Captured Boxed Set: 9 Alpha Bad-Boys Who Will Capture Your Heart (24 page)

Chapter
Eleven

Tren cursed the time it took to
get his ship back online and discard the repair bubble. He used those wasted
moments to imagine how he’d torture the three armed bastard who’d dared move so
brazenly against him.

Of course, he had only his
distraction for one female to blame for getting caught off guard. Then again,
if the cowards had come for him, he’d have taken care of the problem,
distraction or not, but they’d instead dared to go after Megan. Just the
thought of her in someone else’s grasp made his anger burn hotter than a star
gone super nova.

Locating them proved easy once he
got on his way. Megan’s translator also contained a tracking device, an
expensive upgrade he’d acquired for a project he’d ended up passing on a while
back. His ship followed the blip of her signal while he armed himself and
prepared to unleash a miniature war.

Nobody frukxed with him and lived
to tell the tale.

When he got within radar range, he
engaged the cloaking device. Another expensive toy, but wealth stopped being a
barrier a long time ago. His larger craft shadowed the vessel holding Megan. He
made his way to the lowest deck, not the section where the dead-aliens-walking
entered, but another smaller section especially built for space embarkations.
Fingers flying on the console, he engaged his boarding mechanism which lowered
a metal tube. It connected to the other vessel’s surface with only the
slightest thud.

Tren braced his feet over the hatch
as it hissed open and dropped through as soon as it was clear. He hit the
surface of the other vessel and went to work with a laser cutting through the
metal. As soon as the piece dropped, providing him entry, he followed, his
knives pulled. In space, only the insane used guns which could punch holes into
vital areas. Usually, he was that crazy person, but he needed to ensure Megan’s
safety before he let loose.

The storage room he entered, while
loaded with stolen goods, did not contain anything for him to kill. A shame.

A scan of the ship by his own
computer showed only six life forms on board—Megan plus five idiots. A paltry
amount. The first two he found in the bridge, oblivious to the vessel anchored
above them. They only managed to turn halfway to greet him when he slit their
throats before they could raise an alarm. Wiping his blades on their carcasses,
he moved quickly to search room by room. The crewman exiting from a stateroom
managed a squeal before Tren thrust his dagger into him and dragged it up,
eviscerating him.

Cold rage drove him as he
methodically hunted the remaining two. He located the fourth miscreant standing
outside an open doorway, watching something eagerly. Tren could hear a voice
muttering and the fleshy smacks of someone getting beaten. Tren ran at the
inattentive guard and thrust both daggers into its back, using them to lift and
move the gurgling thug out of his way.

Tren stood framed in the doorway,
and his fury coalesced from angry red, to an icy white. The three armed
mechanic, who should have known better than to frukx with him, slugged Megan,
who hung bruised and bloody from a set of manacles.

He caught the soon-to-be-dead alien
midsentence. "…like that, you smug bastard?"

"You’re nuts," she
muttered. "Tren doesn’t care for me." Her words struck him like a
blow.

"Liar," spat the alien. "He’s
never been seen with a woman outside of a brothel before. You must mean
something, and I am going to ruin you for him. Sully you and then throw it in
his face. And he won’t be able to do a thing about it."

"That’s what you think,"
Tren growled, more angry than he recalled ever being. He didn’t need his knives
for this, so he sheathed them as he flowed into the room, vengeance
personified.

The mechanic snarled as he drew a
knife of his own and lunged at him. Tren didn’t move. He caught the flailing
wrist, and the second which came out of nowhere with another blade. He yanked
and twisted the appendages as the third hand came thrusting at him—and missed.
The crack and snap as bone broke preceded the wailing scream of the alien. But
Tren wasn’t done. He grabbed the third arm and snapped it, too.

The idiot, who’d thought to best
him, collapsed screaming. The noise irritated Tren, so he kicked it in the
head, knocking it unconscious.

Then he turned to face his human.

Megan, even with all her injuries
retained enough wits to gape at him. "You actually came for me?"

He shrugged. "Did I mention I
hate pirates?"

She laughed, a sound tinged with
pained hysteria. "You’re insane."

"Probably. But I wouldn’t talk
if I were you. What did I tell you about trouble?" He spoke to her gently,
trying to keep her attention on him as he used his knives to pry open the
manacles. The left one popped open and he went to work on the other.

"I know. I just keep making
that profit margin of yours smaller and smaller."

"If this keeps up, I might
have to keep you for a while until you work off some of your debt."

The restraint snapped off and she
collapsed against him. He caught her with one arm, hugging her tight to him,
his rage burning anew at her weakness and injury.

"I’m sorry, I’m such a pain in
the ass," she whispered against his chest. "You should have left me
to die."

"Never," he almost
yelled, the very thought of her death chilling him through and through. But she
never heard his reply as she slipped into unconsciousness.

A myriad of feelings swirled in
him. He wanted to wake her up and shake her for allowing herself to succumb to
despair. He wanted to crush her tight to him and keep her forever safe. He
wanted to kiss her until she smiled. He wanted to weep with relief that he’d
found her.

I’ve truly lost my mind
and he was no longer sure he cared, a situation he’d examine later.
Right now, Megan needed tending.

He swung her up into his arms, and
headed back out into the main hall. Reaching his created entrance, he held onto
her with one arm as he used his other to grasp a hanging harness that his ship
dropped at his command. The crank, holding the suspended cable, hoisted him and
his precious burden up. He wouldn’t—couldn’t—let her go as he tapped in the
commands to separate his vessel from the now vacant one. The hatch closed with
a metallic click and Tren heard the sound of the metal tube retracting. He
didn’t bother calling up a view screen to watch the fireworks when he ordered
his computer to fire on the other vessel as soon as they were at a safe range.

