Justin Read online

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Tales of the Shareem: Rees

  About the Author

  Justin

  Tales of the Shareem, Book 7

  Copyright © 2011 by Jennifer Ashley and Allyson James

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  All Rights are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author.

  Excerpt of Rees copyright © 2005 by Jennifer Ashley and Allyson James

  Books in the

  Tales of the Shareem

  Series

  By Allyson James

  Rees

  Maia & Rylan

  (short story)

  Rio

  Aiden & Ky

  Calder

  Braden

  Justin

  And more to come

  Chapter One

  “Ident card.”

  The patroller who held her hand out to Justin had pretty brown eyes, sleek dark hair, and a lush body in a tight coverall he wouldn’t mind seeing her out of. Not bad, but she was a patroller and right now in Justin’s way.

  He moved past her outstretched hand, making for the Vistara station’s exit. “Sorry, sweetheart. Catch me on the way back.”

  The patroller got in front of him again. “I said, ‘Ident card.’”

  Even through his impatience, Justin noticed her smooth face, slightly upturned nose, and wide, kissable mouth. He was Shareem — of course he noticed. Her hair was pulled into an I’m-a-tight-ass knot on the back of her head, but she couldn’t hide the sheen of it.

  He didn’t need to give her his ident card to leave the station. Justin had bought a ticket and already turned it in, like everyone else. But patrollers liked hanging around hovertrain platforms harassing people, especially Shareem.

  “Tell you what,” Justin said. “You wait for me here, and I’ll give you my ident card on my way back.”

  Dark brows snapped together, and her sultry eyes narrowed. “No, you’ll give me your ident card now, and I’ll think about letting you walk out of here.”

  Damn it. He was already late, and if he didn’t hurry, Sybellie would be gone, and Justin would have to wait another entire day to see her. If Justin didn’t see her every day, some space in his heart went empty.

  He tried to stride around her, but the patroller got in front of him again. The little sweetie was fast. “Ident card,” she repeated, a dangerous edge to her voice.

  Fuck this.

  Justin grabbed the woman around the waist, lifted her, swung around with her, and set her on her feet again. She gaped in shock as he plunked her down, too stunned to restrain him or even shout for help.

  Justin grinned, tapped the end of her nose, whirled away, and strode through the crowd and out of the station — fast.

  He heard her shouting behind him, but he didn’t worry. The small female patroller would never out-stride a long-legged Shareem.

  A loud thrum vibrated through his body, and something hot bit into his backside. Justin’s knees buckled, and he met the pavement, face-first, his nerves sizzling like fried wires.

  He heard applause. The crowd on the Vistara was cheering the patroller who’d taken down the dangerous Shareem.

  Through his fogged vision Justin saw the patroller’s booted feet stop in front of his face. Justin couldn’t keep his gaze from traveling from her slim ankles up her long, sexy legs all the way to sweetly curved hips hugged by the coverall.

  His last thought before another stun burst whacked him in the side was that she had the most lickable calves he’d ever seen in his life.

  *** *** ***

  His name was Justin.

  The information on Deanna’s prisoner flickered across her console at the main Pas City detention facility.

  He’d been part of DNAmo’s Shareem project — genetically engineered males created for sexual pleasure — before DNAmo’s productions had been declared illegal and the company forced to shut down. This Shareem—Justin—had been sold to a buyer a few years before the shutdown and shipped to a planet called Sirius III.

  Sirius III had required the woman who’d purchased Justin to let him go, as human trafficking was highly illegal in the Sirius system. Justin, once free, had apparently decided to remain on Sirius. He’d lived there for twenty-five years as an ordinary citizen, cohabitating the last fifteen years with a woman called Shela, until her death a couple of years ago.

  A few months ago, Justin had returned, of his own volition, to Bor Narga.

  Why?

  The Shareem represented all things sensual and sexual, qualities abhorred by most Bor Nargans. On Bor Narga, the forbidden Shareem were second class, restricted, watched, forced to take inoculations to keep them sterile and disease free.

  So why had this Shareem given up freedom and a home of his own to come back to this rock?

  Deanna studied the holopic that rotated slowly on her console. Justin had dark brown hair, hard, handsome features, and, of course, Shareem-blue eyes. That was the man in her cell, all right.

  The holopic showed only his upper torso, but Deanna’s memory filled in the rest. He’d towered over her in the train station, the man nearly seven feet tall. He’d worn sun-blocking robes over his tunic and leggings, but the material had outlined a body of solid muscle.

  And he was strong. When the Shareem had lifted her, the power in his hands had taken her breath away, rendering her so hot and confused that she’d not even thought to draw her gun. Clipping handcuffs over his thick wrists had given her a strange shiver of pleasure as well.

  Deanna hadn’t been in the processing room when her male underlings had stripped him down. She was supposed to abhor the sexual as much as the next Bor Nargan woman, but damn. She’d liked to have seen that.

