Braden Read online

  His mouth landed half on her cheek, half on the corner of her lips. His lips were hot, strong, sensual. Braden let the kiss linger, fingers tracing circles on her back.

  He eased his mouth away. His breath touched the moisture his kiss had left before Braden brushed the moisture away with his thumb.

  “Goodbye, Elisa,” he said, voice low. “My beautiful librarian.”

  His eyes were still very blue, the look in them empty.

  Elisa touched his hand. “Thank you, Braden. For everything.”

  As she stepped away to enter the car, which a chauffeur very properly opened for her, she remembered Judith’s warning. It’s going to be rough.

  It would be, Elisa thought as the car slid away. She looked through the rear window at the solid upright that was Braden, and something tightened inside her. The road ahead was going to be very rough indeed.

  * * * * *

  Braden watched the hovercar turn the corner, out of sight, and he felt a hole burn into his chest.

  Damn it. Damn it all to hell.

  He wanted her. And Braden couldn’t have her. He’d likely never see her again.

  This was different from the usual might-have-been sexual encounter, not that Braden’s life had contained many of those. Usually he got whatever woman he wanted, because they wanted him—wanted Shareem—even before they met him.

  This was Elisa, who was fair-minded, sweet, smart and celibate. Off limits. Fantasy was the closest he could ever come.

  Not having her was going to hurt for a long, long time.

  While Braden stood eating the dust of the hovercar, a human man walked past him and into the bar. The bar was closed for the night, but the guy walked on in like he knew he’d be welcome.

  His name was Mitch, and he was an off-world pilot who stopped by to see Judith whenever he landed on Bor Narga. Braden wasn’t sure from which world Mitch hailed, and Mitch never enlightened them. He was tall with light brown hair and amazing green eyes, which made him stand out, even from the exotic Shareem.

  Braden and his friends liked Mitch, though, because he didn’t view Shareem as animals or less than human or any of that shit. Mitch regarded them as rivals for Judith’s attention, which was true.

  “Well, look what the sandstorm blew in,” Judith said, hand on one hip. “Sorry, darling, there’s no more ale. I’ve shut down the pumps for the night.”

  “Not what I came for.” Mitch caught Judith as she walked by and pulled her to him for a long kiss.

  A nice kiss. Braden leaned on the doorframe and watched, feeling a tug of envy. Everyone was pairing off tonight…or tripling-off, in the case of Aiden, Ky and Brianne.

  Was tripling-off even a word? His librarian would know.

  Judith came up for air and smiled at Mitch in a way she’d never smiled at any of the Shareem. “Nice to see you, babe,” she said. “Braden, you’re still here?”

  “Waiting to offer my services as a third.”

  Mitch gave Braden a smile, not an unfriendly one. “Sorry, Braden. I fly solo. Come back tomorrow and we’ll catch up.”

  “Right. You two kids have fun.” Braden patted the doorframe, shoved himself off and walked away.

  Alone.

  Damn it.

  No, not quite alone. Someone dogged his tracks through the now-busy streets, and wasn’t being very subtle about it.

  Patroller? It was past Shareem curfew—not that Shareem cared, but getting caught meant spending the rest of the night in a cell. A transparent-walled cell full of cameras, and watching patrollers meant no hope of jerking off. Shareem had some pride.

  Braden stepped silently into the shadow of the next doorway. Whoever it was walked too heavily to be a female patroller, but sometimes they employed males for routine duty.

  A man stopped alongside the shadowed doorway, but it wasn’t a patroller. He was seven feet tall and heavily muscled—a Shareem—but Braden had no idea who he was.

  That couldn’t be right. Braden knew every Shareem on the planet.

  “Braden, right?” a voice grated. “Thought I recognized you.”

  The Shareem stepped fully into the light. He wore off-world clothes but Braden finally recognized him—he’d known the man twenty-five years ago but hadn’t seen him since.

  “Justin?” Braden said. “What the fuck?”

  Chapter Six

  “I thought Rio lived here,” Justin said as he pulled off his robes in Braden’s apartment.

  Beneath the robes Justin wore a sleeveless, translucent blue tunic that showed off his muscles. It and his leggings didn’t hide much of him, which made Braden realize he hadn’t gotten the clothes on Bor Narga.

