WarriorsWoman (3 page)

“I have you, little one.” He cuddled Minka against his chest.

“Bastard.” Her beautiful eyes spit icy venom at him, then fluttered shut.

She had every right to be angry. Batzorg glared at his second. “You did not have to sedate her. I would never have let her leave alone.”

“You have…soft feelings for her,” Vilmos said quietly.

“We’re all going to fall in love with her,” Lorcan predicted with casual cheer.

“She is fierce, brave and caring.” Batzorg growled as if that explained emotions he did not fully understand himself. He damn well was not ready to discuss them with the triad.

“And beautiful.” Lorcan grinned.

Batzorg loosened the pole up his ass enough to agree that Minka was absolutely perfect. “She is elegantly formed.”

He turned to Lorcan. “Are there further mission objectives beyond delivering her to the founders’ compound?”

Lorcan shrugged. His lips were still moving, but the ship shimmied and Vilmos sealed the craft. “After we reached time-warp speed, we landed here again and hurried to help.”

“Who did Minka marry?” Vilmos frowned. “I don’t remember.”

I know every detail of her life. Why would I forget her husband’s name? Because I hate the idea of another man claiming her?
Batzorg was a realist. There could be nothing lasting between them. They were mechs and she was a revered founder.

Supporting her head in the crook of his elbow, Batzorg held Minka’s slight body easily with one arm in order to unfasten his helmet and rub the sudden tension at the back of his neck.

“I knew her husband’s name a few minutes ago.” Lorcan looked from Batzorg to Vilmos.

Vilmos frowned. “I cannot remember any of the other founders. This mission was a mistake. By transporting into the past we have permanently altered the course of history.”

“Better us than the cyborgs,” Batzorg growled, ignoring his own discomfort with the recent holes in his memory.

“Take it easy.” Lorcan turned toward Vilmos. “Let’s log in and check headquarters’ database for the name of Minka’s husband before we get any more bent out of shape.”

His second’s eyebrows bunched farther together and his mouth tightened. “Thoroughness should never be dispensed with for the sake of speed no matter what the degree of urgency. What kind of effective solution can we hope to execute when we are isolated from headquarters?”

“No access?” Lorcan asked.

“Did I not say so?”

“Quiet, both of you,” Batzorg demanded. They snapped to attention. “Lorcan, take her pack. Vilmos, you carry the cat.”

When they’d accepted their respective loads, he consulted his internal map of the area and confirmed the most direct route to California. Carrying Minka, he strode off toward the highway a few hundred feet south and straight down. “Follow.”

His stabilizers gave him flawless balance, and his bionic limbs never tired, but he picked his way carefully down the steep mountainside, unwilling to accept even a minimal risk when it involved Minka’s safety.

New flurries of snow pelted Minka and she shivered in his arms. “Halt.” He turned to Lorcan. “Retrieve her survival blanket.”

After he’d bundled her securely from the elements, he lifted her carefully and resumed their march. Honesty about his own motives was not any more comfortable than the heavy, aching cock confined by his armor, but Batzorg had to admit Lorcan had been accurate in his assessment that he was not objective about Minka. Vilmos had also been correct about his having tender feelings for her. As uneasy as the strange emotions made him, he was the triad leader and he needed to deal with anything that interfered with their mission.

Protecting her was a given, what mech warrior triads had been genetically and mechanically engineered to do—protect and serve. His strong instinct to guard her life was not a problem.

Her beauty and bravery were plain to everyone. But there was more to his feelings than appreciation of her beauty or admiration of her courage or even his desire to bury himself in her satin heat over and over again. He had adored Minka most of his life. Though they had just met in this time and he had no role in her world beyond keeping her safe. These facts did not change that what he felt for her went far past a fierce protectiveness.

This emotional factor meant he was not one hundred percent objective and therefore was not as fit to lead as he should be. Not willing to relinquish control and not able to formulate a satisfactory solution, he tabled the dilemma.

Batzorg switched to night vision when the sun disappeared. Within minutes, he picked up increasing wildlife signs in the forest approximately five clicks southwest of their current position. The triad traveled the highway’s increased elevation through a series of switchbacks for hours. Overhead, the midnight sky was clear and stars seemed almost touchable.

