Hunted by the Cyborg with Bonus Read online

  She’d never forgive herself. “Let me try again.”

  “Aim for the center of mass.” He handed her the weapon and stepped back.

  This time, she kept her eyes open. She took out the Lamis-Odg first, measuring the blast to stun, rather than kill. The android hit the floor, and she fired on the weird panther creature next. To that one, she delivered a killing stream of photons. The Malodonian. Thud. The Arcanian. His six eyes rolled in different directions. Lastly, the human. They all fell, their programming causing them to twitch the way their sentient counterparts would.

  “That’s my girl!” he said. “Damn, you’re a crackerjack shot when you keep your eyes open.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Beth lunged, knocked Carter’s feet out from under him, shoved him onto the bed, and flung herself on top of him. Grabbing his wrists, she pinned them over his head.

  “I’m at your mercy.” He shot her a lazy, lascivious smile.

  “Yes, you are. So you’d better do what I tell you to,” she said, feeling a little drunk on her own power, although she knew she’d succeeded in tossing him onto the bed only because he’d allowed it.

  “I may have erred in teaching you how to fight,” he joked. “I had no idea you would use your training against me.”

  “A strategic miscalculation on your part.”

  In reality, after two months of training, she had yet to gain an advantage over a cyborg. Their strength, speed, and endurance bested any human’s capabilities. However, she’d discovered a natural athletic ability, and, honed by rigorous exercise, her body had grown stronger, more toned, more agile, quicker. She’d turned into a damn good fighter. She might not be able to get the upper hand on a cyborg, but her Aym-Sec sparring partners hadn’t stood a chance.

  Manacling Carter’s wrists, she teased his bare chest with the tips of her naked breasts. His erect cock throbbed against her dampening pussy. She wiggled.

  He feigned trying to free his wrists, and she tightened her grip while rubbing herself against his hard-on.

  With a straight face, he said, “You do realize you’re leaving me no choice but to break out the big gun…” He thrust his hips upward.

  “Bring it. I’m trained in advanced weaponry, too.” Her laughing snort spoiled the imperiousness.

  He broke her hold to cup her neck and draw her closer. Cerinian brandy-scented breath caressed her face. His eyes gleamed with amusement and desire. “I’ll show you my gun, if you show me yours.”

  “Deal,” she said, before his mouth covered hers.

  Tongues met with a promise of greater delights, warmth and taste suffusing her senses. His embrace, his presence, his acceptance filled the empty spaces of her life until no gaps remained. With him, she belonged. With him, she loved. With him, she felt whole. Real. Human.

  Their fingers interlaced as they kissed. “Thank you,” she said.

  His lips twitched against her mouth. “Most women wait until after I’m done before they thank me.”

  “Ha ha.” She nipped his lower lip. Emotion swelled inside. She needed him to understand how much he meant to her. “I love you so much. Thank you for loving me back.” For accepting me for who I am, what I am. For helping me to become a better version of me.

  He sobered. “I love you. I never thought I’d have this. Until you came along, I lived to work. As soon as the Summit wraps up, we’ll go away together. What do you say?”

  “Yes. Where?”

  “How about the Darius 4 Pleasure Resort?”

  She drew back and frowned. “Isn’t that the planet staffed by android sex workers?”

  “That’s one part of it. The resort has themed venues for couples. There’s a Polynesian island, the wilderness adventure, the Xenian castle…”

  “Okay. Sounds good. Do we have to plan our vacation now?”

  “Point taken. My bad.” He tugged her upwards and captured her nipple. Hot, sweet sensation shot through her as he sucked. “Is this better?” he murmured.

  “It was until you stopped,” she complained.

  “Cheeky.” He gave her ass a light slap but resumed nuzzling her breasts. The pull registered deep in her core. Her skin tingled from the brushing of his slightly raspy face as he moved from one breast to the other. His hands were cool, but warming, as he lifted the mounds to his mouth.

