And Krysty's own s.e.xual appet.i.tes were even greater than his own.

"Close call, us being able to find an eye doc with lenses for J.B." Ryan said. "Can think of a thousand other places where we'd been up the creek, him breaking his gla.s.ses like that."

"I know."

"A man with poor eyesight doesn't have much of a chance when he's trying to stay alive in Deathlands. Get himself and the ones around him chilled in a triple hurry."

"We dealt with it as it came down, lover," Krysty replied. "Like we always have."

"Trader would've cut J.B. loose to find his own way."

"So what? As I've told you before, you're not Trader. You're better than he ever thought about being."

"Am I? Am I really?" Ryan asked. "In his own way, Trader was the most honorable man I ever met. Never did anybody wrong on a deal. Never traded some of the more deadlier stockpiles we found in those hideaways he was always so good at sniffing out. h.e.l.l, he could have earned enough jack to set up his own private little barony if he'd sold that supply of nerve gas we found."

"I never said he wasn't a man with some honor hidden away in a dark corner somewhere," Krysty replied. "I said you were his better, and nothing you say is going to change my mind about that, Ryan Cawdor."

While speaking, Krysty began to examine Ryan's offered foot and calf carefully, lightly running her fingers along the body hair growing there while looking at his toes. To Ryan, the sensation was akin to having five feathers run gently up and down his weary six-foot-plus frame. The woman at his feet turned and placed the lifted leg on one side of her hips, allowing herself full, unenc.u.mbered access between Ryan's legs.

"I must be slipping," she observed, staring at Ryan's crotch.

A timely fragment from Ryan's dream from the mat-trans jump popped into his mind. "'Not a creature was stirring,'" he said.

Krysty gave a l.u.s.ty chuckle.

"Told you I was tired," Ryan added.

"Bulls.h.i.t, Ryan. I've never known you not to beup to satisfying our mutual s.e.xual desires. What you need is a more direct approach." And on that statement, Krysty scooted back even farther, bending her head and allowing her full mane of red hair to obscure Ryan's view of what she was doing.

Not that he needed to have a picture drawn for him. His senses began to ignore his aches and pains from the sec-droid battle and devote their attentions to a new manner of bodily caress.

Krysty took him in her mouth, gently, softly lolling her tongue around and around the swelling corona of Ryan's rapidly extending manhood. He groaned. A gentle suction pulled at him as Krysty inhaled, while still keeping her tongue in rapid motion like a trapped hummingbird.

Such a move would raise an erection from a dead man, and even though he was beaten around the edges and his back had felt better and his shoulder hurt like a viper had bitten into it, Ryan was far from being deceased. Thanks to Krysty's ministrations, he was feeling more alive by the minute.

"I thought you were taking a bath," Ryan breathed, his own carnal desires starting to fully awaken. There was no hiding his interest.

"Later, lover. After we're done," Krysty said, her voice thickening as she stood and removed her outer shirt. She then playfully unsnapped her bra from the back, releasing the twin cones of flesh previously housed inside. "You like the topless look?"

"Come here and I'll show you."

Ryan allowed his eye to feast on the sight. He followed each indentation left in the sensitive skin where the straps of the bra had bitten into her voluptuous upper body. He wanted to trace each groove with his mouth and kiss away the reddish lines left in her pale flesh.

Krysty posed provocatively under his gaze.

"Why, Mr. Cawdor, I do believe you intend to take indecent liberties with me."

"That's the plan."

Krysty pouted, then strolled over, her boots gliding sinuously along the thick pile of the room's carpeting. She crossed her arms and placed her hands over her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, hiding the pink tips of her jutting nipples, but allowing some of the large areolae to peep through her splayed fingers.

"Think you can handle both of these?" she asked, bending at the waist and using her hands to create a plunging cavern of cleavage.

"I prefer to take one at a time," Ryan replied. "Like this."

He nuzzled her neck, working his way down to the tops of her bare b.r.e.a.s.t.s. He flicked his tongue along one nipple while using his fingers to lightly stoke the other. Fast, then slow.

