“Good lord, I hope one of them picks her,” Talia murmured to Lukan before she went off to mingle with the crowd.
She pulled the women aside one by one – no easy task with all the men clustered around them. She talked to them at length and also talked to the men who were visiting. Then she sat back and observed the interactions of the men and women, taking careful notes.
Afterwards, she and Lukan flew back to his home and sat down in Lukan’s office to discuss what she’d found. Mar-ee hovered in the background, ever-present.
“The problem is with the screening process,” Talia said. “Alexandra built up a successful business on Earth by appealing to a particular type of clientele. She matched women who were beautiful by Earth standards with very wealthy men. They both knew what they were getting. But she hasn’t changed her approach at all when she’s screening women for Ilyria, and it’s a massive fail. She sold these women on the fact that your packs are extremely wealthy and the women would be living in luxury. She didn’t sufficiently explain how important family was to your packs, how they should only come here if they were ready to have a lot of children, not just one or two, how fitting into the pack would be vital…honestly, ninety percent of the women at the party tonight shouldn’t even have been there.” She held up a pad of paper. “I made a list. They’re here for all the wrong reasons, and if they decided to stay here, they’d be miserable.”
Lukan shook his head in dismay.
“And,” she continued, “I looked over the contract that you have these women sign. The fact that you require these women to leave Earth forever and never return? That’s going to further cut down your ability to recruit quality women. I understand that you only select women who have no children or close living family, but still, many women have friends they don’t want to leave behind. And many women won’t be willing to leave behind their culture, everything they’re familiar with. If they could at least visit Earth from time to time, it would be much better.”
“They can’t,” Lukan said. “Federation law is absolute on that. There are a number of low-tech planets that Federation members are completely banned from. We do not interfere with these planets until they reach a certain level of technological advancement. It has been tried in the past, and it never ends well. Mass panic, fear of alien invasion, wars breaking out, that kind of thing.”
“Still. It’s pretty extreme. I’m glad I don’t have to sign that kind of contract.”
Lukan’s heart dropped. “But you do,” he said. “There are no exceptions. I thought you knew that.”
It felt as if the temperature in the room dropped twenty degrees. Talia went still, and was completely silent for a long, long moment. Lukan felt everything inside him go still and cold. It felt as if his heart wasn’t even beating. It could not be. They could not have come this far, experienced so much pain to be together, only for it to be snatched away again. It was too cruel.
“Say something,” he pleaded with her.
Slowly, Talia put the pad of paper down and stared at him. “Lukan. You know my father and grandparents live back on earth. And Rosamund is one of my best friends, and actually I have a bunch of good friends that I wouldn’t leave behind. They would notice if I disappeared.”
Lukan swallowed hard. “I can arrange for your family to be moved to a mansion on Earth. They would be supported in luxury for the rest of their lives. You could…you could send them messages, pretending that you were living overseas…”
Even as he said it, he knew it wouldn’t be enough for her.
Lukan felt fear rushing through him. He’d never been afraid before.
This could not be. He could not lose his Talia.
But of course she wouldn’t leave her family behind. Talia was loving, and loyal, and the perfect woman. Too perfect to abandon her family. Too perfect for him to have a hope of keeping her by his side for the rest of their lives. His heart twisted in his chest as he looked into her beautiful eyes, suddenly glossy with tears. Now…now that he had tasted what it would be like to have Talia as his pair-bond, he didn’t think he could bear to lose her. His heart would break. And worse than that, she was hurting too. His stupidity had hurt her. He wanted to howl.
Why hadn’t this occurred to him before? It was his stupid var-hool, his overwhelming need and desire for her, clouding his mind.
“Lukan.” Tears filled her eyes and ran down her cheeks. “No. I can’t abandon my family any more than you could abandon your pack. And I would never ask you to, or let you do that, even though this breaks my heart.” She hugged herself, rocking back in her chair, her face a mask of misery.
Lukan thought he would die.
Anything but this. He would rather lose a limb. Face a pack of ravenous multa-tooths naked, with his hands tied behind his back, dipped in gravy. Swim through lava.
“But the Federation law says that if you do not agree to this, you will have to return to Earth, and your memory will be erased. You will not remember me at all.” He shook his head in denial. This could not be. Talia was part of him now. Life without her would be ugly, and hollow.
She raised her tear-stained face and met his gaze. “Isn’t there any way around the Federation requirements?”
Unhappily, he shook his head. “They are notoriously stubborn. It took us years to convince them to let us work with Alexandra. That is why we are still tolerating her terrible behavior. I will appeal, but it is very unlikely that they will listen.”
It was impossible.
She sucked in a sharp breath. “Then send me back. Right after Cora Lee’s pair-bond ceremony. And I can’t spend any more time with you before then. I’m in love with you, and the more time I spend with you, the more miserable I’ll be when I leave you.” She stood, and tears ran down her cheeks and splashed on her shirt. “But I guess I won’t remember you once my memory is erased.”
Lukan reached for her, and she moved away. He felt as if a red hot iron were stabbing him in the heart.
“Talia!” he cried out.
