Taken (Warriors of Karal Book 3) (8 page)

Washing all the surfaces down, he kept himself busy until he could tell by the steady rise and fall of her body that she was fast asleep. Now she was definitely out of his reach. And only then did he dare remove his clothes and slide under the covers next to her.

Trying not to touch her, in case he woke her, he made himself comfortable, and then closed his eyes, the heat of her body and the rise and fall of her chest comforting in some ways, and oh so disturbing in others.

Lying on his back, staring at the ceiling, he pictured what their life would be like when they returned. He could see them together, children at their feet, and he was amazed at how his view of how his life was going to be had changed. Of course he knew he would have a mate, a female to breed with, but he had never expected to feel anything towards her other than physical attraction.

He began to understand Okil and Darl; he could see how their lives were being shaped by this outside force. In so many ways the females were a threat to the Karal, not just with their bodies and their sexual attraction, but in the way they would turn back time for the Karal, make their species whole again.

***

He woke to find her staring at him.

“The colours flow over your skin when you sleep. It’s like you let all your barriers down and become free,” she said, reaching out and touching his cheek.

He sensed the immediate response of his body. It sent a flush of blues and greens to the exact point her fingers touched his skin, and beneath the sheets, his cock hardened. She smiled, and he wanted to lean forward and kiss her, to taste her lips and let her consume his senses. But that would break the spell, and he wasn’t eager to do that. There was plenty of time.

But not today!

“I have to go and check everything is ready for the launch,” Malik said, reluctantly breaking away from her, covering his erection as he got out of bed.

“Can I come?” she asked, sitting up in bed looking all sleepy and tousle-haired. He longed to go back to her, to lie beside her and thread his fingers though her auburn curls.

“No. It would be too distracting.” He pulled on his pants and then saw her downturned face. “Too distracting in a good way. We don’t hate you.”

“Well, that’s good to know,” she said coolly.

“What I mean is, for our safety, I need the others to be fully concentrating on their job. We don’t want to go into space and find out we have no
tole
,” he said.

“What is tole?” she asked, pulling on a sweater and getting out of bed.

“I will make some for you. It is much better to taste tole than to explain what it is and where it comes from,” he said going to the kitchen and warming some water.

Then he spooned some red grains into two cups, and for a moment she wondered if it was something horrendous like ground-up blood. Surely they didn’t drink blood? Her stomach churned as the water came to the boil and he removed it, pouring it into the cups. The moment she smelt the same burnt smell of coffee beans, relief swept over her.

“Try it,” he said, handing her a cup.

First she sniffed it, taking in the aroma. This was like real coffee, and she sipped it tentatively, feeling the buzz of caffeine hit her brain. “You’re right,” she said. “We would not want to go into space without tole.”

He drank his coffee quickly and then said, “Help yourself to anything you need. I’ll try to see Darl, or Okil, and remind them about clothes for you. But right now I have to go.”

He knew she didn’t want him to leave and that pleased him more than it should. Malik allowed himself a brief smile, and allowed his colours to cover his face, which was an interesting sensation and one he hadn’t experienced since he was five when his father began the process of teaching him to become a warrior, which meant hiding your feelings and keeping your colours firmly under control at all times.

Their trip into space was going to be an interesting test for his self-control.

What was a girl to do? Stuck on an alien planet, in a small apartment, she didn’t have too many choices. It was obvious there was no Stream, and if he had books, she couldn’t find them and doubted they would be in English anyway.

So she went through the kitchen, looking at the different implements and trying to guess what they were for. Then she tried all the different foods, using a sharp knife to cut pieces off fruit, trying to figure out if she was supposed to cook them or not. This game lasted for half an hour, until she tried something that looked like a mango, and tasted like a chili pepper.

A large cup of water, followed by using her finger to scrub her tongue clean, was the only way to get rid of the burning sensation. Foods might be better tried under the guidance of Malik, because, as she should have figured out before, she might try something poisonous that was alright eaten cooked but deadly eaten raw.

What now? Going through the rest of his rooms was out of the question; she didn’t like to pry. In the same way she hoped he would respect her privacy; not that she had anything to hide, but it was just how she wanted their relationship to be. Trusting.

Finding herself sitting on the sofa and totally bored, she was relieved and a little nervous when someone knocked on the door.

Feeling stupid, she asked, “Who is it?” Because whoever it was, she wouldn’t know them; she was on a planet filled with strangers.

“Hi, Chrissi, it’s Reja and Tikki. We have some clothes for you,” a female voice said.

