BloodandPassion

Blood and Passion

Emma
Abbiss

To keep her deep, dark secret, guard Xyla Devi hides the
truth when she’s stabbed in the leg by an inmate on the prison planet Earth. In
pain, she stops at a convenience store for a bottle of wine and runs into two
alien hotties she knew back in peacemaker school. The whirlwind affair that
ensues may be too good to be true. She’s more used to being attacked than being
loved. And the guys are definitely hiding something. Still, for a chance to
fulfill her threesome fantasy, Xyla will risk everything, including her heart.

A
Romantica®
futuristic erotic romance
from Ellora’s Cave

Blood and Passion

Emma Abbiss

Chapter One

Hiding an injury carried a sentence of corporal punishment
but instead of reporting to Medical, prison guard Xyla Devi just squirted
seal-skin over the wound on her hip. Immediately the bleeding stemmed and the
pain subsided. But the side effect of seal-skin was that the slimy glob of
chemicals made her eyes water and her head fog.

She wrinkled her nose. The nostril-searing drug smelled a
lot like the thousand-year-old pollution that had turned Earth into a
wasteland—a wasteland that was now a prison planet for the galaxy’s most
notorious criminals.

This really isn’t my day.

Blinking back tears, she left the dark corner where she had
hidden from the hovering security cam, or see-cam. Xyla forced herself to walk
steadily until she made it out of the ding-wing—the prison’s mental ward—and
down the max aisle. An image of her mother came to mind. Nothing like an injury
to make her want her mommy. And that was just messed up. Her mother was the
last person in the universe she should long for right now.

You can only count on yourself
, she thought, but
memories of her old school friends, Rish and Mikal, negated that idea. No
matter when, what or where, those two crushworthy guys had always had her back.
Damn. How’d I ever lose touch with them?

But she knew the answer. They’d graduated a year before her
and, no doubt gone on to bigger and better things while Xyla was now a
low-level guard on a nearly uninhabitable planet. No, Xyla and Rish and Mikal
didn’t exactly run in the same circles anymore.

With this damn injury, I won’t be running anywhere for a
while.

She wouldn’t report the attack. Not when it was her third
on-the-job injury this month and she was facing a transfer from the ding-wing
to the minimum security ward on the opposite side of the planet.

“Six­­­-five!” An inmate’s shout echoed down the long
corridor, warning the other maximum security prisoners that a guard was coming.

The chip embedded in the back of Xyla’s hand flashed red,
blue, green, signaling the end of her shift. She held her arm over her injury
and hurried past the six-by-eight-foot cells that caged lifers. Whistles and
lusty shouts followed her until the thick metal door that separated the inner
and outer prison sectors thudded shut behind her.

She entered the crowded employee garage, keeping her arm
over the tear in her green slacks. There were too many eyes. Too many see-cams.
Even her boss Kith Rayorr was there, supervising departures from across the
hangar.

A mixture of fuel from the ships and ozone from the outer
prison shield overpowered the coppery smell of blood that trickled from her
wound. Her colleagues, two hundred and twenty-two day-shift peace guards, said
goodbye to each other in tired voices. They powered up their ships and flew off
to their homes on one of the thirteen manmade moons that orbited Earth.

“Night,” she said to no one in particular as she slid into
her wormhole-warped compact spaceship. The rusted door sealed shut with an
oxygenated groan.

“Xyla,” Ship greeted in its haughty voice.

“Hi, Ship.”

“My fuel is depleted. Far below recommended levels for
off-planet travel,” it whined. “I advise we dock at the nearest AllStore to
fuel up…if you approve.” Ship preferred to have a full tank of fuel. Always.
For such a piece of crap, it really was a diva.

“Can it wait?” She belted herself in.

“I may not have enough fuel to fly to the closest AllStore
tomorrow.”

The holo readout showed over half a tank of fuel. As usual,
ship was being a drama queen.
Definitely not my day.
With a sigh, Xyla
pulled the rubber band from her hair and speared her fingers through her blonde
curls.

“Shall I dock?”

“Fine.” Xyla didn’t have the energy to argue with the damn
machine.

Doors rattling, engine choking, Ship accelerated down the
short runway and took off. Out of the cracked viewscreen, the system’s setting
yellow sun smoldered in the sky, making the evening atmosphere bleed shades of
orange and pink. Xyla sat back in the bucket seat and relaxed. Minutes later,
an AllStore came into sight, levitating in puffy peach clouds high up in the
atmosphere. Ship docked upside down next to a brand-new Mustang StarRunner.
Xyla gave an impressed three-note whistle.

