Page 280 of Gladiators of the Vagabond Boxset

Arianna

Curled in Da’vi’s arms, I quieted my anxious mind by chanting positive affirmations in my head.

I was good, I was worthy, I was not impulsive.

Except, I knew that I was impulsive, look at how I’d selfishly chosen to leap into Da’vi’s arms. This wasn’t just sex, not for him…

and maybe not for me, either. I had been lying to myself, thinking that this would make things easier, familiar.

I’d gone and screwed everything up yet again. My family was right: I was an idiot.

Running my fingers over the lines that marked his skin, I delighted in the way they lit up at my touch.

It felt like lightning was chasing my fingertips—fun and electric.

It did the trick, finally distracting me from the mess I was in.

Drifter Arianna, who couldn’t make any permanent ties, got pushed aside in favor of curiosity about his body, his incredibly pretty, sexy body.

“Will you tell me what happened to your hands?” I asked quietly.

I didn’t want to ask him something that might be painful, but it was starting to nag at me that I didn’t know why his hands were made of metal.

At first, I thought they were gloves, like the metal blade he wore on the tip of his tail, but he never took them off.

Da’vi sighed, and a little rumble—a sort of half-growl—came from his chest. I wasn’t quite sure if that meant I’d offended him by asking, or if he was just contemplating how to answer. I shouldn’t be nosy; my father told me that all the time growing up, being nosy got you in trouble.

He lifted one metal hand to let the light of the single lantern shimmer along the shiny black surface.

The other was curled around my shoulder on top of the blankets, holding me snugly against his deliciously warm body.

“They are burned, badly,” he said, his voice raspy and deeper than usual.

My heart ached just hearing him say that, so they were covering up an injury. What had happened to him?

“It was my last fight as a gladiator. I had to face off against the Beast with two others,” he explained.

I felt a rush of sympathy. Being forced to fight against your will was barbaric, but it sounded even more horrible when he had to fight some kind of terrible beast. “That’s the Captain.

The Beast was his gladiator name, like mine was Doom. ”

Recalling what the Captain looked like, I winced.

Ziame was huge, with green, armor-like scales, and knives on his spine, tail, and arms. He had a maw full of sharp teeth and clawed fingers…

He was also nearly eight feet tall. Da’vi was a huge alien, approaching seven foot, but he was dwarfed by the Captain, both in width and size.

“I’m sorry Da’vi. That sounds horrible. I’m sorry you had to go through that. ”

He shrugged beneath me. “It’s okay, and we don’t hold injuries inflicted in the arena against each other, you know.

I nearly killed Ziame with my sword; he defended himself by blowing fire on my hands…

I have extensive nerve damage and sensitive, fragile skin.

The prosthetics give my hands the strength and protection I need to do my job. ”

Even with functioning prosthetics that helped him, it had to be sad to know that you could never fully use your own hands again.

I didn’t mind the feel of them on my skin, but how much could he feel with his metal fingers?

Was it the same as touching me with real hands?

I hated that he’d gotten hurt, that it had been someone he knew, a friend even.

I hated that evil existed in the universe, that it could do these things and make good men like him go through such horrible experiences.

Touching the one he was holding up to the light, I stroked over the segmented bits. “Can you still feel that?” My palm was tiny when I pressed it against his, but we could still hold hands. He moved them like they were real fingers, with no mobility issues whatsoever.

“Definitely. The sensors for these are amazing, they have to be, or I’d never be able to do the precise work repairing an engine requires.

” He smiled, I could see it from the corner of my eye.

He didn’t seem too hung up on it, so I tried not to dwell on the negative either. That never worked out, anyway.

“Besides, if not for Ziame, I would not be free today. They rescued me from that arena. I’m happy in the Vagabond’s engine room.

” Da’vi turned his head, his amethyst eyes warm as he looked at me.

“I’m pretty happy in this shuttle too.” With his wild purple and black hair falling across his forehead and into his eyes without his bandana, he looked cute. He looked handsome.

Ignoring the protective feelings he’d invoked in me over his injuries, I pressed closer, leaning in to kiss him.

Distractions were good; I could always count on distracting myself, I’d perfected that skill.

Rolling on top of him, I sank into the kiss, letting myself get lost in the sensations of his body against mine.

*

Da’vi

I woke to the sound of the com system softly beeping.

It was the emergency channel, the only one I’d left open so the system wouldn’t waste energy scanning other frequencies.

Stumbling out from the pile of soft, warm things—Arianna, blankets, clothing—I managed to locate a pair of pants that fit while I hopped toward the console.

No sign of a ship, so I risked flipping the channel open to listen to what was going on.

“What’s happening, baby?” Arianna said sleepily behind me.

I wasn’t quite sure why she’d called me an infant, I thought I’d proven thoroughly that I wasn’t.

We’d fucked at least four times; I had to make sure she stayed warm.

“Something on the emergency channel. I hope it’s the Vagabond letting us know it’s safe.

” I really hoped it wasn’t an actual distress call from my brothers, but that was a slim chance.

