Treacherous

****To Britomartis: Your mother was a hamster and your father smelled of elderberries. Of course I am French! Why do you think I have this ssssilly acccciiiient?

Chapter 9

Allowing the ship to navigate her to the elevator and then along the proper passage, Bell nearly ran the corridors.

Riddick had been checking the mechanical system’s monitor readout. Oil pressure, battery levels, and other maintenance data could be seen. He’d already turned to face her when she came upon him.

“Riddick, you have to come see. It’s like a treasure.”

Bell wasn’t normally so demonstrative, but the find was something out of a fairy tale. She skidded to a stop, but was off a bit, bumping into him. Without thinking she hugged him, letting her arms wrap around his neck. “It’s so wonderful. You have to come see.”

It happened so fast. She didn’t think of how strange it was to touch him, much less hug him, for ANY reason. Or that she was able to. Had he stooped to aid her? When she spoke she turned to face him. So close. He was turning his head toward her and then she found his lips on hers.

It happened so fast. Thought wasn’t necessary. The situation, the fear of the past few days and the week since the crash, the worries, the excitement of her discovery. Whatever reason, whatever cause, she didn’t have to think to respond. It just was.

He was surprisingly gentle. No, not gentle, just not as rampant as she’d have expected from a man who’d been in prison for so long. Firm lips urged hers to open, and then his sweet breath was filling her. Sweet? The first touch of his tongue to hers, hot, electric, and so morally wrong, tasted of peaches.

Peaches. Who would have thought? The fearsome killer tasted like peaches! She smiled against his lips and met his searching tongue, feeling her stomach flop and the center between her legs contract at the first willing contact.

Long minutes passed. Or was it just seconds? Bell couldn’t tell and didn’t really care. With so many traumas around her recently, and always this man on her mind for one reason or another, it seemed completely natural to be where she was. He was strength and security, and she needed that if not just him.

He’d moved, moved them. The cool metal of the wall pressed to her back, forcing his body closer to hers. Alarm bells sounded in her head as his erection made its dent in her belly. He wouldn’t stop this. Why would he? Propriety? He’d been unwillingly abstinent for longer than she could guess, why would he stop?

“No.” She had to break away, turn her head away from his drugging kiss. Damn, he could kiss though. “No,” she gasped again, shocked by how breathless she was.

He stopped. Well, more like stilled. He didn’t move and didn’t release her.

“Stop, Riddick. No more.”

His head dropped and for long silent seconds she could feel his pulse along with her own. Through his erection mashed so tightly between them, through his chest that rose and fell more rapidly than she remembered, and either his or her pulse was present at nearly every contact point.

“You picked the wrong person to play tease with.”

Bell gasped, “I’m not playing tease! I came down here to tell you something, not to have this happen. And just cuz I don’t want to fuck in the stinky maintenance level doesn’t make me a tease.”

“You saying you’d wanna fuck somewhere else?”

She laughed. Pinned to the wall by a mass murderer and she was laughing. Where was her diary when she needed it?

“Well, since your invitation was so charming.” She left it hang for a second and just smiled. “Let’s see. How do I put this bluntly? I’m not opposed to you, it’s the time, location and situation.”

He seemed to come to a decision and backed off of her some, allowing her to support her own weight. Then his mouth was on hers again. Teeth scraped, tongue invaded, and she was pinned again. His erection ground into her, forcing her helplessly against the wall.

She pushed at his arms and tried to turn away, but he was too powerful and she was too weak and just too damn unwilling. As the seconds passed and he continued to assault her she became lost in a warmth of lust and submission. Her last fleeting thought was to wonder if she would bother trying to stop him again if he forced the issue.

He released her again just as quickly as he’d begun the assault. She was left breathless and shaken. A hand wiped absently across her mouth came away with a smear of blood and she sucked her lip to taste more. She turned accusatory eyes on him but he’d backed up several paces, not looking the least bit remorseful.

“What had you running down here?”

Back to normal. The clipped tone. Don’t get too close. Had she just almost had sex with this guy? By his stance and behavior now nothing at all had happened.

“Oh, um, food.” She had to spend another moment to collect her wits. Normally she was a quick thinking person, but he’d left her feeling half retarded. “I went looking for water and food. There are big tanks of water in the cargo bay. Thirty-six hundred liters all together. And Ramsay showed me the preserver. God, Riddick! There’s bacon and eggs up there! I could kiss ol’ Comate.”

He was giving her one of his assessing looks. “Ramsay? The droid?”

“Yeah. Who better to ask than him? He was the one that brought it up. Never occurred to me. Plus there’re crates and crates of more cans and stuff in the cargo. All the fruit you can eat.”

That had him smiling a bit, “Fruit, huh?”

“Yeah, and there’s more in the preserver. Bananas even. Fresh.” She was taunting him and enjoying it. How seldom had this man received such a gift? To have your one weakness be fruit. It was almost heartbreaking.

“Well, let’s go see. Guess you’ll be cooking for me tonight. Steak and eggs. Baked potato. And bananas.”

Bell laughed, but eagerly lead the way to the galley.

They did eat on ship. When was night really? No time like the present. So they pulled a thick beef steak for Riddick, eggs for both of them, and then whatever else they wanted. The preserver worked so well the steak was still bleeding before they tossed it on the grill built into the galley.

Ramsay stood away in the back getting the occasional hostile look from Riddick who seemed completely untrusting of the synthetic man. They ate and talked some, though mostly they just ate. Filled to capacity and groaning from discomfort they moved to a reclining sofa in the small living room. Ramsay cleaned up after them while they just sat silently and digested.

