Ascension Saga, Book 1: Interstellar Brides®: Ascension Saga

by Goodwin, Grace

  “Touché.”

  She grinned up at me as Trinity watched the byplay with a completely unreadable expression. Was she overcome by her Ardor? Overwhelmed by what had just happened? Afraid?

  I would reassure her, set her mind at ease. Make her worry for nothing, not even her orgasms. I couldn’t wait to make her melt. Burn. Scream my name.

  I had no idea what Destiny’s response meant, this word, touché, nor did I care. She was cooperating. That was all I needed at the moment.

  “Come with me,” I told them, finally getting all of us away from danger. My cock was a terrible leader. I had to get my head back in control, at least for the moment. I didn’t know what threats were outside this floor, this building. Even down the street. “Keep your heads down. Don’t look up. There are vid stations everywhere.” I led them farther down the hall. Thankfully, Trinity stepped into place directly behind me, close, where I needed her to be. Destiny brought up the rear, her weapon at the ready, and I was surprised to realize I was reassured with her in that position. She was a warrior and my mate trusted her. A strange female, but a capable fighter. I would take all the help I could get. Anything to get my mate far from here. Safe.

  And naked. Very, very naked.

  6

  Trinity – somewhere in Mytikas City

  “Do you have any idea where we are?” Faith asked, looking around.

  “As if we know where we are on Alera when we’re not in danger?” Destiny countered in her usual snarky way. Destiny leaned back, inspecting the windows and frame, knocking on the material in some bizarre ritual I didn’t even want to guess at. “I like your ride, Leo. I saw the windows are tinted. Is this bulletproof glass?”

  Leo had taken us in his own vehicle, after walking a random route for several blocks to ensure we weren’t followed. It wasn’t as fancy or large as the one Lord Jax had provided, but I hadn’t cared if it were a horse and buggy. As long as we were moving further and further away from danger, at least for the time being, I’d felt better. And having him sitting beside me in a closed area—even with my sisters as chaperones—had been intense.

  Leo’s hands moved with confidence over the controls. “We do not have metal projectiles in our weapons. But the windows are military grade. Nothing can get through them, not even blaster fire.” He looked over at me, his gaze lingering, making me squirm in my seat.

  Was he as hot for me as he seemed? Or was I reading something into his expression that wasn’t real. Was my Ardor warping my mind?

  “This is a standard military issue EMV. Nearly indestructible. No one can see inside. You’re safe. I assure you.”

  “How fast does this thing go?” Faith asked.

  “This thing obeys all driving laws so that we do not attract unwanted attention.” He was so serious. His face set like stone. His jaw tight. Everything about him screamed powerful, alpha male. Warrior.

  I’d wanted to crawl over and into his lap, straddle his thick thighs and feel the huge cock that was in his pants rubbing against me. To kiss him, taste him. I’d had to bite my lip to stifle a whimper as I breathed in his scent—a temptation that had filled the vehicle. Dark, rugged. I wondered what the sheets of his bed would smell like. Would that scent wrap around me and make it hard to breathe? Would I drown in him?

  Did I want to?

  Yes. Right now, god yes. I did. He had to have pheromones pumping off him in waves, for I was so close to coming that I ached. God, I was desperate to rub my clit, to get off, but I knew it wouldn’t help.

  I needed him. His touch. His mouth. His hands. His energy. His alien cock and all that sweet alien cum. Maybe if I humped him, rubbed our bodies together with our pants the only things between us, that would be enough. Would my body be satisfied with that?

  Hell no. That was the answer. I wanted naked. Grunting. Thrusting. I wanted him to shove me up against the wall and take me as hard and fast as he could. I wanted to ask him to do it. Beg him. Beg.

  Then I realized I was going insane, envisioning dry humping a guy—an alien—that I’d just met as he drove across a huge city… with my sisters watching. I wasn’t sure what disturbed me more, that I wanted to go at it with a complete stranger, or that I didn’t care if my sisters watched.

  Jeez. This Ardor was serious business. Mother had said it could lead to insanity, even death, if left unsated. I’d laughed at her. Now I realized my mistake. My body wasn’t my own. Not right now. And I didn’t like that lack of control one little bit.

