by Sarah Marsh
“Thank you.” Mari sat and smiled at them. “So, what do all of you do on this ship?”
Mari talked with the crew over her meal for hours. Some had to go back on shift, but there was always another eager face to take his chair and answer all the questions she had for them about Dolovia and its people. She quite enjoyed herself actually. It seemed as though Bromm was indeed just a bit of a dick, because all the other men had been quite respectful and charming. She finally finished her last cup of tea and bid the men good night as she wandered back to her quarters. It was such a relief to know that she may just find herself quite at home on this new planet after all.
She opened the door to her room and stood there in shock.
Well, shit, this is pretty awkward, she thought to herself as she took in the stark-ass naked red alien lounging in her bed.
Even Mari had to admit that Bromm was a striking specimen. He was well muscled and his long black hair now hung loose around his shoulders. Her gaze dropped to where his hand was slowly stroking up and down his hard cock, and she abruptly turned away, thinking it was a shame he was such an ass; otherwise she may have been tempted to entertain his offer.
“Ummm, Delegate Bromm,” she asked, trying not to freak out, “why are you naked and on my bed? I thought we discussed this?”
“I have obtained permission from Councilman Trikna to contract you as my mistress once your duty to him has been fulfilled,” he answered smugly. “I can give you the relationship you require, and we can begin our association now.”
Jesus, now what am I supposed to say to this guy? So much for letting him down gently, she thought, even if she did sneak another peek at his equipment. What? Like she couldn’t be curious?
“Wow, Bromm.” Mari tried to apply her most charming smile, while on the inside she was just hoping that his creepy “I’m basically being pimped out by my boss” situation didn’t mean he was a complete asshole. “I’m so flattered, really, I am—but I think we need to talk about this more before we jump into a relationship. I mean, what if we don’t want the same things in life?”
And then she dug deep. What was that movie called again? Oh yeah, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. Well, if that perky little blonde used words to make men run, then surely Mari could do it, as well.
“I find you attractive, and I am attractive. What more do you require?” he answered smugly, still stroking himself, as if he wanted to be prepared when she caved and dove for his cock.
Sheesh, men. “That’s, umm—true, I guess. But what about feelings?” She put way too much emphasis on that last word and sat down on the farthest edge of the bed she could manage without falling off. “Do you love me?”
“Er…love?” Finally, his hand faltered, and she could have sworn she noticed some deflation of the huge red appendage.
“Because I think I might love you”—Marisol put on her best “I’m going to boil your bunny” smile—“and I can’t wait for all the babies we’re going to have. At least six, I’d say, right?”
Bromm’s cock was on full deflate now, and he sat up against the headboard, a confused and uncomfortable look beginning to blossom on his face.
“Oh, Brommy,” Marisol gushed, batting her lashes at him. Now that his overt flirting had come to a stop, she was almost enjoying this. He looked as though he was about to vomit. “And of course you’ll be faithful to me, won’t you? I mean, if you love me, then you wouldn’t want to have sex with some nasty old boss’s wife, now would you?”
“Fidelity?” He seemed shocked that she would ask for such a thing. “But part of my position with Councilman Trikna requires me to service his wives and mistresses.”
That dirty dog! Well, Mari had thought he was a douche bag before when he said he was “servicing” his boss’s wife, but the mistresses, as well? Unbelievable. Why would a gay man have pretend mistresses? What kind of planet were they going to, anyway?
“Gosh, does it really?” She played along, tapping her finger at her mouth as if deep in thought. “Hmm, wow. Maybe we need to take some time to think this through, huh?”
“Yes, errr.” He eased off the bed, then grabbed his clothes as he creeped toward the door. “I suppose perhaps we did jump into this a bit quickly. I shall have to think about what you’ve said.”
Bromm backed his bare red ass right out of her doorway, never taking his eyes off of her, as though she were a rabid animal that would attack. There were some startled crew members who happened to be walking past her door, and Bromm still didn’t attempt to dress. When her door silently slid closed, Marisol finally let go of the laugh she’d been holding in.
Man, these alien men sure are a trip.
Chapter Five
Mari came awake to the blaring sound of the ship’s red alert. She jumped out of bed and grabbed her robe, frantically hitting the buttons on the wall panel to see what was going on.
She was still exhausted. Mari didn’t think she could have been sleeping for more than a few hours with how she felt now, with the ship’s alarm ringing in her ears. When the panel lit up, she was able to confirm that it was indeed still the middle of the night. According to the brief explanation of the flight plan Bromm had given her when they boarded, the ship should have already made two hyper jumps and now be traveling in open space. What kind of trouble could have found them way out here?
She was just about to try and get in touch with Bromm on the computer when all of a sudden everything went dark and very, very quiet—too quiet, as a matter of fact. She couldn’t hear any noise whatsoever. Mari began to panic when she felt herself float off of the floor. Clearly, the power had been cut off from everything…including the gravity drive. She managed to grab hold of the bathroom door and pulled her way back to the bed, where she wedged herself in between the edge of the bed and the side table so at least she’d stay put. Hopefully, someone would come and tell her what was going on soon. This power loss couldn’t be a good thing. It was surprising how she’d gotten used to the noise once she boarded; once your brain adjusted to the background hum of the engines, it was just eerie not to hear them anymore.
