Her Alien Mates (The Drift: Haven Colony Book 1)

by Susan Hayes

Denz glanced around them. In a show of collective wisdom, every vendor within earshot had discreetly left their stall and gathered some distance away. “My office,” Denz offered.

  “Or my ship,” Kade countered.

  “My place is closer.”

  “And my vessel is far more comfortable.”

  “Oh for the love of gravity, enough already,” Shadow growled in a tone that would make a charging gharshtu find somewhere else to be. “The two of you keep trying to make decisions for me. It’s like you’ve forgotten this place was founded on the idea of everyone being free to make their own choices.”

  “But Vardarian mating rituals are the exception,” Denz pointed out. He wasn’t sure how the hell he’d wound up on this side of the argument. Hell, he wasn’t even sure what they were talking about anymore.

  “Maybe,” she conceded, “but that doesn’t mean I have no say on how this goes.”

  “If you don’t do this, Kade will suffer and may go mad. You could too.” And he’d rather see her with another male than think of her trying to fight the sharhal. He’d seen what that had done to Phaedra, and she’d only resisted for a few days.

  To his surprise, Shadow moved closer to him and then touched him lightly on his forearm. “That’s not what I mean, Denz.”

  “Then what do you mean?” Kade asked. His hands were clenched at his sides, and it was obvious he was as off-kilter as everyone else. Denz found some comfort in that.

  Shadow kept her hand on his arm but reached out for Kade too, her fingers resting on the other male’s wrist. It had to be difficult for her to be so close to them both with emotions running this high. “You sure you want to do this?”

  “No. But it makes things simpler. I’m going to make a suggestion, and I want to know how you both feel about it. Not what you say you’re feeling.”

  “You are taking all the fun out of this.” It was a lame jest, and he knew it.

  So did she, but she gave him a ghost of a smile, anyway. “Then you should have said something earlier.”

  He reached up to cover her hand with his. “Probably. But in my defense, I only just figured it out.”

  Kade mirrored his move, covering her other hand. “So, what is this suggestion you want to make?”

  “Kade. You said your anrik had died. That means you have no blood-bound companion. Right?”

  Kade looked at her with something like shame. “That is correct. You will only have one mate. But if this is real, I swear I will do all I can to make up for the lack of—”

  She shook her head and Kade stopped speaking. “I’m not worried about that, Kade. I promise.”

  Then she turned to him. “Denz, I’ve heard that you came from a poly family. Is that true?”

  She could not be about to suggest what he suspected she was. He’d met Kade a few times and believed he was a decent male in most respects, but if she thought he was going to agree to share her with the Vardarian…

  “Denz?”

  He realized he hadn’t answered her. “I have two biological fathers, yes.” And several other parents he’d acquired as his family had expanded over the years, but he didn’t mention them. This conversation was complicated enough already.

  “And would you consider being in that kind of relationship?”

  “There was a time I had intended on it, yes. But things changed.”

  “Do you think maybe they could change again? I’m not asking for forever or anything. Veth, I’ve never been out on a date and I’m probably being greedy and ridiculous, but… I don’t want to have to choose. Not yet, anyway.”

  To his surprise, Kade spoke up. “You wish to bring another male into our bonding?” His words were careful, and Denz couldn’t tell how Kade felt about the idea. Hell, he had no idea how he felt about it either. He was still processing.

  “Is that possible? Or will the sharhal make you crazy if we tried?” Shadow asked.

  Kade shrugged. “I don’t know. Is this what you truly want?”

  Shadow nodded, looking more certain, now. “I think it is. If you both agree.”

  Kade nodded. “I have no idea if it’s possible, but if that’s what you need to be happy, I can try.”

  “Denz?”

  He swallowed, trying to find the words that would let her down as gently as he could. This wouldn’t work. The only male he ever considered sharing a mate with was Zale. If he’d gotten to know Shadow better, maybe this could have worked. But it was too late now.

