by Sadie Carter
“Can you save him? Please? He is precious to me.” She used the word he’d called her. Precious. She had never been precious to anyone. But he saw her that way.
She could not lose him.
Then the creature nodded at her, as though it understood her. A chant filled the room and she looked around to find at least half-a-dozen of those creatures were in the room. They stood around the bed, speaking in low voices.
The creature standing over Que closed its eyes then rubbed its hands together. A silver light came from its hands. Keely held her breath. She just knew she shouldn’t interrupt. Couldn’t interrupt.
That silvery light worked its way up and down Que’s body. The heat of the light almost seared her skin but she refused to back away. She waited, barely breathing even as her heart thumped.
Then the creature stood up, swaying. The silvery light disappeared. Two of the others broke from their position to help steady the silver flash guy. And for the first time, she looked down at Que and saw his back was completely healed. It was like nothing had ever been there. No injury, no blood.
And that’s when she lost it.
12
Que felt as though he had gone up against twenty Coizils.
He ached. He was exhausted. He was thirsty and tired.
And he had no idea where he was. He was lying on his front and there was something furry beneath him, tickling his nose. He attempted to roll but found there was an object behind him, preventing him from moving. Or someone.
“Que? Que, are you awake?”
He relaxed slightly as he recognized the voice. “Keely.”
“Oh my God, Que.” She moved back and he managed to roll onto his back just in time to catch her as she flung herself at him. She lay on top of him, her face buried in his neck, her body shaking as she sobbed.
“Keely?” Panic flooded him. What was wrong? Was she injured? “Keely, what is it? Has something happened? Are you unwell? Did someone scare you? Hurt you?”
“Y-you. . .I. . .I. . .” She could barely speak, her body rocked with her sobs and his alarm grew.
“Keely, you need to calm down. Take a deep breath in. Let it out. Calm down.”
“I can’t c-calm d-down!” She pulled back to glare at him, then her glare dissolved into more tears. His panic grew. “You n-nearly died.”
She flung herself back into his arms.
Nearly died? What did she speak of? He looked around their surroundings. This was not their ship, nor did he lie on a masic. They were in a dimly lit room. It was warm. Quiet. The bedding beneath him was warm and soft. He tested each of his limbs. While he felt exhausted, he was not in any serious pain. More of an ache.
Worry filled him as Keely continued to cry. She was going to dehydrate herself. Crying that much could not be good for her. And he also needed some answers.
“Keely, I command you to cease crying. Now.”
She sat up. The glare was back. But at least she swiped away the tears coursing down her cheeks. “You can’t just command someone not to cry.”
“Why not?”
“Because that’s not the way it works!”
“You have stopped crying, have you not?”
“Grr. If you hadn’t nearly died, I would kick you for that.” Then her eyes shimmered with tears once more. “You nearly died, Que.”
He held up his hand “No more tears.”
“I think I’m entitled to cry when my mate nearly dies,” she told him.
“Your mate. I like the sound of that.” It was the first time she’d said it. At least, he thought it was. He tried to think back, he could remember being cold, except for the fiery pain lancing his back, feeling himself growing weaker and weaker.
“Was I shot?”
She nodded. Then her eyes widened. “Oh crap, you’ve just been shot and I flung myself at you. Twice. Did I hurt you? Should I call for the Silver Flash?”
“I am well, my mate. Stay where you are.” He reached out and grabbed her hand, cursing his weakness as he knew he could not stop her if she truly tried to leave. Luckily, she settled down. He did not want her out of his sight. Not until he knew what was going on. Maybe not even then. The memory of her collared and leashed, stumbling behind the Szquich, hit him then. “The Szquich? He followed us? Shot me?”
She fingered her throat and he realized the collar was gone. “The collar had a tracking chip.”
Stars. He should have guessed that it was. The Szquich would not take a chance with someone of such value as his Keely.
“My fault. I should have known.”
She paced her hand on his shoulder. “You had other things going on. You’re allowed to mess up, Que.”
“Not when it comes to your safety, I am not.”
“Well, it wasn’t me who nearly died.” There was a starkness to her voice he did not like. A pain that ran deep. “Don’t do that again, okay?”
“Keely, come here.”
She shook her head, pulled her legs up against her chest and wrapped her arms around them. She was curling herself up into a protective ball and he did not like it. She should come to him for comfort. He might not know much about soothing human females, but he did know that right then he wanted to be the one holding her, fighting back the fear for her.
“Keely, come here. Now.” He injected plenty of steel into his voice. Still, she did not move. Truly, having a human mate was going to test his patience greatly.
“You can’t show me what it would be like to have a mate and then take that all away, Que. I had just come to the realization that I trust you, and you go and nearly die on me. That’s not cool, understand? Not cool at all!”
And suddenly she no longer looked lost and afraid. She appeared furious. At him.
