Kaden sighed, clearly reluctant to explain. “When Milanni escaped—actually she didn’t escape, she was released from the Relentless because she made a deal with Fyran. Anyway, she had one of the human captives with her. The human’s name is Nicole and both women had been abused so Milanni’s ‘escape’ seemed more believable.”
“They hurt Nicole so badly that she’s still unresponsive?” He nodded and Lexie shuddered then looked away. “How can anyone be that ruthless, or that cruel?”
“They’re evil, plain and simple. And they need to be stopped.”
Her throat was so tight she couldn’t speak, so she settled for a nod. The men who had treated Nicole with such brutality more than likely had Libby. Just the thought of what she might be suffering made Lexie feel nauseous.
He touched her arm, drawing her gaze back to his. “Don’t think about it. We’ll get her back, and you’ll love her through whatever comes after. It’s obvious you’ll do anything for her, so let’s take this one step at a time.”
Guilt swept through her as she saw the compassion in his eyes. He was being so kind, so caring. In fact, every Rodyte she’d encountered so far had been shockingly civil. “I need to tell you something,” she admitted with a massive sigh.
His fingers remained against her arm, his thumb lightly caressing. “You can tell me anything.”
The sensual undertone in his deep voice made her hesitate. The situation was already complicated enough. Maybe it was better to leave well enough alone. No. She couldn’t repay his kindness with deception. She frequently manipulated situations to access information, even bending the truth at times. But this was different. Kaden was no longer just a source. He had become her partner in this investigation, and he deserved the truth.
“Being Libby’s sister isn’t the only reason her roommates called me.”
He tilted his head, but his expression remained patient, open. “Then why’d they call you.”
“I’m an investigative reporter. Solving mysteries is what I do for a living.”
Much to her relief, he chuckled. “That’s why you suggested the television crew to Raylon. You had yourself in mind?”
“Maybe just a little,” she admitted with a smile. “I really do think it’s a good idea.”
“As do I.” He shifted his hand to the small of her back and guided her toward the twisting staircase in the center of the tiers. “This also explains the camera in your pack.” He shrugged one broad shoulder, indicating his burden.
She’d nearly forgotten about that. “Will I be allowed to keep the pictures I took? It’s not like any of this is a secret anymore.”
“I’m not sure. Timing is everything once events start unfolding. I’ll have to discuss it with Raylon.”
They descended the stairs in silence. She was undeniably aware of his warm hand pressed against the small of her back. He made her tense and restless, yet he didn’t appear to be doing it intentionally. Many wild animals traveled thousands of miles, returning to the place of their birth so they could lay eggs or find their mates. Why was it so hard to believe that some humanoid species were driven by similar instincts?
It doesn’t matter if he is my mate. I won’t be “claimed” by anyone. A surge of determination reinforced the reminder. She was here to find Libby and gather information. That was all.
“Does your ship have a name?” It was an unimportant detail, but keeping her mind busy had been her primary strategy for dealing with this crisis. “I think Zilor might have mentioned it, but I don’t remember what he said.”
“I command the Intrepid.” His attention seemed to shift inward as he said, “Hold on a moment.”
She couldn’t hear the conversation, but it was obvious from his expressions that he was conversing silently. “Are you telepathic?” she asked as his eyes cleared and his attention returned to her.
“Not in the way you mean. Integrated com-bots are required by the military.”
That revelation wasn’t any less staggering than telepathy would have been. “You have some sort of technology inside your head that allows you to speak mind to mind?”
“I can communicate with anyone who has similar com-bots, as well as any Rodyte facility, or ship with a compatible transceiver. Many of our technologies mimic Bilarrian magic. In fact, for generations we thought replacing magic with technology would ease our yearning, but it didn’t work.”
Lexie paused on one of the landings, her hand still resting on the railing. “Yearning? I’m not sure what you mean.”
“My people were exiled from Bilarri because we weren’t able to manipulate magic. The isolation made it impossible for magic to be reintroduced into any of our bloodlines.”
“Until you started hunting Bilarrian females?” She hadn’t meant the question to sound quite so hostile, but she refused to apologize. Taking war brides was despicable, even if the practice had been abandoned.
“I can’t change the past. No one can.” He continued down the stairs, clearly upset by her attitude. “But I can learn from it and choose a much different course for my life. Besides, not all of our fathers were monsters, and not all war brides were abused. My parents’ story is very different from what you’re imagining.” They’d reached the second to lowest tier and Kaden motioned away from the spaceport. “Indigo, Zilor’s mate, wants to know if we’ll join them for the evening meal.”
It was an obvious deflection, so she decided not to pry. Still, it made her damn curious about his parents. “Is Indigo one of the human females your friends recently claimed?” She hesitated over the term, finding it obscene.
“She is,” he admitted. “Except she’s not human. She’s a human/Rodyte hybrid.”
“And did they go through the transformation program as well?”
Her persistence made him smile. “They did.”
It might be fun to speak with people who had already gone through the process. It would give her an insider’s perspective on what the battle born were trying to accomplish. “I’ve already met Zilor and he seemed nice enough. Tell Indigo I’m looking forward to it.”
