Meridian Warriors: Xander and Des (6 page)

Xander paced back and forth with the piece of
paper in his hands. He was confused, if there was even a slight
chance that some of the females from their home world made it out,
where were they, and how the hell had they come to Earth?

“Samantha Riley Brenton and twin sister,
Gabriel Belle Brenton, were born thirty years ago to, Frances Nila
Brenton who died in childbirth. She was listed as unmarried;
however, she was in a domestic relationship with Cameron Trent
Brenton who died in a car accident shortly after their birth. The
girls were cared for by Helen Burb, but money was given to the
girls monthly, it came from Collins Shipping,” Rosul said
quietly.

On and on they continued dissecting the
women’s lives to find a connection. There was nothing, it didn’t
make any sense, but they had the proof right in front of them. Des
kept in contact with Sage, the women were napping after they had
given him a lot of shit. He almost felt sorry for him,
almost
.

For an hour, they dug into the women’s past
and nothing stood out. It was frustrating. Xander knew there was
some sort of explanation for all of this, although they would not
be getting it from the women, they had no clue who or what the hell
they are.

“So are we gonna tell them?” Des asked.

“Like we have a choice, man, we are like
underwater in a bubble, I think they are gonna notice when the sun
never rises, and the sky has large whales and sharks wandering
around in it. Hell, how do we even tell them this?” Cash asked.

“I say we tell them the truth, and then let
the chips fall where they may. It is not as if we have a choice,”
Xander prompted.

“Who is gonna be the one to deliver the
news?” Rosul asked.

“Rock, paper, scissors?” Des said
hopefully.

All of the guys laughed and finally Casius
spoke up. They had all been surprised when the quiet, hard man told
them that Gabby was his mate. They were still going to be looking
for their third, which meant either he was a human, or for some
reason another of the Warriors was his mate, and they had never
connected, which was hard to believe. Therefore, it had to be a
human,

“Sir,” Casius said formally. It was like that
with him, even after so many years the man still preferred to be
formal with Xander.

Des and Xander had often wondered about
Casius, he was strong and dedicated, but the man never seemed to
have any fun. When most of them took days off to swim, or go to the
surface, Casius rarely did. He seemed to be content working and
making sure all of the men were trained and ready in case they
needed to defend themselves.

When Rosul developed a new weapon, Casius was
ready to train the men and make sure they knew how to use them. He
was relentless. It was going to be fun watching the big man try to
deal with his female mate. All of the woman seemed independent. It
would be fun to see how all of the men would respond to having
women in Meridian City. Since men lived here there were no hair
salons or spas.

No, the city held houses, thirty-one of them
right now, and nine other buildings. There was the training
facility that held all of the exercise equipment. Then there was
the Dining Hall, built with a state of the art kitchen; Warrior
Killen took it upon himself to take a chef’s class on the surface.
He and his mate, Priw, were the cooks. They were in charge of that
building, and everyone let them when they tasted their food, it was
amazing.

They had a construction building, where they
held materials to expand if needed, they also held all of the extra
furniture they made and collected over the years. Several men were
in charge of that. Then there was the financial building, where
they held their money and gold. All of the men could live a very
comfortable life if they had to on the surface. Then there was the
clothing storage, which held all of the different clothing they had
worn over the years, in addition to clothes in all the current
styles.

There was the technology building, which was
split in two, one side worked on weapons while the other worked on
communication and computers. They were always busy discovering new
ways to use the power they were able to harness. This led to the
next building, which held the medical floor and offices for all the
men. Then in the basement was their power source, what they had
brought from their home planet, which allowed all of this to be
possible. The source was never ending, it was found on their home
planet and was tied to the water, and the Warriors had harnessed
all of it. When the planet was in danger, their King ordered the
source to be split and put on each ship. It was contained in a
large metal container, which they could tap into easily. Xander was
assured when they spilt the source that it would still be strong,
and he had been right.

When they first landed on this planet, they
conserved their energy, since they didn’t know for sure.
Nevertheless, as the years went on and the source never wavered,
Xander ordered it to be used more. They discovered that when they
did use it, the source could reproduce the energy, which they took.
Rosul could explain it, but after he got past the first sentence
most of their eyes glazed over. What it boiled down to was that
Rosul adapted the power source to this water to make it work,
somehow they pulled the elements from the water, and it was added
to the source. The Hopis would never have been able to figure this
out, which was why they were still looking.

Finally, there was the King’s Palace. Xander
had protested when the men began to build the huge house. However,
they insisted on making sure their customs were upheld. The King
and his mates on their home planet lived in a palace large enough
for all the population to congregate. Since they were a diminished
number of people, the palace was smaller. However, it would still
hold all of them when they had a party, or celebration.

In the smaller but still rather large home
that was just outside the Palace was meant for the leader of the
security and head Warrior. That was Casius—he was the lead Warrior.
Xander turned to his trusted friend and frowned at the seriousness
of his expression.

“Yes, Casius,” Xander said and waited.

“What if they don’t want to stay, I mean down
here. If we tell them what we are, then they could demand to leave
and tell everyone where we are. We can’t allow that,” Casius
said.

Xander frowned at him and shook his head. “If
they are part Meridian, then they will feel the mating pull. We
will have to convince them. They are our female mates, Cas—we never
thought we would find them. We can’t just let them go.”

Cash, Rosul, and Des nodded as Xander was
talking. Casius looked at his friends and then shook his head. “So,
I would suggest that we lay it all out then. We have to give them
all the facts and then we will see.”

“Cool. Then tag you are it,” Xander laughed
at his friend who unfortunately, for him, spoke up.

“Wait, what?” Casius said and looked at his
friends who were grinning at him. “Shit.”

