I insisted I wasn’t his mate, and he agreed. He promised to take me back to the Karter once I had the antidote. I’d been relieved. But now? All these other guys—aliens—thought I was his mate because we had sex, and I smelled like him. They treated me like I belonged to Mikos. Even now, it was Mikos in the center of this moving mass of muscles, right next to me like he belonged there.
I wished like hell I didn’t feel so safe with him next to me. This peace in my soul spread deep, like roots under a hundred-year-old oak. Something about him settled me in a way no one and nothing ever had before. Not my ex, god rest his soul. Not sleeping with a gun under my pillow. Not the hours I’d spent at the gym, in martial arts training, or at the shooting range making sure that when I needed to shoot someone, I didn’t miss.
Mikos made me feel safe. Which was a joke. Especially out here. He was a criminal, a member of one of the notorious Legions on Rogue 5 which, by my understanding, were all run more like mafia families or motorcycle clubs than civilized communities.
So, he wasn’t my mate, but he was taking care of me. For now. Didn’t matter what I wanted if he didn’t want me. And even if I did want to stay with him, I was serving in the Coalition Fleet. I’d just signed up for another two years after this term was up. I had no interest in going home, back to Earth. There was nothing for me there. At least with my ReCon team I had friends, a job to do, a contribution to make. I saved people instead of getting them killed. I atoned for my past.
Stop thinking about what you can’t have.Sound advice I intended to follow.
Curiosity about the space station made me crane my neck to peak around the literal wall of large bodies surrounding me. I’d heard this place was wild. Dangerous. Some of the guys on my team had been here, once or twice, and they still talked about it every time we went to the canteen after a mission to grab a few drinks. Their stories reminded me of the kind of things I used to hear about Las Vegas, or Rio de Janeiro during Carnival. Stories about bad people doing bad things. Sometimes about good people doing naughty things. Often, they’d be laughing, and the tales they told seemed to be about stupid people doing even dumber things, and being caught, hurt, or killed.
I’d had a chance to come here once or twice. I’d declined. I grew up in the suburbs of Savannah, Georgia. Despite growing up in our boring, beige house, I didn’t stay there. Home wasn’t the same after the divorce. After my dad died, I’d barely pulled the grades to finish high school. I missed him. I hadn’t seen him for months, and his death still fucking wrecked me.
Trying to be subtle, so Mikos wouldn’t see me, I wiped the lone tear off my face and kept walking. Thinking about my dad shouldn’t hurt this much. Guess I had Mikos to blame for tearing down walls it had taken me years to build.
Seemed I wasn’t over my daddy issues after all. Tough as nails, my dad. Dragged us all over the world when I was growing up. Never content to be home. Always another bad guy to kill, another enemy over the horizon. I tried everything to make him want to stay home with us, everything a nine-year-old could do with anE-Z Bakeoven and a miniature tea set painted with pink and yellow roses. When he was deployed, I gave my big, black teddy bear my dad’s seat of honor at the tea party table. I even pinned my dad’s medals on the bear’s fur and begged one of the guys on base for a hat the bear could wear.
When he was home, daddy sat in that chair and sipped tepid tea from tiny cups. He gave me a hug and his lopsided grin and then? He left again. And again. And again, until my mom couldn’t take the waiting, and she moved on. New daddy. New house. Same old pain. When word came that my dad had been killed in action when I was seventeen, I wasn’t surprised. I was numb.
I used his military benefits to pay for college, went ROTC my senior year of high school, joined the ARMY, then DEA. I’d seen enough bullshit in my life. I didn’t need to watch low-life losers from other planets do the same stupid shit humans did on Earth. Been there. Done that. After a few months in space,I’d realized one of the main reasons I’d left Earth was because I didn’t want to lose all faith in humanity.
When I left, I’d been damn close. Working with the guys on my ReCon team, I felt better about humans as a whole. Seemed sad to say the best human men I met had all left the planet.
“Are you in pain?” Mikos question startled me, and I realized several more tears had somehow made their way onto my cheeks. I wiped them away and shook my head.
“I’m fine.”
Took far longer than I expected to walk from the transport room to the docks. I wasn’t sure if they called them landing bays or what, but they were busy, ships of all sizes constantly zooming in and out of the energy barrier that held in the atmosphere we were all breathing. I had my armor on, just in case, and could activate the helmet, with its life support system, if I needed to. The armor would make fresh air for me for days.
I knew, because I’d once spent five days buried alive with my ReCon team in an underground Hive integration facility before the rescue crews could dig us out. The air down there had gone bad within a few hours, chemicals from the blasting agent the Hive used to seal off the entrance toxic in the extreme. After that, Captain Mills didn’t volunteer us for the underground missions. We’d stuck to boarding ships as they traveled through space, which suited me just fine. I never wanted to be underground again. Not for one moment. Definitely not for five days.
I’d always laughed at people with what I considered irrational fears. Fear of heights. Fear of snakes. Fear of tight spaces. All the phobias. Joke was on me, because now, I was the queen of claustrophobia if any kind of rock, soil, cave, or ground was involved. Metal box floating in space? I was fine. Add some dirt and I was done for. Full fucking panic. A fact I had notshared with my ReCon team, Captain Mills, or anyone else. Dealing with my new fear was my private war.
Another reason I slept alone. The nightmares were a real bitch.
A shudder passed through me and Mikos’s huge palm came to rest at the small of my back, like he really was mine, and I really was his, and hecared.
“What is wrong? Are you unwell, Breanna?” His question caused the three Atlans nearest me to turn their heads and listen for my response. Talk about feeling like a bug under a microscope.
“I said I’m fine.” We were in space, not under a gazillion tons of rock.
His frown—and those damn fangs made it look ten times fiercer—made me hold back a grin. “You will inform me at once if anything upsets you or if there is a problem.”
“Sure thing.” Soooo not happening. Because he wasn’t mine. I wasnothis mate. And the only thing he cared about was fucking and making sure I didn’t die from Hyperion-Forsian hybrid fang poison. Both were solid ideas I gave my full support. Especially the sex. Dying? Meh. I’d be dead. Wouldn’t bother me. But hot, irresistible, blow-my-mind sex? That wasn’t something I hadn’t experienced before him. I wantedmore.
“You are lying to me.” His hand slid lower, his palm cupping my ass as I walked next to him.
I reached behind me and grabbed his wrist to push his hand away. Fuck, he was strong. I couldn’t budge him, which made me even more aroused than the inferno level heat of his touch coming through my armor, racing straight to my clit. One touch and my pussy screamed that she was empty. I wanted to strip naked and beg him to fuck me again. Put his mouth on my wet heat. Suckle my nipples. Make me come. Demand I say his name in that sexy, growly voice that drove me crazy.
He leaned down so his lips brushed my ear as he spoke. “If I did not need my hands free to fight in case of attack, you would be over my shoulder, female. You will not lie to me. Do so again, and there will be consequences.”
8
Breanna
Consequences,huh? Did he just threaten me? With what? Too many orgasms?
Don’t. Say. It.
