Tain walked into her department"s headquarters on her own world, no longer feeling odd wearing real clothes. She"d gotten out of the town on Oliven by using the tunnel under the warehouse, first changing into the smock the women had left for her. She"d also been able to remove the red armbands, so there hadn"t been anything to bring her to anyone"s attention in the woods. The wound on her arm had given her trouble, of course, but that hadn"t kept her from getting some food and water from the women"s hideout and then finding a farm with a horse to steal.
She really had been only a couple of days from her people"s base, and having the food pack meant she hadn"t even stopped to hunt. She did stop to give her stolen horse a rest every few hours, but once the horse seemed recovered she went on. When she reached the base she turned the horse loose to find its way back home, let her people doctor her arm and give her the antidote to the drug, and then she made them give her a ride to the nearest liner station. She was much too tired and aching to want to pilot herself, and seeing that she meant to take a liner was the only thing that kept the base personnel from insisting she stay until she was in better shape.
And all that pushing helped to keep me from having to do any thinking, Tain admitted privately as she made her way to Coleson"s office. I spent most of the liner ride sleeping, and now I have the strength to keep myself from thinking about anything I like. At least until I"m out of this place...
"Ah, Agent Halliday," Coleson"s secretary said with a smile when he looked up and saw Tain. "Right on time for your appointment. You can go right in."
Tain nodded her thanks and continued on into Coleson"s office.
The room was larger than anyone really needed for a work s.p.a.ce, not to mention that it was so poshly furnished it must have cost a fortune to decorate.
But it wasn"t just an office, after all, it was a political statement about Coleson"s position and standing. Coleson was very much a politician, and that was only one of the reasons Tain didn"t return the man"s smile of welcome.
"I"m glad to see you back, Tain," Coleson said warmly as she approached his ten-acre desk, then he gestured toward the line of chairs in front of the desk. "Have a seat and you can give me a synopsis of what your report will say."
"Thanks anyway, but I"d rather stand," Tain said, watching the smile fade from the man"s face. Coleson was handsome, well-built, and extremely charming, which was why people thought he made a great department head.
"I"ve already sent copies of my report to everyone I could think of, but you"ll probably be able to get it quashed anyway. Still, I"m hoping that someone uses the thing to beat you over the head for at least a little while."
"What are you talking about?" Coleson demanded, most of the charm no longer apparent. "What could you have put into your report that you think will harm me?"
"I described how you insisted that I take Ennie as a partner even though the girl wasn"t properly trained," Tain obliged, showing a smile that had nothing of humor or good feeling behind it. "You did that because you expected Ennie to mess up in some way, and when she did you would be able to embarra.s.s her uncle with her failure. It didn"t bother you in the least that you risked my life and hers just so you could further your political ambitions."
"Now, now, it was nothing so dire and dangerous as that," Coleson said, his smile back in place as he relaxed in his very expensive chair. "I already know that the girl did mess up, and the fault for her not being properly trained was her uncle"s. He insisted that she start to work as an agent right away, and all I could do was go along with him. If the a.s.signment had been on any other planet than Oliven I would have lodged a firm protest, but the worst that could have happened - what did, in fact, happen - was that you and she were enslaved. Considering the fact that you and she were retrieved by our own people almost at once means there was really no harm done at all."
"No harm done at all," Tain echoed, seeing that Coleson really wasn"t in the least bothered. "One of these days I"m going to show you exactly how little the harm can be considered. You have my word that you won"t enjoy the time."
"I can understand your being upset, Tain, and that"s why I authorized a bonus for you," Coleson said, still showing that smile as he laced his fingers comfortably across his middle. "I"ve even arranged for you to have some leave, during which time you can spend some of the bonus, but I do need you back here in about four days. There"s an a.s.signment that - ".
"Too bad, Coleson, but I won"t be back," Tain interrupted, this time enjoying herself quite a bit. "Not only did you risk my neck for political reasons, but you went back on the deal we had. I told you that if you ever a.s.signed Killen to work with me I would quit, but it looks like you didn"t believe me. This is my resignation, and if you try to fight it you"ll find out what nonpolitical down and dirty is like."
Tain pulled the envelope with her resignation out of her shoulder bag and tossed it on Coleson"s desk, and the man"s hand slapped down on the envelope as he straightened in his chair. All amus.e.m.e.nt was gone from Coleson"s face, and heavy disturbance had taken its place.
