Page 1 of The Alien Warlord's Fated Mate

Chapter One

Mia Reynolds hummed beneath her breath as she inspected the plants growing in the greenhouse dedicated to her experiments. She’d been working on developing highly nutritious, drought-resistant strains of various cereal grains her entire career. The tray of newly sprouted oat seedlings in front of her represented one tiny step along the path to ending world hunger.

These seedlings could do that without requiring tons of chemical fertilizers and pesticides to grow, the way genetically modified corn did. Or any corn, for that matter.

At least, she hoped they could. Many tests lay in front of these tiny plants, tests and a whole lot of hope.

She bent toward them and said softly, “You can do it, little oatlings.”

“I think they’re going to need more than encouraging words, Mia.”

Mia stood and turned toward her research assistant, grinning at his dry remark. Peter Streible stood half a head taller than her five feet five inch height, his lanky runner’s build nearly lost in the folds of his oversized lab coat.

“Be nice,” she admonished. “They’ll hear you.”

He rolled his eyes. “They can’t really understand you.”

She patted him on the shoulder on her way toward the door. “It’s all in the tone of voice, Peter.”

Mia ignored his muttered reply as she exited into a sunny California afternoon. The greenhouse had been muggy even with the fans on, but outside, the weather was a perfect mid-seventies. Fluffy white clouds floated in a crisp, blue sky, and if she tried really hard, she could almost ignore the sounds of Sacramento’s traffic filtering to her from the nearby highway.

Mia sighed happily. And it was Friday, too. Date night. Well, girls’ night out, since she wasn’t dating anyone at the moment, but close enough, right?

She wrinkled her nose at the faint longing lodged in her chest. Her thirtieth birthday was approaching, and with it hints from her parents for grandchildren. Mia wanted children, someday. She just hadn’t found the right partner yet. None of the men she met seemed right. None seemed to fit well into her life.

But she wasn’t desperate yet, just lonely. She still had time to find Mr. Right, to create the deep, enduring bond that had carried her parents across six continents and thirty-five years of marriage.

Didn’t she?

Peter trailed behind her as she headed toward her lab, finally catching up as they entered the nearest side door of the Plant Sciences wing of the Center for the Advancement of Humankind. The research center was a global cooperative between governments, businesses, and concerned individuals, dedicated to promoting the prosperity and well-being of all humans. Hundreds of researchers worked there in a wide variety of fields, everything from the sciences and technologies to political and cultural studies. Research covered anything that could advance humanity into the next century, including space exploration, though humans hadn’t made it much farther than Mars yet.

Mia’s research was critical to that movement. She’d gained a passion for science from her parents, both leaders in their respective fields, and had paired it with a natural compassion developed during a childhood spent in the dozens of different countries her parents visited for work. After seeing the effects of poverty and poorly used resources in Third World countries, how could she not want to make a difference?

And she’d always loved nature, had always been fascinated by the way plants evolved and adapted to their environments. What better way to forward humanity than by helping evolution shape the next generation of food plants?

Peter veered toward the stairs leading to their second-floor lab.

“I’m going to grab a snack from the cafeteria,” Mia said. “Need anything?”

He flashed an irreverent smile at her. “Two blonde babes and a stack of pizzas?”

“I’ll take that as a no.”

“Party pooper.”

She laughed. “Back in a minute. Don’t start the fun stuff without me!”

He opened the heavy fire door and stepped into the stairwell. “You’re the only person I know who thinks splicing genes is fun.”

The door shut behind him, and Mia tucked her hands into her lab coat, humming as she continued down the hallway. Up ahead, the Plant Sciences wing emptied into the main lobby of Research Building 3, a cavernous, glass-fronted room planted on one side of the massive quad in the middle of the CAH complex.

A group of fellow researchers stood facing the quad, talking excitedly among themselves. Mia stopped beside her colleagues and fellow girls’ night out participants, Kira Patel and Leona Hayes. The three met in the cafeteria not long after Mia took a junior research position, then discovered a shared passion for creating a better future. It had only taken one late-night bar hop session for them to discover their other shared passion: searching for the man of their dreams.

Kira and Leona were night and day in appearance, one short, curvy, and brunette, the other tall, svelte, and blonde. But they were the best of friends and Mia loved them dearly.

“What’s going on?” Mia said.

Leona popped a Nordic blonde eyebrow at her. “You’ve been buried in your plants too long, hon. Listen.”

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