  So I tried to forget my eagerness to fuck Leo and thought of our attackers. It was obvious we’d hit a nerve with someone on Alera, that Mother’s kidnapping had definitely been carried out by an Aleran. We weren’t supposed to be here. We would cause massive amounts of trouble for whomever had taken her. While I was glad to know our existence would piss someone off, I wasn’t really thrilled about being shot at.

  From the back seat, Faith leaned forward, squeezing my shoulder. “Look, Trin. Look.”

  Her slender finger pointed out the window to the brilliant sparkling light that our mother had described to us, but we’d never seen. Shimmering like holographic glitter, the queen’s light shot into the dark sky like a beacon. It was bright, brighter than the full moon on a cloudless night, and I had no doubt it could be seen for miles and miles. Maybe even from space.

  And the light still burned. Mother was alive. For now.

  “She’s alive.” Destiny whispered from the back seat.

  “Of course the queen is alive. Somewhere. But it’s been almost thirty years since she’s been seen. Most think she was captured and is sitting in a containment cell somewhere, rotting. Most have lost hope that she will ever return.” Leo, all but forgotten in the driver’s seat, supplied the information. I tore my gaze from the citadel, and that all-important light, to watch the emotion, or lack of, cross his face.

  “And you? What do you believe?”

  “I don’t waste time thinking about these things. I follow orders. I’m a soldier. That is all.”

  “Bullshit.” I couldn’t take it, not with my pheromones going crazy. The complete lack of expression on his face was going to make me throw things.

  “The queen disappeared when I was very young,” he offered. “I remember her, remember her laughter, her beautiful gowns, the way she would tussle my hair when my father attended meetings with the king. But that was a long, long time ago. Decades. If she were alive, she would have returned by now. Saved us all from years of war.”

  “Years of war? What war?” I didn’t want to know. Not really. Mother had tried to talk me into returning years ago. Before law school. But I’d been selfish. Didn’t want the responsibility that came with being a queen. And too scared to leave the only life I’d ever known. Perhaps hadn’t truly believed Alera really existed.

  Oh, I believed now.

  Leo’s hands gripped the controls, his knuckles white, his hands and muscled forearms crisscrossed with dozens of scars. I wondered if the rest of his body was like that. “What war, Leo?”

  He turned to me, allowed the car to shift into some sort of automatic pilot. “I’ll tell you anything you want to know. But know this. You’re mine. So if you get scared or want to run, want to leave, you can’t. I’ll fight to the death to keep you safe and happy.”

  “Leo.” God, gorgeous Leo. I didn’t know what to say to that. He’d met me a few minutes ago, and already vowed to keep me? Possessive, much? I knew—well, I’d seen—the evidence of his interest come to life in his pants. That huge, meaty cock that I wanted to ride so badly. But I didn’t know who or what he was. Was he a consort, like Cassander? Had his mate died or was he really a virgin?

  That seemed impossible. No woman in her right mind would be able to keep her hands off him. He looked like Henry Cavill’s version of Superman, without the tights. The Aleran uniform he wore did nothing to hide his Fittest Man in the World physique. He had to be six-four, with broad shoulders and a narrow waist. With the weapon holster on his hip, he gave off that
aura of chivalry, as if he were a space-age version of a knight. He wasn’t in shining armor, but when he’d come through the smoking ruins of the suite’s entry, I’d been mesmerized.

  And my Ardor? It had gone insane. Hot all over, my pussy had literally flooded with arousal. My mind went all gimme, gimme, gimme.

  Now that we were away from danger—at least temporarily—I didn’t have to split my attentions. Faith and Destiny could try and figure out who the assassins were, but they weren’t going to get far. Not on their own. Or, at least, not tonight in a strange city.

  The vehicle entered a private parking facility and Leo told us all to duck down so the camera attached to the security gate wouldn’t record our presence when the window slid down automatically.

  After the scanner flashed over his eyes, a computer voice thanked him and the window went back up, and he drove into the lot.

  “It’s safe now. They don’t allow cameras in soldiers’ quarters.”

