Jailed

by Daniella Wright

  Commander Zazuna stops smiling and levels his gaze at Xanrun. “We cannot allow her to live, Xanrun. All humans need to perish, you know that.” He glances at me and shakes his head. “Don’t tell me you have grown feelings for it?”

  Fuck you very much, I say in my head, nearly making Xanrun laugh, but he manages to keep his composure.

  “Of course not.”

  “Then kill it.” Commander Zazuna hands his gun over to Xanrun and stands back. “And don’t try anything funny, Xanrun. I have both Faza’s and Torina’s guns trained on you and the girl, so if you try anything, you will die.”

  Xanrun grabs the gun and points it at me, his eyes blank and uncaring. “With pleasure, Commander.”

  “Xanrun.” I whisper, now truly scared.

  “On three, I need you to throw your body towards the ground and stay down until it’s safe to sit back up. Understood, Angel?” I incline my head and close my eyes, allowing his gentle voice to calm me down, and prepare to do what he said. “One,” he takes the safety off the gun…nice to know the Commander had me at gunpoint, but didn’t have the safety off. God, I’m gullible. “Two,” he takes a step to his left, so he’s in the line of sight with the scariest man in the room. “Three!”

  It all happens to quick.

  I throw myself flat against the floor and gunshots ring around the room. I hear bodies begin falling on the floor and when it grows silent, I peek up and take in my surroundings.

  Commander Zazuna is lying on the floor, his face expressionless as he stares blankly at me, a single bullet hole in his head. I yell in terror and move quickly away from his body. I look up and see the bigger Torian, the one that truly terrified me, and he too has a bullet hole in his head and a couple in his chest.

  “Xanrun?” I ask, looking around frantically. When my eyes land on him I shake my head and get off the ground, running to him. “Is this your only wound?” I ask, eyeing the bullet shot in his left arm.

  He hisses when he tries to move his arm and nods. “Yeah, that’s the only one.”

  “You’re lucky I managed to kill the commander before he pulled out his other gun, Xanrun.” The lanky man says, holstering his gun. He smiles at me and waves. “Sorry I scared you. I had to keep up appearances to make Xanrun and you think I was on the Commanders side.”

  “But…why?” Xanrun asks, puzzled. “I’ve always thought you hated humans and wanted to destroy this planet. You didn’t seem to have a problem walking away from me when I was dying on the floor, begging for help.” The man closes his eyes, guilt seeming to consume him. “What changed, Faza?”

  “I wanted to help you, Xanrun, but if I stepped out of line and tried to help you, the commander would have killed me. I couldn’t let that happen to me…not when I had someone depending on me to return home.” He sighs and rubs the back of his neck. “I fell for a human, like you did, but this human is part of the Resistance. I only continued following the commander around for information, but when he caught your energy signature, I knew I couldn’t keep pretending and let you die. And then I saw her,” he nods to me and smirks. “And I knew she was your mate. You both look at each other like my Ginny and I do.”

  “So…you’re one of the good guys?” I ask.

  He nods. “I am. And I know you have a good thing going on, but if you’re interested, the Resistance is always looking for new recruits. I can get you in, no problem, and you’ll be under our protection. Together, we can stop the destruction of this planet and live in peace with the humans.”

  Xanrun and I look at each other, a million thoughts crossing through our mind, and we both nod to Faza. “We’ll think about it, brother.”

  Faze smiles and nods his head. “When you’re ready to join us, just follow my energy signature. It’ll lead you right to our headquarters. Until then, brother.” He nods to Xanrun and then turns his gaze to mine. “It was nice meeting you…”

  “Macie.” I say at the same time Xanrun says, “Angel.”

  Faza smirks and nods his head. “Until then, Angel.”

  He then walks out of the clinic and is gone within moments. I go on autopilot and tend to Xanrun’s wounds, and when he’s all cleaned up and we’re both still in shock and are exhausted, we head back to the underground shelter and get into bed together. We don’t do anything physical that night, for obvious reasons, but we do talk about what happened. After that, we talk about joining the resistance. Xanrun doesn’t want me joining with him, but I refuse to let him go alone when it’s my planet at stake, and in the end, we decide to call it a night and talk more about it over the next few days.

