Page 21 of Betrothed to the Alien Mercenary

So I dipped my mouth to hers and claimed her, kissing her with slow, tender moves, long, slick strokes of my tongue, and gentle nibbles on her lush bottom lip. She melted in my arms, her curves pressed against me and my cock, an aching bar against her soft belly. When I pulled back, she chased my mouth with hers, and I knew she forgave me. Sliding my hand along her bare waist, over the silk skirt on her hip, I started to bunch up the fabric so I could resume doing what I’d been after in the meeting. She didn’t stop me, a moan trembling on her lips.

It was the sound of something high-pitched, just on the edge of my hearing, that made me raise my head and still my movements. Tilting my chin, I glanced over my shoulder and searched the empty desert for a sign. There! The silhouette of a small vehicle arrowing away from the oasis. I had a bad feeling about that, so I raised my hand to my com device. “Jaxin, someone just left. What’s going on?”

Evie’s expression went from confused to worried, but I didn’t have time to explain. Catching her around the shoulder, I turned her to the door and hurried her inside, where I knew it was safe. An Ovt servant was pushing a cart with food into the conference room just as we entered, the same male as yesterday. He smiled cheerfully before raising the covered lid over the top dish. My vision narrowed to pinpricks, my instincts roaring. No, that was wrong.

“A bomb!” I shouted, and I spun with my mate, throwing us back out onto the balcony. The explosion followed us, blasting through the room with force and fire. Heat seared my back, debris flying after us like missiles, but I did not pay attention to any of it. Rolling with Evie in my arms, our bodies slid to a stop against the railing. I kept her covered protectively, my heart thudding heavily in my chest with each slow contraction. “Are you hurt?” I asked through the ringing in my ears. I could not hear her answer, but she mouthed something. Her eyes were alert, without pain, so I had to assume she was fine.

Rising slowly to my knees above her, I scanned the demolished room behind us. With the alliance nearly taking shape, it seemed those who sought to stop it had taken far more extreme measures. I saw several bodies sprawled beyond the broken table, though they were stirring slowly. The Tarkan King and his mate were nearby, hovering in the air. My warning had caused the male to take his human to safety just in time. His stone-skin ability had protected them both from harm.

Already, I saw my brothers rushing in from beyond the broken doorway to lend aid and search for any more danger. The poor Ovt waiter was dead, but my warning might have saved the rest. I did not stick around to find out. Sharing a look with Jaxin, I nodded before snatching Evie and throwing her over my shoulder. Then, I went over the balcony railing and, with my claws, slowed our descent down the sandstone wall until my boots thudded into the sand.

Racing beneath the trees, I perched Evie on the saddle of the nearest hover cycle and set about hotwiring the thing in record time. We were up in the air and speeding away in less than a minute. Whoever the bastard was that had set off that bomb, I was going to catch him and make him pay. But first, I was going to take my princess to safety.

Chapter 18

Evie

A freaking bomb? I couldn’t believe that my enemies would go that far. Maybe Aramon was right to believe that the alliance was almost complete. I hadn’t been as hopeful, but someone else had to be—or this wouldn’t have happened. The image of the destroyed room was seared into my mind, and I was still trying to make sense of what I’d seen.

If Aramon hadn’t seen the bomb before it went off, I would have been dead; we’d been moving directly toward it. I recalled vividly how he’d thrown us back onto the balcony we’d just left, his body shielding me from the blast. The scent of blood had filled my nose, but smoke and ash soon replaced it, and the chemical vapors from whatever had been in that bomb burned my nostrils. Now, I couldn’t smell anything, but I could see how tattered and torn Aramon’s robe was. His red skin masked any visible blood, but I was certain it was there, as several large splinters and pieces of wood protruded from his back.

