Chapter Nineteen
Jax
T wo days had never passed so slowly. I stayed in the infirmary day and night, sleeping on the floor next to the pod, eating at the counter by the sink. I had countless arguments with her in my head about why she did this, how she could trust Sherrod. And they all usually ended with her storming away and me never seeing her again.
Sometimes they ended with us fucking though.
I thought about that a lot too.
The feel of her against me in the elevator was something I’d never forget. The way she fit in my hands, the taste of her skin, the feel of her nipple in my mouth. Her channel was so tight and soft around my fingers, made just for me. I was obsessed with her mewls and cries, the way she scratched my skin. The memory of her, however brief our two encounters, consumed every other partner I’d ever been with, until she became the only one I craved.
And that would make me angry again. Because what the hells would I do without her? How could I have survived losing her?
Round and round my mind went, until I wasn’t sure if I wanted her out of the pod at all. At least like this, we weren’t fighting, and she wasn’t telling me how little she trusted me.
On the morning of the second day, Narrou said that Thanh and Tohm-Tohm were healed and that they were starting the release process. I stepped away to shower and change so I wouldn’t reek when she finally came out of the pod.
She would have to be weaned off the pod fluid over the course of a few hours and I paced impatiently, sometimes stopping to read out loud. We were at the end of Pride and Prejudice, the good parts that made the book worth it.
I thought about Darcy and Elizabeth, how they’d hated one another at first and then fell in love. Was that possible in real life?
Narrou’s lights and trills sounded, happy and a little tired, interrupting my thoughts, much to my relief. It didn’t serve any purpose to go down that line of thinking. Not when it was just fucking between us.
I took the large towel I’d brought from my bathroom and my father stood by to examine Thanh once she was out of the pod. The fluid drained completely, and when the shell slid away, her eyes half opened and her hands fluttered at her side. I caught her as she tried to step out and wrapped her in the towel, her body coated in the remnants of the fluid, pink and thick on her skin.
I supported her as she slowly raised her head to look at me and I smiled down at her. Relief took the lead, in place of everything else, and I had tears in my eyes. I didn’t want Thanh to see though, so I looked away, making sure the towel was secure.
As I was holding her up with my arm around her back, I realized that something was very different. I coasted my hand up and it hit me: there was no metal. I swooped her up into my arms and set her on the exam table, where Father removed the respirator and I could finally see her entire face. Thanh shivered, and was still trying to wake up but she gave a beautiful, sleepy grin.
“What happened to the armor back there?” I asked. “Do you need it replaced?”
“No. I never have to wear that again.”
“Can I take a quick look?” my father asked.
She nodded, hair clinging to her shoulders in gooey clumps.
I took the opportunity to look when he drew the towel down and my jaw dropped at what I saw.
Tohm-Tohm was covered in a beautiful exoskeleton with a faint glow underneath it. The glow pulsed like a heartbeat and each tendril that stretched out from the center also pulsed, but in different time to the center body. The mottled skin from the burn scars was still there, but gone were the weeping sores and the cracked flesh.
Her little hands wove out of the opening of the towel and she grabbed handfuls of my shirt before leaning into me and I melted right there. Thanh took a large breath, nuzzling against my chest and my heart burst. She was scenting me, rubbing herself on me. Humans didn’t have these kinds of instincts but that didn’t matter. To me, it was a sign that she could be interested in accepting the mating claim.
Slow down, it’s a comfort instinct for her that’s all. Besides, being a pirate, being on the run, it’s not the life for her, it never will be.
“Looks like Narrou went all out,” my father said. “Your back looks practically brand new.”
Thanh raised her head, her smile widening as she looked at me.
“They healed Tohm-Tohm and me, gave us back some of what had been lost.”
I didn’t understand all of that, but that was fine. If she was happy, I was too.
“I need to take a look at your side,” Father said after covering her back.
Thanh didn’t move as he lifted the edge of the towel and examined where the shrapnel had pierced her body. There was new, pink skin there, along with small dots of pink on her abdomen and beneath her arm pit.
“This all looks good. Do you have any pain?” he asked, gently prodding her where the wound used to be.
“Not really. Even my chronic pain is less than before.”
More so than the healing on her back, this made my throat tighten and I barely managed to hold back the tears this time. I knew how much the daily pain affected her, even if she didn’t admit it. So to have that lessened in any way, even a little, was a gift from the Ancestors.
“So, you need anything? Besides the obvious, I mean,” I asked, a skittering sensation growing in my body.
I had to do something for her and not sit around staring at her.
“I’m starved,” she said, her voice starting to lose the thickness of sleep.
“That’s normal,” my father said, moving the towel down her back so he could examine it further. “We’ll get you some food.”
