Last week's episode ended with Max and Addy narrowly escaping death by incineration. This week they'll meet someone new on their journey, and they'll get a chance to rest, recover, and take a much needed shower...together. ;)
An abducted cop and a gladiator prisoner must learn to
trust each other with their lives…and their hearts…to escape their alien
captors.
Catch up reading on CAPTIVE here for free: Chapter 1 Ch 2 Ch 3 Ch 4 Ch 5 Ch 6 Ch 7 Ch 8 Ch 9 Chs 10 & 11 Ch 12 Ch 13 Ch 14 Ch 15 Ch 16 Ch 17 Ch 18 Ch 19 Ch 20.
CAPTIVE
Chapter Twenty-One
“What in damnation?”
The voice ignited a fire in Max’s eyes. He dropped into a low crouch as if ready to pounce on the tall, thin silhouette emerging from the steam like a phantom. An elderly man drew near, gripping the tail of a dead rodent-like creature the size of an opossum. “What happened to you two?”
Max straightened to his full height. Was this Lucky?
“Wait a minute. Don’t I know you?” The man considered Max with a watchful eye. “You’re that gladiator come through here five years ago. What are you doing back in my incinerator plant?”
“You let us clean up, and I’ll tell you all about it.”
Lucky touched his fingers to his lips and slapped Max’s chest, paying no mind to the stinky, gooey slime that now covered his hand. “You got yourself a deal. It’s Max, isn’t it?”
“It is. And this is—”
“Addy,” she said before he could introduce her as Hell Woman.
Following Lucky, they weaved through a hot pipe maze before coming to a little shack made from scraps of wood, metal, and some kind of Hyborean plastic. Inside, a lightstick cast an eerie, almost purplish blacklight glow over the piles of trinkets, knickknacks, and what looked like partially made metal projects littering the cramped, dirty house. A rumpled bed rested in the far corner along with an oversized chair and a stack of worn books. Across from them stood a door that hopefully led to the bathroom.
“You can wash up in there.” Lucky pointed to the door. “I built the shower myself. Pressure’s not great, but it’s got all the hot water you’d want.”
Max bore pathetic puppy eyes, reminiscent of Justice. “No way.” Unaffected by his manipulation, she ran for the door.
A split second after, Max charged into the room, his thermal jacket already unzipped. His chiseled chest and abs were not going to distract her. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Showering.”
“Oh, no, you don’t. I’m showering.” She turned on the water.
“Go ahead. I’m not stopping you.”
“Well, I’m stopping you, buddy.”
“Heh. Wanna bet?” He peeled off the two-piece suit and jumped into the stall.
She stared after him with her mouth open. It wasn’t only because of his audacity. She’d forgotten how fine his naked body looked even when covered in slime.
There comes a point in life when propriety goes out the window, and that point comes when your body reeks of garbage after marinating in the putrid stuff for over four hours. She stripped naked and stepped into the shower.
Without a word, Max moved away, offering her the water as he scrubbed with zeal. She ducked under the spout and turned her back to him. The hot cascade rained over her grime-covered hair and body until the heat penetrated her muscles. She shivered. Greasy water slid down her legs and into the drain.
Covering her breasts with long, soapy hair, she moved from the spray to scrub while he moved in to rinse. Brownish gray suds ran down his perfect hamstrings and calves.
His broken leg bone had been protruding from his skin two weeks ago, yet he had no scars. Did he experience any lingering pain? She didn’t ask. Although they stood naked mere inches apart, she’d respect his privacy.
As if orchestrated, he stepped from the water again, and she stepped in. Maneuvering in that small shower wasn’t easy, but somehow she managed no more than a brushing of hands or fingers when sharing the bar of soap.
Why did she feel a twinge of disappointment?
She lathered, rinsed, and repeated three more times before a sharp cleanser smell filled her nostrils. It was a glorious scent, but would she ever feel truly clean again? She would have kept scrubbing if the soap hadn’t broken up into tiny, unusable pieces.
