “Keep the slaves locked up and stay with them or your punishment will be severe.”

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She nodded and kept her eyes on his.

“Yes, Master.”

* * * *

Guards led Trey and Ben back into the throne room and not for the first time, Trey wished he carried a weapon. Anything would do.

A phase pistol, a Pendarian laser sword, hell, even an ancient Earth projectile pistol like the one that had almost killed Sarah recently.

Anything that would make him feel less vulnerable. A quick glance at all the guards in the room suggested that hand-to-hand combat would not be a good idea.

“Ah, there you are.” Keytark’s voice sounded friendly enough, but his eyes spoke a different story. The man was suspicious. “It is a shame that you couldn’t stay longer, but I wanted to give you a parting gift, a gesture of goodwill for our new business arrangement.”

He clapped his hands sharply and a young man dashed into the room and dropped at Keytark’s feet. “This is one of my finest slaves.”

Something was definitely wrong here. The women were all covered in bruises, painfully thin and obviously frightened. This slave showed no signs of abuse and certainly didn’t cower the way the women did.

Trey wrinkled his nose in an effort to show distaste. “We don’t play with male slaves.”

“Ahh, now see, that’s the best part.” The obese body jiggled with laughter. “This slave is specifically trained for domestic duties. So while you play with your pretty females, this one can prepare meals and attend to your other needs.”

“I see.” Trey’s mind raced, but he couldn’t come up with a reasonable excuse to refuse the gift. An idea started to grow in his head. “Well in that case, we would be happy to accept your gift.”

Keytark moved forward in his seat, levering his bulk back onto his feet. “I expect you to contact me as soon as you have set up the
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contacts on G’trobia. The faster we get moving, the more money we will make.” He laughed as he turned his back on them and left the room. A guard stepped forward, clipped a leash to the slave’s collar, and handed the end to Trey.

Ben and Trey followed a guard back to their ship, secured the new slave in the cargo bay, placed Tee-ani between them, and waited for clearance to leave. The moment permission came through the communicator, Ben got the ship into the air. Once they’d left the planet’s atmosphere, Trey grabbed Tee-ani and pulled her onto his lap.

“Are you okay?” he asked softly.

“Very okay,” she whispered back as she lifted her face to his for a searing kiss. Several moments passed before Ben’s impatient words bought them back to reality.

“We have a slight problem.”

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Tee-ani glanced from one to the other, impatiently waiting for them to explain the
slight problem.
None of their problems had been slight, so she was fairly certain this wasn’t good news either.

“I think the male slave is a plant.”

She grimaced as she tried to understand his meaning. She didn’t know any sentient species who’d evolved from plants, so her practical doctor’s brain slipped into planning and research so she could help the newest member of their group in a medical sense.

Ben must’ve sensed her emotions and realized her thought process because he laughed out loud. The first genuinely happy laugh any of them had heard in several days.

“Not that type of plant,
G’bani
. I meant I think he’s a spy sent to make sure we are who we say we are.”

“Shit. That’s gonna be a big problem.”

“Maybe not,” Trey said quietly. “Maybe we can use this to our advantage. Tee, do you have any sedative in your medical bag?” She nodded warily, uncertain where they were going with this. She didn’t like sedating anybody without cause. “I know it goes against your ethics, but it may save many more lives. If we can sedate him until we can get things set up on the ship, we have a good chance of convincing him that we are slavers. Would you mind staying undercover for a while longer?”

Understanding washed through her. If they could keep the cover going, they would at least be able to buy more slaves or maybe even trace the abductors and stop Keytark at his source.

Surprisingly, desire also unfurled low in her body.

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“Will it include another spanking?” Good grief, she could feel herself getting wet just from the thought. Trey pressed his erection hard against her, grinding his thick cock on the sensitized flesh of her ass. She smiled. “I’ll take that as a maybe.”

* * * *

It took longer than she’d hoped to get the cargo bay set up and secured so that Ben, Trey, and Tee-ani could continue the charade.

Nearly two full Earth days she’d kept her patient sedated. Tee-ani checked the young man’s blood pressure again as Ben carried him into the small area that would be his home for the next few months. A small part of her still rebelled against treating anyone like this, but she understood the necessity.

Ben lowered the sleeping man to the small cot they’d set up in the corner. He moaned as Ben stepped away.

“Pet?” He used her slave title, and she glanced at him sharply.

“How long before he wakes?”

“Several more hours, at least.”

“Good. Go with Trey, check the others. I’ll stay here and make sure our new slave has chores to do when he wakes.”

She nodded, stepped closer, and brushed her lips against his quickly, but Ben pulled her hard against him and deepened the kiss before she could step back. He sucked her bottom lip into his mouth and bit down sharply. She gasped as the pain quickly morphed into pleasure and her whole body began to tingle.

