by Liza Probz
He’d entered the mating frenzy.
Dammit, he thought. He hadn’t given a thought to the frenzy. He’d thought only of claiming his dear sweet Jamie, of driving all thoughts of another man out of her mind.
And now, he’d brought on the frenzy at the worst possible time. In the middle of unraveling a conspiracy, with the fate of two worlds and maybe countless more hanging in the balance, and he’d gone and fucked himself stupid.
And maybe sentenced himself to death.
Don’t think about now, he told himself, rushing to pull the Hareema suit back around his body. As he slid into it, the gelatinous mess shifted into the image of the nondescript human male he’d been using as his disguise.
He didn’t want to risk Jamie seeing him in this state. She’d ask questions about his skin and he would be forced to explain.
It was clear that he loved her. He’d probably loved her for weeks now, following her around, learning her endearing habits, lusting after her night after night. But once he’d gotten to actually experience her perfection, to feel her tight around him, he realized that his heart was lost.
Now he prayed that didn’t translate into his planet being lost as well.
Jamie couldn’t know how he felt, not yet. She was still engaged to another man, still in pursuit of her missing sister. This was no time to burden her with the mating frenzy.
He would do what he could to stave off the effects and focus on his mission. It had always been a matter of life and death. This particular bump would just accelerate the timeline a little.
Or so he told himself.
Jamie had begun to stir by the time he finished fashioning his suit. She gave him a little frown. “Why are you in disguise again?”
“Because the lock is about to release, little one, and we need to get out of here.”
She sat up, stretching her supple limbs in such a way that his cock began to throb anew. He averted his eyes, breathing deep and concentrating on the way the lights flashed on the consoles. When he glanced over again, she’d pulled her clothes on and was staring at him.
Jamie gave him the most beatific smile he’d ever received and his heart felt like it would burst out of his chest and into flight.
“I can’t say I regret that time lock now,” she said with a cute little giggle.
“Me neither,” he replied, meaning it.
“If I may interject,” Herman said, and Jamie jumped at the noise.
“Oh shit, I forgot he was here,” she said, then covered her mouth with embarrassment.
“What is it, Herman?” Drake asked, hiding his smile.
“Your last stated plan was to search for Dr. Lakewood. Is that correct?”
“Yes.” It made sense to find the researcher. He seemed to be the missing link in the conspiracy.
“Then may I suggest that you bring me along with you? I have a built-in GPS mechanism that is connected to a small chip Dr. Lakewood has inserted under the skin behind his ear. He was worried about some harm coming to him in his final days at this office and set this up as a safety precaution.”
“So you’re saying you can find him for us?” Jamie asked.
“I may be able to help,” Herman hedged. “The GPS has a radius of fifty miles, though, so we will need to be close to him before it will activate.”
“Understood,” Drake said, reaching down to pick up the robot. “We’d be honored if you’d help us along.”
“I wish to find my creator,” Herman replied. “And to save Earth.”
Jamie picked up her oversized handbag and opened it. “Aren’t you glad I brought this along now?”
Her smile was gloating as he placed Herman inside. “Now keep quiet in there, Herman,” she said as she closed her handbag.
Then Jamie was pulling out her phone. “I’ll start looking into flights to Chicago. But I hope you have a plan to sneak our robot friend through airport security.”
“No need,” he said. “We’ll be taking my ship.”
Her eyes widened. “Your ship?”
“Yes. A lightweight scout class ship.”
His original plan had hinged on returning in disguise with the crew in the Earhart. It would have gotten him entry into NASA, and the experience of the Earhart crew would have been invaluable.
But when he’d insisted on the plan, four sets of eyes had glared back at him. It turned out that Captain Brooklyn wasn’t so keen on being separated from her mate. And he’d known that Ontarii had physically restrained himself from punching Drake at the suggestion.
Not to mention the fact that there was already a bump showing how well the mates had gotten on together. Even if he could have convinced Ontarii to allow his mate to undertake this dangerous mission, he didn’t know how they would have been able to explain the accelerated and abnormal pregnancy of the Earhart’s captain.
And then there had been Lieutenant Jeffrey Brunt and his mate, Kat’Chinna Yarr. Although Yarr was a seasoned soldier, she’d taken Brunt as a mate and his seed had sprouted in her belly, a Zantharian-human hybrid growing inside her.
That had meant that half the remaining human crew had no desire to return to Earth at the moment. So instead of bringing the two remaining crewmembers back and having to explain their missing crew, he’d gone alone in a Zantharian ship that was undetectable to human scans.
He’d parked the ship outside the city limits, in an abandoned barn. He’d put warning beacons around the place so he’d know if anyone attempted to disturb it, and so far, it remained undetected. Now he’d use the ship to take them to Lakewood’s lab in a fraction of the time needed by conventional travel.
Despite the swiftness of their ship, he had a sinking feeling that they would not find the scientist in his lab, and likely not anywhere on Earth. Still, they had to try and tie up any loose ends that they could before he sent them on the most dangerous path they could take.
A path that led them to the Hareema prison planet.
Drake repressed a shiver. He had no desire to return to that evil place. But all signs pointed to it being the nexus of the Hareema technological advancement that made them impervious to Zantharian bioenergy.