  Braden, still sweating from his encounter with Elisa and the hot walk home, stripped down to his loincloth. Justin didn’t appear to notice. For Shareem, naked was natural.

  “Rio did live here,” Braden said. “When he left for Ariel, he gave the apartment to me.”

  “Rio went to Ariel?” Justin asked, surprised. “How did he get permission for that?”

  Braden grabbed some ale from the kitchen, handed Justin a bottle and collapsed onto the shallow couch. At least Justin’s out-of-nowhere arrival helped deflate Braden’s cock a little.

  A little. The damn thing was still killing him.

  “Rio didn’t get permission,” Braden said. “He fell in love with a sweetie from Ariel and she smuggled him off planet.”

  “In love?”

  “Shareem can fall in love, my friend, no matter how much the scientists at dear DNAmo tried to pound into us that we couldn’t.”

  “I know that.” Justin sat on the other chair, but on the edge, as though unable to relax. “I was just surprised it happened to Rio.”

  “You say ‘I know that’ like you have personal experience.”

  “Maybe I do.”

  Braden took a long drink from his bottle of ale. “Justin, why the hell did you come back to Bor Narga? You were away, free, gone. Don’t tell me that where they sent you was worse.”

  Justin shook his head, looking sad. “No, it was great. The original purchaser of my services was forced to let me go after the authorities on Sirius III pointed out that human trafficking, not to mention sex trafficking, was highly illegal on Sirius. She was pissed as hell and out a pile of cash.”

  “So what did you do? Wander the streets selling your services?”

  He grinned. “Gods, your mind’s in the gutter. No, I got a job. A real one. Working cargo on the docks at first—I’m strong. Worked my way up through the ranks and then started my own offloading company. Made good money.”

  Sounded like paradise. “And you gave all this up, why? What, you were homesick for Bor Narga?”

  Justin’s smile faded. “I sold the business when my lover died. She and I had gone into it together.” He drew a breath. “We were together fifteen years.”

  The quiet way he said it told Braden that Justin knew all about falling in love. “Damn. Justin, I’m sorry.”

  “She’d been sick for a while. When she was gone, I didn’t have the heart for the business anymore.” Justin dug fingers and thumb into the corners of his eyes, and they were moist when he looked up again. “That was two years ago, and still I miss her. I’ve been kind of kicking around ever since.”

  Braden hadn’t known Justin well at DNAmo—Justin and Rio had been close—but they’d all shared the DNAmo experience. Justin had gotten away, lived and loved and lost like a normal human. It must have been wonderful.

  “Still doesn’t explain why you came back here,” Braden said. “Can’t have been for the weather.”

  “Yeah, that was a bitch of a storm we just had.”

  “Does your return have anything to do with Rees?” Braden asked cautiously.

  Justin looked puzzled. “Who’s Rees?”

  “Ah.” Braden drank more ale. Maybe if he got drunk enough, he’d forget all about Elisa. Yeah, right. “Never mind.”

  Braden wasn’t certain he could trust Justin with the kno
wledge that Rees had once been the experiment called R294E8S. Some secrets were just too risky. He’d have to find out more about Justin first, and alert Rees before he spilled all to Justin.

  “Nope, I didn’t come back for Rees, whoever that is. Or Rio.”

  “No? You said you were looking for Rio.”

  Justin shrugged. “I looked up Rio because I need crash space.”

  Braden gestured with his ale. “My crash space is your crash space. I have a spare bedroom—well, it’s more like a closet with a bed in it—but you’re welcome to it. Had a pretty lady medic living in it for a while, but then Calder took her away.”

  “Calder? Wasn’t he burned or something?”

  “Yep. Fixed by the pretty lady medic. Damn lucky asshole.”

  “Man, I need to catch up.”

  “You do. Rylan moved way the hell out into the mountains, and Aiden is fucking Ky.”

  “Shit.” Justin took a deep drink of ale. “I leave for twenty-five years and look what happens. I remember Rylan, always sneaking in to be with Maia, poor guy.”

  “Yeah, that’s him.” The existence of Maia was also a pretty deep secret.

