The Alien Bounty Hunters Complete Series: Books 1-8

by Mills, Michele

  Rayzor’s One

  Rayzor’s One

  Rayzor of Twelve, a lonely Bounty Hunter banished from his home world, is determined to follow his mission parameters: He must extract his target from a primitive planet called Earth with zero human casualties.

  His plan unfolds with precision, until a human female gets in the way.

  Rebecca doesn’t understand what the hell is happening. One moment she’s scared and alone in the spooky forest. Then a seven foot tall alien warrior is gazing at her with dark passion, his clawed hands touching her reverently. He’s kissing her, claiming her and saying, his voice hoarse with emotion—that she is his Bride.

  His Bride? Wtf?

  This stranger is swoon-worthy, but…She doesn’t know his name, or what species he is and he’s kidnapped her, thrown her on his goddamn spaceship and now she’s speeding away from Earth to parts unknown. And he expects her to fall into his arms?

  Oh hell, no.

  Copyright © 2016 by Michele Mills. All rights reserved.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  For permission requests, email to michelemillswrites@gmail.com

  Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.

  Cover Design by Meljean Brook

  Edited by Aquila Editing

  Created with Vellum

  To everyone who loves their sci fi hot.

  This series is for you.

  1

  Rebecca blinked. “What?” It was hard to hear over the thumping music. She must’ve heard wrong, because there was no way—

  “You heard me. If you’re not gonna give me some head, you can get the hell outta my car and walk home, bitch.”

  She stared at him, pissed off like no one had been pissed off in the history of pissed off.

  He’d actually said that to her. He’d fucking said it. And in front of his two friends in the backseat, who were grinning ear to ear, snort-laughing and loving every minute of her discomfort. She clenched her fists. How dare he? Who died and made him king? “Fuck you and the horse you rode in on. I wouldn’t touch your dick now if it was gold-plated and the last dick on Earth.”

  Yes, Rebecca knew she had a bit of a potty mouth, and a temper, but usually she kept that all bottled inside. But holy crap, this guy had turned into such a piece of shit. She couldn’t hold back.

  Eric’s handsome features twisted into a mask of rage. The funny jock she’d agreed to go on a date with that night had been replaced with this selfish, misogynistic freak show in the driver’s seat, whose priority in life seemed to be getting a blowjob. And if that didn’t happen, look out. He turned from Dr. Jekyll into Mr. Hyde.

  Eric gave her the evil eye and jerked the steering wheel over. The car skidded to a halt at the side of the road. He slammed the gear into park, turned and pointed. “Get your ass out of my car.”

  The couple in the backseat cackled at her predicament.

  A headache pricked at her temples. God, if only she’d been bold enough to ask someone at the party for a landline to call for a taxi, none of this would be happening. She’d be at home, in her pajamas, watching reruns of Buffy. Not here, stuck with these assholes.

  “But…” She glanced through the car window at the dense forest and pitch-black nightscape that surrounded them. She was thrilled at the idea of getting away from these jerks. Except… “Go where?” she asked.

  “I don’t give a fuck. You’re walking home. Now get out.”

  So, she got out of the car. What else could she do?

  The chill in the mountain air nipped at her arms and legs. Her cute silver sandals crunched on the asphalt. She slammed the car door shut behind her, trying to think of a really biting parting shot to yell through the open window, the perfect remark to cut him with, but Eric barely waited for the door to connect before punching the gas on his sleek new sports car. He pealed out of sight without a backward glance. The car lights blinked and disappeared around the bend in the road. Silence descended, and Rebecca’s stomach sank like Titanic in the cold North Sea.

  She stood there slack-jawed for a moment. Her heart pounded in her chest like she’d just run the mile. It took a good five minutes for the enormity of it all to sink in.

  What the hell? Did that really happen? Had she really been dumped like trash, alone, past midnight, in the middle of nowhere?

  And holy shit, she’d left her purse on the floorboard of Eric’s car.

  She inhaled the crisp pine scent, trying to calm her nerves and not panic. Calm, calm, calm. Rebecca looked all around—at the road stretching ahead, the big fucking trees, the stars in the endless sky, and took another deep breath. Well, at least there was a full moon, so there was a bit of light. She glanced down, yanked her cell phone out of her pocket and tapped on the screen…and of course there was no 4G out here. Because, of course.

  Motherfucker.

  Her nose started to sting.

  Rebecca bit the inside of her cheek and examined the curve of the road and the dark trees on either side. Well, she could crash through the forest, which would be stupid, or instead she could walk along the side of the road. A car might drive by that maybe she could flag down, or at the very least she might find a tiny town, a house, or a minimart. She’d seen those occasionally on the way up but had no clue how far away they were.

  She exhaled.

  Road it was.

