Braden Read online

  “That’s it, love. You’re learning your body, and what you like.”

  Elisa wriggled some more, rubbing, enjoying it.

  Braden’s heavy hand on her buttocks stopped her. “I’ll go easy on you,” he said. “For now.”

  Easy?

  When the first stinging slap landed across her backside, Elisa jumped. Her body curved against the marble, her clit burning.

  Second spank. It stung yet didn’t, hot tingles radiating through her skin.

  Braden’s hand was large, strong, and the third spank was harder. Elisa squirmed, wanting more.

  He soothed her burning skin with a caress, the stroke easing her and sending her into a warm, contented state. She’d read that Shareem could calm with a touch, but she hadn’t quite believed it.

  She believed it now. Braden smoothed his palm across her buttocks—then surprised her with five more spanks.

  She gasped, and he caressed.

  “Sweet little ass,” he said. “So cute and red. I want to fuck it. But I won’t. Not yet.”

  What?

  “Soon, though.” Braden’s hands smoothed her skin while her hands dug at the marble. She wanted to reach for him, and not being able to both frustrated and excited her.

  “Soon?” she asked.

  “Pretty soon.” Another spank, another caress. “I’ll bring out all my gear. I’ll lay you over pillows, and spank you until you’re pink and hot, and then I’ll lube you up nice and go up your ass. You’ll feel full and so damn good you’ll wonder why you never did it before.”

  Elisa never heard of such a thing. Even in her research on sex, she had seen it confined to man and woman, penis and vagina. No licking, no feasting, no manacles, no spanking and definitely no asses.

  “Break time’s over.”

  Braden’s voice was dark, sinful.

  “What do you—”

  She broke off with a cry as Braden’s hand came down on her backside, the spanking increasing. Elisa squirmed against the tile, the hard stone rubbing her clit and her tight nipples.

  Incredibly, she felt the waves of climax reaching for her, her body loving the contrast between the hard floor and Braden’s punishment. Braden’s warm skin, the sting of his palm, the smooth coolness under her, his breath on her backside—all conspired to send her over the top.

  Elisa pressed her hands flat, bumping against the tile, her clit so hot, her ass tingling with fire. She tried to pull her hands apart and couldn’t, and moaned with frustration.

  As her climax hit hard, she felt Braden lay down over her, holding her in his warm embrace. His laughter filled her ears, his hot breath touched her face and his slow kiss on her cheek made everything perfect.

  * * * * *

  Braden looked down at Elisa, peacefully asleep in the sunshine pooling on her bed, and didn’t want to leave.

  She lay with her head cradled on one arm, her light brown hair snaking across the pillow, her face flushed. The thin sheet would keep her warm in her nest while she slept the exhausted sleep of afterglow.

  The sun filtered through the trees in her shielded garden, announcing that morning had arrived. Time to go.

  Damn it.

  Braden had thought his friends—Rees, Rio, Calder, Rylan—crazy for fixing on one woman and one woman only. He’d thought crazy the risks they’d taken to stay with their ladies. He envied them, yes, but he hadn’t really understood.

  Now he did understand. He’d risk things to be with Elisa—he already was.

  But why, why did he have to find enlightenment with a registered celibate who was only taking Braden for a test drive?

  Braden dumped his gear in his bag and shrugged on his tunic. He should go, forget her, move on to the next honey who wanted him.

  Braden leaned down and kissed Elisa’s cheek. He’d never forget her, and he knew it.

  He quietly left the room, pulled on his sun-blocking robes and slipped out of the house. Shareem knew how to leave a woman’s house discreetly, so that neighbors and patrollers never saw them.

  Braden moved through alleys and emerged near the train station several streets lower down the hill. Skulking through the backstreets pissed him off, but he’d do it to protect Elisa.

  Wouldn’t it be sweet, he thought as he punched his ticket and walked to the train platform, to be welcomed at the front door, to stay all day and all night, to not have to meet her covertly? To not have to hide? Ever?

