AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Everything is fine, darling. I just worry.”
“About Roxy or Nash?” she asked, crossing the washroom to sit on his lap as she had a thousand times before when she’d been no more than one of his attractive jewel thieves.
Varan tugged her closer and nuzzled her neck, breathing in her exotic scent. “I keep forgetting how perceptive you are,” he muttered. With a sigh he leaned back and looked up into her amethyst eyes. “Both, but mostly Nash. I don’t want to fail you.”
“You couldn’t possibly fail me,” she said, placing a soft, gentle hand on his face.
He leaned into the touch but didn’t smile. “I’ve fought him once before, love. I don’t look forward to doing it again. Nash won the last fight and it was all I could do to keep him from killing me. Now we parted as mates, but I believe if he truly wanted me dead it wouldn’t be all that hard for him.”
Adelina stroked his hair back the way he liked it rather than to the side. Her face grew serious and contemplative and he watched her with silent awe. Whenever she looked so serious he knew something he couldn’t even fathom was happening in that head of hers.
“Well, Nash won’t have the same advantage he did on Draga. The gravity on most of the Hai planets is heavier than ours from what I’ve read, but Nash won’t have such an intense advantage after spending so much time in space. And as the gravity there is denser it will take some adjustment for him.”
“Unless he kept up his training,” Varan stated.
Adelina sighed. “Yes, unless he uses the simulator, but I know you’ve set ours to a gravity denser than that on any of the Hai planets and I also know how hard you’ve been training. I’ve seen the programs you’ve been running.”
Varan eyed her with apprehension. “You know I’ve been training at night?”
She smacked his shoulder. “Of course I do, husband. I’m not that out of it after our lovemaking.”
That got him to chuckle and he hugged her tight.
There was a chime from his pocket and Varan pulled out his simulcast. “Looks like we’re wanted in the hangar to greet the captain and her two shipmates.”
Adelina stood from his lap and pulled him to his feet. “Remind me to do a download for the latest news and messages before we cross the border? I don’t know what kind of tech the Drakesthai have to keep information from crossing the border and how effective it will be.”
He nodded and offered her his arm. “Of course, darling. Now let’s go meet the captain of the Ravager.”
“Have a bit of a crush do we?” Adelina asked as she followed him out into the main living space where Nadyah and Roxy both waited.
“I’ll never tell,” he teased.
Varan glanced at his adopted sister and the courtesan and the way they didn’t look at each other. He decided he didn’t want to know. If they were happy he was happy. It wasn’t his business to poke his nose into. “Ladies, shall we?”
Roxy and Nadyah followed close behind as he led them all to the lift. It was too bad he wouldn’t be able to get a tour of the Ravager. But who knew, perhaps he would after they’d made friends with each other and the pirates weren’t wondering if they were going to turn on them and vice versa every few minutes.
The lift doors opened out onto the massive hangar and Adelina straightened, threw her shoulders back and then clasped her hands in front of her, releasing him. When she walked out in front of him, Varan grinned. He was pleased as all hells she was finally feeling confident in her rank and dominance. Not only was she of age, she was married. On a ship where she was the highest ranking person around, Adelina didn’t need to be escorted unless she wanted to be.
Varan couldn’t wipe the grin from his face. He slipped his hands into his coat pockets and stayed close enough to Adelina that he could protect her if need be, but far enough away it was clear who held the dominance in the room.
Roxy and Nadyah took his lead, flanking him and tending to his blind spots.
A small craft landed, flying through the hangar shields that kept the air in and pressurized. It looked used but well-tended. The ramp extended out and then a pair of truly beautiful boots stepped out. Delphine and her glorious purple hair walked down like she owned the place.
But Varan wasn’t interested in what she looked like. He watched the way her eyes darted around the hangar, noting their weapons and equipment as well as their numbers. The two behind her looked rough and skittish. One had to be her first mate, the other Varan would bet his eye collection that he did the unsavory jobs like making the bodies disappear.
When they set eyes on his wife and princess Varan’s grin turned feral, showing teeth. He slid a step closer and stopped a breath behind Adelina.
Delphine barely looked at him, but when she did it was wary appraisal. She recognized he wasn’t true royalty. His life had been a constant battle to the top, and then a battle to keep it all.
“Princess Adelina,” the captain said in that husky voice of hers. She stopped a few steps away from Adelina with a nod, knowing she wasn’t welcome any closer yet. “Thank you for this opportunity and your willingness to meet with me in person.”
His wife took another step forward away from him and the others, showing her trust. “I appreciate that you turned privateer to fight with us in this war, Captain. Now if you don’t mind, Varan?”
Without hesitation he crossed the paltry distance and tapped the cuff on his wrist, the one he never took off. A quick wave and he knew they were clean. “No weapons, Princess. This one has a knife tucked away but it doesn’t have plasma capabilities.” With that he waited, head cocked to the side as he smiled pleasantly at the one who looked like he cut bodies up into tiny pieces before melting them down for the stem cells.
“Cula, I told you no weapons!” the captain snapped. Delphine smacked the male so hard and so fast Varan had barely registered the movement. He filed that bit of information away and waited.
