scales rattled occasionally, and she didn’t know whether to huddle against him or to retreat closer to the wall.
Her stomach rumbled as she took in the smorgasbord available on the ordering panel: not just Xaravian cuisine but some Earther dishes or reasonable facsimiles, and a wide range of random meals across a full spectrum of civilizations. Some she hadn’t even seen before deserting from the Fleet. At least it confirmed there were definitely other Earthers on board. She just had to find them.
“Pick,” Nokx said gruffly, and she jumped.
He’d leaned on the table next to her, his elbows taking up most of the space, and hunkered down like he expected a fight to break out at any moment. Which seemed absurd, since most of the other Xaravians were eating as fast as they could in order to escape the room and his presence. EJ flicked at the panel to select some of the spicy meat the Xaravians ate and handed it to Nokx. He ordered something without really looking at the panel and kept all of his attention on the rest of the room.
At least the others started talking, maybe more loudly than before to distract from when they snuck looks in her direction. EJ shifted in her seat and Nokx immediately tensed, turning his head just slightly so he could see her from his peripheral vision. “What are you doing?”
“Moving so my ass doesn’t fall asleep,” she muttered.
That got his full attention, his silver eyes flashing as he leaned back and crowded her a bit more, though his gaze traveled down to where the bulky robes hid her hips. “What does that mean? How can an ass sleep?”
“When it—goes numb,” EJ said, her cheeks heating. “Never mind. I wasn’t comfortable and I moved. What’s the issue?”
He grunted and went back to scowling at the other males in the room, although she thought perhaps the corner of his mouth turned up.
EJ tapped the edge of the table and searched the room for anything useful. The other pirates didn’t look at her much more than in fleeting glances, and none of them looked to be carrying weapons she could have lifted. It was the same with Nokx; she suspected all of them were armed, but not a weapon was in sight. She wished her universal translator implant worked better, since then she could have understood more of what the crew said.
She was lost in her own thoughts when the food conveyor produced several platters of food on the table right in front of her, rattling and clanking as if it hadn’t been serviced in a while. She filed that information away for later, since she’d done some work on different machines on the gen ship in an effort to steal parts and sabotage what she could to force another port stop. Maybe she could earn a place on the Sraibur by tinkering with various sub-systems and tuning them up.
She couldn’t swallow the pleased sound she made whenever tasty food showed up and seized the plate of red-tinged meat just as Nokx reached for it. Their fingers brushed. She expected him to pull away, but instead Nokx frowned and kept hold of the plate.
EJ gave him a dark look. “That’s mine. You can get your own, big guy.”
His dark eyebrow arched. “You ordered Xaravian food?”
“Figured it would be the only edible thing on this ship,” she said. And her cheeks started to heat when she caught one of the younger Xaravians grinning. Did they understand Earther idioms? Maybe they’d misinterpreted what ‘big guy’ meant in Earther and instead thought...
Nokx’s grip on the plate eased in his surprise, so EJ helped herself and tucked in without another word as her thoughts ran wild. She’d learned early on in the Fleet to find out where the cook came from and only order cuisine from that civilization. If there was a computer cook, the best bet was to figure out who programmed it and bought the supplies and go with their favorite cuisine. Safest way to keep a full belly and not end up sick on a strange ship. The Xaravians wouldn’t mess up their own food, and they’d damn well have the freshest stuff for their captain and crew.
It took a few moments of eating to realize that Nokx hadn’t moved despite the array of other plates available. He watched her with the strangest expression—consternation, amusement, and something fiery that she didn’t want to pay too much attention to, especially since she was sharing