Dazzled by the Alien Daredevil: An Alien Abduction Romance (The Kurians Book 5)

by Ashlyn Hawkes

  “You don’t need to keep me safe. That’s my job.”

  “But—”

  “Shh.” She places a finger against my lips. “No buts.”

  I sigh. “You’re impossible.”

  “Maybe now you understand your father a little more, hmm?” she teases as she moves to walk around me.

  I follow her to the cargo hold and the landing platform. I lower the ramp. The wind is fierce, but it slowly dies down, and I stare down at the ship, grateful that Isabella is back a bit and might not be easily visible to those beneath us.

  “You down there,” I shout, eyeing the five men on the deck. “You will give us Nina now, or we will start to fire on your ship.”

  "Go ahead," the tallest one says. Even from afar, I can see the smirk on his face. There's a line down the side of his face. I can't tell if it's a scar or if it's paint or a tattoo. "You do that, and there will be a war between the humans and the Novans."

  I grit my teeth. “Novans, Kurians, and Earthlings are all humans.”

  “Fuck you!” another one shouts.

  I grimace and aim at him. “If you don’t bring out Nina—”

  “You think you can just come here and make demands of us? You have no jurisdiction here, blue fucker. Go back to your planet now, or else you’ll be sent back in pieces!” the tall one shouts.

  “You’re Frankie, aren’t you?” I ask.

  He lifts his chin. “Who’s asking?”

  “Strol,” I spit out.

  “Never heard of you. Go back—”

  "My father is Nestrol as in Overlord Nestrol. You want a war? You'll have it," I hiss.

  “Strol,” Isabella murmurs. She grabs my arms.

  I shake my head and pull myself free. “If you don’t bring Nina where I can see her, I’m going to start shooting.”

  “Go ahead.” He holds his arms out wide and puffs out his chest.

  I grimace. “Ovian,” I mumble.

  “He knows you can’t shoot him because it will start a war."

  “He’s calling my bluff.” I rub my chin, still holding two guns, one in each hand. “Should I go down?”

  Isabella leans over to check.

  “You got yourself a trollop up there?” the man I assume is Frankie calls out. “Boys, we need to rescue her and teach her about how much she should prefer being with her own kind.”

  “You touch me,” Isabella says coldly, moving to be in full view so they can see her guns. They have to see that she means business, right? They aren’t that stupid, right? “You touch me, and you’ll be eating lead.”

  "Oh, she thinks she's a tough one, don't she? I like her fire, though she's gonna be a biter. I can tell. Pete, you like biters, don't you?"

  Pete grins. He’s missing a few teeth.

  Isabella shudders.

  “Let me go down,” I tell her. “I’ll clear them out—”

  "They have guns. We have guns. We can just fire down at them, pick them off one at a time, and—"

  “They fire at this ship, and it’ll go down,” I tell her. “I patched it up, but it’s by no means a perfect vessel.”

  She grimaces.

  Just then, a huge hook flies out of nowhere and digs itself firmly into the ramp. I try to yank it out and finally manage. Pete's a swift climber, about halfway up to the plane already, but I drop the hook into the water, and down he goes with a high-pitched scream.

  Two more hooks appear. Isabella uses the butt of a rifle to knock one down into the water, but the other drags against the ramp, pulls in tight, and then yanks the ramp half off. The plane shifts and tilts dangerously to one side. Isabella plants her feet, but it doesn’t matter. There’s nothing we can hold onto, and then the plane tilts northward so straight up that we tumble down and fall into the water. The goons from the deck jump into the water, far more of them than just five, and they grab our weapons and tie us up while we’re still in the water.

  We’re dragged onto the boat, and I wink at Isabella.

  On the flight over to find the boat, I told Isabella, “We might have to be captured to save her.”

  “But the plane—”

  “She’s not going to last long. In a fight, she’ll go down. Your weapons, the close range… she’s going to die, but she’ll be the only one to die. I promise you. Do you trust me?”

  “With my life? Yes.”

  “Do you trust me with Nina’s life?”

  She hesitated.

  “We need to be on the same page,” I told her.

