Chapter 5

Chapter Five

H is denya vibrated with excitement while they waited, eyes trained on the surveillance program. Around them, the station wasn’t quiet, nothing in space ever was. The machinery needed to keep people alive always heaved and hummed the mechanical pulse of existence. Tav found it comforting. He lived most of his life in space now and when he made landfall, the natural sounds of any planet seemed strange and loud, too unpredictable for his ears.

The small room they’d stuffed themselves into grew warm with their presence and Tav had to clench his hands at his sides to keep from reaching out to touch his denya. She seemed receptive to him, but he would not let his lust come in the way of their mission. They had a thief to catch.

But it was taking a long time.

The first hour slipped by quickly, even though neither he nor Molly dared to speak more than a few words for worry of being overheard. The second hour went a little slower and Molly began to fidget, slumping in her seat. The third and fourth crawled by, but for some reason the fifth flew. Sitting in the sixth, Tav wondered if they should have trusted the tracker to do its work and relied on surveillance footage for the rest.

A fizz of electricity popped in the distance and both Molly and Tav sat up straighter. His mate gasped as the screen on the surveillance program went dark, tapping fervently to make sure it wasn’t a glitch on the part of the equipment. But the feed didn’t come back up and both of them could hear the muffled clang of piping being moved right outside.

“We have to go see.” Molly reached for the door.

Tav put a hand on her arm to stop her. “They’ll see us the second we get out there. Just wait.”

The light was dim in their closet, but it was bright enough to read her frustration clear as day. Still, Molly sat back, resigned. “Do you have the tracking program?”

Tav pulled out his own communicator which was linked to the tracker’s program. “It’s here.” He pulled up the tracker and saw that it hadn’t yet moved from the room where it had been placed. “Looks like it’s still working.”

“Good, I was worried they’d knocked out all of the electronics somehow.” Molly stood, but there wasn’t enough room to pace, so she mostly rolled back and forth on her feet, staring at the door as if it would magically open and release her to race after their quarry.

Some of that anticipation bled off onto him and Tav wanted to do the same, wanted to chase down their thief or thieves and apprehend them, save the day, get the girl, and be greeted as a hero. But he’d save the heroics for the security guards and hope the girl liked him well enough as it was. He’d never been much of a fighter or a warrior, despite the claws that lay hidden in his knuckles. He could hold his own for a minute, but against someone bigger, or someone who had training, he was doomed.

The electricity popped again and the surveillance footage came back to life, showing an empty space where their pile of goodies had once been. Molly spun in place, looking at him expectantly. “Is the tracker moving?”

Tav checked again. “Yes, quickly.”

She grabbed onto his sleeve and tugged. “Come on!”

“You want to follow them?” That hadn’t been part of the plan. They were supposed to report this to security and let them do the dangerous part.

But Molly’s eyes were bright with determination. “I just want to take a look at them, see if I recognize them. All we have is a tracker that’s moving, there’s no guarantee that security takes us seriously. We get close, snap some photos and vids of our own, and then we get out with none the wiser. It’ll work out perfectly, trust me.”

She sounded so confident that he wanted to, but Tav wasn’t certain. Still, he found himself moving quickly behind her as they eased out of their hiding place and into the darkened hallways of Honora Station at night. There was a faint metallic smell in the air, more pronounced than usual on a station like this. The air could never smell completely fresh, recycled as it was, but it was usually treated so it became unnoticeable after a while.

“No tracks,” Molly whispered, her voice almost lost under the hum of the air recyclers.

Tav looked and saw she was right. If he hadn’t know that the pile of bait had been there, he wouldn’t have realized that anything at all had been moved. Interesting.

They moved quickly down the hallways of Honora Station, strangely running into no one. Though space stations ran on a day to night schedule, it wasn’t like a planet which had natural time, and with all of the different aliens who relied on different sleep cycles, and the visitors coming from all reaches of space at all hours, time was relative. There was always someone awake, always someone around. But not here, not now.

Strange.

With no one around, it was tempting to move like they were sneaking, but that would only draw more attention, so Tav and Molly walked confidently, if silently, eating up the distance and faithfully following the tracking beacon to the heart of the station. Until they hit a wall. Literally.

