by Cara Bristol
“But what about the females you purchase? Don’t they talk about it?”
“They would not dare.”
“Why doesn’t Marlix just purchase a breeder from the BCF?”
“I have encouraged him to do so, but he has been resistant to the idea.”
“He is afraid of shaming himself by overindulging?” she guessed.
Urazi’s ears turned bright red.
“One last question, and then I’ll shut up. Is anal sex the norm here?”
Urazi looked surprised but not uncomfortable. “How else would you do it?”
“Well…vaginally.”
His mouth drooped in distaste. “That is for breeding. And it is not something males enjoy.”
Marlix had seemed to like it. “But what about the woman’s enjoyment?”
Urazi laughed. Then he met her gaze and sobered. “Oh. You are being serious.” He lifted a shoulder. “Nature did not endow females with the ability to find pleasure in sexual contact. In fact, it is quite painful for them, and they would avoid it if they could. This is why we do not ask.”
Outrage on so many different levels swelled, and Tara gaped. Finally she found her voice. “I enjoy sex. When it’s consensual.” She gestured between herself and Urazi. “The way we are conversing…have you ever talked with a woman like this before?”
He shook his head and shrugged. “I would have nothing to say to a female.”
“You have plenty to say to me.”
“You are Terran. You are different.”
* * * *
Entering the Bazaar, Marlix headed straight for Tara’s booth. Despite her seeming lack of concern, a sense of urgency drove him to haste. He still could not believe she bled like that every month. He shuddered.
As he wove through the crowded Bazaar, he treated those who lacked the intelligence or speed to leap out of his way to a glare and growl that would be remembered long after he’d left. He would be wise to avoid attracting attention, but Marlix did not care.
He found Ramon alone in the booth. His back to the entrance, the male straightened bolts of fabric on their stands. Though Terrans did not differentiate between levels of status or ability, Ramon typified a beta male, his demeanor passive and subservient. Replaying memories of the way he’d held Tara, the urge arose in Marlix to disassemble Ramon limb by limb with every passing second that the insignificant male breathed. But if he killed the man before he spoke to him, he would not get what Tara needed.
Marlix strode inside.
Ramon whipped around. Recognition widened his eyes. “You! Where is Tara?” he demanded with more bluster than Marlix would have predicted.
Ramon would never touch Tara again. He was not worthy. She needed a warrior to protect her, care for her. Only he would hold her, stroke her, bury himself in her receptive body to feel her clench and cry out in ecstasy. He had intended to release her at some point, but Marlix decided now he never would. He would keep her because she belonged to him. She would accept it because she had no choice.
He ignored Ramon’s question. “Tara sent me.”
“How is she? If you’ve hurt her…” Though his words withered, they hit their mark.
Doubts about Tara’s condition assailed Marlix. She hadn’t acted injured. In fact, she had seemed healthy, yet the blood… His manhood was proportionate to his size, and she had been so tight. Despite her protests to the contrary, how could he not have hurt her? No one bled as a matter of course. That did not make sense. The two races couldn’t be that different.
He should allow her to rejoin her people before he damaged her further.
At the mere contemplation of separation, bleakness such as he’d never experienced descended, and he knew he could not do it. He would keep her but control himself.
Monto. It would be a short matter of time before he broke that vow. “I have a missive from Tara.” He unclipped his PCD, called up her message, and handed it to Ramon.
The male glanced at Marlix, then bent his head over the screen. Marlix spoke only a smattering of Terran and could not read it at all, but still it seemed as though Ramon was taking a long time to peruse what had appeared to be a brief communique. Finally, Ramon raised his head. A small muscle alongside his left eye twitched, and Marlix grew suspicious.
Ramon handed back the PCD. “I will get you what she needs.”
“What does the note say?” he demanded.
Ramon blinked. “She says she is all right, and I should give you her blue bag. Excuse me while I get it.” He disappeared behind the curtained area. When he emerged, he swung an oblong satchel. “Will this be all?” he asked. An inflection in his tone urged Marlix to leave.
