Explode: Team Supernova (The Great Space Race) Read online

  Before coming in, Sarr’ma had given herself a good shake and ran a brush over her hair and tail, so the dust no longer muted her. Not that she’d ever blend in with a crowd. As far as he knew, she was the only member of her species in this galaxy.

  And he suspected that even in a crowd of felinoids, she’d stand out as particularly pretty.

  Which he was not supposed to be pondering. No time for that.

  It was time to put the plan into action, but that required stepping away from her. She looked so tiny in this room full of large, rough males. Not that he wasn’t a large, rough male himself—not so different from these guys, though he no longer sported a miner’s layer of dirt—but he was with Sarr’ma. Team Supernova. The others had no reason to be kind.…

  The others, he told himself, wouldn’t know what they were getting into. He was worried because of what happened to Zel, but Sarr’ma had been on the racing circuit, for star’s sake. He suspected she’d know exactly how to handle someone who didn’t take no for an answer, agilely avoiding clumsy attempts to grab her and cutting the guy down with such harsh, clever words that his balls would retreat back into his body to avoid the chill. And if her snark didn’t work, that was what he was for.

  Adrenaline coursed through him and he realized he was excited about the prospect of punching someone. Not that he wanted someone to harass his partner. But slamming his fist into the face of the kind of ass who’d push himself on a young woman would feel good.

  It wouldn’t make up for not being able to do so on Zel’s behalf, but it might calm the insistent voice in the back of his mind that kept telling him he’d let his sister down.

  Chapter Eight

  SOME SPECIES WERE lucky to have inferior senses. The air in the bar smelled like dust and stale beer, fried food cooked in rancid oil, and some noxious cleaner that didn’t mask a plumbing issue in the sanitation chambers. She’d been in dive bars on several human-majority planets that had offended her felinoid love of cleanliness, but this place made the worst of them seem like a freshly sterilized regen tank at a top hospital. Note to self: don’t actually eat any of the takeout and make sure Tripp didn’t either. It was bound to be bad for the digestion.

  Sarr’ma felt male eyes on her as she moved through the bar. Felt male minds stripping off what little she was wearing. Felt them imagining how her skin would feel under their work-roughened hands, how it would be odd but hot to fuck someone who had a tail, how the tail might caress them at critical moments, pushing them higher….

  Their heat flickered on her skin.

  It wasn’t a psychic thing. She simply understood sex. Understood people who’d been without a sexual outlet other than their own hands for far too long. Understood that some male beings, even if they should know better, had a weird notion they were entitled to sex.

  Basically, loneliness and alcohol could turn a guy into an asshole.

  Just what she was hoping for.

  She smiled close-mouthed at the men who tried to chat her up, but kept moving. Two tried to block her progress, but she stepped aside, fitting into a space that, to the perspective of a larger species, was much too small for the purpose.

  One man—not human, she thought, unless humans came in turquoise in this galaxy—got smart. He not only stepped in front of her opened his arms wide. “Hello, pretty,” he said. “Do you wanted to be petted, kitty cat?”

  If she ducked under his arms, he’d be able to grab her, and that would start the ruckus too early, before Tripp had ordered food and she’d had a chance to sweet-talk anyone. She would have had to crawl under a table or over one of the guys drinking at said table to get away. Given the state of the floor, crawling under the table was a last resort, and while she was usually all about jumping into someone’s lap and enjoying their reaction, she could predict the reaction of just about anyone in here to a female in his lap, and it didn’t sound entertaining. So she spread her arms wide in imitation.

  And extended her claws. At full extension, they were as long as her fingers, and even in the poor lighting, it would be obvious they were sharp.

  “Is this a local greeting?” she said with a smile that she made sure would show off her teeth. “Am I supposed to hug you or something now?”

  He drew a step closer. This one wasn’t bright or he’d had enough to drink his beer goggles kept him from seeing anything he didn’t want to see. “A hug would be a good start. And a kiss and…”

  “How about a nice back scratch?” She gauged his size and degree of tipsiness and took the chance of moving closer and holding out her hand. “I give great back scratches. How about it?”

