a while. The sight of him like this was driving her fatigue to the back of her mind. There wasn’t room in her head for it and all the wicked thoughts. She fanned herself with her hand as her temperature rose and then unzipped her tight flight suit to just below her breasts so the start of her low-cut white vest was showing. There was a frustrated growl and the sound of a fist hitting something.
“ Captain?”
Acer looked at the panel above him and the flashing red warning light. He clenched his fist, causing the dark blue leather of his gloves to creak, and hit it again. The warning light went out. So did all the other lights on the panel.
“ Cruskin nyaaeso!” He cursed and hit it again for good measure.
“ Captain?” Her voice became more concerned.
Nothing left now but to confess. Perhaps he should’ve let her deal with it. He was sure she would’ve fixed it in the end and he’d be on his way to Lyra Prime. His family probably thought he wasn’t coming. He wished he wasn’t.
“ I think the climate system went down,” he said.
“ What?” Her voice was louder now and full of disbelief.
He looked down the length of his body to see her bent over and looking up at him. His lips parted. His breath left him in a rush. His blood boiled. He could see right down her flight suit, could see the luscious curves of her breasts. His eyes shot back to the dead panel and then slowly returned to her.
“ Do you want me to come down there?”
She got down onto her knees and then all fours. She was going to crawl into the tight tunnel with him. Her breasts squashed together and her hand brushed his thigh. He swallowed at the brief contact and then shook his head. He slid out, stood and looked down at her where she knelt on the floor.
His older brother was a bastard for placing this siren under his protection. Balt had known what he’d been doing when he’d transferred her for something as petty as a gravity drive failure. Since setting eyes on her at the port of Antilles, Acer hadn’t been able to get her out of his thoughts.
She stared up with him round brown eyes that gave her an innocent look and full blush lips that commanded he kiss her. Her fingers combed though her sweat-dampened long brown hair. He’d done that once. She’d been unconscious in his arms at the time. It had been barely a month ago, when they’d been attacked by the first Minervan mercenary ship. He’d received the call from home shortly after that and had selected one crew member to come with him to the Lyra system while the others had shore leave.
He’d chosen her.
It was too late though.
It was only a matter of time now before she discovered why he had to return to Lyra Prime and before he lost her forever.
“ It’s getting hot,” she said and unzipped her flight suit, pushing the arms off so only a tight white vest covered her top half.
His eyes widened when she stood and started tugging the blue suit down, revealing an even tighter pair of little white shorts that hugged her hips. His temperature shot to hotter than the Lyran sun and he couldn’t stop his eyes from running down the length of her long slender legs. His heart pounded.
By Iskara’s wings, she was trying to kill him.
“ Engineer, what do you think you are doing?”
She stepped out of her boots and then the flight suit. “I need to get this engine working and I can’t do it when I’m slowly boiling to death.”
He raked his gaze over her again and swallowed hard.
He had to admit, it was getting hot in the ship.
Her gaze skimmed up his legs, lingered on his bare torso, and then met his eyes.
“ You should do the same. You’ll boil if you don’t.” She gave him a small smile, one that made him believe that she wanted him in just his underwear.
It was a cruel temptation. Perhaps he should’ve told her why he had to return home. Maybe then she wouldn’t have stripped off. If she knew it was as hopeless as he did, she