It felt like hours that she waited there in the dark. Of course, in reality, probably only about forty-five minutes had passed when a couple of loud thunks sounded from down the hall.
She was relieved when she finally heard voices and banging on her door. She didn’t think she’d ever been so glad to hope that Bromm was on the other side. But when the door was finally pulled open, her heart stopped, as it wasn’t red-skinned Dolovians who stood there.
“There she is,” the scaled giant thing said as he pushed the door the rest of the way back. “I only got to kill five males before they gave you up. Not much fun for me, I’d say. Come here, pretty. It’s time to go.”
Mari just gaped at the nightmare in front of her. His speech pattern was odd. The universal translator the slavers put in her head when she’d first been kidnapped had never had trouble with any of the languages she’d heard since she’d been on Sirus. Was it malfunctioning or something? He stepped closer to her and the light on the second man’s belt brought him into clear focus. He had to be over seven feet tall and built like a tank, his body covered in scaly green muscles that reminded her of an alligator, but his face was the truly scary part. He was missing one eye and the socket was sunken in. Half of the cheekbone and upper lip was gone as well—that explained his speech problem.
Mari screamed and tried to fight him off when he reached for her, but without gravity, there wasn’t much she could do. His boots kept him firmly on the floor and he grasped her arms with huge hands, his black nails digging painfully into her flesh.
“Get away from me!” She tried to pull away from him. “What do you want?”
“Quiet, female,” he sneered at her. “I don’t have to bring you in unharmed, just alive.”
That quickly had Mari’s lips clamping shut as he towed her along down the hallway. Jesus Christ, were these monsters here specifically for her? That realization had
all of the other violent attempts on her fellow Earth sisters rolling through her brain, scaring her to death. She frantically looked around for one of the ship’s crew to help her, but she only saw a single body floating silently, blood forming creepy blobs in the air without gravity to pull them down.
When they finally reached the bridge, she was so happy to see Bromm and about six crew members holding on to various pieces of equipment on one side of the room.
“Bromm! Help me,” she pleaded as the alligator man hauled her behind him toward two other men who were also obviously not part of the Dolovian crew.
“Delegate Bromm, are you going to make an issue out of this?” A tall man who could almost pass for human, except for the eerie purple color of his eyes, seemed to be in charge and had his weapon pointed at Bromm. “We were instructed not to kill your crew and take the ship, which is why we used the EMP to take out your power, but I would be more than happy to report back that you resisted and we had no choice.”
Bromm looked at Mari for a moment, his expression tight and full of regret, and then he turned back to the man pointing the gun.
“No, just go and leave us be,” he answered, leaving Mari staring at him in disbelief as the alligator man dragged her to the airlock and onto a shuttle. “We won’t fight you. I’m sorry, Marisol.”
She just stared dumbly at him for a moment. If things had gone differently last night, would he be fighting for her now?
They hauled her behind them into the small shuttle that was docked.
“Why are you doing this?” she turned back to the tall stranger and asked, trying not to completely fall apart now that she’d gotten a good look at the other men crowded into the shuttle. They were all in some state of bodily disrepair—missing limbs, or disfigured with metal replacement parts that looked beyond horrifying. “Where are you taking me?”
“Simple job, lady,” the man with the purple eyes answered. He seemed to be the least damaged of all of them. “We’re getting paid to find you and bring whatever pieces our boss wants back to him.”
* * * *
Marisol was terrified when the shuttle finally docked. Not only did she spend the entire trip imagining the awful things they might do to her once they arrived, she also was creeped out by the leering, and literal drooling in more than one case, of the monsters who had captured her.
“Are ya gonna walk or should I have Zeke here carry you?” The tall man stopped and looked back at her from the now open door of the shuttle. “I think he likes you.”
Mari looked up toward the huge, disgusting green giant and then hurried to follow close to the other asshole.
“Can I have her, Lars?” Marisol’s eyes went wide when the growly voice followed her out.
“No, Zeke.” Lars gave her a smug look over his shoulder. “The doc’s waiting on her, you know that. That pretty little head’s been bought and paid for already.”
“I don’t need the head…”
Mari’s heart stopped dead in her chest, and this time she really did grab for Lars. She was too terrified to look back at the alligator man.
“Goddess, Zeke.” She was relieved to see the revolted look on the other pirate’s face. “Even I think that’s disgusting. Go find one of the pleasure bots if you need to scratch that itch, but any repair costs are coming straight from your credit account.”
“Thank you….” she whispered low.
“Don’t bother, lady,” Lars answered and pulled her toward the open hallway. “You’re dead either way, and the doc won’t be much gentler with you.”
What had she done agreeing to leave the safety of Sirus and all of her friends behind? Marisol hesitated at the doorway that opened in front of them. Lars just rolled his eyes and yanked her inside, where an older man was waiting. She gasped when he turned around and under the mop of white hair was grayish skin and huge bulging eyes.
