Chapter 36: In the Pale Moonlight
Her heartbeat kicks up. I smell fear. I smell sex. All in good time. "Shhh," I whisper into her ear. "Relax." I slide my hand down her spine. "Gonna take care of you." Put my other arm around her. Pull her close.
She takes a deep breath. Nods. Stands passively, letting my hands go where they want to go. I cup a breast, worshipfully. Feels so fucking good, I cup the other one. She makes a soft helpless sound in the back of her throat. Makes my cock twitch.
Reluctantly, I let her go, pick up a bottle of shampoo, squeeze some into my hand. Start massaging it into her hair. Her hands come up like she's going to try to push me away. I press her hands into her head with just enough force to remind her she ain't moving if I don't let her. She shudders. I back off, let her wash her own hair. Take care of my own.
Once her hair is rinsed, she seems about to get out of the shower. I stop her. Not ready. "Wait," I say. Make my voice playful. "Conditioner."
"Maybe I don't want it," she says. Her voice isn't playful at all. I sigh, run my fingers over her neck, reach for a bottle of the stuff, massage a generous amount in. Pick her up to swap places with her so I can rinse the shampoo out of my hair. Her heartbeat rockets up when her feet leave the ground. I press her tight against me, grinding my erection against her back. Then I set her down. Lean back into the water, keeping her pressed against me even though the conditioner makes my nose twitch.
When I'm done, I rotate us again and help rinse her off. Run my hands over her, gently. Lovingly. Remember what Fry said about her being the symbol of my willingness to submit to the better woman. Chuckle.
"What?" she says. Like she's a long way away. I ain't explaining. But I wrap my arms around her and pull her close.
"Another day," I whisper. Turn the water off, grab a towel, and start drying her. She tries to move away from me. "Relax," I say, again, letting a little bit of my real voice through. Her skin prickles into goose bumps.
"You think there's gonna be one?" she asks, her voice small. I sigh, step out of the tub. Pull back the curtain so we're facing each other. Offer her my right hand. She takes it, steps out moving much better than she did when we started. I keep her small hand in mine and pin it at the small of her back. Put my other hand on the back of her neck. Tilt her head back. Kiss her lips gently. She doesn't open them. I kiss the side of her mouth, kiss down to her neck. Her breathing hitches. I press her into me, rubbing my erection against her belly. She tries to pull her hand away.
Pretend not to notice. Sink to my knees in front of her and kiss those soft, damp, breasts. After a long time, she groans like it feels good. Goes straight to my crotch. Reach between her legs and stroke gently. She groans again and puts her free hand on my head. Presses me into her.
I lose it. My hands are on her thighs, digging in. Stand up, lifting her with me, wrapping her legs around me. Shove her against a wall, kissing her hungrily. Stroke her clit, position myself, thrust up hard.
She makes a mewling noise. I'm hurting her. Cools me off enough that I slow down, pull back and look at her. Our eyes lock. Her thighs weigh heavy in my hands. "Sorry," I murmur. "Too rough?"
She clears her throat. "Yeah."
I nod. "Sorry." I smile at her, goofily. Start kissing her neck hungrily. She groans like she likes it. Kiss her lips worshipfully. At last, she opens her mouth and starts kissing me back. I lose it again, thrusting up hard and fast. Cum so hard my legs buckle.
When I can think again, I've got her pinned hard to the wall. I let her thighs go at some point, and her legs are sliding down around my hips. Weird feeling. Pretty sure she didn't cum. She's working hard to breathe. Probably 'cause I'm leaning hard into her. Manage to pull back some. Our eyes meet. Hers are haunted. Fear. Want. Like that. She's still mad at me. Don't like that. Makes me feel bad.
Spilt milk. I stand straight. My dick's limp enough to slide right out of her. She slides right on down the wall. Like I cut her strings.
I lean down, put my hands on her waist. Mean to pull her up, but suddenly, it's not Jack, it's Fry, at the foot of the ramp up to the skiff and I'm tryin' to get her to come with me. Willingly. Leaving Jack and al-Walid to die. Willingly. So I barely touch her. Because I want her to come with me. Willingly. To be like me. Worse than me. Willing to leave people to die. I jerk back, breathing hard.
