Page 19 of Chased By the Alien Mercenary
“That,” I said, as, with a cracking noise, Solear snapped the asshole’s neck and carelessly dropped his body to the ground.That.It echoed in my mind, but I wasn’t sure if that was my alien thinking it or if that was just me. Then he hauled me into his arms, his hands frantic as they roamed my back and arms, growls rumbling from him when he discovered the blood that stained my pants. He wanted to know who did that, and when he glanced back toward the sounds of fighting beyond the outbuilding, in front of the mansion… it was obvious he wanted to dive back in and punish those responsible.
“It was the flowers. Let’s get out of here!” I said, cupping his face with both my hands. I could feel the rapid pounding of his pulse in his neck,feelthe wetness of blood on his skin, and didn’t care. I was too happy to see him. He’d come for me, saved me again, and I hadn’t known I needed someone like him until I found him.
“Always,” he said inside my head, his lips never moving. It was a short, simple statement, but it was loaded with feelings, with promises. More than just a word, it was a portal into what he truly felt. And that one word was a vow he intended to keep, to always come for me, to always protect me, to be my protector forever.
Despite the precarious moment—the urgency to flee this place—I flung my arms around his neck and kissed him. Our mouths collided, clashed, tongues tangling. This wasn’t so much a kiss of passion as it was an explosion of reaffirmation and gratitude that he was here. He was the one who broke it, lifting his headto growl toward the mansion, where chaos still erupted. Then he lifted me higher, cradling me bridal-style against his chest, and began to run.
He was heading in the direction of the landing strip, but in the dark, I couldn’t tell if the big ship was still there or how heavily it was guarded. What the hell had happened back there? It sounded like a freaking warzone! I was insanely happy we were moving away from it. “The Aderian officials got involved,” Solear said to me telepathically. I needed to get used to this, and wow, was he reading my mind?“Yes,”came the answer almost immediately, but it was accompanied with a sense of “right now,” like that wasn’t a permanent thing.
That was good, because I was pretty sure I didn’t need him to read my thoughts all the time. That could get pretty awkward real quick. He didn’t need to know when I was thinking about his sexy ass, for instance. Damn it… “I do,” he growled inside my head, but out loud it was a huffed noise, and he jerked to a stop to peer down at me with gleaming red eyes set deep inside his pale face. I’d made him laugh. Though his face remained unsmiling, I could sense the laughter inside my head, and I kind of liked that. Solear should be happy. I wanted him to be happy.
He’d paused near a large boulder that offered some shelter from the wind and blocked the view of the mansion in chaos. It would have been romantic, if not for the fact that I knew those pretty flowers surrounding us packed a mean bite. There was starlight shining down on us, enough for me to see by and notice the idyllic hillside and the wild, untainted nature that surrounded us. Then, an explosion reverberated and echoed between the mountains, shattering that illusion even further. “Let’s get out of here.”
Chapter 17
Solear
I marveled at the change between us as I walked. With my loyalties no longer divided, her mind burned brightly within mine. Not a path to travel—exposed and path shaped, like between Aramon and me—but as if she were part of me. As if my mind surrounded hers, keeping her safe, like a shield. I liked that very much. I’d never feel alone now, but I could sense that Lyra was not quite comfortable with me knowing every single one of her thoughts. I’d have to teach her how to shield her mind. That did not sit well with me—until I considered that she might be exposed to Aramon’s curiosity as well. That, I could not allow. Lyra was all mine.
I thought that perhaps I’d feel resentful for having to leave that tantalizing information on Jalima’s next location behind, but I didn’t. When I had discovered my mate was in danger, and I’d left her exposed to it, it was like a switch had flipped inside my mind. I understood what Aramon and Asmoded had been telling me all along: there was only one thing that mattered in life, and it wasn’t vengeance. I’d still like that, the desire hadn’t gone away, but those feelings seemed milder now. They certainly didn’t weigh up against what I felt for Lyra.