  We quickly fall asleep, and although I’m still shaken about what happened, I feel safe and loved in the arms of Xanrun.

  My warrior.

  My savior.

  My love.

  Epilogue

  (Xanrun)

  One month later…

  “I love you, Xanrun.” My Angel’s voice whispers to me and I feel her grab my aching morning wood. I feel her breath on my manhood and when she grasps it firmly, I moan in pleasure. Man, this is a fucking amazing dream. “I’m going to take care of you, my love. You’re all hard and aching for me, but I know what will make you feel better. Just relax and enjoy. This will be our last adventure on this bed.”

  Then the dream Angel’s lips wrap around my swollen member and she proceeds to suck me off, making sure one hand holds me firmly at the base, while the other jerks off the length that she doesn’t take into her month. The combination of her lips around me while her hand rubs me is driving me wild, and yet, I hope it never ends.

  “You’re close.” My Angel gasps, feeling me growing harder and harder inside of her mouth, as my body grows tenser and tenser. “That’s it baby, come in my mouth. I can take whatever you give me.”

  I awake with a start as my body tenses up and my aching shaft explodes. My stiff shaft is throbbing in the most pleasurable way imaginable and my back is arched off the bed in ecstasy. When I come down from one of the most mind-blowing orgasms, I glance underneath the covers and see my Angel licking my release off her lips.

  “Good morning.” She whispers out, smiling at me.

  I laugh. “That was a hell of a good morning. To what do I own this amazing wake-up call?” My Angel climbs up the bed and lays down on my body, making sure her head rests on my chest. I play with her hair and she sighs, relaxing in my arms. Something is bothering her, I can tell. “What’s wrong, Angel?”

  She glances up at me, until our eyes meet, and she frowns. “This is going to be out last morning waking up in this bed, Xanrun.” She utters out in sadness. We both made the decision to join the Resistance. We need to if we want to destroy the corrupt Torians left on the planet and bring back order to planet Earth. It won’t be easy, but it’s what we want to do. What we need to do if we ever want to feel safe in this world. “I know it’s silly to be upset over that small fact, but this shelter has been our home for a several months now and it feels safe. It feels like home.”

  I nod my head in understanding. “I feel the same way, Angel. You don’t sound silly at all.” I kiss the top of her head and sigh. “This is where we met. Where we fell in love. But,” I smile. “That’s the great thing about loving you, Angel. No matter where we go, where we live, or what our circumstances are, you’ll always be my home. Where I feel most safe and happy is with you. So, yeah, I’m going to miss this place and all the memories we made here, but as long as I have you by my side, loving me, I know we’ll be okay.”

  “I’m worried about what the outside world holds for us, and our future, Xanrun.” Macie sits up and climbs off of me to sit at the edge of the bed. I follow her lead and wait for her to form her thoughts into words. “Do you think we can really put a stop to your people, Xanrun?” she glances up at me, eyes troubled and unsure. “I know that your commander said the Resistance has the power to stop your people, but what if we join them and we fail? It’ll be the end of us and Earth.”

  I pull her onto my
lap and hold my mate tight. “Then we go down fighting, Angel. Do you honestly want to live in this shelter for the rest of your life? Especially now that you know your brother is out there, fighting for your planet?” she hesitates, but shakes her head no. “It’s better to fight for what you believe in, then to play it safe and not truly live at all. I want to give you the world, Angel, and in order to do that; I need to right the wrong both our planets have done. You,” I pause and swallow past the lump in my throat. “You don’t have to come with me, Angel. You can stay here and wait for me to return to you. I won’t judge you if you stayed. I rather you stay here, where it’s safe, and wait for me.”

  Just as I thought she would, my Angel glares at me and shakes her head. “I’m not letting you do this by yourself, Xanrun. We’re a team now and we’re stronger together than we are apart. I refuse to stay here and wallow in fear. I want to fight.” She realizes her words and narrows her eyes at me. “You’re a clever thing, aren’t you?”