  To be able to walk openly with Elisa, to visit her when he wanted—hell, to move in with her—would be bliss.

  Fuck all this. Braden eyed a patroller wandering the platform, looking for trouble. His anger boiled over.

  He’d double his effort to help Rees get them the hell out of there. They’d go to whatever planet that wasn’t Bor Narga with its fucked-up restrictions, and Braden would never have to leave the lady he wanted asleep while he crept from her house.

  Having Elisa touch him, and he her, hadn’t been enough. Braden wanted more. He wanted her. He’d get her to run away from Bor Narga with him, even if he had to haul her onto the transport over his shoulder. With his hand on her ass. That would be sweet.

  The patroller glanced at him as though sensing Braden contemplating the kidnapping of a highborn celibate. Braden longed to give her the finger but resisted. He wouldn’t be able to help Rees from inside a cell, and besides, his train was coming.

  * * * * *

  “Justin, tell me about that planet you lived on.” Braden paused from shoveling in his breakfast when Justin came out of his bedroom.

  Braden had stopped in the market and bought a feast on the way home—a Shareem had to keep up his strength. Justin sat down in the other chair and helped himself to a juicy peach.

  “Sirius III?”

  “Yeah. They welcomed Shareem?”

  Justin bit into the peach. “I wouldn’t say welcomed with open arms. But it’s not illegal for Shareem to be Shareem there. They weren’t thrilled that DNAmo had sold me to a Siriun woman, and she was ordered to release me when we reached the planet. Just as well. She was a total bitch.”

  “I’d like to go there.”

  Justin wiped peach juice from his mouth. “Sirius III is not the promised land. You have to work your ass off to stay alive. And no selling your services for what you do best. Sex is free between equal partners, no sex trade of any kind allowed. They’re hard on anything that doesn’t smack of consenting adults. Like deadly hard. Like you wouldn’t survive your arrest.”

  Braden shrugged. “I’m all about consenting adults. The more consenting the better.”

  “I’m just saying you’d have to get off your lazy ass and do real work.”

  Braden pushed away his empty plate. “I don’t mind.”

  “How are you figuring on leaving?” Justin asked. “I got out because someone gave DNAmo money, stuck me on a cargo ship and blasted me out. Next to the livestock, I should add, which stunk like hell. I’ll never forget that smell. But Shareem can’t just buy a ticket to Sirius III.”

  “I’m working on that part.”

  Braden wished he could focus but he kept seeing Elisa’s eyes half closing, her face softening as she experienced pleasure for the very first time. Thank you, Braden, she’d said. Her librarian voice wove around his senses, taking away all pain, all loneliness.

  Justin waved his hand in front of Braden’s face. “You still here?”

  “You’re funny. I had a good night.”

  “Obviously.”

  “You have to tell me why the hell you came back here,” Braden said. “I mean, who for?”

  “Why is that your business?”

  “I’m curious. I have to meet the lady who could make a Shareem run back to Bor Narga. Either she’s one hell of a woman, or you’re so crazy you should be on heavy meds for the rest of your sorry life.”

  Justin tossed down the peach pit. “OK, Braden my friend. If you want to know so bad, I’ll show you.”

  “Show me?”

  “Yeah, you ac
tually have to get up off your ass and walk. All right?”

  Braden wiped his mouth and left the table with renewed energy. Strange what curiosity could make a man do.

  Of course, right now, Braden needed anything to distract him from thinking about Elisa, the woman he could never have. He grabbed his sun-blocking robes and left with Justin.

  No need to clean up the dirty dishes first. They’d still be there when they got back.

  * * * * *

  Justin led Braden to a part of the city called the Vistara. It sat on the western slopes of the hill topped by the Serestine Quarter. It wasn’t as prestigious as the Serestine, but never try to explain that to anyone from the Vistara.

  The Vistara housed people who’d worked hard for their money, at last rewarding themselves with a nice house on the hill, a few servants, fine transport. Their children went to schools that mingled them with the Serestines, and some of those kids ended up marrying into the highborn families.

