Not the Man She Thought Read Online Free PDF Page B

of the bed, Laken got
to her feet and left the cabin.
       Taking a
chance that Dev would be in the communications room, she headed down the
passageway in that direction. The dark-haired woman was sitting at one of the
many computers in the room and she looked up at Laken’s entrance.
    “Hey.”
    Laken returned the other woman’s smile with one of her own.
“Do you have a minute?”
    “Sure. Come in.”
    Laken walked across the room and took a seat in the chair
beside Dev. “I was so eager to get to my fiancé Mallin that I left Tellune
without telling anyone where I was going, and now I’m concerned my mother is
going to be worried about me. Could you help me get a message to her?”
    Dev said nothing for a moment, then shook her head. “I’d
really like to, but I can’t, Not without the captain’s permission.”
    Laken was afraid Dev would say that. “I won’t say anything,
if you won’t.”
    Dev’s lips curved into a rueful smile. “I’m sorry, Laken,
but I can’t. If the captain gives the okay though, I’d be happy to send a
message for you.”
    Trying to change the other woman’s mind would only be a
waste of time. Laken had seen how the captain treated his crew and she was sure
Dev didn’t want to get on his bad side. “I understand,” she said. “I’ll talk to
him.”
    Outside the room, Laken stopped for a moment. Having to go
to any man, especially someone like Karsten, and ask him for his permission to
do something as simple as send a message to her mother went against everything
in her, but if that was what she had to do, then she would. Remembering how
well her previous meeting had gone with him, she wasn’t looking forward to it.
But it would be different this time. She wouldn’t lose her temper, no matter
how much he annoyed her.
    With that in mind, she walked down the passageway to the
captain’s ready-room. Once there, she took a deep breath and knocked on the
door, then waited.
    “Are you looking for the captain?”
    Recognizing Jorn’s voice, Laken turned to see him walking
down the passageway toward her. “Yes.”
    “He’s down in the cargo hold.”
    Thanking Jorn, she went back the way she had come and headed
down to the cargo hold. She had only come this way the one time when Finn had
dragged her to see Karsten, so it took her a while to find it. When she got
there, she saw the captain and his first officer standing beside a stack of open
crates, along with Finn and Kamran. She hesitated, wondering if she should
interrupt, but the first officer spotted her before she could leave. He leaned
close to Karsten and whispered something. Karsten’s head jerked up, his eyes
meeting hers. Giving Kamran a terse order to close the crate they had been
looking in, he turned on his heel and strode across the cargo hold.
    “What the hell are you doing here?” he demanded. “I told you
I didn’t want you sneaking around the ship.”
    She glared at him.   “I wasn’t sneaking around.   I went to your ready-room to talk to you and Jorn told me I could find
you down here.”
    He clenched his jaw. “Well, you found me. What do you want?”
    Laken’s gaze went to where the other men were standing down
in the hold. “I wanted to ask you a favor, but since you’re busy, I’ll come
back later.”
    A look of annoyance flashed across his face. “You’re here
now, so ask me.”
    She hesitated for a moment, wetting her suddenly dry lips.
“I’d like to send a message to my mother letting her know I’m okay.”
    “No.”
    Laken blinked, taken aback by his curt answer. “But she’ll
be worried about me.”
    He shrugged. “Then you should have thought of that before
you decided to stow away on my ship.”
    “But...”
    “I said no!”
    “Why not?”
    He folded his arms across his broad chest. “Because I said
so, that’s why.”
    What was he, twelve? “That’s not a reason.”
    “Well, it’s the only one you’re going to get.”
    She ground her jaw. “You’re a real