Taken by Space Pirates: A SciFi Alien Romance (Bound to the Alien Book 2)

by Flora Dare

  I counted my breaths as my old teacher taught me. I couldn't let him touch me again, even if it killed me. The bond was getting harder to resist.

  I could tell he was coming closer to me, and I opened my eyes again. He reached down to me.

  "Do. Not. Touch. Me." He froze. Then moved towards me again. "No." I wanted to shout, to roll away from him. He watched this happen. The drive was strong in me still. Lust and hate dominated my thoughts. I did nothing to him, and he brought me here. "You did this. You brought me here. You put me in her path. One of us will end up dead. The blood is on your hands."

  He stepped back and said, "Blood dripping off your family's hands brought you here. You attacked my First Mate with no provocation. You are under ships rules."

  "I'm your prisoner. Rules are for people who consent. I'm your slave."

  My captive bonds suddenly released from the floor and I slowly rose to my feet. It took every bit of strength I have ever had, but I could not let him see my utter destruction. I stared him in the eyes, just like he did with every stripe she took out of my back. "Take me back to my cell now." He gestured at the coach. "Sit, let me put salve on that. You'll scar."

  "I would rather scar than let you touch me again. Take me to my cell. Now."

  "Don't be ridiculous, it will only take a moment."

  "If you touch me again, I will do to you what I did to her. Except you don't have anyone to save you. Now, take me to my cell."

  I was proud of myself. I forced my voice to stay even and calm. He couldn't know I would be totally unable to raise a hand against him, even to save my own life. The lines around his mouth grew hard and deep. Then he shrugged and the captive bands around my wrists snapped together.

  "I assume you'll watch every time she beats me. Do you get off on it?"

  He stepped towards me and I flinched. He stopped and growled in frustration. He pressed a button on his belt and a force beam ran from my wrists to his hand. He dragged me along, anger speeding his steps. Every step I took burned the lines in my back deeper. I could feel blood running down my sides and flanks. By the time we reached the cell, I was conscious only of putting one foot in front of the other.

  I almost wept when I saw the thin foam mattress I'd almost died on. Pride fled and I staggered into the room, collapsing face first on to it. His feet stopped in front of me.

  I muttered, "Get out."

  He squatted and grabbed my chin, forcing me to look at him. I stared up, the edges of my vision frosted with pain and exhaustion. He said, "Please, let me help you."

  "Please stop touching me."

  "Fine, I won't touch you. But...I can't leave you like this."

  I laughed a hollow, ugly sound. "Worried you might kill me before you've squeezed all your revenge out? Gonna watch her beat me again?"

  His laugh echoed mine. Bitter, twisted sounds full of hate. I wondered if my agony echoed up the link, or if he felt any of it at all. He was human after all. Meli and I hadn't gotten to talk much, but it seemed like mostly all she felt was lust.

  I closed my eyes. The fight had gone out of me, and pain overpowered me. The seconds stretched into days as he stood over me. He kept his word, he didn't touch me, but he fiddled with another of the devices at his belt. Was he going to finish the job with a whip of his own? Instead a cool mist settled over my back and took the worst of the pain with it.

  Lethargy swept into pain's place and I could barely keep my eyes open. I almost wept at the relief.

  I could hear the frustration in his voice. "It won't stop the scarring, if you don't let me put the salve on, but you should at least be able to sleep. We don't have the advanced medicine and medbots you’re used to, I'm sure. Frontier medicine. Let me help you."

  I gathered the energy to shake my head and whispered, "no." I couldn't let him touch me. I was so far gone for him already, I couldn't bear to lose any more of myself to the Pogona. I remembered my mother with my father, nothing else existed except him. Not her friends. Certainly not her children.

  I drifted into darkness, letting sleep claim me as he stood watching.

  Chapter Six

  I was lying on a fluffy cloud, the sun beating down on me. Warmth was all around me and I arched my back and stretched out.

  I awoke with a horrifying scream. Stretching caused my back to light up into a thousand different points of pain. The shredded fabric was stuck to the dried blood and any movement caused a different agony.

  He was standing beside me again.

  "Goddammit, why did I listen to you?"

  The soothing mist fell on my back again, chasing the pain away. Superficially, at least. Any movement caused the fabric to touch the now gaping wounds and I panted shallowly.

  He knelt beside me and I pressed my face against his knee as he sponged something on my back.

  "I have to cut this off. Idiot. We're both idiots."

  He slowly wet each strip of fabric until it came loose from my skin. He sprayed it again and said, "This part is gonna suck. Would have been less awful last night."

  And he scrubbed the ten wounds clean as I pressed my face against his knee.

  Finally, he stopped and began slowly rubbing the salve I'd refused last night into my back. The pain fled, replaced by a more insidious feeling. My nipples went rock hard and moisture pooled between my legs. His hands lingered. I knew my desire for him echoed down the link he didn't even know existed.

  But I couldn't make him stop, and I moaned against his knee. The sound broke the spell the touch of our skin wove, and he jerked his hands away. He pried my hand off his leg and backed away from me.

