Captured Boxed Set: 9 Alpha Bad-Boys Who Will Capture Your Heart (112 page)

"What the hell are you talking
about?" she demanded, glaring down at him where he lay watching her with a
deep frown. "If he is going there is no reason I can’t tag along. I never
unpacked, and I can be in and out of the shower in minutes and ready to go."

Vox’s hands whipped up to grip
Riley’s upper arms in a fierce hold. "You think to leave me after the last
few hours?" he asked
in
disbelief. "I have chosen you as my queen! You are my mate!"

Riley frowned, pressing her hands
against his chest in confusion. "I thought you were going too. Besides, I
never said I wanted to be a queen! Hell, I couldn’t even get a date to the
prom, what in the hell makes you think I’m queen material? Why are you sending
Viper to Earth if not to take me back?"

Vox fought the urge to wrap his
hands around Riley’s neck instead of her arms. "To get your Grandma Pearl
and Tina, of course. You said you missed them. I will bring them to you so you
won’t. I need you to explain to Viper what he needs to know so he can return
with them," he said with a frustrated release of his breath.

Riley’s mouth dropped open again,
but this time instead of excitement
in her eyes, there
was horror
in them
.
"Are you nuts?!" she
screeched
.

Chapter
18

Vox ground his teeth in
frustration as Riley trailed behind him. She had not reacted anything like he
expected after he informed her that he was sending Viper to her world to
retrieve her family. In fact, the look of horror when he told her made him
question his own sanity. He needed to make sure he told Viper to handle Grandma
Pearl with extreme caution or he might end up with his head mounted to the wall
of her "bar," whatever that was. It wouldn’t make a difference, if Riley
missed her family it was the only way to solve the situation.

"Grandma will eat Viper alive!
Forget the
barbecue
sauce—think
sushi!" Riley insisted as she hurried to keep up with Vox as he headed for
the bridge.

"I will warn him that your
Grandma can be difficult—and dangerous," Vox insisted. "I will not
return you to your world, Riley. You belong by my side. If the only way for you
to be with your family is to bring them to Sarafin, then that is what will
happen."

"But what if they don’t want
to come," she demanded. "You have no idea what they are like! They
are nothing like me," she added. "I am the mild one of the three of
us."

"Gods!" Vox muttered
under his breath. "I find that hard to believe."

"What is that supposed to
mean?" Riley asked indignantly.

"I can’t believe they can be
worse than you," Vox admitted as he strode onto the bridge.

Riley stopped with her mouth
hanging open before her eyes flashed. "I am
not
that bad!" she
protested.

Vox turned as he was about to enter
the commander’s room and raised his eyebrow. "Would they have spent the
last two days singing that Gods awful song?"

Riley flushed and her mouth
tightened. "It’s driving you nuts, is it? No, they wouldn’t have spent two
days singing. Grandma Pearl would have whipped your ass into the ground or
filled it full of rock salt! Tina would be too dignified to sing; she would
have frozen you out to the point your dick would have been a popsicle,"
she snapped defensively. "The whole purpose
of
driving you nuts was so you would take me back! I have to take care
of my old boss and his dad, and I don’t want to die!"

Vox realized that every warrior on
the bridge had stopped what they were doing and were listening in fascination
to their conversation. He stepped closer to Riley and gripped her arm, tugging
her into the conference room, making sure the door was closed before he said
anything else. He saw the genuine fear in her eyes, as well as the
determination.

"I would never let anything
happen to you," Vox said as he ran his thumbs back and forth over her arm
where he was holding her. He hid the grin as he felt her body react immediately
to his touch.

"You can’t know for sure. Look
what you did to the jacket Tina gave me! That could have been me instead,"
she insisted, looking up into his brilliant tawny eyes. "In every movie I’ve
ever seen something bad always happens to everyone but the lead characters.
Hell, even some of the romance books I read do the same thing! If you can rip
up not one but two of my jackets by mistake, how do I know you won’t accidently
do the same thing to me one day?"

