Rhani (Dragons of Kratak Book 3)

by Ruth Anne Scott

  Her heartbeat quickened when she thought of the Keep. Her friends waited there for her, but they didn’t know she was coming. They thought she was dead. They would make a big fuss over her, and no mistake.

  At least she didn’t have to worry about explaining her romance with Rahni to Rose and Reyna. They wouldn’t treat her as an alien, and all the formal tension of working together on the Allies team would vanish, too. Rose wasn’t the commanding officer anymore, and Moira wasn’t the Allies representative.

  They were all just human women, equals, with the same concern for Krataks’ future. They all knew the danger the Allies posed to this planet, and they would work together to meet it. No one would doubt them, and no one would argue their message should be ignored.

  She had a long time to mull over the possibilities. The trail went on and on through the forest until Rahni halted by the stream. “Do you recognize this?”

  Moira looked over the bank at the waterfall. “This is where it all started.”

  “Would you like to stop here for a while?”

  The color mounted to her cheeks. “It looks like you want to stop here for a while.”

  He put his arms around her, and his hands took two generous helpings of ass. He tugged her against him. “I always want to stop for a while with you.”

  She got lost in his kiss for a long moment, and his massaging hands lit a fire between her legs. She would be ready when he finally took her to his room. Then again, the grass here was nice and soft and cool and inviting. He could cool her ardor here for…. a while…. maybe longer.

  Ah, yes. One hand moved around in front of her and scratched the crease between her legs. Her pussy swelled with hot blood, and her drenched tissues ached for him. He fingered her slit through her pants until he pulled back. “I can’t wait for the day you start wearing dresses.”

  She pulled out of his arms and took his hand. “The sooner you get me home, the sooner I can change.”

  They passed through the rest of the forest in silence. They both traveled the same future landscape of passion, belonging, and togetherness. They made love and worked with their Clan, down through the years. They raised their own family and visited other relatives in other Keeps. They attended gatherings and renewed their friendships with acquaintances from long ago.

  The trees parted, and the sun on Moira’s face brought her out of her reverie. She looked up and saw Harkniss Keep standing over her, the way it stood over her the first day she landed here with her team. So much had changed since that long-ago day, but nothing had changed as much as Moira herself.

  She came to life in those days. She was born and grew up. She died and came back to life as someone completely different. She found her place in the woven fabric of a planet. It held her here and nourished her when she cut the roots tying her to the Allies.

  A lone figure appeared in the Keep entrance and looked down on her. It was Rose. Rose wore a long gown trailing the ground. Intricate woven designs decorated the embroidered hem and covered the bodice with colored shapes and stylized images. She wore her long brown hair hanging down over her curving shoulders, and she lifted her dress when she walked to avoid treading on her skirts.

  The two women shared a long moment of recognition. Then Rose gave a glad shout and set off running down the hill toward Moira. Moira let go of Rahni’s hand and ran to her friend. They threw their arms around each other’s necks and embraced with shouts and tearful laughter. Then Rose put her arm around Moira’s shoulders, and the two friends climbed together into the Keep.

  THE END

  Tales from Angondra (Sample)

  A Sci-Fi Romance Complete Series (Books 1 – 6)

  Ruth Anne Scott

  Book 1 – Abducted by Aliens

  Chapter 1

  Carmen Herrera shut the bakery door as quietly as she could, but the sleigh bells hanging from it made such a racket everyone in the place turned to stare at her. A statuesque woman behind the counter scanned her uniform up and down. “What can I do for you, Officer...” She peered at Carmen’s name tag. “Officer Herrera. I’m sorry we don’t serve donuts.”

  Carmen blushed. “I’m not here for the donuts. I’m responding to a call-out regarding an abduction in the neighborhood.”

  The woman wiped her hands on her apron and nodded. She towered over Carmen with flowing curly blonde hair and piercing blue eyes. Decorative italic letters splashed across the front of her apron and matched the brochures on the counter: Penny’s Peppermints. “I made the call. I’m Penelope Ann King. I’m the owner of this bakery.”