  “Why not?” Seemed to me, it would be the opposite.

  “Code-breakers once infiltrated the vid system and staged a perfectly executed attack. Took out an entire city division of royal guards in one night. Over a hundred guards. Some of the oldest. The best. The code-breakers knew where everyone would be. Where they slept. Where they ate. What time they came out of their rooms. After that, no more vids.”

  Hackers. On another planet. Things weren’t that different after all. How horrible. “How long ago was that?” I asked.

  “About five years.”

  We rode a very plain, dark gray elevator and ran into no one. We hadn’t gone to a penthouse this time, only five floors up. Instead of a hotel suite, Leo had taken us to a small apartment. I looked around. Living room, a library, two bedrooms, a kitchen—although it had appliances I’d never seen before. It wasn’t fancy, more… comfortable. Was this Leo’s home?

  My sisters were looking around. Faith staring out at the spire, clearly visible from the largest set of windows, and Destiny scoping out exits and entry points.

  Everything was normal.

  Except me, and this relentless lust making my brain mush and my body about as useful as a lit match thrown on a bonfire. I looked my sisters over, took in the dried blood that clung to them still, acutely aware of the warm, strong male hovering just a few steps behind me, locking the door. “Are you both sure you’re all right?”

  Faith nodded and looked at Destiny. “We’re fine, but how about you?”

  “I wasn’t hurt.”

  Destiny rolled her eyes. “We know you weren’t injured, but what about your other problem?”

  I squirmed, my desire thrumming. My nipples were hard and sensitive, my padded bra only adding to the irritation. I wanted to rip it off, all of my clothes, my skin irritated by the fabric, by being confined. I wanted to climb Leo like a monkey, but I wasn’t going to admit that. We were close, too close. They did not need that kind of ammunition.

  Destiny leaned in, whispered, “I mean, it hasn’t been cured or fixed or whatever.”

  It was as if she were worried Leo could hear us. He was walking around the apartment now, doing a security sweep, even though it appeared safe to me. He wouldn’t have brought us here otherwise.

  I trusted him. I had no idea why I should trust him over the five guards who’d been sent to protect us, but I did. Obviously, someone on Alera had been tipped off about our arrival. We’d either been followed from the transport center or one of Lord Jax’s people was a traitor. Perhaps someone at the Brides Center on Earth? Warden Egara? That idea was crazy, but I was quickly learning we shouldn’t trust anyone.

  Except Leo. He was safe. I knew it down to my bones. He was the one, the only one who I felt could protect us from whatever evil had taken Mother, and wanted us dead.

  But I had no right to ask him to risk his life for me. For us. For a woman who’d run, abandoned Alera almost thirty years ago. He’d said he didn’t waste time thinking about it, that he resented my mother for leaving her people, for causing so much death. So much war.

  How could I sleep with him, use him, and walk away? I had a job to do. A duty to the people of Alera and to my mother, and that did not involve risking the life of a humble soldier. He was a good one. Honorable. Simple. How could I tell him who I was when he hated my family? My mother? His past. He’d suffered. For years. And it was partially my fault. I could have returned more than five years ago. I could have spared him some of those scars.

  “Shit. I don’t know what to do.” I whispered the words, my hands up to cover my face from a sister who would say far too much.

  When I didn’t answer her question directly, Destiny continued, “Look, I know we all want to go find Mom and fast, but we need to chill out for a while. I mean, we transported all the way to Alera. Today. We were attacked. Today.” She held up her bloody hands. “I’d say we need a little downtime.”

  Faith nodded. “I need a shower. A bed. You need Leo.”

  Destiny grinned and waggled her eyebrows. “And he needs you. Did you, um, see his cock? It was literally tenting his pants.”

  Faith giggled. “One look at you and… bam.” Faith held up her hand and raised her pointer finger in a ‘just a minute’ sign. Or, an example of how a guy’s cock went from down to up. Very, very up.

  I hadn’t missed it. Not at all. Especially since all that… maleness seemed to be because of me.

  Not Faith or Destiny. While he’d interacted with both of them, he’d barely given either much more than a second glance. As for me, he practically devoured me with his eyes.