And now that I could speak to her, I found that I wanted to share so much. That had to start with an apology, at least, according to Aramon, whom I had shoved firmly out of my head after that suggestion. I was still trying to formulate my thoughts on how to say it, though, when the landing strip came into sight. I parked the plan for now and focused on what needed to happen to getus to safety. My twin and my captain wanted us to steal a ride and get to the city with its port on the other side of the planet. For that, we needed something like that slicer that had departed from the mansion, possibly with that damn Xurtal aboard it that had threatened my mate.
The large Star Class Cruiser was still parked on the strip, and several supply shuttles were dotted around it on the tarmac. I could see a handful of guards milling about on the side nearest the mansion, uncertain what to do. They must have noticed something was going down at the mansion, but they weren’t sure what to do. Run, come to the rescue? I was happily going to take advantage of their confusion, though; it had left much of the landing strip unguarded.
Circling around them, I tried to figure out which ship was our best option to get out of here. The supply shuttles were chunky and slow, hard to maneuver. The Star Class Cruiser was out of the question: too big, and I didn’t know how to fly it anyway, I’d need Aramon for that. But there was a small row of surface vehicles parked next to one of the guard barracks. Anyone of those would do, though some might be a tight fit for two passengers. I grinned, contemplating that, and didn’t mind the prospect of having my pretty mate in my lap.
She was quiet, her thoughts chaotic and all over the place as I snuck around the strip with her in my arms. The guards had not noticed us, but the Aderian authorities had to be close to finishing up at the mansion; then they’d turn their focus to this place. We had to hurry. I wasn’t sure why they’d decided to raid the place when they did, could only guess that it had something to do with that servant’s illegal tampering with the computer in the office upstairs. Another well-timed stroke of luck. Possibly,they’d aid us if they found us here and discovered we were victims of Jalima’s depravity, too. But I couldn’t risk that, and I didn’t trust them. Aderians were slow-moving bureaucrats, and they were total softies. Not a mean bone in them, they baffled me to the extreme.
“One of those, perhaps?” Lyra asked quietly, her small finger pointing at the row of slicers I’d noticed earlier. I nodded, eyes zeroing in on the slightly bigger two-seater at the end of the row. Even better, that one would have more fuel; it would guarantee we’d make it to the city. I didn’t much feel like running out over an ocean or something, and I couldn’t quite recall all the particulars of planet Llykhe.
“Yes, you don’t happen to be able to pilot, do you?”I prodded Lyra as we circled the empty barracks and, without being seen, reached the side of the slightly larger slicer. Her startled expression told me all I needed to know, but I wasn’t disappointed. Even if she was my mate, it wouldn’t feel right to fly with anyone but my twin, not that I was going to tell him that; he’d never let me hear the end of it. That might have made me uneasy in the past, but I realized it just warmed me now. That was Lyra’s doing, I had no doubt; she had eased the rage inside my chest. It wasn’t a burning pit of agony inside my gut, always driving me, it felt softer, more manageable.
“Sorry,” she whispered. “Maybe I could try with a UAR vehicle of a similar type, but I can’t read a single word out here. I’d crash us.” Her thoughts were more than a little dubious even when it came to flying a vessel she was more familiar with, and I knew at once she’d never flown anything herself before. She’d just watched people do it on a few occasions. That meant I had to flyandnavigate, which was a pretty daunting task. I could pilot,I’d learned through Aramon, and he’d help me in a pinch—but it was not my favorite task.
The hatch was locked, but this wasn’t the first vehicle I’d had to steal. My claws made short work of the mechanism, and then I pulled it open. Though I knew the interior would be empty, I still gave it a quick once-over to be sure. Then I picked Lyra up by her waist and lifted her inside. She muffled a surprised squeak and rolled over to make space for me, but she kept hunkered down low as if that would prevent the guards farther away from noticing her. They’d come running as soon as I ignited the engine, but by then it would be too late.
