8. Sloane

eight

Sloane

M y fingers wrap around the mug of hot… well, what's supposed to be an equivalent to coffee, according to Essa. It's got the hot part down, the bitter part down, but it's not making me feel any better this morning like my normal deliciously sugared and creamed coffee would at home.

I guess I can't expect too much since no one on this ship thought to program in any human food. I'm lucky to have something that kind of resembles coffee and an enthusiastic Essa who's swiping through all the rest of the food choices, looking for something to pour into it to make it more appealing.

"What about an oil made from a creature on my planet that tastes like your human vanilla?" she asks with a wiggle of her brows as she turns to face me. "That sounds good."

"But what if it makes my mouth all oily when I go to drink it?"

The thought of drinking anything that still sticks to my mouth makes me dry heave a little bit. We've already tried three other oils, and each one had me throwing out the whole drink because of how gross the texture was.

Essa frowns at me, her hands going to her hips. "This is the fifth one you have wretched at. Do you not want to put anything in it?"

"Look, if you told me you had milk or sugar, I'd be down, but you keep listing off weird animal fats, and at one point, I'm pretty sure you implied one of them was still alive."

"Not anymore." Essa throws her hands up in exasperation. "This is a synthesizer. It replicates foods, but none of it is truly the same as the real thing. If you want to eat the skin of a quash, we'll do that when you visit Haven III."

My heart does a little song and dance when Essa talks about visiting her home planet like it's something we'll definitely be doing. I hope it's true and not just something she's saying to make me feel better about not liking any of her choices to flavor my coffee with. She's been a good friend since I've been here, and I'm wondering if she didn't need a good girlfriend just as much as I did.

"Okay, until we visit, I'll just get used to drinking this plain."

I bring the steaming cup to my lips and brace for the bitterness before the liquid even touches my tongue. Essa grimaces, a shiver running down her body. She's made it abundantly clear that she hates the drink even though it hails from her planet.

"Suit yourself." She shrugs before turning back to the synthesizer and flicking through a few options before choosing one.

She's just turned around, mouth open to say something, when the kitchen door opens, revealing a startled and disheveled Alik. My face flushes, thinking back to three nights ago when he had me begging him to impregnate me. Since then, I haven't seen him or Jovi.

Their obvious dismissal of me hurts, but it's about what I expected when I took the job. Maybe I let myself think they cared about me a bit more than they did when they were paying me so much attention. Their lack of interest since having sex with me has made it clear where I lie in the hierarchy of things.

"What?" Essa snaps at Alik, who's just standing there gawking.

I may have confided in her I'm hurt by how they're treating me. She tried to make me feel better by telling me they aren't used to a pleasure crew female paying them much attention or letting them entertain me in courting ways. Not that she would elaborate on the courting ways when I asked. I want to believe her, but the lack of even being acknowledged right now is making it hard to stay optimistic.

"Sorry." Alik holds a hand up, "I didn't know you were in here. I'll come back later."

He turns to leave, but before he can get very far, I call out to him, "Which one of us did you not know was in here? If it's me, I was just about to go back to my room, anyway."

It shouldn't break my heart when he turns back around, one hand on the back of his neck. It shouldn't feel like a stab in the chest as he walks deeper into the kitchen, confirming it's just me that he and Jovi don't want to see.

I refuse to let the sting of tears fall, though. Refuse to let him see that his dickishness is actually hurting me. I just grab my cup of coffee and make my way out of the kitchen.

The door is still in the process of sliding shut when I hear the sound of Essa hitting Alik. It shouldn't bring a twitch of a smile to my lips, but it does.

"So, how long until we're at the rendezvous spot?" I ask Holoth as I spin around in the captain chair Phial evacuated a few minutes ago.

After leaving the kitchen, I wandered around the ship for a little while, not wanting to seclude myself from everyone. That's how I ended up in the navigation pit, annoying Phial and Holoth with all of my questions. Well, now it's just Holoth since Phial needed to use the restroom.

"A week, give or take, until we're at the meeting spot. After that, we wait until they contact us again." Holoth keeps his eyes on one of the radars even though it's shown the same thing the entire time I've been in here.

"Why are you two so busy in here today?" I spin around again, letting the bolts on the ceiling all meld together and make me dizzy. "Usually, you're out and about hanging out, but you've been cooped up in here since movie night unless you're sleeping."

Holoth closes his eyes, the first reaction I've gotten out of him besides general disinterest. I roll with it. I don't know if he's remembering how he snored through the whole movie, how he was woken up when Essa found out Jovi, Alik, and I were fooling around, or if he's just uncomfortable being reminded of my role on this ship. Either way, it's something to go off of that isn't him giving me the most basic and boring answers to all of my questions.

"What's that look for?"

"No look." Holoth slips even more by sounding tired.

"There was definitely a look." I wiggle my brows at him. Not that he notices since he's still staring at the radar. "Come on, Holoth, entertain me!"

"You have two males perfectly capable of entertaining you," he says through gritted teeth. His statement has my spirits dying, and I slouch in the chair, losing all enthusiasm for this line of questioning.

"They want nothing to do with me, so no, I really don't."

Holoth glances over at me for a moment. A look so slight, so quick I almost don't even catch it before he's back to staring at the radar. "I doubt that."

"Well, let's see, we had a mutually beneficial night together, after which one of them ran off, and the other walked me to my room, where I slept all alone and kind of sad. Since then, they haven't even acknowledged that I exist, so yeah, I'd say they don't want anything to do with me."

