The Taming
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Author’s Note
THE TAMING
IMOGEN KEEPER
She's a proper lady.
Pampered and prim, Klymeni finds herself trapped on a spaceship with a man she refuses to marry. Desperate to escape, she releases a dangerous prisoner. In exchange he takes her with him.
Little does she know, he has plans of his own.
He's a hardened warrior.
For Torum TaKarian, life is simple, kill or be killed. Freedom means taking whatever he wants... until he unexpectedly becomes the ruler of a kingdom on the brink of collapse. The key to his people’s future is the stubborn prissy woman who rescued him.
The line between captive and captor blurs.
When he takes her prisoner and names her his wife, she swears to hate him forever, but her own traitorous body has other ideas. It’s a battle of wills, and only one can win.
This book contains explicit sexual content.
THE TAMING
IMOGEN KEEPER
Edited by Monika Holabird
TABLE OF CONTENTS
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Author’s Note
1
Escape, of course
KLYM POKED HER HEAD around the corner of the galley to peer down the main passageway of the spaceship. There wasn’t much to see. Steel surfaces, dark grated floors, and the pilots’ seats on the bridge.
And, of course, the man to whom her father had sold her.
Spiro. The back of his golden head shone under the lights as he stared through the viewscreen into space.
Their prisoner, Torum, was isolated in the rear, where they’d kept him for days, ever since they’d left his ship on an abandoned planet. Shackled in the darkness on a cot outside the engine room.
If she had any hope of escaping her unwanted Bonding with Spiro, it lay with him.
Sneakiness and stealth didn’t come naturally. Well, strictly speaking, that wasn’t entirely true. Walking quietly on slippered feet came naturally—she was a lady, after all, and quiet was similar to sneaky and stealthy—but not precisely the same thing. The intent was different.
No, sneakiness was not a personal skill. She’d been trained to converse with dignitaries, take holo-photos, organize parties and always, always, be polite—all of which was perfectly useless now.
But people could change if they needed to.
And she needed to.
So, she tiptoed, and her feet made scarcely a sound as she slipped down the passageway.
Another glance over her shoulder told her that Spiro hadn’t moved. She kept the little paring knife she’d pilfered from the galley concealed in the folds of her dress, just in case.
Her skirts whispered over the metal floor as she rounded the wall, passing beyond Spiro’s line of sight.
He was unlikely to come looking for her. He’d learned to avoid her. She’d scarcely spoken to him beyond repeating: “I will not Bond with you. I belong to another man. Please take me to him.”
He’d steadfastly refused to see that she would never accept him, however.
She had no choice.
If he’d only see reason and return her to her future-mate, her home, the life she’d been promised, she wouldn’t be forced to take this drastic step. But he wouldn’t. They’d been frozen in silent stalemate. So much silence.
While Spiro didn’t speak, Torum certainly did.
Every time she passed, he spoke. Whispers of promises. Murmurs of hope. Taunts of freedom. All of it in that dark, accented voice, like grit and gravel, and sharpening steel.
She shivered, as she always did, at the very idea of him. A bounty hunter. A Vestige bounty hunter. An alien from the most hated, feared, reviled enemy her people had ever known, the ones who’d sent the plague that had killed off nearly the entire female population, plunging their race into near-extinction. She’d heard Spiro and his brother discussing him—violent, unpredictable, an enemy warrior of great renown.
And he looked it.
Wild. Untamed. Feral.
Everything she’d ever imagined of the Vestige.
She rounded the darkened passageway, and there he was. As still and unyielding as if he’d been carved of marble. Like the statues of the ancients in the museums back home, a relic from a time when men were harder and life more brutal.
She bit her lip, hesitating.
Inky-black hair cascaded to his shoulders, and an impressive set of shoulders they were. Twice as wide as her own, and thickly bound with hard, bulging muscles that rose and fell in a thin white shirt.
A black tribal tattoo snaked up his neck.
His head was tilted down. Asleep? Do the Vestige even sleep?
There were so many rumors back home that she didn’t know what to believe, of dark deeds, inhuman and evil. Ghost stories whispered in the depths of night that sent shivers down her spine and kept her awake until daybreak.
What was one supposed to say to a prisoner? She considered clearing her throat to get his attention, or maybe returning at a later time—
“Come closer.” His voice, low and raspy, took the decision away from her. More of a rumble, really, that vibrated and tickled all the fine hairs on her body, like a feather had been stroked up her spine.
She caught herself leaning in, holding her breath, her fingers coming up to touch her pearls as she strained to catch his words. His eyes were still closed. “How did you know I was here?” she whispered. “I was quiet.”
“I can smell you.”
Her shoulders stiffened. “You cannot.”
