Crex: Alien Abduction Romance (Captured By Aliens Book 2)

by A. G. Wilde

  She let her tears flow then, unable to hold them back.

  They were tears of anger and of gratitude, as she kept her gaze focused on him, Crex.

  He was doing something he didn’t need to do and they were making him suffer for it.

  He was suffering for her, even though he had no reason to.

  He didn’t need to.

  It was unexpected kindness from an unlikely person. And it tugged at her heart.

  Life hadn’t been kind to her or Callie.

  They’d learned to love and trust only each other.

  Yet, this being, this alien she’d met for just a few hours, something had moved inside him to do such a thing.

  “Please stop,” she sobbed, hating that she was begging them, but she couldn’t bear to see him tortured because of her. “Just stop it! Stop!”

  It took all of her energy to scream at them but she soon realized her begging only made it worse. The whipping wasn’t ceasing. She could see that he was bleeding badly and the image of deep, bloody welts in his back made her choke on a sob.

  Her own back was bleeding but, in this moment, she couldn’t feel anything.

  All she could see was him.

  He was sacrificing himself for her.

  Chapter Seven

  They’d finally left after he collapsed on top of her.

  Sobbing underneath him, she let her tears flow, sure that he was probably dead—his body having given out from all the pain.

  But every now and then she felt his chest move. He seemed to only be taking breaths every once in a while and though it confused her, she was happy to know he was still in the land of the living.

  His weight was crushing her. Only, this time, she didn’t mind.

  Focusing on her breathing, she concentrated on getting air in and out of her lungs.

  When he awoke, if he awoke, he’d roll off her. Until then, she’d have to stay put. She had no energy to even shuffle from underneath him.

  They lay like that for hours, till she felt his breathing go back to “normal,” meaning he was taking breaths like a regular human would.

  His body felt warmer than before and she reckoned he might be brewing a fever, but the warmth was handy against her skin. Again, it felt comforting.

  She would stay like that for a little until he woke up.

  Just for a little.

  * * *

  She didn’t know when she dozed off but when she awoke, the entire cell was in darkness. The weight on top of her was still there and she assumed he was still unconscious. As she wriggled a little against him, something jerked against her naked ass.

  Something hard.

  It was embedded there, between her cheeks, probably when he’d fallen on top of her. But at that time, it hadn’t been hard. She hadn’t even been thinking about it.

  Now, though, it was hard...very hard to ignore.

  Her eyes grew wide as she realized what it was.

  Struggling underneath him to get him to roll over was futile. As a matter of fact, it only seemed to make matters worse, as the hard thing twitched again.

  Shit, it must be his leg. Had to be his leg. It was way too big...too thick...to be that.

  But his legs were straddling hers.

  It wasn’t his leg.

  Gulping, she shuffled underneath him again. But he didn’t move.

  Squeezing her eyes shut, she tried to calm herself.

  He was still unconscious. He wasn’t being a creep. This happened all the time to human men. Boners happened. He looked human on the outside, maybe he wasn’t so different after all. Maybe his boner was unintentional.

  “Crex?” She whispered, surprised at how easily his name slid from her tongue.

  There was no answer or movement except for his chest moving as he breathed.

  He wasn’t conscious.

  He wasn’t being a creep.

  Repeating that to herself didn’t make her feel any better though.

  He needed to wake up.

  There was no way she could stay still with a giant boner pressed against her ass.

  Turning her head to the side, she realized one of his arms was there.

  She needed to wake him up. But how?

  Taking a deep breath, she used the only weapon she could think of. Her teeth.

  Sinking her teeth into his arm, she bit down just light enough to make him feel it.

  Maybe pain wasn’t the right thing to use, but she had no other choice.

  But the small bite did nothing.

  Trying again, she bit down a little harder and was happy when she felt him stir.

  “What are you doing?” His voice sounded low, sluggish.

  “Trying to wake you. I’m being crushed.”

  Without a word, he slid his body to the side allowing her to shuffle away.

  She wondered if he realized he was packing a loaded missile in his pants but he didn’t say anything and, in the darkness, she could hardly see anything. She didn’t know if he was looking at her or not.

  There by his side, she stared at him through the darkness, remembering everything he had done for her.

  “Thank you,” she whispered. “You didn’t have to do what you did earlier.”

  She heard a sound like he swallowed and took a deep breath, then he looked at her. She knew he was looking because his eyes were luminescent in the darkness. Like a cat’s.

  How did she forget that already? She remembered when she’d first realized she wasn’t alone in the cell. His eyes had been luminescent then as well.

  “I didn’t do it for you.” His voiced reached her.

  “What?” Her brows furrowed and a sliver of hurt niggled its way into her.

  When he didn’t explain, Piper pushed the hurt away.

  Whatever. It didn’t matter why he did it.

  “They will come again later,” he murmured as if to himself, but she soon realized he was talking to her when his eyes didn’t leave hers.

  “I know,” she murmured back.

  Why was he telling her that? To prepare her?