  Deanna’s console beeped, startling her out of her daydreams, the alert from the guard she’d been waiting for.

  The Shareem was awake.

  She shut down her files, tucked her handheld into her belt, and left for the detention area.

  Pas City’s detention building contained a maze of cells made of foot-thick transparent plasti-glass, each cell about six feet square and ten high. Nutrition gels were issued through a slot in the floor every few hours, refuse taken away through another slot. That was it.

  The Shareem called Justin was in a cell halfway down an empty row. The guards had let him resume a loincloth that covered his privates, but nothing more. Apart from that, he wore only a black chain around his right biceps, the mark of the Shareem.

  Those biceps were huge, his arms connected to equally huge shoulders, round and tight, above a chest as sculpted with muscle. He was male beauty, slick with sweat, on display for all to see.

  Deanna made herself approach his cell at a brisk walk, pretending that all that naked flesh didn’t unnerve her. Justin raised his head as though he heard her com
ing, though the cells had been soundproofed.

  He looked exhausted, dark smudges under his eyes, but then, he’d gotten a double dose from Deanna’s stun weapon. In spite of appearing as though he could barely stand, however, he gave her an enraged look that could blow a hole through the foot-thick wall.

  He said something, lips moving in silence behind the soundproofed wall. When Deanna flicked a switch to turn on the mikes between them, Justin closed his mouth, but he never took his eyes off her.

  “You know that refusing an identification request from a patroller is grounds for incarceration, don’t you?” Deanna asked. “Even termination?”

  Justin folded his arms, all those muscles rippling. “Yeah? Well, fuck you, sweetheart.”

  Deanna made herself not flinch. “If you give me a good reason for refusing my request for identification, I might be able to get you a lighter sentence.”

  “Request?” His smile held no humor. “Is that what that was? You didn’t need my ident card, Patroller. I’m in your damned database.”

  “I know that. But all Shareem must render identification when asked.”

  “You know, you’re sexy with that rule book up shoved up your ass.”

  Deanna curled her fingers into her palms. “You had your ident card with you. Why didn’t you just give it to me?”

  He shrugged. “I was in a hurry.”

  “For what?”

  Justin stepped forward, put his mouth right in front of the mike, and spoke slowly. “None of your damned business.”

  Deanna’s gaze riveted to his mouth. His lips were pale and smooth, and the way he smiled made his tanned face delectable. His tongue moved with his words, red and moist . . .

  She dragged in a breath. “You’re Shareem. I’m a patroller. It is my business.”

  “Not this time.”

  His eyes were so blue. All Shareem had blue eyes, while native-born Bor Nargans had brown. Their irises were a little bigger than the average human’s, and widened when they were aroused.

  “Your record shows that you were warned twice to stay out of the Vistara district,” Deanna said. “So why didn’t you?”

  “There’s nothing in your rules that says I can’t walk down a public street, sweetheart. I looked it up.”

  “But people on the Vistara have made it clear they don’t want Shareem on their part of the hill.”

  “People on the Vistara are a bunch of full-of-themselves, sticks-up-their-asses, wannabe rich folks. You patrol there. You should know that.”

  Deanna privately agreed with him—patrolling the Vistara could be a major pain in the butt. Not because of crime, but because of the incessant complaints of the people who lived there. Nothing the patrollers did was ever good enough for them.

  “Doesn’t matter,” she said. “You received several warnings to stay away. You knew you could get arrested if you went up there again. So why did you?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe I felt like moving the sticks in their asses.”

  Deanna forced herself not to smile. “Who did you go to see?”

  Justin hesitated the slightest bit, and Deanna knew she’d hit pay dirt. She’d only guessed, but his little start confirmed it.

  “None of your damned business,” he said again.

  “A woman who hired you?”

  “Sure.” He gave her a steady blue stare. “A client.”

  Shareem couldn’t lie, the files said. They’d been programmed to have no emotions and no ability to lie—to have no understanding of the need to lie.

  So why was she doubting him?

  “Can this woman vouch for you?” Deanna asked.

  Justin grinned, and again his face deepened into something beyond handsomeness. “A woman from the Vistara? Admitting she hired a Shareem? Are you kidding me?”

  True—if a Vistara woman confessed to wanting sex, especially with a forbidden Shareem, her sticks-up-their-asses neighbors could make her a social outcast.

  “You might die if she doesn’t admit it,” Deanna said.

  “Guess it’s not my lucky day, then.”

  What was wrong with him? Did he want to be terminated?

  “Look, I can be discreet,” she said. “I’ll contact this woman privately. No one has to know I spoke to her or that she hired you. She can trust me not to reveal her name.”

  Justin leaned his forearms on the wall. “You’re saying that if this client vouches for me, you’ll let me go?”

  “I can at least stop the termination order.”

  Justin remained where he was a moment longer, then he straightened up. “Nope. Sorry, darlin’. A Shareem doesn’t kiss and tell.”

