She took the time to look at Aran. He sat there with his fangs lowered. There was no drool. Yet there was no denying the animal side of him. She could see it in his eyes. Not the same animal that she saw in Niko, but one that was definitely related.
Family, her family. She would have given anything when she was growing up to feel like she was a part of a family, to feel like more than a weight placed around her mother’s neck. She had wanted to be wanted and needed and loved. Being loved is important to a child as important. As it was to an adult.
She met his eyes, this time having made up her mind. She bared her throat to him. She saw his smile, which was full of acceptance. He reached over and moved her shirt a little, exposing her shoulder.
He stopped to look in her eyes one more time to make sure he had her acceptance and then moved. One minute he was staring into her eyes, the next his teeth were locked on her shoulder.
Before she could cry out in pain, before she could reconsider her acceptance of this different culture, he was done and leaving the jeep. Her hands flew to her shoulder. It was knitting itself back together, even as she touched it.
The jeep came to life. She could feel the rumble of the powerful motor under her, but no sound was made. Males and their toys! If they ever decided to branch out with some of their technology, they could take the earth by storm.
She waited to hear something. Nothing. No familiar voices in her head. No brothers bickering the way brothers do. She closed her eyes for a moment to mourn the fact that it had not worked with her.
“Kitten?”
She opened her eyes to what she was sure was a lab, an alien lab, but a lab just the same.
“What is this place?”
“This is where I was born. This is where all the created I call brothers were born. There are many labs like this all over the planet, but this is where we were planned, conceived and born.”
The room they stood in was huge. It reminded her more of a football field in length as opposed to a room. She saw things that mirrored test tubes and beakers, things one expected to see in a lab. She saw things that may have been their equivalent of high powered lab equipment, but it was what was set up in the middle of the long room that gave her pause.
She walked over to them, taking the time to walk around them. Her mind screamed that this could only be one thing on any planet, but she rejected the thought. It was better to stay sane than to believe that someone had done this to her family.
“What is this?”
“We call them incubators. We took that word from your planet. There is no translation for what we call it in your language. You would also call it a womb, if it were inside your body. That is where the created grew until we were formed and could live on our own without the help of a mother’s body.”
“That’s not a mother.”
He looked at the tubes that ran into the mechanical womb, it was as close as they came to being cradled by a mother. He showed her how the sac that surrounded them expanded as they did. He explained the fluid inside that kept them alive.
“This may not be a mother, but it was the closest we ever got to a mother we could touch. If not for our mother’s memories and thoughts that were passed to us, we would have had nothing but this.”
She really tried not to cry for him, but it was such a devastating way to be born, to live knowing that none of the women on your planet had been willing to bear you. They could have. She was sure of that. They had refused. She could almost hear the disdain and understand the social pressure they would have faced. No self-respecting female would have allowed her womb to be used for the creation of something they were told would be no more than an animal used for the purpose of fighting.
“Niko? Did the scientists intend to kill the created when they were finished using them?”
“Yes.
Chapter Twenty-nine
“Lights off. We are five minutes out.” Aran’s voice rang in her head. She heard the replies of his brothers as they checked and gave their positions.
She shook herself free of the memory that Niko had shared with her. Things were making sense now. Maybe the scientists had hired one of the created or even a family of the created to hunt the others down. He may have promised them life if they were willing to destroy the others.
She looked out of the window when she felt the rumble of the jeep end. They were in a highly wooded area. A cabin was sitting in the shadows caused by the moon’s glow. It was a good size one. It could have been someone’s weekend retreat.
There were one or two lights lit inside. The bulbs were dimly lit sending just a peak of light through the windows, as if whoever was on the inside wanted enough light to see, but didn’t want to draw attention to themselves.
“We will do this in two waves. Sergey, Dante, Ash and Nicolas. You are the first wave. Blend in, so whatever is in that house won’t be able to see you. The rest of us will be the second wave. Remember, our mates cannot blend, so we will be going in knowing we can be detected. Mates, now is the time to arm your weapons. Remember, aim only at the enemies.” He gave them a warm laugh and then communication went dark.
The first wave was approaching the cabin. She wasn’t sure how she knew it. It was like being gifted with an extra sense. She could feel them as they moved. She could almost tell you exactly where they were.
As the first wave hit the door, Niko silently got out of the jeep. She followed suit, moving up to his side with her weapon firmly in her grasp. She wasn’t going to be anyone’s victim ever again.
The first shots that rang out had Niko falling on her. His large body covered her making sure she wasn’t a target and inhibiting her ability to breathe.
“Get off of me. Can’t. Breathe.”
He rolled over, but kept a hand on her to keep her from getting up. Like she was going to stand and shout ‘Over here you missed me. Wanna go for two out of three?’
