Imprisoned Read online

  “Jak…Jak where are you?” he mumbled. “I can’t…can’t find you. Jak, please don’t leave me…”

  Lathe felt a strange emotion he couldn’t immediately identify. Then it came to him—the feeling was envy. Who was this Jak that Ari called out for? What relationship did he have with the boy?

  What’s wrong with you? he scolded himself fiercely. What does it matter who the boy cries for? Why should you care if he cares for another?

  But the fact was, he did. Why?

  Pressing the boy closer to him, Lathe buried his face in the riot of thick, black, almost-curly hair and breathed deeply. That scent…the boy’s scent smelled so strange…so good but so wrong somehow. Why?

  He smells like a female, Lathe realized at last. But that was impossible—he’d seen the lad naked not once but twice. He was definitely male.

  And yet he smelled female. Female.

  A burst of understanding washed over Lathe. No wonder he’d felt compelled to save Ari even at the risk of his own life! The boy’s scent had been working on him, manipulating him the same way a Kindred’s bonding scent worked on a female he wanted to bond to him.

  Of course, Lathe didn’t want to bond with a male. He had nothing against males who loved other males but the fact was, he wasn’t one of them. He’d never felt attracted to another male in his life.

  Until now, whispered a little voice in his head.

  No. No, it wasn’t real—it was the boy’s scent working on him—that was all. A Kindred’s first instinct was to protect any helpless female—no wonder he hadn’t been able to stop himself from coming to Ari’s rescue. The boy’s feminine scent had compelled him.

  Lathe wondered for a moment if the boy was putting out the scent deliberately and then decided he couldn’t possibly be. He seemed so upset when Lathe came anywhere near him and his fear was genuine—such terror couldn’t be faked. So he certainly wasn’t drawing Lathe to him on purpose. No, the boy must not even know he smelled so good…so feminine.

  Maybe it’s a trait of his people, Lathe thought. He’d have to ask Ari more about where he came from…if he ever got over his fear of Lathe enough to talk, that was.

  Well, he’s certainly not going to get over it if he wakes up and finds himself cradled in your arms, whispered a practical little voice in his head. Better let him go before you go back to sleep.

  Lathe knew the voice was right. Ari seemed warm enough now—as long as he kept the boy beside him in bed, near the heat of his own much larger body, he should get through the night well enough.

  But it was surprisingly hard to let the boy go and turn his back when all he wanted to do was gather Ari to his chest and keep him close for the rest of the night.

  It’s his scent—just his scent working on me, he told himself. But breathing in that warm, feminine scent made it very difficult to be still. Even with his back to the boy, it was a long, long time before Lathe at last drifted off to sleep.

  Thirteen

  Something smelled really good. Amazingly good. Warm…spicy… clean…masculine were the words that drifted through her half-asleep mind. Ari inhaled deeply and found that the source of the good smell was close—close and deliciously warm. Had Hanna put a new warmer-pillow in her bed while she slept last night?

  But when she pressed her face to the warm thing, it didn’t feel soft like a pillow at all. It was firm and hard like a wall and it moved in slow, deep waves almost like someone breathing.

  Someone breathing? Who’s in my bed? she wondered sleepily. And why does the left side of my face ache?

  Putting her fingers up, she gingerly explored the area of pain and winced at her own touch. Ow, that really hurt. What had happened to her? Had she gotten kicked in a Ton-kwa combat? But she hadn’t been to any combats lately. Not since Jak had gone missing…

  Jak! BleakHall! I’m at BleakHall! And I’m in bed with someone—with Medic!

  Suddenly everything came rushing back: her horrible first day, the run-in with the Serpents gang, nearly getting raped and killed by Tapper and his crew, and then getting dragged away to the big Kindred’s cell.

  And now I’m in bed with him. How did I get here? What’s going on?

  She distinctly remembered falling asleep in the corner, wrapped in the blanket. But now she was in the bunk with the big Kindred—and worse, on the inside of the bunk in the part facing the wall.

  Trapped, she thought wildly. I’m trapped between him and the wall. How can I get out? What am I going to do?

  She lay stiff and frightened for a moment, her breath coming in short, terrified gasps. Part of her wanted to shove against his broad back and try to get away but she was afraid of what he might do to her if she did that. After all, he had those fangs…

  Kill-All, whispered the voice in her head. Ari’s imagination wouldn’t stop. She could imagine the big Kindred pinning her to the bed…leaning over her, his fangs bared…

  Would he bite her if she tried to run? Would he threaten her with his fangs and take what Tapper had wanted? Would he—

  Abruptly a loud, blaring alarm came over the exterior com-link system. At the same time, a blinding light flashed on, flooding the cell with dirty gold brilliance.

  Goddess! Ari’s heart jumped into her mouth and she could barely breathe. What was happening now? Was it some kind of drill? An attack?

  To her surprise the big Kindred didn’t jump out of bed as he had the night before when she’d been frightened of the lasher. Instead he yawned and stretched hugely, his big body seeming to take up even more space for a moment.

  Ari squeezed herself flat against the wall, trying to avoid him but his broad shoulder brushed against her bare breasts anyway and she jumped, realizing that the blanket she’d wrapped herself in the night before had fallen down around her waist.

  “Oh, good morning.” He turned his head, frowning sleepily at her. “Why do you look like you just saw a ghost?”

  “What…what am I doing in here? In…in your bed?” she managed to make herself ask. She also somehow kept herself from covering her bare breasts with her arm though it felt incredibly wrong to sit there in front of him completely exposed.

  Of course, her look/touch showed only a flat, boyish chest but what if Medic realized that what he’d accidentally touched didn’t match up with what he saw? She held her breath when he frowned at her and shook his head.

  “What you’re doing in bed with me is not freezing to death,” he growled. “And it’s where you’re going to sleep every night from now on. You’re too little to sleep on your own when the temperature drops—nearly lost you to hypothermia last night.”

  “What? I don’t believe that,” Ari exclaimed. “It’s just an excuse to get me into your bed.”

  “Look, Ari, let me make this very, very clear to you…” The big Kindred sat up and glared at her. “I am not interested in you in…in the way Tapper is. Sexually, I mean. I don’t…don’t desire you.” He cleared his throat, his face going ever so slightly red and Ari wondered who he was trying to convince—her or himself.

  “Yesterday, in the Infirmary—” she began but he held up a hand to stop her.

  “You had to be searched and it was either me or Mukluk doing the searching,” he said firmly. “I’ve seen the damage he can do with those claws of his—I didn’t want that to happen to you. But believe me I took no pleasure in…” He cleared his throat again. “In searching you.”

  Ari glared at him uncertainly, wondering if she ought to believe him. The memory of his hands on her was hard to shake. The gentle way he had touched her…entered her…

  No, I won’t think about it, she told herself fiercely. I won’t!

  “I don’t like other males,” the big Kindred emphasized firmly, as though cementing the fact in his own mind. “I swear that to you, Ari.”

  “I don’t think you have to like other males to want to do horrible things to them here,” Ari said, but she was beginning to feel cautiously optimistic that maybe she wouldn’t start her morni