Not the Man She Thought Read online

  After nearly half an hour of walking, she was about to give up and turn around when she finally came to the outskirts of a town. Breathing a sigh of relief, she quickened her steps and hurried toward it. She’d hoped to find more than the set of ramshackle buildings lining the street on either side of her, but they were better than nothing. There had to be someone in this place that could direct her to the spaceport.

  As she made her way along the street, Laken couldn’t help but notice the looks the townsfolk were giving her. Men mostly, they were eyeing her as if they’d never seen a woman before. Thinking it might be better to ask directions at one of the shops, she did her best to ignore their leers and continued walking.

  Dev hadn’t been exaggerating when she’d call Seguu the armpit of the galaxy. It was like she had stepped through a time-warp. She had seen pictures of old mining and farming planets that looked like this, but she didn’t think they still existed.

  She walked by a lot of shops that looked like they were deserted before finally hearing sounds of activity coming from a tavern. Laken hesitated for a moment, then pushed open the swinging doors and stepped inside. As the doors swung closed behind her, the room fell silent. Between the bright sunshine outside and the hazy cigar smoke filling the air inside, it took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the darkened room, but when they finally did, she saw that everyone had stopped what they were doing and turned to look at her. Talk about feeling self-conscious. While the few women gazed at her curiously, the men looked like they were undressing her with their eyes, and it was all she could do not to turn and run back outside. Then what? Go back to Rade Karsten’s ship with her tail between her legs? Not if she could help it.

  Telling herself that no one was going to attack her in a public place, Laken squared her shoulders and slowly made her way over to the bar. Unfortunately, the only empty space was between two men, both of whom were eyeing her like they would rather feast on her than the stew in their bowls.

  Afraid to look at either of them, Laken kept her gaze on the rotund barkeep, hoping the man would come over to her. As she waited, the man on her right took a step closer to her. Wanting to put some distance between them, she instinctively tried to step away, but that only brought her closer to his counterpart on her left.

  “So,” the man on her right drawled. “What’ll fifty credits get me with a pretty thing like you?”

  Laken turned to look at the man, her brow furrowing. “I beg your pardon?”

  Lean and not much taller than she was, the man had a scruff of beard and small, close-set eyes. He grinned, showing her a row of uneven, yellow teeth. “I just got paid and those fifty credits are burning a hole in my pocket, so I figure why not take you upstairs and spend them on you.”

  Realization dawned on Laken then, and her eyes went wide. The man thought she was a prostitute.

  The man on her left laughed. “Fifty credits ain’t even gonna get you a smile from a woman like he. Not when I can pay her twice that. So, what do ya say, sugar?”

  Laken jumped as the man ran his beefy hand down her bare arm. She swallowed hard and took a step back. “I-I’m n-not...”

  Shaking her head, Laken turned to run for the door, but one of the men grabbed her arm, spinning her back around. Her heart lurched at the determined look on his hideous face. A sickening feeling settled in the pit of her stomach. Rade Karsten had been right. Seguu was no place for a woman like her.

  * * * * *

  Rade stepped out of the PTV the moment Keir brought the vehicle to a stop inside the cargo hold. Spotting Kellen standing at the bottom of the steps, he gave the other man a nod. Then, glancing over his shoulder at Jorn, said, “Get everything locked up and tell Kam to get us moving so we can get the hell out of this dump.”

  “Actually,” Kellen said as he walked over to meet Rade. “There’s a slight problem. The girl isn’t on board.”

  Rade frowned. “What do you mean, she isn’t on board? Are you sure?”

  “Her cabin is empty, and no one has seen her since you and the others left.”

  Rade clenched his jaw. “Damn her. I told that little fool to stay on the ship.” Turning on his heel, he strode over to the PTV. “Tell Kam to keep the engines powered up. If I run into trouble, I want us to be able to take off as soon as I get back on board.”

  “Shouldn’t you take someone with you?” Kellen suggested.

  Rade glanced at the older man as he climbed into the transport. His friend’s brow was creased with concern. Though his first officer had a point, he shook his head. “I can take care of myself. You just make sure we’re ready to go.”

  Leaving the other man standing in the cargo hold, Rade maneuvered the PTV out of the ship and sped down the dirt road in the direction of the closest town, hoping that was where the girl had gone. What the hell was the matter with her? Did she think he’d been joking when he warned her about getting off the ship? Seguu was a mining colony and the only women who lived on it were whores, which meant that if Laken Andara had been stupid enough to walk into some shop or even worse, the saloon, the men would think she was a prostitute, too. And the fact that she wasn’t wouldn’t really matter much to them.

  Abruptly, a thought struck him. What if he’d been right about her being a Federation spy? What if she’d gone into town to meet one her contacts?

  He shook his head. That didn’t make sense. There was no way the Federation could have known he was going to stop on Seguu, and it would have been impossible for Laken to get a message to them. And even if she had, why set up a meeting in the mining town when she had free run of the ship with him and most of his crew gone?