  The man’s gaze fixed on her claws. His eyes widened. For a second, his mouth hung open, which made him look even dumber than nature and booze already conspired to do. “Uh, no thanks,” he muttered quickly. “No offense. Just realized cats ain’t my thing.”

  Almost disappointing how quickly he came to his senses. Often people saw the claws but still put too much faith in their own bulk against her small size. Those were times that martial arts training came in handy.

  Still, too soon to start the brawl. She had things to do first, including charming a professional into planting a lipstick print on a napkin or something.

  “I’m with someone anyway. I simply wanted to be friendly, since you seemed so keen on saying hello.” She waved at Tripp, who waved back, somehow looking affectionate toward her while maintaining his usual surly face toward everyone else. “Have a lovely night!” she chirped.

  This time she took the chance of ducking under his arm. Other than getting closer than she’d have preferred to someone who hadn’t spent any time in a sonic cleanser recently and needed to remedy that as soon as possible, it was painless. Her victim was frozen in place. Whether it was respect for her claws or complete confusion, she wasn’t sure.

  After that, while she got a few would-be flirtatious hellos that she returned with a smaller, less toothy smile—sweet Cat Mother, someone needed to give these boys lessons if they ever hoped to get laid without needing to pay for it—she made it to the bar without major incident.

  The man behind the bar, a grizzled human with short-cropped iron-gray hair and hard eyes about the same color as the hair, took a step as if to wait on her, but Sarr’ma had a plan and she was sticking to it. Moving around the bar, she caught the attention of the other bartender, the female.

  “What can I get for you, hon?” the woman asked. She was human, of an age with the other bartender and with equally gray hair. Her warm brown skin wasn’t as weathered or wrinkled as her companion’s, but her eyes looked weary. Not as hard as his, but like they’d seen a lot and hadn’t enjoyed most of it. The “hon,” though, sounded surprisingly natural. Unfortunately, she wasn’t wearing lipstick.

  “What’s good?”

  The other woman shot a glance at the male bartender, making sure he was busy and thus distracting, before whispering, “Honestly? Not much. We’re low on a lot of things, waiting for a shipment, and the local beer’s an acquired taste. We brew it from a native grain called dorlak and it’s different. We have some Vobarian brandy stowed, but it’ll cost you. Or if you’re planning on sticking around for a while, you might as well get used to dorlak beer. It’s decent once you let go of the notion it’ll taste like any beer you’ve ever had before.”

  Life was too short to drink nasty beer, not that she’d consume anything produced here and risk concentrated toxins. The brandy was bottled and came from off-world. It should be safe. “Two of those brandies, for me and my friend over there.” She pointed to Tripp. “Start a tab for us. And send a beer or whatever he’s drinking to the blue goon. Only put an umbrella in it if you have one.”

  The bartender snorted. “He’s managed to annoy you already? That’s a record even for him.”

  One of the pair of colorfully dressed females whom Sarr’ma had pegged as professionals of negotiable affection sidled up to the bar. “Come on, Judy. Ert’s annoying even when he’s sober and not l
ooking for trouble.” She was human, with soft reddish curls and a complexion somewhere between Tripp’s and the bartender’s, a warm golden brown. It took Sarr’ma a second to realize the sex-worker was younger than Tripp, maybe younger than she was, which would make her barely old enough to do this kind of work legally in the Central Alliance system. She was delicately pretty, but she looked exhausted and sad under the bright makeup and big smile. She looked Sarr’ma up and down. “You working here now? There’s enough trade for another girl, and you’re a novelty, so you should do all right, but Jorry and I have first dibs on our regulars or anyone who’s actually decent-looking.”

  “As well you should.” Sex for fun was one of her favorite hobbies, when she got around to it, but Sarr’ma imagined sex work was grueling, especially in a run-down, desperate place like Izbo. If you had a customer you liked, or who was at least easy enough on the eyes so you could pretend you liked him for as long it took, you deserved to protect that. “But I’m not here to work. Not that way, anyhow. I came here with my partner.” She pointed toward Tripp again and let the other woman make assumptions about what kind of partner he was.

