Star's Storm: Lords of Kassis Book 2 (24 page)

“Where in the Gods are you, Star? And who is
the male?” Jazin growled out stopping long enough to grip the chair
that was bolted to the floor.

“Jazin? Oh Jazin, I was so scared. I don’t
know where I am? IQ honey, do you know where we are?” Star asked
softly.

“Of course, my dream. We are in space.”

Star giggled again. “Oh Jazin! Do you get
it? I asked him where we were and he said we were in space! Isn’t
he the cutest thing you’ve ever heard? He calls me all these
ridiculous names but he really is smart and such a sweetheart,”
Star added.

“Star, I need to know what your location
is?” Jazin said in a quiet voice that reflected none of the
violence he was feeling at the moment.

“Oh, yeah, sorry.”

Jazin listened as Star cleared her throat
and asked the male what their location was again. This time, the
male gave him the needed coordinates. Once he had them, he
programmed the information into the warship’s navigation system.
Now, he just needed to know who had his mate so he could kill
them.

“Star, how were you able to contact the
Blue Star
?” Jazin asked, rocking back and forth as his
fingers flexed in a crushing grip on the chair back.

“Oh, the box I was in was pulled aboard a
freighter called
Piece of Shit
. When the two men on board
opened it, I used the defense moves Armet and Dakar taught me to
take them down. Jazin, you should have seen me! I kicked their
asses good. Oh, you won’t believe their names! One of the men is
called Dumbass and the other is called Jackoff. Anyway, I was able
to get a pistol one of the guys was wearing and I shot them, only
it was set to stun so I didn’t really hurt them but it knocked them
out good,” Star paused to draw in a breath.

Jazin leaned his forehead down on the chair
as he listened to her excited tone. She didn’t sound the least bit
afraid now. His head jerked up as he realized she said she had
stunned the men, not killed them. Gods, that meant they could still
hurt her.

“Star, what about the men?” Jazin asked
anxiously.

“Oh, you don’t have to worry about them.
Numbnuts, that’s the service bot, has them locked up in the
shithole,” she said mildly. “So, that only leaves me, IQ, and
Numbnuts manning this piece of shit,” Star finished before she
burst into laughter. “This is so good, Jazin. There is no way I
could ever have made this ‘shit’ up,” she added before she burst
into laughter that bordered on hysteria.

Jazin’s heart twisted when he heard the
catch in her voice as she finally calmed down. “Jazin, can you come
get me?”

“I will be there in less than an hour,” he
responded huskily. “And I want time alone with the crew.”

Star giggled as IQ began singing a love song
in French of all languages. “I think it might be an interesting
conversation.”

“Keep the line open at all times,” Jazin
gritted over the noise of the singing. “I don’t want to lose our
connection.”

“I will. Oh, I think Dumbass and Jackoff are
waking up,” Star said breathlessly. “I’d better go have a talk with
them.”

“Star,” Jazin growled out but all he could
hear was that damn male voice singing in some language he didn’t
understand and that didn’t translate. “STAR!” He barked out
loudly.

“I will monitor communications,” Jarmen said
coming up behind his friend. “Perhaps it would be best for you to
get cleaned up. Your mate should not see you covered in blood the
way you are.”

Jazin looked down at his hands. Jar was
right. With a muttered curse, he turned toward the door. As it
opened, he looked back at his friend and pointed to the
communication’s console.

“I am going to kill that annoying bastard,”
he growled out before he turned and the door closed behind him.

Jarmen winced as the male on the other end
hit a particularly high note and held it for a long time. “I will
help you, my friend, I will gladly help you.”

Star gripped the pistol she had tightly
between both her palms as she edged up to the hole in the floor.
She could hear muted conversation as the men talked to each other.
She paused, listening for a few minutes. Shaking her head, she
frowned in confusion. The men were speaking in French! One man was
trying to tell the other that he still loved him, black eyes and
all. The other man moaned that his nose would make him uglier
now.

“Luc, I would love you no matter how crooked
your nose was,” the one man assured him in a deeply accented
voice.

