Page 26 of Sloane

He points at the darkened circle around his eye where Essa punched him earlier. He didn't even try to stop her when she swung at him, probably feeling just as miserable as I am. When I asked him what happened, he told me Essa didn't hit him hard enough. Probably true since she's stronger than anyone else on the ship. If she wanted to hurt Alik, she would've hurt him, and since he's still here talking with just a swollen eye, it's clear it was more of a warning shot than anything else.

Unlike Alik, I went and started a fight with Phial when I saw him leaving the bathroom after being tucked away in thenavigation pit with Sloane for a few hours. He didn't want to answer my questions about what they were doing in there, and he seemed even more eager to poke fun at me.

When he asked me if I was jealous that Sloane was more interested in his and Holoth's companionship, I wrapped a hand around his throat and kicked his leg out from underneath him. He no longer found it amusing after that. No, he pulled his blaster on me and asked me if I was still myself or if he needed to shoot. It sobered me from my anger, and I ran back to my room, hating myself for getting that worked up in the first place.

"We need to amend the contract," I say, rubbing the back of my head so much that my hair is never going to lie right again.

I'm used to the restlessness of being around a female. I've gone many days feeling restless, and never once have I had to have a blaster pulled on me on day three to calm me down.

It's barely been a few hours, and I can already feel myself slipping away, wanting the primal part of me to take over. I want to take, claim, mark, and protect. All things I can't do, especially if I'm so close to losing myself.

"New rules?" Alik rubs his chin. His other hand is already grabbing for his comm and opening it up. He pulls open a blank document log and begins to type. "What do we need from her?"

"More frequent sex, or at least use of her in a sexual manner." It's the most obvious answer to our problem, but it comes with its own difficulties. "If we do that, I think we need rules for how we behave, too."

"No shit." Alik types away without even waiting for me to suggest how we should act.

I don't say anything. I just try to peek over his shoulder and read as much as I can when he types so fast. When he finishes, he scrolls back up to where he was and then reads it aloud to me.

"No fucking her together, no asking her to role-play getting pregnant, no lips or teeth near her neck, and timed sessions to make sure we don't let ourselves slip too far."

"A timer?"

I flop down on my bed, feeling like I did when we had our second pleasure crew member. She also had a timer, but it wasn't because we wanted to rut her and have her say filthy things to us. No, she just didn't enjoy being part of the pleasure crew. We offered to drop her off at whichever port station she wanted, but she'd always choose those times to dress seductively, say the right things to us to get us in bed, and then start her stupid timer. It would buy her another week on the ship and more money in her account when we finally finished our mission.

Thinking about having a timer with Sloane doesn't feel exactly like that, but it's not a great memory, either.

"Yes, the longer we're near her, letting her tease us and getting ourselves worked up, the more likely we are to slip," Alik speaks as though he's not the one who's slipped the most both times we've been with her. "A timer will ensure we get in and get out as soon as possible."

I have to admit that he makes good points, but that doesn't mean that I have to like these rules. "What about when she's just human crew?"

"Then I think we're fine to be around her." Alik looks at his comm and types out some more before reading it out to me again. "If we start to feel any sort of restlessness, anger, or sense of our baser instincts kicking in, we'll alert Sloane, and she can decide if she wants us to leave her alone or if she wants to assist." He chews on his upper right thumb, eyes scanning over the comm screen once more. "That all sounds good and reasonable, right? It doesn't sound like we're being too demanding?"

"I mean, if it were me, I'd ask for sex at least once a day if Sloane's okay with it." Really, I'd be begging to see if we could test that multiple times a day thing that I keep fantasizing about when it's just me, my hand, and my thoughts of Sloane's naked body. "Obviously, if she doesn't want to one day, we don't hold her to it, but I think we need to let them know just how bad this is affecting our ability to do our job."

"Fuck!" Alik pushes from his desk, pulling a second comm tablet out from underneath his bed and opening it up quickly. "Almost forgot to update Varth on our progress to the rendezvous."

My stomach twists at the reminder of what we're actually doing out here in the middle of nowhere. Sure, any reason is a good reason to be trapped in a spaceship with Sloane. But, in about a week, we'll be waiting for smugglers who want to take her. Smugglers who believe we're going to sell her to them.

It makes it feel gross, though. Not to mention the danger she'll be in just by being that close to a human smuggling ship. The idea of what could happen to her if things go wrong sends a shiver down my spine.

Alik's face screws up for a moment like he's thinking the same thing as me. He tosses the comm tablet used to communicate with the smugglers back under his bed and then continues on our list.

"Sex every day if possible, a timer, no fucking her together," he continues to ramble off the rest of the list and mentally check each one. It isn't until he's edited it three times to word it in a slightly different way that he leans back in his chair and tosses the comm to me. "How's that look?"

I scan over the words, not really paying them much attention since I just heard Alik go over them over and over out loud as he typed it up. It's everything he's already said to me, and I agreewith all of it, even if the timer makes me want to ram my head into a wall.

There's nothing more demoralizing than having a female watching the time to make sure you finish fast enough. Well, the only thing more demoralizing is when you end up frequently finishing with minutes left.

"Essa will need to be there for this conversation." I toss the comm back to him. "It's Sloane's first pleasure trip, so Essa will have been taking many, many notes. She's probably already alerted the pleasure crew company of the drugging. Our rating's going to be bad if we even still have one."

"I don't care," Alik snaps, his mood souring almost instantaneously. "Why should I care what our rating is?"

"Do you never want another female on this ship again?"

Alik's eyes narrow on me, his hands wrapping around his wrists and rubbing at them like something is irritating the pelt. "You've been with her, and you can think of being with another female?"

When I look back up at Alik's eyes, I see my friend is gone. The angry beast of a male in front of me is the same male that had Sloane beg us to give her young and almost marked her with his teeth the first time we were inside her. There will be no reasoning with him, maybe not even winning a fight if I don't play my cards right here.

---