"Come on, Tain, you can"t mean that!" he protested, obviously having taken the resignation only by reflex. "I didn"t break our agreement on purpose and you have to know it! Jake Killen was already on the planet when we got word of your capture, and there weren"t - a lot of - others to go to your rescue."
"That"s right, you can"t lie about there being no one else, not when I saw the others at the base," Tain said with a satisfied nod as Coleson limped through an effort to excuse what he"d done. "You had your choice of three other agents to use, but you were so eager to play your private game that you forgot about everything else. Now you can take your new a.s.signment and shove it up your a.s.s."
"No, don"t do this," Coleson said almost desperately after standing up and putting his hand out with the resignation clutched in it. "You know you"re the best agent I have, and I don"t want to lose you! Tain, be reasonable!"
"Goodbye, Coleson, and have a lousy life," Tain said before turning and walking toward the door. Coleson kept trying to call her back, but she hadn"t been joking about leaving. They both knew she would have no trouble finding the same kind of work elsewhere, but first she was going to take a small vacation. There were things that needed to be thought about and then forgotten, and she would manage the forgetting. Even if it took a little while...
Jake walked into headquarters, more grimly determined than he"d been in quite a while. It had seemed like an eternity of being worried out of his mind before he and Tandro and Ennie had been able to leave for the base on horses supplied by Gordi, and then the trip had felt like an extension of that eternity. Not until he learned that Tain had made it back herself was Jake able to rest for a little while, not to mention sleep. But when he woke up he was angry rather than worried, and that anger had been growing.
"Agent Killen," Coleson"s secretary said when he saw Jake, the man"s expression uncertain. "I"m sorry, but Mr. Coleson isn"t available right now. If you"d like to make an appointment I"d be glad to - Agent Killen!"
By that time Jake was already at the door to Coleson"s office, and a moment later he was through the door. Coleson sat stiffly behind his desk, staring at a monitor screen that Jake couldn"t see. When Jake walked in Coleson didn"t look up immediately, but when he did look up his expression lacked the smarmy charm that Jake usually had trouble stomaching.
"How could you say that that girl did an adequate job on her first a.s.signment?" Coleson demanded, which told Jake that the man had been reading the report Jake had filed. "It was her fault that she and Tain were enslaved, and that"s a truth no one can get around!"
"What Ennie did was an accident, due mainly to her lack of proper training," Jake answered mildly, enjoying Coleson"s agitation.
"Once she had some experience to call on, she did rather well."
"But she brought a native of Oliven back with her!" Coleson shouted, then he seemed to regain control of himself. "She brought a native back with her, and that simply isn"t done," Coleson continued more calmly.
"It"s going to be my painful duty to tell her that the man has to be sent back at once."
"It would be premature to start enjoying that idea," Jake advised when he saw the vicious gleam in Coleson"s eyes. "Ennie has already checked with her lawyers, and they"ve told her that Tandro isn"t a criminal so he can go anywhere he pleases. Besides, she"s about to hand in her resignation, citing inadequate departmental leadership as the reason for breaking her contract. You were the one who let her go out without adequate training, you know."
"My skirts are clean on that one," Coleson responded, that smarmy look beginning to come back as he relaxed into his chair. "Her uncle, who is a director, don"t forget, told me to put the girl to work at once. If she wasn"t adequately trained it wasn"t my fault."
"Of course it was," Jake countered, showing his own version of a smile.
"You"re supposed to be in charge of this department, and if someone gives you an improper order it"s your place to say so and refuse to comply. A challenged order would have been brought before the board if it wasn"t withdrawn, and only then would your hands have been clean. As it is it"s perfectly clear that you were playing politics, which the head of this department isn"t supposed to do. I hear there"s going to be an investigation made, and if you"re found culpable you"ll be gone so fast your imprint in that chair will still be visible."
Coleson had gone pale listening to Jake, and his left hand turned to a fist on the arm of his chair. The man was finally starting to understand the ramifications of what he"d done, a circ.u.mstance that couldn"t have pleased Jake more.
"But warning you to be ready to file for unemployment isn"t the reason I"m here," Jake continued, drawing Coleson"s angry gaze. "I was told Tain Halliday stopped by to see you when she got back, and I want to know where she went."