  Did he finally decide to carry out his master’s wishes because of the pain he’d endured? Was he just letting her know beforehand to prepare herself?

  The thought made her swallow hard. Maybe she could change his mind. Shit, there wasn’t anything she could really do in her circumstances. She couldn’t run. She couldn’t escape.

  She was naked and chained.

  The only weapon she had was her intelligence.

  Maybe she could talk him out of it.

  Maybe she could convince him to turn against the High Tasqal.

  “Why don’t you fight back?” She whispered. “I’ve seen what you can do and you looked like you weren’t even trying back then.”

  For a few seconds, he said nothing. Then he blinked and looked away.

  Piper’s brows furrowed again. “How did you get captured anyway? Surely, you could have killed them. Surely, you could have fought them. I just don’t understand how you and I came to be in the same situation. It just seems ludicrous.” She paused, studying him. “Did they drug you?”

  He took a few moments before he answered. “No.”

  “Then how on earth did you get captured? Sheesh. Unless you wanted to get caught.” Her brows furrowed deeper and she watched his gaze slide back to hers. “Oh my god. You wanted to get caught...” She trailed off.

  When he didn’t deny it, her eyes widened slowly. “But why? Is that why you aren’t fighting back?”

  He didn’t answer for ages, allowing her mind to mull over the new information.

  “The Piper is an intelligent being,” he finally looked away.

  “But why?” She whispered, her heart beginning to race. The fact that he wasn’t telling her anything made it all the more interesting.

  Maybe she could capitalize on his plan somehow and get her and the others out of there. Athena had been auctioned first and she was sure the other human women she’d left in the auditorium had probably been a
uctioned by now as well too.

  All she’d have to do was find them and get them the hell out of there.

  But she didn’t have time to ask him anything further as the lights suddenly came on in the room.

  Squinting because of the sudden brightness, she noticed the guards by the cell bars were watching them with interest.

  Shit, had she been talking too loud?

  Spinning as best as she could, her wrists and ankles protested from the pain but as soon as she was on her back and could see most of the cell again, she noticed two discs coming toward them on wheels.

  It looked as if there was food on top of the discs.

  Room service? She frowned as the discs came closer. One rolled over onto Crex and the other came over to her.

  It looked like a piece of meat of some kind, and it looked as if whoever had fried it had no idea what they’d been doing. It was thoroughly burned.

  The meat on Crex’s disc, on the other hand, looked raw.

  As he struggled into a kneeling position, he bent his head to the disc and grabbed the meat with his mouth.

  She watched him eat in awe...or horror—either one, she was staring at him open-mouthed.

  She’d never seen anyone tear through raw meat the way he was doing—as if it was nothing. He was finished in what seemed like only seconds and only then did he glance at her.

  “You should eat. They won’t feed us again for a few days.”

  On cue, her stomach rumbled.

  Following what he did, she shuffled into a kneeling position and bent her head to bite into the burned morsel, praying that it was chicken—hey, a girl could dream.

  It took her much longer than him to eat the meat and she noticed he was watching her eat as if curious, staring at her teeth every time she opened her mouth.

  “What?” She asked, her mouth full.

  “The Piper has strange teeth. No sharp ends. They are flat.”

  “Well, of course, my teeth are flat. I’m not a vampire.”

  “Vampire?” He murmured.

  “Who walks around with sharp pointy teeth in their mou—”

  Just then, he bared his teeth for her and Piper stared at him in momentary shock.

  “Oh...you do,” she whispered as he closed his mouth.

  His teeth all had pointy edges...almost like a shark’s. No, exactly like a shark’s.

  Swallowing the last of her meat, she wiped her mouth on her arm, her eyes never leaving his.

  “Do that again,” she whispered.

  He studied her for a second before baring his teeth again and she found herself shuffling closer so she could get a better look.

  “Whoa...” She murmured, not realizing she’d brought her face right up to his.

  Suddenly, he slammed his mouth shut, causing her to jump.

  Wide-eyed, she eased back.

  He was still studying her, his eyes seeming to dive into her soul.

  “You are not afraid of me.” It was a statement, and she noticed one of his brows was slightly raised as if the thought surprised him.

  Blinking at the realization, she sat back on her haunches, dropping her gaze to her naked legs as the thought floated in her mind.

  When did her fear of him go away?

  Was it when he was being shocked and she begged them to stop, realizing he was just a prisoner like she was? Or was it when he had shielded her with his body and taken the whipping?

  When she finally raised her gaze to his, she realized his face had gone back to that unreadable mask she was getting used to.

  “I—No. I guess I’m not.” She blinked.

  Something passed behind those unreadable luminescent pools of his. She was sure of it.

  He moved then, the chains clanging loudly in the silence, and he was suddenly crouching over her. Piper’s heart lodged itself into her throat immediately, as she scrambled back towards the wall, her back hitting the solid surface and causing the wounds she’d endured from the whipping to protest with pain.

  A few inches away from her, his eyes seemed cold.

  “You should be,” he said.

  Piper gulped, her chest heaving.