“I’ll get it,” I said.
“Something with a lot of protein,” he instructed.
“I’d like a shower,” she said, “and…we need to talk, Jax.”
My stomach soured, mouth going dry. I agreed, we did need to talk. But I had a feeling that what I wanted to talk about and what she wanted to talk about weren’t the same things.
Ancestors help me, I’m not sure if I want to yell at her for being so stupid on Vector Seven or beg her to stay with me.
“Yeah, I think we should,” was all I said, my voice tight.
She squinted at me, like she was trying to figure out a puzzle and I couldn’t take her scrutiny, not right now. I could feel the tension rising in my spine, my muscles bunching as I braced for disappointment, or a fight. I knew that, given my current mood, after not sleeping and hardly eating, I would probably snap, and I didn’t want to do that right after she’d woke up.
“I’ll bring the food to the room, you can shower before you eat.”
“Thanks, that would be nice.”
“Da, would you help her get there?”
“I can walk.”
I tried to hide the spike of anger that lanced through me and I did a shit job because the smile she’d worn started to fade. Yeah, I needed to get out of here, and fast.
“Fine, I’ll let him help me,” she agreed, her voice soft.
I couldn’t even enjoy having ‘won’ this argument. Instead, I practically ran out of the infirmary before I could make this any worse.
I was a mess when I arrived at the dining hall. I loaded up a tray with food that had been prepared for the crew to graze throughout the day. I made sure there was a variety of all the different rehydrated meats, and some of the eggs. All the veggies were fresh so I put those on there, and my father had made a double batch of his flat bread so I put a healthy portion of that on there too.
“Hungry?” asked a voice I’d been avoiding for the past two days.
I didn’t even turn around to look at Sherrod at the table. There was a crew member guarding him, escorting him to and from the galley, which was the only other place besides his room he was allowed.
“C’mon Jax, you can’t ignore the whole time. We’ve got a job to do.”
I grit my teeth and continued to load up plates of food.
“Fine,” he sighed, “you can give me the silent treatment. That just means I’ll need to plan with your cute little mate.”
There was a second, maybe two, where I honestly tried to get myself under control. And then I didn’t give a fuck. I calmly set the plates on the countertop, turned and lunged for him, and was held back by the crew member. Sherrod just chuckled at me and backed up to the doorway.
“You stay away from her,” I growled through clenched jaws.
“She has you all wrapped around her little finger, doesn’t she?”
“Stop antagonizing him,” the crew member said, voice strained with the effort of holding me back.
I stopped struggling against him, and signaled that he could let me go.
“Get him to his room before I kill him,” I sneered.
The crew member nodded and roughly shoved Sherrod out the door.
It took me a bit to calm down and stop picturing all the ways Sherrod could hurt my family. And then, in turn, all the ways I could hurt him . When I was able to speak without snarling, I finished loading the plates onto the tray and walked back to my room. The way that Sherrod was able to manipulate Thanh had shown me something important, as much as I hated to admit it to myself.
Things had gotten messy since the first time I’d kissed Thanh; lines blurred, and my mating instincts didn’t know the difference between a casual fling with her and the real deal. In the whirlwind of all these feelings, I had to remember that I was just a pirate. I had nothing but that life to offer her. Princess might be a nickname I used to piss her off but it was also the truth. She’d been as untouchable and glorious as royalty the entire time I’d known her. Always above me, always the sun that warmed the galaxy around me. I’d been pulled into her orbit whether we wanted it or not. And now I couldn’t leave it, not without losing parts of myself.
But I might have to learn to live with that because there’s nothing I can say to make her stay. Not unless…no, that’s dumb. The Ancestors might have awakened my mating drive for her, but Thanh doesn’t have that, there’s no reason for her feelings to change. She might like me getting her off, but that doesn’t make a relationship.
I was in a sour mood by the time I’d gotten back to the room. I set the tray on the table in the sitting area; the shower was running in the bathroom, and there was a set of clothing laid out on the bed.
She’d said we needed to talk. Was she going to tell me that getting physical was just muddying the waters? Was she going to say that she’d heard me as I’d waited for her and I needed to back off?
I couldn’t wrap my head around what would be so important that she’d felt the need to tell me before she’d fully come out of the fog from being in the pod.
The shower shut off as I paced, and a few minutes later, Thanh came out with a towel wrapped around herself, hair dripping and a wobbly smile on her bright face.
Without the goop from the pod, I could see her so much better, the healthy glow of her skin, the relaxed set of her shoulders. Her smile had always been beautiful, but there was a peace to it now that hadn’t been there since before the shuttle accident.
