Taken: Warriors of Hir, Book 2 (11 page)

Ten

He gave a g’hir’s huffing chuckle. “We mated, little one.”

“We didn’t,” Hope groaned. “Say we didn’t.”

“If it pleases you. Then we did not mate,” he agreed. “We fucked.”

“Yeah,
not
better.” Hope passed her hand over her eyes. “Let’s stick with ‘mated,’ okay? And why didn’t you
stop
?”

“Why would I?” he rumbled, happily nuzzling the sensitive spot where her neck and shoulder met. He brushed his nose against hers and his eyes shone. “I could not imagine a better mate-bonding.  I have never known such pleasure, such a strong release.”

“Thanks,” she muttered, pushing down an absurd thrill of pride. “I’m glad you liked it.”

“Did you not?” He propped himself up on his elbows to search her face. “I felt you contract around me more than once. Your pleasure sounds were loud. Did that not signal your climax?”

“Yes,” she mumbled. “Yes, I absolutely—seriously,
no
worries there—what I meant was we shouldn’t have done
this
. Uh, mated.”

He drew back a little further, regarding her with puzzled alien eyes. “Why not?”

“Because—” Having this discussion while they were still naked, while he was still lying between her legs and—she realized with a surge of wonder and new arousal—hard again, was insane. “Because we shouldn’t have! I mean, we met what—yesterday?”

His brow creased. “This time requirement before mating—is it a human rule?”

“No, this is a
Hope
rule. As in, when my life is complete fucking mess, it doesn’t improve things any to have sex with an alien.”

He froze. “That is all I am to you? Even now, after we have mate-bonded?”

“No, of course not, I just—but come on, R’har, I mean you
aren’t
human.”

His breath exploded in a snarl and he pushed off the bed. Hope grabbed at the bedclothes to cover herself but apparently g’hir didn’t do modesty because he seemed unfazed by the fact that he was completely bare.

“I can
never
be human,” he growled. “But I will not let you make me ashamed of what I am!”

Hope blinked. The idea that he should be ashamed never crossed her mind and shock held her speechless while he dressed.

“Hold on, I didn’t—! Oh, don’t you dare walk—!” But the door was already sliding shut behind him.

“Goddamn it!” she gritted out, yanking the nightgown over her head and scrambling out of the bed. “That’s one thing you and human guys have in common—thinking you’ll win an argument by walking out in the fucking
middle
of it!”

Hope got to the common room just as R’har was about the head through the opposite door.

“R’har, I didn’t mean it that way! I just meant—”

“What?” He rounded on her, his snarl filling the common room. “What did you mean?”

She folded her arms, her feet freezing, ticked both that she had forgotten how freaking cold it was in the common room and that she suddenly felt in the wrong here.

“It isn’t going to work between us, R’har. It just
can’t
!”

With an angry, impatient gesture he indicated the bedchamber door. “How can you say this when we have already mated?”

“I’m not talking about sex! Even if we forgot about stuff like, oh, I don’t know—not living on the same
planet
—you’re g’hir, I’m human! We’re just—” And for no reason at all her eyes stung with tears. “We’re just . . . different, R’har.”

“Yes, we are different!” he roared. “Human and g’hir are
different
. My eyes will never water like yours do. You will never truly understand what it means to me to have lifemated to you! I cannot be human for you, but I will give you more of myself than any human male ever could!”

“Lifemated?” she echoed, shaking her head. “What the hell is—”

Hope cried out as the ship’s floor tilted violently. The impact of whatever slammed into the ship knocked them off their feet and Hope hit the icy deck hard enough to rattle her teeth. Pain shot up her shoulder as the room was plunged into darkness.

She flailed blindly for R’har and for a single terrified instant in the silent blackness of that spaceship Hope reached for him, and found nothing.

Then his warm hand wrapped around hers.

“Hope! Are you injured, little one?”