"Mmm," Krysty breathed. "You ambidextrous little devil, you."

Ryan didn't respond. His mouth was busy with other, more-important tasks.

Krysty felt his hands at her waist, feeling around her belt and the snap of her pants. She was about to reach down and a.s.sist in their removal when Ryan was able to unlatch the buckle one-handed and flick the snap open in an easy, fluid motion. She squirmed out of the jeans and panties as he held on to their waistbands, pulling them down as she moved.

"I'm ready, lover," she breathed, looking down at him through half-lidded eyes glowing a dusky green. "From the looks of things, I think you're ready, too."

And then she was on top of him, joining him as their lips and genitals met in a l.u.s.ty embrace of pa.s.sion that began as a slow, steady rhythm. Soon, however, the motion broke out into a whiplash ride of thrusting that brought them simultaneously to the peaks of paradise.

RYAN WAS AWAKENED from a gentle doze by a light knocking at the hotel door. Instantly his senses came to full attention. Trouble normally didn't come with a knock, but one never could be too careful. "You order room service?" he asked Krysty.

"No, but that's not a bad idea," she said drowsily. "Breakfast in bed."

"Still night," Ryan said, glancing at his wrist chron. "Not even eleven yet."

The big man reluctantly untangled his arms from around Krysty's sumptuous body, his bad shoulder drawing a wince across his face. He stood up carefully, pulling the covers over her splendid nudity.

"Who is it?" he called while picking up his SIG-Sauer from the nightstand. Ryan crouched at the base of the door and c.o.c.ked the handblaster, waiting for whoever might answer.

"Me, Dad. Sorry to bother you."

Ryan relaxed and stood up. "Just a sec, Dean," he said. Ryan looked around the room, spotting and inventorying his shirt, coat, boots, then remembered he left his well-traveled trousers in the tiny hotel bathroom. "Let me pull on some pants."

Once he was partially clothed, Ryan opened the door and stepped out into the hallway. "Hey, Dean. Jak," he said in greeting to the pair. "I'd let you in, but Krysty's sleeping."

"Okay, Ryan," the albino said. "Come by too late? Wake up?"

"Nah, I was just resting. Been a triple-long day. What's going on?"

"Well, Jak and me are bored listening to Doc. He's started going off on something about the crazy-a.s.s theories of some Dutch guy named Von Daniken and how we were all put here by aliens from another planet and he just won't shut up about it," Dean said, rolling his eyes.

"Yeah, I've been on the receiving end of Doc's lectures before," Ryan replied sympathetically. "He'll fall asleep soon enough once he gets tired of listening to himself ramble on."

"Until then, we wanted to go out and see the mall. Get away from him until he talks himself out or something," Dean continued.

"Got a destination in mind?" Ryan asked.

"There's a place for guys our age in here, Dad. Called a vid arcade. Supposed to have games and stuff. All kidsno oldies allowed."

"I've heard of them. All the rage in the predark days." Ryan grinned at Jak. "Surprised at you, Jak. Thought you didn't like being called 'kid.' "

"Don't," Jak said flatly. "Have to keep watch on Dean."

"I read you," Ryan said. "And I appreciate that."

"If the vid arcade sucks, we can still look around. Me and Jak figured we could recce this mall, find out where the good times are for guys our age."

"Find Dean hobby horse. Let him ride," Jak teased.

"You're not that much older than me, Jak," Dean replied.

"I don't care where you go, as long as you stay out of bars and gaudies. I don't need you coming back here drunk or infected."

"Oh, Dad. We just want to look."

"Keep eye on him," Jak said.

"You do that."

"I can take care of myself, you know," Dean protested, his face darkening at the thought of being too young or inexperienced to go out into the mall alone.

He turned to Jak. "You want to sit in the room and chat with Doc, you go right ahead. Bore your white a.s.s into a coma triple quick."

"Mebbe knock you both into coma," Jak said. "Shut both up."

