Romancing the Alpha: An Action-Adventure Romance Boxed Set

by Zoe York

  “Good thinking.” Marat stuffed the food container into the grocery bag and grabbed the security display. “Shall we find another place to finish the night?”

  “Yes.” Ying looked around, as if she might have belongings to pack, but she had brought nothing except those cuffs, and she had no problem leaving those in the disposal chute. She walked to the bed, plucked up the only lamp in the room—most of the lighting was simply diffused from the walls, according to a person’s preferences—and laid it artfully on the floor. She dropped a tacky vase next to it. “All right, I’m ready.”

  Marat was waiting by the door, frowning at the vid feed. “The android is talking again. And facing the display.”

  Ying considered the layout of that foyer. The potted fern was between the map and the hallway. “We can get out without it seeing, I think. As long as it doesn’t hear us.” It was a long corridor, and they were at the end, but androids did have enhanced senses.

  Marat nodded and opened the door. A laser pistol had found its way into his hand. He waved for her to come out and head for the ladder first.

  Missing her weapons very much, Ying glanced toward the foyer herself before trusting him. Nobody had come into sight yet. She hustled for the emergency exit, walking as softly as she could on the carpet. As she had done before, she poked at the button on the side of the hatch. Nothing happened. She shoved against it, but it did not budge. What had happened? Had the security override the android requested done more than give him access to the hotel computer? Damn, she wished she had a few tools.

  “Marat,” she whispered. “Any interest in blowing up a hatch?”

  “That’s a little extreme.” He eyed his pistol. “And the android will hear us.”

  “I—wait.” Ying ran back in the room, grabbed the laser scissors, and ran back out.

  Marat was stabbing at the button no more effectively than she had been. He backed up when he saw the scissors, waving for her to take his place.

  She wedged them open and tapped the button, changing the blade setting from cut to burn. A laser knife would have been better. She struggled to angle the scissors toward the side of the hatch, guessing where the locking mechanism might be.

  A faint beep sounded. Marat looked down at his vid feed, then toward the end of the hallway. “We lost the signal.”

  “Think it found the camera?”

  A pop and a clack came from the direction of the foyer. A crushed black ball rolled into sight at the end of the hallway.

  “A distinct possibility.” Marat crouched in front of Ying, his pistol aimed down the corridor. There were two other passages leading from that foyer that the android might check first, but all it had to do was lean a few feet to the side to look down theirs.

  The scissors cut into the seal around the hatch, but Ying worried she didn’t have enough time. Removing the flex-cuffs had taken an hour.

  Marat looked over his shoulder, probably thinking the same thing. He could make short work of the hatch with the pistol, but that would make a lot more noise.

  A faint hiss came from the foyer. The lift doors opening? Just as Ying was thinking that the noise had been her imagination, that she couldn’t possibly hear a door opening from that far away, gruff voices sounded in that direction.

  An irritated bleep came from the ladder hatch, and she winced. If she had heard the door, the android was sure to hear that.

  The whine of a laser pistol sounded right behind her. Marat crouched on one knee, firing down the hallway.

  Though Ying knew she needed to continue working on the hatch, she glanced toward the end. Two men were leaning around the corner, shooting in their direction. One was staring straight at her, and she dropped to her belly as Marat barked, “Duck!”

  A crimson beam lanced through the air, inches above her head. Out of habit, Ying reached toward her waist, where her gun usually hung. Only the rough fabric of her slave robe met her hand.

  A door opened halfway up the corridor. Someone in a bathrobe peeked out, then immediately jerked his head back. Other doors had opened, as well, and a few shouts came from rooms. Someone was bound to call security, if they hadn’t already. And Ying knew exactly who “security” would side with.

  Marat kept shooting toward the hallway entrance, but the men used the corner for cover, and only ducked around it long enough to fire. Though he tried to keep up the attack, he had nothing to hide behind except for a few trash bins and potted trees lining the walls. Whenever the men fired, he dove or dodged, but he couldn’t keep that up forever. As if to emphasize her thought, the pot closest to them exploded. Faux soil, leaves, and bark hit the ceiling before raining down on the carpet.