Why was he so antsy? Marlix plopped the bag on the counter to verify he’d received the correct items and to see what else might be inside. He pulled out a sealed elasticene package bearing a picture of a smiling woman sniffing a flower. He tore it open and found items matching Tara’s description of menstru-cups. While Ramon fidgeted, Marlix examined the bag’s other contents. Oddities all, including some slinky fabric remnants that could not have possessed any utilitarian function. He dangled one on his finger. “What is this?”
Ramon scowled. “Panties. Since they’re in Tara’s bag, I’d assume they’re hers.”
“Panties?”
“Underwear!” he snapped. “They are worn beneath clothing.”
Marlix caressed the filmy fabric, then squeezed his fist around it. So unsubstantial, it disappeared inside his closed hand. Tara wore this? When he pictured how it would fit, how she would look, the image had an immediate hardening effect on his manhood. He brought the fabric to his nose and sniffed. Flowery and warm, like Tara herself.
“Jesus, man.” Ramon jerked his head to glance out the booth before training a censuring gaze on Marlix. “Are you a perv or what? You have an underwear fetish?”
“I do not know those words: perv, fetish,” he said but gleaned from Ramon’s tone his behavior was inappropriate, so he dropped the panties into the bag and pulled the little tab to close it. He had no other business with Ramon, so he slung the satchel over his shoulder by a very handy strap and exited the booth.
He could feel the male watching him.
Tara needed her stuff, and Marlix had intended to proceed home, but an itch had lodged under his skin. Ramon clearly couldn’t wait for him to leave the booth. While his mien unnerved people, he doubted that that had caused Ramon’s agitation. Near the exit, Marlix pivoted and retraced his steps. When he entered the aisle of Tara’s booth, he spied Ramon shuttering the stall.
In the middle of the business day?
Marlix ducked out of sight and peered around the corner. Ramon finished locking up and then scurried away. Marlix followed at a safe distance, hoping the male would not check behind him. He needn’t have worried. Ramon never looked. Instead, he hurried through the Bazaar with an almost single-minded focus. Then he ran into the Terran Embassy office, located for convenience at the Bazaar.
Marlix swore. How foolish he’d been. How trusting. He reversed direction. As he passed a booth selling antique books, he noticed the sole occupant, the shopkeeper’s assistant, was beta. He marched into the stall.
“You read Terran?” he barked.
The beta’s eyes rounded. “C-commander?”
“Do. You. Read. Terran?” Could he not understand a simple question?
“S-Some.”
Marlix thrust his PCD at the male. “What does this say?”
The man glanced at it, and his face drained of color. “I-I’m not good at all their languages, Commander.”
Marlix slammed his fist on the counter. “Read it to me!”
The beta darted his gaze to the entrance as if searching for escape. He wet his lips. “It-It says, ‘I am OK, but I’m being held captive b-b-by Alpha Commander Marlix at his domicile. Please give him my blue bag from the stockroom. After he leaves, contact the Terran Embassy and report what has happened.’”
Chapter Nine
She and Urazi had finished an enjoyable lunch when his PCD had beeped. After he had answered it, he’d risen, cleared away the lunch dishes posthaste, and disappeared. A stone-faced Marlix stormed in several minutes later. It didn’t take a Parseon brain surgeon to figure out the shit had hit the fan. She’d done the right thing. She was Terran. An independent woman. His equal. Of course she wanted to be rescued. Marlix had shoved her blue bag into her arms, stared at a point over her head, and informed her she had three minutes to do what she needed to do, then don the breeder uniform he’d also thrust at her and report to the portal chamber.
Not a request but an order. Guilty remorse receded under fury, and she’d stomped to a bathing chamber. She took care of business in less than a minute, propped a hip against the basin, and hunkered down to tarry all day. Report, my ass, she’d fumed. She refused to report anywhere.
But at what must have been one second after three minutes, he’d burst into the room. It only took one glimpse of his furious face before she quickly donned the drab beige breeder shift. He hauled her to the foyer, where Urazi had waited with a couple of packed bags. In silence they’d ridden the elevator to the surface, and Marlix hustled her to the tram.
