Prime Imperative (The Prime Chronicles Book 3)

by Monette Michaels

  Damon growled. “Bria’s fine…She is triaging and treating patients on the fucking bar floor. Tomas, Dozer, and the bartender have created a ring of protection around her. But the status could change in an instant.” He shoved his hand on a security plate and let them into a kitchen area. “Most of my patrons know the rules. But we have some real bad asses on the station right now who don’t think the rules apply to them.”

  “Bad asses?” Iolyn growled. “Like the RimPz we saw on the passenger docks?”

  “Yeah.” Damon threw him a dark look as he led them through the maze of the kitchen area. “There are also some mercenaries on station led by an Erian who took one look at Bria and decided he wanted her. I locked his ass up after he tried to take her off the freighter dock.”

  Iolyn’s blood began to boil. “Take her?”

  “Yeah. But I cut his throat before he even touched her.”

  He owed this man for keeping Brianna safe. So he’d cut Damon some slack for having sexual fantasies about his gemate. At the end of the day, she would leave with him.

  “If the Erian is locked up, why do you still seem so worried?” Nadia asked Damon.

  Bria’s brother looked at her and said, “Was locked up. Tomas just told me. The Erian’s friends helped him escape. My security people are looking for them now.”

  Ice-cold fear swept through Iolyn’s body and settled in his gut. “Get us moving, Damon,” Iolyn growled out. “Get us to Brianna. Once we’re sure she’s safe, get out of the way so I can go after the bak who threatened her.” His hands fisted. “And if she’s been harmed in any way, you’d better hide until I calm down, because I’ll want to skin you with my battle-blade—after I’ve covered it in the blood of any man who dared touch her.”

  “Fucking hell.” Damon, reluctant respect in his eyes, opened the door into the main bar area. “Can’t say I’d blame you.”

  Once inside, all Iolyn could see was a massive crowd making a lot of noise. No fighting. The all-male crowd seemed to be entranced by the various sex acts. The largest crowd seemed to have fixed their attention on what appeared to be the main stage.

  Obviously, someone had gotten the idea of taming the majority of the savage beasts with something more interesting—group sex, with five men taking on one naked woman. Her screams and moans could’ve been anything between ecstasy and pain.

  Searching the area, he couldn’t see a dark-haired woman treating any injured. But the place was huge, with multiple stages, dozens and dozens of tables, and more than one bar set up. And lots and lots of big, rough males.

  “Is it always this crowded?” Wulf asked.

  “Yes.” Damon pulled a passing barmaid to him. “Where’s my sister?”

  “At the second-stage bar with Tomas and Dozer.” The woman cast a curious, appraising look over the landing party before scurrying off with a tray of empty glasses.

  Iolyn shoved past Damon and moved through the crowd in the direction the barmaid had indicated. Whatever had happened to injure two people to the point of requiring medical attention hadn’t seemed to slow down the bar’s main activities of serving drinks and entertainment. Besides the action on the main stage, there were sex vignettes, including several of the sado-masochistic bent, going on in alcoves around the edges of the room.

  He punched Damon on the arm. “You let your sister be exposed to this?” He waved a hand at the five-on-one action. While Iolyn was no prude and actually quite dominant in his sexual proclivities, he believed sex was meant to be private, not shared with hundreds of drunk, lusty, rough men.

  “No. I told her to stay out of the bar no matter what happened.” Damon stopped, shoved back a freighter captain who looked as if he was going to join the on-stage action, and then proceeded to walk toward what looked to be the main entrance to the bar. “She doesn’t listen. Good luck with that, by the way.”

  “You’re going the wrong way.” Iolyn pulled on Damon’s sleeve. “Brianna is that way.”

  Iolyn pointed toward a stage which was empty and the bar serving the area. The crowd was lighter in that area of the room, and he spotted several large and armed Volusians dressed in the station’s security uniform.

  Even with all the noise and odor of over-ripe males, spilled alcohol, and greasy food, his ramped up senses told him Brianna was within the protective cordon—and that she wasn’t afraid for her safety. His tension calmed somewhat, but for some reason, Damon’s had racheted upwards.