  Carmen looked around. All the customers listened to their conversation. “Did you know the girl who disappeared?”

  Penelope Ann nodded. “I hire girls from the neighborhood to work here. It gives them a leg up in the world and gives them some experience of earning their own money doing something other than selling their bodies and dealing drugs. I hired Rosie three weeks ago, and she never missed a shift—until yesterday.”

  “If she was selling her body or dealing drugs,” Carmen replied, “she may have gone back to her pimp. Maybe she didn’t want to slave away in a bakery anymore and wanted some easy money.”

  Penelope Ann narrowed her eyes at Carmen. She could spike a bug on a needle at a hundred paces with those eyes, and something solid and powerful lurked under her white chef’s jacket. Carmen stiffened for the inevitable response. “Rosie loved working here. She planned to enroll in community college next semester. She never wanted to go back to the streets. She wouldn’t go back to her pimp unless he took her back by force.”

  “Then there’s nothing we can do,” Carmen replied. “If she worked for him before, we don’t have any reason to believe she didn’t go willingly.”

  Penelope Ann smacked her lips. “You cops are all the same. I should have known you would stick your big toe in the mud like this. We’re talking about a young girl’s life, and you have my word she didn’t go back to her pimp—not willingly, anyway. Are you really going to stand there and tell me you won’t do anything to help her?”

  “I can’t do anything about it,” Carmen told her. “If she spent years working for some pimp on the East Side, and then spent three weeks working here,” she swept the bakery with her hand. “We would have to have something more than your word to interfere with her going back to him.” Carmen glanced toward the door. Now would be a good time to make her escape.

  But Penelope Ann wasn’t finished. “It isn’t just Rosie. A lot of girls keep disappearing from this neighborhood, and they don’t turn up back on the streets, either. They just vanish, never to be seen again.”

  Carmen nodded. “Our captain briefed us on that, but we don’t have the resources to investigate those disappearances. They go into the Cold Case archives. If we turn up any evidence for them, we’ll address them later.”

  An African American woman in baby blue nurse’s scrubs stepped forward. Her fuzzy Afro surrounded her fresh face and set off her glinting brown eyes. “You have the resources to investigate them, but you won’t because the girls were runaways and drug addicts. You don’t have to lie about it. We know the truth.”

  Carmen turned to her. “I’m sorry. I don’t think I know you.”

  “You don’t know any of us,” the nurse shot back. “I’m Aria McCray, and I’ve lived in this neighborhood since the day I was born. Penelope Ann has been here since she was three and went to school with me and Marissa Evans.” She pointed to a slender woman sitting by the front window. Her fiery red hair glowed in the morning sun. “She’s been the head librarian at the Public Library for ten years, ever since she graduated from college. None of us knows you from Adam.”

  Carmen shifted from one foot to the other. “Just because I only moved here a year ago doesn’t mean I don’t care about this neighborhood as much as you do. I don’t make the decisions on what cases to investigate. The department decides that.”

  “Four of the girls who disappeared worked here,” Penelope Ann chimed in. “I gave
them jobs and a place to live and extra food if they needed it. None of them lasted more than a month before they vanished. Now I want to know what you and your department are going to do about that.”

  “Like I said...” Carmen began.

  Penelope Ann cut her off with a wave of her hand. “I know what you said. You said they went back to their pimps and their dealers, but we all know that’s not true. I used to see Carrie Townley standing on the street corner at ten o’clock at night, and I used to see Zoe Martin walking up and down in front of the shoe factory on Benson Street. Neither of them has come back. They disappeared off the face of the earth, and your department and your captain and you and every other cop in the world couldn’t give a flying.....”

  Screeching tires drowned out the rest of her words. Carmen glanced out the window and saw the police paddy wagon pull up outside the bakery. She ran through what she would say to excuse herself from this situation before she faced Penelope Ann again. Then she noticed something that made her turn around again. The vehicle outside the bakery had no windshield and no driver’s side or passenger’s side windows. It was one solid white mass. It had no license plate, either.

