Free Wild Pen Carrington by Sophie Angmering

red-green lights flickering on the combox by her chair had told her that. What she needed was time. Kate glanced at the timepiece on the wall. The longer she delayed their eventual departure, the longer her programmes had to dump what looked like the entire contents of their servers onto her own systems. “And if we don’t cooperate?” asked Dom.
    “I’ll further incapacitate your ship and leave you and your crew for the salvage dogs,” she lied.
    “I wouldn’t expect anything less from a Thorn,” he said. “But I still find it hard to believe you’d do it.”
    Kate gave a humourless laugh. “Believe it.” But she didn’t like the look Dom gave her—an almost knowing look. Like he knew what she was up to and was about to blow her secret wide open.
    “What are you expecting me to tell you?”
    “Tell me?” Kate feigned shocked puzzlement, “I didn’t only bring you here to talk to me. I’m bored today. With the fighting over, the day has gone a trifle…flat. You are two good-looking men. Strip. I want to see you naked and then I’d like to watch as you pleasure each other. If you feel like talking afterwards, then by all means do.” Some did. Kate had been quite taken aback at some of the things she had learnt from her ‘guests’ without any effort on her part to get them to talk.
    The sight of their open mouths and look of utter shock made Kate smile despite herself.
    “You are joking.” Ren, the blue-eyed one, spoke for the first time since they had entered her cabin, his lip curling into a hesitant sneer of disbelief.
    “No,” Kate replied, serious once more. “I’m not. It’s a simple choice. Do it, and you get to be out of here in about two hours and I get something to keep me warm on these long, cold Rim nights.”
    Ren said something under his breath that sounded remarkably like a curse but Dom was watching her with narrowed eyes.
    “Is that how you do it?” His gaze was so penetrating it was as if he could see inside her head. “Is that how you get such a fearsome reputation? What a time you must have with all the sexually repressed enemies of the GEF. What a blackmail asset to hold… I take it you record it all.” His eyes flicked over the ceiling and walls as if to seek out the hardware she had had discretely located about the cabin.
    “The first rule is what happens within these walls, stays here,” Kate assured him, mentally counting the seconds as her precious data started its initial download.
    “I bet it does.”
    “I never talk. One has to maintain a certain reputation for confidentiality,” she replied, pleasantly surprised she could sound so cool when her heart was pounding so loudly.
    “Are you trying to tell me that confidentiality does not have a price, Captain Thorn? And don’t tell me, the second thing, no joining in?” The green gaze was just a little too innocent.
    “No,” supplied Kate coolly. “I am all voyeur.”
    “A wise business move from your point of view, Captain.”
    “Indeed,” Kate agreed. She sat in her chair, her legs crossed at the knees, and wiggled her booted foot. “I’d only spoil things.”
    The two men watched her, their gazes now less shocked and rather more calculating than Kate felt comfortable with. She rubbed the restraint control in her pocket, its presence soothing. She was in charge. “Get to it or I will think you have chosen the crippled ship option.”
    The blue-eyed second in command gave her a reluctant grin of almost admiration. “Lady, you are one piece of work.” He licked his lips. “So, who does who?”
    “I’m not fussy. I simply require some suitable action for my…private records.”
    Kate glanced at Dom out of the corner of her eye as she settled herself only to intercept the briefest of glances between the two men. She blinked. What did that look mean?
    Dom went first, pulling the black close-fitting shirt over his head. It clung lovingly to his body as he dragged it over his smooth, toned torso, his