“Can too.”
“I do not smell.” She never smelled. She had impeccable hygiene.
“Do too.” Finally, that face angled up, sharp jaw, hard cheekbones, slanting black brows, and a leer. His eyes opened, black and unfathomable. He looked... terrifying.
She took a long, slow breath.
“You smell like fruit,” he said, a little scowl forming between his eyes.
She smiled. “Thank you.”
“And pussy.”
She nearly gasped—but
caught herself just in time. The knife slipped an inch in her hand.
She shouldn’t know the word. It was from one of the dirty stories a friend had sneaked into the Institute. She patted her hair in the coiled bun at the nape of her neck and pushed her chin out.
Clearly, he was nothing like her sweet Agammo. Even Spiro, as much as she didn’t want him, was too gallant to use such a word. “I’ll assume that means something polite and complimentary, and I thank you.”
Those dark eyes burned like a physical caress. “I wasn’t being polite. But complimentary? Absolutely.”
She tried not to wrinkle her nose.
Full, dangerous lips curved. “You know what it means.”
She nibbled on her lip for a moment. “Can I trust you?”
“No.”
The thing was, a liar would have said yes. “Why not?”
“Your father is the War Chief of all Argentus.” His eyes burned over her body as if he could see beneath her clothes.
“But I’m not the War Chief, and I don’t even like my father.”
He moved his enormous boots, shifting his shoulders. He lifted a brow. “Tell me, what happens if a Vestige and Argenti mate?”
It was an old joke. And not a very funny one. “I didn’t come here to be crass.”
His laugh rippled across the airwaves. “Why did you come, then?”
She held up the knife so he could see it. “For escape, of course.”
His lips curved wider, and white teeth flashed in a predatory grin. “Now I’m listening, amiera.”
2
Honor’s for fools and losers
KLYM LISTENED CAREFULLY to his murmured commands and tucked the knife into his boot.
A few hours later, Spiro removed Torum’s shackles with a dour frown and escorted him to the bathing chamber at rezalpoint. He let him eat and drink, again, with a rezal trained clearly on his chest.
As Torum finished his dinner, Klym tucked the sum total of her possessions in the pockets of her dress. Her travel documents and her treasured holo-cam, which held every last holo-vid and memory she had of her mother. She patted her mother’s pearls around her neck, ensuring they were safe, and told Spiro she’d tidy up after the meal, and in so doing, moved just a shade closer to the prisoner than necessary. Exactly as he’d bid.
Spiro looked surprised and strangely pleased. He probably thought she was softening toward him, poor man.
For a split second, her body blocked his view.
It happened so fast her teeth clashed together and her vision swam. Torum yanked her against the big, rock-solid mass of his chest, close enough for her to smell the woody, spicy, musky smell of his body. His hand fisted her hair, and Spiro didn’t stand a chance. He was too noble.
“I’ll kill her,” Torum purred, and she believed him.
Her insides shuddered.
Rough fingers slipped along her neck, pressing over a vein until her vision darkened and her knees buckled. “Don’t fuck with me, migané.”
Pure dread slicked up her spine at the hateful growl.
Spiro shifted, his boots creaking.
The knife—her knife—hissed as it flew through the air to lodge firmly in Spiro’s throat. She’d barely even felt Torum’s body move.
Spiro dropped to his knees.
SCANT MOMENTS LATER, Klym stared down at her shaking hands as the escape pod pushed off from the main body of Spiro’s ship, one tiny little vessel wading through the infinite colorless void.
Her bones rattled as the thrusters activated, her teeth clattering.
What had she just done? What had she been thinking?
She hadn’t been thinking about anything at all, except escaping and finding her way back to her future-mate. Her real future-mate. Agammo.
She’d never, not once in her entire, dignified life, done anything cruel. Never heartless. Until now.
And the blood.
The blood had been everywhere, spreading beneath his prone body. Her mouth twisted. And Spiro—the wrong man, the future-mate she didn’t want, the one she refused to have—had clutched his hands to his bleeding neck, sputtering. And the look he’d given her as he’d dropped to his knees. A whole lifetime had burned in the true-blue depths of his eyes. Surprise. Accusation. Confusion. Disappointment. Concern. For her.
She hadn’t thrown the knife that landed in his neck. But she might as well have.
She closed her eyes, squeezing her hands into fists, forcing her face to relax from its grotesque mask. She would never get that look out of her head.
Spiro would be okay. He had to be okay. She hadn’t meant for him to get hurt. It was an accident. Surely that mattered, didn’t it? She hadn’t meant to cause any harm.
She’d just wanted to get away. That’s all. Get away, back to Agammo, so they could start a family and she wouldn’t be alone anymore.