  I smirk and kiss her forehead. “I am, aren’t I?”

  She rolls her eyes, but kisses me back. “You are, but you’re also a pain in my ass.” She chuckles and gets off my lap. “Let’s finish packing up and get ready for our new adventure.” She smiles, eyes determined. “We have a planet to save.”

  Angel and I quickly change into our clothes and grab our small bags that have some medical supplies and food for our journey. We climb up the ladder, leave the clinic, and stand just outside the clinic and take in all the destruction around us.

  I grab Macie’s hand in mine and she grips my hand tightly. “Ready to take back your planet?”

  My Angel nods. “I’m ready to take back our planet.”

  Our planet?

  I love the ring to that.

  For wherever I am, Macie is my home.

  And together, we will bring back peace and restore planet Earth.

  Or die trying.

  THE END

  ~*~

  Forbidden Beast

  ~ Bonus Story ~

  A Dragon Shifter Romantic Thriller

  Samantha Hunter is a new resident at the Emergency Room at Linda Vista Hospital. She meets visiting doctor, Mark Johnson, and they hit it off.

  Recently, there has been a rise in the number of patients suffering from significant and inexplicable blood loss—where the only visible wound is two tiny pin pricks—like a bite. Ignoring Mark’s remarkably cold hands and strange demeanor, she agrees to go out with him. That same night, Samantha meets a strange man in the blood bank…he claims to know the reason for the string of patients with the same condition…vampires. Jared Hamilton is hunting a rogue vampire. Jared himself is a monster, of an ancient and almost extinct race. He finds himself falling for Samantha, seeing a future with her…so long as they can find a way to stop the rogue vampire before he kills both of them.

  * * *

  Chapter One

  I heard the code called over the intercom, and I rushed down the hallway toward the exam room that had been called. I left my coffee, abandoned by the machine. I was fighting exhaustion; every muscle in my body was screaming for sleep. It was my second week as a resident in the Emergency Room at Linda Vista Hospital. Upon entering the room, I beheld the patient, a young male in his late twenties, who was convulsing on the table.

  “Starting CPR,” I yelled as I placed my hands above the patient’s sternum, beginning to pump, forcing his heart to continue to move blood through his body. My arms strained as I began to coax his heart to continue pumping. This was maybe the fifth round of frantic CPR that I had done this shift, and my arm muscles were aching from the buildup of lactic acid. One of the nurses rushed in, a clipboard in her hands. She was a blonde woman in her late forties, frown lines evident on her face, as though she had seen too many bad things in her life.

  “Doctor,” she said, looking at me. It still hadn’t sunk in that that was now me. “Blood testing on this patient has come back from the lab.” She was frowning, making the lines on her face deeper and more pronounced.

  “And?” I asked, my breathing labored as I continued to pump. A strand of my own hair had become stuck to my forehead, but I couldn’t risk stopping the CPR to push it away.

  “It reports a low red blood cell count.”

  “Anemia,” I commented in disbelief. “We’re going to have to transfuse, ASAP. Get me some O-neg.” She nodded, rushing off to get it from the Emergency Room’s supply. I frowned, continuing CPR, and looking at another nurse.

  “We’ll need to defib to get his heart back on line.” She nodded, and went to get the defibrillator unit. This was the third case in the past week where the patient suffered from pronounced anemia that had nothing to do with the accident that had brought the patient into the ER, initially. I looked down at the patient. His skin was pale, bluish in the overhead lighting. His eyes were slightly open, showing only the whites. He had come in after falling while skateboarding; he had a concussion but no open or bleeding wounds on his head. I looked around his body as I worked; there were no signs of any major bleeding. His clothing was completely clean of any bloodstains; if he was suffering from massive blood loss, he should be covered in it. It just didn’t make any sense.

  The first nurse ran in carrying several dark red bags of O-negative blood. She immediately hooked one up to an IV, sticking the needle carefully into the patient’s arm. She placed a small rectangle of tape over the needle to hold it in place. Then, she hung the bag on the hooked pole beside the ER bed, watching as blood began to transfuse into the patient’s arm.