Her shoulder had been briefly, blessedly numb for a moment but now the pain made a grand entrance. It hurt like a bitch but it sure as hell wasn’t the highest priority right now. “I’m fine,” she lied. “Are you okay? What’s happening?”

“We are under attack! I must—”

Another impact slammed against the hull and cut him off.  His grip tightened on her hand as the deck bucked under them.

This time the lights came back on and the blare of alarms with them. The galley beyond looked largely undamaged. Most things on the ship were secured in sealed cabinets and cubbies but those few loose contents of the common room were thrown about but—

“You’re hurt!” she cried at seeing R’har’s bloodied mouth.

He shook his head sharply. “I have to get to the cockpit! Are you—?”

“I’m fine! Go!” Not true, her shoulder was throbbing, but she was likely no worse off than R’har and he was already pushing to his feet.

Hope made it to standing and into the corridor behind him before another impact rocked the ship. Either this one was a glancing blow or she was getting used to being in a spaceship turned funhouse because she managed to catch herself against the wall and remain upright.

R’har had a g’hir’s speed; he was already through the door at the end of the hall.

With hands outstretched to her sides, ready to catch herself in case the ship tilted again, Hope ran after.

R’har sat in the pilot’s seat, his fingers flying over the controls, but outside the windows there was nothing but the usual stomach-flipping endlessness of space and the peaceful turning planet, Olari, below.

“What’s happening?” Hope slid into the co-pilot’s chair beside him but another slam against the hull had her clutching at the armrests to stay there.

“Why are we being fired upon in g’hir space?” he snarled, adjusting the displays. “There should not—” R’har went still and his face blanched. “Goddess, no. It cannot be here . . .”

“What?” Hope demanded. “
What
cannot be here?”

“A Zerar warship.”

Eleven

“The same people who infected your planet with the plague are trying to blow us to hell?” Hope tightened her hold on the armrests as the ship bucked again. “And hey, have you thought about shooting
back
at them?”

“We
are
shooting back,” he growled shortly. “Or we would have already been destroyed by their weapons. The ship’s defensive systems and heavy shielding came online at their first volley.”

Another blast from the Zerar ship slammed against them.

“We must contact Hir,” R’har muttered, his hands moving like lightning over the controls. “We must warn them of this incursion.”

“But the communication systems aren’t—” Hope bit her lip against a whimper as another blast hit the ship. “And maybe we should think about doing that from someplace else? Like maybe we escape
first
and text
later
?”

His fangs were bared. “They have damaged the directional assembly I repaired yesterday. We cannot jump to Hir.”

“Can we, uh . .  . ‘jump’ anywhere?” Hope’s stomach clenched as the ship lurched again. “You know, somewhere where we’re
not
getting pummeled by these lunatics?”

“We have enough power left for a short jump.” R’har shook his head. “It will gain us nothing but a moment’s safety and only drain our fighting capabilities further. We have little enough time as it is. It will not be long before our power is drained completely and we are left defenseless.”

A burst of foreign lettering filled one of the display screens and although she couldn’t read it, Hope recognized that it didn’t look like the g’hir language.

R’har gave a deep threatening growl.

“What is it?” she asked. “What are they saying?”

“They demand our surrender.”

She wet her lips. “Is that an option?”

“The Zerar have sometimes taken g’hir warriors prisoner. My people know to do anything to avoid capture by these monsters.”

“But if we surrender . . . we’ll live, right?”

His gaze snapped to hers.

“Right?” she persisted.

“Hope . . .” R’har shook his head again, his face tortured. “You cannot ask me to—I cannot let them take you. I will die first.”

“Right. I forgot.” Her hands clenched. “The g’hir’s big human secret. If the Zerar see me they’re going want to know what I am, where I came from. They’ll want to know what I’m doing here with you.”

“The Zerar will know immediately why you are with me. They will know they have all they need to extract that information from me.” His throat worked. “I will not be able to hide being bound to you. They will . . .
hurt
you to force the information they want from me, little one. And then I will tell them everything.”