Fucking hell, what the fuck was wrong with me? I feel myself swallow.
Jack looks up at me, confused. She didn't think we weren't done. We're not. Jesus. Fry's dead. Jack's alive. Jack's here. Her knees are spread and my cum is leaking out of her sweet cunt. Don't fucking care if she comes willingly. Can't care. Not gonna make that mistake again. Not gonna let her die.
I throw her over my shoulder and head back to the bedroom. Something warm and wet slides down between us. Know what that is. Makes me grin.
Wanna throw her down, make her cum and cum until I am ready to have my way with her again. Until she wants to come with me. Maybe that'd work. Restrain myself. Lay her on the diagnostic bed as sweet and gentle as I can. 15% chance of a seizure in the next hour, it tells me helpfully.
She tries to sit up. I put a hand on her chest. "Relax," I whisper. "I owe you one. You can be as noisy as you need to be. Whatdya say this morning? Just a little fun before what's coming comes?"
She shakes her head. "Why do you think you owe me an orgasm?" she asks. "Is there some sort of exchange economy on them where you come from?"
I snort. Start running my hands down her body. "Maybe I'm just a nice guy."
Now she snorts. There's anger in that snort. "You think so?"
I growl, louder than I meant to. She shivers. I smell fear. My dick twitches. Pitch my voice low. "Why would you say a thing like that?"
She doesn't answer immediately. Think about tying her down. Think about all the drugs in this room. One of 'em gotta make her truth telling. Tempting. Really mystified why she's so pissed at me. She doesn't know what I'm thinking. Scoot close. Tangle a hand in her wet hair, pull her head back, expose her neck again. Kiss it roughly.
"I've been very nice, Jack," I say, almost in Riddick voice. Once again, she goes all goose bumps. Like that. Caress her throat. Other hand's between her legs. She's breathing hard.
She shook her head. "You were nice. But a nice guy would have just untied me," she whispers, her voice high and tight. "Only a dick would make me promise to just lie back and take it when he decided to tie me up again."
I stop, my teeth against her jugular. Fry asked me an hour ago if I was gonna be a dick or a hero. Guess I knew then what the answer would be. Still feels like I'm bein' kicked in the gut, hearing Fry's word outta Jack's mouth.
"You rather I make you?" I whisper, rough. "Strap you down while you're fighting me?"
"That's a false choice," she shoots back fast. All the shit that's goin' on, this is what she's pissed about. Huh. "You could have asked nicely. How would you like to wake up strapped down with a bit in your mouth and Toombs looming over you saying he'd untie you if and only if you promised to let him tie you up again?"
My hands tighten. She hisses in pain. Shit. Force myself to relax. "Sorry," I mutter. "Didn't mean to do that." Don't wanna, but I take my hands off of her, lock them behind my head. She sits up, looks like she's going to get off the bed, but something in my face makes her lose her nerve. Stare at her for a long time; long enough that she's begun to look shifty. "You're right. That was a dick move. I'm sorry."
She exhales noisily, looks at me, really looks at me. Her eyes soften. I am a very pretty boy, after all. She pats my cheek awkwardly with a bruised hand. "Yeah. Thanks – thank you."
I put a hand over hers. We're having a moment, sitting naked on a diagnostic bed in a dead military base. She ends it. "I, uh, need to get cleaned up," she says, sounding embarrassed. "And I'm really fucking cold. Also hungry. Do we have anything to eat?"
Glance up at the diagnostic. 22%. Maybe getting upset makes it tick up faster. "Yeah. Dahl brought you some pudding."
He brought her the clothes he found; something that looked like hospital scrubs, old socks, and a big ugly sweater. He didn't dress himself; just pulled the ice giant cape around himself with a carelessness she was fairly certain was calculated. For reasons she did not want to interrogate too strenuously, he wanted her to look at him. It was hard not to. Aside from his ridiculous hair, he was stunning. He seated her at the table and brought her food with an exaggerated courtesy that didn't make sense for a guy who had just shoved her against a wall and fucked her. He also brought her console and seemed content to have her play with it while she ate.
She kept half an eye on him. He set up a cot right by the diagnostic bed, lashing the legs of the two together to make a type of double. Clearly, he intended they sleep together. Again.
