CHAPTER SIX
In the morning she realized she’d slept in late. By the time she awoke, the sun was all the way up and the robos were bringing the breakfast mush. The other women were setting the table and gathering in twos and threes, talking in low voices. She saw Shelli, pale but composed, chatting with Lacey. Flo sat up and made a note to herself to tell MARL for future reference how draining it was to use his implant to communicate. Maybe he could improve the efficiency if it was ever needed again.
“Come eat,” Renate said, catching her eye and waving.
Flo had just arrived at the tables, having taken a detour to the restroom and changed into a fresh set of underwear and jumpsuit. The woman had left a seat open next to herself, so Flo sat and accepted a bowl of the uninspiring nutrients.
“What was all that about last night?” Renate asked her in a low voice.
“Not much. Couple of us wanted a late night swim.” Flo affected unconcern. “Probably not a great idea, considering it in the morning light but sounded like fun then. We tried to be quiet. Sorry if we woke you up.” She kept spooning the breakfast into her mouth. “How long till the interview session?”
“The Khagrish have some kind of meeting this morning according to the guards so it’s going to be this afternoon only,” Renate said. “We have free time. I told the others to stick close to the barracks, or else go to the beach in a group. I don’t trust the Badari.”
Biting back a harsh response to the slur on the men, Flo washed down her breakfast with a drink of the bland nutrient fluid and rose. “Well, I hope everyone has fun.”
“Where are you going?” Lips thinned as if disapproving, Renate eyed her suspiciously.
“Maybe I have a date.” Flo winked and took her dishes to the kitchen area before exiting the building. She wondered if she had a Badari watcher during the daylight hours too and decided she didn’t care. A tingle of excitement spiraled through her nerve endings as she took the path to the beach and anticipated seeing Daegan today and this time having a real conversation with him.
When she arrived at the beach, there was no sign of the Alpha. She was sure he’d done his run at dawn and was frustrated with herself for missing him but she had all morning after all. Hoping the Badari in the Preserve were similarly at liberty, she walked along the beach toward the big rock she knew was Daegan’s favorite perch. He wasn’t there either so she stood and watched the waves coming in. The surf was higher today and Flo fought the temptation to do some body surfing. To do it properly she’d need a pair of fins which of course there was no hope of getting her hands on but the waves broke cleanly and she thought she could have a few good rides.
Removing her jumpsuit, she dropped it carelessly on top of her flip-flops. As she waded into the water and got ready to dive under the next wave and swim out, she had a flashback, inducing panic, as she remembered the near death experience the night before. Restored and limber today, she refused to let the previous events diminish her lifelong love for the ocean, any ocean on any planet. Three deep breaths and a prayer to the Lords of Space and she was ready. Stroking easily, she got to the point where the waves rose in response to the rising shoreline and let a few pass underneath her, treading water. Finally she found one she liked the looks of and swam as fast as she could, taking big scoops of the water with her hands and kicking hard to build speed.
As soon as the wave began to lift her, she stopped kicking, thrust her left arm in the direction she wanted to go, took a deep breath and lowered her head. She was in a perfect line, doing her best to be streamlined and maintain her momentum forward. The ride was exhilarating, the warm water caressed her skin like silk and she rose to her feet with a shout of triumph at the end, pumping her fist in the air. Flo wasted no time swimming out again and taking another ride, adjusting her body’s tension a bit to control her motion. The sets were getting larger and she threw caution to the winds and surfed, cutting across the face of the wave as it broke, for a truly invigorating tide. She felt as if she was flying and when the wave deposited her at the beach she laughed from sheer joy.
“Didn’t anyone ever tell you not to go swimming alone?” Daegan asked, rising from the sand.
“I don’t listen well,” she admitted, tossing her hair and thinking about how her wet underwear was probably showing him her figure in great detail. “Do you surf?”
“Does the sun rise?” He sprinted past her, splashing her deliberately as he went by and then he was stroking out to the break point.
