Heat Rating: Fire

Content Warnings: Grapic sexual situations

Hijack his cryotube and hand him over to certain death. It should have been easy....

"Sure," Mel said absently. "Spares ñ they're top of my shopping list." She was looking at the cryotube. The mist of liquid nitrogen was draining away, the ice crystals melting, revealing the body inside.

Darla shook her head and left the room.

Mel waited until the door was shut behind her then moved to stand over the tube. She depressed the door button and the top slid open. Cold air flooded out of the container, and she shivered. It took a few minutes to clear.

"Oh my," she murmured.

He was naked. And he was huge. Everywhere.

Even unconscious he radiated power, and a ripple of apprehension ran through her. She picked up his wrist. His flesh was icy cold as she slipped one of the bracelets over his hand, snapping it in place. She repeated with the other arm and breathed a sigh of relief once the restraints were in place.

Her eyes flicked up to his face, but he was still deep under, and she allowed herself to examine him. This man had been part of her life for the last ten years, never present, but still shaping her every action with his constant pursuit. Now he would never pursue her again.

She knew Sanderson meant to kill him. And he deserved to die if half the stories coming out of Talmare were true. Even so, she felt a strange sense of regret, as though something was coming to an end.

He was a hybrid, part of the Soldier Guild's breeding program. A program she knew had been discontinued when the results turned out to be too dangerous and too hard to control. It was ironic that Zachary Knight had been their one success story. Their poster boy, proof that the breeding program did work. She reckoned the Guild must have been really pissed when he lost it and ended up massacring half of Talmare.

She'd never seen a hybrid close up. In fact he was the only one she had ever seen at all, and ten years ago, fully clothed, his mixed heritage had not been so apparent. Now she could clearly see the signs.

The skin of his arms and legs was marked with a faint black tiger stripe. The stripes could also be seen curling around from his back, fading into the creamy gold of his flat belly.

She picked up his hand again. It was huge but otherwise appeared normal, until she pressed the pad of one finger and a vicious claw emerged. Retractable claws, how cool was that? For a few moments she played, fascinated as the claws emerged and disappeared. She touched one; it drew a bead of blood from her fingertip. She put it to her mouth and sucked it clean.

What else. His thick hair was down to his shoulders, a tangled medley of black interwoven with gold, but there were no stripes on his face. It was a striking face with a hard masculine beauty that even she couldn't deny. Above his high cheekbones his eyes were closed, but she remembered them perfectly; greeny-gold, cat's eyes. His lips were full, and with a sense of daring she touched her finger to his upper lip. It was cold, and she lightly pulled open his mouth revealing long, elongated incisors. His lips were icy, but his breath was warm. She snatched her finger away as she realized he was breathing again.

She allowed her eyes to move lower. His body was heavily muscled but sleek, like a jungle animal. His belly was hard and flat, lightly furred, the silky blond hair running down to his groin. She whistled.

She'd seen a few men in her time in the space brothel, and by any account Zachary Knight was pretty impressive. If you were the type of person to be impressed by that sort of thing. Which obviously, she wasn't.

She forced herself to look away, her eyes moving up. She thought she saw a flicker of movement, and she reached out and put a hand on his chest. His skin was cool but no longer icy, and beneath her palm, she could feel the slight thud of his heart. Not long now.

She made to straighten up, but suddenly he moved. One of those huge hands snaked behind the back of her neck and pulled her down towards him. For a moment, he held her, and Mel couldn't seem to move. Their eyes met, his slightly unfocused, the pupils huge and dilated, but the clear green-gold of her memory. His lips curled slightly. He pulled her forward. Then he kissed her.

It was so unexpected that, for a moment, she was transfixed in place.

His lips were cool and firm against hers. Her hands came up; she pushed them flat against his chest to shove him away, but instead, they slid over his satin skin. She opened her mouth to protest, but before she could get a word out, his warm tongue pushed inside. It filled her mouth. She waited for the revulsion, but it never came, and surprise held her for minutes longer as he kissed her almost languidly, filling her senses with the slow, erotic thrust of his tongue. The hand at her neck slid down, pulling her even closer, until she pressed against him. The coolness of his skin brought her to her senses.

This was so not happening.

She pulled free and took a step back. Her heart was beating hard and fast, and she took long, slow breaths, keeping both eyes on the huge naked man that had just kissed her.

He shook his head then pushed himself up, swinging his legs over the side of the cryotube. The action seemed to exhaust him, and he sat, eyes closed, breathing deeply. After a few minutes he opened his eyes and looked at her, a puzzled frown on his face as he searched her features.

She saw the exact moment when the recognition flared in his eyes. Followed quickly by disbelief.

"Shit," he growled. "Melissa Stark. What the hell are you doing here?" He frowned, his eyes flicking from her face to their surroundings. "For that matter, where exactly is here?"

Mel licked her lips and forced herself to hold her ground. Show no fear. "You're on The Revenge," she said.

"The Revenge?" His eyes narrowed. "Don't you mean The Valiant?"

"No," she snapped, "I mean The Revenge."

He ran a hand through his thick hair. Mel could see a slight tremble in his fingers; he wasn't fully recovered from the cryo yet. Still, she watched him warily, her eyes straying to where the activator panel for his restraints lay on the table. She inched towards it.

"So, I'm a prisoner on my own ship," he said.

"It's my ship."

"You stole it from me."

Mel rolled her eyes. "Oh, get a life," she muttered. "That was ten years ago. Get over it, move on." Then she smiled. "Oh, I forgot, that's not really an option for you anymore, is it Tiger?"