“Ah, there she is.” He smiled, revealing sharp pointed teeth with huge gaps in between. “Well, get rid of those clothes and strap her down, Lars. I have a feeling she’s going to be a screamer.”
Chapter Six
“What the fuck do you mean Mari’s been taken?” Sally snapped her head around to look at her husband and friend, who’d just burst into her office.
“We just received an urgent communication from the Dolovians, telling us that the ship Marisol was on just got their power back up and running. They’ve been drifting in space for the last twelve hours. They were attacked by pirates, and Mari was their target. She was taken.” Arkenon explained gently, “They wanted her alive, Sally, so that’s a good sign that we may have time to rescue her before anything happens.”
“I’ve already tracked her. She seems to be aboard a space station orbiting a small planet in the Corsica system. If you give me leave, I will go and retrieve our friend,” Kali added, placing the tablet with the information on Mari’s tracker on the desk in front of her.
Sally was sick to her stomach thinking about what Mari must be going through. Thank God they’d gone ahead and implanted trackers on all of the human women after the attempts that had happened to kill or abduct them since they’d arrived. This threat from a radical organization, The Motion for Racial Purity, had become more real every day, and it was terrifying when she thought of how spread out her girls would be. They needed to find out who was really behind all of this and put a stop to it, but right now their first priority had to be getting Marisol back safe and sound.
“Wait, which planet in the Corsica system, Kali?” Ark asked, his face full of concern.
“It’s orbiting the planet Draxis. Why?” She looked up at him when he cursed at her answer.
“Your extraction plan will not work if you need to evacuate to the planet. The residents there are quite—hostile.”
“Too hostile for a Tokka assassin?” Sally asked her husband in disbelief. What species could possibly be too much for Kali to handle?
She looked over to where Kali was furiously looking up the planet Draxis. A genuine expression of surprise came over her friend’s face, Sally was shocked, but when she looked down and saw what was on the screen, it made much more sense.
“What the fuck?” Sally screamed in frustration. “It’s a planet full of fucking dinosaurs?”
“Draxis was a planet designed to be an exclusive hunting retreat. All the native species were enhanced to make them the perfect prey for some of the most ferocious species in the Coalition. But the engineers took it a step too far, and only a few months after they opened, there was an incident that ended up closing down the entire resort, resulting in a level eight planet quarantine,” Arkenon explained.
“What was the incident?” Sally asked even though she had a pretty good idea what it may have been. She had seen all of the Jurassic Park movies, after all.
“All of the staff and guests were—eaten.”
Sally just stared at her husband for a minute while that sank in.
“There’s no way we can approach the station without alerting the pirates, and there are thousands of them. I do not have clearance to land on a level eight quarantined planet, but the council has two specialists who do. I will notify them at once,” Kali said before rushing out of Sally’s office.
Ark was looking at Kali’s tablet, and he seemed relieved by what he saw.
“Of course, I’d forgotten that Grae’s brother and his mate work for the council now.” He looked up at his wife and pulled her into his arms. “I’m certain that Luca and Bae will bring Mari back safe and sound, love.”
“They’d better, Ark,” she said in a strained voice. “How can I let them go out into the universe if I can’t keep them safe from these maniacs? We need to find who’s behind this, and when we do, they need to be stopped—permanently.”
“The council is doing everything in their power to find whoever—”
“I’m done with waiting for the council to fix this. Both Sarah and Talia have children now, and I will not have anything happening to one more of my people.”
Sally’s eyes narrowed and her expression went stone cold. “I’m going to agree to let Kali deal with this herself. She’ll find out who’s behind The Movement for Racial Purity and put an end to it once and for all.”
“Sally, are you certain you want the results on your conscience?” Her husband pulled her chin up to make her look him in the eyes. “You know what it means to send a Tokka assassin after a mark.”
“If I could pull the trigger myself, I would.” Sally had never been surer of anything in her life. “This is my family we’re talking about here, and I would do anything to keep them safe.”
Arkenon simply nodded in agreement and pulled her close again. This was just one of the reasons she loved this man—he understood that family was everything, and she knew he would risk just as much as she would to keep them all safe. Sally just hoped that it would be enough.
Just then, Kali came back through the door.
“The council has been made aware, and they’ve already dispatched their agents with Mari’s coordinates. Now we wait.”
Chapter Seven
“You stupid bastard,” Luca slurred and pretended to stumble along next to Bae outside of the seedy bar on Rika Station, “you broke my ship. Now how are we supposed to find any females?”
“You broke it with your clumsy bear hands!” Bae slurred back, shoving Luca into the small table in front of him.
Once assigned their new mission, it hadn’t taken them long to find out where the pirates from the Corsica system frequently looked for their prey. People went missing all the time from Rika Station. Unfortunately, Luca and Bae knew from experience where most of the males ended up. But this time, they knew better than to be lured away by a pretty female with a sexy smile. They’d both been mere boys when they’d been captured to fight in the slaver arenas, and now they needed to get picked up by the pirates for another reason. So they wandered into the seediest bar on the station, covered in the smell of liquor, and proceeded to make a scene.