  She rubbed her clit against his hard length. Tension coiled inside; she could come just from doing this. She teased herself and him by lining up the slickened crown of his cock with her entrance. With little bounces, she played. One good thrust, and he’d be inside…

  Beth avoided temptation and scooted down his body, flicking her tongue over his flat nipples then tracing the rippled abdominal muscles. She let her breath swirl over his erection. His member twitched.

  Nudging her head, he urged her to take him into her mouth. Instead, she drew the tip of her tongue around the thickened coronal ridge then down his long, thick shaft to his balls. She kissed his scrotum, pressing her lips to the ovules contained within then meandered a wet trail back up his length. Finally, she gave him what he asked for.

  He tasted of salt, precum, and her essence, a heady aroma and flavor that ramped up her craving for completion. She would have been tempted to slip her hand between her own legs and work one off while she pleasured him, but his hand was already there.

  She moaned as his fingers circled her clit, slipped between her folds. One long digit slid deep inside her channel, and she contracted her inner muscles.

  She squeezed his shaft, pumping with her hands. More fluid seeped from the tip, and she lapped it up. His thrusting fingers whipped up her lust. She moaned, a low, guttural sound. She was so close…

  He hauled her onto her knees. Positioning his cock, he surged inside, filled and stretched. Satisfaction shuddered through her.

  “Good?” He panted in her ear, his breath hot.

  “Don’t stop.” She pushed back against him.

  He lifted her hips and drove into her, grinding his cock against her clit on the inward stroke, dragging against it outward bound. Damn, the man could fuck. She surrendered to the sensation, surrendered to him, hanging on for the ride of her life.

  His scent, his grunted exhortations, his body slapping her, his cock—oh his cock—pushed her to the edge of the cliff and shoved her over. She cried out on the way down, free-falling toward a crash, but he caught her before she fell and sent her soaring over the top again.

  She came twice, and then finished off a third one before Carter emptied himself, his body slickened with sweat, his cock jerking.

  Together, they collapsed on the bed. Still joined, he rolled them to a spooning position. With his body cocooning hers, she relaxed into lassitude.

  Against her back, his heart thumped. He nuzzled her neck. “You should move in,” he murmured. “You’re here almost every night anyway.”

  True. Rarely did she stay in employee housing anymore. While they didn’t hide their relationship, they did try to be discreet. It wouldn’t look right for the director to be seen sneaking into her quarters, so they retired to his penthouse at the end of the workday then traveled via PeeVee to Cy-Ops in the morning. The exceptions were the times when he left on a mission; then she stayed in the employee section—and missed him terribly.

  “I can do that.” Unlike the O’Shea space station, where she’d been made to feel like a guest who’d overstayed her welcome, she felt at home in the apartment. She’d even gotten to like the overly conscientious little house robo.

  “But are you going to move in?” she quipped. Prior to their involvement, he’d pretty much lived in employee housing. She owned very little, but more of her personal stuff was at the penthouse apartment than his.

  “Touché, smarty-pants,” he said. “Let’s both move in.”

  “What happens when you’re on a mission?” she asked.

  “You can use my PeeVee to go to and from work, which leads into another issue.” L
aziness disappeared from his voice. “I want you to remain on Terra during the Summit.”

  “What? Why? I don’t understand. I assumed I would be going.” The scanners had been delivered to Luna Center. The personnel schedule had been finalized. Everyone knew where they needed to be and when, but she’d planned to be on site to supervise the final details. Besides, the Summit was the single most important meeting in the galaxy, and this particular one the most critical. She wanted to see it—if only from the sidelines!

  “I would feel better if you were here—safe on Terra, safe at Cy-Ops.”

  Her heart thudded. “Have you heard something?” As Cy-Ops director, Carter received regular intel. She didn’t know what the reports contained, but he often holed up in his office with the members of his inner circle and/or disappeared on missions after receiving them.

  He sighed. “Nothing. That’s what worries me. It’s too quiet. Chatter has dwindled to almost nothing. It makes me nervous, so you need to stay here.”

  Was this how it would be? Every time he got “nervous,” she’d be protected out of doing her job? No. Absolutely not.