  The sex-worker paused the flow of words and seemed to collect her thoughts. When she spoke again, her voice was pitched quieter and much more serious. “You do know about the toxin problem here, why there aren’t more females? You might be better off getting on the next ship home and waiting for your guy to finish his contract. I know you two are different species, but they’re doing wonders with artificial implantation these days; you should keep your options open. Plus I’m sure he’s great, but what if you two break up and you meet a cat-guy down the road and you want babies? Kittens, whatever?”

  Sarr’ma had already picked the drinks up, itching to get back to Tripp and the next step of the plan, but something in the woman’s flat, defeated tone made her set the drinks down and lean closer, slipping one arm around the other woman’s waist. “No one told you when you first came here, did they? Do I need to claw someone’s eyes out? Because it sounds like someone might deserve it.”

  “Management wanted entertainment to motivate the workers, and what most of the workers wanted was women. So some of us got recruited without hearing we’d never be able to have babies after we spent a few months here.”

  Sarr’ma put her hand over the other woman’s. The human was bigger than she was, but her hand was softer than Sarr’ma’s could ever be because of the claws hidden inside. “That’s wrong. Someone should get what they deserve. My lips, the Cat Mother’s ears.” If she were her brother and his mates, she’d make sure of it. Stars, if she weren’t up to her eartips in a race with the possibility of intergalactic teleportation at stake, she’d try.

  “I was only eighteen when I decided a few years on my back in an industrial colony might make me enough money I could end up sitting pretty somewhere else. I hadn’t decided if I wanted kids…”

  “But you shouldn’t have had the choice taken from you like that.”

  “No. We’re doing an honest, legal job, but it feels we’re being punished for deciding to do it. They warn females who are thinking about signing on as refinery workers and men with female perma-partners. But the sex-workers get shafted, if you’ll pardon the pun.”

  “That’s not right. You’re doing important work here. Seriously. You’re making this place a little less awful for the refinery guys while putting up with a place that would be shitty even if it wasn’t screwing up your body.” She squeezed that soft, weaponless hand again. “For what it’s worth, I did know about it. The information’s out on the Universenet now if you know where to look for it, so they shouldn’t be able to fool other girls so easily. And we’re only here for a couple of days.” For what? That was one thing she and Tripp hadn’t thought of. “We’re engineers. We’ll help install some new equipment and then we’re out of here.”

  She pushed one of the drinks to the sex-worker. “Here. You look like you need something real, not watered down iced tea like they’re probably serving you until your shift’s over.” The poor woman did look like she could use a drink. Besides, Sarr’ma could lift a lipstick print from the glass with a napkin and be done with that part of the challenge, easy-peasy bloxfruit squeezy, without even having to ask for a favor. She raised her own glass, sketched a toast, which the other woman picked up on. “Here’s to you and your friends. May you find justice and may those driftdwells get lied to about important, life-changing things. Like maybe the location of a minefield.”

  She tossed back the brandy. It was harsh, but not unpleasant. Even with her species’ high tolerance for alcohol, she wouldn’t want to drink a lot of it. The heat of that shot made her raise her empty glass and say, “And here’s to getting off this lousy planet and to a place where the men are dirty only in the good way.”

  She hadn’t realized how loud she’d been until she realized everyone in the bar was staring at her. Both bartenders moved closer and something about their expressions told her this was the kind of bar where blasters were stashed in easy reach.

  “I like the sound of that,” the other woman said, also a bit loudly, as if the brandy were hitting her hard. “I like you. Your ears and tail are beautiful. I’ve never seen anyone who looked like you, all pretty and girly and fierce at the same time, and those adorable ears… May I touch your ears?”