"Where Halliday went is no longer my concern," Coleson returned, his manner suddenly even stiffer than it had been. "She came by to resign, and since I accepted her resignation I don"t care if she went straight to h.e.l.l. My suggestion would be that you go and look for her there."
"She quit?" Jake demanded, feeling as if he"d been hit hard in his middle.
"How could you let her do that?"
"I decided that this department would be much better off without her, and I do still run this place," Coleson answered, the man"s snottiness returning visibly. "With that point in mind, Killen, you can expect your next a.s.signment in a couple or three days. And don"t even think about quitting yourself. You have no basis for a breach of contract, and if you walk out anyway I"ll have you enjoined from working anywhere else. Now get out of my office."
Jake stared at Coleson for a moment, that close to quitting anyway, but cutting his own throat would accomplish nothing.
"Oh, don"t worry, I"m not quitting," Jake said, showing a smile again. "I want to be right here when they kick you out on your a.s.s. That"s a show I"d be willing to pay money to see."
When Coleson"s lips peeled back from his teeth to show a silent snarl, Jake turned and walked out of the office leaving the door open behind him.
He very much felt like snarling himself, but held back on the urge until he was out of the office entirely.
"Well?" Ennie asked as soon as Jake came out into the corridor, Tandro"s expression almost as intense as hers. "Did you find out where Tain is?"
"Coleson refused to talk about Tain except to tell me that she quit,"
Jake answered, frustration beginning to fill him. "Since we already know she isn"t at her apartment or with any of her friends, I don"t know where the h.e.l.l she is."
"Can we help you look for her, my friend?" Tandro asked, the calm in his voice acting as an aid to settle Jake down. "I don"t know how much help I would be, but Ennie knows her way around almost as well as you do."
"I appreciate the offer, but you two have your own plans to take care of,"
Jake said with a sincere smile. Ennie meant to take the training she"d missed from a private source, and Tandro would do the same.
Then the two were going back to Oliven to help Gordi abolish slavery, an end they were both determined to accomplish.
"Do you think you"ll find her if you search?" Ennie asked, sympathy clear in her eyes. "If you need professional help, I"d be more than willing to hire some private detectives."
"If I decide I need the help I"ll let you know," Jake a.s.sured her, then they all left the headquarters building in silence. Once outside they separated, Tandro and Ennie on their way back to her house, Jake to his own apartment. Tandro had looked uncomfortable in the clothes Ennie had bought for him, but Jake knew the man would get used to wearing more than a body cloth. Most planets weren"t as warm as Oliven...
Once in his apartment, Jake threw himself into a chair and began to brood.
He"d already tried to trace Tain"s movements, but the woman had obviously covered her tracks to make sure no one followed her. If only she was less of a professional, less able to disappear without a trace...
A picture of Tain formed in front of Jake"s inner eye, Tain the way he"d seen her so often during their time on Oliven. Her beautiful brown hair fell in gentle waves and framed her lovely face and blue eyes, leading his own eye down to the teasing view of that vest. Every now and then the vest had parted to show glimpses of her large and rounded b.r.e.a.s.t.s, and that skirt thing had framed her private parts with the promise of an even better view if she moved wrong.
"Or moved right, depending on your point of view," Jake murmured, falling into a waking dream. In the dream she stood waiting while he walked over to her, his hands going to her face before he leaned down to kiss her softly. Her lips were like a magnet to the iron in his blood, and that blood began to thunder around inside him as his hands moved down and started to take off her vest. She made no effort to stop him, of course, so those incredible b.r.e.a.s.t.s were bared to his sight in no more than a brief moment.
"You"ve now run away from me twice," Jake murmured as he caressed her with both hands, hating that she refused to respond in any way to the touch.
"At first I thought it was because you hated me, but if you hated me you wouldn"t have run. You would have told me exactly how you felt, and then you would have turned and walked away. Why did you run?"
"That"s my business," she answered, looking through rather than at him.
"Why are you wasting time?"
Jake knew she meant the way he was touching her. He"d forgotten the point for a time, but it had come back to him that female agents were taught a way to sublimate their physical responses if that kind of thing became necessary. Tain wasn"t letting herself respond to him, which wasn"t at all the same as being uninterested.
