Recon Marines II: Marine's Heiress, The (36 page)

Once they were on the bed, she urged
him to his back and enjoyed controlling the pace of their
lovemaking from astride him. It felt like months since they’d
enjoyed each other’s bodies though only days had passed. Emma’s
orgasm surprised her as it came on her. He followed her so quickly
the start of his extended hers.

His shoulder didn’t seem to bother him
as the next time he assumed the top position and moved in a slow
rhythm that coiled the tension in her center until she added some
scratches to his battered back. They finished together, his hard
body pressing her boneless one into the soft mattress.

Vin rolled to her side when he’d
recovered enough. “When I first saw you in this room I couldn’t
take my eyes off this bed. I imagined making love to you
here.”

She snuggled into his side, her body
and heart satiated. “Was it as you imagined?”

She couldn’t see his face but the tone
of his voice told her he smiled. “I’m a Recon Marine. I don’t have
that good of an imagination.”

She laughed and rubbed her hand on his
hard stomach. “I think we should visit Merris Five first. I’ve been
worried about them.”

“
Good plan. We can deliver
the equipment they need to mine the iridium.” Vin rubbed her back
with his bandaged hand. “They should be fine.”

“
I hope they held off the
Underboss’s thugs he sent after them.”

Vin’s hand paused for a moment, but
then he started up again. “I shot them all before I came after
you.”

Emma muffled her laugh against his
chest. “Thank you.”

Vin laughed a little too, more just a
rumble in his chest. “At your service, wife”

“
I love you,
Vin.”

“
I know.”

* * * *

Vin held his wife through the night,
offering thanks to whatever God watched over soldiers and men like
him. Whatever he was. He no longer felt the need to figure it out.
Emma accepted him and understood him better than he did himself.
That he could find love a second time in a life he believed damned
humbled him. He would follow her anywhere a galactic wind might
take them. He was the luckiest man in the universe.

The End

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The Marine’s
Queen

by

Susan Kelley

(C) Copyright by Susan
Kelley, January 2013

Chapter One

“
We’ll have heat for one
more night.” Yalo swept her gaze across the stark landscape
stretching toward the brightening horizon. “Then we’ll freeze and
die.”

Queen Callie Adell shaded her eyes
against the glare and stared at the wreckage of the military
cruiser sitting nearly a half of a mile from their own crash site.
“Maybe we should have tried to walk out of here.”

“
You made the right choice
to stay, my queen. The heat limits travel to a few hours in the
morning and evening. Once out of the ship, we wouldn’t have
anything to protect us from the heat of day or cold of night. Even
if we did, our water would have run out before we reached the
little speck of greenery I spotted on the scanners before they went
dead.”

The dawn lit the interior of the ship
enough for Callie to see that the cold had roused all the others.
Four year old Grace had cried off and on all night, sobbing
complaints no one could answer. Not even those broke Callie’s heart
as much as the frightening silence from Riba’s infant, Sally. Her
hungry wails had stopped hours ago.

Yalo sat up in her seat. She’d
positioned herself nearest the broken door as if her strength could
keep out the killing temperatures. She stretched her arms over her
head with a great yawn and then the desert rose up behind her and
pulled her out of the hatch. Her startled yelp ended in mid
shriek.

Callie rolled out of her chair, her
legs tangling in the pile of coats and blouses she’d used as
blankets. Screams echoed inside the ship from the other women, but
Callie couldn’t make a sound over her shock.

A tall figure shaped like a man but
covered with sand sprang into the doorway. It moved aside and
another similar but shorter being joined it.

Callie finally found her feet and
pushed the others behind her. Riba and Grace hushed their children
as they could, but Sally’s mews continued. Her weak cries stabbed
through Callie’s terror of the aliens looming a few steps
away.

The first invader called out to
something or someone outside the ship, using a dialect unknown to
Callie but speaking in a human voice.

Human. Callie found she could talk.
“What do you want?”

The first one, she guessed it was the
leader, looked in her direction. The growing light revealed the
material covering its head and the entirety of it body appeared to
be a suit and not sand at all. Its colors swirled sickeningly to
match the sand outside the open hatch and the walls of the ship
with some type of camouflage technology. Protective goggles covered
its eyes.

The leader spoke more strange words,
and the second alien skirted around them. It moved with animal ease
around their belongings and into the guts of their ship. Callie
stood in silence between her people and the leader while the other
one searched their vessel.

Callie’s anger and despair rose above
her fear of the strange interlopers and the odd weapons they held
in their gloved hands. “Who are you, and what gives you the right
to enter my ship?”

“
Are there no men among
you?” the leader asked in the common language of the
Alliance.

Callie hesitated to give her answer to
the fearsome apparition. At least it understood her
words.

“
Does no one guard you?”
it asked.

Callie gestured toward the hatch where
Yalo had disappeared. “That woman is my guard.”

Sally whimpered in the silence, her
tiny voice sounding frail after the deep tones of the stranger. The
first rays of the morning sun edged in the door and brought a
welcome warmth.

“
Tar,” the leader said
over his shoulder. “Bring the woman in.”

A third alien lifted Yalo in the hatch
and then sprang up beside her. It released her immediately and drew
back to the edge of the opening.

“
How did you come to crash
on this planet?” The leader seemed to be speaking to Callie, but
the angle of its head indicated it tried to look behind her at Riba
and Sally.

Callie shifted so she blocked her
cousin and her baby from view. “Tell me who you are before we
answer anymore questions.”

Again its full attention swung to her.
She lifted her chin and glared at it despite her pounding heart.
What type of humanoid might this be? She hadn’t believed any of the
rare creatures lived anywhere in this civilized quadrant of
space.