Max stepped out of the stall first, wrapped a ratty towel around his hips, and then handed her one. The old thing was worn thin and stained, and a hundred times cleaner than anything she had touched in the past few hours. She accepted it gratefully, dried off in the shower, and wrapped it around her before stepping out.
Max turned his backpack upside down. His gun, knife, canteen, and other items tumbled out, clanking onto the small countertop. He threw the pack, their thermal suits, and their boots into the stall and ran the water again. “I hope Lucky has more soap.” He checked the cabinet under the sink. “Bull’s-eye.”
Resisting the urge to jump back into the shower, she picked through her slimy effects, tossing disgusting inedible food into the wastebasket. All that time she and Tess spent collecting nuts, drying fruits and vegetables, and making jerky had been for nothing. Now she understood why Max hadn’t bothered packing sustenance. She unwrapped her bottle of whiskey from a baby blanket, threw the blanket in the shower, and tossed the alcohol into the trash.
Max retrieved the bottle. “This is perfectly fine. It’s sealed.”
“You carry it then. I’m not drinking it.”
“You’re pregnant. You shouldn’t be drinking it anyway.”
“I was saving it for the birth. You know, to help numb the pain.”
“Oh.”
She removed the lid from a plastic bowl and looked over the contents—paperback and matches, sewing kit, Tess’s letter. “Everything that needed to stay dry is dry.”
“Good.” He picked up the gun and reached for the door.
“Where are you going with that?”
“You want clothes, food, and lodging, don’t you?”
“Not if you’re going to shoot the guy,” she whispered.
He stopped, his hand on the doorknob, his back rigid. He slowly pivoted. The corners of his mouth turned down. “Do you have trust issues with everyone or just me?”
Pretty much everyone, but now wasn’t the time for that conversation. “What are your intentions with that weapon?” She used her officer voice, the austere tone she reserved for poachers and rowdy drunks.
Something in his eyes changed. They sparkled and held a look of...was it pride? A little smirk tugged the left side of his lips. “If I kill him, the Hyboreans will investigate. I’m going to trade it.”
“Okay, then.” She hadn’t realized she had raised up on tiptoe until her heels dropped back to the floor. “Don’t you think we should keep the gun? Why not give him something else?”
“Like?”
“I don’t know. The whiskey?”
Max paused, giving the bottle a thoughtful glance. He placed the gun on the counter, grabbed the alcohol, and left the room.
By the time he returned, Addy had finished washing her things and wiped down the counter. Eau de refuse still hung in the air but was nowhere near as awful as before.
“We’re set with food and lodging. Unfortunately, the guy doesn’t have much of a wardrobe.” A glint sparkled in his emerald eyes when he held out the clothes to her. “You want the shirt or the pants?”
She grabbed the shirt and slipped it over her head. Thankfully, Lucky was a tall man and the T-shirt came to mid-thigh.
Max wasn’t so fortunate. While Lucky may have been as tall as Max, he wasn’t as brawny. By the sound of Max’s grunting—which grew more agitated with each second—he did all he could to squeeze into the tight pants.
Giggling at him didn’t help matters.
“That’s it.” He ripped off the pants and threw them at her feet in disgust. “You take them. Give me the shirt.”
She pulled the bottom of the shirt down and jumped back.
Max snickered. His eyes twinkled.
“You jerk,” she said, not meaning it. His quick mood changes certainly kept her on her toes. She retrieved the pants and turned away to put them on. When she turned back, she caught him—still in his birthday suit—watching. He looked away too late. There was no mistaking the hunger in his eyes.
What the heck? Standing inches apart in the shower, he had acted as if he hadn’t noticed she was naked. Why, when dressed in oversized, stained men’s clothing, did Max ogle her with the same sexual hunger she’d seen in the breeding box?
Her throat dried. Something in her chest flip-flopped. Her libido stirred. She remembered thinking that if she weren’t trapped against her will, being with this gorgeous man wouldn’t be so bad. Well, she was right, especially now that she had no reason to hate him. The pregnancy wasn’t his fault.
He grabbed his towel, wrapped it around his waist, and left the room. She followed with arms folded across her breasts, feeling completely exposed.