I sat in his lap with my legs wrapped around his waist. My back was facing forward, so I had no idea which way we were going. I knew, however, that we were racing through the sky at rapid speeds. The air whipped through my hair, tugged at my braids, and tore at my skirt and flowy blouse. I had a perfect view of the oasis and the sandstone building next to it, with a stack of smoke spiraling into the air.

The poor waiter was dead. I doubted that the Ovt male had known he was about to serve a bomb. I recalled Aramon’s shout and the door opening to the hallway as he did. I was pretty sure the Tarkan King had gotten away with his mate, but others hadn’t been so lucky. My brain already struggled to recall who or what I’d seen: red skin, but also red blood. Had the remaining Asrai died? Thrymnor was probably fine; his thick skin must have protected him. I could not recall what had happened to the Viridara delegate or the Sune delegate. If any of them had died, we would have to start all over again.

Any worries about the possible failure of forming this alliance faded to the back of my mind when I caught sight of several dark spots. I squinted, trying to make sense of what I was seeing, and then drew in a shocked breath. “We’ve got company, Aramon,” I shouted over my shoulder. The wind caught my words and whipped them away, but I saw Aramon clench his jaw. He hunched forward over the handlebars of the hover cycle he’d stolen, and I was forced to cling more tightly to his neck as he increased our speed.

Then the first sharp spire of rock whizzed past me on my left, too close for comfort. I fought to hold back a scream. The blips were coming closer, resolving themselves into the shapes of several skimmers—very fast flyers meant for a single person. There were hover cycles too, and several other flying vehicles, but they were not as fast as the skimmers. They weren’t as dangerous either, because a skimmer could be outfitted with lasers. When the first fired a shot that crackled over our heads, I knew they meant business. That was a kill squad on our tail.

“Hold on,” Aramon said, and the male was actually grinning, a laugh tinting his tone. “This is going to get a little hectic.” He spun our vehicle with a quick twist of his wrist, and then we were careening in a different direction, darting left and right around several more rock spires. The landscape was transforming from sandy desert to rocky desert. Red stone rose first in spires, and then in twisting cliff walls that forced us to turn and spin in rapid maneuvers, or crash against the stone.

I held my breath at first, too scared to so much as blink, but when spots started dancing in front of my eyes, I had to inhale. Dust made me cough, but I did not dare cover my mouth—I couldn’t let go of Aramon’s neck or I’d fly off this bike and fall. At these speeds, it seemed inevitable that we’d crash, but my pilot was handling the bike around each turn like a dream. The skimmers chasing us had more trouble, and when the first hit a rock and exploded, Aramon whooped with elation. “Fuck yeah! That’s what I’m talking about!”

That was his plan? To race through this maze and make the chasers crash? It seemed utterly crazy, but when a second fared the same fate, it became believable. I did not question how Aramon could keep up with the turns at these speeds—I’d asked for the best pilot there was to be my bodyguard, and he was delivering. I just never thought I’d actually need this skill to escape. Then the skimmers soared higher, their flight capabilities better than that of our hover cycle. They flew above the rock and the narrow ravines, safe from crashing, and we’d already outflown the rest of the chasers. I saw no sign of anybody but the three remaining skimmers.

“Don’t worry. Solear and I have a plan,” Aramon said, his hand spinning the handlebars of the hover cycle casually. I could see it from the corner of my eye if I twisted my head—his steering and the rocks rising in front of us. Oh no. Was that a mountain? We were racing up its slope, steadily climbing into the air. Now, there was no protection from the ravine walls, and the skimmers seized their opportunity, coming in close and firing their lasers.

Aramon braked so abruptly that I nearly flew from his lap; his arm around my waist held me and prevented me from taking that fatal tumble. When the world righted itself around me, I realized that two of the three skimmers had crashed, struck by friendly fire when we suddenly dropped out from between them. That was the craziest maneuver I’d ever seen, but it had worked. How had that worked?