With a laugh, she followed him, careful to keep enough distance between them so there’d be no danger of a collision if they rode the same wave. They rode three sets of waves and then Daegan caught her by the wrist in the shallows, pulling her closer.
She went willingly, enjoying the feeling of his hard, muscular body pressed against hers and the impressive bulge between his legs showing the effect she had on him. Her underwear might be pretty revealing today but his scanty loincloth wasn’t doing much to conceal his package either. Looping her arms around his neck, she indulged herself in one kiss.
Daegan wasn’t about to settle for a chaste peck on the lips, pushing his tongue against her lips and holding her tight.
With a soft sigh, she parted her lips and allowed him to plunder her mouth while she savored the spice that was Daegan to her. Her knees were weak by the time the caress ended and he began kissing her neck and shoulder.
“What happened to ‘we have to talk’?” she asked with a laugh, forcibly restraining herself from touching the massive cock pressing against her, an invitation to intimacy too plain to ignore. “I wasn’t kidding—we do have to talk.”
“Later,” he murmured, moving one hand to knead her breast while he pumped his hips against her, grinding his erection against her mound in a movement amplifying her own desire, craving more direct contact to soothe the ache at her core.
If there was one thing she was sure of, Daegan would never forgive her for making love to him and then revealing who she really was. “Alpha, there are things we must say to each other.” She deliberately spoke in Badari.
Daegan pulled back as if she’d shot him with a blaster. “How is it you speak Badari?” he asked, his voice suspicious.
Flo disengaged herself from his now slack grasp and stepped to her jumpsuit, saying over her shoulder, in fluent Badari, “I learned from a pack up north.” Turning to stare at him, she added, “Kierce says hello and to tell you he still has the scar on his hip where he fell amongst the rocks. I don’t understand why a Badari would ever have a scar, except from the damned force whips—”
“We believe it was because the rock contained a rare mineral and the healer didn’t get to him in time.” Daegan’s frown was monumental and he stood with his arms crossed over his massive chest.
Flo held up her hand. “Before we go further, is this a safe place? Do the Khagrish have any monitoring devices in the Preserve?”
He shook his head, the long black hair blowing in the breeze from the ocean. “This is as secure a place to talk as any. We believe the huts may have some cameras in key spots but not out here.”
“In case anyone is watching, shall we walk or shall we sit? It can’t look like I’m debriefing a superior officer,” she said with a careless laugh which was exactly the opposite of her real mood. Uncertainty over how he’d react to everything she had to impart made her reluctant to speak.
Wordlessly, Daegan sat on the blanket he’d brought and she sat beside him, leaving a few inches between their bodies, both facing out to sea.
Might as well get on with it—the other mood has been officially shattered. “There was an older Badari experiment established in the north,” she said. “Massive, three DNA strains, been going on for 800 years. We believe yours here in the south was created as an offshoot a few hundred years ago, in part to try to eliminate the pack structure the northern group lives by. Kierce told us the Khagrish here try to eliminate those Badari with Alpha characteristics at an early age and now I’ve s
een for myself how things are run. Someday you’ll have to tell me how you and your enforcers survived to adulthood.”
“And the two men taken away with Kierce?” he asked, ignoring her implicit question about his own past.
Flo shook her head and scooped up a handful of sand, allowing the grains to dribble from her hand and blow away on the stiff sea breeze. “He’s the only survivor. It’s his story to tell as to what happened to the three of them. Let me keep going. When the first humans were kidnapped from a colony and brought to this planet, one of them, a woman named Jill, formed a mate bond with the Alpha Aydarr. The Khagrish underestimated her pretty badly and she escaped. I’m going to skip over a lot of stuff here but the end result was all the Badari were freed by Jill and escaped.”
It was a lot to absorb so she paused in case he had questions, which he did, but to her surprise not about the other Badari.
“And you?”
