Captive (34 page)
In his peripheral vision, Addy bounded toward them with the sword in both hands. Noah cried in a corner, where she left him out of harm’s way. She pointed the blade at Red Beard’s face. “Break it up. Now.”
“No, Addy,” Max wheezed too late.
A black rod jabbed into her back. She cried out and dropped the sword before collapsing. He’d murder that damn poacher for hurting Addy. But there was no time to act on his anger. An electric current zapped through his nerve endings. His muscles spasmed.
The Hyborean shocked him and Red Beard alternately until they separated. And then gave a longer shock so they couldn’t move while his furry arm reached into the cage and confiscated the sword.
All he—and everyone else—could do was watch the poacher carry out of the room their only means of escape.
The devastation and hopelessness in Addy’s eyes crushed him.
She was the first to regain motor control and took the opportunity to collect their share of the food. His muscles fired again about the same time as Red Beard’s.
Red Beard crawled to his side of the cage. “You let them take the weapon. You brainless bitch.”
“Shut the hell up. She didn’t know.” There hadn’t been time to explain this to her. He picked up Noah and cradled the baby in his arms. A few minutes of rocking would stop the crying.
“What didn’t I know?”
Red Beard wiped sweat from his face. “That you were supposed to take the food, but leave the weapon hidden. How stupid are you?”
“
I’m
stupid? If you shared the food in the first place, there wouldn’t have been any fight to attract the poachers. We’d still have the sword to cut through the bars and escape. If anyone is stupid in here, it’s you, you...red-bearded bastard!”
Max snickered. She was a feisty woman, but needed to work on her insults.
“Besides, if you knew you couldn’t protect your horde, why bother fighting?”
In an attempt to settle her down, Max stroked her arm, but she shrugged him off. It took two to fight, so in her mind he was undoubtedly as stupid as Red Beard for drawing the poacher’s attention.
She still had so much to learn about this barbaric world. Too bad he had to teach her about it instead of protect her from it. “It was never about the food or the sword, Addy.”
“Then what was it about?”
“Dominance.”
“What!” It wasn’t a question. It was more like her
are you freaking kidding me
shout. Her teetering armload of fruit nearly spilled, but she managed to rebalance it.
“If one male shows his aggression and the other backs down, the hierarchy is established. If no one backs down, they have to fight.”
“Why?”
“How else would they determine the alpha?”
“Are you two dense? We’re stuck in a freaking cage. Who cares who the alpha male is?”
“Everyone in here should care. It could determine who gets food, who gets killed, and who gets—” he glanced at her breasts “—other things.”
“Why can’t you both promise to share the food, not kill one another, and leave
other things
alone?”
“Addy, two beasts can vow not to eat each other, but will they keep that promise when they’re starving? This isn’t a world of gentlemen and assurances. This is a world of animals and survival.”
“Well, thanks to you two animals, there won’t be survival for any of us. How are we going to escape now?” She dropped all but one piece of fruit at his feet, took Noah out of his arms, and then retreated to an empty corner away from both Red Beard and him.
She needed time to cool off.
The woman would never get used to this planet. And honestly, he was glad. Addy should make deals and compromises and believe people could work together for the common good. She shouldn’t have to assess every situation from a survival standpoint. It would strip away her humanity. And witnessing that atrocity would kill him.
An entire wall of the room surrounding their cage sublimated. A motor hummed, and the floor vibrated beneath his bare feet as the cage backed out of the subaquatic through the gaseous door.
It appeared that they’d been on a hovercraft vehicle similar to a pickup truck. The Hyboreans drove in the cab behind the solid wall, and the cage comprised the truck’s bed.
There wasn’t a road per se, but the craft seemed to following some sort of path weaving among trees the size of giant sequoias and hovering over vegetation, downed logs, and boulders. Regardless of what was beneath the vehicle, the ride remained smooth.
The forest’s woody fragrance filled his senses. The air tasted of fresh earth after a storm. Funny how he’d remembered that after fifteen years. Addy closed her eyes and turned her face toward the sky. Did she smell it, too? Did the beams of summer sun peeking through the canopy remind her of home?
Did it remind her of all she’d lost?
