EnforcersCraving

by DJ Michaels

  Enforcer’s Craving

  DJ Michaels

  Dragon Alliance, Book One

  Chelsea is kidnapped from her Melbourne home and taken to an alien planet to be sold at auction. Luckily, she a gets a last-minute reprieve and is rescued by Tarkan and Ari, two sexy male dragon riders. The Enforcers have long resigned themselves to the fact that they will never have a woman of their own. But when Tarkan lays eyes on Chelsea he concocts a plan to ensure she not only commits to them, but will fight for their right to be together.

  Chelsea has many challenges in her new world but her biggest and most immediate concern is finding her best friend. Alone and without support, she turns to the only two people who have offered to help. If Chelsea accepts the bargain, the Enforcers will do whatever it takes to rescue her best friend. Chelsea is attracted to them, but can she risk herself and her heart with two men she barely knows?

  A Romantica® futuristic ménage erotic romance from Ellora’s Cave

  Enforcer’s Craving

  DJ Michaels

  Chapter One

  Chelsea fought the dark fog of unconsciousness and struggled to surface, the urgency in her best friend’s voice pulling her forward much faster than the incessant shoulder shaking.

  “What?” Chelsea mumbled, squinting against the harsh glare. “Did we have an accident? You okay, Tans?”

  “No, we didn’t have an accident and no I’m not okay.” Tansy’s voice wavered. “I don’t think any of us are okay.”

  Chelsea was lying on a hard bunk bed and as she struggled into a sitting position Tansy sat down beside her. Blinking against the harsh light Chelsea looked around the room but what she saw made no sense. She was in a large, rectangular room made of white laminate—walls, floor, and ceiling—and each wall was lined with beds stacked four high. Two doors provided the only break in the room, one heavy and firmly shut, the other half open and leading into what appeared to be a bathroom.

  There were about thirty young women scattered about the room, all different ethnicities, all looking as confused and shell-shocked as Chelsea felt. Her mind was sluggish, her thoughts vague and fragmented and she couldn’t come up with a plausible explanation for what she was seeing. Her voice was whisper soft as she leaned closer to Tansy. “What’s going on?”

  “I don’t know.” Tansy’s usually tidy hair was scrapped back into a messy ponytail and her light-brown eyes showed a level of fear that pushed Chelsea’s adrenaline sky-high.

  “What’s the last thing you remember?” Tansy asked.

  Chelsea rubbed her forehead, trying to diffuse the ache. “We were in my car, coming home from the movies. The engine and electronics died, and I pulled over to the side of the road.”

  “And?”

  “That’s it.”

  Tansy frowned. “That’s as far as I got too. I don’t know where we are or how we got here.”

  “Do they?” Chelsea asked, gesturing to the other women.

  “Not so far. We’ve been able to establish an array of nationalities, mainly from central Europe and the Americas. Most of them speak English but you and I are the only Australians, as far as I can tell.”

  “In this room at least.” Chelsea looked around the sterile chamber. “I wonder how many other rooms there are.”

  “I hadn’t even thought of that. Bloody hell, Chelse, there could be hundreds of us.”

  Chelsea’s heart clenched, skipped a beat, and then thundered like a race horse. “All women, all young and healthy. Do you think the people who took us are slave traders?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “Then what?”

  Tansy had no answer and neither did Chelsea, so they sat on the floor and clung to each other in silence.

  It was impossible to gauge the passage of time in the white room but eventually the locks on the large, heavy door clanked and clicked. At the first sound, Chelsea’s eyes jerked to the entrance and by the time the portal swung open she’d joined the other women as they came to their feet.

  Chelsea tightened her death grip on Tansy’s hand as they stood shoulder-to-shoulder. Two men came into the room, each holding a bulging bag, while a third stood in the doorway with some kind of weapon cradled in his arms. They looked like mercenaries to Chelsea—perfectly capable of taking care of themselves in a fight, but without the clean precision of trained military.