He was moving her to prevent her rescue.
Minutes later, they disembarked the tram and emerged in the countryside—how far from his abode in his province, she could not ascertain. She could have been ten kilometers away, a hundred, or one thousand. She and Marlix had remained under the broad canopy of a tree while Urazi hiked to a small village visible in the distance. Marlix said not a word but planted his feet wide apart and stared at the horizon. She leaned against the trunk and picked at her cuticles, hoping her ersatz nonchalance hid her nervousness and conflicted emotions.
In a plume of dust, Urazi drove up with a conveyance pulled by two huge beasts. She eyed their transport, pressed her lips together, and glared at Marlix. “Where are we going?”
“To the last place anyone would search.”
“Where is that?” She willed him to look at her. He did then, and she regretted fulfillment of her wish, because beneath his anger, she spied betrayal and hurt.
“You will ride in the back.” He gestured to the wagon’s bed, then flipped up a hood attached to his uniform to conceal his hair, forehead, and the sides of his face. Tara did a double take. She’d been too upset to notice, but it dawned now that he and Urazi had changed clothing. Both of them now wore light alpha gray. Urazi had shorn his chin-length hair to the shorter style adopted by alphas. Both had exchanged their insignia for generic alpha rings. In disguise, Urazi had moved up a notch in status, while Marlix had taken a huge demotion. That alone would cloak his identity. No one would imagine an Alpha would pretend to be of a lower rank.
“My people, my government will find me.” She mustered as much confidence as she could. “You only delay the inevitable.”
He flicked a scathing glance in her direction. “Do you think any government will waste its resources and risk jeopardizing an intergalactic treaty for a single individual?”
“Then why bother with the disguises? Why move me?”
“I am Alpha. I win. Always. You would be prudent to remember that.”
Tara tossed her head at his arrogance and marched to the rear of the conveyance. She scrambled aboard without assistance, neither male showing the slightest inclination to help her. “It stinks back here.” She wrinkled her nose, imagining all manner of fowl and ovine mammal had been transported. Livestock. Was that how he thought of her? If so, why go to so much trouble?
They bounced along the hard-packed but rutted road for what seemed like hours, and then Marlix gestured for Urazi to pull over. In the distance, smoke drifted from the home fires of another village.
Marlix leaped from the conveyance and came around to the back. “You will ride up front now.”
“And to what do I owe this honor?” Every muscle ached from the jarring ride.
“You will hold your sarcastic tongue,” he ordered, and their gazes battled in a test of wills. She glared, but he remained expressionless, unmoved. She jumped from the conveyance and would have fallen in the dirt, except, with lightning reflexes, Marlix grabbed her arm. He hauled her near, bent his head, and brought his lips to her ear. “Do not assume your rebellion will go unchastised,” he said. His grip tightened around her arm. “We will join the village ahead. Do not worsen your situation by calling for help. Any disobedience will earn immediate and harsh punishment.”
Their passionate encounter, his unexpected indulgence, had lulled her into a false sense of security, and she’d forgotten she dealt with an Alpha of Parseon. The fear she’d thought had been put to rest reawakened. Marshalling all her bravado, she met his gaze. Their breaths mingled. “Punish me how?” She cursed the quaver in her voice.
He released her with a controlled shove. “You try my patience. Get on the conveyance.”
Tara stumbled to the front. With her legs trembling, it took several hops to seat herself. Urazi scooted over, and Marlix bounded aboard, squishing her between the two of them. Urazi sat, stiff as a wooden plank, but it was nothing compared to Marlix. The man had transformed to stone.
Urazi snapped the reins, and the wagon jolted forward. In silence they rolled toward the village. Though she attempted to maintain a rigid posture and avoid touching either male, the potholes tossed her against Marlix. He did not react or even show he noticed.
Her throat convulsed with misery. Guilt and remorse, now mixed with dread of what he would do to her once they arrived at their destination, caused her stomach to churn. She almost wished she could hasten her punishment to relieve the heavy tension and reinforce in her mind she was the wronged party. Any hostage with any gumption would attempt to escape! How could he blame her for that?
