Page 2 of Taking Jenny (Planet Orhon #4)

Tiger

J enny giggled and smiled at me. “Sorry for scaring you. Are you alright?”

“Yeah, I…” I shook my head but the vision in front of me remained. “Jenny, what are you doing here?”

I rubbed my knee and tried not to stare at my boss’s consort’s sister. But it was impossible. From the moment I laid eyes on Jenny, I knew I was in trouble. As a child, I’d heard stories of human women who could bewitch men. I used to think they were myths.

Everything about Jenny Hollinger made them real.

She was short, even for a human. Slender yet curvy in all the right places, she was dressed in her sister Sarah’s borrowed clothes: a pink tunic and beige trousers.

Her hair was a pale blonde, with stripes of blue dyed throughout.

She wore it loose and straight, the ends falling just below her shoulders.

Her heart-shaped face framed eyes the color of warm carved wood, eyes that held too much curiosity for my sanity.

And her lips…they owned me when she smiled.

My reaction to her was unlike anything I’d ever experienced before.

“Can I come in?” she asked, her voice soft despite the Ladrian dialect she now spoke.

“Of course.” I gestured to the copilot chair, and she sat down next to me.

She gave me an adorably sheepish look. “Again, I’m sorry for surprising you—”

“I’ve never enjoyed a surprise more,” I admitted truthfully, even though I knew my boss was not going to be happy that I had this particular stowaway on board.

She bit her bottom lip, momentarily distracting me. “Well, I wanted to see Orhon. After seeing Halla and getting to know some of the people, I want to know about the outlying planets. And the people there.”

I didn’t want to disappoint her, but she needed to understand that this was not a trip for pleasure and sightseeing.

“I’m not going to Orhon for fun, Jenny. I’ve been tasked with an important mission.

I’m going to gather intelligence and find out what the palace knows about what happened on Halla with Rex. It’s critical.”

“I know. I promise I won’t get in the way.” A soft, pleading look entered her gaze, mesmerizing me. “I just want to see another planet. It sounds so beautiful and—”

Orhon, beautiful ? I laughed derisively as I switched the ship into autopilot. “I guess it is, but I’m not headed to the nice parts of the planet. I’ll be meeting old contacts in some rough, seedy areas. I don’t think you want to—”

“Yes, I do,” she quickly cut me off, and placed her hand on my thigh. “If I’m with you.”

My cock stirred and my breath caught. It was all I could do not to physically react to her touch. “I would like to have you with me, Jenny, but—”

“Why is there always a but?” she interrupted, and pouted.

I sighed and pressed my fingers against the bridge of my nose.

As much as I enjoyed her company, I couldn’t risk my position with my boss.

Jac had already loaned me his ship. If I pissed off his consort by getting her sister into any kind of trouble, he’d kill me.

What I was about to do was too dangerous, and Jenny was far too innocent when it came to our world.

“I need to call Sarah on comms to let her know you’re here with me,” I said, making the only decision I could. “She must be worried.”

A sad look passed across Jenny’s pretty features. “Please don’t.”

“Why not?”

She swallowed hard and glanced out the cockpit windows. “Sarah means well, but she and Elizabeth have always been overly protective of me,” she said, meeting my gaze once again. “I’m the youngest. They treat me like I’ll break, like I can’t handle serious things. Like I’m weak or—”

“Too na?ve to know better?” I finished for her. “Sheltered?”

Her eyes lit up. “Yes, exactly!”

I huffed beneath my breath. “I know what that’s like.”

She tipped her head curiously. “What do you mean?”

“In the Orne clan, my family’s clan, I’m one of the youngest,” I explained.

“There aren’t many of us left. They didn’t want me working for Jacaranda Cozz because he has a reputation for taking risks and getting himself into dangerous situations.

But Kapok, my cousin, worked for him. The clan wanted Kapok to keep an eye on me.

So I joined up to work for Jac, too.” I didn’t want to burden her with the details of my family life, and kept the rest simple.

“Now Kapok’s gone, and I’m working for Jac on my own.

That won’t go over well. I fully expect the clan master to try and order me back home. ”

A small frown furrowed Jenny’s brows. “Clan master?”

I nodded. “A family’s leader. It’s rare now, since most Ladrians don’t live in clans anymore. The royal family system replaced it a few hundred years ago. Clans fell out of style. That’s part of why there are so few Ornes left.”

“Why would that affect how big your family is?”

