Empathy

By Becca Sinh

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2012 Becca Sinh

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“Jay!” Arianna bolted upright in bed, gasping raggedly for breath.

Through the open window, she could hear boisterous laughter, music, and energetic splashing. The late-night pool party was in full swing.

She really should be out there, making sure everyone had enough to eat and drink...but suddenly she’d been so exhausted from dancing that she’d just had to lay down for just a few minutes, and rest her eyes. Now it was a full hour later.

She wasn’t tired anymore, she admitted with a baffled frown. She was fully energized, horny as hell...and thinking about Jay.

Jay was something of an intriguing enigma. Most of their boisterous guests were space miners, astrogators, agricultural technicians, or laborers from the nearby spaceport. Jay was...well, different. He might dress like one of them--but it was clear at a glance that he definitely was not one of them. And no one was entirely sure where he’d come from. One night he’d simply appeared, out of nowhere, in the midst of their evening revelry.

At first, everyone had thought that he’d come with someone else. But no one had admitted to having brought him. And then, because Cypria’s ornate gates were open to everyone across the entire galaxy, it simply hadn’t mattered anymore.

He was polite, cheerful, full of laughter, and a magnificent dancer. Seriously cute, too, Ari thought, and felt another hot tingle ripple from her toes all the way to her scalp. Just the right amount of muscles to go with those coal-black eyes and all that thick black hair. And a face that had captivated her right from the very first night.

He wasn’t what you’d call classically handsome. But there was a spark in him that had drawn her, like a moth to the flame.

She’d flirted with him, and danced some, and had been really impressed with his moves. No matter what she did, he always seemed to be perfectly in step.

She’d flirted a little more the next night, and offered him a quick hug. And every nerve in her body had shot right into overdrive.

Since then she’d been dreaming about him every night...and it was just about driving her crazy.

But she’d never had a dream like this about anyone!

Dreams were...well, dreamy. A little out of focus, or just not quite right. Like the time she’d dreamed about flying in a hover-glider...underwater. There was always one little detail that just didn’t add up.

But this one...wow! Every single detail had been perfect! And she could still feel the hot thrumming deep inside, where she wanted to feel him moving in long, seductive strokes. He’d do it right, she just knew it!

“Ari, here you are!” Her best friend, Sharella, poked her head into the quiet little nest where she’d taken refuge. “Are you feeling okay?”

Quickly she staggered to her feet, and dragged slender fingers through her long golden ringlet curls. “I’m fine, why?”

“Well, you’re so flushed!” Sharella anxiously shook her head. “And it’s not like you to wander off in the middle of a party session.”

She could hardly confide, even to her best friend, that she’d just had the most outrageously intense sex dream ever! “Dancing must have caught up with me,” she said with a lame shrug.

Sharella spared her one last puzzled look, then dismissed the topic with an airy wave of her hand. “Well, you’ll want to hurry back now, because Mr. Dreamboat just arrived!”

“Jay?” Arianna’s eyes widened.

Sharella laughed. “I thought that would get your attention. Yeah, he just got here. Not sure why he’s so late, everyone else has been here for hours. But hey, better late than never.”

She sauntered off with a chuckle, and snuggled up to her boyfriend-de-jour, a huge wrestler-wannabe with muscles the size of cantaloupes. Too much of a good thing, in Ari’s opinion...but then she wasn’t the one doing the tango with Steele, or Wolf, or whatever his name was.

A subtle tingling warned her, and she turned just as Jay slipped through the open doorway. “Hello, Ari,” he said with a gentle smile.

Oh, she wanted to eat him up in one big gulp! But he was playing it cool, so she’d do the same. She always let the guest set the tone. It was one of the things that made her such a successful Jade.

“Hello, Jay. Glad you could finally make it.”

A quick grin danced across his intriguing face. “I got, ah, distracted, and a little delayed. Have I missed much?”

Only the hottest orgasm I’ve ever experienced! “Pretty much the same old-same old,” she lied with an idle shrug. “The faces change every night, but the party never ends.”

“Yeah, I kinda got that.” He glanced out the window just as someone hit the water with a tremendous splash. “But it’s always fun.”

“And that’s why we do it.”

Ari wondered what he’d do if she simply launched herself at him, and slammed him up against the wall with a deep, passionate kiss. He’d probably freak, and run screaming, she concluded with a little sigh. So she’d better not, because she didn’t want to chase him away.

He glanced past her at the rumpled daybed. “I expected to find you out in the thick of things,” he said with another odd little smile.

“That’s where I’m headed now,” she said. “Come with me?”

She reached up to tickle his ear as she started past...but suddenly found her wrist enclosed in his hand. She hadn’t realized just how strong he was, and the sudden knowledge rocked her a little.

“A moment,” he murmured softly, studying her with those intense black eyes. “Are you okay?”

“Sure, why?” Breathless, and so horny that she wanted to explode, especially now that he was stroking her palm with a feathery little caress that shook her from head to toe. “Oh!”