by Maia Starr
He took my hands in his hands and said, "I believe you. I think you, of all human females, are essential to being here right now in this moment. You can help bring about this peace and save both the humans and the Kalazaron from a war. You are essential to that."
"I hope you are right. I will do everything that I can to set things right if I can help. But do you not see that you are essential as well?"
"In what way?" he asked.
"In this way," I said, rubbing my hand down his chest toward the spiral on his belly button. “This marking, the spiral tattoo says it all. This is a combining of human and Kalazaron. This is what is happening now. The peace between human and Kalazaron will come from understanding each other. You have that. You have it more than anyone will ever understand. You are essential to the peace between the two. I know that you have a bigger part to play than you already have played in this. There's so much more to come in the future."
He looked down at the spiral on his stomach, and for the first time he looked at it with a smile on his face, and not as an atrocity as he had called it before. I think he understood my reasoning, and for the first time, he felt proud that he was a hybrid of human and Kalazaron. It was a profound moment for both of us.
"Well, now what, Captain?" I asked him playfully.
"Now we turn this place into a good home. A home for a human and a Kalazaron living together in peace and love."
THE END (P.S. See next page for more bonus books!)
BONUS BOOK: Jarith (Drackon Mates)
By Maia Starr
Chapter 1
MARISSA VOLANDER
Being CEO of the biotech company Gladonetics meant my schedule was always overbooked. So even as I ran across the front courtyard toward the doors of the glass skyscraper that housed Gladonetics, I was already running late for yet another meeting.
It was a blustery day out and I wished that I had pulled my long, brown hair into a tight bun instead of letting it loose with wild curls. I wished that I had worn a straight pencil skirt that was tightly fitted instead of the pleated, black skirt I wore that was riding the wind like it was surfing. It was hard to keep it down since I had digital tablet files in my arms as I scurried in my black heels. My hair was blowing in my face practically blocking my view in my flustered state when… BAM! I ran into a wall and fell backwards, flat on my back.
The tablets went everywhere, my hair was in my face, and my skirt was up to my waist, showing red panties and black, thigh-high stockings with a garter belt. I was mortified and hoped that no one had seen this catastrophe, but that notion was crushed as soon as I heard a voice.
“Allow me, human,” the deep, reverberating voice said.
“What?” I whispered while I was on the floor.
Through my strands of hair covering my face like a mask, I saw a large figure looming over me.
“Who are you?” I tried to ask.
Before I knew it, his hands had grasped my body like nothing and he helped me to my feet, holding me firmly against his body. I looked up into the face of a Drackon warrior. His long, dark-black hair was in tendrils down to his shoulders and his perfectly square jaw was adorned with full, pinkish lips. His eyes were a stark, sea green but with a long, vertical pupil, like the eyes of a cat. He was over seven feet tall, almost eight feet, and his thick, broad body was so hard that it was the reason I thought I had ran into a wall. But that was not the case: I had run into him.
Now I was in a precarious and ridiculous position with my head arched all the way back in order to look up at his face while his massive arm encircled my lower back, pulling me to him to steady me, or so I thought. But I could feel his hard member pressing against my stomach and my eyes grew wide as I realized just how big it must be. He must have known what I was thinking in that moment because he smiled at my response.
“You should watch where you are going, human. There are many that would prey upon your small, delicate size,” he said as he inhaled sharply, as though inhaling my pheromones—and he was.
This was what the Drackon did. They were a race of alien shifters with many abilities. The Drackon were a patriarchal, male-dominated society of warriors with a special ability to shift into part animal. It was this part animal that allowed them to sniff out pheromones in such a way. And although they looked like a larger and stronger version of males on Earth, they were vastly different in that they were able to shift into dragons.
This was not a complete dragon shift; it was a partial shift. When they did shift, large wings sprouted on their backs and shiny, colorful scale armor sprouted in various places on their bodies, but not into a full dragon. I had not seen it in person, but I had seen recordings of it. It was impressive.
Now one of these Drackon male warriors was holding me up and pressing his hard cock against me. A part of me wished that he was fully shifted at the moment, but he was not. In fact, he was well adorned and in regal dress.
He wore black leggings that were made of an unknown material with calf-high boots. His embroidered shirt was white and fit him in a snug manner, leaving little to the imagination. I had never seen a Drackon dressed so well. His face looked familiar to me, but I think I just wanted him to be familiar because he was so damn sexy. If I had met him at a bar later, I would definitely take him home for a one-night stand, but nothing else. But for now, I would have to put my oversized libido aside and remember that I was late for a meeting.
I placed my hands on the large beast of an alien’s chest and pushed myself away as I said, “Yes, thank you. I will remember that. If you will excuse me, I am late for a meeting.”
