She wrinkled her nose. Like a mouse.
I picked up my kilt and dressed. “You’re in trouble,” I told her. “I said to stay in the office, and you left the office.”
“I wanted to use a bathroom.”
“There’s a bathroom in my office. I showed it to you, left you a knife to free yourself.”
“Another bathroom.”
“Why?”
“To shower. My rooms don’t have a shower.”
I hadn’t thought about her hygiene, only about her pussy, the same one I’d washed before and after I shaved it. What the fuck? I pointed to the wall behind me. “Use this shower.”
I untied her ankles, worried I’d tied them too tight, but when she sashayed to the bathroom and slammed the door shut, I knew she’d be fine. The mouse had a bit of an attitude, but at least she left me to think.
I hung my head and scrubbed my face to clear my thoughts. The mouse occupied them, and not as an assassin but as a woman. I pictured her naked body, soaped, wet, and I stroked my dick. Yeah, this felt good.
I needed to unload.
Inside her.
I stroked faster, thinking about the feel of her wet pussy around me. I wanted to dip my dick inside. I cupped my balls and weighed them in my hand, then squeezed tight to get her pussy off my mind. The pain zapped my middle, and I bent over with a groan.
I had a job to do.
The mouse had a job to do.
We needed to do our jobs.
I forbid myself to come, and when she returned from the bathroom, I told her not to go anywhere. This time, she listened and spent the rest of the day in my bed reading Vice’s books.
When she finally slept, I went back to my room.
As I watched her sleep, realization hit me. I’d never met an adversary I feared more. The fact that she weighed a third of what I weighed, the fact she couldn’t best me in a hunt didn’t matter. She’d gotten the best of me already, and that made her dangerous. I returned to my office and got to work.
Chapter Eleven
Mayhem
“Oooo, Mayheeeem?”
I grunted and rolled away from the noise, trying to make myself comfortable on my office floor.
“Yo! Mayhem, wake the fuck up,” Vice said over the com.
I groaned and scrubbed my face to work off the morning haze. “What time is it?” I asked.
“Eight in the morning.”
I couldn’t remember the last time I’d slept past five o’clock. Shit, I’d missed our morning meditation. And I needed it like water right now. It would clear my head. During our nomadic existence on Tineya, we’d traveled on foot all over our planet. Some areas were more fertile than the others. When we settled in areas less fertile or populated, hunting for food and water proved difficult. I’d get up in the morning and try to home in on my prey, a technique my father had taught me. I’d sit in my tent, close my eyes, and tune out the noise of my tribal members going about their morning routine, the pans clanking as females prepared breakfast, the few kids running around our camps.
More often than not, I’d hear everything. One morning during the year of drought, I made them all meditate with me so that I’d have some quiet. Later, we found out we could tune out anything we wanted, home in on our mission without any distractions. My tribe hunted best because we focused on one thing and one thing only. Getting the prey. If we needed water, we’d meditate picturing an oasis in the middle of the vast desert. Then we’d let our instinct take us there.
“I’ll wait until you get coffee,” Vice said.
I chuckled and stretched, then found the com unit I took out of my ear last night. I clicked the button, then put it back in my ear. Vice popped on the screen. The fact he didn’t find it strange I’d slept on the floor spoke of his opinion of me. He thought I was a primitive beast, good for hunting, not much else. That was okay with me. His brother ruled this planet. “Did you get my message?” I asked.
“Yup.”
Yesterday, we scouted human males in New City and found the man who’d sold Reagan at the auction. He’d registered as Joe and got a job at one of our construction sites. I concluded he wanted to stay close to the girl so he could make contact with her on short notice and monitor the news, such as when the news of my death spread over New City.
“Need something from you,” Vice said.
“Shoot.” I sat in my chair, cracked my neck, rolled my shoulders.
“The auctioned girl…” Vice picked up a piece of paper.
“Reagan. Name’s Reagan.”
Vice nodded. “Dewlyn knows one Reagan from the shelter. Black hair, blue eyes.”
My ears buzzed as if a swarm of bees nested inside my head. Didn’t need coffee this morning. That shit woke me right up. I sat up straighter. I sure wasn’t going to like what he’d say next. I knew enough about the burned shelter to know every girl inside it was a mate or at least an owned property. Vice continued. “Need an auction tape so Dewlyn can see her.”