“Permission to bitch-slap?” Mar-ee demanded. “I got it right that time. Bitch-slap, not female-dog-slap.”
Lukan swung to face her, his fists clenched. “I will melt you into a slag heap!” he roared at her.
“No you won’t,” Mar-ee said, dodging behind Talia. “Go ahead, melt me, I dare you!”
“Mar-ee, find me an empty room somewhere in this place,” Talia said. “I’ll sleep there until it’s time for me to leave.”
Lukan waited until they’d left the room to throw back his head and let out a howl of pure anguish.
In a blind rage, he began destroying the room, piece by piece. The chairs. The table. The paintings. Reduced to splinters as he smashed and smashed until his fists bled, then smashed some more.
Chapter Fourteen
Twenty-three women sat in the waiting room outside the memory chamber, pouting. They had been led to believe that they’d be marrying into a life of extraordinary wealth and leisure, and they weren’t happy about being sent back home, even though they’d all be very well paid just for having come to Ilyria at all.
Talia stood inside the memory chamber, across the room from Lukan. She had insisted on being there. She’d agreed to write up a questionnaire for Million Dollar Matches, to help do a better job of selecting prospective female clients, but she would only do it if she was sure the process did not harm the women in any way.
The memory chamber bed stood next to a column that was pleasingly shaped like an abstract sculpture, in keeping with the Vulfan’s aesthetic sense, of making functional objects beautiful. It looked like a tall column of crystal, with jagged edges on top. A beautiful woman lay asleep on the bed. A white-robed attendant spoke to the column.
He described, in detail, what the model would think had happened. Like all the girls, she’d been given a cover story to tell her friends. She would claim that she had left the country on an around-the-world trip.
If she’d decided to stay on this alien world, sh
e would have written emails to her friends, describing how she had met the man of her dreams while traveling, and would not be returning home, and fake pictures would have been sent along with those emails.
Since she was going home, the memory chamber implanted memories of her wonderful travels, and also came up with a cover story for why there was now a hundred thousand dollars deposited in her bank account.
The woman would forget all about the dating agency, and would go on with her life, considerably richer.
Talia watched the woman on the bed closely. She lay there with her eyes closed and a smile on her face. She clearly wasn’t suffering at all.
Lukan walked up to Talia. “You see?” he said in a low voice. “We do not harm them. We would never harm a woman.”
“I do see.”
He seized her hand in his, and she looked up at him, fighting the desire to grab him and pull him towards her. She had barely slept the night before, barely eaten today. She was miserable.
“I have what I think is good news. The Galactic Federation contacted us, and wanted to purchase the technology that we used to destroy the cyborg ships. Nobody else has been able to develop technology like ours.” He looked her in the eye. “We told them that instead of money, we will only give them the technology if they allow us to relax the rules on our mates traveling back to Earth.”
Talia gasped. She felt the dark cloud of misery start to lift, just a little. “Do you think there’s a chance?”
He nodded. “I do. The cyborg fleet is becoming more active, and there was a recent attack on a cargo ship, in which the ship was taken by the cyborgs and all hands on board were lost. The Federation is desperate. And we discussed putting safeguards in place. The women who return to Earth would agree to wear a special monitor that looks like a piece of jewelry. It would monitor the woman’s speech at all times, and if at any point she tried to remove the jewelry, or started to talk about Ilyria and her off-world experiences, she would immediately fall unconscious, and her memory would be completely wiped. As in totally. She would have complete amnesia, forever, and not even remember her own name.”
Talia considered that. “I understand. I could accept a solution like that. As long as the women were warned in advance about what could happen to them, then I think that is a solution that could work.”
“We will hear their answer soon,” Lukan said. “They tried to argue, but I stood firm. I spoke to the Thorolf clan, and they agreed with me on this. It looks as if we are closer to reaching a full truce with them. Thanks to you,” he added, and kissed her hand.
Talia felt a rush of arousal wash over her, and stifled a moan.
“You like it when I do that?” Lukan said.
“Maybe.” Talia smiled and stepped a little closer to Lukan.
“I know what else you like,” he murmured. “Would you like me to demonstrate?”
“Right here?” Talia’s cheeks heated with embarrassment, and she glanced around.
“Anywhere you like.”
“Perhaps your chambers would be more appropriate.”
“Our chambers,” he corrected, and stroked her arm, drawing forth a moan of pleasure that she couldn’t suppress. “And afterwards I will take you on a tour of our property.”
Before Talia could answer, the door to the memory chamber opened, and Alexandra stormed in.
“You’re sending all these women back without even consulting me?” she yelled. “How dare you?”
“I do not need to consult you,” Lukan growled.
“I will not permit this!” She stamped her foot in fury. “You’re just doing this out of spite. I spent weeks and weeks interviewing these women and preparing them to come here, and you’re rejecting them without even giving them a chance? They’re supposed to be able to stay here for a month! If you don’t let them stay here for that full month, then I demand to be paid the full commission for each one, the same as I would if they were successfully mated.”
“Absolutely not,” Lukan said. “And I warn you, you do not want to test my patience, or even be near me. I have not forgotten the unnecessary pain you caused both me and my true mate for the past year with your lies.”