As the hours passed, they all kept relatively silent in their own corners of the cage. The vehicle had stopped occasionally. Each time the poachers would get out, disappear into the forest, return empty-handed, and then continue on their way.
Night fell, blanketing him with refreshingly cool air. Addy snuggled Noah closer to her body. His little pink face seemed content, but she didn’t. She shivered, and her tired, droopy eyes kept closing and opening wide as if she were forcing herself to stay awake. She was afraid to fall asleep. Didn’t she trust him to protect her against Red Beard?
He moved to sit next to her, wrapped an arm around her and pulled her cold little body close to him. Her shivering stopped. Without a word, she rested her head against his shoulder and closed her eyes.
S
he woke to the fresh, dewy scent of morning, and the sight of a man bound and hanging in a tree.
Was this what Red Beard had meant by suspension? Were criminals hung in trees until taken by death, wild animals, or Hyborean poachers, whichever came first?
In this case, it was their poachers. She watched them retrieve the man. “Are you going to fight him, too?” she whispered to Max.
He yawned. “If need be.”
“Why don’t you just sniff each other’s genitals?”
He smirked. “Actually, the alpha wolf does the sniffing; the beta wolves roll over and allow it. But I’ll be damned if I’ll do either.”
The cage opened and a Hyborean dropped the unbound man inside, feet first. He fell in a heap on the floor.
“Did the poachers really think it necessary to tranquilize him?” she said. “He was tied up and hanging in a tree for cripes sake. It’s not like he could have gotten away.”
As soon as the vehicle started, the newcomer jumped to his feet with fists on his hips and chest puffed out in a Superman pose. “Nobody fear. I’m here to rescue you.”
Both Max and Red Beard relaxed back against the bars they had been leaning on, an apparent indication neither thought the newcomer a threat to their alpha status—of course, which gladiator had actually won that title was lost on Addy. Since she didn’t want another rumble in the cell, she didn’t dare ask.
“Rescue us,” Red Beard sneered. “Where did this idiot come from?”
Max looked the new guy over as if trying to place him. “You look familiar. Have I killed you before?”
Nice conversation starter, Max.
“I am an HGC agent. I’ve been cracking down on human hunting and have apprehended and arrested twenty-nine poachers this year alone.”
“You’ve arrested Hyboreans?” Max sounded doubtful. You could tell he thought the guy was loony.
“Well, no. I didn’t do the arresting.”
“What did you do?” asked Red Beard.
“I was the bait for the sting operation.”
“Congratulations,” Max said. “You make a hell of a night crawler. These Hyboreans fell for you hook, line, and sinker, huh?”
“Are you mocking me, sir?”
“Sorry, pal. I find it hard to believe you’re anything but a crook suspended for some offense.”
“I told you I work for the HGC. Sometimes I roam loose in an area near suspected poachers. Sometimes I’m suspended. Either way, it’s not long before I’m captured.”
“What’s HGC?” Addy asked.
“Human Gaming Commission, ma’am. I protect human wildlife from the black market.”
“What about captive humans?” she said. “Do you protect them?”
“That’s not my duty, ma’am.”
“Not your job, huh?” She turned to Max. “Sounds like he worked for the United States government before his abduction.”
“Earthling poaching is illegal,” he said. “No one has been taken from that planet in fifteen years.”
“Hate to burst your bubble, but that’s
so
not true.”
“Yes it is. I should know. I was instrumental in the undercover op that stopped poaching to that little planet for good.” Puffing out his chest, his white shirt pulled tight over his muscles. Genetics didn’t endow him with a huge frame like Max or even Red Beard; still, for a smaller man he appeared nicely cut. “By getting myself captured along with some Earthlings, my master had evidence that interplanetary poaching existed.”
Max stood. His eyes narrowed at their cellmate as if trying to place a familiar face. “What’s your name?”
“Cyrus.”
“Son of a bitch.” Max’s tone sent a chill through the cage. His eyes smoldered, as if embers within him were burning dangerously hot below the surface and required only a slight breeze to set them ablaze. “You.” He grabbed Cyrus by the throat and threw him up against the bars.
“Max,” Addy cried.
“You’re the lost hiker. Only you weren’t lost, were you? You knew the fucking poachers were on the mountain and you lured them into our camp, you bastard. You made
us
the fucking bait!”
