Wulf and the Bounty Hunter

by Gail Koger

  I had wanted to keep my telekinetic powers a secret, but if I didn’t step up and do the right thing, we would all be very dead. “How do you think the Coletti will react when I reveal my little secret?”

  “Maybe they won’t notice,” Ziyad whispered.

  “Oh, they’ll notice.” I took a deep breath and summoned every bit of power I had. Thank the Goddess, the energy signature of a Shivet warhead was unique.

  A cold thread of fear snaked up my spine as I mentally surveyed the enemy battle cruiser. In a missile tube sat death. What made the warhead so deadly was the incendiary chemical called Najea. Once exposed to the air inside the ship, it caused a massive explosion. I linked with Wulf. “Jarl is preparing to launch a Shivet rocket.”

  His rage was a living thing. “We know.”

  “Have any defense against it?”

  “No.”

  “Can you outrun the battle cruiser?”

  “Coletti never run,” Wulf snarled.

  Testosterone was the bane of the universe.

  Fire ants stormed through my head. Jarl had launched the warhead. I dropped my shields and searched for the missile. A pulse of energy caught my attention. There! I threw all my telekinetic power at the warhead. Wham! It crashed into the missile. I kept hitting the warhead over and over again until it finally slowed.

  Wulf appeared in front of our cell and turned off the barrier. “I’m taking you to the life pods.”

  I ignored him and pushed at the warhead with everything I had. Turn. Come on. Turn.

  He shook me. “Did you hear me?”

  “If you don’t want to die, leave her alone.” Ziyad hissed angrily and punched him in the chest.

  Wulf staggered back a step. “You stay, you die.” His eyes widened when he sensed what I was doing. “You can stop it?”

  “If I get more power,” I gritted out, and just like that Wulf, Voss, and Zarek gave me all the juice I needed. I threw our combined psychic superpower at the warhead. The missile trajectory altered until it was heading right back at Jarl’s ship.

  “I really hope Jarl’s shields are down.”

  “They are,” Wulf gloated, holding out his communication bracelet.

  On the vid screen I watched as the battle cruiser vanished in a nimbus of white-hot gases and debris.

  Utter relief rolled over me. At long last the Amarok brothers’ reign of terror was over.

  My brothers’ cheers were deafening.

  Ziyad spun me in a dizzy circle. “You did it. You did it!”

  “You doubted me?”

  Wulf grabbed me away from Ziyad and planted a joyous kiss on my mouth. “The Overlord is very pleased.”

  “Yay?”

  “You’re a Siren.” Wulf hugged me tightly. “A very strong one.”

  That was a good thing? “What’s a Siren?”

  “A Siren is a powerful psychic with multiple talents. Like you. You can sense danger from a great distance. You are telekinetic, you have healing powers, and I am sure you have other gifts you haven’t shared with us yet,” Wulf answered with a pointed look.

  If he thought I was going to divulge all my secrets, he was nuts. “All psychics on Earth are like me?”

  “No. Some only have one ability. There are critter wranglers. They have power over insects, snakes, birds, and animals. Some are trackers who can locate their prey anywhere in the galaxy. Some are healers, and there are a few who can control minds.”

  “Which makes me special?”

  “Very much so.” He kissed me again. His lips were firm, warm, and talented. I could get used to them.

  “No!” Ziyad howled. “You have no right to touch my friend.”

  “She’s my mate,” Wulf snapped.

  She gave him a saw-toothed smile. “Not yet.”

  Not ever, I added silently. I was tired of males screwing up my life. With our stealth fighter and the two million credits, we could do whatever we wanted, whenever we wanted.

  “The Overlord will grant you a boon for saving the warbird,” Wulf pronounced magnanimously.

  He acted like I had just been given the greatest gift of all time. Maybe I had underestimated Zarek. “Our freedom?”

  “No. Sirens are highly prized.” Wulf‘s thumb caressed my neck. “Don’t worry. I will keep you safe.”

  Had it slipped his tiny little mind that I had just saved his ass? I knocked his hand away. “I can take of myself.”

  “Not against a seasoned warrior.”

  Projecting an aura of confidence, I replied, “With my bionics and rather awesome psychic abilities, I can defeat any warrior.”