Still, if he did have to go there, he would go alone. And it was possible he’d never come back.
If the mating frenzy doesn’t take you first, his mind warned. The doors finally unlocked, but it almost felt too late.
Shrugging off his dark thoughts, he put his arm around Jamie as he led her out of the lab and back down the corridor into the main area of the restricted section.
“How are we going to get out of here?” Jamie asked when they reached the security door that led back out into the lobby.
“The same way we got in. Make yourself small and stay behind me. I’ll find a way to distract the guard’s attention so I can turn and keep you invisible while we move towards the elevators.”
Although he sounded confident, Drake wasn’t certain that his plan would work. He shoved open the door, keeping Jamie hidden by slightly angling his body. He was lucky she was such a small little thing, or this plan would never work.
He shifted so she could crouch behind him as he approached the desk. “Hey there,” he said to the security guard sitting behind the desk. “Could you call me a cab? My cell died.”
The guard nodded and picked up the phone. While he was dialing in the numbers, Drake turned, pulling Jamie so that she was in front of him now and hidden by his body. They walked in tandem towards the elevator.
“Your cab is on its way,” the guard called out to him, and Drake gave him a small wave without turning around. He had to reach out to the side to hit the elevator button, and when the doors open, he sidled inside.
He was sure he looked like an idiot, but when the doors closed, it didn’t matter anymore. Jamie was staring up at him with her beautiful green eyes, and just looking at her filled him with such a sense of contentment that he could feel his anxiety beginning to subside.
They exited into the main lobby and the li
ghts were low, the building almost completely empty. Security nodded at them as they passed, and soon they were out on the street.
“I literally cannot believe we pulled that off,” Jamie said, her smile bright enough to light up the entire street. And his heart.
“Me neither,” Drake said with a laugh, placing a tiny kiss on her upturned nose. “Let’s hope nothing happens to make them review their feeds in the next few days.”
“Like noticing a missing robot,” Jamie chimed in, tugging her handbag higher up on her shoulder. “He’s a heavy little bugger.”
A cab pulled up as they exited but Drake grabbed Jamie’s arm and walked them up the street. “I thought you wanted a cab,” she said, confused.
“That was just a diversion. I don’t want a cab to take us to the location of my ship. We don’t need any potential witnesses.”
They turned a corner and Drake led her into a parking garage. There were likely cameras everywhere, but he wasn’t too concerned, not planning a trip back to D.C. anytime soon. He found a late model vehicle with electronic locks and a keyless start and stopped behind the truck.
“You stay here and play lookout,” he told her.
“What are you going to do?” she asked, her eyes wide.
“We’re going to borrow this car.”
“Borrow?” She laughed. “I think the word you’re looking for is steal.”
Drake gave her a smile. “We won’t damage it, and they will be able to recover it fairly easily, I promise.”
Peeling back a portion of the suit that had been designed for just such a purpose, Drake exposed a fraction of his real finger. He let out a tiny flash of his bioelectricity directly into the electronic locking mechanism. The lock popped and he opened the door, motioning for Jamie to climb inside.
Sliding into the driver’s seat, he again used his finger to send a charge into the panel beneath the start button. There was a brief flash, and the car started.
“Neato,” Jamie said while strapping on her seatbelt.
Even the small compliment made his chest swell with pride. You’ve got it bad, he told himself.
Drake maneuvered them out of the lot and onto the streets. He headed towards the state line and the open fields of Virginia. Traffic had thinned out after rush hour and it only took them about a half hour to hit rural roads.
Turning down a gravel road off a two-lane highway, Drake scanned his surroundings, looking for the abandoned barn he’d claimed as a parking spot.
“It’s quiet out here,” Jamie said, her voice small. “And dark.”
“Don’t worry, we won’t be here for long,” he replied, pulling down a road that was little more than an overgrown dirt track. A huge, dilapidated barn yawned in the distance. It had once been the home of a large herd of dairy cows, or so the stink had told him, so it was big enough to hold the Zantharian vessel.
He stopped the car several yards away from the barn, behind a stand of high grass so it wouldn’t be seen from the main road. Then he turned the car off, climbed out, and waited for Jamie to join him in front of the vehicle.
“Spooky,” she said, a little shiver running through her.
Her reaction pushed his protective impulse into overdrive. He wrapped a reassuring arm around her, pulling her close to him, then set off towards the barn.
He had to force the door open, which was as planned, as he’d reinforced it before he’d left. Inside, the gloom hid much of the barn’s interior. Jamie pulled out her phone and set it to flashlight mode, shining it on the large tarp-covered shape in the center of the barn.
Drake removed the tarp, exposing the ship. He then folded the tarp up and brought it with him as he punched in the code to open the ship’s hatch.
“I can’t believe you got this thing in here,” Jamie said. “And kept it hidden.”
“It wasn’t easy, but the fact that most of the roof is missing certainly helped. Not to mention that the tarp is coated with a special Zantharian substance that reflects light in a way that makes it nearly invisible.”
“You think of everything,” she said and he gave her a smile, then motioned for her to board the ship.