It swung its weapon around to its back
using a long strap she hadn’t noticed. It pulled off its gloves
revealing long-fingered human hands. The skin appeared sun-darkened
at it tugged off its dark goggles and then its tight head covering.
Eyes bluer than the cloudless sky of the desert planet stared at
her. Short hair, dark as the bottom of a mine, stuck out at odd
angles.

“
Joe.”

“
What?” Callie managed
around her shock. No grotesque being stood before her but a man
with the face of a god. No artist could have created more perfect
lines to his jaw and cheekbones. Intelligence gleamed in his
compelling eyes.

“
My name is Joe.” He
gestured toward the other two men who had also removed their
headgear. “Roz and Tar.”

Callie nodded at the other two men,
each as perfect in his way as Joe. If it weren’t for the heat
already building uncomfortably inside her damaged cruiser she might
have thought she had died and gone to the afterlife. These men
certainly reminded her of the glorious servants of the Spirit
Father as depicted in paintings.

“
Roz and Tar? Are those
their first names or last names?” Callie knew there were more
important questions to ask, but she wanted to proceed
diplomatically.

Joe’s expression didn’t change but
Callie could see thoughts moving behind his eyes. Finally he
answered. “Only.”

Yalo edged away from Tar and took up a
protective stance in front of Callie. “Get out.”

“
Yalo.” Callie placed her
hand on her guard’s trembling shoulder. Or was it her own fear
coursing across her nerves?

“
Get back, your highness.”
Yalo shot Callie a wide-eyed glance. “Don’t you know what these
creatures are? One name like a pet or a savage guard
hound?”

Wondering if the fall out of the hatch
had rattled Yalo’s head, Callie spoke as calmly as she could.
“They’re men, Yalo. Maybe they can help us.”

“
Men?” Yalo might have
meant her laugh to be mocking but it sounded hysterical. “They’re
not men! They’re recon marines.”

“
Fash take me!” The
science officer, Acacia, swore from behind Callie.

Sally fussed again, and Riba hushed
her with a quiet shaky voice.

Joe took a step forward and reached
for something hanging from his belt. Yalo started for him, but
Callie took a firm grip on her guard’s arm. The marine unhooked a
small sack and lifted it toward them.

“
Water with amino acids
and electrolytes dissolved into it.” His smooth expression revealed
no emotional reaction to Yalo’s harsh words.

Callie took the water bag, her mouth
salivating at the thought of a drink. They’d given the last of
their water to Riba and little Glory last evening. Callie handed it
to Riba who took it with an eager hopeful smile.

The other two men hesitated only an
instant before offering their water containers.

“
Vin?” Joe said over his
shoulder.

“
Here,” a fourth marine
answered from outside.

“
Water.”

No one else spoke as the women passed
the sacks around. Yalo continued to glare at the men, but she
didn’t pass up the water. A quiet quarter of an hour went by before
another beautiful man hopped in through the hatch. He carried more
sacks of water and a few other packs.

Vin opened one of the packs and pulled
out long stalks of some type of dried fruit or vegetable. He
offered it to Yalo and Callie first. When they hesitated he took
one of the stalks and bit off the end.

Callie reasoned the marines could kill
them at will and weren’t likely to poison them after sharing their
precious water. She followed Vin’s example. The food seemed a sour
fruit and took a lot of chewing before it could be
swallowed.

The other women each took a small
piece, but four year old Glory walked a few brave steps forward and
held out her hand. The marines didn’t move back, though they
appeared to lean away from the child. A tension as if they thought
to flee grew around them. Roz knelt slowly, staring at Glory. He
pulled a short wicked knife from his boot and cut a piece of the
fruit. With a strange wariness he held it out to the
child.

Callie held her breath, while Glory
walked closer to the marine. Sleep had left the child’s chestnut
curls in tangles, and her eyes looked as large of coins. She took
the fruit and put it in her mouth, all the time watched by the four
marines.

Glory’s nose crinkled at the tart
taste, but then a large grin spread across her face. “Thank you,
sir.”

Roz stood quickly and retreated to his
leader’s side.

“
Attend,” Joe snapped, his
voice quiet but seeming to shout all the same. The marines all
snapped to stiff stances, though Roz stole another glance at Glory.
“Who are you?”

Callie understood Yalo’s reaction to
the men as she met Joe’s stare. She saw no emotions in his
expression and an emptiness behind his eyes where a man’s soul
should reside. But he had given her people food and
water.

“
I’m Queen Callie Adell of
Giroux.” Callie stepped forward and offered her hand in the way of
interplanetary greeting. Joe ignored it. “Yalo Pangol, my personal
guard. Riba Adell, minister of interplanetary diplomacy and her
baby, Sally.”

The three marines flanking Joe took an
actual step back when Riba moved up beside Callie. Their leader
held his ground, but he didn’t even glance toward the baby. Callie
continued despite their odd behavior. “Acacia Kesol, my science
advisor. Grace Fozell works as my trade minister and you’ve already
met her daughter, Glory.”

Joe stared at her when she finished.
She stared back but a tiny shiver crawled up her spine as she met
his emotionless gaze. The unnatural stillness of the marines and
their rare beauty raised the spectra of Yalo’s warning. Were they
human at all?

* * * *

“
They’re civilians, Joe.”
Vin frowned at the cruiser half-buried in the sand one hundred
yards from their camp.

“
Did you see that little
girl?” Roz also stared at the ship full of women.

Joe understood the overwhelmed
feelings of his men. Five women, a child and an infant. None of
them had ever seen a child so close let alone a baby.