by Mina Carter
“General? General?” Stephens spat, obviously not at all cowed by the sections of warriors amassed behind Isan. He looked at Xaan in surprise. “What else have you been keeping from us?”
Isan lifted an eyebrow, addressing the human directly. “You mean he didn’t tell you that he’s Xaandril M’rlin? Emperor’s champion, war general and Hero of the Nine Wastes? How odd.”
“Fuck me…” Gracie responded this time. “You’re like something big in their government?”
Isan’s gaze flicked over the human female, but there was none of the interest Xaan would have expected from a male faced with a rare human female. “He is. More than. He’s the emperor’s… errr bestie?”
“Daaynal and I grew up together. We served together,” Xaan corrected. “We are blood-bound, not ‘besties.’”
He gave up trying to explain when Gracie just grinned. “Humans,” he commented to Isan. “They make no sense whatsoever sometimes. We have wounded,” he added, turning and stalking toward the hangar.
The healer fell into step with him, a couple of Isan’s men trailing after them. “Heal the wounded,” Isan ordered. “Move any that need ongoing treatment to the medical bay on the Veral’vias.”
They nodded and split up to seek out the walking wounded as soon as they all stepped into the hangar. Another team followed to drag the Krin’s corpse out into the sun. He knew yet another team on the ship in orbit above them would be scanning the planet for evidence of its pod.
Xaan ignored all that and led Isan toward Kenna on the table. “Krin attack. It latched on to her,” he explained, knowing that Keris had managed to get a signal out to the fleet with the basics.
“She’s lucky to be alive then,” Isan commented, lifting the blanket to inspect her injuries. He frowned. “Which healer worked on her? This is… human technology but not human healing.”
“I did,” Keris spoke, making Isan jolt in surprise and look at the bot. She hadn’t moved as he’d walked in.
“What… the trall… is that?” he asked in a low voice, not moving. Xaan’s heartrate kicked up a notch. He knew Isan could have a weapon in his hand in the blink of an eye.
“That is Keris M’rlin,” he said in a level voice, aware that Stephens had come up behind Isan and registered the tension in the little group. He hoped the marine didn’t have an itchy trigger finger because otherwise this was going to descend into a bloodbath. “She’s an AI, and a member of my clan.”
“She’s an AI in a bot body.”
Xaan nodded. “She is, and I suggest you think about your next move very, very carefully, healer. She’s the reason both my son and my mate still draw breath and you hurt her, I will remove your capacity to do the same.”
“Huh. You fight it out with your bestie then. He makes the rules.” Isan flicked a glance from Keris to Xaan and back again. “You healed this female? Tell me… exactly… what you did. On the way back to the ship.”
Xaan watched as a team of healers arrived with a bio-stretcher. “Be careful with her,” he snapped and then felt bad because the healers were only doing their jobs. “That’s my mate,” he added and received understanding smiles in return.
“We’ll care for her like she was our own, General. You have our word,” one of them said as the bio-fields snapped on. Relief filled Xaan. She was safe now. Even if worse came to worst, the bio-stretcher would hold her condition until Isan could heal her.
“She’ll be okay now. Won’t she?” Stephens and Gracie joined him as he walked after the stretcher. The healers were rounding the rest of the survivors up, some walking, some carried.
He smiled and nodded. “We’ll all be okay. Now, let’s get off this fucking planet shall we?”
She’d died and gone to heaven. The only problem was heaven looked an awful lot like a Latharian medical bay.
Kenna blinked groggily and looked around. Yes, it was definitely a medical bay. Individual bays had huge diagnostic beds big enough to fit even the largest warrior, which meant she felt like a child tucked up in bed lying on one. The shimmer of a privacy screen filled the air at the end of her bay she was in, a leather clad figure moving on the other side.
Shouldn’t heaven hurt less as well? All worldly pains gone and all that. More clouds and harps, less medical equipment and what smelled like pine-scented cleaner? Was it some universal truth in the whole of reality that all hospitals had to smell of pine?