“Quit sniffling. It’s annoying.” The deep, gravelly voice of the man who had thrown the knife interrupted her thoughts.
She opened her eyes but refused to look at him, focusing instead through the escape pod’s porthole at nothing but emptiness punctuated by stars too distant to offer comfort. It didn’t help to be reminded that the universe was enormous. And she was small, so small. And home and Agammo and all their dreams were very, very far away.
“I am not sniffling,” she snapped. Was she? Maybe. She wiped at her cheeks. They were wet.
“Good. Don’t.” He leaned back from the console, looking smug.
She breathed through pinched nostrils. “You needn’t be rude.”
The dark pools of his eyes glinted evilly, and his unfashionably long black hair shimmered under the multi-colored lights on the console, the harsh planes of his face almost glowing, and he laughed.
“You didn’t need to hurt him, either,” she said, trying to tamp down the burst of panic at being lost in space with a monster.
“Wrong, amiera. I did have to hurt him.” He propped a black-booted foot on his knee. His head nearly brushed the top of the pod. His elbow bumped against the bulkhead. He took up far too much room. “If I didn’t hurt him, he’d have killed me.”
“You could at least have the dignity to look upset.”
He snorted. “Why would I be upset? I’m happy. Jubilant. He had my hands cuffed behind my back for days. You have any clue what that feels like?” He rolled his shoulders. “I’m free.”
“He didn’t deserve to be hurt like that.”
“It wasn’t personal. It was him or me. Two people. Different goals. Nothing but knives between us. If I hadn’t injured him badly enough to stop them, they’d be coming after us right now. What did you think would happen when you turned on him?”
“I didn’t turn on him. I just wanted to get away from him.”
“Then you ought to be celebrating. Congratulations. You’re away from him. We’re on our way to my ship. And then I’m done with you.”
She shook her head at his flagrant lack of morals. He was barbaric.
Then his words sank in. Done with you.
“You mean done with me after you take me home.”
“You can go wherever you want. But I’m not taking you anywhere.”
Panic set her heart pounding as she imagined herself floating alone through space. “You promised,” she breathed.
“I promised to take you away from that ship. Not to take you to Argentus. You know what they’d do with me if they caught me? I’m not getting tortured for you.”
He said you as if she were vile. Beneath contempt.
A sob of panic rose in her throat, and she swallowed it, tracing her fingers over her pearls. “You’d still be there with your hands tied behind your back if it weren’t for me.”
He turned away, the sinuous shapes of the tattoo twisting on his neck moved as he shifted in the seat, elbowed it irritably.
“Have you no concept of honor on Vesta, then?”
“Honor’s for fools and losers. I’m neither.”
She straightened her s
houlders and tried to match his insouciant tone. “What do you intend to do with me?”
His amusement faded. A muscle ticked in his hard, unshaven jaw.
She pressed her advantage. “You can’t just leave me on a planet somewhere and forget about me.”
He fiddled with the gauges on the console, mouth hard.
She stiffened. “You wouldn’t.”
A grin flashed across his face.
“I would have no way to get home. Even you couldn’t be so cruel.”
His dour glare implied that perhaps, in fact, he really could be just that cruel. His biceps flexed and rippled through his thin shirt as he shifted to run his hands through his hair. “Inns yiurian a ghiann.”
The part of his words she caught made her eyes burn. You’d deserve it and worse. Her Vestigi had been more than adequate for school, but the last word was not one with which she was familiar. The tone, however, left no doubt it was a curse.
“The enemy tongue,” she said, “was part of my comprehensive education. Curse words, however, were omitted. My tutors failed to predict that I would come across a man of your vast vocabulary.”
He laughed, dimples dancing on his face, and said another stream of Vestigi.
“Do try to use words someone who wasn’t raised in a gutter would understand.”
Another stream of amused unintelligible Vestigi.
It didn’t matter.
He could curse all he wanted.
He could hate her as much as he liked, as long as he didn’t abandon her. She needed him only until he could help her get in contact with Agammo. Then sweet, gentle Agammo would come for her. They would Bond as they’d always intended. And all of this would be nothing more than ugliness left in the past. Forgotten. They’d be free together, and they’d build a family.
“Please, if you’ll just help me get somewhere safe and help me contact home—I’m sure my future-mate would see you well rewarded.”
“Your future-mate is bleeding out as we speak,” he growled.
Deep breaths. “Spiro will be fine.” He has to be. “His brother is a good healer. I meant my real future-mate. Agammo.”
“How many future-mates do you have?” He scraped a hand along the hard edges of his bristly jaw.
She stiffened.
“Never mind. I don’t care. Just keep your mouth shut.”