  One of the unarmed men held up his hand, revealing a small black box attached to his palm. He began to speak in an unfamiliar language, but the box translated for him and his words came out loud and clear in easily understood English.

  “Stand here,” he instructed, “two in front, everyone else lined up behind.”

  Chelsea didn’t let go of Tansy as they made their way to the line, but at the last minute Tansy pulled her hand away and stepped clear, turning to face the guard head-on. “Look, none of us know what’s going on here, perhaps if you—“

  The mercenary turned his cold gaze on Tansy and spoke over her. “The translation only works one way. You need to hear me to follow my orders, but I don’t need to hear you. So keep quiet, and line up.”

  Tans was a fighter, she’d served in the Australian Army for six years and she didn’t take shit from anyone. Even when she should. She was tall and her body was strong and athletic. “Listen, mate, I’m not asking for the moon. Just an explanation.”

  The armed guard near the door shifted position and lifted the barrel of his weapon, raising an eyebrow in challenge. His posture was so threatening he didn’t need words to intimidate her. One look from him and every bone in Chelsea’s body liquefied in fear. She didn’t know if the man would shoot Tansy or not but the calculated, detached expression in his eyes didn’t make for good odds.

  Chelsea took half a step out of line and extended her free hand. “Please, Tans. You won’t solve anything by confronting him when he’s armed and you’re not. Let’s do as they say for now, and bide our time.”

  Tansy gave her a hard stare. “Is that what you’re doing?”

  Chelsea ignored the attitude, understanding Tansy was a scared as she was. “I don’t know what the hell I’m doing. But I do know I don’t want to see you get killed because you’ve got a short fuse and a Xena complex.” She waited another beat. “Please. I can’t do this on my own.”

  “Fine.” Tansy moved next to Chelsea and pushed back into line, but her surface compliance did nothing to diminish the fierce anger that pulsed from her body.

  The men went back to business. Starting at the top of the line they worked their way down each side, affixing a thin metal band to the outside wrist of each woman. As soon as hers was snapped into place Chelsea examined it closely. It was as thin as paper, about five centimeters wide and there was no obvious opening or closing mechanism. The band was loose enough for her to fit one finger underneath and the smooth surface reflected the light with a cool, frosty gleam. Chelsea thought it might have been an identification tag of some sort, but as it had no markings or writing she couldn’t be sure.

  Once all the women were tagged, the mercs retraced their way up the line. When they got to Tansy they grabbed her and hauled her out into the middle of the room. The one with the translator held up his hand. “You are now cargo, duly registered and itemized. The cuffs on your wrists are officially for identification. Unofficially they’re there to help you acclimatize to your new life.”

  Tansy turned to him. “What new life?”

  His expression didn’t change, he simply pressed a button on the translator and she collapsed to the floor, her body writhing in agony before jerking to a halt, every muscle frozen. Her back arched almost in half and the tendons on her neck stood rigid and clearly visible. Chelsea rushed forward but the moment she laid a hand on Tansy’s arm she receiv
ed a jolt of energy so powerful it knocked her across the room. By the time her brain unscrambled and she began crawling back to her best friend, Tansy’s body was lax, her harsh, gasping breaths a match for Chelsea’s own ragged breathing. The guard walked over to Tansy and toed her with his heavy boot. “Consider that part of your orientation.”

  Chelsea fought a surge of panic as she crawled unsteadily to where Tansy lay. She’d only caught a brief ricochet of the energy and it landed her on her ass. She couldn’t even begin to imagine the agony of a full dose.

  As soon as she was close enough, she cradled Tansy’s head on her lap, smoothing a palm over her tear-stained face. Chelsea fought back tears of her own. “I’m not going to ask if you’re okay.”

  “I will be.” Tansy struggled to sit up. “I’m not letting those fuckers take me down. Or not for long, anyway.”

  Chelsea smiled as she helped her friend to stand. “Tough soldier-girl, huh?”

