The Alien Huntress Series

by Gena Showalter

  “Don’t know.” Jack’s eyes slid away from Dallas, a tell-tale sign of lying. When he realized what he’d done, he immediately brought his gaze back to Dallas.

  What did Jack know?

  Before Dallas had a chance to insist on the truth, a knock sounded at the door. Frowning, Jack pressed a button. The office’s only door glided open and Hector Dean, agent and resident prankster, stepped inside.

  Every few days, the man shaved his head, intentionally and not as a dare, keeping his scalp to a tanned shine. Both of his arms were sleeved in tattoos and his eyes were golden, like a snake’s.

  Despite the rough look, he was a good man. Dallas nodded at him in greeting.

  Hector nodded back and said to Jack, “I need to speak with you about a case.”

  “Can it wait?”

  “How long?” was the irritated response.

  “Just—” Jack waved his hand through the air. “Give me five minutes. Good?”

  “Make it a quick five minutes.” Hector stepped back and the door closed in front of him automatically.

  “What’s that about?” Dallas asked.

  “We heard a rumor a group of alien warriors are headed our way.”

  Alien warriors were always headed their way, it seemed. “Why can’t we see Jaxon?” Dallas asked again.

  Jack scrubbed a hand over his face. “You’ve asked me these questions a thousand times before, Dal. I have the same answers now as I had every other time. I suppose they’ve got him quarantined in case his captor’s exposed him to something toxic.”

  “That’s bullshit.” Dallas slammed a fist against his knee. His leg wanted to jerk in reflex, but he held it steady, pressing his heel into the tiled floor. “Even in quarantine, we should be able to suit up and see him. Look into his room, at the very least. They won’t even tell us where he’s being held.”

  “True, but there’s nothing we can do about it. Look, they had me call a temporary number, okay? He probably doesn’t even remember, but I talked to him and he sounded drugged out of his mind. I asked him for answers, and he refused to give them. Now those damn officials won’t let me tell him hello. Said I made things worse.”

  “Something’s going on here, Jack. Something more than they’re telling us.” Something more than you’re telling me.

  Jack pinched the bridge of his nose. “Probably. But again, the reins of control aren’t ours, so our hands are tied. He’s safe. He’s being cared for. You have to accept that and drop it.”

  “Drop it?” Hardly. “He’s been missing for four weeks. Four fucking weeks! None of us have been allowed to see him. If he’s quarantined, fine. I’ll bow on that point and won’t ask to see him again. But why won’t they let me call him? He’s like a brother to me.”

  “I don’t know, okay? I just don’t know.” Jack’s stare was hard, angry.

  Dallas slinked back in his seat, extending the long length of his legs. He rubbed two fingers over his jaw, considering his next options. He didn’t want to use his new abilities on Jack. Didn’t want to use them on anyone, really. Hell, Dallas didn’t even know if he could. Not intentionally. They came and went of their own accord, leaving chaos in their wake.

  Besides, to try and use them was to give over to his alien side. The dark side, he thought dryly. Did he really want to do that?

  He didn’t have to think about it. Yeah. For Jaxon, he would do anything.

  Since the shooting, not many people wanted to hang with Dallas. Most feared him, kept their distance. He’d changed, he knew it, but there was nothing he could do about it. Only Mia, Jack, and Jaxon treated him the same as they always had. Jaxon was honorable, a better man than Dallas, and deserved all the help Dallas could give. If Dallas had to dabble in the dark arts, he’d dabble in the dark arts. And there was no better time than the present.

  Concentrate. He closed his eyes, drew in a slow breath.

  Jack snorted. “Taking a nap, Gutierrez? That’s not what I pay you for.”

  He didn’t open his eyes. “I need a moment to think.”

  “Think at your desk.”

  “Jack,” he growled.

  There was a pause. A sigh. “Fine. Whatever.” Papers shuffled, a cabinet rolled open. “Sometimes you’re a pain in my ass,” Jack muttered. “I should kick you into next week.”

  Dallas tuned out the background noise and reached deep inside himself, not stopping until he found the shadowy corner where he’d tried to bury each of his new abilities.