“Since it’s no longer fashionable to be in a clan, no one wants to unite with anyone in a clan,” I told her. “My parents’ union was the last one of the Orne clan.”

Her face scrunched up, as if she were trying to make sense of everything I’d just said. “And your clan master, he’s in charge of you?”

“Not in charge. But he keeps the family on course, so we can continue to grow as a clan. And I can’t help with that if I get killed on a risky mission working for Jac.”

“So, your clan master wouldn’t like it if you were running a mission by yourself,” she said, seemingly starting to understand.

I shook my head. “No one in the clan would. This is the kind of dangerous mission Kapok used to do for Jac.”

“Then why can’t you?” she asked simply.

“He was older than me. More experienced. A fighter.”

She looked me over, slowly, then grinned. “You look like you can throw down.”

I chuckled under the weight of her warm, appreciative gaze.

“I’ll defend myself if I have to. But I’m not the kind of guy who will pick a fight over a bad split disk call.

I’d rather try and talk my way out of situation than hurt someone.

Kapok? Total hothead. He loved fighting and had no problem jumping into the thick of things.

” I swallowed hard to keep my emotions in check. “I miss that guy.”

“I’m sorry,” she said softly.

“Thanks.” I steeled my resolve as I glanced back at her. “But I’m not like Kapok and that is why I should drop you off on Halla before I go to Orhon. I don’t want to risk your safety.”

She crossed her arms over her chest, drawing my gaze to her full breasts. “So, you’re going to be overprotective of me, too? Just like my sisters. Just like your clan master?” There was a definite challenge in her formerly warm brown eyes.

I leaned back in my captain’s chair and smirked, realizing just how bewitching she could truly be. “So you made me talk about all of that with my clan and Kapok to trick me?”

“No.” A sly smile curved her lips. “That was just a bonus. You clearly needed to talk about all those things that were obviously bothering you.”

She wasn’t wrong. “How did you know it was bothering me?”

She shrugged. “Once you started telling me everything, I could sense you needed to let it all out. It’s a barista thing.”

I glanced at the console screen, checking to make sure our altitude was still in the right range. “What’s a barista?”

“I work at a coffeeshop,” she said. “I serve espresso drinks and a lot of people like to tell me their problems. I’m easy to talk to, I guess.”

“You are.” Jenny was easier to talk to than anyone I had ever known. She’d gotten more out of me in minutes than most people did in years.

She smiled wistfully. “I love to travel, which drives my sisters crazy. But going to new places, meeting new people, trying weird food—it’s what I live for.

I live cheap and save every penny just so I can travel and experience different parts of the world.

Exploring is my passion. So yeah, I want to come with you to Orhon and experience it firsthand. ”

She continued on when she saw my hesitation. “I understand wanting to tell Sarah that I’m on the ship. That’s fair. But can you wait until we’re already on Orhon before we let her know?”

I shoved my fingers through my hair and exhaled a deep breath, deciding to give Jenny what she desired. “I guess I didn’t find you on the ship…until we landed.”

She grinned and leapt up from her seat. The next thing I knew, she had her arms around my neck to hug me and placed a kiss on my cheek, sending parts of my body into chaos.

“Thanks, Tiger,” she said, beaming happily as she settled back into her chair. “I promise not to get in your way. You won’t even know I’m with you.”

Yeah, that wasn’t going to be an easy feat when I was hyper-aware of every move she made, every breath she took.

Needing a diversion, I increased the speed on the ship and took over the controls again.

As we broke atmo on Orhon, Jenny gasped and glanced out the windows in awe at the approaching planet.

Except there was nothing appealing about where we were headed and I needed to prepare her for what to expect.

“Where we’re landing…it’s not the most pleasant place in Ladrille.”

“What do you mean? It’s gorgeous here.” She swatted my arm and pointed out the window, her excitement palpable. “Do you see that glass castle? It’s amazing.”

“That’s not a castle,” I said. “That’s Deacon’s family home.”

She gasped. “No! Well, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, considering how high ranking he is. Is that where we’re landing?”

“No.” I flew our ship past the estate toward the opposite side of the city. “Because Jac is so notorious, when we visit the city we have to park at the dump.”

She blinked a few times at me, as if she’d misunderstood. “Huh?”

“We park at the city dump,” I repeated, watching as her eyes went wide. “It’s the safest place to leave Sovereign . Otherwise, task forces might impound the ship to keep Jac grounded so they can finally arrest him.”

Jenny’s jaw dropped open. “My sister married a criminal?”