  “Yes, but if I’m down on that boat—”

  “They won’t touch you.”

  “If they tie you up—”

  “They won’t find all of the weapons on me. I will keep you safe.”

  “I’m not too worried about me. It’s Nina I’m worried about.”

  “Then we have to get to her.”

  “So you want to be captured, don’t you?”

  “Yes, actually.”

  “You’re nothing but a daredevil to the very end,” she said with wonder in her eyes but a note of skepticism in her voice.

  “All of our daredevilry ways… just training for right now, this moment. We can do this. We can, and we will save her.”

  “I hope you’re right.”

  “Darling, I’m always right.”

  “It’s so strange to hear you call me that.”

  “You are. You’re my darling.” And I pulled her close for a long kiss that warmed me and touched my soul.

  She’s actually far more than my darling, but we can talk about that later.

  For now, everything is going according to plan.

  There’s just one thing.

  The rest of the plan is just to free Nina and to save ourselves. Not much of a plan, really, but that’s all right. We won’t fail.

  We can’t fail.

  Because if we do, all of us will die.

  16

  Isabella

  It’s nerve-wracking. Strol’s plan is crazy through and through, but I knew from the start that we wouldn’t be able to stay on the plane for the duration. I’m just grateful that it hasn’t fallen into the sea yet, the autopilot mechanism doing enough to at least keep the plane somewhat hovering.

  “I think we need to try and claim that,” one of the goons says.

  Frankie nods. “You can try to hook her and climb her. See if you can figure out the controls.” He realizes I’m glowering at him, and he laughs and crosses over, pinching my chin in his hand. “Kyle there used to be a fighter pilot. He knows planes. I’m sure your alien technology won’t be too hard for him to figure out.” Frankie spits at Strol.

  “You need to back off, buddy,” I tell Frankie.

  “Why’s that, darling?” he drawls.

  Hearing him call me that term that Strol just did not that long ago, a term I didn’t even like Strol using has me bristling. I already have a dagger in my hand, and I’ve been trying to cut my bindings already. The rope’s too wet yet from when I was tied in the water, though, so the serrated edge isn’t cutting through the fibers just yet. Plus, Frankie’s complete attention is on me, so I stop trying to free myself and force myself to grin at the asshole.

  “If you don’t stop, you’re going to have your brains blown out,” I say sweetly.

  “Oh, I don’t think so. If that’s going to happen to anyone, it’s going to happen to…” Frankie whips out a gun and points it inches from Strol’s head. “Him. Not me. Don’t you see? You lost. You picked this blue fucker over any one of us.”

  “I don’t know you,” I say dryly. “I’m not from around here.”

  “Well, you can plan on settling down here. One of my boys will claim you.”

  “I’m not a fucking prize to be won,” I spit out.

  “Your alien boyfriend here isn’t saying much in your defense,” Frankie says.

  “He’s thinking of all the ways he’s going to kill you,” I snap.

  "I don't' think so. He talked a big game while he was on his plane, but now
he's down here with us, and he's scared. Your cock's all shriveled, ain't it? All tiny and small, just like your pea-sized brain. You don't deserve our women, and you don't deserve—"

  “Why don’t you just send us on down below?” I cut in, wanting him to shut up.

  “You want to get away from me, don’t you?” Frankie asks. “Too bad, sweetheart.”

  “No. I want to know…”

  “You want to know what? That Nina is all right? That she’s alive? She’s not down below, sweetheart. She’s alive, yes, but until she apologizes—”

  Apologizes? For what? For wanting to go to Kuria?”

  "For breaking my heart!" Frankie shouts. He marches right up to me. For a man, he's short. I'm actually an inch taller than he is, and I smirk at the realization.

  “She broke your heart?” I repeat skeptically.

  “Yes, she did. She was going to date me, but then she—”

  “She what? Agreed to a blind date, saw you through the window, and ran away?”

  Frankie strikes me hard with the butt of his gun. Blinding pain strikes me, and wetness trickles down the side of my face.

  “It takes a real man to hit a woman,” I mock.

  “Keep it up, and I’ll kill you.”

  “You will not,” Strol says coldly.