She groaned softly as pain lanced through her. Not badly, but enough to be uncomfortable. What the fuck was with that… She was dead, so why the pain? That was the deal. Or should be.
“Hey, kelarris,” a familiar deep voice, raspy with sleep, made her turn to see Xaan levering himself quickly out of the chair next to the bed. “How are you feeling?”
At least this heaven had an angel. Things were looking up.
She closed her eyes as he leaned to kiss her forehead, his hand seeking and enveloping hers. Just his touch was enough to bring comfort, and love filled her in one huge rush. The last thing she remembered was agony in his eyes as he faced losing her. Her heart clenched. She never wanted to see anguish and pain like that ever again.
“I didn’t die…” She clung to him, unable to stop touching him, her fingers on his cheek as he lifted up to look down at her. “What happened? How did we get here?”
He smiled, leaning his arm on the pillow behind her head and stroking the hair back from her face. “Keris happened. The bot that crashed in and killed the Krin? It turned out to be the AI from my son’s ship. She saved you—”
The privacy shield whisked back to admit a healer. Tall with silvery-ash hair, he was young but every bit as scarred as Lord Healer Laarn.
“Made a draanthic mess of it as well,” he groused, motioning for Xaan to move out of the way so he could get to the diagnostic controls. “You were in surgery for a couple of hours so I could get you fixed up.”
She smiled at Xaan as he obediently stood just outside the field of the bed as it spread out to scan her. That he didn’t like to be separated from her, even so the bed could scan her and his presence wouldn’t foul the readings, was obvious. He was practically vibrating with the need to get back to her.
“But she’s okay now?” Xaan demanded. “She’ll heal now.”
“She will.” The healer nodded. “It saved her life, but it was a patch job.”
His expression softened a little as he looked down at her. “It kept you alive long enough to get here. Now you’re as good as new. You’ll need follow-up checks, just to ensure no ongoing problems, but other than that, it looks like you’re going to be just fine. How do you feel?”
She frowned, pressing a hand to the center of her chest. The horror the Krin latching on, the feel of its teeth like knives burrowing into her gut, filled her mind for a moment and she shuddered. Yeah, she was going to have nightmares about that for years to come. “It still hurts a bit. Nowhere near as much as it did, but still a little. Like an ache?”
Isan. The healer was called Isan, she remembered, dragging his name from the depths of her mind. Which meant they were on Fenriis’s ship. The high number and depth of his scars reassured her that, despite his apparent youth, he was a very highly trained healer. Appearance could be deceptive with the Lathar, though. The youngest looking could be the oldest warriors she’d met.
“Cellular memory, that’s all. We can deal with that.”
He added a smile that was quite at odds with his fierce demeanor. It was almost as if they’d all been briefed on how to deal with humans and he was just now remembering some of the finer points. Reaching out to the trolley next to him, he selected and peeled a med-patch. Then he leaned to smooth it over her upper arm. She hissed as the pain lessened almost immediately.
“There,” he said in a lower voice. “That should be around the right dosage for a female your size. It should help.”
Her gaze dropped to his hands as they moved over the console in front of him. There, just under the cuff of his jacket, dark marks peeked
out. She smiled. The manner made sense now.
Isan had mating marks, which meant he had a mate somewhere—a human one since there were no Latharian females left. Humanity were the only other species that they formed for. From his expression, though, he was as confused as all hell about it.
She hid her smile as the field snapped off and in the same instant, Xaan was back by her side. His tight expression betrayed his need to touch her, but he held off as he looked at the healer.
“I can take her home?” the big general demanded in his deep rasp.
“Just make sure she rests and if she feels ill, bring her right back,” Isan said firmly.
In the next instant, Kenna found herself scooped up against Xaan’s broad chest. “Ill. Back. Got it,” he rumbled and carried her out of the medical bay with long strides.