“I’m a mercenary, ex-Special Forces. My team and I were kidnapped off our ship by the Shemdylann and rescued by Jill at the first lab. I serve Aydarr, usually as a pilot, but when this opportunity came up, he asked me to go undercover. Ever since Kierce was rescued, Aydarr’s been prioritizing trying to find your group and launch a rescue mission. He’s salivating at the thought of another hundred Badari soldiers. We’ve taken down a number of labs, rescued a lot of humans, but we’re stretched thin.”
Daegan held up one hand. “I’m attempting to take this all in and trying to form the right questions, out of the million or so in my head. Are you a mere scout then or the first soldier in the attack?”
“Both.” She bristled internally at him calling her a ‘mere scout’ but kept her temper. He was entitled to be a bit snarky with all the data she was throwing at him today. “I have a tracker embedded in my skull so now Aydarr knows where we are. My people can communicate with me, so we’ll know his plans, although the process kicks my ass. There’s a hurricane coming by the way, which is going to delay the rescue operation.”
He glanced at the ocean. “Yes, the waves and the riptide last night tell me the same thing. We’ve had the giant storms before. The Khagrish will lock us into cells in the main buildings and we’ll all ride it out. What’s the plan for this attack?”
Flo picked up a tiny shell and examined it rather than fidget or get up and pace. “I haven’t been told yet. I know one of Aydarr’s concerns is whether you and your men will come in on his side, or stand aside like one of the DNA groups up there chose to do. How much control do you have over the others here?”
“About 95% of them are loyal to me or at least take my orders. There are some who prefer to work more closely with the Khagrish.” Daegan was apparently unmoved by the existence of less worthy Badari.
Thinking about some of the bad actors they’d dealt with in the north, who’d been ruthless in pursuit of their own goals, Flo asked, “Yet no one betrayed you?”
He shrugged. “They know death would be theirs, at the hands of my—what did you call them? My enforcers. Or if not them, then others.”
Flo chewed on that for a moment. “I bet I’ve met three of the bad apples, haven’t I?”
He nodded. “Your impressions are acute. The men who don’t count themselves as loyal to me are among those regarded as non-alpha leaders by the Khagrish and receive perks and better treatment because the enemy wrongly believes they control the rest of us. It’s all appearances and acting and a delicate web of lies. Fortunately the Khagrish have no DNA test for alpha traits or none of us would survive. But as cubs alpha-born often don’t know yet to act discreetly and mask their authority over others. I had a few close calls but luckily for me the scientist who was most suspicious of me died in an accident.”
Flo thought of Yonn, the Generation Eleven alpha-born in the valley and how he was already obeyed by full grown Generation Eight soldiers at times. “Uh huh, an accident. I just bet.”
He didn’t dignify her implied accusation with a response.
The waves crashed on the beach as the tide came in. Flo wished she could rewind the clock a bit and recapture the easy camaraderie of surfing together.
“How are things done in this Aydarr’s pack?” he asked.
“I don’t begin to understand it all, not being Badari, but the men swear a blood oath to him at a certain age. The pack has a hierarchy based on what’s called dominance challenges but no one could hope to take Aydarr on and win. Not even his number one enforcer and not the other Alpha.” She nudged his shoulder. “Even we humans feel Aydarr’s power if he’s projecting it. Kind of what you did last night when you were talking to Shelli.” And don’t ask me if I think you could take Aydarr. Inwardly she shuddered at the mere idea of two Alphas fighting for dominance. Would the Badari at the valley follow him if he defeated Aydarr? The consequences became more and more head spinning the longer she thought about it.
“And you?” He turned his head to her and caught her chin in his strong fingers so she couldn’t look away. His golden eyes blazed amber. “Have you sworn this blood oath to the man?”
“No,” she said, heat pulsing through her body as she met his gaze. “The only humans officially in the pack are mates. There’s some other kind of oath given and received during the creation of a mate bond which causes them to be accepted into the pack. Man or woman. But obviously no human could ever win a dominance challenge against a Badari, so they’re outside the structure for rank. Like the healers, although they can fight.”