Damn bliss ride.

While Ship fueled up, she released her buckle and pulled
herself through the porthole located on the top of the vessel. Gravity shifted
and she dropped into the store, landing on the sticky floor next to a news
screen that announced another bomb scare on Uranus.

Has to be the fifth one this month
, she thought as
she averted her face from the nearby see-cam. Her left leg throbbed.

A bottle of wine suddenly sounded like her best idea ever.
Maybe two bottles.

After grabbing a couple of bottles of cheap red wine, Xyla
limped around a tall stand of fresh lublub grubs and jerked to a stop. Down the
aisle stood a man she hadn’t seen since they’d attended peacemaking school on
Mars together, a man who set her heart pounding.

He looked the same. Not a day older, but then he was of Ivec
descent—a wealthy but secretive race from a distant system who lived damn near
forever and owned almost everything in the Milky Way.

Mikal Fabom.

Mouth gone dry, she just stood and stared. Tall and
well-muscled, he had a body that inspired sculptors to labor over blocks of
stone to reproduce his physique.

Years ago he’d had long, dark-brown hair that he’d worn in a
braid that had reached an ass made for cupping. Now his head was shaved,
leaving just the tiniest bit of dark stubble. But his eyes hadn’t changed. They
were still quicksilver and saw everything except her, just as he’d never really
seen her in school. At least not as more than a friend. He only had eyes for
that hottie, Rish Limaeve. And who could blame him? The only other male Ivec
student in peacemaker school, Rish had a long, lean swimmer’s body, golden,
shoulder-length hair, deep blue eyes and a lush mouth that tended to get him in
trouble.

She licked her lips.

Oh, the sexual fantasies she’d had about Mikal and Rish…
Xyla shuddered. They’d been the closest thing to friends she’d had. Too bad the
two men had achieved adult rank and she’d remained underage while attending
school. She rolled her eyes at herself.

Yeah, as if my jailbait status was the reason the two
most bliss guys in school didn’t want me.

What they’d lacked in knowledge of human culture and law,
they more than made up with sheer physical strength and sharp, nearly
genius-level intelligence. Hot, strong, smart, rich— Yeah, Xyla had just been
one in a very long line of women who’d wanted them.

Move
, she admonished herself,
before he sees you
staring at him.

She turned to go down the adjacent aisle, wincing at the
stab of pain from her knife wound.
The alcohol will take care of it.

She ran smack into Rish. Wine bottles in both hands, she
stepped on his booted feet and couldn’t find her balance. He grabbed her
shoulders to steady her. A pleased smile showed off the tips of his Ivec-sharp
canine teeth and brightened his wide-set eyes.

“Xyla Devi.” He didn’t release her. The heat from his hands
soaked through her uniform into her tense shoulders, warming her. “Mikal, look
who fate found for us.”

She felt a hot blush paint her neck and cheeks. She stepped
out of Rish’s arms. And backed right into Mikal’s hard body. Where was a black
hole when she needed one?

Towering over her, Mikal lifted her chin to look down into
her upturned face. His quicksilver eyes cut into her, sharper than the shank
that had sliced open her flesh.

“H-hi.” She winced. Damn all things bright and shining.
Stammering? She was a peace guard for nebulous’ sake.
Pull yourself
together!

“Long time,” Mikal said, his warm voice sliding through her,
making her wet and breathless. His gaze swept over her cheeks, which had to be
hot pink, to meet her eyes. “How are you?”

Gasping as though she were a spacewalker without a suit, she
stepped to the side, putting distance between herself and the two men whom
she’d thought of so many nights before bed in the hope that she would dream of
them.

That they remembered her. Knew her name—astonishing. A deep
breath. “Rish. Mikal. Good to see you.”

She straightened, proud that she hadn’t stuttered. Not that
anyone could blame her for stammering in the presence of these two bright
stars.

De-lish.

Rish tucked a golden curl behind his ear and raised an
eyebrow but said nothing as she blatantly checked him out. He wore a peace
guard uniform two shades paler green than hers, signifying he was class
three—two levels above her—and probably worked in the courts instead of the
prison. His pants hugged his body as she’d only dreamt of doing, accentuating
his hard lines. His shirt showed off his flat stomach and muscular arms. She
licked her lips.