Trey glanced at the sleeping man and then hustled Tee-ani from the room. His hands shook a little as he rubbed her arms in a soothing motion. “Are you sure you’re okay with this? It’s very likely that we’ll need to fuck you in front of him to keep up the charade.”

She nodded again. Part of her was terrified at what they would need to do to convince this slave that Ben and Trey were genuine, but a bigger part of her quivered with need at the erotic memory of the
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spanking she’d received on the slavers’ planet. Even knowing that Ben and Trey would need to demand sexual submission from her in front of another man didn’t seem to lessen her arousal.

She seemed to be learning an awful lot about her own sexuality on this mission.

Trey grabbed her hand, unlocked the door, and led her through the familiar corridors of the pirate ship. It seemed almost like they’d created another world in the cavernous space of the cargo hold, which essentially was what they were trying to do. The charade would only work if they could convince the male slave they were greedy, successful slave traders instead of the kind-hearted pirates on a mission that they actually were.

Tee-ani stopped walking. The male slave? “We don’t even know his name.”

“We’ll ask when he wakes. Or maybe you should.” He ran an agitated hand through his hair as he turned to face her. “
G’bani
, I have no idea how we’re going to pull this off. Pretending to be a slave owner for a day or two seemed simple, but trying to maintain the illusion for several months or more could be very dangerous.”

“Trey, I trust you and I trust Ben. We can do this. G’ntriel is already tuned into the slave’s emotions. Even if you and Ben can’t decipher his intent, surely she can.” Trey didn’t look convinced and for a moment, she wanted to shake him. Even after everything he’d seen and done on this ship, somehow he fell back to the prejudices about female G’trobians he’d grown up with. “G’ntriel sensed your distress on a planet nearly a light year away. What makes you think she can’t read the emotions of a single male in the cargo bay?” She stood ready, hands on hips, willing to argue until he listened to simple logic, but he surprised her by lifting her off the ground and kissing her soundly.

She could barely catch her breath by the time he replaced her on legs suddenly made from jelly. With a quick smile, he pulled her to his side and they again moved toward the medical bay. As she stepped
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into the room, her confusion and arousal were quickly overridden by concern for her patients.

G’baena sat on the bed closest to them. The young woman watched Sarah intently as she used one of Tee-ani’s medical instruments to heal several scars across one of the Pendarian women’s shoulder. G’baena glanced over to Tee-ani but flinched when she caught sight of Trey beside her. Tee-ani moved quickly toward her, hoping to reassure her that she was safe.

Sarah and several of the women rescued from the same ship as Tee-ani had spent the last couple of days treating and reassuring the women that they were safe, but none of them seemed overly convinced. Their collective demeanor suggested false hope had been offered too many times.

“G’baena, do you remember me from the slave ship?”

The younger woman nodded her head slowly. “You treated me when I was first abducted.”

“Do you remember what you told me about your family?”

“Yes.” The word was soft, the anguish behind it heart wrenching.

Tee-ani wrapped her arms around the slender woman. “We want to give you a chance to reclaim your life, the opportunity to seek justice. Trey and Ben can travel back to G’trobia with you and make sure…” Tee-ani’s words trailed off when she saw the absolute horror flash across G’baena’s beautiful face.

“G’Beydeatrey? G’Bende-anrali?” G’baena’s frightened voice froze Tee-ani to the spot. G’baena looked up, taking her first good look at the man beside Tee-ani. “My Lord?”

Trey nodded slightly.

Faster than Tee-ani would’ve suspected, G’baena leapt off the bed and hit Trey square in the nose with a closed fist. Trey rocked back on his heels for a moment before he grabbed the startled woman and pulled her into his embrace. He held her as she cried and Tee-ani watched a myriad of emotions cross his features.

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It took several attempts before she could decipher the words tumbling from G’baena’s mouth. Things like “you left me” and

“why” and “how could you” fell rapidly from her lips. Trey continued to hold the young woman as she cried out all of her fears and frustrations from her experiences over the last few months.

“G’baena, please forgive me. Ben and I had no idea that your family would do that to you. We can take you back to the planet.

Make sure you’re taken care of and that your family faces justice.”

Tee-ani realized that G’baena had begun to hyperventilate. Her breathing rapid and labored, G’baena shook so hard, Tee-ani could see the vibrations ripple across Trey’s shoulders. Unwilling to just sedate the nearly hysterical woman, Tee-ani stepped forward and placed her hands on either side of G’baena’s face. She gently urged G’baena to look at her as she spoke in a low, soothing voice.

“G’baena, I want you to listen to me. I know you’re scared and tired, but I promise you, you are safe here. No one will make you do anything you don’t want to do. You are protected and free to make your own choices. If you don’t want to go back to G’trobia, no one will force you. You have my word on that.”