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  She laughed. “Tricky, but I’m glad you did it. I was getting overwhelmed by all the tribute bride talk.”

  “I thought you’d enjoy spending time with other humans.” He started walking toward the inclinator at the end of the shimmering stone walkway, pulling her with him.

  “It’s not that I don’t like talking to them. They’re perfectly nice. Nicer than most people I knew on Earth, actually. It’s just that I’m not used to the whole ‘girl talk’ thing.”

  He tilted his head at her. “I’ve lived most of my life surrounded by warriors, so I would be unfamiliar with ‘girl talk,’ as well. I’ve actually spent very little time talking to females.”

  “For a newbie, you’re not bad,” Katie said.

  He tightened his grip on her hand, enjoying the warmth and how small it felt encased in his. “Thank you. You’re much easier to talk with than the Cressidian pleasurers.”

  “Cressidian pleasurers?” she asked as they stepped into an empty inclinator compartment.

  Zayn nodded. “They’re known to be the most enjoyable pleasurers because of their empathic abilities, but I find you much more intriguing.”

  She stared up at him, as the inclinator surged up. “Did you just say I’m easier to talk to than a hooker?”

  “It’s a very high compliment,” he said, noting that her eyebrows had popped up.

  “Okay.” The corner of her mouth twitched. “I’ll take it as a compliment then. Just don’t expect me to do the same tricks these Cressidians do. I’m not into swinging from chandeliers.”

  Now his eyebrows went up. “Is that a mating ritual on Earth?”

  She giggled. “No, it’s more of an expression.” She faced forward as the inclinator rotated. “Now where are we going?”

  “I know that each of the holographic wings has its own gathering spot. Instead of going to the one on our wing, I thought we could try out one of the other wings.”

  “So cocktails in a different setting?” she asked. “I love that idea. After dress shopping and hiding in an underground bunker, I could use a drink.”

  The inclinator door swished open and a blast of cold air greeted them, making Zayn very aware of how thin his clothing was.

  Katie shivered and rubbed one hand on her bare arm. “Which wing is this? The Himalayas?”

  Zayn didn’t know what that meant, but he did remember the name he’d been told. “The Swiss Alps. The Après Ski bar is supposed to be very charming.”

  “Then let’s find it fast.” Katie tugged him forward down the wooden plank walkway that was dusted with a snow. More snow fell from above, and Zayn flinched as it hit his skin.

  Within a few meters, the walkway forked in two, and he spotted a wooden building to the left with a peaked roof covered in white. Wide windows seemed to flicker from within, and smoke curled up from a chimney. They ran the rest of the way, bursting through the doors and causing the few people inside to turn abruptly.

  “Sorry,” Katie said, wiping her arms and giving a wave to a couple at the long bar who’d looked up.

  Zayn stared at the snow on his arms as it rapidly melted and dripped onto the polished wood floors. “I’ve heard of snow, but I’ve never experienced it before.”

  “Really?” she asked, as he led her to a pair of brown oversized chairs angled in front of a crackling fireplace. “I don’t have a lot of experience with it, either, but do they not have snow on your home world?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t have any memory of the Drexian home world. I grew up on outposts all over the galaxy, but none of them had snow.” He looked out the window to where it fell in a soft curtain. “It’s pretty.”

  “Especially when you’re inside by a fire.”

  Zayn looked over to where the firelight warmed her skin and made her hair look even more like a halo of flames. The brief run had made her cheeks pink and her eyes bright. All the blood in his body rushed south, and his cock stirred. He crossed his arms over his lap. The last thing he wanted to do after last night was scare her with a huge erection.

  A Gatazoid female hurried over, depositing two steaming mugs on the round table in front of them. “House specialty. Hot Buttered Rump.”

  “Did she say rump?” Katie asked, picking up her mug of light brown liquid and blowing on it.

  Zayn plucked the dried padwump stirrer out of his drink. “Yes, she did.”

  Katie took a sip. “It’s not bad. A little sweet, but with a kick.”