  She sat up, ready to go to mat on this one. “Let me do what you hired me to do. You’re aware of threats the rest of us can’t imagine, but I don’t want to live safely, I want to live. I promise I won’t take stupid risks. For stars’ sake, you trained me! You taught me to fight, how to fire a blaster.” She waved her arms. “Is that why you asked me to move in here—so you could keep an eye on me?”

  “No, of course, not.” He raked a hand through his hair. “I asked you to move in so we could be together.”

  “Nearly every cyborg and Aym-Sec officer will be guarding Luna Center. A fortress isn’t that well defended.”

  “I can’t refute the facts…” He shook his head. “I would feel better if—”

  “Are you ordering me to stay home?”

  “Is that what it’s going to take?”

  “Is Carter the director or Carter the man issuing the order?” To sustain the health and longevity of their relationship, they had agreed to compartmentalize their interactions. On work-related matters, she would defer to his wishes. On personal matters, they stood on an equal footing. If he pulled rank, she would obey his request, but she didn’t like it one bit.

  He sighed. “The man—mostly.”

  “Then, let me do my job. How will it appear to the staff if you put your girlfriend on light duty? All I’m going to do is oversee the installation and operation of the scanners and coordinate the support staff. It’s a boring, mundane job.”

  “You got shot!”

  “I could be shot walking down the street on Terra, knifed in the lobby of the Galactic Trade Center, or mugged in a PeeVee garage.”

  “That’s supposed to make me feel better? Besides, Cornelius’s attack wasn’t an act of random violence or robbery; it was an attempted political assassination.”

  “Of Mikala—not me! If I hadn’t tripped, I wouldn’t have gotten hurt.”

  “So you think your job is boring?” He switched gears.

  “No. Not exactly,” she hedged. The chance to work for Aym-Sec—Cy-Ops—as a logistics coordinator had been the chance of a lifetime. If she hadn’t undergone the self-defense training and discovered her strength and confidence, she wouldn’t have realized what she was missing. However, a desire to challenge herself mentally and physically had germinated. A wild, what-if kind of dream had taken shape as a goal to strive for. She’d been intending to talk to him about it, but this was the worst possible time to broach the subject.

  “When I lived on the O’Shea space station, I spent a lot of time in the observation lounges staring out into space. Earth and the moon were right there. So, so close—yet unreachable.” So wondrous, awe-inspiring. People who’d grown up on a planet took for granted the simple pleasures. She’d had no idea what it felt like to walk a real garden path, a city street, or feel the ocean surf foam over her toes. Gazing at Earth and its moon, she’d dreamed. Maybe one day…

  Until she’d come up with a plan and convinced the O’Sheas to let her leave, Earth and an entire galaxy had been denied her. “I object to being an observer, watching life roll by.” She’d fought too hard to come to Terra to play it safe.

  “What is it you want?” he asked quietly.

  “I’ll never be a Cy-Ops field agent—”

  Carter’s eyes darkened.

  “I know you have to be a cyborg. And I don’t intend to become one,” she reassured him. “However, I would make a good Aym-Sec officer.”

  “You’re killing me. You’re trying to worry me to death, aren’t you?”

  “Aym-Sec positions aren’t as dangerous as Cy-Ops.”

  “That doesn’t mean risk-free. There are still hazards. You’re a woman.”

  “You employ other women in those positions.” And, he had two female cyber operatives.

  “They’re not my woman,” he said.

  His woman. She liked the sound of that but refused to be distracted or deterred by the warmth his words created. “Do you think I couldn’t handle it physically? I’m not trained enough?” She’d push herself harder, longer. She would qualify.

  “No,” he admitted reluctantly. “You’re damn good.” He rubbed his eyes. “I have no reason to deny you, other than one.”

  “The idea scares you?”

  “The idea terrifies me.”

  “You face scary situations all the time in Cy-Ops.”

  “It’s my life I’m endangering, not the life of the woman I love.”

  “I’m not asking to be a field agent. I’m aware it’s beyond my capability.”