Adjusting the seat while pulling the hatch on my side shut, I quickly unfurled my navigational cable and began hooking it up. There was no way I’d know what direction to fly in without checking the computer. That would leave me vulnerable, and thus, Lyra. So I’d have to make it a quick check, then fly by visual until we were a safe distance away. I had a feeling the Aderian authorities were going to descend on this landing strip any minute now, so we had to hurry.
“You can fly this thing?” Lyra asked me dubiously, which stung my pride a little. But I had just asked her if she could pilot, so it was obvious she thought I might not know either. The cable glittered silver as I held it against the port that would give me access to the slicer’s computer, my eyes shifting from that fragile tendril that would give me control of so much power to the equally fragile human female at my side.
“Yes,”I said to her, and I wasn’t sure if, that time, my vocal cords had rumbled the words along with the mental thought. I bared my teeth at her, snapped them together, and grinned when sheshivered, not in fear, but with heat that curled through her core. Embedded in my mind as she now was, I could sense that, as if that heat curled through my own flesh. Despite the pressure to escape, I could not resist leaning in, cupping the back of her neck, and kissing her.
Her mouth was wet and pink, her expression dazed by the time I released her. My cock had grown achingly hard beneath the restrictions of my armor. I craved to sink inside her then and there, but the sound of approaching engines warned me our time had run out.“Watch them,”I ordered her, and then I closed my eyes and connected with the Slicer’s system. This time, what I needed to do was as familiar as breathing, and the route I needed to plot a simple one: a straight line through the mountains, across a massive ocean, and to the port city on the other continent of this planet. It only took a few seconds before I could plug in the course.
When I blinked my eyes back open, Lyra was watching out the window. “They’ve noticed us! Go,” she said, just as I flicked on the engines and clenched my hands around the yoke. Tightly, so she wouldn’t notice them tremble with nerves. This could go badly in a hurry. I spun the slicer in the right direction with only a slight wobble, then pressed forward, allowing us to surge away from the landing strip.
Shouting went up behind us, the milling, uncertain guards had finally found something they definitely knew how to respond to. Fire on the thieves. I’d seen Aramon perform evasive maneuvers a thousand times; I’d plotted their courses for him every single time. But it was not the same when you were the one holding the stick. Swerving left and right made us wobble and dip, andI cursed silently, especially when it made Lyra scream in fear. That shot straight through my chest like a knife.
“They’re shooting at us!” Lyra warned as I fought with the throttle, it hiccuped, the engine grinding noisily. Right on the heels of her words, the first laser struck the side of the slicer, followed by a second strike that impacted the hatch on Lyra’s side. Too close for comfort, far too close. With a howl of frustration, I pushed, and the vessel shot forward, nosediving before I righted it.
“Well done, bro,”Aramon whispered at the back of my head.“Now ease up on the throttle and give left a little more,”he instructed. It was proof that he’d been watching all along but had known not to interfere until the critical moment had passed. Not alone, I reminded myself. I had family now. I had my twin, as always, and Lyra right beside me to protect. Worries about flying smoothed away, and full of determination, I pointed us toward the correct mountain range. In short order, we were out of range, but I double-checked twice to make sure we weren’t followed and that everything was in working order.
Lyra was silent, but her mind was racing, fear replaced by elation over our successful escape. “You have a navigational implant,” she said. “How had I not noticed that?” She sounded surprised and I wanted to defend myself, but I didn’t need to, not with her. She smiled, “but that sure came in handy now. You’re such a mystery…” That she said as if it was a compliment, and I wanted to believe that it was.
I also wanted to turn to her and pull her into my lap, to assure myself again that she was in one piece. That had been too close, and it was all my fault. Instead, I listened quietly to Aramon’sinstructions as I locked our course into the computer and turned the slicer to autopilot. I sensed that my twin wanted to linger and ask questions, tease, perhaps, that he had been right. Rarely had I been the one to shove him out of my mind, but this time I did. Lyra and I had so much to share, now that she could hear my thoughts.
First, I was going to find a first aid kit and take care of the cuts on her legs; however, the scent of her blood was driving me crazy.