Silence stretched out between them as Xaan strode through the ship. She had no idea where they were going but she assumed he’d been assigned quarters somewhere. No ship commander would make a general and the emperor’s champion sleep on the floor.
“Hey,” she asked as they turned a corner. “Didn’t you have a ship of your own at some point?”
“Uh-huh.” He nodded. “My brother commands it now though. I… I ceded it as a flagship to spend more time at court. Near you.”
She blinked and looked at him in surprise. “You gave up your ship to be near me?”
Color tinged his high cheekbones as he nodded. But he wouldn’t look at her as a set of double doors opened to a sumptuous suite, and they swept inside. She barely gave the rooms a passing glance as he carried her right through them to the bedroom.
He paused in front of the bed, holding her in his arms, and looked at her directly. “I love you, Kenna. I’ve been crazy about you since the moment I first saw you. It just took me a while to get up the courage to admit it. To myself… to you.”
The honest words rumbling in his deep voice warmed her through. A soft smile curved her lips as she cupped his face gently.
“We got there in the end.” Her smile quirked up into a quick grin. “Could have done without the asshole alien trying to gut me.” Her smile fell. “I probably have some scars.”
He leaned in to steal a quick kiss, one that turned soft and slow with heat and promise. “I don’t care about them. I just love and want you, exactly as you are. I always have, and I always will.”
Her eyes filled with tears as he put a knee onto the bed and followed her down, pulling her into his arms. She sighed and nestled against him happily. “Good. Glad you finally got with the program, General. Thought I was going to have to start issuing some orders of my own.”
“Oh?” His eyebrow winged up, his hand stroking lazily over her hip. “And what kind of orders would those be, little human?”
She gave him her best wide-eyed and innocent look. His lip quirked at the corner, so she knew he wasn’t buying it, but she carried on anyway.
“Well, it kinda hurts…”
“Where? Do you need the healer?” Instantly concern flooded his face and he was halfway out of the bed before she stopped him with a hand on his arm.
“No. I don’t need the healer,” she said quickly. Lifting her hand, she touched her lips. “I was teasing. I just want you to kiss me.”
His concern melted away as he returned to the bed and eased her into his arms. His blue gaze held hers, warmth in their depths as he leaned down to place a gentle kiss on her lips. By the time he lifted his head some time later, she had handfuls of his leather jacket, holding him to her.
“More than kiss me…” she added.
He smiled against her lips. “Oh, I don’t know about that. I’m sure the healer said you needed to rest,” he teased.
“If you don’t get naked right now and please your mate, Champion,” she bit out in sensual frustration. “We’ll be calling the healer out for you. I didn’t get hitched to a sexy alien general to deal with these needs myself, you know?”
“Well, when you put it that way…” he claimed her lips again, a heated torrid kiss that led to an entire afternoon and evening of the Latharian general proving just how well he could please his bonded mate…
Epilogue
“Rest easy, daughter of my heart,” Xaandril murmured as he placed the bouquet of Terran roses on the circular pattern of stones that marked his daughter’s grave. They were Kenna’s bonding flowers, the ones she’d carried at their ceremony in front of the emperor. She’d insisted that he bring them here to place them on Daanae’s grave in memory.
He bowed his head for a moment, his eyes closed. What he’d done to deserve his little human female he didn’t know, but he wasn’t going to argue. She was his, for now and always.
“You would have liked Kenna,” he told Daanae, in case her spirit was listening. “She’s a fierce warrior and so full of heart. She’d have fallen in love with you in a heartbeat. I mean,” he chuckled, “if she can fall in love with me, she’d have had no chance resisting you. Would she?”
The wind changed and brought the scent of his mate to him from where she stood near the flyer. He smiled at the sight of her still in her bonding gown and his jeweled collar at her throat as he’d longed to see for so many months.
“I said I wanted a little time with you first before I called her over,” he explained. The changes in her scent thrilled him, even if she wasn’t aware of them herself.