  And back to his cock. God, it was, well… huge. His uniform pants had done nothing to hide the thick, long bulge. Had I said thick and long? Even the outline of the wide crown had been obvious. He’d been aroused. Instantly and thoroughly aroused.

  “Cassander said a guy didn’t get hard unless he was with a woman who was The One. That the five guards had yet to find their mates, therefore their cocks were… impotent?”

  Faith laughed. “That’s a weird word. Leo doesn’t look impotent at all. Maybe dormant. And Trinity, my dear, it seems you’ve got what it takes to awaken Leo.”

  I was attractive. I didn’t flatter myself to think I was gorgeous, but the fact that I’d supposedly awakened Leo sexually was pretty empowering.

  “You know what, guys?” I replied. “My Ardor isn’t better and I really want all that untapped desire focused on me. He’s gorgeous and—”

  “A virgin,” Destiny added.

  God, a virgin hottie who wanted me. Blatantly. I whimpered because I was soooo ready.

  “You are safe here,” Leo said, coming back in the room. We spun about as a unit, and I felt guilty talking about him. He was more than a virgin. He was a Coalition fighter who’d saved our lives. Brought us to safety. He was honorable and wise. Chivalrous and brave.

  All that and a big cock, too.

  His eyes immediately met mine, but I couldn’t hold his dark gaze. Nope. It dropped to the front of his pants. Yup, a hard-on of epic proportions. I had no idea how he was able to walk comfortably.

  I pointed. I couldn’t help it. “Um… should, does it, I mean—”

  Instead of being embarrassed—like an Earth guy would have been for being caught so blatantly aroused—he stood straighter, rolled his shoulders back, which only made his cock more pronounced. “It’s for you.”

  I’d never seen a man so… intent. His dark hair was mussed from battle, his uniform stained and torn by the shoulder. He looked rugged and fierce. My palms itched to run over him, feel the hard muscles, well-defined beneath his clothing. And to feel that cock, learn every ridge, every bulge. Every long, thick inch.

  Seeing it made me feel feminine and powerful. Even in my jeans and sneakers, my hair most likely snarled and wild. Oh, and an inside-out shirt. Yeah, totally sexy.

  I heard Faith stifle a laugh, but didn’t look away.

  “Buster, on Earth a guy doesn’t show that much interest until at least the end of the first d
ate.” Destiny’s words had that punch of abrasiveness I was used to.

  “On Alera, a male’s cock will only rise for The One.” He was so earnest about it. If an Earth guy had said that, it would have been the worst line ever to get in a woman’s pants.

  But here, he meant it. All Aleran males were this way. Just like I had my Ardor, he had his… stirring. But I could fuck anyone, even Cassander, the gigolo. It seemed I really did have the power to awaken Leo.

  God, that was hot.

  “See?” Destiny muttered, in response to his statement. We’d been right. “Are you telling me that you’ve never had a hard-on before?” Destiny asked, blunt as ever. Thank god she was thinking the same thing. I couldn’t dare ask.

  “No.”

  “You’ve never…” Faith asked, twirling her finger around in circles.

  His fists clenched at his sides, his breathing coming deeper, his chest rising and falling as a result. His eyes blazed, focused right on me, his jaw clenched. I could relate. I was practically coming out of my skin holding myself back. Any thought about not jumping his bones was gone. I wanted Leo and I wanted him now. Holding me, pinning me to the wall, pressing me down.

  “No.”

  How hot was that? He’d been waiting for this moment, for me, to come all the way across the universe. To awaken him.

  “But now?”

  “I wish to be alone with my mate. To soothe her Ardor.”

  Leo took a step toward me, but no further. That was it. I couldn’t wait any longer. I needed him. Needed his hands on me. His mouth. His cock.

  Now.

  I launched myself at him, my arms going about his neck, my mouth meeting his. He opened for me, his tongue finding mine.

  His hands went to my bottom squeezed. I jumped and wrapped my legs around his waist.

  “Okay, then,” I vaguely heard Faith say. “We’ll just… um, be… elsewhere.”