“Yes. More than anything,” he said. Her taste lingered on his lips and her fragrant musk overwhelmed him. Every instinct urged him to take her—to claim his mate at long last.
He opened his eyes. Her undergarments lay in a discarded heap on the filthy floor.
“But not like this,” he said.
She whimpered and grabbed the waistband of his trousers, tugging him closer. “I want you. Only you. Don’t let me down.”
He grabbed her hips and lifted her as her legs wrapped around him. He ground against her, finding her wet, ready and tempting, but he remained in control. “Is this what you want? For me to fuck you in a filthy alley?”
“I think it’s more of a corridor,” she said.
He growled, not sure if it was a warning against interrupting him or frustration at his self-imposed restraint.
“Not important. Right. But, yes, Jaxar. I know what I want, and I want you. Now.” She bucked up against him to make her point.
He pressed his forehead to hers and waited for her body to still. “I will claim you. Properly. But this is not the location.”
“Why not?” Her voice sounded small, lacking her normal confidence. It pained him to hear such uncertainty.
“Do not doubt yourself. I live and breathe for you. Before I knew you, I lived and breathed for you. I waited a lifetime for you. I sat through long nights, convinced you were a dream sent to torment me, but I waited. And I will wait for the correct moment to claim you. I will not rush this. I will do it properly.”
Her heart hammered, then slowed. When she spoke, her voice remained level. “Those are the nicest words anyone has ever said to me, and I hate you a little for it because you’re right. I’m reacting again.” Her legs slid down until she could stand using her own strength. “I’m serious, though. I meant every word. I’ve already made up my mind about claiming and all that, but I think seeing Havik put me into a tailspin.”
She had already made her decision…
His heart sang. “Yes? When did you decide? Was it my astounding culinary skills? I have other skills that start with cu—”
Vanessa
Van put a finger over Jaxar’s lips. “Enough of that now.” He licked her finger and she rolled her eyes. “How about I stop having my ass hanging out?”
“Yes. Your ass is for my eyes alone.” He retrieved her discarded trousers and panties. “These have been on the filthy ground. They are not fit to touch your skin.”
She grabbed the panties then paused. “Maybe you’re right. Seems gross to put them back on.”
While she wiggled into her pants, Jaxar took the pink cotton panties and stuffed them into a pocket without saying a word. He adjusted her, resting her head against his chest and wrapping his arms around her.
“What is it with you and hugs?”
“Shh, my hugs are awesome. Let me hold you.” His arms tightened, refusing to let her go.
“I can hear your heart like this,” she said, her voice muffled.
“Then you hear that it beats for you alone.”
The service corridor connected to a side street. The main thoroughfare glowed in the distance. Drinking establishments and greasy spoons clustered at the junction. Of course, Havik found them immediately.
“My friends, I have found you,” the big red man said. He wrinkled his nose, as if he instantly detected what they had been up to but had the good manners to not comment. His glower, however, cranked up a notch.
“I am not your friend,” Jaxar growled. Van laid a placating hand on his arm. She wasn’t sure that Havik was her friend, either, but he might be, which is a thought she never imagined having.
“Keep him busy while I go into that shop.” She pointed to a clothing store edged between a shoe store and a shop that appeared to specialize in piercings. The last thing she needed was her ex-husband hovering over her shoulder while she picked out new underwear.
Thankfully, Sangrins were humanoid in size and shape without added extras, like tails. She picked out a few pairs of plain, sensible undies, then tossed them back in favor of stretchy lace threaded with a pink ribbon at the waist. Sensible panties waited for her back at home but nothing like these. She picked up a pair of stretchy black pants and wore both purchases out.
Jaxar and Havik were deep in conversation when she returned.
“How far away is the botanical garden? We’re burning daylight,” she said, knowing perfectly well the distance and direction of the garden.
“A brief journey. I will summon a transport,” Jaxar said.
“A garden? You always enjoyed gardens,” Havik said.
She knew that tone. “Yeah, no. You’re not invited.”
“I have time before my meeting. I would enjoy a public garden. All this green is quite new to me.”
Right. Perhaps it was the euphoria of an orgasm still singing through her veins or the lacy black undies or the subtle way Jaxar kept touching her old panties in his pocket, but Van was done with this bullshit. “This is a romantic date. You are not invited.”
The transport vehicle arrived. Much to her dismay, Havik climbed in right behind them. “It is a public vehicle,” he said, willfully ignoring his uninvited status. Then he said the dumbest thing she ever heard: “You need me to vet your suitors.”
She had worked so hard to keep her shit together in the dumpling shop because she was an adult. Letting Havik speak his piece was part of the forgiveness process and being a better person, blah blah blah. Too bad some jerks mistook courtesy for permission to boss her around.
“No. Absolutely not,” Jaxar said, totally on the same page as her. They needed a signal, so he’d know when to throw Havik out of the moving vehicle. A cutting motion over her throat was unmistakable. Universal, even.
“I barely like you and I certainly don’t trust you,” she said.