  Every single one of my ungrateful brothers broke into laughter.

  Okay, I was exaggerating a bit.

  Wulf thought it was pretty funny too. “I’m a hunter. You could never defeat me, Yakira.”

  “Wanna bet?” I pulled back my bionic right arm and let him have it right in the kisser. His head snapped back, and he hit the floor hard.

  Ziyad stared down at his unmoving form. “Did you kill him?”

  “No.”

  “Can I eat him?”

  “No!”

  “Get his laser pistol,” Colburn yelled.

  Wulf erupted to his feet. “You haven’t defeated me.”

  I shook my head in disbelief. “If I was the enemy, you would be dead.”

  “Then I could eat you,” Ziyad crowed.

  Wulf fingered the butt of his laser pistol.

  “Don’t even think it. She’s family.”

  “Regrettably.” Wulf touched his mouth gingerly. “Nice punch.”

  “Thank you.”

  “But a punch won’t save you, and you don’t have a killer’s instinct. A warrior would have you in chains in a very short time.”

  “I don’t have a killer’s instinct? Tell that to the Tai-Kok,” I retorted.

  Loki nodded. “The Tai-Kok fear her. They call her the Reaper.”

  “With good reason. Anytime Yakira sees a Tai-Kok, she goes nuts.” There was a humorous edge to Ivar’s voice.

  Colburn shuddered dramatically. “It gets really messy.”

  “They are monsters. I’ll kill as many as I can.” Try having one of them munch on you and see how forgiving you are, and I wasn’t about to bring up how many Rodan we had exterminated.

  A muscle in Wulf’s jaw jerked. “You’ve killed, what? One or two?”

  “We’ve destroyed over three thousand of the vermin.” Ziyad’s tentacles wiggled happily.

  I choked back a laugh. She was such a good liar.

  Wulf’s eyebrows shot up. “You two have killed three thousand Tai-Kok?”

  “Give or take. It’s hard to keep track,” was my blunt reply.

  “They’re not very tasty,” Ziyad confided.

  “So you see, I don’t need a bodyguard.”

  “No, you need a keeper.” Wulf whirled on my brothers. “Why didn’t you stop her?”

  “We have tried, but when Yakira decides to do something, it’s hard to stop her.” Colburn huffed.

  The ships alarm began to wail, and a mechanical voice announced, “Hull breach on deck three. Hull breach on deck three.”

  “I’ll be back.” Wulf engaged the energy barrier and teleported away.

  Chapter Five

  A satisfied smile curved my mouth. Once I had shot out the control panel for our cell, the containment field for the entire detention area went down. Now I watched Ziyad do her magic and summon our cloaked ship. The Coletti had underestimated us. “They’re going to regret not taking our communications bracelets.”

  “Big-time. Without them, the ship wouldn’t have been able to track us.”

  “High five,” Ziyad called, holding up her hand.

  She had picked this one up from old Earth vids. I smacked my right hand against hers. “We rule.”

  Loki asked querulously, “Gonna let us in on the plan?”

  “Nope. Wouldn’t want to ruin the surprise.”

  Ziyad tapped her communica
tions bracelet. A glittering blue transport beam engulfed us. We appeared on our transporter platform. I raced over to the console, started the timer, and put my Visio crystal bracelet back on. “Sixty seconds before the Coletti realize we’re missing.”

  “Piece of pie.” Ziyad zoomed off to the bridge.

  I quickly transported my family aboard our ship and mentally linked with Ziyad. “I’ve got them. Get us out of here.”

  “Aye, aye, Captain.”

  “What are you wearing?” My father’s bellow echoed around the chamber.

  I rolled my eyes. “You’ve been in enough bars. Figure it out.”

  “Are you sassing me?”

  “Yeah, I am. I’m sick to death of bailing the lot of you out of jail.”

  Ivar butted in. “Whose ship is this?”

  “Ziyad’s and mine.”

  “Yours?” My father looked around the transporter room with avarice in his eyes.

  Colburn wanted to know. “Did you buy it with the bounty credits?”

  “No, and before you ask, none of you are getting one single credit.”