  Shadow watched him, her upturned face full of hope and vulnerability, and he realized no words he could say would make his rejection easier to hear. Not at this moment, standing out here in front of everyone. He couldn’t do that to her.

  “One date. Just you and me,” he said, slightly stunned at his own agreement.

  The three of them stood in silence for a long moment. Finally, Shadow smiled. “Okay.”

  He thought about all the work waiting on his desk and the meetings already scheduled for tomorrow. “Breakfast? I’ll come by your place and we can pick a place to eat. And if you change your mind before then, you can just send me a message.”

  “Breakfast sounds nice.” She hesitated and then added. “And I won’t be changing my mind.”

  Then she turned and smiled at Kade. “Which means it’s time you and I went and got this whole mated thing verified. There’s a way to do that. Right? I’m sure that was mentioned in today’s presentation.”

  “There is. And I agree. We should have that done first.” He swallowed. “But judging by the way I feel, there can be no doubt. I am experiencing the sharhal.”

  Shadow blushed. “I think I am, too. Otherwise…” she waved her hand at them both. “I’m not sure this conversation would have happened at all.”

  They managed a stilted and awkward goodbye, and then Denz was alone again. “What the hell have I gotten myself into?” he muttered under his breath as he started the walk back to his quarters. Somewhere in the back of his mind he thought he heard Zale laughing. No laughing, asshole. You were supposed to be here for moments like this. Instead, you went and got yourself killed.

  There was still time to work everything out, though. He’d only agreed to breakfast, and given how hard the mating fever was hitting Kade, tomorrow morning was a long way off. By then, Shadow might have decided she didn’t need anyone but the Vardarian. It would be simpler. Easier. And part of him rebelled at the thought of losing Shadow. Clearly, that part of him was fraxxing insane.

  Shadow’s thoughts were racing around her head too fast for her to catch them, and she was experiencing a sense of euphoria that her nanotech couldn’t regulate. If this was the sharhal, it was coming on hard and fast. There had only been a handful of matings between humans and Vardarians so far, which meant there wasn’t a lot of information about how it progressed, even though most of those bondings had happened here at the colony.

  Kade took her hand and led her toward the bridge and the Vardarian side of the river. She allowed him to take control for the time being. She had the layout of that area in her database, but she’d only been there a few times.

  She spotted Skye standing outside the Bar None as the cyborg’s voice came in over their internal channel. “You okay? I heard enough to know what’s going on.”

  “I’m okay. I think. This is just a lot to take in.”

  Skye laughed. “No kidding. You don’t do things by halves. Do you? I said to tell Denz you liked him, and you wind up inviting him to consider being in a triad.”

  “Yeah, that was…unplanned.”

  “Welcome to a life of freedom. We make plans, and then the universe tosses them out an airlock. If you need me, call. If not…have fun!”

  “Thank you.”

  Kade shot her a sidelong look. “You looked a little distanced for a second there. Is everything alright?”

  “Sorry. I was letting a friend know I was okay.” She tapped a spot just in front of her ear. “Built-in comms.”

  “Ah.” He slowed his stride
a little and gave her hand a squeeze. “That answers one of my questions. You are a cyborg.”

  “I am.” She raised her free hand to show him the barcode on her inner wrist. “Is that going to be a problem?”

  “Not at all. I assumed as much. But now I am certain.”

  “Glad one of us is.”

  “I am not certain about much, my dyna.” He uttered a rueful chuckle and then sped up again. She found herself extending her stride to keep up, which wasn’t something she had to do often. She was as tall as many human males and usually had to shorten her steps to avoid outpacing her female handler. Here at the colony, she was on the shorter end of the scale, and both Kade and Denz were a head taller than she was.

  “Did you just call me a sunbeam?”

  “You speak my language?”

  “I got the updated language files when I arrived. I’m fluent in all the languages of your people.”