The Kertinillian Army might be trying to rather forcefully recruit me.

They wouldn’t just go around blowing ships out of the sky, that would be extremely dishonorable.

There were only quiet beeps on the emergency frequency, nothing that sounded like an actual distress call. That was a relief; if they were in trouble, there would have at the very least been some kind of recorded message repeating. Akri would have taken care of it.

“Nothing alarming,” I said while I listened closely to the repeating patterns of beeps.

It sounded like it could be some kind of code, but if it was, it wasn’t one I recognized.

“Do you know what this is?” I knew several of the ciphers that the Kertinillian Army used to encode their messages, but this didn’t sound like one of them.

It sounded extremely basic, but without booting up the shuttle’s systems, I wouldn’t be able to use the computer to calculate the probabilities.

Arianna appeared from between the blankets, dressed and shaking a little.

She stepped up next to me, her breath misting in the air in front of her with each exhale.

“Sounds like Morse code to me,” she offered.

“There are long and short beeps, right? Each pause means the end of a letter and the start of a new one.”

Primitive but effective. “Okay, so what are they saying? This has to be the Vagabond, right? This is a human code?” I searched the screen, but there was no sign of a ship, just the green curve of Zosma Y filling the screen.

A Kertinal ship wouldn’t know this kind of code, so it had to be a signal that it was safe to come out of hiding.

Arianna huffed, her teeth clacking together.

Wrapping my arm around her shoulders, I tugged her into my body, my tail curling around her middle.

“I don’t actually know Morse code, but I’m pretty sure that’s it.

” When I looked at her, there was no sign of her usually sunny expressions; she looked a little angry with herself.

I pressed my forehead to hers. “It’s fine.

We’re going to risk firing up the thrusters a little and drift around the moon.

I’m sure they just meant to give us a human-only signal to let us know it’s safe.

” The beeps almost sounded like the static of space; it was innocent-sounding.

I doubted a Kertinal vessel listening in would think anything of it.

Arianna had known, though. That was enough.

The moment we had drifted enough, I could spot the Vagabond—nearing the moon, already close by.

Risking it, I started engaging more systems; Ziame wouldn’t have given the order to approach if he didn’t think it was safe.

They just didn’t know exactly where we were either, which made locating us hard without real coms.

“Let’s go,” I told Arianna, eyeing her ravished appearance with some satisfaction.

It was too bad our private little time had come to an end, but I couldn’t be selfish; we had to try to reach Yengar to rescue more humans.

She was trying to finger-comb her dark brown locks, but they appeared hopelessly tangled.

Good, I wanted all my brothers to know she was claimed.

I didn’t even care that I was barely dressed, but when Arianna started to try to put my arms in my sleeves, urging me to get more clothes on, I gave in.

Maybe she wasn’t as comfortable announcing to the entire Vagabond crew what we’d been up to.

It had seemed like she was okay with it down on the planet; it wasn’t as if those tents were completely soundproof.

Eoin and Jakar knew, so the rest of the crew now did as well.

Landing the shuttle in the already-open cargo bay of the ship, we had to wait for the doors to close and the bay to pressurize.

Spinning Arianna in my arms, I tilted her chin up with a finger so I could press a kiss to her soft, pink mouth.

“We’re safe. I’ll get this engine going, and then we get to play hero and rescue more humans. ”

I wanted to say things about the future, about how I’d make her a happy mate for the rest of her life.

That I wanted her in my bed every night for all the days to come.

Somehow, those words never made it past my lips.

The shuttered look in her eyes… it filled me with disquiet.

Something was happening inside that pretty head of hers.

Wasn’t the joining of our bodies enough to show her that we were perfect together?

Things moved far too fast when the shuttle opened for us to talk about it.

Suddenly, we were surrounded by humans and gladiators, everyone asking if we were all right.

Arianna was already arm in arm with Abigail and Camila before I knew it, walking off the shuttle without a backward glance.

I tried to ignore how that made me feel, plastering a frown on my face as I stalked after them and turned toward the engine room, Eoin and Ziame following me.

“With your load of ore, we have more than enough to fix the engine,” Eoin said.

“I already refined what Jakar and I brought up, so you can get started right away.” The male was grinning, his bright mercury eyes glimmering with excitement.

Like Jakar, he was handy, but his affinity for metal had naturally drawn him even more to the engineering part of the ship, while Jakar had followed his heart and was babying the hydroponics and his vegetables.

Ziame rumbled at my side, smoke curling from his nostrils, accompanied by a clicking sound.

I tried to hide the instinctive urge to step aside, my hands tingling in remembrance.

“The Kertinal vessel left after scanning the planet and our ship, and confirming there was no Kertinal present. I do not believe they will be fooled again. How long until our FTL drive is up and running?”

I wanted to spend time with Arianna, to have her sunny presence at my side or in my ear through coms. Since that didn’t seem to be happening, I’d focus on working as hard as I could.

“No more than twelve hours, Captain,” I said.

It would push me—I’d had little sleep at all—but I’d put Eoin to work; that would speed up the process.