  “Bria is safe. But remember the Erian I spoke of?”

  Iolyn would never forget and even now mentally plotted all the ways he’d hurt the apayebo before he beheaded him.

  His brothers, Nadia, and the rest of the landing party surrounded the two of them, both to provide protection from the unruly bar crowd and to hear what Damon had to say.

  “Yes,” Iolyn answered. “What of him?”

  “He and his buddies just entered the bar. To get inside, they had to get past the Volusian guard I had on the door.” Damon’s voice and gaze were frigid. “They’re armed and heading for Bria. So, go to Bria. I’ve got some killing to do.”

  Iolyn let loose with the Caradoc battle cry as his batel rabia broke loose of the chains he’d placed around it. It echoed off the high ceiling of the large barroom. His brothers’ rage aligned with his, creating a wave which pulled in the other Prime in the landing party along with Borac.

  Nadia muttered, “Damn, I’ll never get used to that.”

  Damon, eyes widened in shock, looked at Borac. “What the fuck was that? It’s like the atmosphere heated up.”

  Borac answered, “That’s the Prime battle rage I told you about. Feels wonderful.”

  “Well, hell—” Damon shrugged. “Whatever.” He headed for the Erian and his men as they pushed through the bar crowd and moved toward Bria’s location.

  Iolyn thrust his arm across Damon’s chest. “No. The Erian is mine.” He angled his head. “Huw. Nadia. Take the others and guard Brianna.”

  “You’ve got it,” said Huw. Then he and Nadia sliced through the crowd, taking the other three landing party members with them.

  “I want the Erian.” Damon had pulled a large knife and held it in a tightly clenched fist. “I saw him first.”

  “Brother-kin, I sense Brianna would be very upset with me if you were hurt.” Iolyn pulled his much larger weapon, a battle-blade. “Plus, you already got to make him bleed once. He’s mine now.”

  “Fair enough.” Damon grunted. “I will keep the others off your ass.”

  “That would be good. Wulf will assist you. Won’t you, brother?”

  Wulf laughed and brandished his battle-blade. “I live to assist.”

  Iolyn laughed and noted Damon cracked a smile and shook his head.

  “Let’s go get these baks,” Iolyn muttered.

  The three moved quickly to intercept the Erian and his mercenaries. When they were about four meters in front of the Erian’s path, they stopped.

  “Leave. Now,” Iolyn shouted. Rules of engagement always provided for a chance to retreat. He also wouldn’t want his gemate, raised on a pacifist planet, to think him a blood-thirsty barbarian.

  His roar effectively silenced the bar patrons standing nearby and startled the Erian and his gang into halting their forward progress.

  “This is your only warning.” One which he knew the Erian would ignore.

  In fact, he was counting on it.

  Chapter 9

  Minutes earlier, Hades

  “Bria, please go back to your quarters.” Tomas’s voice cracked with tension, and his head was in constant motion as he scanned the dimly lit and smoky bar. “You’ve done enough. The security guards have basic emergency medical training.”

  “No.” She continued to check over the male victim on the floor beside her for indications of why he was unresponsive. “This man’s in shock, and his life signs are decreasing. The dancer’s leg is still bleeding. I don’t have the equipment I need to stabilize either patient quickly, not even a me
di-laser, so I’m forced to do things the old-fashioned way…hands-on care. My hands. You want me to leave? Get me gurneys…now. I can treat these people more effectively in the medica.”

  “Madre de dios, Bria.” Tomas tore at his hair. “You aren’t safe here. The sharks are circling. Your brother is gonna have my balls for breakfast for exposing you to danger and”—he swept his arm to include the stage shows and the smaller sex vignettes—“things a proper lady like you should never see.”

  Until Tomas had mentioned it, she’d managed to ignore the live sex shows to her right and left, because she had patients to triage. Now, she looked up and was amazed that the violence and its bloody aftermath had barely fazed the performers and their rapt audience.

  Emotions still ran hot in the large barroom. Most of the tension in the air was sexual. Yet, there were toxic threads of violence interwoven in the lust. The same kind of violence that had one lusty patron attacking one of the dancers. The injured man she now examined had pulled the bastard off the woman.