The last remaining skimmer spun around and faced us, revving furiously to gain speed. I thought it was going to crash into us when Aramon headed straight for it, swerving left and right to avoid the strafing laser fire. At the last moment, he ducked us beneath the vessel, avoiding a crash. I had a perfect view over his shoulder of the skimmer turning and chasing after us again. It was faster than us and rapidly closing the distance. Through the transparent dome of the skimmer, I could see straight at the pilot. An Ovt male. So, our supposed neutral, safe haven had betrayed us after all.

The mountain rose at a sharp incline, but eventually, we were going to run out of that rising slope. When we did, would we careen down another slope on the other side? Or would our runway abruptly terminate in a cliff like many of the mountains and cliffs we’d already passed?

The skimmer was so close that I could see the color of the pilot’s spots—bright silver and purple. He was going to pull the trigger at any moment, and we’d be done for. There was nowhere to go. “Hold on, this will be awesome!” Aramon said, and he did not sound scared or worried; he sounded like he was having the time of his life. As the skimmer’s nose got close enough to bump our exhaust, we dropped, plummeting down at a steep angle.

I had my answer: we were flying off a cliff. The skimmer went straight while we went down, and I could watch its silver underbelly soar over my head. The plummet flung me up into the air, held only by one of Aramon’s arms. Then his other arm came up past my head, holding a laser pistol, and he fired. It was a single shot, arcing overhead and striking the skimmer in its tailfin. One shot was enough.

The skimmer tumbled and careened in a crazy spiral, and so did we. Too high for the hover cycle to propel itself into the air, we were tumbling and spinning wildly as well. The engine spluttered, but Aramon kept us tethered to the machine, his boots hooked beneath the metal footrests. He was laughing, his fist shaking in the air with a rude gesture aimed at the retreating, failing skimmer.

“Aramon!” I shouted, my eyes taking in the rapidly approaching ground. "We're going to crash! Do something!" At this point, I didn't know if there was anything hecoulddo; I'd never been on a hover cycle that had gone too high. I just knew that it was virtually impossible to extract them from this kind of dive once they'd entered it. Interestingly, my crazy Asrai mate didn't seem worried.

When the ground came close, the engine made a different noise. I heard it, but Aramon had been waiting for it. His leg moved, kicking hard against the side of the bike, and his free arm abruptly jerked at the handlebar. “Hold on,” he shouted, as if I weren’t already clinging to him for dear life. He sat down, hunched over the bars, forcing me to lean back and watch the world in a crazy, upside-down pose.

But the bike was going, the engine humming smoothly as it got back into range, propelling us into the air and aborting that fatal fall. In less than a minute, Aramon spun us into a graceful arc around a large boulder and brought the hover cycle to a stop. Dust arced into the air behind us, but that was the only sign that we’d been going too fast; the landing was perfect. The silence that followed our landing made my ears sting in the absence of the rushing wind. We’d made it. I slid on wobbly legs from his lap and collapsed on the hot desert sand, but I was never getting onto another hover cycle with Aramon ever again.

“Thanks, bro,” Aramon said out loud, but I knew he wasn’t talking to me. Even if he was, I was too busy being grateful that I was alive to respond. My heart was racing, my palms were sweaty, and sand stuck to the back of my neck from cold sweat as well. All my careful braids had been ripped apart by the harsh winds our speed had generated, and I didn’t even want to check my panties to see whether I’d soiled myself or not. When we fell, I was certain we were going to die. When those skimmers fired at us, I thought we were goners. Too many near-death experiences in a row—there was only so much I could take. This was the final straw.

“Your com device, please,” Aramon said. He stood next to me, casting shade over me with his wide shoulders. I saw only darkness against the glare of the sun and the glow of his red eyes inside his dark, deep-set eye sockets. I raised my wrist limply and let him take the device from my skin without asking why. “Thank you, Evie,” he said politely. Too politely. He had to be up to something, or he wouldn’t be so nice. Suspicious now, I forced myself to sit up and was just in time to see him raise a rock and smash it into my com with a crash.

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