  Yes, she should be. She should definitely be. He wasn’t human. She couldn’t trust him.

  But then again, she’d learned that she couldn’t trust most humans anyway. The fact he wasn’t human was moot.

  And despite this, despite the circumstances, the fear she’d felt just yesterday when she’d first seen him was gone.

  Spinning in his chains, a movement she knew must be painful, he turned away from her to lie on his side.

  The gasp that left her mouth was immediate.

  All across his back, deep bloody, raw welts crisscrossed in a network. Throwing her hands to cover her mouth, she fought the tears that suddenly flooded her eyes and blinked hard to keep them at bay.

  His back looked so painful...so, so painful.

  “Your back,” she whispered, as she stared at it.

  He’d endured all that for her? That would have been her back. She should have been the one to receive all that pain. Suddenly, the welts on her own back didn’t seem important compared to his.

  “Your back,” she whispered again.

  “It will heal.”

  When she sniffled, he spun again in the chains to face her, probably so she didn’t have to look at the wounds.

  He studied her for a few seconds, and something passed behind his eyes again before he closed them.

  As she sat in silence staring back at him, a whirlpool of emotions spun within her.

  He’d sacrificed himself for her.

  Felt so much pain.

  He’d done that for her. Piper.

  Only a few people in her life had ever been so kind.

  And he wondered why she was no longer afraid of him.

  Logic told her she should be. But her gut told her something else.

  And from childhood, she’d learned to follow her gut.

  * * *

  Even with his eyes closed, he could sense that he was being watched. The guards at the cell bars were looking in at them curiously. But it wasn’t their eyes that were the subject of his thoughts.

  The Piper was watching him. He could feel her curious green gaze.

  The flat-toothed soft being seemed to enjoy staring at him. He guessed that meant her planet was rather primitive, not having much contact with beings from other worlds.

  He didn’t like admitting it, but he found her interesting. When he’d woken up earlier, his body had responded in a way he hadn’t thought would have happened. He’d been aroused. At least, his manhood had been.

  He wondered if she’d noticed.

  Did the males of her species have phalli like his? Outwardly, she could have probably passed for a female of his species, except for the hair below her midriff and the fact that she was incredibly soft all over, lacking ridges on her back and without armor over her chest plate.

  Maybe that was why his body reacted in the way it did. It was because of her softness.

  She’d felt like something he should sink himself into.

  It had been a while since he’d allowed himself to feel anything soft against him in such a way.

  Still, for his body to react in the manner that it did...it had never done that before, not so involuntarily.

  Such a reaction had only occurred when he’d wished it to, not on its own.

  The thought was unsettling.

  And then there was the warmth of her small mouth on his skin when she’d nipped him. It had startled him awake. Her species didn’t seem to have respect for boundaries...or maybe it was just her.

  The Piper was a curious being.

  She’d gone from being terrified of him to being brave enough to come right up to his face in only a short time. And if that intoxicating smell of hers hadn’t been haunting him before, it certainly became unbearable when she’d come so close.

  The thoughts scared him.

  Something was happening that
he didn’t like.

  In this most surprising of circumstances, he was starting to feel and he didn’t like it.

  Feeling caused pain. And he had enough of that anyway.

  He could still feel her watching him, but he kept his eyes closed. If he opened them, he knew he’d be held by her gaze.

  She was nice to look at. Strange, but not in a bad way.

  “Crex.” The deep familiar voice seemed to echo in his head.

  It was Yce. His friend was in another cell somewhere on the ship and, luckily with his psionic abilities, Yce could communicate with all the members of the team. Apart from his skill as a soldier, that’s what made Yce such an integral part of the mission.

  “Crex.” Yce’s voice boomed louder in his head.

  “I am here,” Crex answered in his mind.

  “Xul was successful. Ulruq is dead.”

  That was great news. Ulruq was one of the High Tasqals at the head of the Tasqal Legion. It had been the first step of their mission. The first objective had been to kill Ulruq. The second was to destroy this ship before they were able to abduct beings from any more worlds. The Isclits, the slug-like aliens who owned the ships, worked under the Tasqals and were paid well for it. But what they were doing was illegal.

  The Tasqals were a scourge upon the universe. Their race was dying out, had been dying out for centuries through a disease that only affected them. They were all dying. But they found a way to keep their species alive.

  By impregnating compatible female beings, they could breed and carry on their species.

  The only problem with that was that the child carried none of the mother’s DNA. Instead, it was pure Tasqal, infecting the mother and sucking her life source.

  It meant any female unlucky enough to be impregnated with Tasqal spawn was given a death sentence.

  Just like his mother was.

  Back then, Ulruq had been one of the Tasqals in charge of the raid on his planet.

  It was good to hear the beast was dead.

  “Is Xul headed to the Muk outpost?” The plan was for Xul to crash-land on a nearby planet called Muk. There was an outpost there where he would regroup with their ship, the Elysium, to carry out the second part of the mission.

  “Yes,” Yce replied. “But there is a problem. There is a human with him.”