  “I am pleased to hear that. And yes, I called you a sunbeam. Though that is the most literal translation. In this case, my intended meaning was something more like, one who shines like sunshine dancing on water.”

  In the midst of all the mad moments she was experiencing, his simple statement hit her the hardest. It was the first time in her life someone had given her a compliment. “That’s beautiful. Thank you.”

  Something in her tone must have caught his attention because he stopped and turned to face her. “What is it?” He touched her cheek with gentle fingers. “You have tears in your eyes. Why?”

  “Because you’re the first.”

  He looked at her in puzzlement, his hand still on her face. “To do what?”

  “Compliment me.”

  “I find that hard to believe.”

  She was intensely aware of his touch and the way his thumb moved against her skin in the subtlest of caresses. She also noted she could barely sense his emotions now. Either he was no longer experiencing powerful feelings, or he was concealing them from her somehow. “I haven’t been free very long. I’m not from the same lab as the other cyborgs. In fact, I’ve never been around so many of my kind before.”

  “Whatever brought you to this place, I’m glad for it.” He lowered his voice until his words were more a caress than sound. “But I am even more grateful to know that none of these fools got to you first.”

  “Well, Denz had good reason to put some distance between us.”

  Kade’s eyes darkened. “And yet you still want to try to build something with him.”

  “I do. But since I’m the clone of the woman who killed his friend and family member, you can understand why things are a little… weird.”

  Kade blinked. “You have clones?”

  “I used to. Now there’s only me and Nyx, and she’s the original model.”

  “And is she here, too? Is she the one who killed Denz’s friend?”

  She could see Kade struggling to figure this out. She didn’t like telling him this way, but she had made a promise to herself when she’d gotten to Haven—no more lies. Not to herself, or anyone else. “Nyx isn’t here, no. She and her fiancé are on Astek Station, out in the Drift. None of the others survived.”

  He swept his thumb across her cheek again, his eyes locked on hers. “You are alone here.”

  She was tempted to argue with him, but something told her now wasn’t the moment. Instead, she nodded.

  “I’m alone, too.” Kade paused and then exhaled. “And so is Denz.”

  “Yes,” was all she said. He was so close she could have reached out to rest her hands on the bare planes of his chest. Like most Vardarians, he wore an ornate vest-like garment that was closed at his throat but parted in a gentle V to show off the hard body beneath. It was sleeveless, too, and her fingers itched to run over his powerful arms and anywhere else she could reach.

  She swayed a little closer to him, and for a brief moment their eyes met. She thought he might kiss her, or she’d kiss him. Before either could happen, he lowered his hand and straightened. “We should go to the clinic and get everything confirmed.”

  She blew out a sharp breath and nodded. “We should.”

  Not that there was any doubt in her mind. There was no other explanation for why she was ready and willing to jump into the arms of a male she just met. This was the sharhal, and it was only just starting. Shadow knew what that meant. Over the next few days, the need to bond with Kade would grow stronger. Vardarians who fought the mating fever could fall into madness and never recover. Some died. That wasn’t a choice she’d make for either of them. She would bond with Kade and build a life with him. Whether Denz was part of that future wasn’t her decision to make. She’d made her offer—albeit a wild and unexpected one. Now, the choice lay with Denz.

  No matter how this all played out, at least she had spoken up and made her preferences clear. One of the first things she’d learned after being released from the Gray Men’s control was that freedom didn’t mean you always got what you wanted. It only meant you had the chance to ask.

  4

  Kade felt like he was plummeting off a cliff with his wings tied. From the second he’d caught Shadow’s scent, everything had moved too fast. All he could do was react to what was happening, and he wasn’t doing a great job of it.

  He had intended to introduce himself, get the female’s name, and then find a way to speak with her privately. That plan had crashed and cratered as soon as he got close to her. The need to make his claim had dominated every other thought in his head. When she’d retreated from him and ended up with Denz’s arm around her waist, his control had shattered like a rock dropped from orbit.