  The other nurse wheeled the cart with a defibrillator machine into the room. We needed to shock his heart back into acting on its own so that I could stop forcing it to pump with my flagging arms. She put gel on the paddles, and I knocked them together, gathering the shock.

  “Ready,” I said, placing them on the patient’s chest. A shock went through the paddles, and the patient’s body arched on the table. We all waited in silence, listening and watching the heart monitor as it beeped. It was faint. Too faint.

  “One more time,” I said, placing the paddles together before then placing them on the patient’s chest. “Go.” The patient convulsed with the shock, and I looked at the heart monitor, seeing that the heart was beginning to come back online, tiny green mountains on the background of black, the numbers starting to climb as his blood pressure rose to a normal rate. I sighed in relief.

  Handing the paddles to a nurse, I stood back, wiping sweat from my forehead and watching the patient’s vitals on the screen. As the blood entered his system, they began to further normalize.

  As soon as the alarm was beeping slowly and normally, I watched the patient’s heart worked on its own for a little while. I looked around at the other nurses and residents who had crowded into the room. In the Emergency Room, whenever a code is called, anyone who is free in the area is required to answer. You never know how many hands you will need in order to get the heart started again, put the guts back in, or stop the bleeding.

  “Good job, everyone,” I said. We all began to disperse, some people checking patients, some going to the break room to get some shut eye, and others to get some type of nourishment. So far, residency had been one long attempt to keep myself functional, or so it seemed. This was when he walked up to me.

  “Excellent technique, doctor,” he said. He was dangerously good-looking: perfectly shaped facial features, deep blue eyes, and a smile that lit up his entire face. If I knew my body structures, what was hidden beneath the scrubs was an even better sight—a definite gym body, for sure. I needed to stay far away because this one was trouble, and he knew it. You could almost smell the confidence brimming from him. It smelled like expensive cologne—the good stuff that makes you want to devour the man.

  “Thank you,” I said, pleased to have been noticed. I removed my latex gloves, tossing them into the trash.

  “Mark Johnson,” he said, holding out his hand, which I made sure to shake firmly. My father had taught me at a yo
ung age that in order to impress people, you had to shake their hands firmly and confidently.

  “Samantha Hunter,” I replied, keeping my tone polite but distant. I did not want to give him the impression that I wanted or craved this attention. I had, only recently, gotten out of yet another in a string of catastrophically bad relationships. I couldn’t tell if it was my tendency towards social awkwardness that made my choice in romantic partners so poor, or if I was cursed with some damn awful luck.

  “I’m visiting from St. Elizabeth’s,” he said, mentioning a hospital that was located out in the suburbs.

  “Ah, welcome,” I replied coolly, heading to retrieve my abandoned coffee from the machine. He walked along beside me, his hands in his pockets, and his stride easily matching my own. I arrived to find my Styrofoam cup still on the counter beside the coffee machine. I picked it up and took a sip of the espresso. Cringing, I realized that it had grown cold while I had been gone.

  “Ugh. Awful stuff in this machine,” I cautioned him, raising my eyebrows.

  “It is pretty standard fare for Emergency Rooms,” he said. “So, what was wrong with the patient?”

  “It’s been the third case of severe anemia that I have seen in the past week,” I went on, since he seemed like he wasn’t going anywhere. “It seems…uncommon. Especially since the patient seemed to lack any sign of major bleeding. I mean, he was here to be treated for a concussion.”

  “No bleeding anywhere?”

  “Some minor cuts, but that’s about it.” He nodded, crossing his arms and rubbing his clean-shaven chin with one of his large, masculine hands. His nails, I saw, were trimmed immaculately; typical for a doctor.

  “Anemia itself is fairly common,” he replied, cocking his head to the side as though he were studying me. “It’s related, often, to diet, and environmental factors. Sometimes, even genetic. It can seem like these things can come in waves…it doesn’t mean that it is, statistically speaking, significant.”