  Zayn knew there was some sort of alcohol in the drink, but as he took a long gulp, he couldn’t determine what kind. As long as it wasn’t Noovian whiskey, he’d be fine.

  Katie took another drink, sinking back in her chair. “I’m feeling more relaxed already. Thanks for saving me from an afternoon of wedding planning.”

  “Saving you is my job,” he said, the cocktail warming him and making his fingers buzz.

  She smiled at him over the rim of her mug. “I’m still not used to the idea of us being assigned to each other. What if a match doesn’t work out? What if you hated me?”

  “Not possible. How could I hate you? You’re the most perfect female I’ve ever seen.”

  He wondered why he’d confessed that, and glanced at his now-empty mug. They wouldn’t put Palaxian Pleasure Tonic in these, would they?

  “You think I’m perfect?” She narrowed her eyes at him and took another long gulp. “You barely know me. What if I have a horrible temper or a nasty drug habit? What if I was obsessed with watching the shopping network?”

  “Are you?” He put his mug down on the table and wiggled his tingling fingers.

  “No, but I’m far from perfect. Trust me.” She gave her head a small shake. “On second hand, you shouldn’t trust me.”

  “No?” He chuckled. “Are you dangerous?”

  She winked at him, setting her own empty mug down. “Deadly.”

  Standing up, Katie crossed to his chair and settled herself on his lap. She looped her arms around his shoulders and nuzzled her face in his neck. Zayn’s body hummed with desire, and his cock hardened as the soft curve of her ass pressed against it.

  “I think our drinks may have had Palaxian Pleasure Tonic in them,” he said, trying to slow his own rapid breathing.

  “The other tributes mentioned that,” Katie said, her words slurred. “They said it’s supposed to be really good.”

  His muddled mind weighed the options of letting her continue to nibble on his neck and telling her the truth. “It might make you do something you will later regret,” he finally said.

  “I won’t regret anything I do to you,” she whispered, running a hand down his chest. “Just touching you makes me feel like I’m on fire.”

  “That’s the pleasure tonic,” he said, now noticing other couples with similarly empty mugs locked in embraces around the room.

  She shook her head. “I’ve been wanting to touch you since the first time I saw you, but I’m normally too shy.”

  “Katie.” He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her closer to him. “I’m all yours. You can touch me anyway you want.”

  “Tempting,” she said, raising her head and kissing him gently.

  Zayn sank into the kiss, moaning as her tongue parted his lips, and he tasted the lingering sweetness of the drink. His cock was throbbing now, and he arched up so that it ground against her.

  Katie gasped and pulled away, glancing down at his lap. “It feels even bigger than it looks.” She bit the corner of her lower lip. “I’ve never had one that big.”

  “I promise I won’t hurt you,” he said, tracing a finger along her jaw.

  “I know you won’t hurt me.” She stroked a hand down his cheek. “How is it that I trust you when I barely know you?”

  “The same reason my heart clenches every time I look at you.”

  She giggled. “Are you saying you believe in fate? Isn’t that a bit superstitious for a super advanced alien?”

  “I only know what I feel when I look at you,” he said. �
��That you are mine to protect and cherish. Forever.”

  Katie blinked a few times. “No guy has ever said anything like that to me.”

  “They were the wrong guys.”

  “No kidding,” she said, arching a brow and wiggling her hips on his cock. “And none of them had anything close to this.”

  He brushed a curl off her forehead. “When we are mated, I’ll be very gentle.”

  Katie gave him a mischievous grin. “Too bad.” She leaned over so her lips were next to his ear. “I like it hard.”

  Zayn fought to keep himself from throwing her to the rug and claiming her right there in front of the fire, reminding himself that it was the pleasure tonic talking. He knew his feelings were real, even if his lips were looser than he’d like them to be, but he could not act upon her lowered inhibitions. He wanted nothing more than to take her slow and savor every sensation, but not when she was drunk on pleasure tonic.

  “Zayn?” Katie asked, her sultry tone snapping him out of his thoughts. “I think you should take me back to our suite.”