  “Bet your ass on it.”

  They were both wobbly as they shuffled over to join the line and the moment they were in position the guards moved them forward. They snaked out of their room, along what felt like kilometers of passageways, until they came to a chamber where the column halted.

  “Remove your clothing and put it in the chutes over there,” the guard said, pointing to a series of trapdoors set into the wall. After the salutary lesson provided by Tansy, the instruction to strip was followed without a whimper. Nobody liked it but no one wanted to be convulsing on the floor in agony either.

  The women reformed their line and walked into another room, this one much smaller than the last. The ubiquitous white walls, floor and ceiling were still in evidence, but this room was completely empty. The door slammed behind them and Chelsea’s fight-or-flight response kicked into overdrive. The adrenaline coursed through her body and she could do nothing but stand there, because there was nowhere to go.

  The clunk and whir of machinery heralded another event of some sort and Chelsea tried to keep it together. Part of her was expecting fatal gas or perhaps a hail of bullets, but when openings appeared in the walls and spewed out pink, fluffy foam she laughed in relief. The absurdity of pink foam after the horror and uncertainty of the last few hours seemed to snap something inside her. She knew her laughter was out of place but she couldn’t stop, not even when the foam got into her mouth and stung her eyes. Even when her lungs started burning and black dots floated across her vision.

  Tansy grabbed her upper arms, strong hands pinching despite the slipperiness of their skin. “Chelsea, knock it off. I get that you’re scared, we all are, but you have to keep it together.”

  She leaned into Tansy’s neck, sheltering her face from the spray so she could take breaths deep enough to get herself under control. It took a while. “I’m okay. Thanks.”

  Tansy pulled her hands away and pushed her saturated hair from her face. “Good. All this naked touching is freaking me out. But I was looking forward to slapping you back to normal.”

  Chelsea laughed, a real one this time. “I bet you were, hardass.”

  The foam stopped, replaced by a cool, clear mist that rinsed them clean and dried in a matter of seconds. Then a door opened. More shuffling. Another room, this time medical.

  That was the moment Chelsea’s drugged-fuzzed brain finally got back to work. The austerity of the room she woke up in, the advanced tech of the translation devices, the control bracelet—those things could probably be had if there was enough money involved. But what awaited them in this room went far beyond anything she’d ever seen or heard about.

  The technicians looked normal enough but the machinery and devices in the room weren’t like anything she’d ever seen, outside of a movie set. Ten stations were set up, each waist-high cubicle boasting identical equipment and instrument trays.

  Chelsea panted against her rising panic as the women were herded forward and handed off to the techs. Her heart raced almost out of her chest but she managed to stand still as she was scanned with a handheld machine and inoculated with some kind of pressure pump. The technician handed her a series of small cups containing various pills and liquids and she couldn’t do anything but swallow them.

  Then one of the guards stepped up behind her and braced her tight against his body, holding her immobile. She struggled to get free but when the tech came at her with what looked like a small nail gun she froze in horror. Closing her eyes against whatever horror was coming, she felt the cold press of metal just behind her ear. When the gun clicked, pain exploded in her skull and she clutched at her head in a futile effort to fend off the agony.

  The guard released her before she was ready and she staggered against the partition. Almost in tears, she sagged against the hard plastic and rubbed at the wound behind her ear. No blood and the pain had started to recede.

  She was still pretty shaky when they were herded into yet another room. This time they received clothing and she quickly dressed in loose trousers, a knee-length tunic and pull-on booties. They were herded off into more corridors but by now Chelsea was too traumatized to pay attention. She almost sagged in relief when a door opened to reveal the white room with the bunks. Not home but at least something familiar in this strange and scary place.