And he felt like smiling. Because she had just told him that she trusted him. She trusted him and she had called him mate. She was his.
And he was not going to allow anymore distance between them. He gathered his strength and lunged for her, toppling her onto him so they lay chest to chest.
“Que!” she slapped her hands against his chest. “Don’t do that, you’ll injure yourself.”
She tried to pull back and he gave her a sharp smack on the ass. She froze.
“Stay where you are,” he growled.
“Did you. . .did you just smack my ass?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because you were trying to get away and I already told you twice to come to me and you did not. Now you will stay where you are and listen to me.”
“Or what? You’ll spank me?”
He perhaps should have taken note of the way her voice had risen. But he did not.
“Yes.”
“I am not a child! You cannot spank me!”
“I would not spank a child,” he retorted, insulted. “But a mate who is being disobedient is a different story.”
Something cold went through him as her face blanked. Stars. Something he had said had caused her to pull back on him.
“You cannot just spank me because I don’t do what you say. I may be your mate, I’m not fighting that anymore, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to be some obedient little pet who does whatever you say.”
“Good.”
Shock filled her face, wiping away the blankness. His breath came easier.
“What do you mean, good?”
“I do not want a pet. I do not want someone who tells me what I want to hear or does whatever I ask because they fear me.”
“Ask? More like demand.”
“I am a demanding male. That is the way I am. I will try to curb that in the future. However, I am certain there will be many, many times when I will make mistakes and grow demanding again. I will need my mate to point those times out to me. What I never wish is that she be too afraid of me to speak up.”
She stared down at him for a long moment. “Threatening to spank me. Not cool.”
He frowned slightly. “You worry I would truly harm you.” He could ne
ver do that.
“No, I know you wouldn’t. I wouldn’t trust you if I thought that. But I don’t want you to think of me as less than you.”
Less than him?
He rolled them over until he lay over her although he was careful to keep his weight off her. He rested on his forearms and his knees which he’d placed on the bed on either side of her thighs.
“Mate, you are never, ever less than me. And I will not hear you say that again. You are everything that is good and right and perfect in my world. Without you, there was only gray, white, black. No color. When you came into my life, color sprang back into it. I could feel things I had not felt in a long time. Happiness. Hope. You are everything to me. I would die for you. I would starve in order to feed you. You come first. Always.”
“Oh.”
“Oh? That is perhaps the most I have said to anyone ever and you say ‘oh.’”
She clasped his face between her hands. “Do you love me?”
“Warriors do not love,” he stated arrogantly.
He saw a flash of something in her eyes, perhaps disappointment. He could not have that. “What we feel for our mates goes far past love. It is all. They are our reason for living.”
She let out a small sob.
“No more crying,” he said hastily.
She let out a low laugh. “Big bad warrior looking all panicked over his mate crying.”
“I do not wish you to be upset.”
“I know,” she whispered. “When you said you’d spank me it wasn’t about a display of dominance?”
“Hm, it was more about getting your attention. But I had also intended to threaten that if you ever disobeyed me and put yourself in danger again that I would turn you over my knee, bare your bottom and spank you until you swore never to do something so foolish again, however I am guessing that might not be the best thing to say.”
“You guessed right.” Her gaze turned thoughtful. “I scared you.”
“You did.” His breath came easier now that she no longer looked as though she might murder him.
“You scared me too,” she whispered. “And I want to threaten you with something dire if you ever go and nearly die on me again only I have no idea what to threaten you with since I’m pretty sure spanking you is out of the question.”
“It certainly is,” he stated arrogantly. Then he rolled them back to their sides. “But I am sorry I frightened you, precious.”
She sniffled and reaching up cupped his face between her hands. “I’m sorry too. I’ll try not to do that again, either.”
“See that you don’t.” He leaned in and kissed her. The kiss soon turned hot. He reached around and squeezed her ass and she moaned into his mouth. Then she drew back.
“Que, I don’t think this is the time or place. You’re still recovering from your injury. And I should get the Silver Flash in here to check on you.”
That was the second time she’d mentioned the silver flash. He still had no idea what that meant. He also did not know where they were. The fact that they might not yet be safe brought him out of the fog of arousal.
She was right. Now was not the time to claim her. That needed to happen when he was assured of their safety.
“What is the silver flash? Where are we?”
“Well, uh, that’s something I’m not sure quite how to explain.”
“What happened to the Szquich?” he asked.
“Oh, well, that I can explain. I. . .um. . .I shot him.”
His eyes widened and he stared down at her. “You shot him.”
“Yeah.” She shuddered. “Three times.”
He lay on his back and pulled her onto his chest. She trembled against him. Taking a life was not something she was used to. And for all her bravo, his mate was soft and fragile underneath. She needed special care.
“Tell me.”
He listened as she explained everything. When she finished, he just lay there, running his hand up and down her back.