Vox let out an exasperated sigh. "Nothing
is going to happen to you! This is not some entertainment holovid, Riley.
Accept that Viper is going to bring your family here, and I promise to never
kill another one of your jackets ever again," he growled out in
frustration before he turned around to patch into the conference call with
Creon, Ha’ven, and Adalard.

Damn it!
Riley thought crossly.
How am I supposed to convince him that
bringing Pearl and Tina here isn’t a good idea if he refuses to listen to me!
God, I can’t even imagine what they would do. Tina…
Riley knew her little
sister would not handle being around so many guys very well. A bad incident
when Tina was in her last year of high school had made her sister skittish
about any of the male species, regardless of whether they were aliens or not.
That was what motivated Pearl to move them to San Diego from Los Angeles.
Things had changed when Pearl inherited a bar from an old boyfriend who died
from liver disease. Tina became the manager, handling all the bookkeeping after
she got her online accounting degree. Unfortunately, she became even more
reclusive. She refused to leave the office during open hours and never went
anywhere without an armed escort, namely Pearl, when they left at night.

Well, if singing is getting
through to him, then singing it will be!
she
decided with a reluctant sigh and broke into her off-key rendition of "Ninety-nine
Bottles of Beer on the Wall."
A girl has to do what a girl has to do.

Vox’s loud groan filled the room as
he clenched his fists in a desperate attempt to not wrap them around Riley’s
neck. Instead, he opened communications with the
Horizon
. He was sure if
he could kill Raffvin and some of his men, he would feel much better.

He saw Ha’ven and Creon on the
Horizon
and Adalard and Zebulon from the
D’stroyer
on the display screen
.
He
listened as Adalard explained Mandra had been gravely injured during the attack
on his uncle’s base. Bahadur, one of Ha’ven’s generals who had infiltrated
Raffvin’s inter-group, explained Raffvin had decided to abandon the base. He
ordered it and all the inhabitants he had enslaved to be destroyed. Mandra had
made the decision to attack.

"What of Raffvin?" Ha’ven
asked his younger brother, Adalard. "Were you able to kill him?"

Vox
listened as Zebulon filled him in on the current status of the situation. He
was furious Raffvin had slipped through their grasp again and worried about
Mandra. He knew how fierce a warrior the huge Valdier was during battle. He was
glad his friend would survive. He grimaced when Riley hit a particularly bad
note. He suspected it was on purpose. He knew exactly what she was trying to do,
and it was time he finally let her know one of the reasons why he could not
return her. He had a feeling she was not going to be very happy about it
considering it was one of the things she kept insisting she was terrified might
happen. He ended up cutting the meeting short since there was nothing else that
could be done until Raffvin was found. In the meantime, he had a brother to
send on a mission, traitors at home to take care of, and a mate who was about
to find out she was no longer completely human. Out of the three, the first two
were going to be much easier than the last, he suspected.

* * *

Lodar knelt down next to Vox with
a fierce frown on his face. Tor stood over to the side with an equally accusing
look on his. Vox sat on the floor of the training room where he had brought
Riley, looking up at two of his most trusted warriors and closest friends with
a pleading expression on his normally impassive face.

"What did you expect!"
Lodar growled out in accusation. "She told you she was terrified of
something bursting out of her."

"That she did," Tor
agreed
,
ignoring Vox’s heated
look.

"She said she didn’t want to
turn into anything," Lodar continued. "What part of your plan made
you think blurting it out to her and then calling her cat forth was a good
idea?"

"I don’t know!" Vox
admitted as he ran his hand down protectively over Riley’s still, white face. "I
thought if she understood why she couldn’t return to her world she would
finally be more—submissive," he finished a little weakly.

"How can you even think to use
the words submissive and Riley in the same sentence?" Tor asked in disbelief.

Vox growled at his chief engineer’s
tone. "She would never have believed me otherwise," he insisted,
brushing her hair back from her face. He turned to Lodar. "Can’t you do
something?"

"She fainted," Lodar
replied drily. "The best thing is to wait for her to come around. I am not
sure if you want to be here or not. She might just succeed in killing you this
time."

Vox ran his hand over his face and
lowered his head in despair. "You are probably right. Are you sure she is
going to be all right?" he asked huskily.