  Things could easily explode again with the right spark. The sooner her patients were stabilized and out of here, the better. She didn’t like the feel of the atmosphere.

  Bria continued her examination of the male victim. “Tomas, I can’t leave my patients. Just can’t. And as for the sex acts…doesn’t bother me. So get over it.”

  Well, she might have lied a tinge. She’d studied sex in medical school, the biology and psychology of it. She worked in research where the sex act was often discussed, but in a clinical fashion. She’d also had sex. But nothing within her experience resembled what was going on around her.

  A thought struck her. Would her gemat expect some of these acts? She’d heard from Lia that Prime males were very alpha-dominant. She shuddered—with excitement or dread—she wasn’t sure which.

  Tomas opened his mouth, probably to plead with her to leave once again when a security guard tapped him on the shoulder. The two men huddled. Their auras flamed with anger and fear. She was about to ask Tomas what was wrong when—

  “Doctor…” The security guard attending to Siri, the dancer whose leg had been slashed, pulled her back to the here and now. She’d worry about sex, and what it would entail with her Prime mate, when she’d found him.

  “Yes, Dozer?”

  “Siri’s bleeding isn’t slowing. What am I doing wrong?”

  Blood flowed freely through the guard’s hands as he put pressure over Siri’s wound. The dancer’s eyes were glazed with pain and her already pale skin was almost translucent.

  “Press harder. You’re being too gentle,” she told Dozer. “Tomas…” Bria glanced up and found Tomas blocking her view of the room at large, his body posture on guard, his weapon drawn. “…are the gurneys coming from the next galaxy? If I don’t have transportation in the next few minutes, then we’ll have to draft help and carry the patients to the medica on tabletops.”

  “I’ll call again.” Tomas looked harried and more worried than her request required. “The paramedics have their hands full with multiple injuries elsewhere on the station. I sent one of the door guards to the medica to get a gurney. You need to leave. Now.”

  She glared at him and didn’t answer. Her response hadn’t changed since the last two times he’d told her.

  “Ai yi yi, Bria…por el amor de Dios—” Tomas’s plea was cut off by the sound of his com unit. “What!” he shouted into the unit.

  Bria listened to his side of the conversation with half her attention as she felt for fractures or wounds on the male victim. She checked Dozer and nodded with approval as Siri’s bleeding was under control.

  “She’s here.” Tomas spoke into the com device, but his narrowed gaze continued to sweep the area around them. His grip tightened around his laser weapon. “Damon, even if I told her about the Erian’s escape, she wouldn’t budge.”

  The Erian mercenary had escaped? A twinge of fear shot down her spine. Then she looked at her nearly dead patient and muttered, “Damn right, I won’t.”

  Dozer choked back a laugh.

  Tomas glared at her. “Fucking come and get her yourself, ¡Cabrón!” He snarled. “I hate to say it, but I agree with her. She needs to stay. The guy’s really white. He looks dead.”

  “And that’s what he’ll be permanently”—she paused to take the man’s pulse—“if I don’t get him to higher level of care and soon.”

  Tomas glowered and then hissed into his com unit, “She’s more effin’ stubborn than you. Ai yi yi. Pinche puto pendejo baboso!” Tomas’s anger ran so high he’d devolved into gutter Spanish. “Yeah, yeah, I’m not going anywhere. Roger that. Fuckin’ out.”

  “Where is he?” she asked after Tomas shoved his com unit into a pocket and grumbled in Spanish under his breath.

  “Borac’s suite. The Galanti is in jump station space. The landing party’s with him…including your gemat.”

  Her gemat? Here?

  “Really?” When he nodded, joy and anticipation at meeting her mate…mixed with worry he’d be disappointed. The opposing emotions swirled in her stomach, making her feel sick.

  “Bria?” Tomas’s voice had gentled as if he were afraid of scaring her. “You okay? You look sort of…green.”

  God, did she look that bad? Probably. She felt light-headed like some too-stupid-to-live heroine in the romance novels she read. She finally remembered to breathe and then attempted to reassure Tomas she was okay. “Yes. No. Hell, I don’t know.”