  They swirled and churned, bright lights in a world of black. He didn’t know which was which, didn’t know which to unleash. If he accidentally kicked into hyperspeed, Jack would not be able to see or hear him, so he’d be of no use to Jaxon.

  You aren’t alien, a tiny voice spoke up. You arrest and slaughter otherworlders for doing this. It’s against the law. He quickly squashed the voice. For Jaxon, he reminded himself. Anything.

  Jaxon would do no less for him.

  Not knowing what else to do or how to choose, Dallas simply cut the tether restraining all of the lights. Immediately they shot through him, pinging from one corner to another and heating his blood to boiling. His muscles spasmed painfully, forcing a groan from his clenched teeth.

  “Dallas? You okay, man? Listen, I know you’ve been having a hard time since the accident. You’ve lost Mia to the training camp, Jaxon to rogue aliens, and the other agents are leery of you. I know that has to hurt. Your eyes changed from brown to blue in a single night, man. That freaked them out a little. Give them time. They’ll forget soon enough and maybe start to believe you used to wear contacts.”

  Every bone in Dallas’s body seemed to expand, stretching his skin tightly.

  Jack continued, unaware. “Hell, I might even start to believe it. God knows you won’t talk about the truth and that’s fine. I don’t need it. You’re a good agent, one of my best. You’ve never let me down. I trust you. So trust me on this, okay? Drop the quest for answers about Jaxon. He’ll return to us soon enough.”

  Dallas’s throat was constricting, grabbing every breath that tried to enter or escape and holding tight, choking the life out of him. His ears rang, a banshee’s wail.

  “I’ve hired a new girl,” Jack continued, still oblivious to the pain surging through Dallas. “Macy Brigs. I think you’ll like her. Not as sassy as Mia, but—what’s wrong with you?”

  I’m on fire. I’m going to die in a burst of flames. Breathe, he needed to breathe.

  Dallas’s eyelids popped.

  He was still sitting in the chair, still visible, which meant he hadn’t kicked into hyperdrive. The spasms suddenly eased, and his muscles relaxed. His throat finally opened, and he sucked in a gulp of air.

  Thank God the flames ebbed to a crackle.

  Jack’s lips parted on a gasp. “Your eyes…they’re glowing.”

  He’d succeeded. He knew it, felt the power deep inside. “Bark like a robodog.” His voice was layered with threads of energy that thickened the air. He could feel the pulse of it, the hum.

  “Arrf, arrf.” No hesitation from Jack, no snorting or laughing or asking why.

  Not even as a joke would serious Jack usually have done such a thing. Yes, Dallas had done it. He should have been ecstatic, but it was a hollow victory.

  “Jack, you will tell me everything you’ve been ordered not to tell about Jaxon.” Wait. A good agent knew to cover his tracks. “And once you’ve spoken of it, you’ll forget what you told me in this office.”

  Jack stilled, his breathing slowed. His turquoise eyes glazed over, as if he’d been pumped full of drugs or hypnotized. Then, he began talking. He told of a new alien species, of a virus and infected women. He told of a race between otherworlders and humans to capture the men responsible, for otherworlders could use the virus to destroy humankind.

  Dallas listened, his stomach filling with jagged shards of lead. Shards that cut, made him bleed internally. “Why won’t the government let us see Jaxon?”

  “I honestly don�
�t know.” Jack sounded like a robot, voice monotone, devoid of any type of emotion. “I’ve requested his return on three separate occasions and was finally told to shut my mouth or lose my job.”

  No wonder we monitor this power and destroy those who use it. Dallas could have forced his boss to share his darkest secret. Could have forced his boss to kill every agent in the building.

  Such power could be addicting.

  “Call Mia.” As he spoke, his blood began to cool and his hold on the mesmerizing intonation faded…slipping from him…finally gone completely. No! He gripped his chair, feeling a bit light-headed and a lot weak. With those ghostly hands, he reached inside himself a second time, but couldn’t find a single light. They’d winked out, vanished. For the moment? Or the rest of his life?

  The puppet-glaze disappeared from Jack’s eyes. He shook his head, as though trying to clear his thoughts.

  Tense, Dallas waited for his boss to snap at him, fire him, something. But the conversation was never mentioned. Jack had truly forgotten it.

