Page 188 of Gladiators of the Vagabond Boxset

Noa

I was feeling so much better that it was hard to deny what Luka had just told me.

I still didn’t want to believe it, and I wanted to be angry about it, with him.

Except he was trapped just like me. When I thought about it, that made so much more sense—the guards, the lack of clothing that first day.

I’d finished my floor of rooms in record time after I’d sat with Luka for an hour.

I’d rushed out of there and made short work of things, letting out my frustration—my sense of feeling even more trapped than before.

I wanted to smash things, so I’d vacuumed with a vengeance and scrubbed tiles with fury.

I was exhausted by the time I sat down for my evening ration bar with the other women.

The kind of tired that came from a lack of food, sleep, and hard work.

Not the kind from a raging fever, of feeling sick, so it was still a marked improvement.

Aradne even gave me a pointed glance and then a sharp nod.

“Good, are you going to get back to your normal work now?” When I nodded at her, she gave me a grin full of sharp teeth. “Excellent.”

That night, I slept without dreams, and that morning, my appetite was back.

I felt a little off-center, like I had that first time after I’d left Luka’s presence, as if I had a slight balancing problem.

I hated that all he’d said was that my body had developed a sudden need for his particular pheromones and that he didn’t have the means to fix it.

How could this have happened? Why? But I realized, as I left his room, that maybe the dependency wasn’t as one-sided as it appeared.

I’d caught the way he’d almost moved as if to go after me.

He didn’t like it when I left—he’d even grimaced as if he was in pain.

As we assembled in the kitchen that morning to receive our assignments for the day, a hush fell over the crowd just before the Dragon swept into the room.

At her heels trotted the Dumb Duo, kitted out in the black-and-gold uniforms standard for the resort.

I shivered at their appearance, my skin breaking out in goosebumps just at the sight of Dumber and his glare as he spotted me.

He had definitely not forgotten how I’d taunted him.

This wasn’t the normal way things operated; the Dragon rarely got involved with the standard day-to-day operations.

Now, she launched into a speech that served as a warning for punishment to come if we didn’t get this resort into tip-top shape in the next five days.

There was no explanation as to why we were suddenly required to tackle a lot of extra maintenance, but we could all hazard a guess: someone very important was coming.

My task list that day was twice as long as it normally would be, with instructions on how to deep clean things like the carpet and the bathroom for each suite.

Just looking at the list made me a little dizzy; this was going to take forever.

As soon as the Dragon swept out of the kitchen, grumbling erupted among the gathered crowd.

A peek at the lists of some of the others near me told me they had lists of similar lengths.

When I headed for the basement with the other housekeepers to prep my hovercart, I made sure to stay near Aradne and her bunkmate, Moira.

While Moira was anything but fierce, their presence would probably deter any kind of shenanigans.

I had a feeling that Dumber was going to try and look me up, so I needed to make sure he couldn’t catch me alone somewhere.

The cart was heavy with all the extra cleaning supplies, so I really had to put my back into it to get it to steer right.

In the elevator to the top floor, I actually landed the damn cart and then leaned over it so nothing rattled out of it, but I still had to collect two stacks of towels and place them back on the thing.

The ever-present guard was at Luka’s door, and I contemplated doing his room first. My skin was itchy with the need to go see him.

The very reason I’d spent two whole weeks already trying to avoid him.

I refused to be dependent on any man. I hadn’t relied on one back on Colony Four; I wasn’t going to start here on Jihari.

With how long my list was, I decided to put Luka’s visit right in the middle. I wasn’t a hundred percent sure, but I had a feeling he might help me, and maybe I could actually take a break for a few minutes. This was going to be exhausting, but there was nothing for it but to put my back into it.

By the time I was done with the first four suites, I was a hot, sweaty mess.

At least three of those rooms had been vacated, so I didn’t have to tiptoe around someone’s personal belongings.

I was faint with hunger, but I had four more to do before I could head for Luka’s room.

I stepped out into the hallway to head for my next one, my arm clutched around my midriff to press against my rumbling belly.