“We weren’t supposed to open the box, Jon
Paul,” Luc replied. “The man said that we were only to pick up a
box in space, do not open it, and he would buy this piece of shit
from us when we delivered it still sealed to him! How are we going
to open a restaurant now?”

“You will just have to win one in a poker
game for us,” Jon Paul responded lightly.

“Bonjour messieurs,” Star called down in a
soft, hesitant voice. “Mon nom est Star Strauss. Avec qui dois-je
le plaisir de parler?” She asked in French.

Both men looked up startled. The man she had
hit in the throat stood up and bowed his head in greeting. “Bonjour
Madame. I am Jon Paul and this is my partner, Luc. We are your
humble servants from the most romantic city on a planet called
Earth.”

“Paris?” Star giggled with a raised
eyebrow.

“Aucun,” Jon Paul answered with a wicked
smile. “Montreal, Canada.”

“So how did to French Canadians end up
owning a piece of shit freighter in the middle of a distant star
system?” Star asked switching to English as she sat down
cross-legged near the opening.

“It is a long, but magnificent story of true
love, pirates, and a wonderful game of chance,” Jon Paul said with
a mischievous grin. “Would you like to hear our amazing story of
adventure?”

“Yes,” Star giggled. “I think I would.”

Luc slowly stood up and gave Star a pained
smile. “And you will share your story of how you ended up in Snow
White’s magical box, as well, oui? The stories would go much better
with a bottle of wine,” he added in a slightly hopeful voice. “As
well as help with the pain to both my nose and my pride that such a
tiny, beautiful fairy could take down two such big, but lovable
Frenchmen.”

Star laughed out loud. “I’ll let you out but
be warned, if you try to hurt me my boyfriend is going to be very,
very upset with you,” she teased as she stood up. “By the way, did
you really name your service bot Numbnuts?” She whispered.

Luc’s face twisted again as Jon Paul burst
into laughter. “That my lovely fairy, is yet another story.”

*.*.*

By the time the
Blue Star
arrived,
Star had fallen in love with the two adorable Frenchmen who had
emigrated from Paris to Montreal to start their own restaurant. The
men told her how they had been returning from a farm that was
renowned for its cheeses when the SUV they were driving got a flat
tire. The two had been arguing so much about the proper way to
change a tire they didn’t notice the strange lights in the sky
until it was too late. They woke on a strange spaceship. The group
of pirates who planned to sell them decided to keep the men after
Jon Paul and Luc convinced the captain to let them cook for the
crew. They had spent the next ten years cooking and fighting
alongside the mismatched group of misfits that made up the pirate
crew. Two years ago, the captain decided she wanted to retire. The
ship was sold and Jon Paul and Luc found themselves on a distant
Spaceport with a few credits and the little knowledge they had
learned during their years aboard the pirate ship. Luc was a master
at poker and he introduced the game at the bar on the Spaceport. It
became a huge success and the bar owner let the two men stay on for
about six months with the promise of a place to stay and all the
liquor they wanted in exchange for holding poker games. One night,
a horrid man came in. Fascinated with the game, he played and
played until all he had left to chance was the
Dread
, the
short haul freighter that was two trips shy of the scrape pile. Luc
won the freighter in the card game. The next morning, he and Jon
Paul woke up with a massive hangover in the middle of space in what
they called a ‘piece of shit’. The name stuck. The only thing they
were truly grateful for was it came with IQ and Numbnuts, neither
the original name of the service bots. Since neither Luc or Jon
Paul knew the first thing about piloting a spaceship they relied on
the service bots to pilot it. Both service bots received some
slight reprogramming over the last two years which is why they
acted the way they did. Jon Paul and Luc’s new names had come about
the evening they first woke up. They had traded insults with each
other for having found themselves in yet another strange mess. The
service bots had picked it up and it stuck since neither man could
figure out how to un-program the names from the bots' memory.

“We have guests, Dumbass. They have boarded
without permission,” IQ said over the communication’s console
attached to the wall. “Should I tell them to blow off or are they
expected.”

“First, we need to know if they are friends
or enemies. How else do we know whether to offer them a glass of
wine or not?” Jon Paul replied with a grin.

