Quiet

Ruth and Amanda were settled into their quarters by James Terry, Amanda was secretly relieved that the silent ‘were had delivered their luggage and disappeared.

Amanda left her sister flirting with James and hurried to her own quarters, with shaking hands she pulled out a silver case that had not left her side since they had left Osiris. With shaking hands she pulled out a surveillance wand she wanted to double check that there were no tracking devices anywhere near her, satisfied that she was safe for the moment Amanda started to unpack the remainder of the case.

She looked around the room, she needed a place to hide the small control chip she had removed from the interior of the Self Satisfaction Virtual Reality Module 7.2. Behind her the door slid open, with out thinking about it she threw the wand at whoever was coming in and grabbed her gun out of the case and pointed it toward the door.

Acting out of years of training Cord ducked the flying object and looking up into the gun in Amanda’s hand, he continued forward under her arm and tackled her to the floor.

“What in the hell do you think your doing?” he growled, Cord could see the fear in her face, he held Amanda down until the fear faded and embarrassment took its place.

‘tianna what a time for his body to notice he held a female pinned down’ Cord thought as he carefully rose up off of Amanda and stepped back by the door, he slid the door partway closed and leaned against the wall

“Care to tell me what kind of trouble your bringing to my ship?” he asked in a quiet voice.

Amanda got up from the floor feeling like a fool, how was she going to explain this, ‘best to try and bluff it out’ she thought.

“Excuse me sir, you were the one who barged into my room,” Amanda lifted her chin and tried to stare him down, it had worked on the toughest Matron on Osiris, surely it would work on this man. Amanda worked on controlling her unexpected reaction to the man who leaned so casually against her wall. Never in her life had she responded so physically to a man.

The fog of desire cleared enough for Amanda to recall what he had asked her, frowning she asked, “Your ship, I thought Cousin Chloe owned the Katie’s Pride? Who are you?”

“Chloe is the owner, I am the first mate, and my name is Cord, your turn to answer me. What kind of trouble are you running from?”

“I’m not in any kind of trouble, and I would thank you to please leave my cabin this instant.” Amanda haughtily replied.

“Don’t try to lie to me woman, your beautiful eyes won’t make me forget that you drew a gun on me.” Cord cursed silently to himself as soon as the words left his mouth, though his expression never changed to reveal his thoughts.

“My apologies Mr. Cord, you simply startled me and I have been trained from a very young age to react quickly to situation as my body guards may not be there.” Amanda hoped that the excuse satisfied him, even though it sounded pitiful even to her own ears.

Even with Cord wearing sunglasses Amanda could feel his assessing gaze as he weighted whether or not to accept her lie. With a sharp nod of his head he strode out of her cabin, Amanda collapsed onto her bunk relief making her knees weak.

“You know it’s to bad all the great ones are sly, though I do think he is a little on the large size” Ruth announced as she breezed into Amanda’s bunk, looking around she pronounced the bunk not to bad, “I expected worse accommodations actually, the infirmary is definitely set up very well. Much better then expected.”

“Sly? Whose sly, Mr. Terry?” Amanda came up out of her fog to question her sister.

Ruth’s laughter pealed out of her like silver bells, Amanda had always been jealous of her sister laugh, according to their brother Amanda’s laugh sounded like a donkey’s bray.

“No, that ‘were Cord is sly, silly”

“How do you know?” Amanda asked curious as to why her sister would say something so outrageous.

“Because, he didn’t even bat an eyelash when I said hello that’s why” Ruth replied as if that explained everything.

Amanda looked at her sister in astonishment, if the heated length his arousal was anything to go by, she really didn’t think Cord was, tentatively she ventured “Ruth, you do realize he is from the planet Helios?”

Ruth spun and stared at her sister in shock, she knew the history of the Core planets even better than Amanda, Dr. Graham Helios-Ware was a genius in his field of genetics, but when he announced his belief in the need for genetically engineering humans to achieve the perfect specimen he was laughed out of the medical community.

The doctor was the last in a long line of a very rich family, rich enough to purchase a small planetoid out on the farthest rim of explored space; there with his dedicated followers he genetically engineered the foetus’s of his pregnant followers. Children of this genetic tampering came to be known as ‘Weres due to their animal like eyes and remembrance of their creator.

“Amanda are you sure? ‘Were’s almost never leave Helios due to the reception they receive from everyone else.” Ruth, even though she struck everyone she met as an empty headed frivolous woman with no more on her mind than her next exciting escapade, cared deeply about her chosen career in medicine. Ruth more than anyone Amanda knew reviled what Dr. Helios-Ware had done.

“Ruth, I may have had my head stuck in a medical textbook, then in the innards of synth for the past couple of years, but yes I am sure Mr. Cord is a ‘Were.”

Ruth sat down beside her sister; she chewed the ends of her hair as she thought this over, “Manda, do you think?”

Amanda thought over what she knew of the first mate, her first impression was of a tall man with long hair wearing a faded red cotton shirt and canvas pants tucked into battered combat boots, nothing to really stand him out from the rest of the crowd on Evansdown docks. She refused to think of her visceral reaction to the man when he shook her hand, or of the surge of passion that suffused her when she felt his arousal against her thigh.

“Ruth, I hardly know the man and I don’t know how he would take your offer to fix his genes.” With a sharp movement Amanda stood and started to move jerkily around her bunk, “I have to finish unpacking and get ready for dinner.”