She listened to the laughter on the wind, laughter she knew. She had heard this laughter when the crazy created had held her. He had tormented her and laughed with a gleeful joy as he did it. The very sound of it reminded her of horror films and demented humans all wrapped up into one eerie package.
“Dee, we are too open here. We have to get to cover. Follow me.”
He was using his elbows in the dirt showing her how to propel herself forward. She mimicked his moves, as he followed behind her. It was nowhere as graceful, but it got the job done. He stopped her when they reached a thick set of trees with heavy foliage on the ground. It gave them a perfect view of the front door. When it opened on oiled hinges that made no sound, she saw it. When nothing entered, or for that matter opened the door, she knew it was one of the brothers who had blended in. He looked as if he was invisible, impossible to pick out in the environment.
The silence felt like it lasted years, when in reality it only took them a few minutes to search the first floor. Ash whispered ‘clean’ through their mental link and Nicolas let them know they were headed for the basement.
She followed Niko as he stood, then crouched and started for the door that was standing wide open. She tried to place her feet in the spots he stood in before her. She felt when her foot tangled with a vine. She pulled on it, even as she heard Niko shout stop in her mind.
She heard a series of shots go off, as small explosions happened around her. Once again Niko’s body was covering her. This time he was careful, making sure she could breathe.
It was rigged to blow. The evil son of a mechanical womb had rigged the place to blow and she had walked right into the trap. It had looked like a vine, green with leaves attached. How was she supposed to know? That wouldn’t help the brothers that had died because of her.
She was finally in a family and she had killed her brothers or maybe even her best friend. Some people weren’t meant to be part of a team. She sent out a mental sorry to all of them, wondering if they could even still hear her.
“Are you finished feeling sorry for yourself?” Rena’s v
oice was one part laughter and the other part exasperation.
“I was enjoying this.” That voice belonged to Ash.
“Really Rena, we have so little fun.” Nicolas was laughing.
“Some people weren’t meant to be part of a team was rather amusing since she is a part of us.” Hale was enjoying himself.
“Ok, stop it.” This came from Niko.
“Wait, I didn’t get to chime in.” Dante said. sending her a mental grin.
Rena sent her a mental eye roll. Of course she would figure out how to do that mentally.
“Enough. All of your brothers and your mate are fine. Back to the problem at hand.”
Aran had ended it, after giving them a chance to blow off steam. It had been close, but they had reacted as they had been trained to do. It would take more than that to get rid of them.
Ash began giving them a running commentary. They were on the steps going in to the basement. The lights were off, but they could smell human blood. They found the light switch. Then the commentary stopped. Nothing but silence.
“Aran.” Sergey’s voice rang out in her mind. “You have to see this. The created is gone. We swept the place from top to bottom. There are no explosives.”
“Wave two, hold your spots. I am going in.” Dee watched as Aran left Rena with them.
He moved with lethal grace as he approached the door, blending in with the environment so that she lost sight of him.
The link was silent as they waited for him to announce what they had discovered. “Wave two, come down Ash will come up to provide a look out for us.”
They traded places as Ash emerged, blending in with the surroundings. They stepped into the cabin, making their way to the basement. Dee took the time to look at the surroundings of the floor they were on. It was wide open with the possibility of at least two bedrooms from the attached doors. It was a beautiful place for a well off family to come and spend time. Nothing seemed out of place.
When her feet touched the basement floor and her eyes took in the walls, she knew the upper floor was a sham to hide all that had happened down here.
There were pictures everywhere. All of the pictures were of them; the brothers, or Dante, even Rena and herself. All of them were captured in bright color as they went along their day, unsuspecting.
As she picked out pictures of herself, she told herself that it had to be done with long range cameras, telescopes maybe. There was no way that this created could have been so close to her without her knowing.
Her mind mocked her, calling her a liar. It said she was quickly retreating to the land of the living dead. The land where people saw, but refused to believe. How did someone with a long range camera or even someone with a powerful scope take a picture of her in the coffee shop she frequented in the bathroom as she was washing her hands? The coffee shop that had no windows in its bathroom.
A created could, because he had the ability to blend in. Whatever he was wearing or holding would have blended with him. The brothers were armed when they blended and what they held blended as well.
He had stood behind her as she washed her hands and she had never known. She had never heard the click of the camera taking her picture or seen the flash of the bulb. She never felt his breath on the back of her neck, but he had been there. She was sure of it. Had he touched her or given her a barely there caress that she had wiped off like an annoying insect?
No, she wouldn’t lie to herself or even dwell on it. There were more important things here than that pic of her at the sink. The walls were covered in blood and the pictures, many of them mostly of her and Rena, had been brutalized. The created wanted her to see them and to be afraid.
Still she couldn’t focus on that, because Vance lay in a chair with part of his intestines hanging out. Tina lay on the floor beside him looking abused.