  “And Aiden and Ky? Hmm.”

  “Together with a lady of the d’Aroth family, believe it or not. She loves them to pieces. You don’t seem too freaked out about Aiden and Ky.”

  Justin shook his head. “I got used to life on Sirius, where sex between consenting adults isn’t considered taboo. In fact, they think it’s healthy. Men and women share equal status, some men pair up with men, some women with women. Couples, threesomes, foursomes—whatever melts your butter as long as it’s consensual and no one gets hurt.”

  Braden sighed. “Sounds like paradise.”

  “It was normal to me. Isn’t much else to do there except watch trees grow.”

  “Hey, I wouldn’t mind having a shitload of sex while I watched trees grow. But you still haven’t answered me. Why the fuck did you come back to the hellhole that spawned you?”

  Justin drank again and gave Braden a little smile. “To find someone.”

  “Someone. Not a Shareem?”

  “Nope.”

  “A woman?”

  “None of your damn business.”

  “Shit. A man?”

  Justin laughed. “No, not a man. Don’t worry. Your ass is safe from me.”

  “Good.” Braden drank again. “I don’t mind a threesome, or a foursome, or a moresome, but not without a lady in the equation.”

  “Me either.”

  “Friend.” Braden clicked his ale bottle to Justin’s. “And now that you’ve made me think about it, I had an encounter tonight I couldn’t finish and if I don’t yank I’m going to die.”

  “Don’t let me stop you.”

  Braden got off the couch, his cock killing him. “Bedroom’s behind the door next to the kitchen, clean linen and towels in the cupboard. ’Night.”

  Justin nodded, half in amusement, half in sympathy, as Braden rushed through the doorway into his bedroom. His loincloth came away before the door even closed, and then followed lube and reliable hand on cock.

  He stroked, pulled, massaged, rubbed—fucked his own hand every which way—and still he couldn’t ease the torture of not being with his librarian tonight.

  * * * * *

  Elisa’s spiritual advisor was eighty-two and a beautiful woman. Sixty years of serenity rested on her face, which bore few lines. Her sleek silver hair was covered with a translucent veil, and her movements were soft and gentle.

  “My dear, it is perfectly natural for you to have responded to him,” Lady t’Lenka said. “You are a young woman, and the Shareem were bred—rather imprudently—to satisfy a taste for the forbidden.”

  Elisa rested her hands on her knees, her legs cramping a little from the kneeling position. The private garden was large, spare and beautiful, the air cool under the wooden pavilion. Wind chimes whispered, a fountain trickled nearby and the cushion beneath her knees was covered with the softest silk.

  Elisa knew that the entire garden was protected from Bor Narga’s sun and sand by a force field, and that the natural beauty of the place wasn’t natural at all. It was cultivated, crafted, perfected, like most things on Bor Narga, including Shareem.

  “I wish I could make myself believe that,” Elisa said in answer. “A natural reaction, never to occur again. A chance encounter and now it’s over.” She clenched her hands. “But I want to see him again.”

  Not only for the sexual feelings Braden had awakened in her. Elisa wanted to talk to him again, to simply hear his voice.

  “Are you asking for my permission for another encounter?”

  “I don’t know,” Elisa answered.

  Lady t’Lenka gave her a sympathetic smile. “My dear, I know that choosing the Way of the Sky was difficult for you. I even know that you made the decision in order to avoid an unpleasant marriage, not because you craved the life of a celibate. I believe you will do well in the Way of the Sky, but it must be a choice made for the right reasons.”

  Elisa sighed. “Meaning I should embrace the Way only because I believe in it.”

  “Child, I will tell you a secret. I haven’t always been eighty-odd years old.”

  Elisa returned her smile. “I know that, my lady. I’ve seen the holopics of you when you first entered the order.”

  “Yes, but before that, when I was in my twenties, I was quite a wild young woman. Sensual pleasure wasn’t as taboo on Bor Narga as it is now. This was well before DNAmo developed Shareem. The creation of Shareem, unfortunately, only fed the underlying paranoia the ruling women have about becoming slaves to men in all but name, as our ancestors were. But when I was a girl, there was more freedom, and I definitely did some wicked things.”