  I heard him mutter under his breath, "This doesn't make sense. Why do I want to touch her?"

  He kicked a tray closer to my hand and said louder, "Eat. You'll need your strength to heal." Then he strode out of the room. I gnawed on the tough lump that rested in front of me.

  It seemed like some sort of flavorless nutri-loaf they fed the military on short rations. No fluffy delicious bread or even vitae. I choked down about half of it before I gave up and closed my eyes.

  I'm not sure how long I drifted, when I heard the door open. I wanted it to be him, but it wasn't. It was Ardal. She stood over me and I looked up at her. Hate burned in her eyes. She squatted next to me.

  "I don't know how you've managed to put a hold on him, but by the time I'm done, there won't be anything left of you for him to worry about. He'll get his revenge and I'll toss what's left of you out the airlock." She flicked the leftover lump of nutriloaf.

  "Wasting food is an offense on this ship. Rations are precious, my pretty, pretty princess. Lucky for you, it's only two stripes. Unlucky for you, insubordination is five. And you are just lying there. No rising. You're a prisoner and there is an expectation of behavior."

  Seven lashes? I wasn't sure I would survive, could survive. The pain was unspeakable.

  It didn't matter what I did or didn't do, she was determined to punish me for the Captain's attraction to me. I laughed, at her, at me, at the situation.

  She grabbed my hair and pulled my head back with it. "How fucking dare you. That's another five."

  I choked out, "It doesn't matter, he doesn't love you. More importantly, he doesn't want you. He's been waiting for me and didn't even know it. And when you finally kill me, he'll destroy you."

  She stood next to me for a long moment, the long tail of her whip glowing in a pool at her feet. "I don't need him to love me, I have enough for both of us.” She was muttering now, I could barely hear her. “But he's never looked at anyone the way he looks at you. And I can't bare that.” She looked back over at me, almost pleading with me. “Besides, he's going to use you up for revenge, you should thank me."

  I smiled up at her. She was deadly serious, and I knew she was going to do her best to slowly kill me. Perhaps it really would be better. The life mate bond was destroying my sense of self. Who knew if there would be anything left of me if he claimed me? And he would, he wouldn't know why, but he would h
ave to take me.

  So I laughed at her. "Unless he undergoes the bond breaking ritual he will always be linked to me." It wasn't entirely true, probably. He was human, he shouldn't be connected to me. Then again, Meli was human, and she and Tlavi were clearly bonded.

  But I also raged at the thought of Ardal touching Sam. Something in my face must have changed, because she quickly activated the capture bonds, locking me to the floor. She let the whip tickle down my legs.

  "He won't break protocol, not even for you. I'm in charge of keeping order on the ship, and as long as there is still breath in me, I will punish you until there is nothing left."

  "You'll ruin his plans."

  "Fuck his plans. Once you're dead, he'll send your head to your family and call it even. This convoluted plan of his is nothing but stupid male ego."

  "Do you think he'll forgive you?"

  "There won't be anything to forgive. This won't kill you, just make you miserable. Miserable enough that you'll kill yourself to get away from me. Every single day here will be worse than the one before."

  Whatever wavering I'd had was banished at her words. I was Madrelir, and my race would not submit or surrender. A sharp buzzing filled the air, nearly breaking my resolve before it began.

  Her whip cracked through the air and when it landed on my skin, I realized what she'd done. All my muscles contracted with every hit as the electrified whip sliced into my flesh. After the last hit, silence filled the room. I was beyond even crying.

  Her barely perceptible words slipped out. "Give him up. Let go of whatever hold you have on him and this ends here. Let me stop doing this."

  "I can't. You don't understand."

  She paced beside me. Waves of pain just kept rolling through my body, but I knew she was fighting with a decision. It was pure instinct that I tried to touch Sam through the bond.

  If she was going to keep pushing, I had to try to touch him. It was probably a pain triggered hallucination, but I felt warmth flowing back into me. The iciness fled my fingers, and the room seemed more solid.

  She reached down and pressed on the newly opened wounds on my back. I couldn't stop the pain and fear from flowing through the bond. I pulled away from it, trying to block him away from me. I shouldn't have tried to touch him.

  But it wasn't my mind trying to comfort me. The door flew open and Sam stormed in, yelling.

  "How dare you abuse a prisoner in my care? I gave you leave to extract punishment for being attacked, but I told you not to come anywhere near her again. Clearly there was an issue."

  Her voice started wheedling. "Sam, honey, I was just trying to get her to talk. You said you needed information. We know her kind." I saw him seize her arm and drag her out of the room, thrusting her outside and slamming the door in her protesting face.

  He walked over to me and sighed. "You are causing a lot of problems on my ship. Ardal is very good at her job, and you are distracting her. Your attack on her aside, she isn't known for holding grudges."