“You will know exactly what I am when I cut
you both into small pieces,” Jazin snarled out, stepping through
the narrow opening leading into the small kitchen area.

“Jazin!” Star squealed, jumping up from her
seat and throwing herself into his arms. “You came!”

Jazin retracted his laser sword as Star
threw her tiny body into his and began pressing kisses to his face.
His arms tightened around her and he pulled her close, inhaling her
sweet fragrance. The feel of her, safe and secure, against him sent
waves of relief coursing through his body. Jazin had Jar monitored
the communications as best he could but the male called IQ had been
no help. The damn male had driven Jar nuts with his singing,
constant questions about what he looked like, and innuendos as he
tried to find out if Jar was into open relationships.

“What do you mean, I came? Of course I would
come,” Jazin said huskily.

His eyes moved to focus on the two males
sitting across the small table staring at them. They had their arms
around each other and watched him as if they were old friends. One
of the male’s actually had his head on the other's shoulder. Both
were smiling at him with a goofy grin, not the terror they should
have been.

“Ah, amour,” Luc sighed in contentment. “Do
they not make a beautiful couple, Jon Paul?”

Star giggled softly and leaned up to whisper
in Jazin’s ear. “The one with the black eyes is Luc. The other is
Jon Paul. They are from my planet and they are very much in love
with each other.”

Jazin pulled back and stared down at Star in
surprise before he looked back at both men in sudden understanding.
“So who is the other male that was talking to you?” Jazin growled
out looking around. He wanted to kill someone, maybe not the two
men grinning at him like fools, but someone.

“That was IQ,” Star said with a huge smile.
“He’s the pilot.”

“You called, my love?”

The husky male voice that had been driving
Jar up the wall for the past hour called out. Jazin and Jar turned
at the same time, raising their swords. Both men stopped, their
mouths hanging open, as the tiny service bot rolled up and uncurled
at their feet.

“Well hello good-looking!” IQ said looking
up into Jar's glowing amber eyes. “You can play with my programming
anytime.” A low, sexy purr rumbled from the tiny bot.

“Gentlemen, please meet IQ. The pilot of
this piece of shit,” Star said right before she burst into
laughter. “Oh Jazin, I can’t wait to tell Jo and River about
this!”

Jarmen growled down at the little service
bot that had moved forward and was running one of its arms up his
leg while saying things he did not understand. He shook it off with
a grunt of disgust and shot a frigid glare at the two men who
chuckled in delight. They might think it was funny but he did not.
He closed his eyes and focused on the tiny bot. In seconds, he had
reprogrammed it back to its original status with a few minor
improvements.

Let's see if they like this!
Jar
thought as he opened his eyes again. The little bot rocked back and
forth before just standing silent with a frozen look on its
metallic face.

“Jar!” Star cried out in disappointment. “I
liked him the way he was. You program him back to the way he was
right this instant!”

Jar turned and looked at the pouting face of
the tiny warrior that was wrapped tightly around his friend and
sighed deeply. His friend wasn't the only one she had wrapped
around her tiny fingers. His eyes glowed again before he looked
down at her with a frown.

“If he starts humping my leg again, I'll
overheat his circuit boards,” he growled out before pointing at the
two men who burst out laughing at him. “That goes for both of you
as well.”

Luc picked up the bottle of homemade wine
off the table and took a huge swallow of it before he wiped his
hand across the back of his mouth and replied. “My glow-friend, the
tiny fairy has already beaten you to it! Can you not see my eyes
and nose? Is she is not magnificent?”

Jazin growled softly as the men went on and
on about what the beautiful fairy did to them and how enchanted
they were with her. He was more than ready to return to the
Blue
Star
when the old freighter shuddered and groaned, knocking
them sideways.

He and Jarmen had come in using a small,
service shuttle so they could not be detected. It was currently
docked to the service hatch under the freighter. The shuttle was
just big enough for two people. Their plan was to board the
freighter, secure Star somewhere safe, and kill the men who took
her. Armet and Dakar were on their way with the Tearnat starship.
The
Blue Star
would meet up with them once it was back
online and would destroy the freighter after they were safely back
aboard the warship. Now, it looked like someone else had the same
thought.