Lucky stood in a corner of the main room, stirring something in a pot. A one-foot section of pipe ran through the wall behind his pot, probably heating the delicious-smelling food inside. It was then she noticed the giant rat missing and prayed it wasn’t in the stew. No way was she going to eat that nasty-looking thing.
Her stomach rumbled its disagreement. She hadn’t eaten anything since last night’s supper. And who knew when her next meal would be now that her food supply was garbage. She rested a hand on her swollen belly. Superbaby had to eat.
Fine, alien rat stew for breakfast it is.
By her third helping, Max turned his attention to her and explained how they would get out of the incinerator plant. “When the refuse bunker is full, the Hyboreans incinerate it. Before that happens, they open the facility’s cooling vents to the arctic air. We’ll squeeze through the louvers and, once outside, run like hell.”
“Good plan. When will they open the vents?”
“In about three hours,” Lucky said.
“You sure this is going to work?”
“No,” Max replied nonchalantly, and he dug into his bowl.
Stomach cramping from stuffing herself like it was Thanksgiving dinner—or her last meal—she pushed her empty bowl away. “How will we get food out there?” she whispered to Max.
He squeezed her thigh under the table but didn’t look at her. He kept eating.
Did he want her to be silent? Was he making a pass? The heat from his touch burned through her borrowed pants. She stared at her bowl, not seeing it. Instead, she saw him in the breeding box: his strong hands touching her body, brushing up her bare sides, caressing her breasts—
“I see you’ve collected more things since my last time through.” Max’s voice snapped her from her daydream, his hand no longer on her leg. “You have ammunition for this?” He set the gun on the table. He must have snuck back into the bathroom at some point and hid it beneath his towel.
Lucky picked it up, caressed it, and then whistled. “She’s from Earth. Thirty-eight special. A rare beauty. Where’d a gladiator come across a weapon like this?”
“Do you have ammo or not?” Max shoveled more stew in his mouth.
Lucky opened the chamber and examined it a minute more before handing it back to Max. “I don’t.”
“I need more protection out there. What about my old gladimort?” Max pointed to the great sword decorating the wall above the front door. Its design appeared similar to the Scottish claymore Duncan’s father had fought with in one of Ferly Mor’s holograms, except the handle was shorter. Either it required the fighter to have massive arm strength, or the sword was light enough to wield one-handed. “What will you take for it?”
Lucky glanced up at the sword and smiled as if remembering an inside joke. The circumstances in which he acquired it, perhaps? He scratched his matted beard. “What do you have?”
“After the whiskey, I’m afraid not much for trading. I need everything else to survive the elements.”
“How about her? I’ll give you the gladimort for the woman.”
Addy’s heart froze.
“She’s pregnant, you know. Eats like a mammoth. Probably clean you out in a week.”
“I don’t mean for keeps. Just for an hour or two. I ain’t been with a woman in a long time.” Lucky turned to her with dark, sad eyes. His weathered face held no sinister grin or evil expression. “I didn’t realize how lonely I’d been until you come along,” he said in a low voice as if confessing his sins. Color shaded his peaked cheeks.
Instead of feeling repulsion at his proposal, sympathy for this lonely old man entered her heart. Then came panic that Max might actually agree, as if she were his property to hand over in the first place. Yeah, right.
Max leaned into her, hiding his face from Lucky. He lowered his voice. “I want my sword back.”
“Then you sleep with him.”
Max turned back to Lucky, but not before she saw him smirk.
“I’ll take my gladimort, scabbard, and baldric in exchange for the .38 special.” He slid the weapon across the table.
What was he doing? They needed that gun. Surely, they had something else worth trading besides sex and weapons.
Lucky’s gaze drifted down Addy’s thin, white T-shirt. He gave a dejected sigh before examining the weapon again. Considering her previous encounters with the men on this planet, she waited for him to point the gun at her chest and threaten to shoot if she didn’t have sex with him. Instead, he asked, “What use is a gun without ammunition?”
