Warriors of Ryon: Bayden

by S. K. Yule

  “Bayden—”

  “No. Let me finish.” He waited until she nodded before continuing. “Not knowing still doesn’t erase the fact that I killed innocent people.” He flexed his shoulders and cocked his head to one side and then the other. “I’ve killed people as a Reaper too. It’s unavoidable at times. My life, my friend’s life, against those who threaten us; I’ll choose to crush the threat every time. I only kill when there’s no other way, but sometimes… I don’t see my life changing anytime soon. There will always be a chance I might have to kill.”

  Her heart hurt for him. She couldn’t imagine the pain, the guilt he held inside him. No wonder he had trust issues. How could she blame him for it? Being a soldier was difficult at best in opportune times, but how did one cope upon finding out that the acts thought to be honorable were nothing but mercenary missions for a lying, greedy, heartless ruler. And to think about his awful childhood added onto what Bayden himself had just told her. How had he turned out to be the incredible man he was? That said so much for his character, and he couldn’t see past all of the things that weren’t his fault and realize that he was extraordinary.

  “Now that you know, you can finally realize that everything I’ve told you about me not being good enough is the truth. How could I expect anyone to trust me? To love me? Impossible.”

  “Stop cutting yourself down, Bayden. You aren’t as bad as you think.” His burst of laughter made her jump. “Once you realized what Mykal had been doing, you turned it around. You put your own life on the line to do so. Now what are you doing? Still helping people. You helped me and Molly, and you’re trying to help everyone on the other planets by searching for this fuel source. I can understand why you have trust issues, but not everyone will stab you in the back.”

  “Really? Because everyone’s stabbed me in the back.”

  “Everyone? Conlan’s stabbed you in the back? What about Thad? Sarek? Stryder? And contrary to what you believe, I didn’t stab you in the back. I didn’t turn away from you. I realized I was wrong, and I apologized for it. I made a simple human error. I wasn’t out to get you. Do you think Molly will stab you in the back? My God, Bayden. You have to let someone in at some time.”

  “Why? Everyone I know has gotten hurt when they’ve let that one particular person a little too close.”

  Then it dawned on her. “Ahhh. We’re talking specifically about women here, aren’t we?”

  She was beginning to understand a little better now. Men like the Reapers, like Bayden, wouldn’t easily open their hearts to anyone, but when they did, it’d be forever. That would make them vulnerable. If Bayden gave her his heart, she’d literally have the power to destroy him without ever touching him.

  He glared at her, and she frowned.

  “Yeah. I thought so. You’re scared, Bayden.”

  “I’ve never been scared of anything in my life.”

  “Maybe not any tangible being or thing, but love scares the hell out of you, doesn’t it?”

  “I don’t want to talk about this any longer. The others will be returning soon.” He walked away again, tapped his earpiece, and began talking.

  She wondered if she’d ever get through to him. Before she could contemplate further, her stomach growled. She took the bar from her pocket. After unwrapping it, she sniffed it, surprised when the scent of blueberries wafted up her nose. She nibbled the bar, happy when the fruity taste hit her tongue. In no time, she’d finished the small treat. She shoved the empty wrapper into her pocket right before Bayden returned.

  “The others are on their way back.”

  She started to say something, but her brain went foggy, and a wave of dizziness swamped her. She swayed and reached for his arm.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Just a little dizzy.”

  “Maybe you need to eat something,” he said.

  “I just ate a bar Zaira left me from your pack.”

  “I didn’t have any bars in my pack.”

  “Sure you did. That little fruity bar wrapped in foil. Zaira gave me one and took one with her.”

  “I didn’t have any little fruity…Son of a bitch! I’m going to kill that lita.”

  She swayed again, held on to his arm tighter, and then she got the uncontrollable urge to giggle. “What bitch?” She started laughing and put her hand over her mouth to contain it. “Oh! You mean Zaira. The bitcha-rooney-dooney, who—” She snorted and smashed her hand harder over her lips.

  “Can you walk?”

  “Maybe.” She tried to take a step, and the ground rushed toward her face. Just before she fell, Bayden scooped her into his arms.