  “You look pale,” Jack said, frowning over at him.

  Determination pushed Dallas onward. “Tell Mia to return.” Together, they could hunt Jaxon down. They could do what those government officials probably deemed unnecessary: save him. “Please.”

  “No.” Jack gave another shake of his head. He rummaged through his top drawer and withdrew a bottle of antacids. “She volunteered to teach at the academy. You know that, just as you know she’s using their database to try and hunt down other halflings, as well as her brother. She won’t appreciate being summoned, and when that woman gets angry, bad things happen.” Jack shuddered and shook a half dozen or so of the little pills into his mouth, chewed, swallowed.

  “She’d kill us all if Jaxon dies and she wasn’t even told of his capture. Give her a choice, at least.”

  Jack’s frown deepened. “Look. The truth is, I don’t need pressure from her, too, and that’s exactly what I’ll get if she comes back.”

  Dallas arched a brow and pinned his boss with a get-real stare. “You’ll also get a bullet in the brain if she finds out you kept this from her.” Sadly, he wasn’t joking. Mia was the epitome of violence. After the upbringing she’d had, Dallas understood that, even sympathized. While she’d calmed down since falling in love with Kyrin en Arr, king of the Arcadians, she was still a frightening enemy to have.

  A pause, another sigh. “Fine. I’ll call her and tell her what’s going on. I can’t promise you anything, though, so don’t get your hopes up. She’s been as unpredictable as you lately.”

  Probably because they were both bonded to the same Arcadian, but Dallas didn’t mention that. No one but Mia, Dallas, and Kyrin, the alien responsible, knew. Dallas preferred to keep it that way. No reason to solidify what everyone probably already suspected, thereby intensifying their distrust of him.

  “Just to prepare you,” he said, “I’m not giving up. I will find Jaxon.”

  Jack stared at him for a long while. There was a mix of pride and regret in his eyes. Finally, he ran his tongue over his teeth. “You’re stubborn, have I ever told you that? Kicking you into next week wouldn’t be good enough.” He turned and flipped through the numbers on his holoindex. When he found what he was looking for, he muttered, “I can’t believe I’m doing this.” He picked up his cell unit and pushed a series of buttons. “I just sent you the number for a new agency. It’s run by two former shadows. Eden Black and Lucius Adaire. They once worked for the government agency that has Jaxon and might know a way around some of the red tape. You did not get their number from me. Understand?”

  This was one of the many reasons Dallas loved his boss. “Understand.”

  “Now get out of here. You’ve caused my ulcer to flare.”

  Grinning, Dallas pushed to his feet. Immediately he regretted the action and lost his smile. Another headache slammed past his temples and straight into his brain. The pain was so excruciating, his knees buckled and he fell straight back into the chair. Shit, once again he couldn’t breathe.

  Jack might have asked him a question, but all he could hear was the loud roar of blood in his ears.

  The office around him faded, his eyesight completely gone. He was suddenly trapped inside his own mind, no way out. Shouldn’t have cut that cord. He laughed bitterly, or he thought he did; no sound emerged. Images began flashing through his head. He saw a beautiful, golden-skinned Rakan and a human male who looked capable of murder, holding a bucking Jaxon down. Dallas was screaming at them, then racing away a moment later.

  This hadn’t happened yet, he realized. He’d done no such thing.

  The Rakan and the human were covered in soot and seemed weakened, but still they held firm. Someone stood off to the side. Watching? Dallas couldn’t see the person, only knew that he or she was there.

  At the far end of a hallway was a brunette. She, too, was dirty. Bleeding. She was crouched on her knees, her eyes glazed, as if she were drugged. Her features were conflicted. Decisions, decisions sang through his mind. Then he realized the brunette had a decision to make. What, he didn’t know.

  Next he saw petite, dark-haired Mia holding a gun to the brunette’s head. “She’s going to kill you!” Mia yelled to Jaxon.

  The brunette laughed as if she hadn’t a care. “She’s right, Jaxon.”

  Jaxon continued to buck wildly, screaming and screaming. Those screams echoed through Dallas’s mind, making him cringe, nearly making him gag.

