Читать книгу Fighting For Their Mate - Grace Goodwin - Страница 9

Captain Dorian Kanakor, Prillon Warrior, Coalition ReCon Shuttle

I grabbed Captain Seth Mills by the wrist in my anger, but as I expected of a warrior, he pulled away and stepped close to confront me. He was nearly as tall as I, large for a human. And his strange blue eyes blazed with challenge.

And pain.

A pain I shared every day.

“What the fuck, Dorian?” Seth scowled at me, his voice carrying over the small number of warriors huddled around us. We were all sweat soaked and covered in grime from hours of battle on the freighter. But the room was almost silent as my crew and his ReCon team waited to see what was about to happen.

It wasn’t often the commander himself connected with us. Hell, it was even less often that one of us was assigned a bride.

“I need to speak with you, Mills. Alone.” I toned down the irritation in my voice, knowing that any challenge would surely be met with resistance, not the level-headed cooperation I needed for this insane idea to work. An idea that had just come into my head after hearing the commander’s news.

He studied me for mere seconds before turning to the co-pilot, a sassy Earth female named Trinity. “You get us back to the Karter.” He turned, meeting the eyes of his second-in-command, another large human warrior I’d come to respect. “Jack, you’ve got the con.”

I didn’t wait for their agreement and my crew needed no such instruction, the chain of command as natural as breathing. Leaving their curious gazes behind, I led the way to the very small supply storage unit at the back of the shuttle. This escape vessel wasn’t meant to hold many people. With all of ReCon 3 plus the survivors from my crew, the small ship neared capacity. But Seth followed me into the small space and I sat on a crate of emergency medical supplies. He sat opposite me as the door slid closed, sealing us in.

His calculating gaze leveled on me and he waited. Silent. Patient. I had no choice but to begin.

“My cousin, Orlinthe, was killed in battle a few months ago.”

“I remember,” Seth agreed. And he should. We’d all gotten drunk together more than once on the Karter over the last three years. When Orlinthe had been lost in battle to the Hive, ReCon 3 had been there, surrounding me and my fellow Prillon warriors, Earth whiskey in hand to drown the pain. Or at least burn it out of my throat.

“I was his second. I never tested for a mate of my own.”

Seth froze in the act of wiping grime from the sleeve of his armor. A lost cause since all he did was smear it around, but it kept his gaze off mine. “So? Go down to medical. Do it.”

“I don’t want to.”

He looked to me. Sighed. “Jesus, Dorian. You aliens don’t make any sense. Why are we having this conversation?” Seth’s head was tilted, impatience finally showing in the harsh line of his mouth and the tapping of his boot. He shifted on his seat, the butt of his ion rifle resting on the floor beside him, his grip on the barrel so tight his knuckles turned white.

“You have a mate, Seth. A matched mate. Do you know how special that is? How rare a gift?” I wanted to kick him now, wake him up. He was being a fool.

“Oh, no.” Seth’s eyes rolled back into his head and his chin rose at an odd angle before settling back into place, a strange smile on his face. Sometimes, human expressions were difficult to decipher, and I did not have the benefit of the psychic connection of a Prillon collar to help me understand. “Is this where you give me the lecture about how lucky I am? How I should get down on my knees and thank your gods for sending an innocent woman out into space to be my bride?”

“Yes.” So he did understand.

“No.”

“No?”

Seth stood and I did as well, the small space placing us nearly nose to nose as anger rose within me. How dare this warrior, this human, dishonor his matched mate? It simply wasn’t done. “Why do you dishonor your bride?”

Seth barked with laughter, but there was no humor in the sound. Only pain. “I’m not dishonoring her. I’m saving her.”

I frowned. “From what?”

“From me. From grief. From loving a man who could die tomorrow. I’m not ready to stop fighting. I can’t go home, back to Earth. I’m different now. Too different for the mundane shit Earth people deal with every day.” He sighed. “I can’t have a mate. I won’t do that to her.”