He was silent for a moment then smiled. “She sounds excited to meet you.”
“Good. I’m excited to meet her too.” They cut across the tier and stepped onto a raised platform overlooking an industrial section of the outpost. Large factories were interspersed with row after row of warehouses. “Lunar Nine looks big from the outside, but in here it goes on forever. How many of the factories are in use?”
“Not quite twenty percent, but another twenty-five have been contracted and will open within the next few months. Our goal is complete self-sufficiency within the year.”
Within the year. The phrase rang through her mind like an alarm bell. “How long do you expect to be up here and how many battle born males are hoping to go through this transformation process?”
His smile was slow and slightly mocking. “You’re not here as a reporter, Lex. We’re working together to rescue your sister.”
She cringed at the reminder. “You’re right. Libby comes first.”
Rather than wending their way through the factories, he led her through a curved tunnel that circumvented a large portion of the industrial area. They emerged onto a railed bridge, spanning a deep fracture in the cavern’s floor. It was easy to forget this entire complex was located inside the moon. The bridge led to a charming courtyard arranged around a three-tier fountain. A transparent dome crowned the courtyard, allowing a stunning view of vivid blue sky and the tall, leafy trees surrounding the courtyard.
Lexie stared at the clever display, finding no fault in the detailed image, yet knowing it couldn’t be real. If the dome was actually transparent, the sky would be black. There was no light on this side of the moon. “Does the image change?”
He nodded. “Zilor has been playing with the programming. It can be changed according to the season, for a special occasion, or time of day. There’s a library of images to choose from.”
She dragged her gaz
e away from the dome as she asked, “Does this place have a name?”
“It’s called the Pavilion.”
Seven doors surrounded the courtyard, six at identical intervals and the seventh directly across from the arched entrance. “What’s behind the doors?”
“Six are officer suites,” he told her. “At one point all six were occupied, but it’s down to Raylon and Chandar, and Zilor and Indigo. I think.” He chuckled. “It’s hard to keep track of everyone.”
The door across from the entrance swung open and Zilor waved them over. “We’re in here.”
Kaden took her hand and led her into the seventh room. The outer walls were transparent and convex, creating a strange, floating sensation.
“This is wild,” Lexie whispered as her gaze swept the scene presented by the transparent sphere. To her left she could see the vast blackness of space. To her right and in front of her spread the spaceport and the front face of Lunar Nine.
“This feed is live, but the walls are programmable displays, just like the dome in the other room,” Kaden explained when she just stood there in stunned silence.
“Give her a minute,” a female encouraged. “I had the same reaction the first time I saw it.”
Lexie pulled herself together enough to look at her hostess. With dark blue hair, accented in pink and teal, and heavily lined blue eyes, Indigo was not at all what Lexie had expected. Any woman who would allow a man to “claim” her had to be spiritless and simple—or desperate. Indigo was clearly no wallflower, so she was probably running from something.
Indigo walked across the room, colorful skirt rippling around her legs. “Welcome to Lunar Nine. The shock will wear off in a day or two and then you’ll be really excited.” She stuck out her hand and Lexie shook it.
“Lexie Ward. I’m pleased to—”
“Oh my God,” Indigo cried. “I’ve seen you on TV. You’re on that morning show with the gay man and the really skinny blonde.”
Lexie laughed. Indigo’s enthusiasm was infectious. “That describes about half of the morning shows, but I take it you live in Colorado. Mile High Mornings is local.”
“I’m from Boulder. That’s where all the crazies live, don’t ya know.” She grinned with good natured self-mockery. “Do you still do Mile High Mornings?”
“Nope. It was canceled after less than a year. To be honest, I was relieved. Name recognition helped my other projects, but getting up that early five days a week was for the birds. Besides, at heart I’m an investigator. I work better behind the scenes.”
“Shall we sit?” Zilor prompted with a patient smile. “The food is getting cold.” His gaze warmed every time he looked at Indigo. And her expression was just as telling. With his perfect features and her bold appearance, they made a striking pair.
The two couples sat down across from each other at the large round table. Kaden pulled out the chair on his other side and set her backpack down. She made a mental note not to forget it when the visit ended.
Zilor and Indigo had prepared an assortment of Rodyte and American dishes. Wanting to be adventurous, Lexie tried a couple of the Rodyte dishes, but both were so spicy she found them painful rather than appetizing. The Bilarrian blood wine, however, was a delicious combination of spicy and sweet.
“So what brought you to Lunar Nine?” Lexie asked Indigo once the small talk had been exhausted.
“Another victim of the Relentless. I’m able to help people heal from certain forms of trauma, and this person needed help desperately.”
“The Relentless? Isn’t that the ship you think Libby is aboard?” She looked at Kaden. He only nodded, so she turned back to Indigo. “How did your patient escape?”
“She didn’t escape,” Zilor told her. “She was rescued.”
Hope and frustration twisted through Lexie. She pushed her half-empty plate aside and leaned forward, hands flat on the table. “Who is she? May I speak with her?” Before they could answer, other questions surged to the front of her mind. “How did you find the ship back then? Can’t we just do that again? Why wasn’t the crew arrested the first time? Why were the other captives left behind?”