  Jaxon finally battled his way free, dislodging the weakened couple and grabbing a gun. The brunette grabbed one, too. Mia fired, Jaxon fired, the brunette fired. The faceless someone in the corner fired.

  One of the killer beams slammed into Jaxon.

  After that, Dallas’s mind short-circuited and blackened. He slumped over, panting, trying to focus on the here and now.

  What. The. Hell?

  CHAPTER 5

  Frustration was like a cancer inside of Le’Ace, eating at her, consuming her inch by inch. Every day her boss contacted her and asked about her progress with Jaxon; every day her answer was the same: I’ve made none.

  The words were almost a foreign language on her tongue. She’d never had to utter them before and despised uttering them now. Failure would earn her nothing but pain. Pain she desperately wanted to avoid. Yet she hadn’t pushed Jaxon for more. Every time she considered her options—cut off one of his fingers, try to wipe his brain again, shackle him to the bed—she talked herself out of it.

  Why?

  The answer eluded her, same as success.

  He was a man. Only a man. Nothing special. She recognized the lie immediately. His courage was something to be in awe of, and his internal fire something to envy.

  What was she going to do?

  He was healing nicely. And yet, he’d seemed to have morphed into a different man entirely. He was polite, reserved, never spoke out of turn, never voiced a dirty word or innuendo as he had in Thomas’s cell. He was the man she’d read about in his file. And she didn’t like it, wanted the old Jaxon back, though she couldn’t name why. The only thing consistent about him was that he refused to answer any of her questions.

  Of course, he didn’t have to do anything he didn’t want to do. He had freedom of choice. She was as jealous about that as she was frustrated with his lack of cooperation. Her entire life, she’d never had a choice.

  Actually, no. That wasn’t true. She had one choice, always: life or death. Bad as it was, she wasn’t sure why she held on so tightly to her life or why she continued to obey Estap time and time again. Death would have been easier. But she did hold on, she did obey, always watching those around her, wishing she could experience half of what they did. Love and passion, laughter and companionship.

  Just once.

  Le’Ace bit back a snort. She’d scaled mountains, engaged in gunfights and knife fights. She’d trekked through land mines, navigated burning buildings, and jumped from planes and moving cars. Hell, she’d even taught teenage
girls how to do the same, a definite testament to her strength. But she’d never possessed the courage to stand up and say “No, I won’t do that” or “Kill me, I don’t care.” Not for long. She’d never had the courage to even take a lover, in truth. Someone she desired. Someone her boss hadn’t told her to fuck for intel or to create a sense of trust. Someone she didn’t need to steal from or secretly kill, as only a woman on top of a man could kill.

  She’d been too afraid.

  Now somehow someone was tempting her to forget her job, her fears, and simply enjoy. It was the “for once” she’d always craved, but she was at a loss. Jaxon’s audacity is a novelty, that’s all.

  Right? That would explain why the more she watched him, the more her body reacted to him, hungered for him, even though her mind knew better. Not that she could do anything about it. For her, passion could equal nothing but agony. When she was called away, and she would be, she would leave. If she were told to kill him, she would kill him. No question. No hesitation. Tears? Maybe. She thought she might miss him.

  And if they did get together, there was no way in hell he’d want her back if she were ordered to sleep with someone else while they were separated. Much as she might want to, that wasn’t something she’d lie about, pretending she’d been faithful just to keep him.

  Unless ordered, she thought bitterly.

  How do I handle this?

  Over the years she had chased many humans and aliens. She had tortured, and she had coldly, brutally executed. In those situations, she’d known what to do. With Jaxon, she was completely out of her element.

  Why? she wondered again. Why was he different?

  His stubbornness, perhaps, his strength. If he had a weakness, she hadn’t found it. These past few days, he hadn’t even seemed to have a man’s needs. He hadn’t touched her again, not since they’d lain side by side in bed and she’d pretended to be his wife. He kept his distance as if she were poison.

  What if I’d really been his wife?

  The thought zipped through her and she couldn’t stop it. Couldn’t stop the hot pang of longing that followed it, scorching her soul-deep. Would he look at her with all that fire and passion again? Tenderness, even?