Eyeing her sister Ruth realized that there was something going on between Amanda and Cord, a mischievous grin lit up her face.

A knock on the door interrupted both women, a dark head poked around the door, cries of “Jules and Jube Jube” rang through the ship as all three women hugged and tried to catch up on eight years of living in the space of thirty seconds.

Laughing Jules, pulled the twins over to sit on the bunk, with one on each side of her she told them how she ended up cooking on Katie’s Pride after their father fired her and threw her out of the family estate.

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Weeks went by as Katie ran cargo runs between the Core worlds and the planets on the rim, Ruth settled into her role as medic efficiently and easily. When they were stopped for longer than a day, she would open the infirmary to the local community. Once they were back in the Core, Ruth would simply contact the nearest hospital to refill whatever was low in the infirmary. As Ruth laughingly remarked, it was handy to be the heir to the largest pharmaceutical company in the ‘verse.

Amanda tried to stay hidden in her bunk, but Jules and Ruth would have none of it, they would drag her out of her safety. Amanda found renewed joy in cooking beside Jules and acted as nurse to Ruth when the infirmary was open.

Even Chloe finally warmed up to the twins, she allowed Amanda to delve into the computer systems on Katie’s Pride. There never was a specific time Amanda found to work on the systems, so it did not really surprise Cord to see a long pair of legs sticking out of the wall and muttered cursing coming from within during his early morning rounds. He wanted to move on past, but Amanda voice stopped him.

“Umm, could you help me please, I seem to be sort of stuck”

Crouching down Cord looked into the small access hatch, Amanda was lying on her stomach, one arm was free the other was caught behind her.

In a rueful voice Amanda explained her predicament, “the seat of my coveralls caught on something and when I tried to get them free I seemed to have caught my other hand as well.”

When no help was immediately forthcoming, Amanda attempted to squirm around to see who was behind her, a large warm hand laid on the back of her leg froze her still. There was only one person on the ship who had hands that large, and she had been studiously avoiding him for the past few weeks.

“Hold still”

Amanda felt the pull on the cloth of her coveralls, the cold edge of the knife slid along the edge of her skin, suddenly she was free, her arm fell to the floor of the hatch, crying out in pain Amanda attempted to slide out.

“Hold still, woman” Cord demanded, cursing under his breath about over intelligent women who didn’t know how to follow orders. Grabbing Amanda about the hips, Cord lifted/slid her out of the hatch. The slit in the rear of her coveralls split open even further, giving him an unobstructed view of the creamy globes of her ass and the thin wisp of bright blue underwear that hugged her skin like a lover.

Attempting to ignore the sudden tightness in his pants Cord stood Amanda on her feet, he could see the embarrassment coming off her in waves. With a sharp nod, he moved off down the corridor.

“Wait, please” Amanda’s voice came softly down the corridor, when Cord stopped, she continued, “Thank you for releasing me, I know how much that you hated to touch me. I really appreciate what you did.”

Turning Cord stared at Amanda in amazement; hate to touch her, where in the nine hells would she have gotten that idea. The blood pounding in his groin gave lie to that idea, he moved down the aisle, following Amanda as she retreated till her back was to the wall.

Licking her lips nervously, Amanda wondered if she had somehow insulted Cord, the ‘Were culture was extremely complex and not much was known about it, other than they did not like to touch anyone other than their immediate family.

Without a word Cord placed his hands on either side of Amanda’s head, she could slip out under if she wanted to escape, but Amanda found herself unable to move. Suddenly Cord was kissing her, his mouth was hot, her lips were soft and welcoming, he plundered her mouth with his tongue, rallying Amanda nipped at his lips, both drank deeply from the other, only their mouths touched, tasted and played with the other.

Leaving Amanda leaning against the wall, it’s support the only thing holding her up Cord walked down the aisle without looking back. He knew if he looked back he would take her right there on the cold steel floor. A woman like Amanda required soft blankets, cool sheets and a comfortable mattress because they would be there for days.

Amanda made her way back to her bunk where her dreams were studded with erotic images of her and Cord, she woke with an ache in her heart and between her thighs.

Ruth bounced into the room without knocking, “Morning Manda, you look like hell, still not sleeping huh?” Ruth perched herself on the side of her twins bunk, “You know if you just took him to bed I am sure it would be worth it, you would get a decent sleep afterwards anyway.” Ruth ducked the pillow that Amanda swung at her halfheartedly.

Patting Amanda on the knee, Ruth continued, “I’m not here to counsel you on your lack of sex life, but your going out with Jules and me tonight, we are stopping on Courtney where Cousin Chloe is to meet with a Captain Reynolds and his crew. Chloe says that their rep is very good and it is safe enough for you to come out of you hidey hole.”

Ruth placed her hand over her twins mouth to stop the inevitable retort, “Manda, I know you better than I know myself, your in some kind of trouble, everyone on board knows that your hiding from something. I just told them your hiding from unrequited a beau who wont leave you alone, that’s why you hide when we go to the Core. Now, get up and come to the head, I just love saying that, Jules and I are going to do something with that mess you call hair.”

Not allowing Amanda any time to answer her Ruth stepped out of the room calling for Jules. Lying there in the bunk Amanda felt tears flow down her cheeks, it was times like this that she realized how much she actually loved Ruth, and how much Ruth loved her. Getting out of bed Amanda grabbed clothes nearest to hand before hurrying out of the room, if she didn’t catch Ruth before she got to Jules Amanda knew she would end up with multicoloured hair.