  “What?” My father advanced on me furiously. “I kept you from being eaten by the Tai-Kok. You owe me.”

  Pain wrapped around my heart. “I love you too, Father.”

  His face flushed and he shifted nervously.

  When had Father turned into this awful stranger?

  Colburn stepped in front of him. “How many times has Yakira rescued you from the loan sharks?”

  Father hunched his shoulders. “A few times.”

  A few? Boy, was he in denial.

  Loki looked around in shock. “Holy Goddess, Yakira. This is the experimental stealth fighter that Adal the master thief took from the Tai-Kok a year ago! You pulled off the theft of the millennium by hijacking the ship.” Loki hooted, doing the Bjarke warrior’s victory dance.

  I laughed. The moves were similar to karate kicks and punches with a little Earth hip-hop thrown in. “We retrieved it during a Tai-Kok attack. Adal was fatally wounded and didn’t need it anymore.”

  Ivar walked up and gave me a gentle hug. “Spreading your wings?”

  “We are. Uncle Babba got your ship out of impound and will meet you at the Sipin spaceport.”

  “No,” my father blustered. “If we leave, the Coletti will take the fighter from you. Let me contact Dingle.”

  A weary sigh escaped me. “You aren’t using our ship to settle your gambling debts.”

  “You’re an ungrateful whore.” Father’s fist shot out.

  I blocked the blow and shoved him back. “How many times did you hire out your own sons as mercenaries to pay off your gambling debts?”

  A flicker of remorse flashed in Father’s eyes. “They are dutiful sons.”

  I smacked him on the chest. “How many times?”

  Father shrugged dismissively. “What does it matter?”

  “Twenty-five!” I shouted. “Twenty-five times they could have died on some remote battlefield. Would you have mourned their loss or just kept on gambling? When everything is gone, what then?”

  “You. I will sell you to Dingle and live as I was meant to live,” Father raged.

  Horror, revulsion, and betrayal hit me like a war hammer. Dingle was a Yagga. A fat, hairy humanoid with horns and three penises. Sex with him was a death sentence. He secreted a substance that caused fatal convulsions in human females. I felt tears running down my cheeks. Had the darkness inside my father finally won? “Does my life mean nothing to you?”

  “If I don’t pay the credits back, I die,” Father snarled defiantly.

  “Yet it’s okay if I die in your place? Isn’t that a little cowardly?”

  “I am not a coward. I’m the one who boarded that Tai-Kok ship and freed you. I gave you back your life, and now, as is my right, I take it.”

  Stunned and sickened, I stared at him. “Your right?”

  Colburn suddenly spit in Father’s face. “Quod mox ut nondum gradatim. I renounce you.”

  “Quod mox ut nondum gradatim. I renounce you.” Loki’s voice was low and lethal.

  Father paled. “You cannot!”

  Disgust and fury burning in his eyes, Ivar spit in Father’s face. “Quod mox ut nondum gradatim. I renounce you.”

  “Filthy betrayers. I spit on you.” Father hawked a wad at his sons. The slimy mess splattered the floor. “She’s not even blood kin.” Father grabbed a laser pistol off the armory on the wall and pointed it at us. “I’m taking the ship.”

  “Never!” I unleashed my telekinetic abilities and knocked the pistol out of his hand. Another blow, and he was out cold.

  Ivar picked him up and put him on the transporter platform. “We’ll dump him on Threll. He’ll fit right in.”

  Threll was the armpit of the galaxy. I put the coordinates in the transporter console. The sense of loss and guilt was overwhelming. I should have done more to stop Father’s gambling.

  “None of this is your fault.” Ivar wiped the tears off my cheeks. “We were supposed to take care of you, not the other way around.”

  “He’s never been the same since Mother died,” Loki said, pressing a kiss to my forehead.

  “Ziyad, we need to make a quick stop at Threll,” I told her mentally.

  “Why?”

  “It’s Father’s new home.”

  “We’re leaving Father behind?”

  I could feel Ziyad’s confusion. “We are. The evil inside him won. He was going to sell me to Dingle, and Goddess knows what he had planned for you.”