“It was the only way to prove Earthling poaching,” Cyrus rasped out, trying to pry Max’s hands off his throat.
“Where was your little band of government agent Hyboreans when they saw us getting shot with tranquilizers? Why didn’t they arrest the poachers then? Why?” Max thrust Cyrus’s head into the cell bars again.
“If they did, others would have taken their place,” he choked out in a high-pitched voice. “They needed to track us to the black market and shut down the operation from the top.” His words were barely understandable, his face red.
Recalling the ice cavern and Max’s powerful hand around her own neck, cutting off her circulation, she rubbed her throat in sympathy and fear for Cyrus’s life. “Stop it. He’s here to help us.”
“Why didn’t he help me then? Why didn’t he help my brother or my cousin or the eighty other men in those cages?”
His contempt and hate was greater than anything she had witnessed before. Squeezing harder, Cyrus’s face turned purple and his fingers slipped from Max’s. His eyes were drooping like on the verge of sleep, or death.
“Max, you’re killing him!”
“I know.” Her gladiator’s icy tone and evil grin scared her. Tears stung her eyes. Max was losing control over the beast raging inside. If he killed this man, he killed their last hope of escape. And then afterward, when the beast calmed, he’d realize the consequences of his hatred, and he’d plunge into an even darker place than he’d been before.
If Cyrus died, Max would, too.
“Let go of the beast!”
Max glanced at her over his shoulder. His gaze locked on hers, and she knew he saw himself through her eyes. He understood what she meant.
His hands opened.
Cyrus slumped to the floor.
Max turned his back on the HGC agent and Red Beard, and held his hands in front of him, watching them shake. He’d scared himself with his loss of control.
She moved past him, crouched on the floor next to Cyrus and checked to see if he was still breathing. He was, thank God. “He’s coming around,” she said a few moments later.
Cyrus jumped up nearly knocking her over and imitated the Superman pose. “Fear not,” he rasped. “I’m here to rescue you.”
She glanced at him and then at Max with a didn’t-we-just-go-through-this expression. She was beginning to think Max was right—this guy
was
loony.
“Cyrus?” she asked cautiously. “Are you okay?”
Cyrus stumbled backward and leaned against the cage bars, rubbing his temple with one hand and throat with the other. He slowly sat back down looking from Max to Red Beard—who sat watching with mild interest—to her until recognition dawned on his face. “I blacked out,” he said, as if anyone needed an explanation.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “If it makes you feel better, Max has that effect on a lot of people.” She cast Max a contemptuous look, but it was wasted on his back. He stood rigid, watching the passing flora through the cage bars. Only she knew he wasn’t interested in the scenery. He was trying to calm himself and gain composure without appearing weak. The man in him was trying to tame the beast.
He’d be better off alone for the moment.
“I’ll get you some water, Cyrus.” Addy got up to check on Noah sleeping in his makeshift bed—he looked so plump and healthy and peaceful, her heart swelled—and then returned with the canteen. She sat on the floor next to Cyrus. “Can you really get us out of here?” she asked when he had drunk his fill.
“Yes.”
“How?”
“Sit tight and wait. My master and his agents will move in, capture the poachers and free us.”
“Where are they now?”
“I couldn’t say. They don’t hang around while I’m suspended. ‘Hang around’—get it?” Laughing at his own joke, the weathered lines around his eyes creased and his Superman blue irises sparkled.
“Yeah, I get it. I’m just not up for laughing right now.” Not with Max’s back still turned. She wanted to go to him but feared the others might take that as a sign of weakness and start trouble again. Stupid alpha dominance games.
“Don’t worry, ma’am—”
“It’s Addy.” She extended her hand.
He took it in one of his but instead of shaking it, covered it with his other hand. Apparently no one on this planet practiced the custom of shaking hands. “Don’t worry, Addy. I’ve been captured eighteen times, and every time my master has come through.”
“Except the time they stole eighty-three people from Earth.” Max’s voice was gruff instead of pissed, indicating he was starting to relax. He glanced over his shoulder, and his gaze went straight to their hands. His eyes flared with anger and something else. Could it be jealousy?