  “Shoot the hatch,” Ying ordered, frustrated that she didn’t have a weapon of her own. “We don’t have any cover, and the scissors aren’t working.”

  Between the noise of his own weapon and the shouts coming from the foyer, she didn’t know if he heard her. A grenade was lofted down the hallway. Ying cursed and started to back up, even as she knew there wouldn’t be time to evade it.

  But Marat fired and caught it dead on. Instead of sailing all the way to them and then exploding, a flash of white lit the hallway at the halfway point. It roared as it blew, and heat roiled down the corridor, warming Ying’s face even from forty yards away. The blast bashed down doors on either side and blackened the walls.

  Ying reached toward Marat, about to tell him again to shoot the hatch—or give her the weapon so she could do so—but more laser beams streaked out of the smoke from the explosion. The men were using the haze to advance.

  Marat dropped to his belly to avoid twin streams of laser fire streaking down the hallway. Ying flattened herself against the wall. He kept firing, and a cry of pain came from somewhere behind the smoke.

  “I just need—” She halted mid sentence, her gaze locking on a bulge on the side of his trousers.

  Remembering the jokes about grenades, she dove to the ground beside him. Even as he continued to fire, she groped for the pocket that held that bulge. Marat only glanced at her and did not stop firing. He did tilt his hip upward, so she had better access. She dug out a sleek black device. Fleet-issued ordnance. Good. She knew how to arm it.

  She rolled to the hatch, thumbed the detonator upward to activate the countdown, then backed away. The android they had seen on the camera earlier was striding out of the smoke, a gun in each hand. Marat fired twice, striking it, but the sturdy construct’s step did not falter.

  “We need to get back,” Ying said, more worried about the bomb she had just set than the android.

  Marat waved for her to go with one hand and threw something down the hallway with the other. Another grenade. He scurried backward, moving more quickly than Ying, who had her eyes locked on the android, ready to duck if it fired. Marat grabbed her by the waist and threw her over his shoulder before she could blurt a protest.

  His explosive hit the ground in front of the android and went off. The boom rattled the floor and broke down doors, but was soon drowned out by Ying’s grenade going off.

  From Marat’s back, she twisted around, trying to see if it had been effective. She was almost struck in the head for her efforts. A warped piece of metal flew down the hallway. If Marat had not lurched to the side—either to avoid it or simply because the floor was buckling and he stumbled—it would have struck them.

  Even though smoke filled the air they had left, and heat flooded the hallway like molten ore, Marat ran back toward the hatch. He dropped her and ordered, “In. Go!”

  Ying needed no urging. Not only had the hatch been blown away, but the wall all around it had peeled back like flower petals. The vertical passage inside appeared undamaged, and Ying flung herself through the hole, hardly caring if the ladder remained intact or not.

  The warped, heated metal burned her through the robe. She gasped and fell several feet into darkness before managing to twist and grab for the ladder. Her knuckles slammed against the rungs, hitting three as she fell befo
re she caught hold of one. She jerked to a stop so hard that it wrenched her shoulder.

  Lasers fired again up above.

  “Marat,” she called, “this way. There’s room.” She hated the idea of him getting hurt—or killed—because he was trying to protect her. She hated needing protecting. As soon as she got a chance, she would arm herself, whether she had to steal a weapon or not.

  “Marat?” she asked, peering toward the hole above. Light and smoke flowed into her shaft, but she couldn’t see anything of the fight or the hallway.

  She almost started back up again, but a dark shadow blotted out the light. Marat dove into the ladder well. Crimson beams slammed into the already warped frame, all that was left of the hatch. His big figure curled in on itself, tightening into a ball. Eyes wide, Ying realized he could fall right onto her and knock her off the rungs. There was not enough room for him to pass by her in the shaft.

  But somehow, he twisted and got his legs under him. He caught the ladder earlier than she had.

  “Down,” Marat whispered.

  Ying was already descending. She slid down the ladder, her legs hooked around the outside bars, not bothering to use the rungs. She paused once to try an access hatch and almost received boots in her face.

