Page 20 of Claimed By her Alien Prince

More guards holding gargoyles, stood at the edges of the steps, watching us through red glowing eyes.

At the top, on the throne to the left, sat the epitome of Satan himself, except he wasn't red and had no horns. His ears were pointed though, and so was his black goatee. He wore some kind of contraption on his head, a metallic crown.

The woman next to him took my breath away, and from her long neck to her regal face, I would have sworn she was Queen Nefertiti, .

I had seen her bust once in Berlin, and she was one of the reasons for my interest in world history. My eyes would have most likely lingered on her indefinitely, had not a small movement to the left made me turn my head toward a grouping of more aliens, all seated, all staring at us.

And then the very air around me seemed to stir, causing a prickling sensation, as if somebody was blowing against my exposed neck.

My erratic heartbeat slowed, and calm returned to me like a protective shield. I turned my head toward the right of the throne, where seven men stood or sat. Each held a different pose, ranging from nonchalant to bored, as if they purposefully tried to camouflage their emotions, or maybe they had done this so often, they truly were bored.

It didn't matter though. It also didn't matter that each man was breathtakingly beautiful. Where the guards appeared model handsome, these guys were supermodels. Ripped beyond belief. Their skin colors varied just like ours. But that wasn't what caught my attention.

No, only one of them did.

He stood leaned against a pillar, with his head tilted, regarding me with an intensity that took my breath away even more so than his red, glowing eyes and familiar face. He was the same man—alien, vampire?—who had been visiting my dreams for years.

Fromthemomentthefirst redhead entered I perked up, but it wasn'ther. Neither was the second, with her black hair. Although both women were incredibly beautiful, noticeable even more in their ceremonial white gowns, neither one was the girl from my dreams.

I didn't exactly give up hope, since there were five more to come, but I did call myself a fool, until the fourth entered.

My eyes flew to her, drank her in from head to toe. She was absolutely breathtaking.

Long, red hair spilled over her left shoulder, leaving her graceful neck exposed. A neck so elegant, I ran my tongue over my fangs and leaned harder against the pillar to stop myself from lunging for her.

Her sweet scent filled my nostrils even from here, alluring, teasing, inviting.

A heavy thud inside my chest almost toppled my composure, and with growing alarm, I noticed a beat. Slowly at first, tentative, like a small animal scenting the air for a predator, but with each passing moment, the beat gained in strength, so much so, that I had to force my hands to stay where they were, as they wanted to reach up to my chest, to feel this new sensation. But I didn't dare give away that my heart, for the first time in over three hundred years, was beating inside me.

I was all too aware of the ramifications. If my father would even scent a hint of it, he would exploit it, and so would my brothers.

And yet I couldn't take my eyes off the proud creature as she walked in, sidling up next to her sisters. Just like the girl in my dreams, her face was shaped like a diamond, with a strong chin, over which sinfully lush lips curved in what seemed like disdain. Disdain for being here? Or a natural shield not to show her true emotions?

The white, flowing gown didn't do anything to hide her lush curves, nor did her gown's generous V-cut hide her full breasts.

My eyes moved up over strong cheekbones to her clear, green eyes.

As if she sensed my gaze, her head lifted, and our eyes met. The strange new beat in my chest sped up, and I nearly pushed off the pillar with the foot I had set against it.

"Looks like you have already picked?" Nergal, reclining lazily next to me, hissed.

Of all my brothers, Nergal I liked the least. He was the most sadistic of the seven of us. The most like Behlial. Of all of them, I could afford him sensing my mating bond the least.

"They all look the same to me," I replied in a forced, bored voice, as the sixth girl walked in. The fifth I had completely missed, utterly stricken byher.

When they were all lined up, Behlial rose and slowly walked down the stairs. The girls' apprehension at his approach was palpable.

"So you are this season's crop?" Behlial said in his snide voice, moving to the first girl, taking her chin into his hand, and moving her face right to left to view it from all angles. He leaned forward to sniff her neck.

"Excellent," he exclaimed. "My name is Behlial, King of Darkness. What is your name, my dear?"

"Judith," the girl answered in a quavering voice.

My fists clenched as he repeated the process with the second, and I wondered how I would be able to stand by when he did the same toher.

My newly awakened heart began to beat faster; it had awakened forher, my karamia—soulmate.

None of us aboard the ship of the damned had a karamia, most probably didn't even know what it meant, but I studied the old scripts, holodocs, read what I could about our history, to make sense of our task, our fate. To find out why we were damned, why we were here.

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