Kept: An Erotic Anthology (24 page)

At last he could hold her properly. Jadd took her in his arms and went to the one thing still intact in the room. The bed. He sat on it with her curled up to him in his lap.

“Out. Please.” He indicated with his eyes. Brask and Dassenze filed out and closed the door. Rather futile that, since much of the wall was missing, but it would do.

A single other creature had remained in the room. He arched an eyebrow at it. “Leave, dog.”

Popstar lay on a cushion, watching them. He pricked his ears forward and gave a bark of approval.

“He’s okay,” Brittany mumbled. She found Jadd’s hand at her shoulder and played with his fingers.

“Brittany.” He sighed, nuzzling her hair with his nose. “Mine. All mine.”

“You’re mine too,” she murmured. No doubt in there, just her claiming him.

“Yes.”

She peeked at him through a dangling lock of twirled hair. “I have a sister, Talia. Will she be okay now? The Earth isn’t going to be destroyed?”

“No. It’s not.”

“I saw some of your blue spaceship up there, in the sky, blasting away with some horrible weapon. I only saw bits of it.” Her voice trailed off. “It was incredible. Huge. The building shook. I can’t believe everyone else will forget that, except me.”

Disturbed at her anxiety, he squeezed her and synchronized his breathing. It was a sure way to calm a mate. “Did you want to ask me something?”

“Are you sure Talia will be okay?”

“I would think so. I’m hoping we can stay here together. Though you’ll have to be at our base,” he tucked that twirl of hair aside, “You might be able to see her, even if you can’t meet.”

“Oh. I’m going to miss talking to her. Sucks.” She shut her eyes then bowed her head.

It seemed as if she hadn’t thought this through. The need to be with him had probably occupied her every thought for so long and he was an alien.

“I want to make this as easy for you as I can. You know that?”

She nodded and looked at him hopefully.

“Brittany, you’ve saved your world. Take pride in that. It will be a Hunting Ground for several years, but your people seem likely to be starfarers one day.”

“I guess. Starfarers. We’re going to other stars, planets? So odd. And all I did was be me. But I’m...I’m not sure how I feel about the other. Women being hunted. It was different with you and me.”

“There’s nothing you can do about it. It will happen. Once caught and made pets, they’ll be well treated.”

“It’s going to take me a while to get my head around all of this.”

He wished so much that he could fix the sadness on her face. She seemed lost. He kissed her tenderly. “We’ll get through it together. I’ll do whatever I can to help you.”

“Jadd?”

“Yes?”

“They won’t separate us now?”

“No.” Her question pleased him. “Dassenze promised me absolution and we’re bond mates. I’ve got you forever. Shush now. I want to just be here, with you.”

He kissed her sweetly on her soft lips, then cuddled her, touching her with as much of his skin as he could, surrounding her. Keeping her safe. With the Bak-lal gone from the Earth, he had time to decide what to do about her magic. If that was what it was.

He swallowed and blinked, and breathed, his chest rising as hers did, falling as hers did.

He was at last content. The world settled into place, like warm rain misting a silent field of grass, and became...perfect. His heart and hers were one.

Epilogue

Talia Wolfe squatted among the dust and a few bird droppings. The pigeons had made their home here already. After her sob story and a small bribe, one of the rescue crew had let her in. She used the samurai sword to scratch an arc in the rubble. The huge gap in the wall and the missing balcony made this seem unfamiliar, like it wasn’t even Brittany’s place.

Slowly she rose, feeling the skintight black jeans grip her like they wanted to make love to her ass, creeping into her butt crack in a nasty way. She squirmed a little as pleasant sensations throbbed outward. Ugh. There was an odd vibe here, almost sexual. It clashed horribly with the sadness.

Talia shook her head, tilted her neck back to strive to stop the flow of tears, but they ran down her face anyway. She coughed and swallowed, wiped her nose roughly.

Stop crying.
Crying wasn’t helping.

She might be a lab person and not a field investigator but she wasn’t giving up on finding out what had really happened here. Her baby sister was missing and no way was she ever presuming her dead.