Max opened his hand. Three lonely bullets rested in his palm. “You can have these when we leave.”
“You got yourself a deal.” They made their Hyborean accord before Lucky removed the sword and presented it and its effects to Max. “Good luck out there. Keep an eye open for those nasty poachers.” He took their bowls to the sink.
Max got up from the table, slung the baldric over his shoulder, and fastened it diagonally across his chest. The hilt of the gladimort stuck out behind his right shoulder. He drew the weapon looking mighty formidable.
Men in kilts were sexy, but they failed in comparison to a bare-chested gladiator wearing nothing but a leather baldric and a low-riding towel.
She cleared her dry throat. “How can we tell if a Hyborean is a poacher?”
Max placed the hilt of the sword to his eye and looked down the long, two-inch-wide blade. “You’ll know.”
Big help that was. “Duncan told me they sell both men and women for illegal sport.”
“They do.”
“What exactly is an illegal sport?”
He moved into a small open space between Lucky’s junk and made slashing motions with the weapon. “You don’t want to know.”
“If I didn’t want to know, I wouldn’t have—”
“Imagine getting kicked and beaten,” Lucky said, his tone grave, “until you have nothing inside you but hate.” He turned from the sink, wiping down the blade of a kitchen knife. The lines in his face deepened as dark-brown eyes focused on hers. “Imagine being shocked every time you display something other than aggression. Imagine being starved until your stomach burns from the acid digesting your innards.”
He didn’t need his pause for effect; chills had already climbed her spine and spidered down her arms.
“Now imagine you’re thrown in a pit with an equally angry and abused smilodon. A rusty dagger is your only weapon.” He turned the blade over in his hands as if seeing that dagger. “Your stomach growls. Your mouth waters. You eye him up and down thinking how good he’d taste. But when you see the tiger’s tongue dart out to lick his chops, it’s then you realize you’re not the only one staring down dinner. It’s eat or be eaten.”
“That’s horrible. How did you escape?”
“I was lucky. Human Gaming Commission busted up my fighting ring, arrested my owner, and patched me up good. The boss here adopted me.”
Not for the first time while on this planet, Justice and his dog fighting past came to mind. He’d been aggressive when they first rescued him, but once he settled into a loving, caring environment, he grew very affectionate.
After retreating to the bathroom, she wiped her brow, uncertain if the sweat was due to heat radiating from the conduits surrounding Lucky’s home or to nerves.
How would they protect themselves from poachers? Max couldn’t possibly fight them off with a sword, could he?
A high-pitched beeping from the counter startled her. Her nerves settled when she recognized the alarm of her running watch. Seven o’clock.
Prenatal time.
Sitting on the “flowerpot” lid, she held the cool, thick pen-like device to her navel. The door banged open, and she dropped the instrument. “Don’t you knock? I could have been busy in here.” She retrieved the pen from behind the toilet.
Max ignored her question and rummaged through her things. He picked up the sewing kit and then nodded in her direction. “What’s that?”
“I’m not sure.” She rinsed it off and set it in place at her navel again. The pen buzzed, chirped, and buzzed again before a quick, sharp sting pinched her belly.
“Why the hell would you shoot yourself without knowing what it is?”
“Because it’s for the baby. I think it’s vitamins and growth hormones.”
“Let me see that thing.” He tossed the sewing kit and his torn backpack onto the counter and reached for the pen.
“Don’t open it.”
“Can’t, even if I wanted to. See this?” He lowered the instrument to her. “This is a Hyborean computer chip. Unless you’re telepathic, you can’t screw with it. I guess that prevents you from overdosing. I’ve got to tell you, I’m surprised they hand these out to the broodmares.”
“First, I am not a broodmare. Second, they didn’t give it to me.” She grabbed it out of Max’s hand. “I took it.”
“You took it?”
“Of course. Ferly Mor has been giving me injections twice a day since I left the breeding box. I can’t stop— What?”
Grinding a palm heel into his eye, Max’s jaw set. The forced breathing through his nose grew louder with each heave of his massive, bare chest.