Molly placed her hand against the surface as if something would trigger a door to open. The hallway ended abruptly and there were no doors, no branches shooting off in other directions. There was nowhere else to go.

“What does it say?” she asked, nodding towards his communicator.

Tav looked. “It’s still moving. It’s like it could just go through the wall.” He joined her and felt around, but there was no secret catch, nothing that suggested the wall was anything more than it appeared.

“Argh!” Molly pounded her hand against the wall and slumped down to the floor in frustration. “Really? Really! We were so close! But we never even saw who did it! What the hell?”

He slid down the wall beside her, bumping his shoulder gently against her own. “We can still tell security what happened. They’ll look into it. Surely they don’t want thieves on their station.”

“I’ve been here for a few weeks, and I’ve got to say, security hasn’t exactly instilled a lot of confidence in me, you know? There isn’t brawling, not that I’ve seen, so that’s good, but other than that, this place is kind of…” she trailed off on a sigh.

“Past its prime?”

“That’s one way to put it.” Molly cradled her head in her hands and let out another sound of frustration. “I just want this party to go right. It’s not even technically my stuff that they’re stealing, I probably shouldn’t care so much. But I really do!”

Tav grabbed one of her hands and laced their fingers together, trying to ground her with touch, to calm her down. “I care, too. This is important to you. You want to see it done right.”

She rolled her head sideways and grinned at him. “This wasn’t how I imagined spending the night with you.”

And just like that, Tav’s cock woke up and reminded him that this woman was his mate and he should claim her now. His brain agreed with the plan, if not the timing, and told his cock to calm down until the time was right. “We’ve hours yet before we need to report for duty.” He leaned in and brushed his lips against hers, cradling her cheek and nuzzling against her neck when he pulled back. He dragged in her scent, the intoxicating smell of woman overwhelming the scent of the station around them. He could roll around in it until he was indelibly marked as Molly’s own.

She leaned in close and her eyes drifted closed. “Are you angling for an invitation to my room, sir?” Heat and seduction rolled through her words and any thoughts Tav had of controlling his cock went right out the airlock as he imagined her spread out on her bed, ready and writhing for him.

“If I am?” His fingers curled in her hair, the strands soft and bouncy.

“I’d say the sooner we get up, the sooner we can get naked.”

They might have been confused for participants in a footrace if anyone saw them sprint back to Molly’s quarters. At some point they must have crossed an invisible barrier as they began to see a small trickle of people around them, people they had to dodge to avoid trampling in their mad dash towards the promise of sex.

Tav almost didn’t hear his communicator beep while Molly was unlocking her door, but when he pulled it out of his pocket, his hopes crashed as he saw a message from Juuno.

Dansin’s done a runner and dipped into the ship funds first. Need you to talk to security.

“Gods be damned!” he hissed.

Molly looked around and her smile fell. “What happened?”

He calmly put his communicator back into his pocket and took a deep breath. “You’re not the only one with a theft problem. My second in command has disappeared with some of my ship’s funds. It needs to be reported to security and my engineer needs me back there tonight. I—” There was so much more that he wanted to say, but every moment he waited put his own people at risk. “I will do my best to return to you tomorrow.”

“If this is the end…” She was trying to put on a happy face, but Tav could feel the reluctance.

He stepped in close and cupped her cheek again; he loved the soft feel of her skin under his fingers. “You have my word it is not. Once this is dealt with, I will return to you. We will have our time together, and throw your amazing party, and catch your thief. Believe me.”

“I do. God help me, I think I do.” Despite the abrupt end to the night, she smiled.

Tav dipped his head and stole a final kiss before forcing himself to let go and walk away. He would deal with this, and then Molly would be his. There wasn’t any other possibility.

An investigation that fizzled out, a hook up cut short by responsibility, and a million little things that needed to be done put Molly at the far edge of her patience by lunchtime the next day. She barely slept the night before and knew that the bags under her eyes might scare away anyone who got too close. Tav didn’t show up to work in the morning, but she couldn’t say she was surprised. In two days he’d managed to be a big help, and she was feeling the loss of his assistance just as much as her body was feeling the loss of what they could have had between them.