“I’ll find out what happened to you, Brit, if I have to tear this whole fucking building apart to find clues.”

She stepped up to the hole and looked down at the organized chaos below. Sirens whooped and wailed in the distance. People in orange jackets worked with cranes and trucks to shift rubble and save people. This had been an earthquake?

She stuck the sword into the floor and leaned on it a little, refreshed by the gusts flailing at the building and cooling her face. Absolute sacrilege to use a sword so, but who was going to chastise her?

“I’m finding you, sis. I am.”

A scrabbling sound made her swivel to the side. A man crouched there, drool dripping from his mouth. He’d somehow scrambled up from below. That whole corner of the apartment was gone.

He coughed and spat blood, swayed. In one lowered hand swung a pistol. That alone made her wary, let alone the drool and spaced-out look. She unwedged the sword from the floor, raised it a tad.

No need to panic. Even if he’s got a pistol, and I’ve got a bloody sword.
Ever since she was a teen she’d had a knack with pointy things, and could make them do stuff no one else could.

With the rioting and unrest below, she figured she had a right to be straightforward, especially when he took a staggery step toward her and his arm began to swing up.

“Don’t do anything, mister. I don’t know you.” The hoarse tone must have impressed him. He paused and looked back with narrowing eyes. If only her students were as well behaved. “Good. You keep yours down and I’ll keep mine. I suggest you leave now –”

He chuckled low and from the twitch of his wrist he was going to raise that gun and aim at her.

Fuck.
Her bluff was called.

Practicing kendo and her innate talent meant she could theoretically kill. If you forgot he was a person. Too far to reach with a swing. She’d have to throw. A knife, yes, but a sword – a full sword? Something, some weird
zing
in the air here, grabbed her, made her think she could do this.

She swept up the sword, leaning and twisting to the side to gain momentum for the throw.

Then someone dropped from the hole in the roof, landing between her and droolman, dark coat swirling like a fucking superhero. She swore. The floor shuddered at the sudden weight. Something cracked even. Was he that heavy? Or the floor was weak.

A flurry of blows and she stepped to the side, watching their little fight, hearing the grunts. The new guy was big and mean and didn’t pull his strikes at all. Neither did drooly man. The pistol went flying, so did a small sword...what the fuck. Who else but her used a sword? Then drooly man poised another knife above the guy ready to drive it into the juncture of neck and shoulder. Instant death zone.

No.
She really didn’t want him, her would-be rescuer, to die.

She gulped, and threw. Knew it was a thousand to one. A trillion to one. Impossible. Wasn’t a straight throw. Men were in the way, like the big guy. She had to go and bounce it off things like the wall to the left. It was a fucking hard ricochet, an incredibly stupid throw. The blade whipped round, hit wall, spun, bounced and flew.

Impossible, incredible,
doable
.

It sank, all two feet of shiny, pointy metal, into drool man’s side. Heart level. He gasped once and froze at the same time as there was a
whoompfh
and much of him turned into particle sized bits of flesh. The cloud of red splattered across what was left of the corner of the room.

Big guy let the remains of his opponent slide to the floor and he turned to her, empty hand emerging from his coat. His mint green eyes glinted.

“What the fuck was that?” She frowned. He’d shot the guy with something, hadn’t he?

Damn. What was
he
? His face looked like someone had used him for carving practice. As he came toward her, she stepped back, wishing her sword wasn’t currently residing in a corpse. Her heel hit something hard and she stopped. “Who are you?”

“Brask. Who are you?”

“I guess it’s polite to answer. Talia Wolfe, I’m looking for my sister, Brittany. Though seeing you just killed someone that might take priority.”

“She’s not here.”

“Obviously. I’m glad I saved you.”

He grunted.

Ungrateful imbecile. She felt in the pocket of her jacket, hoping to find a weapon, and only came up with some origami paper. Sometimes, in deep dreams, she imagined herself with a sword of paper that cut
anything
. Boy, did she need that now.

Brask was wide enough to blot out the sun. And that blue war paint made him seem worse. Not that his semi-spiky blond hairdo wasn’t scary too. Where did he get his make-up and hair styling done?