My skin prickled, the back of my neck crawling with sensation.

I spun around in time to watch Dumber step out of the service elevator with a smug grin on his face.

In his security uniform, he looked dapper—like a space cadet freshly kitted out for some formal occasion.

His short hair curled slightly over his pointed ears, which were studded on the lobes with a glittering red gem.

All he did was give me the creepy crawlies.

The Rummicaron guard was watching with interest as Dumber approached, and I backed up, dragging the cart with me. I kept it between us while I grabbed my trusty glue gun. Since Luka’s arrival, I’d kept that thing somewhere for easy access just in case; I wasn’t taking any risks.

“Where do you think you’re going, you bitch?

” Dumber demanded. He proved the validity of his nickname the next moment when he tried to stop my hovercart from moving and pressed the blatantly green button labeled "Go" in Aderian.

He was holding onto the edge of the cart with his hand, but when he effectively pressed on the gas, he yanked himself off his feet.

I, on the other hand, leaped forward with the cart’s sudden, jerky motion and steered it right at the Rummicaron guard and Luka’s room.

The bulky male leaped aside to avoid being run over, and I slammed the cart to a stop and my palm to the door panel, making it swish open.

Luka was right on the other side, as if he’d heard the commotion and was waiting for me, ready for action.

His hands were around my waist, yanking me into the room, and the cart followed as it was programmed to.

Only this time, Dumber tried to follow, slamming into the hovercart, and the whole cart wedged itself inside the opening when it crazily spun around, blocking access for both Dumber and the Rummicaron guard, who was growling with annoyance at all the ruckus.

“Now that’s certainly one way to make an entrance,” Luka drawled, his long-fingered hands still curled around my waist. He pulled me a little closer until my palms pressed against his chest, allowing me to feel the dense, heavy muscle beneath his dark red shirt, to feel the heat radiating from him. “Are you alright, Noa?”

I tilted my chin up to look at the sharp line of his jaw, but I was too close to really see what he was thinking.

His eyes were focused on the open door and Dumber, who was cursing up a storm as he tried to unstick the cart.

When I looked, I realized that the Rummicaron had stepped back, arms crossed over his chest, while he stared at Dumber with an open mouth.

Yeah, that’s the kind of idiot we were dealing with here.

Didn’t even understand the freaking hovercart.

“I see you still can’t tell the difference between your left and your right boot, can you, Ceralion?

” Luka drawled with a heavy dose of mockery.

“Do you need a hand, cousin?” he added when Dumber made a frustrated growling noise and let go of the cart at last. I tried to hide my shock at Luka admitting a family connection with this sack of shit, but I caught a flash of amusement in his glittering black eyes.

“Fuck you, Lukalyn,” Dumber said, his left hand shooting up to make some kind of gesture. Tips of thumb and pinky touching—I’d seen that gesture a few times when Aderians were arguing or taunting each other. I had gathered that it meant something vulgar, like sticking out a middle finger was to me.

“Now, that’s not nice. What did I ever do to you?

” Luka drawled, and now his hands shifted on my waist—one hand curling to pull me to the side, pushing me back until I was behind him.

I tightened my grip on my glue gun and stepped back, allowing Luka to stand in front of me.

I didn’t like being dependent on anyone, but I wasn’t an idiot.

If Luka wanted to get in the line of fire, I wasn’t stopping him.

Luka had taken on this casual pose as if he hadn’t a care in the world, but I saw the tension in his shoulder blades.

Moving me back had triggered the hovercart to make another attempt at following me into the room.

Now that Dumber wasn’t holding it, it actually could—its auto-rotating system allowing it to spin to align properly with the door.

As soon as the cart cleared the doorframe, Dumber stomped inside after it, and my skin immediately started to crawl, feeling like it was covered in muck, as if I were sinking into a swamp of terror.

He was grinning, sharp canine teeth on display. “Do to me? Like you don’t know, you smug asshole. You think you’re so much better than me! But look who’s locked up. Who’s the one with the power now?”