Her console was crammed to the brim with data, but wouldn't talk to the system's computers. Looked like she'd turned on security. Or maybe Radne had. From what Richards said, they were locked down in the base, in a communication blackout. She was pretty sure the blast doors would open for her. She was less sure about communications. If she couldn't use the interface again, someone would have to leave the gravity well to call out.
Richards retrieved the clothes she'd worn yesterday, folded them neatly, and put them in her bag. He put it by the door. "Thank you," she called to him.
He grinned at her, lupine and feral. "You never know," he said, his voice low. "Always have a dump bag."
"Ri – someone told me that once," she said. Something dark passed over Richards' features.
"Did you?" he asked, his voice low.
"Yeah." She gave him a quick look. There was a lot of anger in those brown eyes.
"Did it do you any good?"
She nodded. "Yeah. That first time the mercs-" She stopped. "It did me good."
His eyes bored into her. Without breaking eye contact, he pulled a chair right in front of her, boxing her in between the bed the wall, and the table. "These merc assholes grabbed you when you were a kid."
She rubbed her face. "Yeah."
"Dragged you around Audhumla."
"That's what they told me," she said, neutrally.
"They hurt you?"
She flinched, remembering Dahlgren's fingers on the control collar. His look sharpened. I do not like where this is going. ". . . Yeah."
"And you got away."
She smiled. "Yeah."
His eyes became darker. "In Polyphemus station. In the fucking lower levels. With your hands cuffed behind your back and a control collar around your neck."
"Ye-ah. More or less. I got them both off me and onto Dahlgren first." His lips twitched and some of the darkness faded. "How did you know all this?"
"Toombs. He was giving Dahl shit about letting you get away."
"Ah."
"Howdya do it?"
She shook her head. "Someone – someone showed me how to get out of handcuffs, once. I got them off one wrist, and when Dahlgren came at me, I beaned him over the head with them. Pretty easy after that. He was pretty drunk."
"Dahlgren came at you," he said, his face darkening again. "Just him. With your hands cuffed behind your back. Because he was mad about his brother getting eaten by an ice giant. Because he wanted to take it out on you."
"Yeah. I don't think you need me for this story."
He leaned close. "Oh, I do. Was that fucker trying to rape you?"
She felt her face go red. "Just drop it. Please."
He stared at her for a long time. After too long, he backed off, slightly. Muttered, "he's a dead man."
"Jesus," Jack said. "Where the fuck do you get off, deciding that? Where the fuck do you get off, deciding that? We're all in this together, now. He might be the one who saves the galaxy from Necromongers."
Richards snorted. "I don't give a fuck about the galaxy."
"You know you're in the galaxy, don't you?" she said, lighter than she felt. "That was years ago. He's been decent. Made me pudding. Told Toombs to fuck himself instead of putting on the shock collar. Hasn't tried to hurt me, even just a little bit. And I did get his brother killed."
He just stared at her.
"Everyone deserves a shot at redemption," Jack said. "I know I do. I killed someone, you know. A lot of people – a lot of people have died for me." Her eyes bored into his. "I've done bad things. I have a lot to make up for."
"You killed Antonia Chillingsworth," Richards said, his voice flat. "That bitch needed killing. Nothing to make up for there."
Jack rocked back. "You know a whole lot stuff about me for some 'random bruiser Nara picked up.'"
He leaned forward, close enough that she could feel the heat of his body. Not human standard, she thought, suddenly. "Yeah. I know a lot of stuff." He said, his voice intense. "I know you killed that bitch to save your friend, and if he don't do what they want, they're gonna hand you over to her people. Do you know what they'd do to your soft flesh?" His hands were shaking. He saw her eyes on them, and clenched them into fists. Put the fists on her knees. Tapped them, heavily. "You'd be years dyin'."
"You care about that?" Jack said.
"Yeah," he said. "Despite popular reports, I'm not a fucking psychopath. Never fear. I will slit your throat before I let that happen to you."
"Well, that's comforting," Jack shot back. She rubbed her eyes. Took a deep breath. "Jesus, Riddick, let's stop playing. Why are you here?"