  Bria shook off the weakness and forced herself to concentrate on her patients. As long as she focused on what she knew and did best—caring for others—she’d be fine. Just fine…for now. So, she’d occupy her mind with what was in front of her.

  The question uppermost in her mind: What had she missed on this patient?

  She’d finished the pat down on the man. Nothing broken. No contusions on his head. Unconscious, but breathing shallowly. Lying on his back. No blood on his front. No blood pool under him.

  She shook her head. “Fuck this. I need to turn him.”

  A couple of the lookee-loo bar patrons came forward while Tomas yelled into his com unit about the gurney.

  “Gently now,” Bria urged the men as they turned the patient onto his stomach and peeled off his torn shirt which got hung up on something on his lower back.

  “Well, hell,” she said.

  The man had been stabbed. His back was one huge bruise of pooled blood. He had a knife tip stuck in his back over his left kidney, which had effectively plugged the hole. The knife must’ve broken off sometime during the fight or the man’s fall to the ground. “This man needs surgery and now.”

  “Tomas—” she called out.

  But before he could respond, the crowd parted and two men brought in a gurney.

  “Thank the stars. Get this man to the medica. Put him on a regen bed face down and find me one of the damn station paramedics. I need him to assist me with both patients. Someone needs to carry Siri to the medica and put her on a regen bed also. Now, people.”

  As men scurried to do her bidding, she supervised, but all the while, at the edges of her consciousness, she fretted over the upcoming meeting with her gemat.

  “Go. Don’t wait on me. Get them to the medica.” Bria picked up the injured man’s laser pistol which had fallen out of his waistband after they’d stripped off his shirt. She made sure it was locked and then stuck it in her back waistband so it wouldn’t go missing.

  Once her patients were on their way, Bria began to follow when an abrupt and uncomfortable silence settled over the bar. The silence seemed even more ominous considering that Siri’s stabbing and its aftermath had only caused a hiccup in the bar’s activity.

  Then Bria scented something on the air, something addictive that negated the odor of blood, sweat, booze, stale sex, and smoke. An aroma which made her forget where she was and what she had to do. She had a sudden intense urge to seek out and then cover herself in the luscious scent.

  She took another deep breat
h and sighed. The aroma brought to mind a deep, dark woods in the heat of the day. All rich smoky resins and musk. She took another breath, and a tingling began in the skin over her right ovary. Her breath hitched, and the bottom seemed to drop out of her stomach.

  Her mark! Something was happening to her gemate mark.

  Bria gently touched the area. Heat burned through the material of her pants. The mark throbbed with a delicious pain that also pulsed in her sex.

  Using Tomas’s big body to block out curious gazes, she turned her back to the room and gingerly peeled down the waistband just enough to uncover the mark.

  “Oh my God.” Her mark had come alive. Where before the pattern had been pale, now it bloomed with vibrant color. She traced the swirls of color and gasped as her sex contracted and her clit ached. “I didn’t believe it.”

  Lia had told her about Mel Dmitros-Caradoc’s bond mark reaction when first exposed to her gemat Wulf after twenty-seven years of separation, but Bria had been skeptical…until now.

  “What is it, Bria?” Tomas nudged her toward the bar, keeping his body between her and the room. “Pull up your pants,” he hissed. “Dios! There are men here who would take that much skin as an invitation to fuck you blind.”

  “Tomas, you’re in my way.” She turned and craned her neck to see if she could spot the only man who could’ve made her mark react with merely his scent. But there were too many bodies, too close together. “I need to find my brother. My gemat is with him.”

  “Yeah, I told you that, remember?”

  “You told me he was on-station. Now, he’s in the room. I scented him.” She tried to move Tomas out of her way, but he was too big. When she tried to go around him, he countered her every move. Infuriating, over-protective male. “Move it, Tomas.”

  “No. Something’s wrong. Stay put.” Tomas turned his back to her and scanned the room. “Oh shit. Well someone’s here and heading straight for you.” He pulled his weapon and stepped forward as if to confront whoever had put that harsh, angry growl in his tone. “And it ain’t your gemat, that’s for damned sure.”