  Elisa found it difficult to imagine this woman with her quiet, graceful movements going to wild parties and chasing men.

  “I see that you doubt,” Lady t’Lenka said. “But I had too much money and I loved excitement—the rawer the better. If we’d had Shareem then, I’d have taken up with them in a heartbeat. I tried every kind of liquor and pleasure-seeking drug I could find, and I loved off-world men who were so much more aggressive and sexual than our own males. I was shameless with them.”

  Elisa still found it difficult to imagine, but the sparkle in the elderly woman’s eye told her that her words were true.

  “Why did you decide to follow the Way, then?” Elisa asked.

  “Because I woke up one morning, sprawled in someone’s shower, having no idea where I was or what I’d done for the past three days—or with whom, man or woman. I realized that I’d been striving for happiness with recklessness. Recklessness, I realized, was killing me. I did much soul searching and decided to look into one of the Ways. I didn’t make the final choice to follow the path for a year or two. I wanted to be certain.”

  “Are you saying that I’m not certain?”

  “I’m saying you didn’t have time to be. You hadn’t any intention of pursuing the ascetic life before your fiancé upset you, had you?”

  Elisa dropped her gaze. “To be honest, no.”

  “I knew that when I approved your application. But I understood that you were the sort of young woman who would try very hard, and I hoped for the best.” Lady t’Lenka unfolded herself from her cushion and came to Elisa. She rested her hand comfortingly on Elisa’s head. “I want you to see this Shareem, to follow your temptations, and then to make your choice.”

  Elisa looked up in astonishment. “You want me to seek him?”

  “It’s what you came here to ask me, my dear, wasn’t it? For a dispensation?”

  Yes, she had, though she hadn’t said so. Elisa had wanted to talk around it with her, to assess how Lady t’Lenka would react before Elisa asked. Wise Lady t’Lenka had seen right through her.

  “I grant you the dispensation,” Lady t’Lenka said. “For one month. Go and see your Shareem, and do what you must. You will not be allowed to wear the robes, or enter th
e order’s house, or in any way associate with the Way until you have chosen one path or the other. That decision will be final, no turning back. Do you understand?”

  Lady t’Lenka pulled Elisa to her feet as she spoke. Elisa looked into her shrewd eyes. “Yes, m’lady. I understand. It’s what I need to do.”

  Formality over, Lady t’Lenka pulled Elisa into a sandalwood-scented embrace. “Go with the goddess’s blessing, my dear.” She smiled at Elisa, eyes twinkling. “And for heaven’s sake, enjoy yourself.”

  Elisa kissed her cheek, bowed as she’d been taught and turned away, her heart beating hard with excitement.

  * * * * *

  “Lady of my dreams,” Braden said when he answered his terminal a day later. “Did you call to torture me some more? Have pity on your poor Shareem. I’m running out of lube.”

  “No.” On the other side of the blurry screen, Elisa n’Arell drew a breath. “I called to hire you.”

  Chapter Seven

  Braden came alert, his adrenaline spiking off the scale. “Like I said, sweetheart. You’re torturing me.”

  “I want you to do whatever it is you do. With me. Teach me. Please.”

  The little please made his cock jump. “Darlin’, I have a huge hard-on, and I might have to make you relieve it.” Braden forced his voice to be careless, but he cared. Damn did he care. “You’re a celibate. Certified, registered—whatever it is you do.”

  “I’ve gotten a dispensation.”

  Oh, hell. “You know you’re killing me, love.”

  “I’m not teasing.” Elisa watched him intently, the bad console distorting her lovely features. “Is there some kind of contract we need to negotiate?”

  “What?” Braden dragged his mind back from his fantasies. “No, no. This is just between us, sweet baby.”

  “All right, then what do I do? Meet you at Judith’s bar?” Elisa blushed. “I beg your pardon. I’m new at this. I’m not sure how to approach you.”

  I beg your pardon. Gods above, he was going to die.

  Braden drew a breath and suppressed every hormone screaming at him. This couldn’t be real. He had to be asleep. This was a dream—a cock-hardening, come-inducing dream. But no, there she was, on his crappy console, wide-eyed and asking him to be Shareem with her.