“Like what you see?” he asked, chuckling.

“Always did.” Xyla was still blushing but the heat that
filled her body now belonged to sexual need more than embarrassment. She
dropped her gaze to Mikal’s black boots and ogled his thick thighs. He wore a
peace officer’s uniform too, off-white. Probably patrolled the space lanes. On
his left thigh, a splash of red marred his otherwise perfectly clean uniform.
She looked away, but not soon enough to go unnoticed.

“Is that blood on your pants?” Rish asked Mikal.

Xyla took another step back and planned her escape. If they
turned her in after she’d covered up her injury, she could lose her job.
Should’ve
forgotten the wine and just fueled up and flown home.

Both men turned on her, blocking her paths. They inhaled
deeply. Rish licked his lips. Mikal’s pupils dilated.

“You’re injured,” Mikal said. Not a question. A statement
with steel behind it.

Think fast.
“Sliced myself on some exposed metal in
my ship. Looks like I need another coat of seal-skin. Sorry about your uniform.
Bill me. I’m on RMC Moon 2.” She turned to leave.

Mikal, looking as though he didn’t believe her, grabbed her
arm and spun her around. “Screw my uniform. You’re bleeding all over the
place.”

She glanced at her hip.
Glum.
He was right. The seal
had broken and her wound was deeper than she’d first thought. Blood spilled
down her leg to cover her boot in a bright-red sheen. She worked the
finger-sized tube of seal-skin out of the loop in her pants and generously
smeared it on the wound through the rip in her pants.

The bleeding slowed.

She blinked past the dizziness that swept over her again.
The bottles of red wine protested with a clunk when they hit the metal-mesh
floor and clattered as they rolled away. Her legs buckled. But instead of going
down, she was lifted against Mikal’s broad chest and found herself looking into
his handsome face.

She smiled.

“Dream come true,” she mumbled, or maybe just thought.

She leaned in and gave his lips a kiss. Warm. Soft. Another
kiss. This time with tongue. The taste of his mouth—perfect. His sharp canine
teeth pricked her lower lip. She tasted copper and didn’t care. He didn’t
respond but didn’t pull back.

The sexual fantasy she’d had in school that kept her
obsessed with the Ivec guys flashed through her mind for the millionth time
since she’d first met them. It always started the same.

* * * * *

She was running late for class. Alone in the school showers,
she relaxed her muscles under a hot spray of water, steam billowing all around
her like balmy, dense clouds.

The back of her neck tingled. Mikal and Rish appeared out of
the mist, as though they were ghosts taking corporeal form. Water beaded their
bodies. The scent of sweet soap saturated the air around them. Xyla closed her
eyes then opened them, expecting her dream guys to disappear like the fantasy
they were. But not only were they still there, they approached her, holding her
hands and kissing her with a gentleness that belied their capacity for
violence.

She had seen them in action, their speed, their strength.
Mikal and Rish were at the top of their class in every category…and they sure
as hell were at the top of her lust list. She shuddered as their hands smoothed
up her ribs to cup her breasts and roll her nipples in perfect synchronization.
She jerked in their hands, feeling petite and feminine between two such large,
masculine males, her lips parting on a groan.

Mikal studied Xyla’s face, the rise and fall of his
well-built chest quickening, his silver eyes smoldering. He rubbed circles down
her back and cupped her ass, drawing her against him so that the length of his
hard body fit against her soft curves. She melted into him.

Rish pressed up against her from behind, the thick length of
his cock nestled in the small of her back. He kissed the side of her neck,
making her shudder and sigh. Mikal took advantage of her parted lips to kiss
her too, thrusting his tongue into the deep recesses of her mouth, cupping her
face in his weapons-hardened hands.

She writhed between them, whimpering her need for joining,
reveling in the knowledge that they would always answer her siren’s call. Mikal
and Rish accepted her, loved her—flawed or no, she knew they would always be
there for her whenever she needed them.

Their touches, strokes and kisses took her passion to new,
unknown heights. She stood at the precipice of the ancient rhythm of panting
breaths and bodies joining, certain that being with Mikal and Rish would
surpass having amazing sex to embody a loving of hearts, minds, bodies and
souls.

Mikal gripped her hips, positioning her over his erection
while Rish spread her ass cheeks and pressed the head of his cock against her
tight little hole—