"You"re right, I am wasting time," he agreed, then reached down and removed her skirt before taking her wrist and pulling her after him.
She wouldn"t have followed on her own, of course, but being his slave gave him all the choices. He"d made some mistakes with her, but sometimes a mistake can still be very satisfying.
"You were a very bad girl and caused me an endless amount of worry, and now you"re going to be punished for that," Jake said as he led her to the chair, sat, and then pulled her over his lap. "I think you know you deserve what you"re about to get, but you don"t yet regret having earned it. That lack, however, is about to be remedied."
The way Tain moved just a little showed how unhappy she was to be in that position, but she wasn"t allowed to do anything but accept what was done to her. Not having to hold her down let Jake use both hands to put the insertion into her round little bottom, and when she gasped he smiled. All the training in the universe couldn"t keep her from responding once that insertion was in place.
But first there was a punishment to be given her. Jake picked up the thin, narrow wooden paddle, and once his hand was wrapped comfortably around the handle he began to spank Tain. One stroke and she made a sound in her throat as she fought not to squirm. Two strokes and the sound was repeated as she continued to resist moving. The third stroke drew a slightly louder sound from her, but it wasn"t until the fifth stroke that she lost the battle to lie still. Her pretty bottom was starting to turn pink, and Jake was only just beginning to warm up - so to speak.
After ten strokes Tain was moving in desperation as she half whimpered and half moaned. Jake watched the squirming as he applied that paddle to her bottom over and over, memory of how worried he"d been about her adding to the strength of his arm. It had taken her two days to get back to the base, and if she"d pa.s.sed out from blood loss at any point she could have died.
Tain was kicking and howling, her bottom red and tender-looking when Jake came back to himself. He"d been so furious over almost losing her that the paddling had been a bit harder than he"d originally intended. There was no question that she deserved to be punished, but he wanted her able to respond to what came next. If he gave her too much pain, her response would be less than what he wanted it to be.
So he gave her only three more strokes of the paddle, each stroke making her jump and yell and writhe. When he put the paddle aside and urged her to her feet, he felt nothing of a sense of not having done a proper job.
After all, tomorrow was another day and so was the day after. It would take more than a few days for his anger to disappear, and Tain, being responsible for the anger, would also be responsible for easing the emotion.
Once Jake got to his feet, he picked Tain up in his arms and carried her to the bed. She was crying, of course, but that was only to be expected.
He put her down and then followed, letting her raise her aching bottom off the bed while he leaned over those b.r.e.a.s.t.s and began to kiss and lick them. Tain"s breath came in gasps almost as soon as he started, but when he began to kiss his way down her body she also began to moan.
Her knees were spread nice and wide, and when he began to lick her lowest softness her moans turned downright frantic. She probably would have been begging him to ease her if she"d been permitted to speak, but slaves did only what their owners allowed. Jake made her writhe and squirm for quite some time before he straightened and began to take off his body cloth. He would have enjoyed feeling her hands on his own body while he took pleasure from hers, but letting her touch him would have interfered with the rest of her punishment. Jake knew she wanted to touch him, but she hadn"t earned the right to do that.
When he finally knelt between her legs and began to enter her, the squeaking she"d been doing started to intensify. The insertion made her so delightfully tight that he might have had trouble entering her if he hadn"t gotten her so aroused that her body wept in its desperation for his. Once he had all of him inside her he began to stroke her in a different way, his arms braced on either side of her body. He knew she wanted to be held as he used her and meant to refuse as a continuing punishment, but after a very short time he found that it was he who was being punished. This woman meant too much to him for him to just use her like a hole in the ground.
So Jake gathered her in his arms and pressed his lips to hers while he eased them both, and suddenly her own arms were around him.
She"d been denied the touching of him until she really wanted to, until she wanted to touch him. The feel of her hands sliding down his back was so good, so incredibly good, so - Jake had to shake his head hard to pull all the way out of the daydream, and then his sense of loss rose to new heights. His dream had kept changing to match his changing desires, and the last of it was almost pitiful. He wanted Tain Halliday to want him as much as he wanted her, but all that wanting just wasn"t going to happen, at least not on her part.
He might be able to talk her around somehow, but first he had to find her.
And how was he supposed to do that...?