  Carmen opened her mouth to say something, but all at once, a blinding flash of light exploded through the bakery. Carmen’s ears popped, but no sound accompanied the flash. She blinked to clear her vision, and the next minute, she found herself sitting on the hard metal floor of the paddy wagon. Penelope Ann, Marissa, and Aria sat next to her. The four women exchanged glances.

  “What the blazes is going on?” Aria snapped.

  “We’re in the police van,” Penelope Ann rounded on Carmen. “Are we under arrest or something?”

  Carmen shook her head. “This isn’t the police van. That’s what I thought at first, too, but this van has no windows and no license plate. I don’t know where we are, but we’re not with the police.”

  The vehicle—or whatever it was—gave a lurch, and Carmen tumbled sideways. Nauseous vertigo seized her, and she braced herself with her hands against the floor. The vehicle spun faster and faster until no one could sit up straight anymore. They lay on the floor and groaned in agony.

  Then the spinning stopped as suddenly as it started. The four women sat up and looked at one another. A gentle vibration hummed through the metal surrounding them.

  “What’s happening?” Marissa whispered.

  Carmen examined the tiny chamber, but there was nothing to see but bare white walls. “Whatever it is, we’re still moving.”

  “Where are we going?” Penelope Ann asked.

  “I wish I knew,” Carmen replied. “Someone has captured us and is taking us somewhere.”

  “It must be the same people who kidnapped those girls,” Aria added.

  Carmen turned on her. “What makes you say that? We have no evidence anyone kidnapped any girls. Anyway, we aren’t drug addicts and prostitutes and runaways. We’re professional women. I’m a police officer, you're a nurse, Penelope Ann owns the bakery, and Marissa is the librarian. We don't fit the profile.”

  “But we’re all women,” Marissa told her. “If someone was abducting women from our neighborhood, maybe they saw a chance to catch four women at once. That’s how we wound up here.”

  Carmen set her hands on her hips. “And how exactly did they catch us? How exactly did we wind up here? I don’t know about you, but no one even came near me. No one hit me over the head with a club, or put a handkerchief with chloroform over my nose and mouth, or a bag over my head, or anything like that. I was standing there, minding my own business, and then....” She trailed off.

  The others stared at her and waited. Marissa raised an eyebrow. “And then?”

  Carmen dropped her eyes. “Then I wound up here.”

  “You’re the police officer here,” Marissa told her. “How do you explain our presence here, traveling somewhere against our will, if we weren’t abducted? Maybe no one hit us over the head or dragged us into a dark alley, but here we are. It seems to me we’ve been abducted.”

  Carmen shrugged. “I can’t explain it, but I don’t want to say we’ve been abducted until I know for sure we have been. I don’t want to...”

  Aria burst into gales of laughter. “I know. You don’t want to alarm the civilians, right?”

  Carmen mumbled under her breath. “I wasn’t going to say that.”

  “You weren’t going to say it,” Aria shot back, “but you were thinking it. Don’t insult our intelligence by beating around the bush. We all know we’ve been kidnapped by someone. How or why doesn’t really matter. What matters is what we’re going to do about it.”

  “We can’t do anything about it,” Carmen replied. “We just have to wait until we get wherever it is we’re going. We’ll bide our time, and when the time comes, we’ll see how we’re going to get out of here.”

  Chapter 2

  Carmen stretched on her side and rested her head on her arm. She pretended to be asleep, but there was really no need. The other women paid no attention to her. Marissa really was asleep curled up in a corner of their little chamber, and Penelope Ann leaned against the wall with Aria’s head cradled on her outstretched legs. Both of them kept their eyes closed, but they weren’t asleep. Carmen was certain of that.

  She studied the other women with a critical eye. She would have to watch all three of them and make sure none of them did anything to wreck her chances of escape. She couldn’t trust any of them. They were all too rebellious. None of them knew how to follow the instructions of a recognized authority like the police.

