Page 9 of Souls of Steel
“General Rhodes gave me specific instructions and I’m going to follow them. Now shut up and let me focus.”
Cerberus rumbled, but didn’t call me out on my lie again. He knew very well that three-quarters of the time, I wasn’t that good at following orders. That was why Cerberus and I were a good match, because despite our differences, we were equally cruel and violent.
It was a shame that I hadn’t gotten to show that to the terrorists. Selene Renard’s involvement had made my intervention less needed and a show of force superfluous.
Maybe that was why I felt so off. I’d been ready to give those fools a taste of chimera fire and I’d been robbed of the chance. Yes, that explained my restlessness.
Selene was responsible for it, but not because of her luscious lips and blood-red hair. She’d just gotten to my foe before I’d been able to, but she’d soon have to pay the price for it.
I opened my cockpit and shot her a smile I knew was very unpleasant. “Perhaps it’s time that I introduce myself as well. I am Flight Lieutenant Knox Alexander, second-in-command of the Grand Chimera Warrior Unit. Come. It’s time for us to meet with General Rhodes.”
A flicker of nervousness flashed over her expressive face. She understood the situation too and knew this wouldn’t end well for her. It wasn’t illegal for women to come to this area of the city, but it was improper. Between that and her sudden acquisition of the Sphinx, she was in a lot of trouble.
To her credit, she suppressed that fear quickly. “Lead the way,” she told me.
I jumped out of the Cerberus and she followed my example without being told to. She patted the Sphinx’s claw and murmured a soft, “Thank you, my friend.”
If the Sphinx answered, it wasn’t in a way I could grasp. In any case, Selene seemed to take comfort in the brief exchange, because when she turned toward me again, she was more relaxed. “I’m happy to hear General Rhodes is well. He was right in the middle of the blast. I feared he might have gotten killed.”
“Did you? Well, don’t worry so much, Ms. Renard. I assure you we had everything well in hand.”
She narrowed her eyes at me and I mentally cursed, wondering if I’d said too much. She must’ve realized how strange this whole arrangement had been. Anyone with a brain would have. I’d actually thought it would never work, because even the desperate extremists wouldn’t take such blatant bait.
But they had, and now, they would be destroyed. The collateral damage didn’t really matter, not to me, at least. Selene might not agree.
I was almost disappointed when she didn’t ask me what I meant. “I see,” she answered instead. “I hope my attempt to help came in handy anyway.”
“That’s not for me to say,” I answered, walking a little closer to her. She shot me a suspicious look, but I wasn’t intimidated.
Instead, I was seized by the sudden impulse to pin her against the first available flat surface and have her right then and there. Compared to me, she was positively tiny and I could already imagine how good her tight cunt would feel around my cock.Orders, Knox. Remember your orders.If she was punished for what she’d done, maybe something could be arranged at a later date. But for now, I had to obey and take her to the general.
Fortunately, it didn’t take us long to get to the mobile chimera unit that had arrived while I’d been doing damage control. Two LCHRPs hovered over the hastily erected tents. Medics and soldiers ran around in a display of organized chaos I was familiar with by now.
I headed directly for the tent I recognized as belonging to my superior. There were no guards outside, but the chimeras watching over the area made them unnecessary.
The general was alone when we walked in, reading something on his holo-screen. He shut down the display and got up, turning toward us with a smile that did very little to hide his true intentions. “Ah. Flight Lieutenant Alexander. Well done. I take it this must be the unexpected pilot of the Sphinx.”
“Yes, Sir, this is Selene Renard.”
General Rhodes’s eyes raked over Selene’s figure. My hackles rose at his almost offensive scrutiny. I didn’t like the way he was looking at her.
He might be older than me, but he wasn’t immune to the charms of a beautiful woman. And he was said to enjoy spending time with Terran sex workers.
Selene just stood there, keeping her eyes on his face, without fidgeting. The only thing that betrayed her nervousness was the acceleration of her pulse. I noticed just because of my connection with Cerberus. General Rhodes seemed oblivious.
“Any connection with Tanya Renard?” he asked after a long moment of pause.
“She’s my mother, Sir,” Selene replied dutifully, her voice level and calm. Despite my previous thoughts, a worm of something that felt uncomfortably like respect wriggled at the back of my mind.
The general scowled, displeased by the news. “So you’re a priestess of Gaia then? How does that mix with you piloting the Sphinx?”
“It doesn’t,” Selene answered. “Unlike my mother, I was born without Gaia’s Gift. I thought I was an Unblessed, but Gaia might have simply guided me in a different direction.”
The latter sentence snapped me out of my trance as I processed what Selene and General Rhodes were talking about. Renard. Shit. Why hadn’t I made the connection before?
Selene’s mother was the High Priestess of Gaia on the American continent.“It looks like you might have more trouble breeding her than I’d hoped,”Cerberus murmured.
It was easier to ignore him when I wasn’t inside the chimera, but the truth of his words still irritated me. On the bright side, Selene’s connection to the High Priestess made it more difficult for the general to approach her sexually and that was a good thing.