  She couldn’t stop giggling after he picked her up and began carrying her. “What’s”—snort and then laugh—”wrong”—laughing hysterically—”with me?”

  “You’re high, Ellie. You’ll be fine.”

  “Are you saying someone spiked my brownies?”

  “Um. Sure. Whatever that means.”

  * * * *

  Ellie sat on a rock, sipping the water Bayden had given her. The pounding in her head pulsed and intensified with each heartbeat. She squinted. Bayden stood only a few feet from her, and she didn’t miss the way his gaze kept resting on her, or the way Zaira shot her venomous glares now and then. Apparently Zaira thought it’d be funny to leave Ellie the snack that she mistook for an energy bar. A snack that turned out to have a drug in it called rev, something that Bayden explained was a stimulant.

  Ellie glared right back at Zaira. The best she could anyway since any change in facial expression caused fresh pains to shoot through her head. She was beyond upset that Zaira had thought it to be a harmless joke.

  “Get over yourself already,” Zaira finally said after another glare from Bayden. “It’s not like it killed her or anything.”

  Bayden’s face darkened. The other men acted as if they weren’t paying attention because they obviously didn’t want to be a part of the shit storm Bayden was about to rain down upon Zaira.

  “You could’ve fucking killed her, Zaira. Do you ever stop and think about anyone but yourself? She’s not from any of our planets. What if she had an allergic reaction to it or had gone into shock?”

  “Seriously? You are preaching to me about thinking about anyone but myself? How many damn missions have I gone on for the sake of others? How many times have I helped you all out? I wasn’t trying to kill her. If I had been, she’d be dead.”

  A shiver of dread slid down Ellie’s spine. Her dislike for Zaira had now grown and spread to fear. The woman wasn’t right in the head.

  “You’ve never done anything out of the kindness of your heart, Zaira. You’ve been paid for every fucking time you’ve helped us, for every mission.”

  “And everything you all do is out of the kindness of your hearts?” She laughed.

  “Not everything, but we didn’t all become Reapers to make money or to get rich. We did it to help people who are in similar situations we’ve been in.”

  “Give me a break. Nobody does anything for free.”

  “Maybe not the people you’ve been hanging with lately. I don’t think we’ll require your help any longer once we return you to Cerbys.”

  “You bastard.”

  “Tell me something I don’t already know.”

  “You can’t just drop me like that.”

  “Watch me.”

  “I’ll make sure the rest of the Renegades never help you again.”

  “I doubt that. Just because you fuck them all, it doesn’t mean you own them.”

  “You’ll pay for this.”

  Bayden walked toward Zaira until he was nearly toe-to-toe with her. “Don’t threaten me or anyone under my protection. That includes everyone here plus many more. Let it go. Put on your big-girl pants and walk away from this one, Zaira. I know your reputation and your hunger for revenge against anyone you think has done you wrong. Don’t make this into something it’s not. It isn’t as if we’re that close or even friends for that matter. It’d
be a grave mistake on your part to cross me.”

  “Fine.” Zaira smiled sweetly.

  Warning bells began to clang in Ellie’s head as she realized the Zaira train was in danger of derailing. Ellie thought about the way Zaira watched Bayden. The way she watched him when she thought no one else was watching. How her ire grew every time she saw Bayden spending time with Ellie. Her stomach lurched, and her skin prickled. Zaira thought she was in love with Bayden, and he’d just given this woman—a mercenary—the ultimate brush-off with a threat attached.

  Ellie would breathe a sigh of relief when they reached Cerbys and said good-bye to Zaira. Until then, she’d be on guard.

  “You okay?”

  Ellie jumped. She’d been too absorbed in the argument between Bayden and Zaira to notice Conlan’s approach. Looking up into his green-eyed gaze, she nodded. Conlan was a gorgeous golden-skinned man with dark hair and a hulking muscular frame. He didn’t appeal to her the way Bayden did, but she wasn’t so blind that she couldn’t appreciate him.

  “Let’s get a move on. We need to get out of here,” Bayden called out to everyone.