  It wasn’t the way he’d imagined this moment unfolding. Not that he’d thought about it much. This wasn’t supposed to happen at all, but here he was, holding the hand of a female all his instincts screamed was his mate. Somewhere, his ancestors must be laughing their scales off right now.

  “So, where are we going, exactly?” Shadow asked.

  “To the medical clinic. I could run the tests on my ship, but I thought you’d prefer to have this done by someone impartial.”

  She laughed. “You’re forgetting I could feel your emotions earlier. You were as shocked and confused as I was. Still, it might be better if we weren’t alone just yet.”

  “I think you’re right.” His body thrummed with a fresh wave of sexual tension at the thought of what that could lead to. Her naked beneath him, long legs wrapped around his hips as he…No. This was not the time or the place.

  “You said you could sense my emotions earlier. Does that mean you cannot feel them now?”

  “A little. But I’m not a powerful empath. I can only detect strong feelings when I’m close to someone. Until I came here, I mostly used it to make sure I avoided upsetting my handler or her bosses when they were in a bad mood. They never knew I had the ability at all.”

  “Your handler?” He didn’t like the way that sounded, but it was possible it wasn’t translating well. Galactic Standard had some strange idiosyncrasies he was still trying to figure out.

  “I mentioned I wasn’t from the same research station as the other cyborgs here. I had a human assigned to me at all times—someone whose only job was to make sure I did mine and didn’t show any signs of becoming self-aware or defiant.”

  “What would have happened if you did?”

  “My memory would have been wiped and my behavioral programming reset.” Shadow’s voice was flat and level as she spoke, like she was discussing the weather or a shipping manifest, not the deliberate and total destruction of her sense of self and all her memories.

  “Did that happen often?”

  “To me? No. Nyx warned me of the risks, and I managed to keep my awareness hidden from them. It wasn’t easy, but some quirks in my makeup gave me some advantages.”

  “Your empathic talent,” he said.

  “That was part of it, yeah.” She squeezed his fingers. “Maybe we can talk about it later? I want to know more about you, too. I mean, if this
is real, we’re going to be together for the rest of our lives.”

  “We are.” A disturbing thought struck him. “But you are not permitted to leave the planet. Are you? That’s part of the agreement your governments and mine made when this place was approved.”

  “I’m not. But one of us got special permission to live elsewhere, so…maybe I can too?”

  Even as she said it, he could see the idea pained her. She didn’t want to leave her home, or whatever burgeoning relationship she had with Denz. He hadn’t let himself think too much about the other male. Sharing a female wasn’t a problem for his species because most males were ritually blood-bound. They had years to get to know each other before they found their mate. This would be something different, but…it might mean she’d be safe and happy here at the colony. Denz could protect her while he was gone.

  He might be able to keep some portion of his freedom that way. That is, if he didn’t fly into a jealous rage the next time Denz touched Shadow. By all the winds that blow, could things get any more complicated?

  They reached the medical building, and he led her inside. The air in here was cool and crisp with the faint odor of antiseptic and mystery that all places like this seemed to have. A hologram of a Vardarian female with a pleasant smile and silver skin shimmered into existence a moment later, and he quickly explained why they were there, their language preferences, and a few other details.

  “Please follow me to an exam room. You can provide blood samples and a healer will bring you the results shortly.”

  The hologram glided to an open doorway and pointed inside. It looked like every other clinic he’d ever been in—a few simple chairs, a bed, and a medical droid sitting in one corner, its various limbs folded against its body as it waited for the next patient.

  Shadow eyed the robot warily. “What’s that?”

  “A droid. It will take the blood samples and run the tests.”

  She tensed, and he could tell she was on the verge of walking out. It took him a moment to understand her reaction, but when he did, he wanted to kick himself. She’d been created in a lab. Probably experimented on. Of course she wouldn’t be comfortable in a place like this with a machine that looked as if it could inflict all sorts of harm. “If you’d rather, we could have it done by one of the staff.”