He blinked, his black eyes blank and disturbing. “I explained—”
“You explained sweet fuck all. Did it take you two years to get to Earth? Because that’s how long I was in school before I left. Two years. And how did you wind up on that station? Did you track me to Sangrin? I was in the system for a year, a whole fucking year, but now that I’m serious about another man, you pop out of the woodwork. You’re too late, Havik. I’m meeting his family and I’ve already accepted his proposal. We’re mates. So forgive me if I’m not going to let you invite yourself into my date with my boyfriend.”
She gave Jaxar the signal. The love of her life blinked at her, uncomprehending.
Havik’s glowering intensified, ratcheting right past disapproval and straight to scorn. “What do you know of this male?”
“Enough. I’m not arguing with you about this.” She gestured broadly over her throat.
“Are you well? Are you having an allergic reaction? Is your throat swelling? Breathe, Vanessa,” Jaxar commanded.
She batted away his hands. “No. I’m giving you the sign.”
“The sign?”
“To throw Havik out of the car! It’s obvious.”
“It is,” Havik said, nodding.
“Oh, shut up,” she snapped. “You’re not funny and you’re not cute. Jaxar, throw him out of the car already.”
“I will depart here,” Havik grumbled. The transport pulled up to the curb. “To answer your questions, I was at the station because I have a meeting with your warlord. It seems we have intersecting missions.” He paused, attention snagged by someone on the street. Moving quicker than anyone with his bulk should be able to move, he pulled Van from the vehicle. “Come with me.”
Chapter 22
Jaxar
Jaxar grabbed the impertinent male and threw him against the vehicle. The fiberglass shell flexed from the force and the shrill alarm of the vehicle’s collision detection sounded. “Warning. Do not lean against the vehicle. Any damage will be charged to your user account.”
He ignored the robotic voice and held the curved karambit to Havik’s gut. “Do not touch Vanessa. You do not have her permis
sion.” She was his mate, not Havik’s. The intensity of his outrage got the best of him. “She begged me to claim her a moment ago. She is my mate. Mine.”
“Yes. I heard and I can smell. Unhand me.” Havik brushed off his jacket and tugged at the cuffs. “I spotted a known associate of my quarry. I need you to follow.”
“Not my mission. Not my concern,” Jaxar said. He turned back to the vehicle only to have it pull away into traffic.
“I am too easily spotted.” Havik pulled out three comm pods to be placed in the ear. “It is important.”
Jaxar huffed. He doubted that. The male only wanted to impress Vanessa.
“It is related to the females aboard your ship. Your warlord will want you to follow,” Havik said.
Vanessa gave her former mate a dubious look before accepting the comm pod. “Fine, but I don’t trust you.”
Neither did he.
Jaxar placed the pod in his ear. He had no reason to trust the male and the fantastic tale of betrayal and loss he spun, and he had even less reason to assist the male in following a target.
“Do not worry. We will maintain our distance and disengage if the situation appears risky,” Jaxar said to Vanessa. He took her hand as if they were enjoying a casual stroll.
“If this is about who abducted those women and sold them, then it’s important,” Vanessa said. Jaxar warmed at her words. His mate had such a compassionate heart.
He glanced over his shoulder and his top lip curled back at the sight of the red male. Vanessa’s heart could be too compassionate, in his opinion.
The pod chirped and hissed with static before Havik’s voice came through. “Stop making faces at me. You need to go faster. The target will soon be out of your visual range.”
“No. Dashing after your target will make us conspicuous, which is as good as having your giant red hide run them down.”
“Plus, I don’t run,” Vanessa added. “So who are we chasing and why? Are they dangerous?”
“Are they?” Jaxar asked. Placing Vanessa in a hazardous situation was unacceptable.
“The male with the overly coiffed hair and gold caps on his horns. Yellow and green striped tunic. I recognized his face. He was apprehended last year for trafficking sentient beings, but he struck a deal to avoid imprisonment,” Havik said.
“Okay, that’s bad, but—” Vanessa started to say.
“You vanished from Earth,” Havik said.
“I really didn’t.”
“There were no records of you leaving, at least under your name and identifier. Other females have similarly disappeared. The Earth authorities recruited me to discover who was taking their citizens and why. My sources led me here,” Havik said.
“You thought I had been taken by traffickers?”
Jaxar rubbed a hand on her back to soothe her.
“How else would you explain your disappearance?” Havik replied.
“Fine. I did want to vanish.” She fell silent. Jaxar knew the story about the government contractor who pressured her into volunteering again and how that made her feel threatened.
“How many females have disappeared from Earth?” Jaxar asked.
“Enough to warrant investigation,” Havik replied, which was no answer at all.
“Not enough for the general public to notice but enough to form a pattern,” Jaxar mused. “They will be vulnerable, perhaps without family or close friends. They will not have children of their own, because their absence would be noted immediately.”
“Oh shit. If they’re not mandated to report for testing, they could go years before anyone noticed they were gone,” Vanessa said, echoing his own thoughts. “Who would do that?”
Indeed. Since discovering the smuggled females in the stasis chambers, the warlord had been asking the same thing. The buying and selling of sentient beings was illegal in every planet holding an alliance with the Mahdfel. Jaxar’s people had been created to be slaves. They would not tolerate such atrocities and actively disrupted such trade when they discovered it.