  I glance over at him and frantically shake my head because Frankie's gaze is focused on Strol now instead of me. If Strol goes after Frankie, we won't have any idea where Nina is. I would love to have these guys be brought to justice and turned in instead of killed, but if we make a play now, we'll have to kill them, and I'm not free of my binds yet. Strol would have to do everything, and chances are too good that he'll get hurt or even killed in the process.

  “Ah, do you think darling here loves you? She doesn’t.” Frankie laughs and tilts his head to the side. He’s so very close to Strol that they could kiss if he wanted. “She just needs to have a real man’s cock in her.”

  “I only see one real man here, and he has blue skin,” I say.

  “You want me to scalp her?” someone asks as I’m yanked backward, an arm snaking around my face, a blade against my hairline.

  “Don’t you dare,” Frankie snaps. “She’s… She’ll be Kyle’s if he can get the plane.”

  Frankie squints and walks away a few steps, his attention on the ship. I cut and hack at the bindings and glance at Strol.

  He winks at me. He’s not nervous. Good for him. I’m terrified.

  Strol clears his throat. "You took it personally that Nina wants blue cock, huh?"

  “You better not talk to me about her or say her name again or else—”

  “Nina!” I shout.

  Frankie backhands me. I just grin at him.

  “She’s in the captain’s quarters, isn’t she?” Strol asks. “You want to keep her close.”

  “Have you touched her?” I demand coldly. “If you touched her, I swear I will—”

  “You aren’t going to do nothing to me,” Frankie says.

  He marches over to the cable that extends from the boat to the plane. Frankie holds out a hand, and one of the other goons hands him a cutlass. Grinning like a madman, Frankie glances at me, grins, blows me a kiss, and then he hacks the line. Kyle's stranded on the plane, which is now tilting at a slightly less severe angle.

  I glance at Strol. We're going to have to take command of the boat. Otherwise, we have no exit plan. There's no other option available to us. The plane is as good as lost, although it might be a floating dead duck and useless even if we could find a way back on board.

  “That plane of yours looks like a hunk of junk,” Frankie says as he strolls back over.

  The guys on the deck, maybe ten of them, all burst out laughing.

  “You didn’t come all the way from Kuria on that bucket of bolts, did you?” he asks Strol, getting in the alien’s face.

  “That ship is going to go all the way up your ass,” Strol says through gritted teeth.

  “That so?” Frankie winds up and punches Strol hard in the gut.

  I don’t expect Strol to react to that any. He’s a wall of muscle. But the pain etched in his face is more than I can bear, and when Frankie pulls back, I see a glint of silver.

  He’s wearing brass knuckles. At least they don’t have blades attached. I don’t see any red, so Strol’s not bleeding, but that had to hurt like a bitch.

  “Big guy, huh? Have to cheat to get in good blows,” I snap.

  “You and your mouth.” Frankie eyes me. “You’re going to need to learn some manners, ya hear?”

  “Well, I’m not going to learn any manners from the likes of you,” I spit out.

  “Aw, darling, don’t you think you’re hilarious? Here’s a hint. You aren’t. Want another? Keep your damn trap shut. A guy wants a woman who looks good on his arm, yes, with lips like yours around his cock. But he also wants a girl who knows that she should keep her mouth shut unless he asks her a question.”

  "A real guy wants to hear from his woman and also won't touch her unless she wants to be touched. Guess what? I don't want to be touched, and neither does Nina."

  Frankie marches over to me and grips my chin so hard that my teeth feel squished. “You don’t know Nina, so you don’t know what she wants. Worse? She don’t know what she wants either. She’ll know soon enough that it’s me she wants.”

  “That so?” I ask coolly.

  The glint in Frankie's eyes shifts. We're pushing him too hard, and I nod to Strol.

  He drops his ropes, and he grabs the first goon and tosses him overboard. Before Frankie can react, I bring up my knee and hit him square in the balls. With a grunt, he goes down, and I kick the side of his head.