Inside he pointed Jamie to the bridge. “We’ll get her up and out of here in no time. Then it’s just fifteen minutes to Chicago.”
“Fifteen minutes?” she breathed. “Why don’t they replace planes with these things, then?”
“Because it required a special Zantharian fuel to be able to travel at those speeds within the Earth’s atmosphere. Fuels on Earth are still too cost-prohibitive.”
“Oh,” she said. “We really are backwards humans to you guys, huh?”
“Not backwards,” he replied, regretting his earlier outburst. “Just not quite as advanced.” He bent to give her another kiss, unable to help himself. “But you humans make up for the lack in other ways.”
“I think I know what other ways you’re talking about,” she said with a smile.
Drake wanted to pull her back into his embrace and not let her go. He wanted to explore every inch of her delectable body again and again.
Instead he strapped himself in at the control console and started punching in coordinates. “Find a seat and fasten yourself in. It’s going to be one hell of a ride.”
Chapter 15
Jamie chose a seat close to where Drake was sitting and started the process of buckling herself in. She’d barely fastened the final restraint when she felt the shudder of the engines kicking on.
The blank wall in front of them lit up with an image of their surroundings. It flickered, then focused on the collapsed roof above them. The majority of it had tumbled in on itself long ago, but the edges still held, making a jagged hole that suddenly seemed too tight to fit the ship.
Jamie held her breath as the ship slowly lifted from the ground. The hole grew larger as they approached, and she fought the urge to close her eyes. We won’t fit. We can’t fit. Oh Lord, we’re going to crash.
And then, they were through.
Drake had proved himself to excel at every other skill he’d displayed, so she wondered why she’d doubted his ability to pilot the ship. They were rising into the night sky until they paused above the trees around them.
Jamie looked out over the vista of fields and farms, wondering why he’d suggested she buckle in tight. Everything was still around them.
Then all of a sudden, it wasn’t. The ship shot forward and the farmland became a blur. Jamie had to turn her head and fight off a bout of motion sickness as the ship rushed through the air at speeds she couldn’t even imagine.
“What do you think?” Drake asked, turning around to look her way.
“I think you should keep your eyes on the road!” she yelled, gripped by panic.
He had the audacity to laugh. “I thought I was the one with color-changing skin. You’re looking a little green at the moment.”
“Shut up, turn around and drive!” she said, and then she did succumb to the urge to shut her eyes up tight. The blur around them was too much to handle.
She blocked out his chuckle and focused on her breathing. Fifteen minutes, he said. I can handle that.
Jamie realized that, when her eyes were closed, she couldn’t really feel the sensation of movement from the ship. There was a faint hum, but that was it. They could have been sitting still for all she knew.
She risked cracking open her eyes and saw that the world was still a blur, but when she breathed deep and didn’t focus on the streaks of light passing them by, it wasn’t too bad. After a couple of minutes, she felt well enough to relax.
Her eyes fastened themselves on her pilot. He was back in his human disguise, just a normal looking guy she wouldn’t even give a second look to. But now she knew that underneath, he was anything but normal.
Drake was easily the tallest male she’d ever seen, and, she was fascinated to admit, the most handsome. His muscular body was a woman’s dream. It didn’t appear overly-swollen or out of proportion, like some bodybuilder who wo
rried only about packing on mass. He was definitely well-defined and clearly strong, but his body, though exceedingly large, didn’t seem terrifyingly so.
Everything was just right.
She remembered how silky the tendrils on his head had seemed. They were thicker than human hair, fuller, but oh so soft. And his eyes, like midnight pools with a golden ring around them. If she wasn’t careful, she could lose herself in eyes like that.
Jamie wished that he could put aside his human disguise. She wanted to see him again in all his Zantharian glory. Maybe after all this is over…
She stopped herself from going down that garden path. This was no time to be thinking about a future when she wasn’t even sure if there would be one. Her planet was in peril, apparently the whole galaxy was. When compared to the danger facing countless races, her hopes for a time when she could touch him again seemed inappropriate.
And still, deep inside, she knew she wanted that again. She longed to be possessed by him, ravaged and wrapped in the rapture of his arms.
He’d taken her in a way no human male had ever come close to. Her entire being had belonged to him in those moments. It was so overpowering, so intense that she’d lost consciousness.
And I missed his climax. I regret that.
She’d been excited to watch his face change as he reached the ecstasy of his peak. Instead he’d fucked her into unconsciousness.
And she prayed to God that he would do it again.
“We’re approaching Lake Michigan,” he said, and she jumped, not realizing that they’d already covered such a remarkable distance. “Let’s see what Herman has to say. Maybe he can get a bead on Lakewood’s location.”
Unfastening a couple of straps, Jamie was able to bend down and pull open her handbag. She tugged out the robot, holding him tightly in her lap.
“Well, Herman, what do you think about supersonic flight?”
Several lights blinked over the ball’s surface. “By my calculations, we’ve been traveling at over 3,000 miles per hour. While jets are able to fly faster, I doubt the ride is as smooth.”
“Thank you, Herman,” Drake said, and Jamie detected a note of pride in his voice. “Now, are you getting any readings on our lost scientist?”