  Deanna made a noise of exasperation. “Gods, why are you being so stupid?”

  They were going to kill him. This beautiful specimen of a man would be injected with drugs until he lost consciousness and died, then his prefect body would be incinerated.

  Deanna reached to the transparent wall and spread her fingers across the cool plasti-glass. The gesture went against all her training, but for some reason she wanted to do it. She had to get through to him.

  “I’m not supposed to tell you this,” she said, “but the people on the Vistara wanted you to be terminated as soon as I slapped the cuffs on you. They didn’t even want me to bring you down here and lock you up. I made the decision not to listen to them. You were my bust, my prisoner.”

  Justin’s eyes flickered, and she saw a flash of serious anger in them. But Shareem couldn’t get angry--could they? Not like this, not with murder in their eyes.

  “Well, aren’t you a love?” he said, his voice going soft. “Deciding that the poor Shareem gets to live?”

  “If you sign a statement promising you’ll never set foot in the Vistara district again—and obey it—I might be able to let you go.”

  He didn’t hesitate. “No.”

  Deanna balled her fists. “What is the matter with you? Make the promise that you won’t go up there again, and I might be able to get you free. Help me help you.”

  Justin came out of his negligent stance and slammed into the wall in front of her, fists against the plasti-glass. Deanna started to back up in alarm, but she made herself stay in place.

  He couldn’t hurt her, couldn’t get out, couldn’t even do the Shareem trick of using pheromones to relax her. The cell walls, set up to contain any kind of prisoner, including off-worlders who might have telepathy, wouldn’t let him.

  “You’re only offering to ‘help’ me so you can sign off on your fucking report,” he said in a hard voice. “The Shareem wouldn’t cooperate, so he had to die. Not your fault—you followed the rules. That’s all you want, Patroller.”

  “Deanna.”

  “What?”

  “My name isn’t Patroller. It’s Deanna. Deanna Surrell, Patroller First Class.”

  He stared down at her. “You trying to be my friend now . . . Deanna?”

  He pronounced the name carefully, his voice taking on a sensuality that reached through the glass.

  “I’m not trying to be your friend,” Deanna said, softening her tone. “But I don’t want to see you terminated because some sticks-up-their-asses, wannabe rich folks decided you ruined their pristine street. That’s not fair. But I can’t help you if you won’t work with me.” Deanna put her hand on the transparent wall again, directly over one of his. “Please, Justin.”

  Chapter Two

  The please got to him.

  This had to be a first. A patroller saying please to a Shareem.

  Her brown eyes had warmed, and the hand placed directly over his fist was a sweet gesture. She’d look beautiful with a scarf around her wrists, she on her knees, begging him with that look in her eyes.

  Deanna. Lovely name. Justin could whisper it while he cupped her breasts, again while he slid his hand down to find the wet heat of her pussy.

  His cock tightened, and Justin immediately shut off his thoughts. The last thing he needed was a big hard-on, here in these cells where he couldn�
��t hide it.

  “Sign the statement, and you can go,” Deanna said. “As easy as that.”

  Justin rested his forehead against the transparent wall. He’d not negated her assumption that he’d been on his way to visit a client, because he sure as hell wasn’t about to tell this patroller the real reason he’d gone to the Vistara.

  And no way would Justin sign a document promising he’d stay away from the district. Not while Sybellie lived there.

  Sybellie, his daughter.

  Shareem were not allowed, on pain of death, to father children. If Justin had to be terminated to protect the knowledge that Sybellie was the offspring of a Shareem, so be it.

  Sybellie did not know that Justin was her biological father and neither did her adoptive parents. He sure as hell would never let that knowledge out, because the gods only knew what the asshole women in the Bor Nargan government would do to Sybellie if they found out she carried Shareem DNA.

  They might shut her away, experiment on her, dissect her, or simply kill her. Justin wouldn’t risk that, not even to save his own life.

  But, damn it, she was his daughter. He wanted to see her. He needed to see her, even for a brief hour across a crowded street.

  “Please, Justin,” Deanna said.

  That please again. It did funny things to his insides, even through his worry and anger.

  Maybe if Justin did please this patroller, she’d let him out and dismiss the case. He could please her with a little screwing, maybe in her cubicle, on her desk. He didn’t have his box of equipment with him, but he could make do with a piece of cloth for her mouth, maybe a belt for hand restraints. Level-two Shareem were good at improvising.

  Deanna’s handheld beeped.

  “Excuse me,” she said.

  A patroller being polite to a Shareem. What a day.

  Deanna touched a button on the handheld and read whatever text was flowing to her, her mouth pursed.

  A sweet, red mouth, with moist, plump lips. Nice for kissing and other things that mouths were good for.

  Justin couldn’t stop himself thinking these things, even with her holding his fate in her hands. He’d love it if she could hold something else in them too. It would make his inevitable termination all the sweeter.