More important matters called to
him, such as getting Megan to the medical unit as quickly as possible. He laid
her on the table with care, stripping her bloodied garments, a strange moisture
in his eyes as he visually catalogued her external hurts. A low moan emerged
from him when he read the list of internal injuries she’d suffered because he’d
failed her in the first place. In that moment, he vowed to never let her down
again. To never allow another to hurt her.

And
I’m never letting you go.

* * *

Megan’s eyes fluttered open and,
worried about what she saw, she shut them quickly.

Oh no, I died.

She tried to calm her breathing,
which quickened as she took stock of her situation. The last thing she
remembered was collapsing in Tren’s arms as he rescued her, the screaming pain of
her body making her faint. That agony seemed gone, which given Tren’s alien
technology seemed possible. But the soft surface she found herself on, a fluffy
cloud for sure, and the frescoed ceiling above her certainly didn’t resemble
either his ship or anything else she’d ever encountered in her life.

Hence, she must have died and gone
to some alien heaven.

That sucked.
I’ll miss my damned
pirate.

A tear leaked from the corner of
her eye…and was wiped by a calloused finger.

Her eyes flew open and she let out
a watery laugh as a familiar purple visage came into view. "I’m not dead,"
she exclaimed.

"Of course not," he
retorted.

She grinned at his matter of fact
statement. "Well, excuse me for doubting you. The last thing I remembered
was passing out."

"A weak female constitution is
no excuse for doubting my abilities."

Megan snorted. "I’d like to
see you act so tough if you were tied up and beaten."

"Is this another one of your
round about ways of asking for kinky sex?" He leered at her and Megan
laughed.

 It felt good to be alive.

"So how long was I out? And
where are we?" she asked, sitting up and only realizing as the sheet
pooled around her waist, she wore not a stitch of clothing.

To his credit—or not—he didn’t let
his gaze stray to her exposed breasts.  "Your injuries required several
galactic cycles to mend. As to our location, I’ve brought us to a secure
location so that I can have repairs done to the ship."

"Oops, another delay on my
path to auction," she joked, although her heart wasn’t truly into it. The
thought of being sold didn’t irritate her, frighten her yes, but the ache came
more from the knowledge that her eventual sale meant she wouldn’t enjoy Tren’s
company—or body—any longer.

"Never fear, you’ll get what’s
coming to you," he announced cryptically dropping a light kiss on her
lips. "Now, are you hungry?"

Megan nodded and watched him
saunter out of the room with a spring in his step. She wondered what made him
so freaking happy. The knowledge that as soon as the ship got repaired, he
could finally get rid of her bothersome ass?

Megan scowled.
Stupid, rotten
jerk. He doesn’t give a damn that soon I’ll belong to someone else.
The
realization crushed her. It also destroyed her last wall of denial and forced
her to examine the truth of her feelings for him.

Ah, shit. I love him.

How and when had it happened? She
didn’t like him. He intended to sell her, and yet he roused a passion in her
body like no other. He intentionally goaded her until she attacked him, but at
the same time he stimulated her mind and put up with her attitude. Hell, he
encouraged it. And she’d fallen hard for him; a useless emotion that now
guaranteed he’d break her heart because she didn’t suffer under the delusion he
felt the same way. Why would he when he could have his pick of women, well,
alien females anyways? Why would he want her argumentative barbaric ass when he
could hook up with a docile, dainty bitch?

Megan growled as she thrust the
sheets back and swung her legs out of the bed. Standing, she stretched, naked
and uncaring. In a mood, she stalked to a brightly lit opening covered with
filmy curtains. She stepped through and saw paradise, or something closely
resembling it.

Two suns shone in the sky, one much
fatter than the other. They made the rolling waves of a large body of water, a
sea of the deepest teals, dance and glint with light. Moist, warm air caressed
her bare skin. The balcony leaned out over a stone cliff of black rock, but
when she looked to the side, she saw a beach stretching in the distance, its
white sand sparkling.

She didn’t hear Tren join her, but
felt him at her back, his body brushing up against hers. His arms laced around
her torso loosely as he rested his chin on her head.

"How do you like the view?"
He asked the question with a lazy casualness she didn’t trust.

"It’s nice."

"Only nice?" He spun her
in his arms and she peered up at him to see him frowning slightly. "This
location is not to your liking? Do you not like warm weather and living along
the beach?"

"I love tropical climates. And
the place appears gorgeous, but there’s not much point in getting too attached."
She shrugged. "I mean, this is temporary right?"

"What if it weren’t? Would you
mind living long term in a location such as this?" His gaze bored into
hers intently.

She scrunched her nose up at his
questions. "What’s with the twenty questions?"

"Just curiosity. For the
auction, of course. Your new owner will want to know." His lips curved
into a smile when he said this and mirth danced in his eyes.

"You’re a jerk," she
replied with none of her usual heat. His words depressed her instead of riling
her like they usually did.

"I know. Now get your buttocks
inside and eat something so I can show you around."

She wanted to ask why he bothered,
but he’d already gone through the curtains. Casting a look out over paradise,
she could admit—at least to herself—that if she could have a say in her future,
she wouldn’t mind a place like this.

Megan went back into the room and
saw Tren already lounging on the bed, eating off a laden tray. Hunger of a
different sort filled her and she undulated her hips as she crossed the room
toward him. His eyes lit with a glow she recognized, but he didn’t move to act
upon it. Annoyed, Megan sat cross legged on the bed to eat, still naked and
displaying her pussy, not that he paid her any mind.