Gusts of wind grew stronger, snow flurries decreased visibility, and the temperature fell. The deteriorating weather did not impede the triad’s ability to cover ground, but he needed to find food and shelter for Minka.

An almost buried fence post caused him to alter course. A crunch of gravel beneath the deepening drifts confirmed his new route choice.

Chapter Two

Minka struggled to lift her eyelids. Maybe they’d frozen shut. Winter in Wyoming was cold enough to freeze anything. Dimly, she realized someone carried her. He was warm and solid against her side and she was too tired to protest. She burrowed into his chest and recognized her personal transport—the intense one. He’d saved her life.

In no immediate danger, she drifted in and out of awareness secure his arms. She pictured her rescuers. The new group dressed like ski bums. Their clothes fit the weather better than the dude ranch visitors’ wardrobe choices, but not by much. These guys moved like predators, but something not quite normal nibbled on the edge of her conscious thought. Exactly what bothered her, besides their general hunkiness, and the delusional issue, she wasn’t sure.

She inhaled the delicious scent of the man carrying her, a sexy blend of woods, spice and clean, musky male. He smelled as good as he looked and that was saying a lot, because he fit her personal ideal of masculine beauty. Tall, muscular and powerful, the man was also graceful, brave and honorable. Or so she hoped. Then he had that whole dark and brooding thing going on she found so irresistible.

Of course, if she’d designed him he would have been incredibly hot for her. But in what passed for real life since the horrific pandemic, she still wasn’t the kind of woman who inspired men’s fantasies.

Sexy guy number one had arrived in the nick of time to save her. He’d shown up with his friends, sexy guy number two and sexy guy number three in the same kind of prototype vehicle as the first three men. Any resemblance between the two groups began with their rides, continued with their future trip delusions, and ended with their extra-intimidating size. The first guys had been attractive, as long as she didn’t look into their flat eyes, but they’d been stone-cold killers, definitely not turn-on material. The new hotties, with glints of arousal in their dark gazes, were a lot harder to resist. Their obvious interest sent sparks zinging to erogenous zones she’d thought dormant.

Where had these guys come from, hunk central?
All three of them were hot enough to start their own fantasy show. They were also bossy—the one carrying her much more so than the other two. He was definitely the head jerk in charge.

To be honest, at least in the privacy of her own thoughts, his bossiness was more than a little hot. His Neanderthal approach was a tiny bit over the top. Although having three gorgeous guys dashing to her rescue and taking care of every little thing, like her inconvenient broken wrist and Nigel’s temporary death, made her feel all girly and mushy. A new experience for her. Even before the contagion, she’d been more the handsome hunk’s gal-pal type, never the princess.

She loved kids and in a perfect world would’ve had a large family. This world was about as far from perfect as possible. Even when there’d been millions of men to choose from, the few times she’d tried sex had been huge disappointments.

In her experience, men made terrific friends. She’d always been more tomboy than siren. Until a few hours ago, her sex drive had been missing in a long spell of non-action. Now after meeting three reality-challenged time travelers, her hormones decided to make up for lost time and kick into high gear.

Of course the men weren’t from the future, but they seemed sincere in their delusion.

Hey, she could overlook a minor issue or two. Since the pandemic, who was all that tightly wrapped? She talked to her cat. They believed in time travel. A bit of future tripping never hurt anyone and neither did her imagining something sexy happening between the four of them.

Whoa, three guys and her? Was that even possible? And they were big. Very big…all over? How would it feel to be totally filled, stretched and utterly satisfied?

Her eyelids weighed five pounds apiece. She let the darkness claim her again with a smile teasing the corners of her mouth.

* * * * *

The next time her eyes opened, she lay on an actual bed. The unmistakable fragrance of fresh pine and the crackle and hiss of real wood burning made her turn her head. Set into a log wall, an enormous stone fireplace held a blazing fire. A ladder-back chair stood on one side of the natural stone mantle, banked by a dresser. On the other side of fireplace, an open, unpainted plywood container, a bit like a giant toy box, took up three feet of wall space.

