Page 90 of Seeded By Two

After all, it had always been my duty to protect him, no matter the cost.

His life had always taken precedence over mine.

But in that moment when he realized we were not facing a marauding crew of Jizziks after all but the Ukmat who had merely adopted their appearance, he must have realized they had come for him—not for me, his decoy, and certainly not for Beth.

And so he had done what I never thought he would have the courage to do—and that wasn’t to say he didn’t have any courage at all, only that the courage he possessed existed in negotiations and in a more intellectual nature rather than physical—and handed himself over.

When Beth told me about how a team of human males had approached her when she had run away from us, I knew right away they were very unlikely to have been genuine humans— especially in a Seeding Facility such as this.

I was pleased she had changed her mind at the last moment and decided not to betray us.

Although she had to have been very angry at us, desperate to take revenge on us, she had seen through it and decided otherwise.

I was proud of her.

Much prouder of her than I was of my own performance when we had first met.

My armed guards shifted left rather than right as I had expected, taking us at a right angle to the Captain’s quarters.

I glanced over my shoulder and peeked through the hole formed by my arms placed on the top of my head in the universal sign of surrender.

There were other guards standing to attention outside the Captain’s quarters, so I knew someone important was in there.

Clearly, they had other plans for me.

By now, Beth would already be hurtling away in the transport ship to a place of safety.

With any luck, the Ukmat would not give chase and she could escape and enjoy the rest of her life.

Without us.

Without her fated mates.

It seemed all but inevitable now that the fifteen-hour mark for the bonding deadline would almost certainly not be hit.

Perhaps the bond would fade between us, or perhaps it would remain in place forever, a beacon of my failure toward her and my Prince.

The armed guard finally came to a stop in front of another door with a pair of guards standing outside it.

The door hissed open and the guard unnecessarily shoved me forward.

I was expecting it and so did not lose my balance or collapse on the floor as they had perhaps hoped.

I looked back at them impassively, not sharing a single shred of the anger bubbling inside me.

I didn’t want them to know they were having any kind of effect on me.

I lowered my arms, the magnetic cuffs tight on my wrists.

My ankles were unbound but that was about to change.

The guard that shoved me earlier tossed a set of ankle cuffs to the floor. “Put them on!” he snapped. “Now!”

You didn’t say please, I wanted to retort but knew that would only needle him, make him come into the room, and beat at me with his rifle.

With his guard buddies watching, he couldn’t let a chance like that go so easily.

I wasn’t afraid to be attacked or incur injuries but why do it when it might affect my chances of an effective escape?

---