Bell was feeling better than she could remember feeling. None of the worries of the planet or the company or the others intruded. No wonder she fell asleep.

She woke to find she’d slipped toward Riddick and was actually snuggled to his side beneath his arm. The arm he’d had on the back of the sofa was now around her. There was no telling how long they’d slept. She didn’t feel stuffed anymore at least.

“Awake?”

She sat away from him, trying to act like she hadn’t just been cuddling him. “Mmmm. That was awesome. Big dinner, short nap. Now a shit, shower and shave and I’ll be ready to go again.”

His lip curled as he looked at her. “You forgot one thing.”

“Oh, yeah, the fuck. Well, we can’t have everything, now can we?” She stood and stretched, feeling the kinks from sleeping in such an awkward position. “I guess we ought to get back to trying to escape.”

It felt strange to say, and even stranger to mean. They’d literally ignored that they were being hunted on an uninhabited planet and that there was some mysterious doom that they were trying to avoid learning of. Safe for now. The ship was locked up, and in truth they could take off now, but they needed to secure more water and pillage the last of the canned foods from the settlement.

“So we’re virtually ready to take off. We just need to get some more food and water. Make sure we have enough for everyone.”

Riddick had been moving to stand when he stilled at her words. “Everyone?”

Bell frowned, not understanding what he was asking. “Yeah, there are twelve of us all together. We’ll need more than just five thousand liters of water. That’ll only last maybe six weeks.”

“It’ll last us six months.”

Us? She nearly gasped in understanding, “We can’t just leave them.”

He stood fully before her now. His stance was his naturally competent one, as if he were ready for anything. The lazy snooze was long forgotten. “Why not?”

“They’ll die.”

His brows rose in an unmistakable ‘so?’.

“Riddick, leaving them would be the same as them leaving you.”

“I won’t go back to Slam.”

The significance of this conversation felt at odds with arguing at all. Life for a dozen people. She couldn’t turn her back on them. “I wouldn’t let that happen,” she whispered. “We have the ship. They can either cooperate or be left behind, or something. There has to be a way. We can’t just leave them.”

“What about Johns?” he asked. “He won’t just hop on for a ride. He’ll kill you to get to me. He’d kill all of you.”

Bell shuddered. She knew he was right, but still. “We can put him in cryo. The others wouldn’t argue. We kind of have a monopoly on ultimatums today. They come, they keep quiet, we’re gone before they can talk.”

“You’re runnin’ with me now? You help me and you’ll be as wanted as I am.”

She waved her hand dismissively, “I’ll deal with that later. No one but you knows my name. The ship doesn’t have comm. We’re not in danger yet.”

“Cept for Johns.”

She curled her lip in disgust at the man’s name.

“Till there’s a bounty on your head for live capture you’re in more shit than I am. You set me free. That’a really pissed him off.”

“Yeah, I’m probably not his favorite person. How much did I cost him?”

“Enough,” was all he said, then he tilted a knowing look at her.

“What happened to you thinkin’ Johns was a cop?”

Bell frowned, “I never did. He’s a greedy little merc with a nasty habit.”

“The others all thought he was law. What tipped you off?”

“Nothing.” She played with the hem of her shirt for a moment. “The way he tied you shoulda tipped them all off. A cop woulda held you private, away from everyone. Where you probably would’ve escaped from. Sticking you out in the public square, he knew you’d need help and he didn’t figure there’d be any volunteers. But I knew before, before I ever boarded the Hunter.”

Riddick just waited silently before her.

“He caught up with some guy he was hunting a couple years ago, and I was there. The guy had stolen one of our ships. I was sent on retrieval. I disabled the ship by remote when I was within range. Musta helped Johns out royally. He was taking the guy out when I arrived. He never saw me. The kid he was taking couldn’t have been more than fourteen or fifteen. He’d been beaten so badly he couldn’t stand and Johns only kicked him more when he fell. It was disgusting.”

She was silent for a minute as she thought back to watching Johns abuse the teen.

“I stayed out of sight, but locked the ship down. He came back and tried to get in, probably to clear the security cameras. They’d caught him in action.” She sneered the words out, hating Johns anew just thinking about it.

“The kid was just some petty criminal. Purses, wallets, shoplifting, that kinda stuff. The ship was nearly by accident. Logs showed the guy had picked him up and then left him alone on the ship on Mulcitare Dorn. He was probably killed and the kid just ran with the ship. Now he has a permanent limp and irreparable brain damage. His family took him in and he’s learning to walk and write again. Johns was charged, but only served a couple months. After all, he’s a law abiding citizen who does his part to get criminals behind bars where they belong, right?”

“You testify?”

“I didn’t have to. The security log did it all.”

“He never found out what you did?”

“Or even who I am. He didn’t recognize me when he boarded with you. Too busy strutting his shit to worry about civi’s. But he’s never seen me before. Witness protection and my own company kept me away from him.”

“And you still wanna save his sorry ass.”

Bell rolled her eyes. “Not just him. All of them.”

He shook his head, but said no more.

“So we gonna go search this place? We need food and anything that will hold water.”

Without comment he moved and she followed, out of the galley and down the corridor. Just like normal he wasn’t discussing his actions and she was left to follow along or wait behind. But at least this time she felt like she’d had some effect on what he would do. She didn’t care how it got done, as long as no one was left alive on Tangier when they left.