Page 103 of Mated By Twilight

They should have kept closer watch on her. They shouldn’t have just trusted, blindly, that she would be alright with Skara.

But there would be plenty of time to beat themselves up later.

For now, they focused on running to the security room. There were cameras all throughout the public areas of the Star, and a few of the private ones in the back. With all the fans gathered in the entrance hall, there was a lot more focus there. But unfortunately, there were also a lot more people to keep track of. It would be all too easy to lose track of one small human.

As security contacted Corvidair and the station authorities, Tillos and Sollit were watching the playback of the cameras.

The authorities would help, true, but they were her mates. It was their task to go after her, and they were here and able now.

And every law in the Coalition supported their right to chase her down and get her back by whatever means possible if she had been taken against her will.

Tillos operated the main holodisplay of the security room as Sollit stared carefully. Tillos sped through the moments of their arrival. Leah was so beautiful it hurt. He smiled a bit as he watched her again ride the steps down to their parents and accept the bouquet.

She met with the fans. The distance between them getting bigger.

And there, the moment Skara met up with her. The ratchi female took their mate to the alcove and they talked for a short while.

As Skara was leaving, alone, Tillos stopped speeding through the video, and they watched in real time as Leah stood there. Almost out of view of the cameras.

They were so focused on her, they almost missed the bright spark of pink that approached. If she hadn’t gotten so close, Sollit wouldn’t have noticed Biella there at all.

Leah certainly didn't miss her, however. She turned and fell back a step in surprise.

Biella’s back was to the camera, so they didn't see what she did. If they hadn’t been watching her carefully, they might not have noticed when Leah suddenly slumped against her, flowers dropping to the ground. Biella kicked them further into the alcove, out of sight, and swept her arm around Leah, then ran out holding onto her like she was a heavy sack squished against her chest.

The entire thing was over so quickly, no one even noticed. The crowd was focused on Skara who had grabbed their attentionwhen she walked out of the alcove. Tillos and Sollit were on the other side of the room, talking to their own fans, and Biella blended into the people slowly trickling out. None of them even thought there was anything unusual going on.

Their mate had been taken away, just that quickly, right under their noses, and they hadn’t even noticed. No one saw it.

“She can’t have gone far,” Sollit said, mostly grasping for reassurance for himself.

Though, it was true. The station was on the large size, owing to the fact that it was a theme park. And though Biella was able to get out and into the tunnel without being spotted, she wouldn’t be able to get far with a human so obviously limp against her chest.

At least, he hoped not.

“Does Biella have her own ship?” Tillos asked.

“No. She uses public transport,” Sollit said. They’d asked her that very question on their date. She had to spend a fortune just following them from place to place. They had even joked about it being cheaper at some point to just buy her own ship, but Biella told them she didn't have a pilot’s license for interstellar travel.

Unless that had changed in that time – which was possible – she was still doing public transport. Which meant shereallycouldn’t get out of here with Leah in tow.

She had to be somewhere on the station.

“Do we search?” Sollit asked, looking at Tillos.

His brother frowned. “This place is huge.”

“Split up?”

“Even then…”

“If only we put a tracker on her,” Sollit growled. It wasn’t really unheard of for mates to track each other like that for safety. But it hadn’t seemed necessary since she was always with them.

“Wait,” Tillos jerked his head up. “Skara!”

“Skara?”

“She’s ratchi!”

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