The stranger’s face did something decidedly odd and incredibly diverting where his features couldn’t seem to decide what direction they wanted to go, so they never went anywhere at all.
To Theo’s absolute delight, he actually repeated the first three words on the list before giving his head an emphatic shake, gesturing with the gun once more. “I don’t think you understand. This is an abduction, Dr. Campbell. You’re coming with me.”
Theo didn’t turn away from his notebook, busily adding to his notes. He sketched out the pattern the man had shaved into his close-cropped hair on the right side: three intersecting triangles. Theo directed his answer to his notebook, pen flying across the page. “Or else you intend to shoot me, I suppose, is meant to be the implication with the gun?”
A large muscle began ticking in the stranger’s clenched jaw.
“Yes,” he gritted out between even, white teeth.
Theo beamed at him, tucking his hair behind his ear with an excited wriggle. “How thrilling! Just give me a moment to jot off a quick letter for my brother, and we can be off. I must say, this coincides nicely with the due date for that stack of term papers I’ve been putting off marking. Well done, you.”
The stranger gave the aforementioned stack of papers a baffled glance as Theo turned to another page to leave a short note for his twin brother, Ari.
He was bound to be perturbed if Theo did not make it home in time for tea tomorrow after all.
Ari didn’t like it when Theo diverged from their schedule, which was a constant source of conflict as Theo was appallingly bad at keeping to a schedule. The dear thing spent most of their lives nudging Theo back on track—
“Enough.”
The dark snarl of the stranger’s voice, crackling in the space between them like a bolt of lightning, startled Theo into dropping his pen.
The stranger tugged up a hood of soft gray material attached to his black leather coat, casting his face in shadow. He reached across Theo’s desk, plucked him from his seat one-handed, and lifted him effortlessly across his desk, scattering clutter all over the floor.
One muscular arm curled around Theo’s midsection, holding his back tightly against the man’s firm chest.
Theo ran his hands over the corded muscle of the man’s tense forearm with an appreciative hum as they started to move across the floor.
He was quite tall indeed for Theo’s coltish legs to dangle midair. It made Theo want to turn and wrap those legs around his waist. It was evident he’d have no trouble supporting Theo’s weight.
Altogether, an absolutely delicious thought. And here Theo had thought he was in for yet another lonely, boring Thursday night.
The stranger considered the door for a moment, then reached out with his gun hand to yank at the figured brass handle, prompting Theo into action.
“Oh, I almost forgot!”
He stomped down on his captor’s boot, showering the carpet with another layer of caked-on mud and debris. The arm across his stomach tightened uncomfortably as the man hissed through his teeth.
The ray gun prodded Theo’s side menacingly, but he just turned his head with an apologetic smile. “So sorry about that; I assure you it was quite necessary!”
With a noise reminiscent of a lion with a thorn in its paw, the stranger carried Theo out the door and into the cold night air.
Chapter Two
“Get in.”
Theo cast a dubious eye on the heavily dented ship and attempted to back up a step until the hard edge of a gun prodding at his kidneys urged him forward.
“Hardly seems spaceworthy,” he sniffed as he gingerly climbed the rust-bitten ramp into the ramshackle craft.
The stranger followed him closely. Once on board, he raised the ramp with a horrendous howl of abused hinges. A large metal door screamed shut behind them, closing them in.
The silence that immediately followed landed like a weight on Theo’s chest. He strived to fill it while the stranger latched the door.
“So, effectively, I’m your prisoner.”
His captor made no response as he flung his coat onto a scratched-up emergency seat bolted to the side, revealing a gray knit shirt straining to contain his shoulders beneath the black leather straps of his holster.
More tattoos decorated every inch of skin exposed, the meandering lines on his neck disappearing beneath the low collar of his shirt. Theo contemplated the possibility of following those lines to find out where they might go.
With his tongue, preferably.
The man shoved past Theo to enter the open door of the cockpit and fiddle with the flight controls.
Theo leaned against the wall in what he hoped was a fetching pose, allowing the lace at his cuff to fall away from his wrist in a move that had twice proven effective in turning a man’s head. “Shouldn’t you have tied me up or something by now? What if I overpower you and make a daring escape?”
This time, he received a response in the form of a skeptically raised eyebrow and what Theo personally considered to be an offensive lack of concern.
“I could do it. I assure you I have unexpected depths.”
He took the silent flex of rippling back muscles as reply.
“Am I technically your prisoner if there is no prison? ‘Captive’ would be a more accurate descriptor, one would think.”
The man inclined his head toward the battered copilot seat. “Strap in.”
He waited until Theo had clumsily buckled the harness before reaching over to yank on the straps to tighten them. Theo’s heart went into double time as he manipulated the straps over his hips with a firm hand.
Theo had always been partial to a firm hand.
Never before had he encountered one that was so charmingly decorated. Theo had also always been partial to calligraphy.
His captor strapped into his own seat and initiated takeoff. The ship lifted from the dock, leaned distinctly sideways, then righted itself with a wobble and fell directly back onto the dock in