I stop spinning in my chair, the bottom of my toes squeaking against the floor. It's a pathetic answer, but Holoth's giving way too much credit to my abilities to keep anyone interested in me.

Apparently, I'm great for one night of fun, but after that, I'm not worthy of even talking to them until they want to get their dicks wet again. Which, okay, fair enough since that's what I signed on for. Doesn't feel very good when I thought at least Jovi and I were friends.

Holoth, for sure, looks at me this time, and he doesn't even look away when I notice. He studies my face for a long moment, his eyes narrowing on the emotions I'm trying hard to keep from spilling out in the form of tears.

"Why do you care?" he asks, and it makes me feel even worse somehow.

I let out a sad little laugh. "I don't know, man. I thought we were friends, I guess." I throw my hands up, realizing how dumb it all sounds. "I get along well enough with Essa and with you and Phial. I thought maybe…" I shake my head, letting the words trail off, not needing any of them to know deep down. I was kind of hoping they'd all want me to stay, too, even though the only thing I have to offer anyone on this ship is my body.

"You thought what?" Holoth turns to me, his hands on his thighs as he leans forward. "We've had plenty of pleasure crew come through this ship, and not a single one has acted like you do, so none of us really knows what to do with you. Do you want to be our friend? Okay, three of the five of us do that for you. Why should it matter what their opinions of you are? They can be your job, and we can be your friends. That sounds more than pleasant, in my opinion."

"You wouldn't want them as friends anyway," Phial adds, his talons clicking against the floor as he walks back over to his seat. "They get too worked up and want to fight everyone."

I don't miss the way Phial's blaster is casually held in his hand or how he's walking with a slight limp. His feathers ruffle behind him when he notices me looking at him, but then he's flicking the blaster, telling me to get out of his seat. I scurry out, not wanting to keep him on his feet any longer if he's actually hurt.

"Which one?" Holoth asks, sinking back into his chair and putting his hands behind his head.

Phial looks over at me where I'm standing and fiddling with my fingers, unsure if I'm even allowed in here now that one of them is hurt. His eyes go to the pendant around my neck, a question popping up in his mind that he thinks better of asking me.

I've thought about flipping the pendant to green just to see if they'd talk to me then, but that seems even more pathetic than moping around the spaceship and bothering the other three.

"Jovi's having a bad day," Phial says as he swivels his chair back to the comm screens and starts messing with them. "I pulled my gun on him, and he calmed down."

"Gun already." Holoth smiles, but his tone is hollow as he rubs at his temples. He doesn't bother not voicing the question that Phial thought better of asking. "Mind calming them down if you're able? They'll get more and more dangerous if not."

"They know she's in here. It's why he was so angry in the first place," Phial says, rubbing at his leg after he straps his gun back in its holster. "If you're not going to calm them down, we probably shouldn't leave until you can."

I eye the door to the navigation pit, unsure if Jovi or Alik is going to bust in at any moment. Alik didn't seem that angry when he came into the kitchen earlier, but then again, he looked depressed more than anything else.

If they're that upset about me being here, why haven't they come to find me themselves? Why haven't they just said something to me about it?

"They can't come in here," Phial says when I don't respond to either of them. He stares at the door and kicks his legs up. "Locked them out starting yesterday. When they get in bad moods, it's best to keep them separated from other males. They see us as competition."

"Competition for what?"

Phial and Holoth both snort at that and then grow concerned when they realize I don't know what they're talking about. Phial cocks his head to the side, his feathers bristling before he uses his hand to smooth out the ones on his head. "Competition for you."

"We've had the pretty human locked up in here with us for so long today, and they're ready to rip us apart limb from limb. I can guarantee it." Holoth chuckles but continues staring at the radar. "She thinks they don't want her."

Phial throws his head back in laughter, causing a fresh blush to erupt in my cheeks and down to my chest. It would be very much appreciated if everyone could stop pretending like they know everything, and I know nothing about how Jovi and Alik are treating me since I'm the one currently being treated the way they're treating me.

I don't say anything, though. I just cross my arms over my chest and glare at the two males hellbent on making me feel embarrassed for being unsure of where I stand with the two aliens I kind of like a little bit more than I should since they're my job and not supposed to be anything more.

"Turn it to green. Don't turn it to green. Either is fine with us," Holoth says, his smile still spreading his lips as he watches to see what I'll do. "You're our friend. We don't push our friends to do anything they're uncomfortable with."

"We're friends?" Phial cocks his head to the side the other way, the movement rustling his feather as his talons tap against his chair arms.

"I hope so," I tell him, giving him another pathetic laugh. Apparently, that's all I can do today: give pathetic laughs and half-assed smiles.

I grab for the pendant around my throat, knowing I came here for a job, and I don't like that my friends are getting hurt because I'm not holding up my end of it.

I thought when Jovi and Alik didn't come to see me at all, it was because they wanted nothing to do with me. Which is still true. I didn't know they'd also still need me to help with the release of aggression they need. Especially not since it hasn't even been close to the five days they're used to waiting. Maybe that's my fault for telling them I don't really have a cooldown period.

"I'll see you guys later, okay?" I say to the two sitting in their navigation chairs.

They watch me open the door and step out, a look of concern marring their faces, but they just hold up their hand in goodbye as the door closes. When I'm left alone in the hallway, I take a deep breath to steady my nerves and then walk back to my room.

I wait until the door slides open before I click the pendant over to green. I don't know why I expect them to knock down my door immediately, but they don't. I have time to get undressed, comb through my hair, and brush my teeth before I hear pacing outside my door. I also have enough time to decide how I want this to happen.