“What? It’s not like you haven’t stolen anything from them.”
The room held no sound except for the single drop of water that fell from a dark strand of his hair onto the floor. Her chest tightened. She couldn’t move under the power of his concentrated gaze boring into her.
He inhaled deeply in an obvious attempt to control his emerging anger. “Why didn’t you tell me about this?”
“It’s no big deal. I’ve set my watch to go off every fifteen hours. It takes a second to pull it out, and I can even do it through my clothes. It won’t slow us down. I promise.”
He slammed his fist on the counter. “Hell, woman, what do you think those Hyborean bastards are doing right now?”
She backed away from the fierce barbarian. He hadn’t been this angry since the breeding box, and he hadn’t been wearing an alien great sword then. Her heart pounded. “They’re looking for me.”
“Damn right they are. If I’d have known we’d have less than half a day’s head start, I wouldn’t have—” Max’s hand reached up behind him and clenched and unclenched the hilt of his sword.
“You wouldn’t have what? Taken me with you?”
He didn’t answer. He didn’t need to. She could see in his eyes he thought bringing her along had been a huge mistake.
She set the prenatal pen on the counter. “It’s not like they weren’t going to notice us missing at some point. Besides, just because they’re looking for me doesn’t mean they’re looking in the right place. The first thing they’ll search is the Yard. That could take hours.” So get over yourself, she thought but didn’t say for fear he’d draw his weapon and slay her now. Or worse, trade her for the .38 special.
“No. The first thing they’ll do is LoJack your shock collar. When it doesn’t respond, they’ll know something’s up. Hell, they could be tracking us right now.” He swore again and removed his hand from the hilt.
Silence broke between them as he paced the small bathroom, doing a mighty fine impersonation of a caged lion. He was probably scheming a way to ditch her. She would have left the room, but his very large, very angry body blocked the door. She didn’t dare squeeze past him.
Instead, she tried looking busy rearranging the hanging clothes. At least in this oven of a room, they were sure to dry before the louvers opened.
Max picked up her gladiator boot from the counter and studied it. “You ever snowshoe?” he asked in a normal conversational tone.
“What?”
He leaned his face toward her and spoke slowly, as if it was the English she didn’t understand and not his one-eighty attitude change. The beast within him had evidently calmed, and the man returned. “Have you ever snowshoed?”
“Yes.” What the heck did his brain do, channel-surf his moods? A minute ago, he was so pissed he could have pummeled her. Now, he was acting like her buddy. Either the guy was bipolar, or he had already figured out how to ditch her.
She studied him. Whatever his plan, she’d be ready for it.
Turning the boot on its side, Max slid open an inconspicuous tab on the instep, revealing two tiny levers beneath. She hadn’t noticed the tab before—probably because her boots were buried in smelly trash the whole time she wore them. Using his finger and thumb, he squeezed the levers together.
Ten serrated spikes sprung from the thick sole. Addy jerked back, banging her hip into the counter.
“You okay?”
“Lost my balance,” she lied. Nice prowess, Dawson. Idiot. She swallowed. “Please tell me those are used for traction on ice.”
“That’s one use for them.”
Her stomach turned. Maybe his mood hadn’t changed after all. Maybe he was going to slash her apart with the boot. Then again, wouldn’t it have been easier to run her through with the sword?
“To disengage the crampons, flip the levers the other way. Like this. Here, practice.” Max thrust the disengaged boot into her hands. He picked up the sewing kit.
The switches were easy enough to manipulate. “These are so cool. Who designed this gadget? Q Hyborean? Where’s the button for the rocket boosters?”
“Don’t I wish.” Max pushed the needle and thread into the strap of his torn backpack.
Maybe she was wrong about him. He wouldn’t have shown her how to use the boots if he were going to ditch her. Right? Or was he more cunning than she realized? Maybe he wanted to lull her into a false sense of security.
Hmm, whatever ideas were rattling inside his head, she knew one thing for certain: when the louvers opened, Max would not be sneaking through them alone.
#
What is Max up to? Find out in next week's episode
Chapter 22 or read the full
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