  On the other hand, if he was wrong about her being a spy and she had gone into town to do the shopping she’d mentioned, then she was even more stupid than he’d thought. He was going to put her over his knee and give her one hell of a spanking when they got back to the ship. If he could get her back, that was. Swearing under his breath, he switched gears and drove down the dirt road even faster.

  * * * * *

  “Take your hands off me,” Laken demanded, trying to jerk her arm free of the big man’s grasp. “I don’t know who you think you are, but I won’t be treated like this. Now, let go of me!”

  He laughed and pulled her against him, his other hand cupping her breast roughly through the thin material of her dress, his foul-smelling breath hot on her face as he bent his head to kiss her. Laken turned her head away, cringing as his bushy beard scraped her cheek.

  “Get the hell away from her, you asshole!”

  Relief coursed through Laken at the sound of Rade Karsten’s voice. Startled at the interruption, the man loosened his hold on her and she pushed away from him. She whirled around, to see Karsten striding across the room. She didn’t think she’d ever been so glad to see someone in her whole life, even if it was him. Which was probably why she didn’t notice he was glowering at her until he had closed the distance between them and taken her arm in a firm grip.

  “I told you to stay on the ship,” he growled, his dark eyes glinting dangerously.

  Laken bristled at his tone. “I wanted to come into town.”

  His face hardened. “To do some shopping, wasn’t it? More like get yourself into trouble.”

  She glared up at him. “I can take care of myself.”

  He snorted. “So I saw. Let’s go.”

  She hung back, digging her heels into the floor. “No.” It was a stupid thing to say, especially since she really was grateful he’d come to her rescue, but he had a way of bringing out her stubborn streak.

  His eyes narrowed. “What did you say?”

  Laken lifted her chin. “You heard me. I’m not going with you.”

  Even as the words left her mouth, she knew how foolish they sounded, but before she could say anything else, the man who had been pawing her earlier interrupted.

  “I don’t think the lady wants to go with you, buddy.” He took a step toward them. “Why don’t you just turn around and leave n
ice and quiet like.”

  Laken’s stomach lurched as the two men sized each other up. The local who had been bothering her might be as tall as Rade Karsten, but he owed his size to fat, while the captain of the cargo ship was all muscle. If there was a fight, she was confident Karsten would easily win.

  Beside her, Rade inclined his head. “My wife and I just had a little misunderstanding back on our ship, that’s all. We don’t want any trouble.”

  The other man smirked and looked around the room ay the rest of the tavern’s patrons. “Hear that? This outsider says he don’t want no trouble.” He turned his attention back to Karsten. “Then you shouldn’t have brought a pretty thing like her here.”

  He didn’t wait for a reply, but instead launched himself at Karsten. Laken opened her mouth to warn him, but Rade moved faster than she would have thought possible. One minute the big man’s fist was hurling toward Rade and the next he was on the ground cradling his jaw and glaring up at the captain of the cargo ship.

  That was when all hell broke loose. The thinner guy with the yellow teeth who had offered her the fifty credits earlier smashed a bottle against the edge of the bar and advanced on her and Rade from one direction while at least half a dozen of the tavern’s other patrons closed in on them from the other.

  Laken took a step closer to Rade. He might have knocked one guy out, but there was no way he could take on the entire tavern. He didn’t look at her, but just drew the pistol from the holster at his hip and leveled it at the man with the bottle. Up against something more deadly now, the man halted in his tracks, eyeing the weapon warily. The rest of the group men did the same.

  “Like I told him,” Rade said, gesturing toward the big man on the floor. “We don’t want any trouble. You just let us walk out of here and there won’t be any.”

  Laken wet her suddenly dry lips, wondering what she and Rade would do if the other men pulled out weapons of their own. But Rade didn’t hesitate long enough to find out. Keeping his pistol trained on the room, he took her hand in his free one and slowly backed them out of the tavern. Outside, he quickly led her over to the waiting personal transport vehicle.

  “Get in,” he ordered tersely, giving her a little shove.

  Still too shaken to bristle at the curtly spoken command, Laken did as she was told, quickly climbing into the front seat. Rade followed, holstering his weapon as he did so. A moment later, they were speeding down the dirt road toward the ship.

  Rade gave her a sidelong glance. “We’re not being followed are we?”

  Laken looked at him in confusion. “Wh-what?”

  His mouth tightened. “Followed! Are we being followed?”

  She half turned in her seat to glance over her shoulder, expecting to see a horde of angry locals chasing after them, but there was no one in sight. “No.”

  Rade visibly relaxed at that, but he didn’t say anything. It was obvious from the tight set of his jaw that he was furious with her. Knowing from experience that a confrontation with him would only end with her over his knee again, Laken ignored the voice in her head that told her to stand up to him, and instead jumped out of the transport the moment he pulled the vehicle to a stop inside the ship.