“Emerald’s people saved us?”
“Yeah.”
“And one of them had the ability to heal with his hands.”
“Swear, weirdest thing I’ve ever seen, but when he finished your back looked like new. You lost a lot of blood, though, and you’re still kind of pale.”
“That explains why I still feel weak.” He didn’t like feeling weak when they were in an unknown place with people who may have saved him but were still unfamiliar to him. “And your eye?”
Her face had no sign of bruising.
“Silver Flash took care of that too once he’d recovered from helping you.”
“Do you still have my communicator?” he asked.
“Right here.” She pointed at it on her wrist then tugged it off and handed it to him. “But you should know, I’ve tried to contact Blue a few times and haven’t been able to get through.”
He tried to put a call through to Koran. Then Safan. Nothing.
“It is as though something is jamming it.”
“I think we might be up a mountain or something,” she said. “There’s a thick fog out there and more snow than there was where we were before.”
“We need to get back to the ship. And off this planet.”
She nodded, then made to climb off the bed. “I’ll go get someone.”
He grabbed her wrist. “You will not leave the room.”
“Que.” She looked from where he held her wrist to his face.
“When it comes to safety, your safety, I am in charge,” he told her. “That is not negotiable.”
“Not negotiable?” Her eyebrows went up and her eyes sparked at him.
“You are good at making negotiations, yes?”
She nodded, frowning slightly now.
“Then we will make a deal, you and I. About how this mating will work. But one thing I can not negotiate about is your safety. I must be in charge of that.”
“I’m not walking around with an escort all the time,” she warned.
He blew out a breath. “I do not like the idea of you on your own. Trouble seems to find you.”
“It does not!” she protested.
“All right. No minders. However, you will carry your communicator at all times.”
She seemed to think about that, then she snapped, “Fine. That’s a deal.”
He gave her a small smile. “You are a wonderful negotiator, mate.”
She snorted. “Somehow, I think you’re playing with me, just like you did with the Szquich when you made out you were no good at that Largos game. You could have wiped the floor of him, couldn’t you?”
He just grinned.
She rolled her eyes. “I’m just going to go to the door and call out. They don’t seem to have communicators here. I won’t leave the room, all right?”
“This is acceptable.” Although he would be watching, ready to step in if there was the slightest hint of threat to her.
“You’re crazy. Negotiations, my ass.”
“Your ass is spectacular,” he told her, staring down at her bottom. “It is too bad you will not allow me to spank it. I did almost die. Surely that means you should give me whatever I desire?”
She turned, stared at him, then glared. “Do not think you get to use the whole nearly dying thing to get the position of power in our negotiations.”
He held his hands up in a gesture of surrender even as he hid his grin. “I would not dream it.”
13
They lay together under the furs.
“How are you feeling?” she whispered to him.
He still felt like he had gone through a hundred days of training without a break, but he could not say he was in any pain. The creature she called Silver Flash had come in and checked him over then said something that neither he nor Keely understood before leaving again.
He took that as meaning he was well.
Then Emerald had joined them along with another creature who brought them food. Keely had hugged Emerald several times, and the little creature smil
ed and hugged her back.
Then they’d left and now they were lying here alone, trying to get some rest. He longed to get back to the ship and make certain all was well. However, he also knew he needed to be at full strength before they left here. It seemed they were safe, although he would not completely relax. If he was on his own, he probably would have left, but he had Keely to protect.
Precious cargo.
“I am well. We must leave tomorrow.”
“I know.” She ran her hand down his chest. He had no shirt. He hoped these creatures had some clothing he could borrow or he was going to freeze.
“I’m sorry that I interrupted your hunt for your brother. Do you think there is any possibility he is still here?”
He stared up at the ceiling, feeling that familiar pang of worry hit him. “No, I am not sure he was even here. Nobody recalled seeing another Zerconian warrior and we do not blend in well.”
“You certainly don’t,” she agreed, placing her hand on his chest. “I’m sorry, Que.”
He sighed. “Right now, my brother is not my main concern. Getting you to safety is. I will feel better once we are off this planet.”
“The others will be getting worried about us. Not being able to contact us.”
“I know,” he agreed. He rolled to his side then drew her back until her ass was nestled in against his stomach. “Get some rest, my precious mate. We will need our strength for tomorrow.”
She sighed. But he did not feel her body relax or her breath even out. She held herself tensely. He pushed her hair back off her neck and pressed his lips to her silky skin.
“Keely? What is wrong?”
“You know how I said my mom left when I was four?” she whispered.
“Yes. I remember.” It was not something he would ever forget.
“I often wonder why she didn’t take me with her, you know? Like what did I do that was so horrible that she would leave me there with him?” The last word was spat out.
“Who was him?”
She grew tense and was silent for so long that he thought she was not going to answer him.
Then she whispered, “My step-father.”