  “Sorry,” he said. “I was looking up.”

  This hatch was locked, anyway.

  Without comment, Ying continued downward.

  That android had not been far away, and they would make easy targets when Wolf’s men reached that obliterated hatch and stuck their heads—and their weapons—into the ladder well. Her hope was that they couldn’t see well through the smoke and could not be certain that their enemies had disappeared. They should approach the broken hatchway with caution.

  Ying stopped at the next exit. They couldn’t afford to be choosy. This one opened, and she crawled inside. It wasn’t another floor, but some access passage between levels. Conduits snaked along the tight walls.

  Marat grunted as he followed her. With shoulders broader than hers, he scarcely fit inside, but he pushed through behind her. She had no idea where she was going, but so long as they put some distance between her and her pursuers, it was a good thing. Probably. As she twisted into the maze of passages, she wondered if she had missed her chance. Why hadn’t she let herself be captured? Pretended she was Marat’s unwilling prisoner? Because she hadn’t been thinking? Or because she was afraid of what would happen to him if he was caught too?

  Sighing, she continued deeper into the dark, tight maze, wondering if she was ever going to get her chance to avenge her father.

  — FIVE —

  Marat shifted his weight, trying to find a spot where there wasn’t a pipe, cord, nob, or nub poking into his back. Ying, sitting against the opposite side of the four-foot-wide maintenance shaft didn’t appear much more comfortable. A blue glow stick rested on the curved floor between them, the extent of the light in their compact hiding spot. Marat had gotten over moderate claustrophobia during his first ship assignment in the Fleet, but he still couldn’t feel at home in close quarters like this.

  “My next shore leave is going to be on a planet,” he said. “With mountains, trees, singing birds.”

  “Maybe you’d find your vacations more peaceful if you didn’t spend them attempting to rescue slaves.”

  Marat bit back a retort. Soot smeared the side of Ying’s face, bruises darkened her knuckles, and she kept yawning. She had to be feeling as tired and cranky as he was, maybe more so since she didn’t have a weapon or even a change of clothing. He wished he had thought to bring a pistol for her. Just because he didn’t keep a collection on the wall of his cabin the way Striker did didn’t mean he couldn’t have acquired one. Maybe that would have brought a smile to her face. Nothing else had.

  It had been over an hour since they had escaped that android, winding so deeply into the crawlspaces between the lower levels of the space station that it would take determination and good sensors to find them. Whether or not they would find their way out in the morning remained to be seen, but they had claimed this spot and eaten their meal without worrying about it for now. The food had been good, despite the interrupted preparation and the lack of plates. Marat had complimented Ying’s culinary skills, but received nothing more than an indifferent shrug in return. He had thought that their time preparing the meal and sharing their backgrounds might have improved her opinion of him, but perhaps not. Or maybe she was just tired.

  Marat pulled out his tablet to check the time. It was after midnight on the station. A few more hours, and they could try their plan, assuming Ying still wanted to do it. He was surprised she hadn’t simply let the android capture her back on the lodgings level. Of course, it was hard to surrender to something shooting indiscriminately down the hallway.

  Ying yawned again, slumping lower against the rounded wall.

  “I’ll stand guard,” Marat said, “if you want to—” A hint of movement in the shadows caught his eye. He grabbed the light stick and thrust it in that direction, thumbing up the illumination level.

  A spider almost as big as his hand was sauntering along the floor of their shaft. He grimaced and reached for his laser pistol.

  “Marat,” Ying said with censure, as if he were contemplating killing a baby.

  “Yes?” He didn’t take his eyes from their unwelcome intruder.

  “You’re not going to shoot it, are you? Spiders are a sign of luck.”

  “Luck? Spiders are venomous, and that thing’s big enough to take a chomp out of your leg.”

  “That’s a Mercrusean Hooded Tarantula. It won’t chomp on anything bigger than a beetle or another spider. Maybe a small lizard.”

  “Then why is it stalking my ankle like an assassin on a mission?” Marat growled, eyeing the thing’s hairy legs. He didn’t like spiders of any size, shape, or predation, but the big ones with the hairy legs were the most alarming.