“So you are a coward.”

I thought, perhaps, the human would punch me for such a statement. But his shoulders slumped and he closed his eyes in defeat. Let his head drop so his chin touched his armored shirt. “I suppose I am. I won’t leave a widow. Children with no father to protect them. If I accepted a mate, I’d be selfish, Dorian. I’d want it all. I’d want to fuck her until she had my baby in her. And then another. Pure and simple.”

Yes, his desire was one most males shared, from all planets. I agreed with him, but I could see his problem. His Earth problem.

“If there was no danger to her, no chance that she would end up alone and unprotected, would you accept her?”

He looked at me as if I were crazy. “Of course, but that’s—”

“Agreed,” I said, cutting him off. “I will be your second. You are a warrior. You will claim your mate as a warrior should, with a second to ensure her pleasure, protection and happiness. She will be cherished by both of us, as a Prillon bride would be. The risks you speak of would no longer be a concern. Should you die, I vow to care for our mate and protect our offspring. And I assure you—” I smiled then. “—she would be filled with that baby twice as fast if she belonged to both of us.”

“What the hell are you saying?”

“You would need to make the same vow to me. That if something happened to me, you would be there for our mate and children.”

That stunned Seth speechless, but I waited. He knew the ways of the Prillon warriors. He’d been in space long enough to know our custom. We always shared a bride to protect her from exactly what Seth feared. A Prillon bride was never alone, never abandoned. If one mate died, the other assured the care and protection of their mate and children. I very much had looked forward to sharing a mate with my cousin, but that was not to be. I respected Seth as a warrior. He was one of the few humans I counted a friend. And he’d saved my life more than once. I trusted him to care for a mate. To protect her, as I would.

But Seth was human, not Prillon. Humans, I had been told, were territorial, more like Atlan beasts than Prillon warriors. Perhaps the idea of sharing a mate was too difficult for him. There could be jealousy. Rivalry. Anger. Instead of making the closest of bonds with a shared bride, it would rip us apart. So I waited for him to consider my offer. I, too, knew the power of patience. Of silence.

When he raised his eyes to me, I saw hope, but also speculation. “And what if she refuses this arrangement? She was matched to me. A human. One man. She might not accept a second mate. Hell, she might be an uptight, puritanical freak who prays for forgiveness every time she has an orgasm.”

I couldn’t imagine such a female, but I had to assume there were some of such mind on Earth. Strange.

“Is this how you would describe your ideal match?” I asked.

“Hell, no.”

I nodded, pacified. I doubted a warrior as strong as Seth would be attracted to such a female. And if that was not what he wished for in one, that would not be the match that had been made. “Accept her. I will be your second. And we will seduce her together. We will convince her that two mates are better than one.”

Seth held out his hand in the odd way humans did to seal an agreement. “She will have final say. And if she doesn’t want both of us, she goes home, or to someone else. I won’t leave a widow behind crying over my grave.”

I placed my hand in his. “Agreed. But unless you don’t know how to bring a woman pleasure, I am not concerned with that possibility.”

He scoffed at my obvious insult. “You talk a big game, Prillon. You don’t know what Earth women are like.”

“Enlighten me.”

Seth shrugged. “Clingy. Needy. Soft. They don’t like to get their hands dirty.”

“I do not require my female to be dirty. I want her to need me and to be soft.” My head buzzed with confusion. “Is this how you describe Trinity? Is she not an Earth female?”

Seth chuckled. “She’s not a woman, she’s a soldier, like my sister, Sarah. Soldiers are different. Hard. Tough. They’ll lead you around by the balls and run your life. I don’t want that either.”

“What do you want?” I asked.

“Hell if I know. If your subconscious bride matching system works like you aliens claim it does, I guess we’re about to find out.”

Indeed.