  So, she tucked her cell back in her pocket and walked forward, because at least she was doing something that didn’t involve getting hopelessly lost. Cold wind blew against her bare legs, rustling the miniskirt she’d worn that evening. She tightened her paper-thin cardigan around her torso. It was spring. Nice in the daytime, but chilly at night, especially up here in the mountains. And wow, these weren’t some pretend mountains, these were the real deal, the mountains John Muir had backpacked. She guesstimated Yosemite was only about an hour away.

  And she wasn’t even remotely dressed for this trek in the wilderness, let alone on the potholed pavement at the side of the road.

  Fucking shit.

  Rebecca sullenly kicked a small branch out of her way and continued trudging forward on her walk of shame, her desperate path back to civilization. It was freakishly quiet out here, in sharp contrast to the party she’d left earlier and the loud music pulsing in Eric’s car. Out here she could hear the wind brushing through the trees, the hoot of an owl…and that was about it. It would be nice if she weren’t so upset.

  “Why?” she yelled out to no one, shaking a fist at the glittering stars in the nighttime sky. “Why?” She choked off a sob, determined not to cry. If she cried, those assholes won.

  What kind of sense did it make for them to dump her on the side of the road? She was alone; she could get hurt out here. And no one would know. She’d never be found.

  And all because she’d refused to put Eric’s dick in her mouth?

  Really?

  For that, she’d been literally kicked to the curb. They’d slowed down and pushed her out, laughing like a pack of hyenas. She barely knew any of them. Eric had sat near her in psych class all semester. He’d asked her out a couple of times and she’d kept putting him off, but he was persistent. Finally, she’d agreed. Eric was handsome and on the basketball team, great on paper. Right? Why not give him a chance? What harm was one date? Looking back on it, she should’ve gone with her initial gut reaction of nope, bit of a jerk. But, trying to be nice, she’d given in.

 
Big mistake.

  He’d invited her to a party in the mountains—a two-hour drive away. “It’s slamming. Everyone goes there. You’ll love it,” he’d said.

  She wasn’t sure, but he was very convincing.

  And, well, sometimes Rebecca worried she was boring.

  She never drank, did drugs, or went out to any college parties or functions. Ever. She wasn’t a people person. She liked animals, especially horses. Horses, she could understand. People, not so much. This was why she was studying to become a large-animal veterinarian. But she’d decided she needed to put in more effort to make friends considering she usually kept to herself and hadn’t made a single new friend since moving away to college.

  So she went out with Eric and the couple he’d brought along.

  Two point five seconds after she’d stepped into the raucous party with Eric and his friends, Rebecca had known it was all a huge mistake. It wasn’t her scene at all. She wanted nothing more than to get away from the pounding music and crush of people. And when Eric had pushed her against a wall in a dark hallway and shoved his beer-soaked tongue down her throat, she’d rebuffed his advances.

  And from that point on, things had gone from bad to worse.

  Now here she was, walking along a backwoods road, nothing to guide her except the pale light of the full moon. And she was pissed off and embarrassed, a mess of nasty emotions all knotting inside.

  And then she heard the noise.

  It started out soft, a sort of buzzing sound, easily mistaken for a bee or a mosquito. She ignored it at first, too busy rubbing at her eyes and pushing her hair angrily away from her face. She muttered to herself, concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other.

  Then it got louder.

  Rebecca stopped and cocked her head to the side, listening. Something zoomed in. She gasped and looked up.

  Whatever it was, it was large, its presence shooting over her head and skimming the treetops. A gust of wind blew her hair in all directions and her skirt up around her hips. She shrieked and hopped around, trying to understand what was happening. She could almost feel the weight of it passing overhead as it went into the trees behind her. But she couldn’t make out what it was. One moment there was the thrashing of trees, a torrent of wind, and then…utter silence.

  Wow.

  Rebecca stood at the side of the road, stunned. Everything had returned to normal—the hoot of that owl, the fresh smell of pine, the stillness of the night. What the hell had that been?

  She turned and oriented. Whatever it was had gone in that direction, off the left side of the road, in the dense forest. There was nothing coming from that direction though. No filtered light through the tree trunks, no sound. Nothing. As if she’d imagined the whole thing. But it had happened; she was sure of it. But if so, wouldn’t she have seen the thing that had passed overhead? It was like an unseen airplane or a helicopter had swept over and landed in the midnight forest, invisible to her eyes.

  That was impossible, right?

  Realistically, she knew it was smart to keep walking and leave this puzzle behind, keep on with her original plan of following the edge of the road and ending up in civilization. A car might eventually pass that she could flag down for help.

  But…

  She pulled out her cell phone and turned on the flashlight app. What if someone had crashed? Maybe they needed help. She had to check this out. Or at least that was the story she was telling herself. She’d always been curious about everything. So curious. “My little Nancy Drew,” her mom had called her.

  Rebecca grinned, pleasant memories of her mother, who’d passed away two years ago from cancer, running through her head.

  Just a quick look. What harm was a quick look?