“She doesn’t know yet, but Kenna’s with child. You’re going to be a sister, Daanae, many times over if I can manage it. So I’m going to need you to do something for me, okay? I know you’re watching, so look out for Kenna and your siblings. Help the gods to keep them safe and healthy. Can you do that for me?”
Pressing a kiss to his fingertips, he reached out and pressed them gently against the center stone of the memorial. He was rewarded with a sudden, light breeze that brought the sound of the bellflowers, his daughter’s favorites, to his ears as it ruffled the petals of the bouquet.
Xaandril smiled, as the gruff Latharian champion felt the presence of his firstborn even from beyond the grave. “Thank you, sweetheart.”
And with that, he waved over his new family to say hello to his first.
* * *
***
* * *
Thank you so much for reading HITCHED TO THE ALIEN GENERAL!
I hope you loved reading Xaan and Kenna’s story.
* * *
The next book in the Warriors of the Lathar Series is ALIEN WARRIOR’S SECRET.
* * *
Being captured by aliens is better than being sent home… And sometimes love can be found in the most unexpected of places… like under a seating rack.
* * *
Check out ALIEN WARRIOR’S SECRET here!
* * *
I appreciate your help in spreading the word, including telling friends. Reviews help readers find new books! Please leave a review on your favorite book site!
* * *
SIGN UP TO MINA’S NEWSLETTER!
http://mina-carter.com/newsletter/books/
Also by Mina Carter
Perfect Mate
A hospital manager with a heart of gold. A soldier with a dark secret.
* * *
Lillian's life is... dull. The highlights of her day, other than her skinny hot chocolate, are the hunky guards who work in the military wing. It's classified and way above her pay grade, but she can't help feeling sorry for the hollow-eyed men and women they shuffle past reception. Then a late night emergency is wheeled in, his abdomen shredded and covered in blood. They’re not an emergency room but she can’t turn him away and risk a death on her hands.
Unable to get the handsome soldier out of her mind, Lillian sneaks into the restricted area and finds herself thrust into a world where nothing makes sense. A world where men aren't always men, the dead walk, and her handsome soldier is way more than he seems...
Her scent calls to him. She's his. Now he has to keep her alive.
Jack Harper was a soldier,
a good one... then the Project decided to play god. Now he has permanent anger management issues and a monster living inside him. Used as a weapon, he's been waiting for a chance to strike back. But the Project are onto him.
Ruled unstable, a kill order is passed down on Jack and his squad and they are transferred to St.Margarets. Play-things for the head docs until a bullet to the back of the head deals with them for good. But Jack isn't going down that easily, not when the delicate scent he'd been waiting for all his life wraps around him.
The delicate human woman is his mate. And he'll fight anything the Project throws at him to save her.
Monsters do exist…and they’re the good guys.
* * *
READ MORE…
Cyborg’s Price
He's one of the most dangerous creatures in the galaxy... so why can't she keep her hands off him?
A junior nurse aboard the Combined Fleet Ship Valkyrie, Samara's days are usually filled with minor bumps and scraps and the occasional health or workspace check. But when a dangerous prisoner is transferred aboard, she finds herself on brig duty. Dealing with the big, lethal looking military grade cyborg should be terrifying, but one look into his green eyes and she can't think of anything other than what his big, hard body would look like under the grey ship suit...
She's small, soft and fragile... he should keep his hands to himself and forget her.
Captured and en route to a medical facility for dissection and study, cyborg Lyon expects nothing but pain and degradation from his captors. But Samara isn't like the others, treating his wounds with care and igniting a fire deep within. When she neglects to ensure his cuffs are locked tight, all hell breaks loose. A hot, sensual hell against the cell wall. When his team arrives, Lyon knows he should walk away...but he can't. His little human has gotten under his skin. He'll take her as payment for his suffering, keep her in his bed and pleasure them both for as long as it takes for him to lose interest.