  He dropped down next to me and I almost wept as he sprayed a soothing mist over me again. "These I am going to salve, even if you don't want me to touch you." His touch burned through me, even with the pain, I wanted him to roll me over and take me. By the end, his hand was shaking and I could practically feel him holding himself back.

  I didn't know what I wanted anymore. I wanted to see my homeworld again, to walk under the sun and feel the grass under my feet. I wanted to run through the forest, dragging Sam along, showing him the places I escaped to as a girl. To hide him and us away from a world that he hated. He ran out of the room, releasing my bonds from the floor as he did.

  I sat up, the painkiller gave me the strength to strip what was left of the shipsuit off my body. I lay down, gingerly, and pulled the thin sheet up to ward off the cold. I couldn't bear to have it touch my back. If Ardal came back first, she would likely bring clothing, not wanting me to be nude in front of him. And if he came back, I was going to kneel at his feet and beg him to touch me.

  The pain had sharpened the bond for me. I remember the look on my brother's face when I threw him out of my quarters, when he and Meli fought. His control was nonexistent, like mine now. I needed to touch Sam, to be comforted by him.

  The door opened and I looked up. Joy lit my dark places as Sam stepped through the door. He had a bundle of fabric in his arms and a poleaxed look on his face when he realized I'd cast off the tattered shipsuit.

  I sat kneeling, facing him, as I'd watched my mother sit for my father. My nipples jutted hard in front of me and I arched my back as best as I was able, trying to draw him to me, ignoring the pain.

  I had given myself over completely to the Pogona and knew nothing other than making him mine. I ran a hand down my slick scales and watched his eyes follow my hands. I burned with need for him. He just stood there, but I could smell the arousal on him. I rose and walked to him as the fabric fell from his hands and he grabbed me.

  He devoured my mouth in an endless kiss. I pressed against him, reveling in the hardness of his cock pressed against my belly. Unlike when he warmed me at the pool, no reminder of my virginity was going to stop me from having him.

  He lifted me easily, and I wrapped my legs around his waist. One hand curved around my hip, holding my ass, and the other fumbled at the front of his pants, loosing himself to enter me.

  We were lost in the grip of Pogona until he slammed me into the wall. The exquisite pain of every one of those slices down my back exploded at once and echoed down our link. We both collapsed on the floor. Luckily the pain broke the hold of Pogona over us.

  I could feel the heat of my flushed body and I rolled away from him. I ended up in the corner of the room, curled up in a ball. All I could feel was shame at my utter lack of control. I didn't know who I was when I was under the spell of my biological drive. The only thing I could think about was impaling myself on him, but the second I allowed that to happen, I would be utterly and completely his slave.

  He rose unsteadily to his feet and backed out of the room, pausing at the door long enough to say, "That is for you." And pointed at the forgotten ball of filmy fabric on the floor.

  He staggered out of the door and I watched him go. I picked myself up off the floor and walked over to the fabric, pulling it up. It was a gown that would flow over the wounds on my back. My eyes teared up, he was trying to help me, in some fashion.

  What a mess. He loathed my family. I loathed the implacable bond that drove me towards him. He was thoughtful. I slipped it over my head and lay back down on the mattress.

  I awoke to light knocking at the door, a first. I sat up and called out, "I'm still in here."

  A woman I didn't recognize came through the door, carrying a tray. She stopped in the doorway and looked warily at me. I waved at her, taking in her blue tinted skin and sharp nose ridges. She was a B'athusiti.

  I'd never seen one in person before. They'd been part of the Republic Foundation for a few years but were not considered a pacified planet.

  She said, "I'm Mavit. I brought you food and medicine."

  I tilted my head at her. I didn't entirely trust her, after my run-ins with the first mate. "I'm Thea. I mostly lay around."

  She smiled and continued, "Assuming you don't try and choke the life out of me, I won't have to activate your captive bonds or have any unpleasantness."

  I held my hands up, signaling peace. "I wasn't entirely in my right mind in that moment. It's been a long few days."

  She came into the room and a table slid out of the wall. She set the tray on it while two benches slid out to flank it. It was nice to not sit on the ground.

  Mavit pointed at a covered dish and said, "That is a specialty of my people. Roasted Flartik. Hearty and very healing. Eat first, and then I will tend your wounds. I'm also a medic."

  I devoured the food. It was the first real meal I'd had since coming aboard, and I ate what I thought would feed six. As I sopped up the last of the savory stew with a piece of bread, I fina
lly looked up.

  My need to eat had overcome all of my good manners and Mavit stared at me in amusement. I swallowed the last bite and daintily dabbed at the edges of my mouth.

  "It's possible some of my rumored bad temper was just hunger."

  She grinned at me. "It's more likely that Ardal pushed you to it. She's drawn a line around the Captain. Practically hiked a leg up and marked him as hers."

  I lifted one brow, remembering how Sam had pushed me up against the wall. I grimaced as pain shot through me at the small movement. The First Mate might have tried claiming him, but he obviously didn't feel so bound.

  "Oh, your back. Bunch of idiots should have called me sooner. They know better. You've suffered for no reason."