Ryan mulled the proposed jaunt over in his mind. Other than the battle he'd entered into in the pita battle he'd gone into of his own free willhe'd seen no signs of trouble in Freedom. The mall was run tighter than most villes he'd been through, and people seemed to want to mind their own businessblue-light specials or not.

He'd never allow Dean to go out alone, but with Jak at his back, Ryan knew they'd be as safe as one could be in Deathlands.

"Be safe," Ryan said.

"Count on it," Dean replied.

Chapter Seventeen.

"That big lit-up map directory says the vid arcade is supposed to be down at the end of this corridor past the fruit stand," Dean mused as he and Jak turned a corner past a former men's-clothing store that now served as a combination private residence and produce shop. A few scruffy apples and some dried-up broccoli were in a cart near the proprietor, who sat in a wooden rocking chair with a sleeping child and waited patiently for someone to buy, even at that late hour.

As they walked farther down the indicated corridor, both of them noticed increasing numbers of children and teenagers, varying from eight-year-olds to girls in their early twenties. A few openly gawked at the duo, their attention on Jak's milky white skin and fine whiter hair. The albino, used to being stared at, hardly noticed the rude scrutiny.

"Whoa, whitey. Hold it. You, too, kid." A tall, wide youth dressed in matching denim pants and jacket about Jak's age stopped them at the arcade entrance. A .44 Magnum blaster was strapped to his right leg. "Don't recognize either of you, and I don't see proper ID. Visitors, I take it?"

"Right. What was your first clue?" Dean agreed, already bristling at the young guard's arrogant tone of voice.

The sarcasm went unnoticed. "Got friends?"

Dean and Jak exchanged brief questioning looks. What a stupe question.

"Of course. Lots."

The guard looked as though he thought the pair facing him were r.e.t.a.r.ded. "Let me rephrase the question. Got friends here in the mall?"

"Yeah, back at the Freedom Center Station complex."

"No, no. I mean friends who have played in here before?"

"In the vid arcade? No."

"Then you don't have memberships."

"No, I don't suppose we do," Dean said. "How do we go about getting one?"

"You got the jack, you get the membership."

"Why doesn't that surprise me?" Dean asked, glancing over at Jak. "Everything in Freedom costs money."

The guard nodded. "For a new boy, you wise up fast."

"Come on," Jak said, tugging at the hem of Dean's new T-shirt. "f.u.c.k him. We got jack, you see."

"We'll be back."

"I'll be here. My shift goes on all night till closing."

JAK SAT DOWN on the dirty toilet seat and tried to ignore the pungent odor that had taken up residence in the grimy bathroom located at the far end of the mall corridor past the vid arcade. For all of the technological marvels that were encased and preserved within Freedom's walls, working public toilets weren't among them.

"Smell worse Doc," Jak said.

"Sorry, didn't know you were going to take a dump," Dean noted, holding his nose and backing away against the dirty mirror over the nonworking sink across from the open stall. "Here's a helpful hint, though. I think you're supposed to pull your pants down first and then go about your business."

"Smart a.s.s. Keep watch," the albino youth said.

Dean leaned back against the bathroom door with his full weight. "No one's coming in. The smell would keep them out."

"Like you stop them."

Dean half watched Jak and half read some of the graffiti scrawled on the back of the bathroom door he was guarding. Most of the comments were s.e.xual in nature involving male-female, male-male, male-mutie and, most disturbingly, male-animal. He was about to ask Jak to voice an opinion on how he'd personally dealt with the subject of interspecies romances back in Louisiana when the albino suddenly earned his full, unwavering attention.

Jak had crossed one leg over his other thigh so he could reach out and touch the bottom of his right combat boot. He now ran his nimble fingers along the edge of the boot near the heel until he felt what he was obviously looking for.

"Feet hurt?" Dean asked.

Jak's fine white hair swung as he moved his head down for a better look at the sole of the boot. "Not yet," he said. "Will kick s.h.i.t out you, asking questions."

"h.e.l.l of a place to do a boot repair," Dean muttered, turning back to reading the p.o.r.nographic messages on the door.