“It’s a long, complicated story,” Zilor said, then he took a long drink of some murky blue liquid.
“We’ve located the Relentless three times,” Kaden explained. “But each time they reinforced whatever weakness we used to locate them.”
“All right, but what about my other questions? Why wasn’t the crew arrested and why in God’s name did you leave the human captives behind?”
Zilor cleared his throat, his handsome features tense, expression guarded. “To arrest the crew we’d have to take the ship. That’s a very different mission than sneaking aboard to rescue one or two people. The crew won’t go down without a fight, a violent, likely bloody fight, which means the lives of all the captives would be endangered.”
“Well, you successfully rescued three other people. Weren’t the human females important enough to save?” Her heart was pounding in her ears and she desperately wanted to scream. “How long ago was the last rescue mission? Did you leave Libby behind?”
Kaden reached for her hand. She jerked it away. “They knew nothing about the human captives until the third mission,” Kaden spoke in a quiet, calm tone, obviously trying to defuse her anger. “I was there the third time, and it wasn’t a rescue mission. We went after the original commander and Milanni. We figured the crew would be less adversarial once their commander was in custody. We had the commander’s ident code, but Milanni wasn’t chipped. So we scanned for females, expecting Milanni to be the only female on board.”
“But she wasn’t?” Lexie blinked back tears and combated her raging emotions with slow, deep breaths. Breaking down in front of strangers was contrary to her personality. Kaden had already seen her tear up once. It was not going to happen again.
“At the time, there were six other females, but they were scattered all over the ship. We’d planned for a fast and focused extraction. We didn’t have the firepower to take on the Relentless.” Kaden stopped her objections with an upraised hand. “Garin ordered the Destroyer to stand-by. He intended to unleash a full-scale attack as soon as the commander and Milanni were off the ship.”
“What happened?”
Zilor took up the tale. “Kaden’s team captured the commander, but Milanni put up more of a fight than Raylon expected. The second-in-command, Fyran, fired up their jump drive, so I had to pull Raylon out without her. Maybe someday he’ll forgive me.”
“If Zilor had hesitated another millisecond, Raylon would be Fyran’s captive right now,” Kaden stressed. “When the Relentless jumped into hyper-space, we had no way to follow. And we’ve been searching for them ever since.”
She nodded, accepting the information without commenting on the decisions they’d made. As Kaden had said earlier, no one could change the past.
“Then Milanni made a deal with Fyran,” Indigo added. “She promised to steal the transformation formula if he’d give her back her ship.”
“What’s so special about her ship?”
“She used to work for the Integration Guild, so she has all sorts of internal hardware that’s powered by her ship,” Indigo continued. “Without her ship, most of her implants don’t work.”
“I’ve heard that phrase before. What’s the Integration Guild?”
Kaden refilled her glass of blood wine before he answered. “Almost everything on Rodymia is organized into guilds. The guild masters maintain control with the help of their guiding councils. Each guild master also belongs to the steering committee and they deal with issues that concern more than one guild. The steering committee used to have more influence than the crown stirate, which is our planetary leader.”
“But your planetary leader has been deposed,” she pointed out.
“True.”
When Kaden offered nothing more, Lexie asked, “How did the steering committee react to the new three-person panel? Sorry, I’ve forgotten what y
ou called it.”
“The Triad,” Kaden provided. “One member of the steering committee sits on the Triad, so the guild masters still have influence. They’re just not the loudest voice anymore.”
She wasn’t convinced it was that cut and dry, but they’d avoided one of her questions and she wasn’t ready to let it slide. “When was the third mission? Was my sister one of the people you left behind?”
“Are the other captives less worthy of rescue than your sister?” Indigo challenged. “The men were horrified when they couldn’t rescue everyone and they’re doing everything they can to rescue them now.”
Lexie was about to apologize when Kaden answered her question. “The last mission was almost three weeks ago. Libby hadn’t been kidnapped yet.”
Indigo was right, Lexie was being selfish, but she couldn’t stop the faint rush of relief that passed through her being. “Thank you for being so candid.”
“Now can we talk about something less depressing?” Indigo urged. “I know the search for your sister led you to Stargazer Ranch, but what have you thought of the rest? Isn’t Lunar Nine amazing?”
“It’s beyond amazing,” Lexie agreed. “But I’m not sure how to react to the reason the battle born are up here. No matter how you dress it up, the transformation program is also a breeding program.” She looked Indigo in the eyes and asked, “Why did you agree to participate in an alien breeding program?”
Lexie expected an argument, but Indigo laughed and looked at Kaden. “You haven’t kissed her yet, have you?”
His gaze narrowed, warning clear in his eyes. “How did you figure it out? I’ve been so careful not to touch her.”
“All you have to do is look at her.” Indigo glanced at Lexie as she added, “No one can hide the hunger once a Rodyte male finds his mate. Nothing can stop it. You’re lucky if you can even slow it down.”
“So you’re saying bonding fever is so powerful it can’t be ignored?” Lexie allowed disbelief to sharpen her tone.
“Kiss him and find out.” Indigo laughed again. “There’s no human equivalent to the pull.”
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