Chloe

“I don’t suppose you can tell me what you were doing for the Coalition for the last four years? If possible, I’d like to place some basic information in your file for your mate. It will help him understand you and relate to your past.”

“No, I don’t suppose I can,” I replied. I’d been back on Earth for a year. I’d served four years with the Intelligence Core. But in the last twelve months, I was rarely asked about my time with the Coalition. Not many on Earth believed in the Hive—especially since the news services didn’t share any of the horrors the space bad guys were inflicting. As of now, Earth was insulated from the Hive by the rest of the Coalition planets. Even though there were some who volunteered to serve, like I had, the percentage was small. Earth met the volunteer quota required to retain Coalition protection and no more.

Earth’s governments were still too busy fighting each other to dedicate serious resources to space.

And returning to Earth? No one who’d been out there was allowed to talk about what they did. Even if the debriefing wasn’t so severe, and we could talk, no one understood, or believed most of it. No one within the Emergency Services department in Houston believed me. I took 911 calls fifty hours a week and helped manage the worst-of-the-worst kinds of problems. Domestic abuse. School shootings. Hurricanes. Floods. Heart attacks. Car accidents. Humans would believe a story about ghosts or television psychics predicting the future of their love lives. But the Hive threat in space? Me, working undercover in outer space? Me, fighting aliens and infiltrating enemy lines? Yeah, my co-workers would have had a good laugh at my expense.

Not that I could tell them much. Just like some personnel within the US armed services, everything was kept confidential. SEALs couldn’t say where they went on a deployment. Spouses couldn’t be told a location. Missions were kept secret. Top secret.

Especially the new technology being developed to disrupt the Hive communications frequencies. And people like me, who had a knack for listening to their chatter and deciphering what they were saying. I couldn’t explain how I did what I did, but I listened and sometimes the strange sounds just—clicked with my NPU in a unique way. There were others like me, but not many.

And one of them in particular, Bruvan, was wrong a lot. Too much. But he always managed to blame someone else. Blame the Hive for changing their plans.

Blame me.

He’d nearly gotten my entire team killed on the last mission, nearly killed me, and I’d been sent home, medical’d out, and he was out there still. Peddling his bullshit. Getting good warriors killed.

I had to bite my bottom lip to keep the anger in when the warden offered such a sympathetic ear. But I didn’t know her clearance level, and I wasn’t going to ask. “I really can’t say anything about it.”

The warden arched one dark brow and pursed her lips. “Well, it says you worked two deployments within the Intelligence Core, completing four years, before your return to Earth. You’ve been working as a 911 operator in your hometown. You’ve settled back into civilian life. Have a job. An apartment. Friends. And yet, you’ve decided to become a bride. Why?”

I frowned. “Does it matter? I’m here of my own free will.”

Glancing down at my wrists, they were restrained to the arms of the utilitarian chair by thick metal bands. “Although, being strapped to this chair doesn’t feel quite so voluntary.”

She looked at her tablet, swiped her finger and the restraints retracted into the chair. “They are for your safety during testing and to protect me from those who have been convicted of crimes. Until the testing is complete, they’ve consented to the match, and they arrive on their new home world, they are still prisoners.”

“Thanks.” I rubbed my wrists, although they weren’t chafed. The move made goosebumps rise on my skin as I became chilled in the hospital-style gown I wore. Breeze on the bare backside? Wouldn’t want to miss that.

“You are far from a prisoner, Chloe. The opposite, most likely. I assume you have plenty of commendations on your record from the Coalition Fleet.”

“Fishing,” I said, forcing a smile from the woman.

“It’s like that, is it?” She sighed. “You can at least tell me why you’re volunteering.”

I shrugged. “I’ve been to space. I know the Coalition, the type of guys who are qualified to be tested for an Interstellar Bride. I also know myself. I’m from Earth, but four years in space has changed me. Earth isn’t the same anymore. I can’t speak of what I did. Even if I could, no one would believe me. I’m just…bored. I don’t belong here anymore.”