And if the Zerar knew that his people had a chance of survival they would want to destroy that chance as quickly as possible.

Earth . . . Dear God, they would destroy the whole world. And R’har—

Her eyes met his. “Would you consider surrendering if I weren’t here?”

His hesitation gave her the answer.

Hope looked across the cockpit at R’har, at his rippled brow, his startling eyes, and remembered the tenderness of his touch on her body. He wouldn’t surrender because he was protecting her. Just by being here she was going to get R’har killed.

The hell I will!

“Okay,” Hope murmured, scrambling to think. She nodded at the blue-green planet below. “Okay, what about the Olari colony? Can we land?”

“That world has been stripped of its defensive capabilities. The Zerar will only follow us down and destroy us before we can land.”

“But you said—a ‘jump’ opens a wormhole, right? They can’t detect us inside a wormhole, can they?  You can do a short jump and they won’t know where we’ve gone.”

“They will not be able to detect us during the jump but we do not have the power to go far. The instant we emerge in realspace they will detect us.”

“Can you jump to Olari? If you could do that—” She gave the abandoned world an anxious glance. “We could hide on the planet, couldn’t we?”

R’har’s luminous eyes widened. “Make a jump into a planet’s atmosphere? That would be insane!”

“Good, maybe the Zerar won’t expect us to be as crazy as we really are.” 

R’har shook his head. “My Hope—”

“They won’t know where we’ve gone! They might just think we scrounged up enough power to get away from them.”

The ship bucked underneath them.

“We can’t surrender,” she reminded. “We can’t let them capture us and if we stay here, we’re fucking dead anyway. We can’t even let them get ahold of us
dead
because that’ll start them wondering what I am. I might not agree with the g’hir plan to use human women like this but we just can’t—My whole
world
could be destroyed by the Zerar if they find out the g’hir are breeding with humans. So right now, R’har, we’re down to two choices to keep them from finding out about me—you destroying this ship with us inside it or,” she nodded at Olari below, “jumping to the planet.”

“I cannot do this, Hope,” he said hoarsely. “I cannot knowingly risk your safety—your life—this way.”

“My safety will be a whole lot more than ‘risked’ if we stay here much longer.” She rested her hand lightly on his arm. “You can land this thing, R’har. I know it.”

He gave a humorless huffing laugh. “Then you are far more confident than I.”

Another burst of alien language scrolled across the screen. Even the Zerar’s letters looked menacing.

“Hey, if you’ve got a better idea—” She wasn’t sure what R’har had meant by the Zerar hurting her to get the information out of him but right now her imagination was in overdrive. “Believe me, I am all ears.”

“I do not.” R’har’s jaw worked. “But even if we do survive this jump it will not be  . . . pleasant.”

“Probably still a hell of a lot more pleasant than being captured by the Zerar.”

“Yes.” He gave a grim smile. “That at least I can promise you.”

She glanced at the controls. “What do you need me to do?”

“Do not die, my Hope,” he growled, his glowing eyes serious. “All else I can endure.”

She gave a nod. “You got it.”

He turned his attention to the controls and glanced at her. “You might also fasten your safety harness.”

“Right,” she muttered, even through she had no idea how to do it. Now certainly wasn’t the time to ask for directions or help. He was fastening his own so she just copied his movements as best she could.

“The jump will be short,” he said. “But it is unlikely this ship will withstand atmospheric pressure upon return to realspace. The controls will likely short out and we are low on power. I cannot be sure of how close to the surface we emerge. If we are lucky I will have time to land the ship in a controlled crash.”

And if we’re not lucky?
But she nodded anyway. “Okay.”

“Are you ready?”

For a moment the cockpit’s lights blinked out, leaving them in the utter blackness of space.

R’har’s and Hope’s eyes met as the lights came back on.

“Whether I am or not,” she said, gripping the armrests, “I think we just ran out of time.”