  “Guess we better get going.” Conlan held his hand out and helped her up.

  “Thank you.”

  “Don’t worry about all of the stuff with Zaira. She’s a pain in the ass, but she’s on our side.”

  I wouldn’t hold my breath on that one.

  On the way back to the ship, she was sick several times. She couldn’t wait to get back to Molly and sleep in a soft bed. The effects of the rev hadn’t lasted long, but they’d been intense with nasty aftereffects.

  Once they made it back, she found the room she and Molly had shared on their maiden trip to Ryon and collapsed onto the small, but comfortable bed. Thad gave her some pain medication for her headache, and she fell asleep once the ship leveled out after liftoff.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Wake the fuck up!” Stryder bellowed.

  Ellie sprang from the bed. Her eyes were still blurry from the hangover and pain medication. When she saw Stryder’s deadly stare leveled on her, her stomach churned.

  “What’s wrong?”

  There had to be something terribly amiss for Stryder to pay her a visit. “Come with me.”

  The unease crept deeper into her bones, and she had an overwhelming urge to curl up in the corner.

  “You can’t do this.” Sarek said from behind Stryder.

  “Fuck I can’t. She’s worthless to us. We can’t lose Bayden because of her. I warned him about bringing her with us in the first place. He’ll have to deal with the consequences of his decisions. If Zaira wants her in exchange for him, so be it.”

  Thad appeared. “Sarek’s right. You can’t just feed her to the wolves, man. You know he’d kill you for it.”

  Something awful had happened. When she met Thad’s somber gaze, her heart sank. The him Stryder was talking about had to be Bayden.

  Stryder snarled again. “Not on his best day. Besides, I owe him my brother’s life. Do you think I can stand by while he’s tortured and murdered because of her?” He jerked his head toward Ellie.

  “We can’t let you do it, bro.” Conlan said from behind Sarek and Thad.

  Tortured and murdered? Suddenly, her head felt is if it’d split in two with the pressure building inside, and the headache had nothing to do with the hangover this time. The men were now arguing, but she only caught words here and there. “That bitch…” “Going to kill her…” and so on. Finally, she couldn’t take any more and stood.

  “Stop it! Everyone stop it!” She screamed the words as loud as she was able and was amazed when the room became quiet.

  “Someone tell me what’s going on.”

  Silence.

  “Tell me!”

  “Zaira convinced Bayden that she might have some information about…well about someone we’ve been trying to track down for a long time.” Conlan rubbed his nape. “He went with her once we landed on Cerbys. An hour later we got a vid message from her saying that she’d drugged Bayden and was going to turn him over to Mykal if…”

  She threw her hands up when he didn’t finish right away.

  “She wants you, and I’m going to give you to her,” Stryder said.

  “No, you aren’t.” Thad straightened to his full height behind Sarek.

  “Yes. I am.”

  “You’ll have to go through all of us first, bro,” Conlan said.

  “No problem.” Stryder flashed a bit of fang.

  “Stop it! Sheesh. Are you guys a bunch of teenagers or what?”

  “Pretty sure last time I checked, I was past my teenage years,” Conlan said.

  “Never mind.” She’d laugh at his obvious outrage over his lack of manliness if the situation wasn’t so dire. “Why does she want me?” She frowned.

  “In case you didn’t notice, she doesn’t like you much. You do remember that she drugged you?” Thad gave her a stare that shouted, “duh.”

  “Yeah, I did notice, but where I come from that isn’t usually a reason to kidnap someone.”

  “You aren’t on Earth any longer,” Stryder said. “Besides, Zaira’s been after Bayden’s dick for longer than any of us can remember. It’s no secret you and he have a thing for one another. Zaira’s a vengeful bitch. We’ve tolerated her because she’s damn good at obtaining intel.”

  Anxiety gnawed at her insides. If Stryder was this upset over the situation… Stryder didn’t strike her as a man who got rattled over nothing. “But if she wants Bayden so bad, why would she be willing to trade him for me?”

  “Did you miss the vengeful bitch part?” Stryder asked.

  “No.” Ellie looked around at the men as sudden silence fell over the room. “You aren’t telling me something.”