“Yes, I sometimes forget that the female humans are allowed to conduct meetings, just like the males. It is not so on my planet, and it never will be,” he said as he picked up my tablets that were thrown about the ground.
His words inspired an immediate rage reaction inside of me. I yanked the tablets from his hands as I said, “Yes, everyone knows that. That is why you come here and take human females from Earth: the Drackon treat their females so badly, there are hardly any left. It wouldn’t surprise me if they all ran away from you.”
He laughed. It was a loud, boisterous laugh that shocked me, as that was not the effect I was going for with my insult.
Then he said, “You speak as though the women are being forced to be mates of the Drackon. They willingly give themselves to us. They all register and there is a waiting list. You females WANT us, badly.”
I huffed in anger at his response. He was right. He was one hundred percent right. Ever since the Drackon opened lines of communication for finding human female mates to take back with them to their planet over twenty years ago, the waiting list had become famously over populated. Every female wanted a Drackon warrior to claim her as his mate.
I was never on that list, nor would I ever be. I was too much of a tomboy to be claimed by a male of any species. Still, I did not want to admit this to him moment because I wanted to win this argument, if it was in fact an argument that we were having.
“Not all of us want you badly!” I said as I stomped off toward the door. I lied. I wanted him. I wanted him badly, but not for a life-long mate: just for endless sensual and lustful encounters.
As I entered the door, I looked back over my shoulder at him. He was still staring at me and I took this opportunity to take all of him in. I looked immediately at his crotch and realized that the tight-fitted, wet-suit like tights were there with good reason. He was hard, and I could see his long, thick bulge. If the pants were not made of such thick material, it would have created more than just a bulge in his pants.
I looked to see that he was smiling at me. I quickly looked away. I was embarrassed. I was embarrassed that he had seen me practically half naked with my skirt up around my waist and embarrassed that he had caught me checking him out. The Drackon were the epitome of male dominance and I was too dominant to like their way of life.
“Nice of you to finally join us, Ms. Volander,” Archer Payne said as I w
alked into the board meeting. This was the meeting that I was late for, and a very important one. It was a meeting with the board of Gladonetics, and the seven men that sat around the conference table were all my bosses. They made all the decisions about the company and I oversaw making sure those decisions were implemented successfully.
“Apologies, gentlemen; my plate is full today. Let’s get down to business, shall we?” I said, taking a seat, not wanting to have to cater to apologizing to these men.
“Yes, we have news. We have been in quiet relations with the Drackon species for two years now, as you know,” Archer Payne said.
As soon as he said it, my stomach began to feel nervous. Was it just a coincidence that this meeting was about the Drackon and I had just run into one right outside the door of our business? That did not sound coincidental to me. I shifted in my seat waiting to hear what he was going to say. News of the Drackon dealings was not anything new. As Archer Payne said, it had been two, quiet years of dealing with them. We were a biotech company, after all, and their abilities to shift were of great interest to us. So the company had acquired small things from the Drackon, like DNA samples in the form of spit in test tubes. This was a great scientific advancement and we had an entire department devoted to analyzing the small samples the Drackon gave us. So we had in fact been in business with the alien race for some time. But it seemed that now there was a something new.
"Yes, we have, " I said in response to Archer Payne’s introduction to this meeting.
"We have been chosen by King Hanu Rykor of the Drackon to meet with his son, Prince Jarith Rykor, to further advance our agreement with them. The king wants to enter negotiations for a more open trade of biotechnology with Gladonetics.”
"That is unbelievable," I said, excited for the opportunity. I took my job very seriously. In fact, it was the only thing I took seriously; I did not have any outside life beyond work whatsoever. I did not date. I made it a point to use men for sex only. Romance only got in the way of my career goals, therefore I did not pursue it. To be chosen as the sole company to enter into such a drastic deal with the Drackon was a very important career opportunity.
"Yes, it is," Archer Payne said. "We want you to lead this project. It just so happens that prince Jarith was here on other business when we got this last-minute communication from the king earlier today."
"The prince is here?" I asked, already knowing that it was why the Drackon that I ran into looked so familiar to me; of course I had seen his face, and he was the prince.
"Yes, he is already here on Earth and in the city. You will meet with him in two hours. We expect you to use that time to prepare for the meeting."
I tried not to panic. After what had happened only moments before with the prince, I probably was not the best person to meet with him. He had already seen my panties; how would he ever take me seriously? I was in for a challenge. But I was not going to let it deter me from the biggest career opportunity of my life.
"You have my word; I will be ready."
"Excellent. We know we can count on you. You are a pit bull in the business arena. We want a fair deal where the Drackon are not taking advantage of us, but also not so hostile that we do not get what we want," Archer Payne said.