  “Thank common sense for that small favor.” His hair stood up at all angles from raking his hands through it. He twisted his mouth. “I was trying to protect you when I insisted you learn self-defense. Let me think about it, okay? Let’s get the Summit over with, and then we’ll revisit your request.”

  “Fair enough,” she agreed. It was a step in the right direction. “And what about the Summit?”

  “You’re relentless.” He sighed. “All right. You can go.”

  “Thank you.” She stifled a crow of triumph. Maybe he’d tossed her a bone; maybe he realized how serious she was and would not be deterred; maybe he intended to test himself to see if he could handle it. Whatever his reason, she’d take it. The Summit would give her a chance to prove her mettle. She’d show him what she could do, and he’d grant her request. She wouldn’t rest until he did.

  Chapter Twenty

  “Fourteen ships, correct?” Carter asked cyborg Dale Homme, an inventor who designed spaceships and other tech. Through his connections, Homme had gotten his hands on some alien vessels, acquiring invaluable intel for Cy-Ops.

  “Correct. Four cloaked fighters will orbit the moon, ten others will be stationed in the outer sector, ready to move in at a moment’s notice,” Homme said.

  Carter had called his seven most trusted best and brightest for one last briefing before deployment: Homme, Kai Andros, March Fellows, Sonny Masters, Manny Mansfield, Illumina, and Brock. There was no such thing as being too prepared. Check, double-check, and check again.

  He wished the entire fleet could be on the ready and armed during the Summit, but competition for orbit space would be fierce. Vessels from across the galaxy would converge on the moon like a cloud of gnats. Hundreds of large ships would hover in lunar space while thousands of transport pods would zip to and from the surface. Dodging ships that couldn’t see or scan them would be tough enough with just four vessels.

  “Lamis-Odg could also have cloaked ships at the Summit,” Carter said.

  “Moonbeam is in the programming stage on a cloak detector and jammer,” said Homme, who owned a spacecraft factory. He nodded at his wife and Cy-Ops partner. “Illumina has been assisting with coding. I wish we had a prototype for the Summit, but we’re not ready yet.”

  “We’ll want safeguards built into it anyw
ay,” he said. “That’s all we need is for Lamis-Odg to get their hands on a jammer.” The terrorist nation had acquired cloaking technology when they took possession of a downed Cy-Ops ship. For a primitive people who scoffed at science and believed in gods and sand demons, they’d taken to modern technology like an Arcanian to a tourist’s wallet.

  “Has there been any more chatter about the secret weapon, about it being unleashed at the Summit?” asked Amanda “Manny” Mansfield.

  “That was our conjecture, based on the broken communique we intercepted. We don’t know what kind of ‘weapon’ Lamani has—or if he has one. It could be another ruse, but we have to be prepared and assume Lamis-Odg will be nearby.”

  “They do have a vested interest in the outcome,” Brock said drily, “seeing how the AOP will decide whether to declare war.”

  “The initiative is expected to fail by a large margin, but Brock is correct. If I was Lamani, I’d stick close by to find out what’s going on,” Carter said.

  Manny drummed her nails on the console. “I don’t mind not chasing my tail to put to rest rumors and dead ends, but it seems ominous the false leads have ceased.”

  She and her partner and husband, Sonny Masters, had the distinction of having gone undercover on the Lamis-Odg home world in search of Lamani. The terrorist leader had vanished before they got there, but they’d connected with an underground Resistance movement. Cy-Ops now had allies on the inside.

  Sonny shook his head. “Lamis-Odg and their Malodonian partners have been flooding cyberspace with false rumors of attacks for years, and all of a sudden they go silent? That’s bad news—not to mention the possibility they might have developed a secret weapon. What if they have an undetectable microexplosive device?” Looking grim, he glanced at his wife.

  Until now, Carter hadn’t appreciated the stress Sonny must feel when his wife, Amanda Mansfield, deployed. Beth wasn’t in near the danger Amanda was, but he faced similar anxieties. It had nothing to do with them being female. It was more about the relationships.