Read Online Gap [1] The Real Story: The Gap into Conflict by Stephen R. Donaldson - Free Book Online Page B

marred her took something away from him.
    He was so surprised—in a sense, so shaken—by this perception that he went to her without thinking, carried her back into the sickbay, and instructed the computer to treat her injuries.
    Another step.
    Soon his surprise became a visceral trembling, an ague in the core of his distended gut. New ideas were working on him. He wasn’t thinking about revenge now—about having a UMC cop as his crew, about making her suffer for what Starmaster had done to Bright Beauty. Now his thoughts were more visceral. He’d never had much to do with women. In the course of his piracies, he’d captured or kidnapped a few, used them hard, then gotten rid of them. But none of them had had Morn Hyland’s capacity to make him shiver, make him do things he didn’t expect. None of them had been so entirely in his possession—or so desirable.
    She was still unconscious, perhaps because of his beating, perhaps because of the drugs the sickbay computer gave her. She had no idea what was happening as he undid her shipsuit and peeled it off her limbs.
    He couldn’t stop trembling. After all, it was a good thing that he’d hit her. The darkness and swelling of her bruises made her bearable: if she’d remained perfect, he would have had no choice but to kill her. So he paid no attention to the firm lift of her breasts or the velvet curve of her hips. He concentrated exclusively on the livid hurt of her bruises as he climbed on top of her.
    His orgasm was so intense that he thought for a moment he’d broken something.
    Before he rolled off her, he had the satisfaction of seeing her eyes flutter open, seeing her begin to realize what he’d done. He filled her with revulsion, even though there was nothing she could do about it. That was good.
    Nevertheless he continued trembling.
    He could no longer tell whether he was excited or afraid.
    “Does that make you feel like a man?” She sounded bitter and miserable—and faraway, as though the aftereffects of his blows muffled her distress. “Do you have to destroy me to feel good yourself? Are you that sick?”
    “Shut up,” he replied amiably. “You’ll get used to it. You’ll have to.” He was grinning; but he still had to brace his hands on his hips to conceal the way they shook.
    As if she hadn’t heard him—as if she were still on the same subject—she muttered, “It’s because of men like you I became a cop.”
    It occurred to him that what he was doing to her might make her come apart. Maybe she had already begun. At the idea, he bared his teeth.
    “Is that so?” he drawled. “I thought it was because you like guns. Muscle. They make you feel like a man.”
    Maybe she was still stupefied by blows and rape and medication: maybe she didn’t hear him. Or maybe she really was trying to threaten him. “Forbidden space is bad enough. We don’t need any worse threats than that. But men like you are worse. You betray your own kind. You prey on human beings—on human survival—and get rich.” She didn’t look at him. Perhaps if she had looked at him she would have lost the courage for what she was saying. “I’ll do anything I can to stop you,” she recited like an article of faith. “No price is too high for stopping a man like you.”
    Angus had to respond. Involuntarily he remembered the insane bravado with which blind Captain Davies Hyland had tried to outface him. He couldn’t let the captain’s daughter think he cared about her threats.
    “Me?” he retorted, gathering anger or pleasure as he spoke. “I’m a danger to human space? What about you? I wasn’t the one who blew up your ship. I didn’t make you gap-sick. I didn’t hunt you down. I didn’t even fire on you. You killed all those cops yourself, you.” This was fun. He was going to teach her what her threats were good for. “I’m just a freighter captain. You’re a traitor.”
    He could see his words hit her: she winced and turned her head away. As if he’d