“What does this Aydarr expect of me? Of my Badari? To swear blood oaths to him and accept his orders?” Daegan’s voice was contemptuous and his talons were edging out from their sheaths.
Flo tried to choose her words carefully. “That’s the way it’s worked for the Badari I know for 800 years. Aydarr doesn’t tolerate any Badari in the sanctuary valley who haven’t sworn the oath to him. “
Grim-faced now, Daegan asked, “Kierce?”
“Had to swear. Although I overheard someone in the know say Aydarr told Kierce if he’d been blood sworn to you, he would have been allowed to keep the pre-existing allegiance.”
“And if I refuse? Will we still be rescued? How generous is your Alpha?”
Flo closed her eyes briefly, realizing she had a headache coming on. She wished Aydarr could have this conversation with Daegan directly. She was the wrong person to try to negotiate between Alphas. I was naive to think Daegan would tamely fall into line and be so grateful to be rescued he’d sign right up. “Going by what’s happened before, with the Tzibir—the third DNA line I mentioned—the answer would be yes. I doubt Aydarr would transport you to the sanctuary valley then. He’d probably have to leave you here in the islands and cut contact. I’m not sure how that would work, how you could be safe going forward. The Khagrish are getting more sophisticated about fighting back. They even brought in a person to be the security chief for the entire planet but one of our guys killed him, which was a big setback for the enemy.”
Daegan covered her hand with his own. “I hear the distress in your voice but you’re giving me much to think about and I have to consider the welfare of my men, and our cubs. The answers you seek aren’t simple and binary.”
Warmth and desire traveled through her body at his touch. This was not the discussion she wanted to be having with him but it was the one called for by her mission. “I realize you can’t say yes immediately or hastily. Aydarr committed to rescuing you, even set aside pending human rescues to have enough men and equipment ready to launch an attack here. To be honest, I’d hate to see him go ahead if the campaign to free you isn’t going to have any benefit to our overall war.”
“I’ve made no decision. Can I talk to this Alpha myself?”
She shook her head. “I told you, I have an implant. Badari telepathy doesn’t reach this far.”
Daegan was relentless. “When will you contact him again?”
“I don’t know—it’s their decision to reach out, not mine. Based on what we’ve done before, the pack would come
in overland. We have a way to turn off the force fields and infiltrate the lab’s artificial intelligence to get access to the complex and then it’s hand to hand combat. I’m usually flying overhead cover, doing some strafing but we have a limited number of flyers and an even smaller number with armament. Then we usually evac the prisoners, strip the base of as much useful material as possible, destroy the rest and get the hell out of the area before the Khagrish send reinforcements. I’d expect a similar approach to this base only of course Aydarr is hoping you’ll be ready to fight as well. Protect your young and the women too.”
“Do the other humans here know about any of this?”
“No. I was inserted into the group late on their departure night and the human prisoners are generally so demoralized these days, no one took notice or cared. I’ve done undercover assignments before in the Sectors. I’m good at it.”
“Yes, you are,” he said in a neutral tone, rising to his feet. “We must go.”
Confused, she dusted her hands off and set the shell aside. “What? Why?”
Staring at her, Daegan tapped the thick black band on his wrist. “Don’t you feel the bracelet signaling? We’re being recalled by the Khagrish.”
“Lords of Space, do you think the enemy suspects something?” Scrambling to her feet, she had butterflies in her gut.
“Relax, it’s probably about the storm. The Khagrish make us do the labor of readying the island for the wind and rain,” he said. “Perhaps you women aren’t being summoned. I’d rather you didn’t stay here on the beach by yourself.”
“I’ll be fine, especially if all the Badari have been called.” She cast a longing glance at the ocean, wishing she could ride the waves and forget all the deeply serious things she’d just been talking about.
“Promise me you won’t go swimming,” he said, surprising her with the ferocity in his voice. He grabbed her by the arm. “Not alone, not today.”
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