  Most ordinary people of the metropolis aspired to the Vistara. The Serestine Quarter was attainable only by being born into or absorbed by one of the great families, the d’Aroths being the pinnacle of those families. But any lady could live on the Vistara if she worked hard enough and was lucky enough.

  Braden had never liked the district. Oh sure, he could go for having a big house with cool rooms and water anytime you wanted it, shielded gardens and fancy hovercars. But when people moved to the Vistara, something happened to them. They suddenly became impossible snobs and closed ranks against anyone below them, even their best friends from their hardworking days.

  Once on the Vistara, no one even wanted to look at Pas City. The views from the houses always faced north, to distant desert rather than the sticky city below.

  They wouldn’t look at Pas City, Braden figured, because they feared they could fall right back down there if their luck changed. And they were right.

  If the Serestine Quarter barely tolerated Shareem, the Vistara didn’t like them at all. Highborn women, it was understood though not talked about, sometimes dabbled in the forbidden, like pleasure drugs from off-world or Shareem.

  Vistara women, on the other hand, considered themselves the most morally upright on Bor Narga. Nothing soiled them. Vistara women were the most heavily robed and closely veiled, and only their family and dearest friends saw what was under all the covers.

  Just as well, Braden thought as he and Justin emerged from the train. Those veils probably concealed faces so bitter and sunk in themselves that shriveled prunes would be more attractive.

  While the ministries were run by highborn women, Vistara women filled the lower ranks. They were determined to make Bor Narga the most pristine city in the universe.

  If only those pesky millions in the slums of Pas City weren’t there to drag them down.

  Patrollers eyed the two men sharply as they left the train station, but Braden and Justin pulled folds of their robes around their heads, a signal that they weren’t looking for female company. Even so, one patroller broke from her pack and followed them as they strolled leisurely down a public street.

  “You came back for a woman from the Vistara?” Braden asked as they walked. “I swear to the gods, I’m starting you on those meds.”

  “Patience. Think we can ditch the patroller?”

  “Are we Shareem?”

  The main shopping boulevards were already filling, though the sun had been up only a few hours. People in the Vistara were early risers.

  Street vendors existed up here as they did in Pas City, though here they were more likely to sell fine fabrics, expensive fruit and the most up-to-date gadgets that nobody needed. Awnings overhead kept the area cool and many of the vendors had heat-shielding around their booths.

  Braden and Justin strolled along, looking at the goods, the patroller trying to be inconspicuous behind them.

  As the street became more crowded, Braden and Justin drifted apart, forcing the patroller to choose which of them to follow. Braden wove around booths, back and forth across the street, and then plunged down an alley to take a roundabout route back to the shopping boulevard.

  By the time he emerged into the vendor-lined boulevard again, a host of people, mostly women, were between him and the patroller. The patroller scanned the crowd in irritation, obviously having lost sight of both Braden and Justin.

  Braden stepped into the shadows between two booths, sucking on a flavored ice-stick he’d bought while he roamed. At this distance, he might pass for a pampered Vistara husband idling away his time while his wife was at the office.

  The patroller looked up and down for a while longer then gave up and walked back toward the train station, her stride angry.

  Braden spied Justin bending over a vendor’s cart a little way up the street. He finished his ice and pushed the stick into a recycling bin as he headed for Justin.

  Justin looked up from a display of handheld devices Shareem weren’t allowed to buy as Braden approached. Justin gave the woman behind the booth a warm smile, and she blushed and actually smiled back. She must not have been from around there.

  “Not her, is it?” Braden asked as they walked away together.

  “Who?” Justin glanced back. “No, not the vendor. I just like to smile at women. It’s instinct.”

  Braden had the same instinct. “So where is she?”

  “Calm down. Almost there.”

  Braden strolled along, trying not to feel stifled by the perfect buildings and perfect houses and immaculately clean streets of the Vistara. He decided he liked sand-scoured alleys and tattered awnings and brusque fruit sellers who actually let Shareem buy things. Real life.

