Page 15 of Stolen Slave

As soon as she passed, I pivoted and stalked down the corridor. Anyone watching wouldn’t suspect anything about my hasty retreat because of the few choice trinkets I purchased on my way back to my ship. Any male would have such hopeful thinking after witnessing the procession.

At the docking bay, I found one of the two ponraid passed out by the crates, his clawed-hand badly burned. The other stood with his back to me as he attempted to short the charge on the bay door.

“That won’t work, my friend,” I said.

He jumped and spun around in time to catch the low-setting stun blast to his face. No one paid me any special attention as I sent him rolling down the dock next to his companion.

Using my stim tracker, I requested ship access. The door opened. I hurried inside before the door closed behind me and immediately set my hand on the datapad to disengage the ship’s impending cargo bay shock.

“Deactivate defense sequence seven-two-one on my command.”

The charge dissipated with an audible whir, and I breathed a little easier as I entered a random jump destination and activated the jump straight from the landing pad before the dock master could comm the ship. Then, I opened comms to the nearest Helix.

“Bounty Runner Khorahn reporting a human sighting.”

The response was immediate.

“Location.”

“A void station in the middle of nowhere. I’ll send the coordinates.”

“What condition was the human in?”

“It was walking around.”

“Was it healthy? Mistreated? Did it have a registered volunteer number?”

“My friend, if you want the galaxy to assess humans to that level, we need to be educated. It had chest mounds if that helps,” I said, playing dumb. “Intriguing looking things that moved as it walked.”

I grinned when he swore.

“That was a female.”

“I’d be happy to supply more information. How would I know if one was healthy? What are they supposed to look like? Do males ever have chest mounds?”

I settled into my seat, prepared to learn.

CHAPTER EIGHT

VYA

A sickening pull in my stomach woke me, and I groaned. My head hurt, and my mouth was drier than a desert. I must have had one hell of a night because I couldn’t remember a thing. Warm and too sick to move, I kept my eyes closed and tugged my thin blanket higher.

I frowned. It was too thin for my blanket.

Memories hit me like a Mack truck a few seconds later. The bathhouse. The handjobs. Mila dying and me being shocked so many times I couldn’t even see anymore.

Tentatively, I reached for my face. A bandage covered my eyes, confirming that the things I remembered happening to me weren’t some horrible nightmare. It was all real.

A small sound of despair escaped me.

The bed shifted, and a warm hand stroked down the length of my arm.

Panic squeezed my chest, and my heart started to hammer. Mila was dead. No one was left to sleep next to me…except for the giant bug things.

I wanted to bolt away but knew better than to try.

So I lay there in a complete state of near hyperventilation and waited.

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