  “We don’t believe she has any intention of trading Bayden for you,” Conlan said. “Her goal is most likely getting her hands on you to have a little torture time. Because you know, that vengeful bitch thing Stryder keeps mentioning.”

  “Agreed,” Thad said.

  Ellie’s stomach was a ball of twisted knots and dancing butterflies. She’d fallen in love with Bayden, and he’d saved her and Molly’s lives. How could she not give hers in return? But what about Molly? Her chest ached at the thought of abandoning Molly, and ached even more at the thought of someone dying for her. There was no choice in the matter.

  “I’ll go.” Ellie raised her chin, squared her shoulders and leveled a stare on each of the men daring them to argue with her—which might’ve been funny if the situation were different.

  “You know Bayden will kill us all if we take her to Zaira,” Conlan said.

  “If we don’t take her, we may never get him back.” Stryder slammed his fist against the wall. “We know Zaira’s not going to go through with the trade, but she doesn’t know we know that. If we take Ellie, give Zaira the impression we’ll do the trade, we can use Ellie as a bargaining tool to gain more time to find Bayden. If we walk in there with nothing…”

  “We can’t make her do it,” Thad said. “It’s not right, man, and you know it. It goes against everything we stand for.”

  “No. Stryder’s right,” Ellie said. She turned to Sarek. “Will you swear to me on your life that you’ll take care of and protect Molly if something happens to me?”

  Sarek nodded as tears glistened in his eyes.

  “You can’t do this,” Conlan whispered. “Bayden would rather die than trade himself for you. He saved you. I’ve known Bayden since we were kids. He wouldn’t want you to die for him.”

  She ignored him and continued. “If I do this, every single one of you”—she pointed to each man, one by one—”have to give me your word that you’ll always protect Molly. That if a situation like this ever happens after I’m gone, she’ll never be sacrificed. If you can make that promise, I’ll go. She’s my responsibility, just as Bayden is yours. I can’t die knowing Molly might be in danger one day.”

  “Zaira probably won’t kill you,” Conlan sa
id. “At least not right aw—”

  “Shut up!” Thad said.

  Thad dug an elbow into Conlan’s ribs. “Ooomph.”

  “Will you tell Molly good-bye for me, Sarek? Tell her I love her, and that—” Her stomach twisted, and she swallowed around the lump in her throat. She launched herself against Sarek, soaking his chest with her tears.

  “I’ll take care of it, Ellie. Bayden wouldn’t want you to do this.” Sarek wrapped his arms around her and rubbed her back, soothing her.

  “Doesn’t matter. I’m an adult, and I can make my own decisions. I can’t let that happen to Bayden. I won’t let it happen.” She stepped back and looked at Stryder who was still glaring at her. “I love him, Stryder. I won’t let Bayden sacrifice himself for me. I don’t know what I ever did to you to make you hate me, but I’m glad you’re a loyal friend to him. I’m glad he has all of you. Don’t ever let him down. Don’t ever let each other down. Now do what you’ve wanted from the start and take me to Zaira.”

  “We need to make a plan. If I have anything to say about it, we’re all coming back…alive,” Thad said through gritted teeth.

  “Let’s do this.” Stryder’s eyes seemed to gleam with a little less hatred for her and maybe held a tiny bit of respect? Maybe, but his ferocity hadn’t dissipated any.

  * * * *

  “I thought you said she’d know if you guys came after Bayden,” Ellie whispered out the side of her mouth, barely moving her lips, to Stryder as he made a show of pushing her along.

  “That’s why the others aren’t leaving until after we near our destination. Zaira will most likely only instruct one of her four lackey spies to stay behind and watch the ship. Sarek can easily provide a distraction for the others to slip out undetected.”

  “Four? How do you know there are four?”

  He grunted. “Because I do. The rest will be hired guns. She won’t have many unskilled players on her team. She’s too damn cunning for that.”

  “Is it because of your special vampire senses?” She giggled, nervous not because he was a vampire and hated her, although that didn’t help, but because, at that moment, she might well be marching to her doom.