I nodded my head in agreement. I knew what we wanted. We had been after it since we had discovered that the Drackon existed. But we did not speak of it. It was our corporate secret that would cause a scandal and hostilities if anyone knew.
"You have my word, Mr. Archer Payne," I said, standing up and shaking the hands of every man in the room with a firm grip. I always had to be more masculine than feminine in these meetings, even though I knew my looks were extremely feminine and sexy.
I left the meeting and went to work. The first thing that I did when I returned to my office was close and lock the door. Then I sat at my large, glass desk and privately looked for the photographs that we had of the prince. Perhaps it wasn't him that I had run into earlier. Perhaps that was simply a warrior of the prince.
"Please, please, don't let it to be him," I whispered to myself as I typed in the search in the photo database. My fingers were shaking as I typed in the information. Then my stomach turned as the data began to load, but it wasn't quick enough for my nerves. "Come on, come on, you slow piece of crap."
Ding! The data was finished and I opened the envelope. There on my screen, staring back at me, was the prince of the Drackon alien warrior race of the planet Mooreah.
"Shit!" I shouted; the Drackon staring back at me was the same one that I had encountered. I put my head in my hands, feeling very embarrassed and pissed off at my ridiculous luck. Of course it was him. I looked back at the screen and took in his regal photo. His long, dark-black hair was loose, hanging down to his shoulders just as it was when I ran into him earlier that day. His eyes stared a hole in me even from my screen. They were so unusual in that stark, sea-green color with the black, vertical, long pupil, like the eyes of a cat. It made his eyes penetrate anyone he looked at, even through the computer screen.
I quickly closed the photos because I was starting to get hot and bothered. I had to confess that I had always wondered what it would be like to take a Drackon to bed. Many women of Earth did so, but almost all of them chose to remain monogamous with them after bedding them. I found that to be very intriguing and yet dangerous. This was another reason why I was so interested in their biology; perhaps they released some sort of chemical when they mated that caused a human woman to want to be with them forever.
So even though my interest in taking one to bed was very high with my extreme libido being what it was, I did not want to take the risk. I had too much going for me on Earth to suddenly fall head over heels for an alien warrior that we knew very little about other than their ability to shift into dragon men.
I prepped and reviewed all our Drackon information, scanning through anything that might be of use when speaking with the prince. It was to my benefit that I had already met him and saw what type of personality he was. Now I had to go through all the information of how humans have dealt with dignitaries of the Drackon alien race in the past. One wrong gesture and I could accidentally be giving the prince the equivalent of flipping him the bird without even knowing. Plus, doing the research kept me busy so that my mind did not drift off to the encounter I had with him earlier. Anytime I closed my eyes, I saw his gorgeous, strong, tall body lifting me up from the concrete. I had to force myself not to relive the moment over and over again in my mind because it would make my body become heated. That was not very professional.
Finally, two hours had passed and it was time to meet with the prince. I gathered all of my confidence and knowledge and walked into the boardroom where Archer Payne was waiting for me.
"Miss Volander, are you ready? The company's future is in your hands," Archer Payne said to me.
"No pressure there, huh, Archer?" I said smugly, not able to control my smart-ass wit even in this tense moment.
"I'm just making sure," he said quietly as we both turned toward the door as it opened.
An impressive sight entered the room: four warriors with stone-hardened expressions marched in, two on each side, escorting in Prince Jarith. The warriors parted and stood guard on each side of the doorway. It was a regal entrance that made my mouth water as I watched the prince with his tall, perfect stature walking in.
The prince looked at me and he smirked a delicious grin. I felt Archer Payne look at me, wondering why the prince was giving me such a welcoming smile.
"Prince Jarith, it is an honor. My name is Archer Payne, and this is the CEO of Gladonetics, Miss Marissa Volander." Archer Payne bowed to the prince and I did the same. Our eyes remained locked.
"Marissa." He repeated my name, and did this so seductively that my face flushed red. I cleared my throat and tried to get down to business.
"Yes, Prince Jarith, it is an honor to meet you at last. Please take a seat so that we may get down to business, please," I said, moving over to
the table and sitting down, glad for the distraction. It was obvious that there was tension in the room and I could tell that Archer Payne was picking up on it.
"Thank you, Marissa," Jarith replied without taking his eyes off of me. It was very distracting. We all sat down at the table and I began to lead the meeting.
"We at Gladonetics are very excited for this new opportunity with the Drackon. Thank you for choosing us, and we are sure that these negotiations will be good for both the Drackon and Gladonetics. Now, should we get down to the specifics?" I said as we had not yet been told exactly what they hoped to accomplish with this first meeting, or what the negotiations would entail.
"Yes, in fact my father has insisted that he be included in this meeting," Jarith said.
Archer Payne and I looked at each other in confusion and I said, "Oh, is the king joining us? We were not aware that he was here."