  Grek.

  Chapter Sixteen

  “Neither of you happen to have a pair of sunglasses on you, do you?” Katie asked, shielding her eyes as they stepped off the inclinator and onto the promenade. Usually, she thought the shimmery cobblestones were pretty, but today they seemed to be glaring up at her.

  “Sunglasses?” Reina gave a high-pitched giggle. “Why would we need sunglasses when we’re so far from the sun?”

  The Vexling’s chirpy voice made Katie’s head pound even more. “No reason.”

  “Would it have to do with the fact that you and Zayn were spotted drinking in the Swiss Chalet?” Serge asked, narrowing his eyes at her.

  “What? No.” Katie’s cheeks warmed. “How did you know that?”

  Serge bustled forward, then stopped and looked back over his shoulders. “There’s little that happens with my tribute brides that I don’t know about, darling.”

  Katie hoped he didn’t know everything that happened last night, or everything she said. The one thing she could be glad about was that she and Zayn had fallen asleep almost as soon as they’d reached their suite. She remembered trying to do a semblance of a strip tease before realizing he was snoring, and then curling up next to him.

  “The drinks they serve there are way stronger than any hot toddy I’ve had on Earth,” she said. “I don’t know what they put in them, but they pack a punch.”

  “Palaxian Pleasure Tonic,” Serge said, with a wave of his hand.

  “That’s right. Zayn mentioned something about that possibly being in the drinks.” Bits of the evening came back to her, and she hoped her face didn’t show her embarrassment at the memories. Had she really told him she’d never felt a cock as large as his. She almost groaned out loud. Way to play it cool, Katie. She knew her plan was to butter him up to get information, but she wasn’t sure if she was ready to butter him up that much.

  Reina shook her head. “They shouldn’t put that in a drink unless they warn you.”

  “A warning sign would have been nice,” Katie agreed, although at the time she’d been perfectly happy to lose some of her inhibitions. If she was being honest with herself, it had felt really good to be in the moment. She’d spent so much of her life working an angle, it had been freeing to not think of any of that.

  “Come on, ladies,” Serge said from several feet ahead of them. “We’ve got lots to do today, and you two are walking slower than molasses in winter.”

  Katie raised an eyebrow, as Reina muttered something about Serge and his Earth sayings.

  “Remind me again who we’re seeing today,” she said, speeding up her pace and marveling at how fast Serge could walk, even though his legs were significantly shorter than hers or Reina’s.

  Before Serge could answer her, Katie’s stomach dropped. Actually, the entire station dropped away as Katie floated off the ground. Serge yelped as he, too, lifted off from the cobblestones. Looking around, Katie saw that everything not secured to the ground was floating. Bistro tables bobbed by and even the water in the fountain was drifting up into the air in an undulating blob.

  “It’s the station’s gravity,” Reina cried out, grabbing hold of Katie’s ankle from below.

  Katie peered down and saw that the willowy alien had one elbow hooked around a lamppost to keep her tethered to the floor. As Serge somersaulted past her, Katie reached for him, clutching one of his wide, green lapels and pulling him closer.

  He stared at her from his upside down vantage point. “This is intolerable!”

  “These malfunctions are getting more intense,” Katie said, remembering when the gravity had flickered off and back on the day before, when they were in the bunker.

  She looked up and gulped. The open-air promenade soared at least two hundred feet overhead, and furniture was drifting up toward the clear domed ceiling. Katie cursed under her breath. If Reina hadn’t grabbed her, she might be fifty feet in the air by now.

  Luckily, it seemed like most people who’d been on the promenade had been able to grab something stationery, but there was lots of shrieking. Most of it coming from Serge.

  “I cannot work under these conditions,” he said, his voice shrill. “I’m going to be lodging a serious of formal complaints as soon as my feet touch the ground.”

  “I’m sure they’ll get things back to normal soon,” Katie told him as she adjusted her grip on his jacket.

  He grabbed her hands. “For the love of everything holy, do not let go of me!”