  “Your furry, white ankle is doubtlessly in its way.”

  “Oh, of course. I didn’t realize I was blocking the way to a spider convention.” Marat was tempted to zap the thing, anyway, but he shifted his legs back, scooting into a crouch, so he couldn’t be in the creature’s path. Earlier, he had been thinking of turning off the light stick so they could sleep, but if this was a representative of the inhabitants of the ductwork, he wanted a light on.

  “I can’t believe such a big, strong man is afraid of spiders.” Ying smirked at him.

  He had wanted a smile, but that wasn’t what he’d had in mind. “I’m not afraid of them. I just prefer they remain in their natural wilderness habitat, not in spaceships, space stations, shower cubicles, or my equipment locker.” Marat scowled at the memory of recent pranks he had suffered, thanks to the word getting out that he did not care for spiders. “It’s not going to find many beetles or lizards to eat in here.”

  “You might be surprised. I’ve noticed that a surprising number of the ecological niches get filled on stations,” Ying said as the spider sauntered closer to her. She wasn’t bothering to scoot her legs or body out of the way. “Rats in particular are a universal constant. No matter how much technology you use on them, they seem to find a way to adapt and survive. On the Death Knot, we kept a couple of cats to keep them in check.”

  The spider reached her and started climbing the side of her gray robe. Marat’s fingers twitched, and he looked away. How could she stand that? He took several deep breaths and tried to think of something else.

  “According to Chinese folklore, a spider brings happiness in the morning and wealth in the evening. Maybe this means everything will go according to plan with Captain Wolf tomorrow.”

  He wondered if she actually believed that superstitious stuff. He wasn’t going to look at her face to check if she was being serious, not until that tarantula had ambled off into the darkness. Just knowing it was climbing over her made him break out in a sweat.

  “Do you really fight fires for a living?” Ying asked, that smirk lingering.

/>   “Yes. In a strong, brave, and manly way too.”

  “Oh? I’ll look forward to seeing that then.” She raised her brows and gave him an appraising look.

  The attention made him flush, especially since he had not been expecting it. “I hope you don’t see it,” he said, looking away from her. “Fire is always dangerous, and in space, it’s usually deadly.”

  She gazed at him thoughtfully.

  “As I was saying before,” Marat said, not wanting to explain anything further, “I’ll take the first watch if you and your fuzzy friend want to turn in for the night.”

  “It looks like he’s off to hunt—” Ying picked up the tarantula and set it on the other side of her, letting it continue its slow saunter through the shaft, “—but I’ll accept that offer. I trust you’ll stand watch in a strong, brave, and manly way, so that I’ll be safe.” She turned onto her side, putting her back to him.

  Marat told himself that her teasing didn’t matter, that he didn’t need to prove his virility to her, but he did find himself wishing that the spider hadn’t strolled through. Or that he hadn’t reacted to it. If she was used to having a strong, fearless father and being surrounded by tough pirates, maybe she thought his quirk was a weakness, one it was ridiculous for a man to have. It was probably too late to mention that a spider’s bite had almost killed him once and that his wariness around them was perfectly normal.

  Again, he reminded himself that what she thought of him shouldn’t matter. By the time he helped her with Wolf, his shore leave would be over, and he would probably never see her again.

  As these thoughts strolled through his mind, his gaze lingered on her. He caught himself admiring the curve of her waist in the dim glow of the light stick. She was barefoot, with only the robe for covering, and several inches of her calf were on display, a shapely calf enhanced by the tail end of that dragon tattoo. It would be quite pleasing to run his hand along her smooth leg, and it would be easy to do so, since he was sitting against the opposite wall of the narrow passage, no more than a foot from her. Except that she would doubtlessly lurch upright at his touch and punch him. She hadn’t given much indication that she thought of him as anything more than some strange mercenary who had tangled up her plans. Still, despite their contentious relationship thus far, there had been moments of civility, of pleasantness even, and he didn’t like the idea of never seeing her again.