  Justin grabbed Braden’s wrist and jerked him into a too-clean alley between buildings. Justin was gazing intently at a café across the street, one with seating on the walkway in front of it. Not many sat at those tables, but a large window showed that the interior of the café was filled with morning caffeine-seekers.

  “Second table from the left,” Justin said. “Rose-colored robes.”

  The robes in question shimmered as the wearer moved. Because she was inside, the lady had removed her concealing face veil, her head still framed with translucent silk fabric the color of pink roses.

  The woman was much younger than Braden had expected, early twenties. Maybe just finished with university, maybe still there. A few curls of light brown hair trickled around her veil as she leaned forward to delicately sip her coffee.

  She was pretty in an unselfconscious way, talking and laughing with her friends because she liked to. If Braden hadn’t already found Elisa, he’d be tempted to beguile this one into bed. Pretty Vistara ladies needed pleasure too.

  “Very nice,” Braden said with admiration.

  Justin nodded, not saying a word.

  Braden glanced back at the woman again, the mystery not solved. Sure, she was pretty and animated and looked as though she might be fun in the sack, but was she wonderful enough to merit a return to Bor Narga?

  Justin had lived a normal life in a place that had acknowledged him as human. Here on Bor Narga, he risked arrest for the slightest offense, real or imagined, and termination, every single day.

  Something didn’t track.

  Justin’s gaze was still riveted to the café. Whoever the young woman was, she’d knocked Justin on his ass.

  “So, my friend,” Braden said. “Why are you letting me see her? To show her off? Or did you want a threesome and couldn’t think of a better Shareem to have it with?”

  Braden had been joking, but the last word was barely out of his mouth before Braden found himself against the wall, Justin’s hand hard against his throat.

  “Don’t you even think about touching her. Ever.”

  “Whoa.” Braden lifted his hands. “I get it. The lady’s yours—” His breath cut off as Justin squeezed harder.

  “She’s not…”

  Abruptly Justin released him, as though the oomph had gone out of him.

  Braden f
ingered his throat, watching Justin in surprise. “Where the hell did you meet this lady? On Sirius?”

  Justin shook his head, eyes filled with pain. “She’s never been off Bor Narga.”

  “Then when? At that age, she wouldn’t have been born before you got shipped out. Just before you left at most.”

  Justin looked at Braden again, and what was in his eyes made Braden’s mouth go dry.

  “What are you saying?” Braden asked. “That’s not possible. You know it’s not possible.”

  “It is possible, my friend.” Justin lowered his voice to a whisper, mindful that the Vistara had more surveillance per square foot than did any other part of the city. “Her name is Sybellie, and she’s my daughter.”

  Chapter Ten

  Braden looked in shock at the girl sitting so happily with her friends in the café. She laughed and talked like any carefree young woman who had enough money to shop the boulevards of the Vistara and then stop for coffee with friends.

  Questions poured into Braden’s head—How the hell? Are you sure? How is that possible?—but he kept his mouth closed.

  Talking about it here would be a bad idea. No telling when a patroller would pop up or how well this alley was monitored. Even Shareem staring at a woman for too long would land in the cells.

  Justin looked at Sybellie with a kind of hungry longing, a mixture of sorrow and happiness. He clearly didn’t want to leave but when Braden nudged him, he nodded, knowing they couldn’t stay.

  With one last look, Justin led Braden out to the main street again.

  They didn’t speak all the way back to the train station. Braden didn’t even have the heart to wave at the patroller they’d ditched, who glared at them as they stepped onto the shielded platform.

  Braden and Justin didn’t talk during the half-hour train ride back down to Pas City. There, they walked out of the station and headed directly to Judith’s bar. Once inside, Braden claimed his usual corner table, ordered two glasses of Judith’s best ale and paid for them himself.

  This early, he and Justin were the only Shareem here—Shareem liked to sleep in. Mitch was there, and Judith’s attention was all for him.