For such an outrage to happen on a planet under Mahdfel protection went well beyond an outrage.
It was an open declaration of war.
Vanessa
A short walk led them back to the spaceport. The area hummed with activity. Shuttles left in a steady stream to the orbiting station. Vehicles made deliveries to warehouses. Small cargo vessels skimmed above the buildings, on their way to planetside destinations. Workers on breaks lounged outside, enjoying the late afternoon sun, and others loitered in taverns. Automated bots rolled by, laden with packages.
Nothing stood still and nothing closed, as ships laden with cargo and passengers arrived at all hours.
Van loved the energy of the docks, even though the smell left something to be desired. Exhaust choked the air, barely covering the unmistakable stench of rotting produce and spoiled food.
She pulled away from Jaxar, noticing that people did not take a lackadaisical stroll through the spaceport. They walked with purpose. They had business to take care of, to work a shift, catch a flight, or have a drink.
Jaxar paused at a drink vendor where Van ordered the largest iced concoction she could. The heat had been pleasant at first, but the humidity made her shirt cling to her and she felt sticky everywhere. They took their time perusing a flower stall. A bouquet with tiny little red buds on a stalk, shaped like lavender, enchanted her.
As their quarry led them deeper into the neighborhood, the respectability of the storefronts faded as the buildings grew shabbier. The lane became narrower and the sun dipped behind the buildings, casting everything in gloom.
The guy they followed finally went into an old warehouse that looked ready to fall over. She and Jaxar continued to walk past and circled around to rejoin Havik in an abandoned building that overlooked the back of the warehouse.
Water damage warped the floor and the interior smelled musty, like a fungal infection waiting to happen, but the building was otherwise clean. No refuse, signs of drug paraphernalia, or rodents. That didn’t seem right.
He watched the building through a pair of specialty lenses. “Activity inside is minimal.”
“Is this location secure?” Jaxar asked.
“Yes.”
“Because I have only one small blade. That is not enough to protect my mate.”
Havik made a grumbly-annoyed noise, then pulled out a pistol from his jacket pocket. “Use this if you must bolster your sense of inadequacy.”
Growl, growl. Snarl, snarl.
Boys.
The unmistakable click and hum of an energy blaster readying to fire brought their posturing to an end.
Chapter 23
Jaxar
Havik was an idiot.
The Sangrin male they had followed now held them at gunpoint, along with three other males. “Good thing you Mahdfel aren’t known for your brains,” he said with a sneer. “Now drop the pistol and kick it over here.”
Jaxar moved forward. The male swung the gun toward Vanessa. He froze instantly, seething with rage. Four regular males against two Mahdfel was not a challenge, if not for Vanessa’s vulnerability.
“Oh, so the female is important to you. I’m guessing your mate?”
Jaxar held his hands out, palms up, in a sign of supplication, but said nothing.
“The pistol. Now,” the male snapped. Havik complied. “Not very smart dragging your mate along when you followed me.”
“I will tear you limb from limb,” Jaxar promised in a cool voice. This was his fault. Irritation at Havik’s prodding and poking distracted him from securing the building, from protecting his mate. When Vanessa invariably changed her mind and declined his mating bite, he would not fight her. She would be correct. He was unworthy.
“Absolutely charming.” He whacked Vanessa in the side of her head with the blaster. She crumpled to the floor, the wound already bleeding.
Rational thought stopped for Jaxar. He was all instinct and fury and demanded that the male pay for ever
y precious drop of Vanessa’s blood that he spilled.
An electric jolt seared through him and dropped him to the filthy floor. His muscles twitched, but they did not respond. Havik lay next to him, his eyes fluttering and his lips moving as if trying to communicate a warning.
Idiots, the pair of them.
“I would behave if I were you.” The male placed restraints on Jaxar’s hands, tugging them to ensure that he could not slip them off, then did the same to Havik. Satisfied, the male hauled Vanessa to her feet, twisting her arm and pressing the blaster to the base of her skull. “On your feet. Now march.”
Vanessa
So, this was fun. The guy with the atrocious sense of fashion frog marched her across the dank alley, into the warehouse, and down a groaning set of stairs. Voices were muffled and she wasn’t sure if that was the ringing in her ears or if her translation chip was malfunctioning. She didn’t have long to ponder it as they were all shoved into a locked room that at one point might have been a meat locker or a walk-in cooler. She didn’t need to know what the man waving the gun around was saying to understand what he meant.
Stay here. Don’t be trouble.
Right.
The ringing in her ears and throbbing in her head threatened to overwhelm her. Leaning against a wall, she focused on the room.
It stank and had minimal ventilation. A figure huddled in a corner at the back. Near the door, a snarling, half-starving dog-thing had been chained up. Clearly, it was meant to act as a guard, but Van couldn’t help but feel for the animal. It had a ferret-shaped body and short legs but looked large enough to stand at her hip. Van suspected it had white fur under the gray grime, but the lighting made it difficult to tell. It had black large ears perched on top of its head and black crests that ran down the spine until reaching its black tail.
Claws clicked against the concrete floor. The animal backed up and growled, ears pressed back flat.
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