“Who was that?” She twitched her head at the dead man, and managed to keep down breakfast. Jeez. She could clamp down on her emotions, but he was a mess.

“A Bak-lal clone.” At her frown Brask gave her a mirthless smile. “Recon observed him climb up out of the collapsed building next to us. He was a killer, made by an alien. He should be the last one.”

“I can see you aren’t crazy, so why the wild story?”  Or was it that wild? Things, here, now, felt so odd. Like anything could happen.

He shrugged and made as if to come closer.

“Stop right there.” She held out her palm.

And he grabbed it, twisted her wrist, stepped in fast, and clasped her neck in his other hand.

He glared. Green eyes. Big green eyes. A flash shocked her to her very bones, tinkling through her like broken glass. As she crumpled she was distantly aware of him catching her, along with a ringing in her ears that swept her body. Goose bumps rose and her hair stood on end.

“Sleep,” he whispered. “Forget, pretty girl.” His hand brushed her cheek, scraping her skin yet gentle. “I’m sorry I had to do this. I wish...”

Wish what?

She rallied, blinking and frowning at the blurred face. “What?”

“Still with me? Huh.”

The flash came again.

Bastard.
She felt her eyes roll up. Her hand encountered someone’s hard-muscled shoulder and slid. Through the fog in her mind, his delicious scent registered. She opened her eyes again.

“What are you? I need to do this three times?”

Flash.

“If I was allowed to hunt here...” The soft words faded in and out. “...make you my pet.”

Last was a strange rapture that floated in, where she became him and he melted into her. And then, she
forgot
...

***

On the other side of the continent of Australia, something long buried stirred, and listened to the signals from its killed sister queen. Now, it decided, would be a good time to fire up the stagnant engines and set out a plan of conquest.

Succumb

Sorcha Black

~ for Bratgirl

I could taste the arousal in the girl’s mind even from outside her window. The trusting thing hadn’t bothered to draw the blind, thinking no one would see into her bedroom on the twenty-third floor. The desire was clear in her expression, even in sleep. Full lips parted, the small frown, the sensual softness to her features. Dark brown hair that twined about her. Her bed sheet tangled around her tan thighs, and she squirmed. In her dream, I watched the phantom man touching her with the calm assurance of one familiar with bringing women pleasure. It was the way the girl touched herself when she thought no one watched.

But whenever I could, I watched.

Touching the glass, I faded through the thin divide. My feet touched the floor, the carpeting plush and welcoming beneath my bare feet. Welcoming me to look as long as I liked.

It wasn’t so wrong just to look, was it? But now I had entered the dwelling. I had already fed and the energy coursed through me yet. But there was something about this one that drew me back all too often.

In her dream, the man teased her cruelly. The girl was horrified at her own reactions but was helpless to stop him. Helpless to stop the feelings the pitiless man built inside her. A sleepy hand wandered down her body to the needy place she managed to ignore all day until she was home alone.

Her hand slipped into her panties and, still dozing, she whimpered in frustration. The dream never went farther than this. Only teasing and more teasing. The girl didn’t know what came next. How it felt to be touched by another, or brought to orgasm by anyone but herself. Her mind and body, however, craved touch in a way that lured me there almost every night.

The energy that she emitted was a mocking taste of what she had to offer. Could it be so different with a woman than it was with a man? The more aroused a human was, the more energy they discharged when they kissed. Her draw, though, wasn’t simply as a food source. The flavor of her mind was ancient and pure, untainted with the more modern tastes I had never developed a palate for. There was a goodness and kindness in her that she didn’t mask with snobbishness or an attempt at being cosmopolitan.

From the new vantage point her tanned skin looked even softer and more in need of touch.

She was to have been a gift, but looking upon her more closely, I knew it to be impossible. Fox was my friend, but seeing the girl in his aerie, a part of his harem, would drive me mad. Aye, he was comely and his women all came to love him when they’d bonded, but I didn’t
want
her to love him.

In her dream, I touched the hazy man. He disappeared in a swirl of mist, leaving me in his place.