“I’m just gonna get dressed,” she said, holding the towel closed in her small fist.
“Okay,” I breathed.
But she didn’t move.
And I didn’t move.
We just stared at each other, time slowing to a stop around us while I drank her in. There must’ve been a glint in my gaze, a hardness in the set of my mouth or something that betrayed my emotions beyond the lust swirling in my dick because she saw right through the control I was trying to exert over my emotions.
“You’re angry with me.”
I let out a long breath through my nose, nostrils flaring, heart hammering.
“Yeah,” I said, hoping she’d leave it alone for a few minutes and get dressed.
“For saving your life?” she asked, voice incredulous.
How did she do it? How did this little thing, that I could toss across the room, rile me so fast that I could feel my blood go from calm to boiling in the span of a heartbeat?
In a vain effort to calm down, I started to pace, pulling at my hair, my horns, trying to breathe but it didn’t work. All I could see was her body soaked in blood, the thick stickiness of it on my hands, the sound of her breathing turning shallow.
“You almost died .” My voice was hoarse with the effort to not scream. “I was holding you as you bled out and…Ancestors and Heretics, Thanh.”
“But —”
I slammed my hand down onto the bar and swiped the glasses off. They crashed with a chaotic chime of shattered glass and crystal. When I turned back around toward Thanh, her dark eyes were wide, and her skin was flushed. A smart woman would have run from me. She wouldn’t have stood there and antagonized me further.
“You finished? Had a good tantrum?” she asked.
“Fuck you, Thanh! Do you have any idea what it was like to have to see you like that?! And for what? Because that relsh vrex told you to be in charge? I told you what kind of person Sherrod is and you still trusted him! Why?!”
“To save you, you asshole!”
She charged at me and I charged right back. We were so close she had to crane her head to look up at me, our chests heaving with each fierce exhalation. As usual, the line between violence and passion was a thin one where Thanh and I were concerned.
“I took shrapnel for you !” she poked me in the chest. “I trusted Sherrod for you !” A smack to the chest. “I did all of that, all of this for you !” Another smack and instead of letting her hand leave my body I snatched it, holding on tight when she tried to pull it free.
I struggled to take in her words. The hurt behind the anger. And something else, something bright and fragile, something I had never seen before mixed in with a weaker version of the anger I was so used to from her.
I wanted to believe her, to accept the possible meaning behind her words: that she cared enough for me to put her life on the line. But it felt too good to be true. I wanted to believe it too much and so I was obviously reading in to what she was saying. I was her partner after all, we had to watch each other’s backs. Still, I had to know, had to hear her say that so I could close off the hope she’d stirred to life.
“Why in the hells would you do that for someone you hate?” I demanded, still holding her hand in mine.
“Maybe because I don’t hate you anymore, you ever think of that?”
My brain stopped, stunned by the words. Was this real? Had she really just said that she didn’t hate me anymore?
Our eyes searched one another, hunting for the catch, the snide come back, the vicious retort. But it didn’t come. There was no sound but our breathing, and my heart thudding in my ears. Thanh’s pulse thrummed wildly in her throat, as a bead of water slowly made its way down and settled in the hollow between her collarbones. I wanted to lick it off her skin, then mark every inch of her.
I wanted that more than I wanted answers, more than I wanted another damned fight with her.
I pulled her to me as she grabbed a handful of my shirt, our bodies propelled by years of hate-driven lust, and the last few days of blurred lines and stolen moments. Our mouths crashed onto one another and I wondered if there would ever be any other way for us. Our couplings might always start with anger and harsh words, but they would end with moans and languid sighs. I would make sure of that.
I captured two handfuls of her lush ass and yanked her up my body at the same time she jumped and wrapped her legs around me. I was so wide she couldn’t even hook her ankles together behind me and it was a reminder that I had to be careful, and not hurt her.
Then she bit my jaw, the sharp sting turning molten as the towel rode up and I was suddenly skating my hands along her bare thighs.
“Wait,” she breathed, “we-we should talk.”
Her lips were kiss bruised and there were scratches on her chin from the stubble on my face. Her little fingers dug into me, like she didn’t want to let go, in spite of her words.
I swallowed, our breaths harsh, mingling together.
“Talk…yeah, okay,” I said.
But her body didn’t seem to be in agreement with her words because she trembled against me and my hands roamed up, finding that tight rosebud nestled between her ass cheeks. Thanh’s eyes rolled back as I pressed just a little and I pictured what it would be like to press my cock into that hole.
“We…Jax,” she moaned.
Her pelvis rolled against my stomach, searching for friction.
“You know what I think?” I asked against her throat.
“Wh-what?”
“Talking is overrated.”