Tara dug her fingers into her knees and focused on the stone towers rising in the distance.
They drew near the village, and Marlix adjusted his hood to better shield his forehead and slumped to appear smaller. At the gated entrance, two males emerged from a guard tower and raised crossbows.
“Halt! Who goes there?” one of them demanded.
“I am Urazi. My brother and I and his female seek political asylum.”
Brother? Political asylum? She didn’t know what surprised her more. The story they’d concocted or that Urazi was the one to tell it.
The guards circled the conveyance. One of them riveted on Tara. “Why is her hair pink?”
Yeah, Tara thought. Explain that.
This time Marlix answered. “Genetic mutation caused by the Terran gene splicing after the Epic Radiation Flare.”
Gene splicing, really? Who would buy such a cockamamie story?
Marlix continued: “She is part of the reason we seek refuge. Her anomaly has made her a target and jeopardized her life.”
“And her arm?” The guard stared at the flowers winding around her limb.
“Her alpha loaned her to a Terran, who marked her.”
Pity replaced suspicion on the guard’s face. “Tragic.” He shook his head. He believed him! Tara gaped.
“You are magnanimous to adopt such a burden,” the guard said to Marlix.
Marlix was an effing humanitarian.
In a genial tone now, the guard said, “We do not recognize rank here. You must remove your insignia.”
Marlix and Urazi unclipped the alpha rings and handed them over.
The guard stepped aside and gestured for them to proceed through the gates. “Welcome to the Enclave.”
* * * *
Marlix shut the hut door and exhaled his relief. The success of his makeshift plan had been far from assured. Had the guards recognized him or had Tara indicated she had not come on her own volition, they would have been denied entry. What her government might or might not do did not worry him.
They could search, but they would be stymied and would not find her. If they exacted diplomatic sanctions and ended the treaty, well, that would benefit Parseon.
However, potential retaliation by Commander Dak concerned him. Tara, while not a citizen, was under Dak’s protection, and he would not allow another Commander to lay claim to anything or anybody within his province that would jeopardize his pet project—the trade venture with Terra. Marlix did not doubt that seconds after Ramon had notified the Terran Embassy, Dak had been informed as well. While the embassy did not have the wherewithal to find her, Dak did.
So Marlix had hidden Tara right under Dak’s own nose—in the Enclave. No one would search for them here after the way he had denounced it. The only reason he would set foot near the Enclave would be to raze it, so anyone would surmise.
Like he’d warned Tara, he would win. At any cost. He would not permit a mere female to thwart his desires. Desire. Monto. Even though she had betrayed him, his continuing need paralleled his anger. His lust had not abated but had increased since he’d used her. Or she had used you. He had lain back and let her have her way. In retrospect, he realized he’d conceded too much control and allowed her to seduce him into performing the very acts Protocol deemed the most heinous. With a female not of his race, he had reveled in intercourse reserved for breeding purposes.
He could not have committed a more serious crime.
But the ecstasy! Her sheath had contracted around him, her body had shuddered. Her cries had been of rapture, not pain. She’d found her own perverse pleasure in their wicked transgressions. She had led him astray, she with her pink hair, her swaying hips, her bouncing breasts, her unusual eyes, her amusing brashness.
Not so humorous now. She had tricked him.
He had cared for her, tended to her wounds, granted her more leniencies and favor than he’d bestowed upon any female, and she’d betrayed him. Lured him into letting down his guard. Her sole intention had been to escape. She did not want him.
But he still wanted her, and he would not be denied.
Perhaps he should toss her aside, but the strength of his lust worried him. What if his desire did not abate? No, he’d decided the appropriate recourse would be an exercise in satiation. As a young alpha with a penchant for sweets, he’d sneaked into his sire’s food preparation room and eaten an entire sweetcake his sire’s beta had baked. The overload of sweetness had made him ill, and when the beta reported his mischief, his sire had forced Marlix to consume a second and a third sweetcake. And then whipped him.
