both. I don’t understand how you can be so kind to me now.”
“Join in anytime here, Mike. She needs to see us as a pair. If we’re going to get her help getting out of here, she has to realize from the start that we travel as a set.”
23
Mike came over to stand beside his cousin, facing her.
“You were always as fair with us as you could be given your lack of understanding of our emotions. We like you, Jaci.” Mike dared to stroke her cheek and move in closer.
“Kiss her, Mike.”
Mike needed no further urging from his manipulative cousin. He pulled her into his arms and bent slightly to take her lips more fully than Dave had, sending his tongue to stroke her hot lips and slide intimately within. She squirmed closer, her temperature rising appreciably as he delved deep into her mouth.
“That’s enough. We don’t want to scare her off, I believe you just said?”Dave’s voice was disapproving as he watched them with narrowed eyes. Mike winked at him over her shoulder as he lifted away from her all too tempting lips.
“You kiss like a dream, Jaci.” He liked the look of her flushed face, the sparkle in her eyes. “I’ll dream of you tonight.” He kissed her eyes, eliciting a soft moan from deep in her throat.
Dave came up behind her, sandwiching her warm body between the two cousins, surrounding her in their heat. They both could feel her increased heart rate as Dave leaned in to nip at the tender skin where her shoulder met her neck.
“My people don’t dream much, but since the accident, I’ve been waking in the night with strange images in my head.”
“Did your ancestors dream before they started tinkering with your genetic code?” Dave kept his tone gentle.
She nodded, leaning back against him. “There are stories of dreams so violent that warriors would wake with their weapons in their hands and kill the first person they saw. My ancestors were even more violent than your human predecessors.”
“Well, I want you to dream only of us, Jaci. Happy dreams. Dreams of pleasure and understanding.”
Mike breathed in her ear as Dave laid his healing hands on her once more, reinforcing the thought.
“Dream of us tonight, sweetheart, and know that you are not alone.” Dave whispered into her other ear as his energy zinged through her once more, calming and reassuring.
24
“Someone’s coming to check on Jaci.”
The message came unbidden into their minds, a forceful voice neither of them had heard before. They drew away from her with a final caress and pushed her toward the monitor in the corner.
“Someone’s coming. Can you say there was trouble with the equipment?” Mike walked with her to the place where he knew the monitor resided then moved past her to sit nonchalantly on the cot against the far wall.
She shook herself as if to gather her cool. “Telepathy, right? That’s how you know someone’s coming.”
“I always knew you were smart.” Mike smiled at her.
She grinned back at him, her smile full of pleasure. He felt as if he’d just praised his puppy and received a full-body tail wag in reward. She was just that cute and so freshly innocent on her journey of emotional discovery.
“Get to work, sweetheart,” Dave reminded her in a low voice from the other side of the room, “and wipe that killer smile off your face. It’s most un-Alvian looking.”
His conspiratorial wink softened the chastising words as he pretended int erest in the viewer the cousins had earned for good behavior. They were slowly learning the Alvian language and were permitted to read certain histories and other entertainment texts to keep their minds occupied. That had been a new development instituted by the Maras. Apparently they’d learned from their studies that captive Breeds fared better when there was sufficient activity for their rather advanced brains.
Jaci schooled her thoughts and her expression in preparation for the arrival of one of her people. She realized in that