The room was actually warm. She curled and uncurled her thawed toes. Another dream? If so, she hoped it continued because it was way better than her usual fantasies.

The hunk with the amazing healing kit strode into the room, his arms loaded with split logs. He smiled tight and fast at her. “You are awake.”

She sat up in bed, shook her head to clear the fuzziness, and scanned the room again. Her pack rested under a window.

Alarm danced across her skin, raising goose bumps. “Where’s Nigel?”

The hunk’s name—Vilmos—came back to her.

His head ducked and he seemed engrossed by his boots or the wooden floor. “He is in the kitchen. Lorcan is with him. Your pet is quite safe.”

“And fed?” She winced at her sharp tone.
When did I turn into a shrewish cat mother?

“Ah yes, one can of shrimp and one tuna. He caught a rat as well, but gave the rodent to Lorcan intact.”

“A true sign of his esteem.” Her voice softened as her fear dialed back to caution. At least they hadn’t killed her cat.

Fully awake now, she eyed her enormous, but so far polite, captor. His face shield was flipped up and she reminded herself the man saved Nigel’s life and fixed her arm. He seemed friendly and harmless enough, but he could well be a friendly, delusional jailor.

She drew in a deep breath for courage and let it out slowly. “Am I a prisoner?”

His dark eyes widened in surprise and met hers with something that looked almost as if her question had hurt him. “Of course not.”

“Good. Where are we?”

He stared at a spot over her shoulder while he rattled off longitude and latitude.

“More general?”

“Wyoming, approximately thirty kilometers southwest of your most recent camp.”

Thirty kilometers? How long had she been out of it? For the moment, she gave up on the location question. “Thanks.”

The lingering effects of fatigue made her movements slow as she folded her legs tailor fashion and smoothed the quilt covering the bed. Even in the dim light from the fire, she saw the soft squares of wool formed a cheery Christmas tree with appliquéd ornaments and a star at its top. Her butt rested on someone’s treasured heirloom.

When the sheer numbers of deaths from the contagion mounted, the unfathomable loss of lives became overwhelming and somehow less important. Until some detail, like the quilt, touched her, reminding her of so many missing friends and family. Then her grief came back new and sharp enough to slice open old wounds.

After swallowing the sudden lump in her throat, she restarted the conversation. “I’m Minka Dubinski and you are?”

“Vilmos two of three, triad unit 341926 at your service.” His gaze flickered over her.

Strange surname. Probably part of the future trip delusion.
She wasn’t going to disturb his fantasies. Keeping her own imagination in check took enough effort. “Mind if I call you
Doc
?”

“I am not a doctor, but you may call me whatever you like.” He met her gaze with dark puppy-dog eyes—sad and trusting.

Definitely strange, but definitely sweet.
“Do you know what those creeps wanted?”

“Creeps?” he echoed.

“The first group that arrived in the weird vehicle.”

“Ah, the cyborgs. Yes, of course, they wanted you.”

“Why?”

“Your natural immunity to the contagion makes your blood a rare and valuable commodity.”

She shook her head again, hoping to get more sense into it. “I still don’t get it. What are they going to do with my blood?”

He sighed. “They hope to develop a vaccine that would grant others your immunity.”

“Even with a miracle vaccine, they can’t bring people back from death.”

“Ah, you’re forgetting with time travel. They could arrive prior to the contagion’s release and inoculate those they want to save.”

Her stomach growled so loud she blushed, saving her from saying something tactless to sexy crazy guy two of three.

“You’re hungry.” He dropped the wood he’d been holding in the bin next to the fireplace. “I will return.”

Minka watched his cute ass move out of the room and hoped he brought back food, otherwise she’d be tempted to nibble on him. She shook her head again, this time at her inappropriate thoughts. Their insanity was contagious. Had to be, she wasn’t like this.

The moment the door closed behind him, she scurried over to check her pack and found her gun—still loaded. She tucked the weapon back under her sleeping bag. Maybe the hotties really were harmless as well as incredibly attractive.