“Go back to the Intelligence Core.”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?” she asked.

I tilted my chin indicating her tablet. “It doesn’t say on there I can’t go back?”

She looked down and scanned farther, moving her finger over the tablet several times. Reading the fine print, I guess. I’d never seen my own file. “Ah yes. It says you suffered injuries that make you ineligible for service. But it doesn’t say what those injuries were.” She raised a brow, waiting for me to clue her in.

“I was hurt on my last mission. I healed eventually, but I don’t want to ride a desk.” That was all I could give her. It was the truth. There was no need to tell her that I wasn’t allowed to return. They gave me the choice, retire or be forced out. They never expected me to want to go back.

I never expected to want to go back.

Maybe that head injury was worse than I thought. Maybe I was crazy for wanting to go back out into space. But, I wasn’t going back. At least, not to the same life. I knew the odds, and there wasn’t a chance I’d be matched and mated to Bruvan or anyone else I once worked with.

I didn’t like them enough.

But who was I matched to? I’d interacted with most of the alien races. Atlan. Prillon. Trion. I’d only met one Hunter from Everis, but he was sexy as hell. Any of them would be fine with me. And with that matching dream, two lovers, I was pretty sure I was headed to Prillon Prime. I needed to know. The curiosity was killing me. “Was I matched?”

Warden Egara stood, went around the table, slid into the metal chair. “You have been matched. And it’s a first for me.”

“Oh?”

“You’ve been matched to a human. A man from Earth.” She glanced at her tablet again. “It’s a ninety-nine percent match.”

I climbed from the chair, put my hands on my hips. “What? I’m not staying here.” I was here being tested so I could leave this planet, not to end up stuck here.

She shook her head. “No. You won’t stay here. You’re matched to an Earth Coalition fighter. He’s the captain of a ReCon Unit serving in a Coalition Battlegroup.”

“What sector?” I was still reeling from something, my feelings a jumble about this. A man. A human man. I liked men—humans—just fine. But after that hot dream, I’d been hoping for two, huge Prillon hunks to totally blow my mind.

“437. Battlegroup Karter.”

“Are you serious?” Sector 437 was a known hotbed of Hive activity. I’d heard of Battlegroup Karter. Some very high level tech had been taken from that sector. The first Hive Nexus unit had been trapped there and eliminated by another human woman I’d served with in the Intelligence Core. Meghan Simmons. She’d been a friend, until she’d mated that Atlan Warlord, Nyko, and moved into civilian life on Atlan. I was happy for her, but I’d been alone out there with a whole lot of testosterone after she left.

And then the ship I was on blew up. Bruvan laid the blame at my feet. That had been fun, and earned me a trip home.

But I didn’t belong here anymore. I felt like a stranger in my own town. I couldn’t relate to anyone. I couldn’t talk about what I’d done for the Coalition. I got up, went to work, fed the neighbor’s cat. Day after day.

I thought of the dream that was quickly fading. Two guys. Not one. Definitely not human. No guy I’d met was that skilled. Or maybe I just hadn’t met the right guy. “So, you’re sure I’m not making a huge mistake?”

“Very sure. If you accept the match, you’ll be transported to his location.”

I began to pace and lifted my arm to tuck a strand of long black hair behind my ear. I got the dark locks from my Vietnamese grandmother and I wished with everything in me that she was still alive. That any of them were. But other than a few cousins I saw once or twice a decade, I was on my own. “What if I don’t like him?”

“You have thirty days to decline the match and be reassigned.”

“You sure I’m matched to a human?”

“Yes. Why do you ask?” Her brows rose with more than idle curiosity and I wondered just how much she knew about the kinky fantasies she’d sent into my head in that testing chair.

