Page 16 of Her Lawless Prince

“Our first defiance didn’t turn out so well.” He calibrated the controls and then directed the compression material to wrap around Yevgen. It didn’t look quite as fetching on the machine. “Captain Rita wasn’t lying. Unless you know where you are and how to fly an escape pod to the nearest port, there’s no escaping a spaceship.”

“They have to fuel sometime,” Payton said. “And I’m confident I can figure out how to fly a pod if I have to.”

“If they don’t shoot us out of the sky,” he said.

“They won’t. Not if we have Yevgen with—”

The door slid open. Fuse stood holding a tray with one hand and a blaster with the other. Glaring at Payton, he put the tray on the floor and kicked it lightly with the tip of his boot. Two bowls filled with what looked to be foam slid toward her.

Payton grimaced. “What the blasted spaceport is that?”

Fuse gave her a superior grin. He touched the cut on his neck where Payton had clawed him. “She said I had to feed you. She didn’t say you had to like the menu.”

Fuse gave a dark laugh as the door slid closed.

“Wait!” Nyle called to stop him. “I need tools.”

The door reopened.

“Lasers, wrenches, medical supplies—” Nyle began.

“I’ll let the captain know.” Fuse again shut the door.

“I’d like to eject him into the deep black as well,” Payton muttered. She gave a small shiver of disgust. “I’m not eating this bile.”

Nyle reached for a bowl and sniffed before licking the foam.

Payton’s nose wrinkled, and she leaned away from him.

“It’s an aerated nutrient paste,” he said. “You should eat it. I won’t be able to carry both of you if you lose your strength.”

“It’s probably poisoned.” She shook her head.

“They won’t kill us. Yet. They need us. Besides, poison is too passive for a brute like Fuse.”

“You. They need you,” she corrected. Payton picked up a bowl and studied it. “But I see your point.” She tried it and frowned. “It tastes like dirty leaves.”

“We’re lucky Fuse lacks imagination. It could have been so much worse. I once spent a day on a fuel port that only served elteeb stew.” The food had been swimming in the broth. He’d preferred to starve on that layover.

Nyle quickly ate the foam and returned the empty bowl to the tray.

“I don’t suppose you can build a blaster with all those tools they’re bringing you,” Payton mused. “Maybe ask for a laser with enough jolt to stun them into submission.”

“I have a feeling I’ll be supervised during repairs.”

“If it’s Fuse, I’m pretty sure that glargnot doesn’t know a blaster from his forefinger.” Payton gave a little grin and placed the bowl back on the tray. She hadn’t finished her meal.

The overhead lights began to dim. The ship’s environmental controls were warning them of the upcoming sleep cycle.

Payton glanced at the ceiling as she moved toward the wall opposite Yevgen. She ran her hands over the metal panels. “I will never understand why they feel the need to hide controls.”

“A designer thought it was more aesthetically pleasing,” he answered.

“The children born in Shelter City didn’t understand wall sensors when we first moved them into the barracks after evicting the Federation. Most of them had never seen them work or been inside a building like that, though they’d spent their entire lives living underneath it.” Her hand found the hidden scanner inside one of the beams of light, and the corner rotated to reveal a small decontamination chamber. Without the captain pointing it out, there would have been no way of knowing it was there.

The lights dimmed a little more. Payton stepped inside, triggering green lasers to begin dancing over her body. She pulled his shirt over her head and stood naked in the unit as the light bathed her.

Nyle knew he should look away but couldn’t. The room lights continued to darken as the green glow of the lasers cast over her.

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