That was easy enough. Intelligent, sensual, soft and curvy, resilient.
I had hoped she would not be attached to him after such a short time. At least that’s what I had assumed when she had deliberately rejected the match.
Since arriving on Zeus’s ship? Her gaze did not linger on any male. Her body did not respond when she was near the others. She tolerated my presence, nothing more. She would, at least, converse with me. Look me in the eye. The others? She would barely look at any other male on the ship, as if the very sight of a Prillon warrior caused her pain.
The fact that she trustedme, chose my company, was a boon I would not ignore, nor take for granted. Willow Baylor was a perfect female, in every way. She should be mine.
Shewouldbe mine.
Fuck that asshole and his stupidity. He’d obviously hurt her, broken her heart. I knew he was a bastard. His reputation preceded him everywhere he went. But he was also honorable, or at least I’d believed, before he had chosen to leave my sister to die at the hands of the Hive in that base.
If I was going to woo Willow properly, I needed details about her relationship with Helion. I doubted she would be willing to share. I needed to know everything that had happened since she had given me clothing and ordered them to feed me.
In truth, Helion’s torture had been half-hearted at best. His pathetic attempts to intimidate or harm me? Easy to ignore. I’d faced far worse on the battlefield. Even Doctor Mersan had seemed tired, rather than dedicated to the task of breaking me.
I would have forced them to kill me. My death wouldn’t have mattered. The moment Helion’s ship had overtaken my small cruiser, I’d sent word ahead to the Atlans I was working with to attack the Hive base without me. They, too, knew the location of the base. They were the ones who had given me the plans, who discovered that my sister was among those taken. I would have gladly died rather than give Helion the power to destroy the Hive base while there was the slightest chance my sister remained a prisoner inside its walls.
I understood Helion’s logic, could even respect it. The Elite Hunters were highly skilled. I could not believe they were infallible. I had to believe Helion would have made a different choice if it werehissister being held captive. For Helion the matter was simple math. The number of potential lives on one side of the scale vs the number who might die on the other. For me, Thomar, and Bastion? The decision was based on love. Family. Honor. Loyalty.
If that was not worth dying for, nothing was. Absolutely fucking nothing.
Thanks to one brave, beautiful female, our odds of saving my sister had gone from terrible to possible. With the assistance of the ReCon team Bastion and Thomar had assembled—all volunteer—plus the Atlans and their stolen Hive ship? We were now a formidable force.
Everything had changed. Once we rejoined the Atlans at the rendezvous point, we would finalize plans and initiate the rescue operation. Amalia would be saved.
When Helion captured me, that had been theonlything I cared about.
Until now.
Untilher.
“Come on, O. Get your fucking head in the game.” Bastion Arcas, my cousin and best friend growing up, taunted me from his side of the sparring matt. We’d been grappling for close to an hour and I was losing. Badly. Didn’t fucking care. Wasn’t even breathing hard.
But then, staring at a beautiful female took very little effort. “You’re cheating. All those integrations made you what, twice as strong as you used to be?”
Bastion laughed. “More.” His gaze sharpened and the smile disappeared from his face. “What’s your problem? You should be putting up more of a fight. You’re distracted.”
“Trying not to hurt you.” I gave him attitude, but we both knew he was right. Even now my gaze traveled across the training area to where Willow sat watching a group of Atlans try to best one another in a shooting contest. Their aim on a normal day? Deadly.
Today, not one of them had managed to hit the target, each shoving or tackling the competing beast in turn. Flexing. Roaring. Laughing. They tumbled atop one another like young boys. Every moment of their display directly in front of Willow.
Bastion kept talking, as if I were paying attention. “Oberon, we’ll get Amalia out of there. I promise you.”
“I know.” The strike team we would take into Hive space was unlike anything ever put together by the Coalition. A group of mercenaries who happened to be integrated Atlan beasts, Bastion and myself, plus an experienced ReCon team that was made up of talented members from both Battleships Karter and Zeus? Incredible. That ReCon team, to my shock, included two humans.
One of them female, Chloe. She was a high-ranking commander in the I.C. She appeared to be small and helpless, but I knew better when the warriors from the Karter treated her with both respectandcaution.
Even more impressive, she was the commanding officer in charge of the mission. I didn’t ask how she had managed to even be part of this team, when she answered to Helion. Didn’t know, didn’t care. She was, according to everything I’d heard, beyond deadly when it came to infiltrating Hive tech.
Like Willow, she was from Earth. But unlike Willow, Chloe was mated to one Prillon and one human—the latter, a ReCon captain called Seth—was here with her.
A human male and a Prillon warrior shared a female? That seemed a strange match indeed. Perhaps, if we survived this mission, I’d ask them how the fuck that had happened.
Between now and then, all I could think about was Willow. She sat still as a statue, watching the Atlans fire countless shots with their ion blasters. She looked beautiful, but breakable, fragile as glass. The dress she wore was made of a fabric containing alternating, very thin, bright yellow and white stripes. A few scattered green leaves decorated the curve-hugging bodice and hem. Her boots looked soft and were lined with fur, the darker green a near match for the leaves on her dress. I knew her eyes were blue, but I strained to see them from this distance.
I could see her lips, however. I wanted to—
Bastion’s foot slammed into the side of my jaw. I fell to my side, adjusting my downward momentum into a roll so I came up on my feet.