  It wasn’t the first time a stranger had asked to touch her ears. Depending on her mood and the person’s tone, it came off as either flirtatious or rude, like they thought she was a pet. This woman’s request sounded awe-struck and shy, as if she was trying to figure something out and touching Sarr’ma might help.

  Wouldn’t be the weirdest thing she’d ever done. “Sure,” she said, more calmly than she actually felt.

  The touch wasn’t as tentative as Sarr’ma would have expected. Nor was it self-serving, simply indulging her own curiosity. She was rubbing around the ear the way a close friend or a family member might, and stars, it felt good. Comforting. Sarr’ma leaned into it and purred. She couldn’t help herself. Much as she’d mentally sneered about the hard-up men here, she’d been more starved for touch than she realized. Not necessarily sexytimes—simple friendly contact. Her people were more physically demonstrative than most. At the university and at racer parties, her friends of other species had gotten used to being hugged, kissed, and nibbled for no reason other than it felt nice, the way she’d do with another felinoid. In a place where people might not understand, she’d been cautious, and it was killing her. Teasing Tripp by crawling into his lap wasn’t the same thing, although those seconds where he let himself hug her, before he remembered whatever it was that kept him so uptight, were frustratingly almost-hot. This woman’s touch was sweet…

  And then it shifted and it wasn’t sweet at all, no longer a friend’s touch but a potential lover’s. Sex-worker or not, though, she didn’t know Mrrwr’wrn, wouldn’t know that particular spot by the ear was so sensitive, so erotic. Sarr’ma had to take a deep breath, not assume…

  One look into the woman’s eyes dispelled that thought. She might not consciously know felinoid erogenous zones, but she was looking for them. Her eyes were wide, pupils dilated, and her red-glossed lips were parted.

  And everyone in the bar was staring. Waiting. Anticipating a show.

  If Sarr’ma kissed her—which the woman clearly wanted—it might start a riot as guys jostled each other for a better view. Starting a riot had been part of Sarr’ma’s plan. And this was definitely a more interesting way to collect a lipstick print from a Izbo bargirl than taking it off the glass or getting her to blot her lips on a napkin.

  If you were going to start a bar fight anyway, you might as well enjoy it.

  Sarr’ma leaned forward, looked up at the other woman, parted her lips and licked them.

  And the next thing she knew, she was kissing someone whose name she didn’t even know. Wasn’t the first time and probably wouldn’t be the last—sometimes a cat-girl wanted a smooch without anything more,
including complications. But this felt intimate, as if they’d bonded during their chat.

  Which made Sarr’ma feel bad for her lies and half-truths, but she hadn’t lied about the important part. This woman had been misused and hurt, and someone should pay.

  That all passed through her mind in less than a second. After that all her brain cells went to the woman in her arms. She felt too thin, almost frail, as if she didn’t take good care of herself. Her breath tasted like the brandy, and like exhausted despair.

  But she could kiss. Oh stars, she could kiss. And move her body against Sarr’ma’s, and insinuate her thigh between Sarr’ma’s legs, where she might feel dampness through lace, because suddenly Sarr’ma wanted. Wanted to rescue the woman, as much as anything, or at least add a touch of pleasure and happiness to what must be a tough life. And it had been way too long. All the sensations were building as if they were actually naked and in private instead of fully dressed and in front of an audience that sounded both horny and hostile.

  Horny and hostile…not good. Sarr’ma wanted to lose herself in the moment, but her predator’s instincts took over. “Get behind the bar!” she ordered, right before someone threw a bottle at them.

  Then someone punched the bottle-tosser, shouting, “That’s for spoiling the show, asshole! Know how much I’ve paid to see her and Jorry do nothing more than kiss? Those two were making out for free.”

  “Yeah, and not with us. Hey, kitty…I thought you were with someone.”

  It was that rude blue guy again, and now he seemed to feel free to grab her.

  She could have given him a lecture about different relationship styles and the fact that on her home world, monogamy was the exception rather than the rule.

  But why waste the breath? Instead she grinned toothily and said, “I lied. I lied because I didn’t like you.”

  “Coz I’m blue?”