  Ignoring the curious looks she got from the crew, Laken hurried up the steps and ran to her cabin. She was frantically trying to lock the door when it slid open and Rade strode into the small room. Seeing the dark look on his face, she quickly backed away, stumbling a little as the ship took off.

  “Get out,” she told him.

  “Not until you and I have a little talk.”

  Laken backed into the desk behind her. “I have nothing to say to you.”

  His raised a brow. “Not even a simple ‘thank you’ for coming to your rescue back there?”

  She lifted her chin. “I told you, I can take care of myself.”

  “Like hell,” he growled. “If I hadn’t come looking for you, you’d have had half the men in the saloon between your legs by now, with the other half waiting to take their turn.”

  She knew he was right, but he didn’t have to be so vulgar about it. “You’re disgusting.”

  “I’m honest.” He swore under his breath. “None of that would have happened if you’d just stayed on the damn ship like I told you.”

  She glared up at him. “I don’t take orders from you.”

  His jaw clenched. “Well, you’d better damn well start taking them.”

  “I’ll do what I damn well please, and neither you nor anyone else is going to stop me!”

  The words were out of her mouth before she even realized it, and she could tell by the dangerous glint in Rade’s eyes that she’d pissed him off even more. Dammit, why couldn’t she ever learn to keep her mouth shut?

  Trapped against the desk, it was impossible for her to evade him, and he easily grabbed her arm and dragged her over to the bed. She desperately tried to yank free, but his fingers were like a vice around her wrist and she was powerless against him.

  “Don’t you dare!” she shrieked, but the words was lost in a whoosh of breath as a sharp tug on her arm sent her tumbling over his knee. She immediately tried to push herself upright, but the arm he wrapped around her waist held her firmly in place, and she let out a cry of frustration. “Let me go, damn you!”

  But Rade ignored her, instead bringing his hand down on her upturned ass with a hard smack.

  “You have got to be the most stubborn, infuriating woman I have ever met in my life.” He punctuated each word with a spank, each of them harder than the one before. “You deliberately went into a place like that just to spite me, didn’t you?”

  She squirmed as heat spread over her bottom. “Spite you? You really think a lot of yourself don’t you? I didn’t do it to spite you, you arrogant bastard. I went in there because I wanted to.”

  Laken didn’t care that the words would probably earn her some extra smacks. She was going to have her say, dammit!

  But to her surprise, the spanking stopped. Laken sighed, thinking her was done, but then she felt him push up her skirt. She went rigid across his lap as she remembered him telling her that the next time he spanked her, it would be on her bare ass.

  “Don’t...” she cried, but he had already yanked her skimpy panties halfway down her thighs.

  Her face went red at the thought of him seeing her half naked. All embarrassment quickly faded as he began spanking her again, though. Sharp, stinging smacks, they covered every inch of her exposed derriere until her ass cheeks felt like they were burning. She struggled wildly against him, kicking her legs so frantically that her panties slid down her legs and went flying. But she didn’t care. All she could focus on was his hand as it came down over and over again on her poor bottom.

  When he finally stopped Laken didn’t wait for him to pull her to her feet, but quickly pushed herself off his lap, afraid if she didn’t, he might spank her some more. She cupped her red-hot ass with her hands and glared up at him as he got to his feet. She wanted to tell him to get the hell out of her cabin, but all she could seem to do was stand there. Maybe he’d read her mind and leave on his own.

  But Rade didn’t leave. Instead, he stood there gazing down at her with those smoldering dark eyes of his. All at once, she caught her breath at the funny, little flutter in her tummy.

  She should take a step back. Or better yet, run into the bathroom and stay there until he left. But she couldn’t make herself move. Then it was too late. Because in the next breath, he bent his head and kissed her.

  For a moment, Laken was too startled to do anything more than stand there. But then, very slowly, her eyes fluttered closed and her lips parted under his, and she was kissing him back. At her response, Rade’s kiss became more demanding, his tongue finding hers and tangling with it, and she moaned softly as he slid his hand in her hair.

  Her eyes flew open. What was the matter with her? The brute had just spanked her. She should be slapping his face, not kissing him!

  Lifting her hands to his c
hest, she shoved him away as hard has she could. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  His mouth quirked. “Kissing you. I thought that would have been obvious since you were kissing me back.”

  Her face reddened. “I was not.”

  He chuckled. “I know it when a woman kisses me, sweetheart, and you were definitely kissing me back.”

  Her color deepening, she took a step back, then another. “You bastard. Get the hell out.”

  His eyes narrowed, and for one moment she thought he might try to kiss her again, but then he spun on his heel and strode toward the door. As it slid open, he turned to face her. “Don’t go wandering off again on the next planet we dock on, Ms. Andara.”