  There was a flash of black, and Ziyad stood over Halvor the Betrayer, the man who had once been my father. A single tear rolled down her left cheek. “I cannot forgive you. Quod mox ut nondum gradatim. You are dead to me.”

  Halvor jackknifed into a sitting position, and a strange little smile appeared on his face. “Vengeance will be mine. You will all die horribly.”

  Ziyad’s claws sprang out. “I can end you now.”

  “Get away from me. Get away from me, you pathetic half-breed.” Halvor’s hatred was unmistakable.

  Enough was enough. I kicked out with my bionic right leg and caught Halvor the Betrayer on the chin. He fell over with a moan. “You just threw away your family, and for what?”

  “I grieve with you, my sister.” Ziyad enveloped me in a bone-crushing hug.

  “Can’t breathe.”

  She released me and embraced each brother, repeating. “I grieve with you, my brother.”

  “The five of us are a family, and one sick male cannot change that.” Colburn’s expression was tight with strain.

  “Family. Now and forever.” Ziyad turned and slowly walked back to the bridge. I followed her and sank into the copilot’s seat.

  I closed my eyes as a spasm of nausea gripped me. How could he?

  The brush of Wulf’s mind was like fingertips stroking my skin. “Ssssh. It’s okay. Your father is a dead man walking.”

  What? My eyes popped open. I quickly looked around the bridge and groaned. Yep, Wulf was definitely in my head. “How? I’m wearing the Visio bracelet.”

  “Hour by hour, our mental bond grows stronger.”

  “Oh yay.” Could this day get any worse?

  “Know this. I will never betray, abandon, or sell you. Your family is my family. I’m driven to protect you from any who mean you harm. You were meant to be mine. My heart is forever yours.” Wulf’s voice was low, husky, and seductive.

  My jaw dropped. “Wow. That’s so hot and so not you. Did you get hit on the head?”

  Wulf’s irritation rolled over me. “Coletti never lie. I cannot live without you. I will never hurt you. You are my mate.”

  “I can’t do this now. I can’t. I’m still trying to understand how the male I called Father turned into a raging psychopath.”

  “His loss of honor does not reflect on you,” Wulf responded.

  “Doesn’t it?” All my buried fury and hurt boiled over. I opened my mouth and screamed blue bloody murder.


  Ziyad shot to her feet and stared at me in alarm. “Are you being attacked?”

  My equally alarmed brothers ran onto the bridge. They lowered their weapons when they realized the only problem was me and my emotional meltdown. Colburn squatted down in front of me. “What’s going on?”

  “Other than the fact our father could give lessons to the Tai-Kok?” I pointed to my head. “Wulf.”

  “Oh. Told you he was your mate, did he?”

  “Yes.”

  “Isn’t he?” Colburn said all calm like.

  I sputtered, “I don’t know. Maybe.”

  “Wulf has hunted for you for ten long years. Why do you think he did that?”

  I gaped at Colburn. “You’re taking his side?”

  “Wulf can keep you safe.”

  “This is a private conversation between me and the warlord. So, butt out,” I hollered at my brothers.

  “Dingle will never touch you,” Wulf promised; his mental voice was soothing.

  “Please. Give me a moment. I need to think.” Was Wulf truly my mate, or did he only want me for my psychic abilities? More importantly, could I trust him? I suddenly felt his solid muscles, his heat, his strength wrapped around me; and for the first time in my life I felt safe.

  “I never stopped looking for you, worrying about you. Were you getting enough to eat? Were you safe? When I finally found you, I could breathe again. Colors became brighter. My life had meaning. I need you and only you.” With slow, exquisite care Wulf mentally kissed me.

  The emptiness inside me vanished, and just like that I knew Wulf was the other half of my soul. Weird.

  “Not weird. Fate,” Wulf corrected. His mouth danced over mine. Once, twice.

  Goddess, that felt good. “I love the way you kiss.”

  “I’ve waited so long to touch you.”

  I could feel the intensity of his hunger, the driving need to possess me.

  “What’s stopping you?” A strangled gasp tore from me when dozens of psychic hands roamed over my body, igniting my blood. “More.”

  Wulf’s phantom mouths closed over each of my nipples, and he sucked them until I thought my senses would implode.