Lodar laid his hand on Vox’s
shoulder and gave it a sympathetic squeeze. "It was just a shock to her
system. All the scans came back normal. She’ll be fine."

Vox nodded in relief. "Leave
us, then. I think it best no one else is here when she wakes." He looked
up at Tor who straightened from where he was leaning against the wall. "Has
Viper left yet?"

Tor nodded. "Yes. He was not
happy, but he is aboard the
Horizon
on its way to Earth."

"Good," Vox replied with
a sigh. "Keep me posted on what is going on. I will join you in a few
hours. Set our destination for Sarafin. I have some traitors that need to be
dealt with," he said with a hard, cold edge in his voice.

"Good luck, my friend,"
Tor said as he smiled gently down at Riley’s face that had a bit more color in
it than a few minutes ago. "I have a feeling you are going to need it."

Lodar laughed as he stood up. "Just
make sure she doesn’t have anything hidden on her."

Vox shuddered when he thought of
the two small devices that she was so fond of. He had found them and hidden
them in a locked cupboard in their living quarters. He had also gone through
the large pink case she had, but he couldn’t find any other harmful devices in
it. He hadn’t had a chance to check the large bag she was so fond of as she
always had it with her.

He looked around the large training
room. There were weapons lining the walls on three of the four sides. Perhaps
this wasn’t the best place to bring her for her first shift. He knew she was
ready for it. His cat was more than ready for his mate, and he could sense hers
was close to the surface. The last time he made love to her he could see the
swirling lines of her cat running along her skin. He could also feel the
increased heat of her body against his.

Just the thought was enough to make
him hard. His cock swelled as he remembered the brief glimpse he had gotten of
Riley in her cat form. She was magnificent! She wasn’t all lean muscle and
sleek lines like the females of his world. She was nice and
plump
, with a rounded stomach that made his
cat want to flip her onto her back so he could rub against it. She had been
solid white with dark swirling lines of black through her coat and the
beautiful blue eyes that made him feel like he was drowning every time he
looked into them. Her face was framed by longer white hair that showcased the
delicate lines of her face. His cat had gone wild. Unfortunately, Riley had
taken one look at her front paw and fell over unconscious before he or his cat
could do anything. Maybe he should have warned her what was about to happen
instead of shifting and calling forth her cat before the door even finished
closing all the way.

He glanced down and was surprised
to see steady blue eyes gazing up at him in wonder and fear. He gently touched
her cheek with a finger, stroking the silky skin. Neither one of them said
anything as he sat holding her possessively against his body. He saw the
confusion, the questions, and the wonder fighting each other as the magnitude
of what happened flickered through her mind.

"Ever since I met you I have
made one mistake after another," Vox admitted in a quiet voice. "I
have never felt the emotions that you bring out in me. I have always been in
control but with you that control disappears. My body burns for you all the time,
Riley. I love listening to you, even when you are singing that gods-awful song.
I love watching your eyes flash with fire or laughter. I love how protective
and fierce you are for those you care about. I love how you are soft to the
touch and the passion in you when I make love to you. Most of all, I love you
more than life itself," Vox finished softly.

Riley blinked up at the most
handsome, confusing, and unusual man she had ever met. He had totally turned
her life upside down. He confused her with all the emotions he woke inside her
when he was near and scared the hell out of her more than she had ever been
before because she knew he had the power to break her heart. That was something
she had protected ever since her mom took off all those years ago.

"Can you ever forgive me?"
Vox whispered with regret. "Can you find it in your heart to at least give
me another chance to not mess up?"

A smile tugged at the corner of her
mouth as warmth filled her. "You love me?" she asked with a sparkle
of hope in her eyes.

Vox closed his eyes for a moment
before he opened them and sighed heavily. "With every fiber of me and my
cat’s being."

Riley reached up and tugged his
mouth down to hers. She kissed him with everything she had inside her. She let
all her fear, hope, and love flow into it, showing him everything that she didn’t
know how to express. Her lips caressed his, her tongue running along them until
he opened to her. Her arms wrapped around his neck, pulling him off balance
until he was
lying
over her.