  She pressed her lips together to keep from laughing, the absurdity of the situation overtaking her fear. “I promise.”

  As abruptly as the gravity had disappeared, it suddenly returned. Katie fell to the ground on top of Reina with Serge collapsing in her lap. Tables and chairs crashed around them, and Katie raised her arms over her head to shield herself from anything else that might fall from above. After a few seconds, she looked out from under her arms.

  Serge’s face was beet-red from hanging upside down and his jacket rumpled from where she’d held on to him. He stood up and brushed himself off, giving both her and Reina a small bow. “It seems I owe both of you a debt of gratitude for not letting me float away like a balloon.”

  “Anytime,” Katie said, although she hoped this would not become a regular occurrence. It would, however, make a great detail for her exposé. She nibbled the corner of her lip as she thought about her article. With all the things happening on the station, it was clear she needed to speed up her timetable. If the Boat was gradually falling apart or breaking down, she didn’t want to be here when it finally failed.

  She thought of Zayn and felt a twinge. Come on, Katie, she scolded herself. You know you never get emotionally involved with a mark. And no matter how hot he was or how he made her feel, he was her mark. He was also the key to her story.

  Tonight, Katie thought. Tonight she’d get what she needed from Zayn. Standing up, she glanced at the furniture that had crashed into the fountain and spotted a Drexian with a bloodied leg. No, she couldn’t think about Zayn. She’d get her juicy scoop and get the hell out of here. Before it was too late.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Zayn was on autopilot as he made his way down the walkway. The power fluctuations had stopped, along with the shooting pains in his head, but he didn’t feel any better. Not after drinking Palaxian Pleasure tonic the night before. Luckily, he and Katie had both passed out once they’d reached their bed, not waking until Serge and Reina had arrived and hustled her off to more appointments.

  He’d been almost glad for the two aliens’ abrupt arrival, since it saved him from the awkward moment when Katie remembered what they’d almost done. He’d seen a flicker of embarrassment in her eyes as Reina had hurried her to dress, and it was a stab to his gut after their closeness the night before. He knew it had been a manufactured intimacy, but he’d never thought pleasure tonic revealed any emotions that weren’t already present. It only seemed to relea
se them. He knew he hadn’t said anything to her he didn’t actually feel, and he held out hope that the same was true of his mate.

  Zayn rubbed his aching head. He wasn’t up to a session in the gym, but he knew the Drexian’s gym also had a pool. A few laps might loosen his muscles, and take his mind off both his nightmares and his new redheaded distraction. The monotony of swimming laps had always helped him clear his mind.

  Following the corridors until he reached the training area, he crossed through the expansive gym, with its hovering punching bags and holographic boxing ring, and entered an even larger room with a clear, hexagonal ceiling. The long, rectangular pool stretched from one end to the other with a white deck surrounding it. The floor felt like rubbery pebbles beneath his feet as he kicked off his shoes and crossed to a wall of cubbies, pulling out a standard issue swimsuit.

  He was the only one in the room, so he shed his clothes quickly and pulled on the suit, which fit like a tighter version of his boxer briefs. Climbing onto one of the starter blocks, he swung his arms back and forth until they touched behind him. His skin felt tight where it had grown back over his scars, and he watched it pucker when he flexed his forearms. Zayn knew these scars would remain, along with his internal ones.

  He dove into the water, feeling the jolt as his body hit the cold, welcoming the cool against his skin as his arms sliced through the water and grateful his family had once been stationed on an outpost near a deep lake. His best memories from his childhood were swimming in that black lake that had been so deep he’d never been able to touch the bottom.

  Thinking about growing up made him think about his parents, which made him swim harder. Both Drexian, they had not been members of the elite class. His father had been a grunt and had worked his way up fighting on the oldest ships and being assigned to defend the most remote outposts. Zayn had sworn he’d bring his family honor when he grew up, and earn his own command.

  His fingers touched the slick end of the pool and he flipped underwater, kicking hard as he broke the surface. He was glad his parents hadn’t lived long enough to witness his disgrace.