  Before I can see if he's unconscious or not, two goons are heading toward me. I hit the first in the stomach, but a third comes around and grabs my arms, pulling me backward. I still have my legs, though, and I kick out, hitting the second guy in the stomach. The first recovers and dives at me, so when I kick, it comes up and hits underneath his mouth. His teeth clang, and he drops down to the deck hard. The other guy releases me, and the two of them check on him.

  At least they have a heart somewhat. I ignore the sound of gunshots behind me as I zigzag my way to the captain’s room. It’s locked, but I kick the knob five times before it breaks off. The door swings open, and something comes flying at me.

  “Whoa! Nina?”

  “You aren’t Frankie.” Nina eyes me, well, as much as she can. She sports a nasty black eye. That eye is swollen halfway shut. Her one arm dangles by her side.

  “Nope. Isabella. Strol and I came to rescue you.”

  “Strol?” she asks.

  “Come on.”

  I usher her out of there to realize that it’s complete chaos on the deck. Frankie has more like a dozen and a half men, and they’re running around like crazy. Strol doesn’t have a weapon, but he has a hold of some guy and is using him as a human shield. Frankie is screaming at his men to fire, but they aren’t listening. Good. I wouldn’t know what to think if Strol got his human shield killed.

  I slink down to make myself as small of a target as possible and motion for Nina to follow.

  That’s when the plane stops hovering.

  The men all shriek, and Frankie races to the steering wheel. We’ve drifted some from the spot where the plane hovered, but as she falls out of the sky, we’re too close. The boat just narrowly misses being hit, but the wave that’s generated causes the boat to nearly capsize.

  Despite the chaos and the heavy rocking of the boat, water covering the entire deck, Nina and I make it to where Strol is.

  There's no real choice in the matter because we have to get to safety. That's our first objective.

  “We need to—” I shout.

  “Jump!” Strol agrees.

  We race over to the railing. Strol lost his human shield before we reached him, and he jumps onto the railing.

  Nina jumps first. Strol and I nod, and we jump together. It’s not easy for Nina
to swim with her one arm, so Strol has her wrap her good arm around his neck, and he carries her.

  Frankie, the bastard, gets his boat moving a lot faster than I would’ve thought possible. He’s hightailing it out of here. As for the ship, it’s sinking fast, and my stomach churns. Did Kyle get out of there in time? Just because he associates with Frankie doesn’t mean I want him dead. I don’t necessarily want Frankie dead either. I’d rather he rot behind bars for the rest of his life. Kidnapping is no joke, and he at least fought and beat up Nina. Who knows if he did worse.

  Eventually, we make our way to shore, and I struggle to find a silver lining. Yes, we did it. Well, partially. We’ve managed to save Nina, that fucker Frankie and his goons still need to be captured.

  “Don’t you worry,” I tell Nina. “We’ll get them.”

  “I want to help,” she says stubbornly.

  On impulse, I hug her. “I’m sure you do, but your arm…”

  "It's not broken," she protests. "It just needs to be popped back in. I dislocated it once when I fell out of a tree when I was seven years old. I broke my first bone when I was three. I might've given my parents a few heart attacks over the years." She grins. "I want to give them hell."

  “I’m sure you do, but for now, how about we go see your parents and friends?” I urge. “They’re worried sick about you.”

  Nina hangs her heard. “You’re right, but if I do that, that means I won’t be able to go after them. There’s no way my parents will agree to that. They might not even let me out of their sight to go to Kuria now!”

  “Oh, I doubt that. You’re too headstrong for that,” Strol says. “Besides, you’ll be away from Frankie and his ilk if you’re on Kuria.”

  “True.” She eyes him. “Are they all as big as you?”

  “Just about.”

  She nods slowly. “It’s not about the sex. That’s not why I want to go. Something inside of me is calling for me to go there, and I want to help. I heard that they’re starting to build levitating cities, aren’t they?”

  “That’s the plan. It hasn’t started yet.”

  “Good. I want to be a part of that. I studied some engineering, and I really want to help with that. Plus, they do need women, and if I happen to fall in love…” She scowls. “That’s what most people don’t talk about. That I want to go because of my brain, not because of my body and wanting to spread my legs. But no. That doesn’t fit Frankie’s narrative, so he spread to everyone who would listen that I was a whore.”