“You could easily pay me for every single one of these referrals, and never even notice the financial loss,” Alexandra said angrily.
“That is very true,” Lukan said scornfully. “However, I choose not to pay you for two reasons. First of all, my people do not pay for work that was not done as it should be. It does not matter if we have all the money in the world, I will pay none of it to you for work poorly done. And secondly, I despise you, and would not enrich you in any way.” He put his arm around Talia’s shoulders. “Now leave me and my true mate. You foul the air with your presence.”
“That is it,” Alexandra hissed. “I will tolerate this no longer. I’m ending our partnership. You will have no more brides from Earth. I hope the Thorolf Pack declares war on you for your insolence, and destroys you.”
Lukan shrugged. “Very well, end our partnership. It is better that way.”
Alexandra stared at him, confusion replacing the anger on her narrow, pretty face. “Your people will die out. Is that what you want?”
“The Galactic Federation finds itself in dire need of technology that only we have. They are becoming more agreeable to our demands. I can start my own dating agency on Earth.”
Alexandra let out a gasp of dismay. Talia suspected that Lukan was partly bluffing, but Alexandra didn’t know that.
She stood there glaring at him and blinking very hard. Finally she said, her voice shaking, “You’re going to regret this,” and stalked out of the room.
Chapter Fifteen
“Ooh, I can’t wait to see this,” Talia said eagerly, hurrying towards a colorful field behind Lukan’s castle. “It looks like millions of jewels glittering in the sunlight.” Lukan had his arm slung around her shoulders, and Mar-ee was hovering along next to them.
“Those are flower gardens my grandmother planted. They were my mother’s favorite place to go as a little girl.”
Talia looked around in wonder. There were flower trees with colorful explosions of blossoms on their branches. There were pink bell-shaped flowers that leaned towards them as they walked by, and puffed out perfume. There were white flowers that glittered like diamonds, and fields of flowers that were as tall as cornstalks.
There were even flowers that hummed and trilled like birds.
“What is that?” she asked, pointing.
“The statue garden. And there is a…what you’d call a gazebo in the middle of it.”
Lukan led her through the statue garden. There were statues of Vulfans, both in humanoid form and in animal form. There were statues of other animals of their world as well.
Small robots moved discreetly through the garden, fertilizing, trimming away dead blossoms, and sweeping up dead leaves.
“I had forgotten about these statues,” Lukan said. “I hadn’t thought about them in a long time.” When she was with him, he saw the beauty of the world through her eyes. His mind was not just focused on military strategy, and death, and war, and planning for war.
“If I could stay here, I’d want to come here every day.”
Then his eyes gleamed. “Let me show you something else.”
“I can’t wait,” she said.
He led her over to the gazebo. There was a bed inside, freshly made up with white sheets. A male serv-bot stood by the entry to the gazebo, seemingly shut down. He stared off into nothingness, his eyes dull. He sort of looked like the male version of Mar-ee, wearing a metallic valet’s uniform.
As they approached, he perked up. His eyes lit up, and he seemed to shake himself a little, then glided towards them.
“Welcome,” he said. “I have been waiting to serve you.” He peered at Lukan. “I have not seen you in many years.” Then he looked at Talia with interest. “You have a true mate now. Your father would have been most pleased with your choice.”
�
��Good heavens,” Talia said. “How long have you been waiting out here?’
The robot appeared to think for a minute. “I have been in stand-by mode for ten years.”
Lukan grimaced. “After my mother died of the Population War sickness, my father could not bear to visit here anymore. And he died shortly after that. I didn’t come out here for a long time either. But now, somehow, with you by my side…I can look at the flowers and remember the happy times I had here, rather than the sadness.”
“I’m so glad to hear that.” Talia’s smile was like the sun beaming down on them.
He Lukan led Talia towards the bed, and Mar-ee and the serv-bot started to follow them.
“Get out!” Lukan growled at them. “I want some privacy!”
The serv-bot looked a bit dejected as he turned away.
“Do not feel too badly,” Mar-ee said to him, gliding next to him. “Lukan has a terrible temper.”
“Wait!” Talia called after them.
The serv-bot hesitated, hovering above the ground, and glanced at Lukan to see what he wanted.
“Do as my mistress says,” Lukan said. “Her command is my command.”
“What I would like both of you to do is go to the house, prepare a picnic lunch for Lukan and me, and return in two hours.”
The male serv-bot brightened, and bowed his head to her.
“I am Farex, and I am at your command,” he said. He turned around again and descended the gazebo steps.
“The two of them are going to have sex while we are gone, and they do not want us to watch,” Mar-ee explained to him as they left.
“Mar-ee! TMI!” Talia yelled after them.
“I do not understand that, HBF,” Marie called back. She and Farex glided off through the flowers.
“Only two hours?” Lukan grumbled.
“After two hours, I expect to have worked up quite an appetite,” Talia said.
The Vulfan's True Mate (A BBW Paranormal Romance) (Starcrossed Dating Agency Book 1) Page 8