“Fuck yeah, it is.”
Our mouths waged war as I walked us toward the bedroom. Tongues and teeth battled for dominance while blood and moans fell from our lips.
“I don’t hate you,” she breathed.
“I don’t hate you either.” I slid my fingers along her taint, teasing the edge of her cunt.
“But I…this is…Oh god, Jax!”
“Yeah, agreed.”
“With what?”
“Whatever I have to so I can have you.”
She chuckled and tore my shirt up my torso and over my head but it caught on my horns. I started to chuckle, half my face covered by the shirt as she struggled to get it off me.
“These horns are so damn sexy but they make this,” the shirt ripped, “difficult…there!”
She grinned triumphantly, dangling the torn shirt before dropping it.
“That was my favorite.”
“Really?”
“No, I couldn’t give a shit about the shirt.”
“Can you do anything without making a joke?”
“Oh yeah,” I said, biting my way down to where the towel was barely staying closed. “I can do a lot of things without making a joke. I’m just…”
“Nervous?”
I looked up at her, no more armor to protect either of us.
“Me too,” she whispered. “I’ve never been with anyone that knew about Tohm-Tohm the way that you do. With anyone that’s seen me… my back.”
“If you want to stop —”
“No. I want this with you even if it makes no sense. I don’t care anymore. I don’t want it to make sense, I just want you to make me feel…”
“What?”
“Everything.”
I huffed a dark laugh against the space between her breasts and nuzzled the towel down. Her light brown nipples were pebbled and begging for my mouth.
“I can give you that,” I whispered, laving her nipples with my tongue. “I’ll give you everything…all of me is yours.”
I said the last part so softly I wasn’t sure she heard me and that was fine. I didn’t even want to admit that to her, it just came out as I laid her on the bed. The towel fell from her body, spread out like a pair of wings, as I knelt at the foot of the bed, and sat back on my heels to look at her.
The curve of her waist tapered down to round hips that lead to strong thighs. She was small, compact, but not weak by any means. The lines of her body spoke of strength that was beyond muscles. The faint trace of her burn scars on her legs and hips, the scars I knew she still had on her back, they all spoke of a woman that had been to forged into a rare person through all those trials. And I knew I didn’t deserve her, I never would. But right here, right now, I was welcomed into her embrace, and I would treasure every second.
My calloused hands explored the planes of her body with reverence, my lips following in the wake of my touch so I could taste her. Thanh threaded fingers through my hair, guiding me to the places she wanted me by gripping my horns. I’d never let anyone do that before, it had always felt too vulnerable, even degrading at times. But with her, I wanted to give her everything and I loved that she wanted me so much that she would tell me where to go.
When her legs fell open before me, and her little shoves and pulls directed me to her weeping slit, I parted those lips with my thumbs, taking in the sight of her, a perfect flower opened for me. I ran my knuckle up and down, dragging her fluids in the process. Her breaths turned harsh, pelvis rocking up, begging me to take her in my mouth.
“I’ve dreamed about this,” I rasped against her inner thigh, “drinking from your pussy like a fucking chalice. Making you come over and over on my tongue.”
“Less talking…more eating my — ugh, fuck!”
I licked a path from her opening to her clit and back down, feasting on her. She grabbed both of my horns and started grinding herself on my mouth. I was so hard that I was in pain, and I yanked my pants down with one hand, working my cock.
“No,” she demanded, “you leave that alone.”
The tone of her voice was pure, undiluted Dom and I shivered in submission.
“In fact,” she pulled herself back from me and crooked her finger, “you lay down on your back.”
I kicked my pants the rest of the way off and did as she commanded. Her wet hair was tangled, and there were red patches on her body from the scruff on my face where I’d been rough. Her fluids wet her thighs, and sweat dotted her forehead, making her shine.
Thanh was the most beautiful mess I’d ever seen.
When I was on my back, Thanh crawled to me with a wanton grin that made me wonder if I was dreaming.
“I want to ride your face,” she said. “If it’s too much, you double tap on my thigh. One hand stays on my hip, the other can play with me. Got it?”
“Yes, Mistress.”
I could barely get the words out, I was so fucking starved for her. All these months unable to stop thinking of her and hating her for it because I didn't want anyone but her. I'd lived like a monk, fasting from pleasure, and now there was a feast spread out before me.
Before she straddled me, Thanh took my mouth in a slow onslaught that left me drunk with longing.
“Are you ready to eat my pussy like a good boy?” she whispered, dark eyes glittering.
“You have no idea how long I’ve wanted this…Mistress.”
Her cheeks flushed and those perfect bow shaped lips twisted into a crooked grin right before she slung her leg over my head and straddled my face.