Last night she’d believed him when he promised they’d see each other again. This morning? It was harder to have faith. Everything seemed to be falling apart. She’d yelled at Qavis for something that wasn’t his fault, she’d stubbed her toe on a misplaced table, and when anyone asked her where those pipes that she’d set up the day before were, she had to count to ten slowly before she bit their heads off. How had everything gone to hell so quickly? The party was fast approaching and she wasn’t sure she’d make it that far. She just wanted it to be over at this point.

“The musicians are here to set up.” Qavis approached her timidly, keeping plenty of distance from her, as if he wasn’t an eight foot tall alien who looked like he could lift her up and throw her across the room.

“Musicians?”

“They said they needed to test the acoustics.”

She wasn’t going to scream. She wasn’t . Molly forced in a deep breath and let it out slowly. This was fine, things like this happened. “Is the stage set up for them?” she asked.

“I think so?” Qavis still kept his distance and he didn’t look away from her to check, as if he was afraid she might attack.

“Okay. Let them do their thing. We’ll just have some entertainment this morning.”

Qavis nodded and went to shepherd the band to their place. The music made Molly’s headache even worse, and the fact that she couldn’t stop gritting her teeth couldn’t be helping. She just wanted this day to end! She wished Tav were with her. Even if he couldn’t make the work go faster, smoother, he made her feel better. It was crazy to want him so much already, but Molly was so mixed up with the party that she’d take any island of peace that she could.

Thinking of Tav reminded her of her goal the night before, and that reminded her that she had to call security and report the theft. It went about as well as expected, and if her communicator didn’t contain most of her schedule for the next week she would have chucked it across the room and smashed it into a million pieces in frustration. Security didn’t seem to care that her things kept going missing, and when she mentioned that they’d placed a tracker on the items and could tell them exactly where they were, the guard promised he’d check it out.

Eventually.

Yeah, she didn’t have much hope from that quarter.

“I think it’s time for you to take a break.”

The smooth masculine voice that had wormed its way inside of her had her jumping out of her seat and launching herself at Tav as if they hadn’t seen each other in months, rather than hours. He clasped his arms around her and held her up and it felt so good to be held that Molly simply melted against him, letting all of the tension go for the first time since she’d taken on the job. She hadn’t realized just how much she’d been holding until letting it go made her feel like she could fly.

“Is everything settled with your people?” she asked, lips brushing against his neck as her head nestled there.

Tav shivered against her and there was a kind of power in knowing that she affected him like that. “As settled as it can be at the moment. The credits he took are frozen and station security is on the lookout, though it’s likely that Dansin is long gone.”

“I’m sorry. I hope security gives you more attention than they’ve given me.” She didn’t want to let go, but Molly knew they were standing in the middle of a crowded room and she didn’t want everyone staring at her. No, she realized she didn’t actually care about that . She just didn’t want questions that would eat into the time she could spent with Tav. “And you’re right, break time sounds good. I can steal a little while.” Given the mood she’d been in all morning, Molly would have been more hindrance than help if she tried to get her hands dirty, and she was sure spirits would be lifted if she got out of everyone’s way for an hour or two.

And any time spent with Tav was a gift, especially as it would all be a memory soon enough.

“We could pick up where we left off last night,” she offered, grinning wickedly as she remembered the mad dash through the station to her room.

Tav brushed his lips against hers quickly before grabbing her hand. “I had something else in mind.”

“A trip to your quarters?” Because she wanted him behind closed doors and she wasn’t going to be picky about it. Hell, the closet they’d hidden in was just down the hall and she was happy to sneak into there for a few minutes.

He squeezed her hand. “When I have you in bed, I want the night to feast, not some hurried joining that will only make us ravenous for more.”

Her stomach growled and Molly realized it must have been after lunchtime. “Um…” something had just occurred to her and reminded her of some of the issues of bedding aliens. Not all of them had the same… etiquette as humans and that could lead to confusion. And pain. “When you say feast, you’re not being literal, right? That’s not a Detyen thing?”

Tav tipped his head back and laughed, the sound booming through the room and spreading joy to all who heard it. He kissed her again, as if he couldn’t help himself. “You are a joy, Molly mine. And I promise, all talk of feasting is purely metaphorical.”

Molly mine. She liked that. She’d never wanted anyone to claim her like that before, but here she was, and she couldn’t imagine anything better than Tav wanting to keep her long after the winter party was over and neither of them had a reason to be on Honora Station any longer.