  Marissa had too high an opinion of her own brain. She came up with every excuse to discredit Carmen’s authority. Penelope Ann had a secret that made her resist taking direction from anybody. Carmen couldn’t figure out what it was, but something hovered there hidden just below the surface. Penelope Ann would take some breaking in before Carmen could count on her to help her break out of this—whatever it was.

  And Aria—what could you say about Aria? She had a mouth that belonged in the circus. It went off at the slightest provocation. Carmen would have to do a delicate balancing act between keeping her distance from Aria and keep her close enough to make sure she didn’t do the rest of them any damage.

  All of a sudden, the chamber in which they lay lurched again, and a clang of metal woke them all with a start. Aria sat up, and Marissa rolled over on her side. “Where are we?”

  “We’ve stopped moving.” Carmen tried to stand up.

  The others copied her, and all four women stood staring around them in helpless ignorance. What was there to look at but the same four walls? Then another clang struck their ears, and something metal scraped against the side of the chamber. They turned toward the noise.

  In front of their eyes, one of the walls slid to the side, and a pale blue light flooded the chamber. Carmen shielded her eyes from the glare. She couldn’t see a thing outside their prison. Then a tall figure stepped into the light. She peeked around her hand to try to make it out. Seeing their captors for the first time would give her some idea what she was up against when it came to formulating a plan to escape.

  Another figure entered her field of view, and then another and another until four silhouettes lined up in front of the door. Ever so slowly, Carmen’s eyes grew accustomed to the light. Or maybe the light dimmed enough for her to get a good look at her kidnappers.

  One was taller than the other three, but they all presented the strangest picture Carmen ever saw. She couldn’t believe the evidence of her own eyes. They had pale lavender skin with gleaming violet eyes, and she couldn’t distinguish any iris or pupil in their eyes. Only a bright violet orb filled their sockets. They twitched their lips in the strangest way, and their arms came to stubs at the ends. They had no hands.

  Carmen’s mind whirred from the shock of seeing them, but before she could react, they stepped into the chamber in shoulder to shoulder formation. They evaluated the women with cold critical eyes. The women stared at them with their mouth
s hanging open. Not one of them, not even mouthy Aria, could say a word.

  Once they got within range, Carmen saw them clearly enough to realize they had tiny tentacles around their lips. If those tentacles kept still for a fraction of a second, they might have resembled facial hair. But they never kept still. They twitched and flickered in constant movement. The image reminded Carmen of a snake’s tongue lashing in and out. Did these creatures sense their surroundings with those tentacles?

  The tallest creature moved his head from one side to the other, and his tentacles stretched out from his face toward the women. Aria screwed up her face in disgust, and Marissa stepped back to get away from the thing.

  Penelope Ann set her mouth in a stern straight line and stepped forward. Carmen noticed her moving and grabbed her by the arm. “No, Penelope Ann! Don’t antagonize them. We don’t know what they plan to do with us.”

  Penelope Ann rounded on Carmen and yanked her arm free from her grip. “Don’t you tell me what to do! These people—or whatever they are—kidnapped us in broad daylight out of my own bakery.” She faced the tall creature. “I don’t know who or what you are, but I demand you take us back to where we came from immediately. You had no right to take us against our will. You’re violating all the laws known to man. Release us at once or pay the consequences.”

  Her words gave Aria and Marissa courage, but Carmen cringed, especially when the creature remained impassive. It probably didn’t understand a word Penelope Ann said. If it did, baiting it and standing up to it would only make their situation worse. The creatures might kill them all on the spot.

  The creature swept the group with its eyes one more time. Then a sound came out of its mouth. It didn’t really resemble speech, but for some reason she couldn’t explain, Carmen understood it. “We took you to sell on the planet Corax in the Regulus Galaxy. You will never go back where you came from. Your laws mean nothing here. You are our property now, and we will do what we please with you. You will do yourselves good to cooperate. Resistance will be useless.”