Chapter Thirty
Nicolas was on his knees, working on Vance. Sergey and Hale were untying Vance from the chair. They managed to lay him on the ground without causing Nicolas to lose a beat as he worked on him.
Niko and Dante were bending over Tina’s body. “Aran, I think she has been violated.”
“The created?”
“I don’t think so. Nicolas will have to let us know, but I think Vance did it.”
“Why would Vance rape her? That makes no sense.”
“I don’t know what happened here, but I am sure the created was behind it.”
Dee nodded, knowing all too well how twisted the mind of this created was. “What next?” Her voice was emotionless. He wouldn’t stop and she knew it. They were in his sight and he would only do more and more until he had driven them apart or someone got accused of a crime.
Fighting felt useless.
“We go on.” Aran’s voice came out soft, but with a whip of authority to it.
The softness of his voice disturbed her funk, making her turn to look at him. He grew in size before her eyes. He was no longer the male she had been used to talking to. He was no longer the male that was mated to her best friend.
He was a commander, the ultimate alpha male. He was the male that the other alpha males listened to. Her eyes grew big as he topped over eight feet before he stopped growing. The thin veneer of civility was gone. His face had changed shape like his body.
She glanced over at Rena to find her grinning at him like a woman in love. She wanted to make a sound of disgust, but caught it as she thought of herself and Niko.
“We will go on.” He said again, bringing her attention back to him. “This created has chosen the wrong family to try and terrorize. I believe this is done for personal satisfaction that one of us has done something to him or his family unintentionally and he has decided that we should pay for it. The insult he imagines we laid at his doorstep will cost him his life. There will be no remorse or second chances. He will die.”
Aran looked at each of his brothers, before pausing to look at Dee and then finally at Rena.
“To my family new, old and adopted.” He glanced at Dante. “We do not stop. We continue to live, to thrive, to love and be loved. There will always be someone willing to try and take what we have fought hard to gain. We will not go quietly. We will not go at all. We will prevail. Make no mistake, some wars are short, and some are long. All that matters is that we win.”
Rena walked over to him and hugged him. She looked like a doll next to him. Dee laughed. She suddenly understood the nickname and it was appropriate.
“Kitten?”
In the midst of the blood and destruction, Niko slid his arms around her. She turned and kissed him. She took those words to heart. ‘We will go on.’
“What about them?” Dee asked.
“Nicolas thinks he can save them.” She hugged him tighter. She was at home with him.
Nicolas had told them an ambulance had an ETA of ten minutes and they needed to clear out. It didn’t take long for them into get back to the jeeps, leaving Nicolas, Dante and Ash behind.
***
The brothers had all taken a different path and gone home. At least, that’s what she assumed had happened. They were now strolling into Niko’s house, having changed what they were wearing.
The last to come in were Dante, Nicolas and Ash.
“How is Vance?” The guy was her supervisor. She wanted him to be well. Besides she had questions she wanted to ask him.
“He will live. He is fortunate that I arrived when I did. I rode to the hospital with him. He crashed three times. I made sure he would live.”
“What will he remember?” Aran asked.
“Nothing. His memory loss will be permanent.” Nicolas smiled, but it wasn’t warm.
“What did he know?”
Dante answered Aran this time. “Not much. The created played with his mind. We will have to wait to find out if he remembers anything that happened before the cabin.”
Aran nodded and asked about Tina.
“I took her to the safe house with all of the other women. Nicolas has alread
y taken a look at her. She was definitely violated by Vance. She may need to speak to someone. I will arrange it.” Dante replied.
Aran nodded and pulled Rena onto his lap. Holding her close, he let his eyes close.
The brothers stayed long enough to take comfort in family, the coming together after a near tragedy. Hale picked up a ball from the pool table and threw it at Nicolas, who caught it and threw it back at him. The others laughed and placed bets on who would get the first hit.
Dee and Rena screamed about someone losing an eye. It was rough play, but so much better than guns aimed at them and small explosions going off around them.
In the end, no one scored. They put everything back and silently departed, leaving Dee sitting on Niko’s lap in the middle of the game room.
“Is it all over?”
“No, kitten. There’s more to come.”
“What about us, Niko?”
“Kitten, we’ve only just begun.”
Back Matter
I hope you enjoyed Niko and Dee’s story. I truly enjoyed writing it and getting to know them.
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Continue reading for Sergey – Book three excerpt
Chapter One - Sergey Excerpt
He sat in a bar nursing a drink that would exit his body before ever making it to his head. All it would leave behind was the desire to become more aggressive. He controlled it, barely.
He had taken this assignment as a way to keep Aran and Niko home with their mates.
He had taken this assignment in hopes of getting one step closer to the male who had placed a target on all of their heads. All he had accomplished so far was to be left alone in a rundown bar, waiting for his contact.
Niko: Love me Harder - Alien Paranormal Romance Page 14