  Chapter Two

  Tarkan sat tight in the shuttle jump seat, eyes closed, going over the battle plans he’d already memorized. His stolen armor pinched in all the wrong places and he was fighting an unusual case of nerves. It wasn’t so much that this mission was ambitious, dangerous, and far outside the usual Enforcer job description. It was more that he was at his best on dragon-back, with the wind in his face and hundreds of pounds of scaled muscle pumping underneath him. He felt trapped, sitting far above the ionosphere in a small spaceship—recently liberated from their enemy—while waiting to dock with a much larger spaceship, which was most definitely still under enemy control.

  He turned to his den-mate. “This is fucked, you know.”

  Ari’s expression didn’t change. “I know. But think of the payoff if we get it right.”

  “Women.”

  “Mmm. At least twenty of them.”

  Which brought Tarkan back to the huge deficiency in the payoff portion of this mission. “But what’s the point?” he asked, lowering his voice so only Ari would hear. “We’re risking our lives to steal these females from under Brightstar’s corporate nose, and when we get back home we have to hand every single one of them over to the Council. The councilors will pick the best ones to marry and whoever is left over will go to the land holders. No Enforcer is going to even get a sniff at those women, no matter what the Council says. We’ll be stuck visiting the bower houses for the rest of our lives and we’ll never get a woman of our own.”

  Ari leaned in, his black hair shielding his face from the other Enforcers in the shuttle. “We’ve been assured that all adult males are on the list for a mating contract. We just have to wait until we each get our turn.”

  Tarkan grunted and sat back, wedging his shoulders into a seat not designed for a warrior of his size. “You talk a good talk, my brother but you don’t believe that shit any more than I do.”

  Ari let out a heavy sigh. “No, I don’t believe it but I don’t see what we can do about it either.” He clenched his fist and playfully punched Tarkan’s leg, hard enough to elicit a grunt. “Maybe when we steal these women for the Council, we should steal some for ourselves.”

  If only they could.

  Their conversation was interrupted when Jaxmyre, the Den Commander, moved to the center of the seating area. His stolen armor fit no better than Tarkan’s and he looked all kinds of wrong in the dark-blue synthleather of a Brightstar soldier.

  “Heads up, gentlemen. Our shuttle is about to fly into the center of the convoy and if that goes to plan we’ll be docking with the transport ship in five. As soon as the docking clamps lock on, I want everyone standing, helmets on, weapons hot. Try to look like blue-soldiers—competent enough but not too clever.” One side o
f his mouth kicked up. “If you look too professional they’ll know for sure we’re impostors.”

  The snickering lightened the mood but Tarkan suspected every man in the shuttle was as on edge as he was. This was their first off-world raid and the stakes were high. Not just for the success of the mission but the disaster that would follow if any Enforcer was identified and taken hostage.

  The shuttle jerked to a halt and the metallic clank of the docking clamps echoed around the tiny ship. Seat straps clicked loose and helmets were donned, each Enforcer checking his neighbor to make sure nothing was out of place on their uniforms. The inner door whooshed open and Tarkan’s nerves calmed between one breath and the next. The mission was on whether he liked it or not and for them to have their best chance, every Enforcer needed to be absolutely focused and totally on point. He made eye contact with Ari and after a quick nod they both flipped their visors down to cover their faces.

  When the guards came this time, Chelsea’s anxiety escalated into stomach-clenching fear. Helpless to do anything but fall into line with the other women, she walked the endless maze of corridors until her group came to a halt in a nondescript hallway. When they didn’t move off for a while, Chelsea and Tansy peered over and around the line trying to work out what was going on. It appeared they’d joined the back of another line of women but more than that they couldn’t tell.

  Their group shuffled forward about ten meters then held for a while, then they trickled forward again. The pattern repeated until they entered a large holding room manned by guards in blue leather uniforms and black helmets.

  Tansy was a good ten centimeters taller than Chelsea and she tiptoed to see over the group at the front.

  “I think it’s an elevator of some kind,” Tansy said. “It fits about twenty-five women at a time.”

  Chelsea wiped her sweaty palms on her tunic. “I wonder where they’re taking us now.”