I thought about the dream. There were two men touching me. Making me melt and want and burn. But I’d never considered that before, so I could adapt. One man was enough. I could love one man just fine. My perfect match. A human. At least he wouldn’t have tentacles or anything weird. Bulging bug eyes. A forked tongue. Scales. Claws. Ugh. I shivered. “Can he be sent back to Earth when he’s done his service?”

“No.”

“Why not?” I fired off the questions like bullets.

“Because no matched mates can live on Earth. Once he accepted the testing, he is no longer allowed to return to Earth, the same rule as you.”

“Then we’ll live on a space ship the rest of our lives?”

The warden sighed.

“Commander, sit down. Please.”

She used my Coalition rank and that softened me. She saw me as someone from space more than just an Earth female. I did as she requested.

“Just like your time in service, not all answers are known. I can tell you this. Again. The testing is ninety-nine percent accurate. I can confidently say that you will be satisfied with your mate.”

I thought of just how satisfied the men in the dream had made me. I thought of that for a moment, then a specific detail about what she said. “The only way you can be confident this works is because you’ve been to space.”

She nodded.

“Yet you’re back.”

“I was matched to two Prillon warriors. They died in battle. I chose to remain a citizen of Prillon Prime, but I serve the Coalition as a warden here on Earth. Someday, when I’m ready, I’ll be matched again.”

I felt for her. I could see the loss in her eyes, the pain of losing not just one mate, but two. Did testing other women to be brides fulfill her or make feel her loss even more keenly?

She didn’t give me time to ask her these questions, for she stood, the chair scraping along the floor.

“State your name for the record.”

“Chloe Phan.”

“Are you currently married?”

“No.”

“Do you have biological offspring? Or adopted children?”

“No.”

“You have been assigned to a mate per testing protocols and will be transported off-planet, never to return to Earth. Is this correct?”

Never to return to Earth. Exactly what I wanted. “You mean I’ll leave Earth behind and be transported to Battleship Karter?”

“Yes, Chloe. That is exactly what I mean.”

I looked at the wall over her shoulder. I wanted off Earth. I wanted to fit in again. To be where I belonged and a battleship was very familiar to me. Maybe the testing was good.

What the hell. I’d find out soon enough.

“I accept.”

Warden Egara looked down at her tablet, swiped her fingers. “Good. Hands back on the arm rests. Yes, thank you. Don’t mind the restraints, they are required so you’ll remain still for preparation and transport.”

Preparation? Transport? I’d never transported in a chair before. Never in a hospital gown. I tested the restraints, but it was more practical than panic—like preparing for battle.

She swiped her screen again and to my shock, the chair slid toward the wall where a large opening appeared. The examination chair moved, as if on a track, right into the newly revealed space on the other side of the wall. The tiny room was small, and glowing with a series of bright blue lights. The chair lurched to a stop and a robotic arm with a large needle slid silently up to my neck but paused, one of the lights turning red.

“What?” The Warden was looking down at her screen with a frown, so I saved her a few minutes of confusion, telling her what I could.

“I don’t need an NPU. I already have one—sort of.” The thing implanted in my skull wasn’t the standard issue NPU, but I wasn’t allowed to tell her that either.

She lifted her gray eyes to mine, curiosity and calculation in her gaze. “And why, exactly, is it not showing up in my scanners?”

I shrugged. “I really couldn’t say.”

“Of course, not.” She looked annoyed now, and I grinned at her to ease the sting. My NPU translated all the languages in the Coalition Fleet, just like everyone else’s, but it was…more. Doctor Helion, the Intelligence Core’s specialist on neural implants, told me the experimental Neural Processing Unit was coated in a specialized material meant to evade detection by Hive Integration Units in the event I was captured.

Thank God that had never happened.

“Fine, Ms. Phan. Good luck out there.”

A sense of lethargy and contentment made my body go limp as I was lowered into a bath of warm blue liquid. I was so warm, so numb…

“Just relax, Chloe.” Her finger touched the display in her hand and her voice drifted to me as if from far, far away. “Your processing will begin in three… two… one…”