Page 156 of Home

“Because they found me out! I was a fool to trust a complicated operation to a female, and she caused it to fall apart, exposing me and all those who believed in me. I had to run so that I could live to fight another day.”

“How do you have friends on the inside if they were all exposed?” the male asked, rubbing his still crossed aching eyes, though Mir’ Ahn’s finger had been removed long before.

Flustered, Mir’ Ahn raised his voice, his words becoming even more slurred than they’d been yet. “Do not question me! I know of what I speak! Either you’re with me, or you’re against me! Do you join with us or not?”

The male, busy looking at the intricate sticker pads that naturally grew on his amphibian like fingers, turned his attention back to Mir’ Ahn. “I’m not with you! I do not even know you. Even if I did, I will pretend I don’t when the Cruestaci come looking for you. Because come looking for you they will! Youdon’t betray the Cruestaci people and expect not to be in their sights.”

“No one will come for me. They fear me!”

The sticky green male shooed Mir’ Ahn away and went back to examining his hands.

Mir’ Ahn didn’t bother to get up and move, but he did look around the hookah bar he’d been entrenched in for the last three days. He could barely see two feet in front of his face, not only from the smoke permeating the large, dark room, but from the hookah pipe he near constantly sucked on. He spent a few minutes observing everything within his limited view, then quite clumsily turned in his chair. Leaning on the low, rounded table in front of himself, he focused on the green amphibianesque male sitting at the same table. “I have a proposition for you.”

The male peered at him. “Do I know you?”

“Not you. But you will and you will thank me.”

“I don’t do business with strangers.”

“I’m Mir’ Ahn. I am Steward of the Cruestaci Palace Warriors.”

“That does sound familiar. I think I’ve heard of you.”

“Good. Then let us talk business. I find myself here because I had to make a quick escape from Cruestace. I’m building an army! We’ll return to Cruestace and rule! If you join me, you’ll be at my side! Are you in?”

“Why did you have to make a quick escape?” the green male asked.

“I planned to overthrow the royal family and take over Cruestace myself. A fool female I trusted as an integral part of the plan failed to perform as promised and the whole thing fell apart. I was exposed along with all those who eagerly joined the rebellion. I had to leave in a rush so I’d survive to fight another day.”

“Rebellions are good. I miss rebellions. Are you going to have another one, do you think?” he asked, sitting forward to lean on his forearms and try to focus on Mir’ Ahn.

“I am. I know the entire layout of the royal palace on Cruestace. I know all the secret entrances, and I have friends onthe inside. I’m going to return with an army of males who understand what dominance is all about. We’ll kill all the royal family and take the planet for ourselves!”

The male struggled to focus on Mir’ Ahn. His protruding eyes squinted as he tried to see him through the haze of smoke and drugs. “I think, maybe you should hurry. Or at least join forces with the male who was here earlier. I’m fairly certain he was planning the same thing.”

“Are you sure?” Mir’ Ahn demanded. “I might have to kill him, too.”

In the very back of the room, with a black scarf swept around his head and across his face, Rokai sat with his booted feet up on the chair across from him. He shook his head at the ramblings of the two drugged males across the room.

“This is the third time they’ve forgotten they’ve already met and discussed this very same thing,” Elspeth said.

Rokai looked at her and rolled his eyes. “I’m so ready to just kill the bastard and be on about my business.”

“All we need him to do is walk out of the bar, then we can grab him,” Elspeth said.

“It’s not like anyone in here would notice if we grabbed him now, and if they did, they’d forget in ten minutes anyway,” Rokai said.

“True. And it’s not like we need to worry about anyone else he spoke to, they’re as out of their minds as he is.” Elspeth sat there for only a few more minutes before she sat forward. “I have an idea.”

“What? What are you going to do?” he asked, as she stood.

She adjusted the brown and white paisley scarf over her head to reveal her eyes and her nose more clearly, then unbuttoned the long heavy jacket Rokai had made her wear to keep the fact that she was female from any who might see her. “Be ready to meet me in the waste chamber.”

Rokai nodded and watched as she pretended to be as drugged as the patrons in the hookah bar.

Elspeth wandered over by Mir’ Ahn and stumbled, accidentally falling against him. Her breasts pushed into hishands as he irritatedly caught her and shoved her up and away from him.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I don’t know what the problem is. I can’t seem to stand very well. It’s just so hot in here,” she said, unbuttoning several of the buttons on the shirt she wore beneath the jacket she’d already unbuttoned. She shoved her hands inside her shirt and began to rub her breasts and cleavage before fanning herself. “Just so hot.”

---