  She strode forward with a quick step into the uncharted forest in the direction she’d last heard the sound. Her thin sandals crunched against the needles in the undergrowth. The forest enveloped her like a black fuzzy blanket, the sameness both sinister and disorienting. Despite the light she had in front of her, she instantly lost sight of the road she’d been following. She stopped and glanced up to note where the moon was in relation to where she was standing, hoping this might help her find the road later if she got lost. The road was directly behind her, but when she changed direction, “behind her” could mean anything.

  Shit. Should she really be doing this? This could turn bad, fast.

  She took a deep breath and kept going. “They might need help,” she muttered.

  Rayzor pounded a fist against the emergency light blaring an audio warning, turning it off. It’d been a rough landing. His ship was a bag of bolts by most estimates, but still it was the fastest personal flier in the four sectors, with the tightest maneuvering ratio he’d ever seen. It wasn’t a thing of beauty, and nothing was regulation, but it did the job it needed to—helping him hunt down fugitives.

  But by the gods, the damn thing was always breaking down. Rayzor kicked at the nearest panel, heard something settle…and nodded.

  Fixed, finally.

  He turned and strode to the front vid screen on the bridge. Sensors had shown his target was on the move, so he’d jumped ahead, trying to land in a position to head the Mandible off. The idea had been risky, but worth the effort because it had worked. Now he needed to find his target and bring him in. Rayzor should be slipping in and out of this planet like a silent predator. Unnoticeable. The ship’s shield rendered it invisible to the human eye. The Mandible came to Earth often; this was his favorite hunting grounds—a remote section of the universe and an even remoter section of this planet, but with enough humans to eat comfortably without distractions.

  “Locate the target,” Rayzor ordered the ship’s computer. A holo-map formed, pinpointing the location of THX238, and something else, a moving red dot… “What is that? The life form on grid 6F?”

  “A humanoid female,” the computer answered.

  Rayzor growled deep in his throat and felt his jaw tighten. This was exactly the type of complication he had been hoping to avoid. He was here to capture and extract the genocidal maniac THX238. No other law enforcement or Bounty Hunter had been able to bring him in. But Rayzor was the best Bounty Hunter in the four sectors. His consistent number one status on the Leaderboards was proof of that. No one else had accepted this difficult mission. No other Bounty Hunter had wanted to come all the way to this insignificant, primitive planet on the edges of the known universe to capture this target. But Rayzor didn’t care what he had to do to apprehend this felon. The riskier the job, the more money involved. And if he made the amount he’d been promised for a clean extraction, he could retire.

  For good.

  No more running after felons and fighting for his standing on the Leaderboard. No more condemnation from every single Xylan he came into contact with for his position as a banished son of the notorious Kroga of Seventy-Five. He’d felt a certain sense of satisfaction over these last seven years as he’d proven wrong everyone who’d met him and prejudged him. He’d showed them his worth as he captured and brought in the worst murderers in the universe for extradition, but that wasn’t enough anymore. He needed peace, the peace only his remote residence on Zamarian Prime could afford him. The successful completion of this mission was his ticket out.

  His eyes narrowed as he focused on the moving red dot. He’d known this could happen. THX238 was here to hunt. But Rayzor needed to get in and out sight unseen to satisfy his mission parameters. Every intergalactic law he broke during this extraction would count against him in his final pay grade and his Leaderboard standing. Humans were primitive and therefore off limits. If a single human life was lost during the removal of his target, Rayzor stood to not only lose thousands of chits, he also could lose his license. Earth was remote to citizens of the four sectors and was also protected under the Rare Indigenous Species Act.

  “Where is the target?” he ground out.

  “THX238 is moving towards the humanoid female.”

  Rayzor suited up,
clicked his black armor into place, strapped on his weapons and walked into Earth’s comfortable night. Time to get to work.

  2

  Rebecca stilled like a deer, turning her head carefully, practically sniffing the wind. She was being watched. She knew it. Not a single sound, but the presence was there, and she could feel eyes on her. It was damn creepy.

  Was it a bear? Sweet baby Jesus, she had no idea what to do.

  Goosebumps ran down her arms. She stayed still, because if it was a bear, the last thing she should do was run.

  But eventually, standing stiff as a statue lost its novelty. That feeling of being watched faded and she couldn’t hear a thing but the deafening silence. She had to move. Rebecca licked her lips, took a deep breath and gingerly continued forward, hoping to find the airplane—or whatever that had landed in the spooky forest—sooner rather than later. There was probably nothing out there; she was losing her mind in the creepy, dark woods.

  This was starting to feel like an episode of The X-Files. The setting needed to be chillier and wetter, and Mulder should be there telling her to—

  What was that?

  Rebecca whipped around. Her whole body tensed. She’d heard a clicking sound…and it wasn’t human. It sounded like an insect, but louder than any insect could make.

  Oh, fuck. There it was again.

  She sucked in a breath. What the hell was that? Her heart pounded in her chest. She gripped the cell phone, tempted to use the light to try to pan the area but also scared of what she might find.