***

Alex woke up again and this time it was
easier to open her eyes. The nurse had given them something to
sleep. She looked over and her friends were both waking up as well.
Good, they were alone now and could talk
. Something about
this place did not ring true to her. She wasn’t sure what kind of
town Meridian City was, but it certainly was different from any she
had been in.
They called their leader a King? What was up with
that?
In addition, so far the only nurse they had seen was
Sage, no change of shift, no candy strippers.
Just
weird
.

“Alex?” Gabby whispered, Alex turned and saw
both of her friends were now sitting on the sides of their
beds.

Alex grimaced when she saw the damage the
storm had done to them.
Shit, this sucked
; all of them in
one way or another were injured to the point that leaving this
place today was out of the question. Alex would not put her friends
in danger if they just had to put up with a little weirdness. She
just needed a cell phone to call someone at the marina to notify
them where they were so her father didn’t start a full out search
for her.

“Yeah, I am up,” Alex said and pushed the
button on the bed and made it rise, so she was sitting up. Alex
felt her shoulder move and she groaned in pain.
Shit, the nurse
said she had dislocated and torn muscles.
She was going to have
to wait and see if she needed surgery. They would let her know
today.

“You okay?” Sam asked quietly as not to make
the nurse come back in.

“Sore, you?” Alex asked her two friends.

“Uhhhh, huge leg cast!” Sam said and pointed
to the large cast on her leg, she had broken her femur,
and it
sucked
.

“Yeah, sorry,” Alex muttered and then looked
at Gabby who had a smaller cast on her foot since she broke her
ankle.

“We are a sorry sight, I don’t think we have
a choice,” Sam said and Alex looked miserable, her friends were
right, they were going to have to stick this out. It was funny how
they were on the same page; it just went to show you how close the
three of them were.

“We just need to get a phone, we have to call
the marina, or they will be sending out a search party soon. I
would also like to know how big that damn storm turned out to be!”
Alex whispered loudly.

“Well, do you have any suggestions on how to
get the hell out of this mess?” Sam asked.

“Not really,” Alex said and bit her lip, “I
think we are gonna have to wait and see what happens. Shit, have
you ever seen so many hot men all in one place? And they are so
tall. I bet they would tower over us.”

All three women were tall, and when they went
on dates, they had to wear flat shoes because most of the time,
they either looked their dates in the eyes, or they were taller
than they were. In the past, they all commented on the fact that
men didn’t really like taller women,
it must be a superiority
thing
, they thought.

“I know, hell, Casius looks at me and I
practically have an orgasm right there. What the hell is going on?”
Gabby whispered.

None of them spoke for a while, each of them
thinking about the men they were so drawn toward. Alex was freaking
out a little by the fact that two men were so attractive to her,
and they seemed to be friends. She would love to take one of them
for a tumble in the sheets, but by the looks of it, that would
never happen. She would never upset or come between friends.

“Where do you think we are at?” Gabby
asked.

“Not sure, I was out the whole way here. I am
not even sure how the hell they found us. I mean there was no one
around us when we went over,” Alex said and then Sam laughed.

“No, there was a man swimming in the ocean,”
Sam said smiling.

Gabby and Alex looked at each other and shook
their head. “You were hallucinating,” Alex said laughing.

“I don’t know.” Sam frowned and looked around
at her friends and said quietly, “I swear, he looked like the one
you were talking to, Alex. I think his name was Des.”

“How could you see that?” Gabby teased.

“Because it was the last thing I saw before
the wave hit. The man was riding the wave. He looked like he was
having fun. That is what caught my attention. I am sure he was in
the water. Are you sure there wasn’t another boat around? Maybe
they were scuba diving or something. I don’t know. I just know I
saw him,” Sam said in frustration.

“Regardless, we need to figure out what we
have to do to get out of here, or get a phone,” Alex said with
sympathy, she knew her friend thought she saw something.

***

“There you go, they have already set the
tone,” Des said and pushed him toward the doorway they had been
standing next to listening to their mates. All five of them had
listened, and with a deep breath, Casius glared at them and walked
into the room.

Xander and the others followed with smirks on
their face. This would be entertaining to see the larger, hard
Warrior try to explain this. Xander and Des knew they were going to
have to jump in and save the poor guy, but they were going to make
him start this at least. He needed to get used to speaking to
people in complete sentences.

“Ladies,” Casius said slowly, then looked
over his shoulder, and glared at all of the men when they
smirked.

Alex and her friends turned and looked at the
men with wary expressions. Xander wanted to sigh, it was going to
take a lot of explaining for them to understand they had a new life
now, at least he hoped so. Alex could always deny the bond, it
would suck, but it could happen. Xander stood taller and thought,
that was never going to happen, Alex was theirs, and the sooner
she figured that out, the better for her.

The men all went to their mates and stood or
sat beside them. Casius looked down at his mate and tried to smile.
He probably looked like a scary dipshit, but he couldn’t help
that.

“What do we have to talk about?” Alex said
smartly and looked up at the men with a hint of defiance.

Casius cleared his throat and said, “Well, we
are here to answer your questions the best we can.”

“Oh really? Then where are we?” Gabby
asked.

“You are in Meridian City, we are
approximately five miles below the surface of the water, and about
three hundred miles southwest of the southern tip of the United
States,” Casius said clearly and slowly.

Alex and the girls were silent for a moment
before one of them—no one was sure who—began to laugh. Casius
frowned and looked at his friends and shrugged his shoulders, none
of the men understood why they were laughing until Alex spoke
up.

“Okay, real funny, guys, now seriously, where
are we. I am not getting the vibe from all of you that you are
killers or kidnappers, so what’s the deal?” Alex asked, wiping the
tears from her eyes.