Who cares if she didn’t know them, they were from Earth and they were women. Chrissi flung the door open and tried not to look too excited. “Oh my goodness!” Chrissi exclaimed. “Is every woman on Karal pregnant?”

“It feels that way,” Reja said, her hand going to smooth over her baby bump. “Which is good for you, because between us we have plenty of clothes that don’t fit us, so we brought them over for you to try.”

Reja was so pretty: her hair was long, her skin tanned, so unlike the white faces of the people on Earth, and she glowed; they both glowed. Impending motherhood suited them.

“Thank you,” Chrissi said. “This is so kind of you.”

“Nonsense, it makes up for you having to go straight back out into space. You haven’t even had time to see the sights,” Tikki said.

“Malik said he would show me around when we got back,” Chrissi said. Seeing Tikki and Reja looking so happy and relaxed was amazing. It gave her hope, made her believe that there could be a happy ever after for her on Karal, with Malik.

“How is he?” Reja asked. “Darl came home all in a panic a couple of days ago because the other warrior’s match was ill. Her tag showed she had a terribly high temperature. So he had to do a quick scan for a match for any of the other warriors. He couldn’t believe his luck when you had entered.”

“It was a last-minute decision, chance really. I never wanted this,” Chrissi said, looking at the dresses Tikki had placed on the bed for her to look over.

“But now you’re here?” Reja asked. “I know Darl thinks he has got it exactly right, but Darl always gets carried away by his own plans. He didn’t give you that bruise, did he?”

“No. That was from when I was on Earth.” Chrissi said, putting her hand to her chin. Then she said, “I love it. Everything, the air, the food, the animals…”

“The aliens,” Tikki said and laughed, sensing Chrissi didn’t want to discuss the bruise. “I am so happy Okil brought me here.”

“Oh, so you are with Okil?” Chrissi asked.

“Yes, and that is why I am so pleased you are here, because we need the missions to go ahead. Okil wants to give humans a fighting chance at survival. This one, I think,” Tikki said, holding up a blue dress against Chrissi. “Try it on.”

“Are you sure? It’s so pretty,” Chrissi said, admiring the small flowers that had been embroidered on the blue fabric.

“Yes, of course. Celia did the flowers; she never knew she had a gift for sewing until we came here. There’s so much we can do, so many opportunities we never had on Earth,” Reja said.

“If they ever let us out without a chaperone,” Tikki said, then saw Chrissi’s face. “Oh, don’t worry, it will get easier. Each time a new woman arrives, there is less talk and fuss from those who oppose us walking amongst them. There are still so few of us, but everyday there are more and more.”

“What do you think?” Chrissi asked, twirling around in the sky-blue dress, which hugged her figure in all the right places.

“I think Malik will find you irresistible,” Reja said. “Or has he already … found you irresistible?”

“No, not yet,” Chrissi said, catching her meaning and trying not to blush. “We were so tired last night. It was a quite a journey.”

“And then tomorrow you go out into space again. So tonight is the night. Get it over with, you won’t regret it,” Tikki said and then giggled.

Chrissi didn’t want to know any more; she didn’t want to think of what would happen after Malik came home. She simply wanted to enjoy having a pretty new dress. And she was supposed to be a trained astronaut! Well, inside she felt like any other woman, feminine and soft, and why couldn’t she be both?

Tikki and Reja stayed for an hour or more. They furnished Chrissi with more clothes, and would have left even more, but when she looked inside Malik’s closet she realised there was nowhere to hang them.

“Oh well, you won’t need too much until you come back, so why don’t we keep hold of them until then,” Reja said, gathering up all the remaining clothes.

“Thank you both so much,” Chrissi said.

“Good luck, Chrissi, us humans must stick together.” There was a knock on the door. “That will be Okil. He will escort us back home. Darl is busy checking Elissa over, he is so anxious about her baby, more anxious than he is about ours.” Reja patted her swollen stomach.

“Is it because it’s the first child to be born? Of this generation, I mean. Until a baby is born healthy, they don’t know if the two DNA strands are compatible?” Chrissi said.

“Yes,” Tikki said, casting a glance at Reja that gave Chrissi the impression something was being left unsaid. “The first child is always going to be the one that gives Darl most concern.”

“Then it’s a good job he is such a good doctor. You mustn’t worry,” Reja said firmly to Tikki. “Tikki’s just more concerned because Elissa is her sister.”

“Oh, I never realised. So you are both here, wow.”

Tikki smiled, but still looked strained. “Yes, my sister was the first, and then I met Okil and we fell in love, so when he was granted the right to have a female of his own, he chose me.”

“How romantic,” Chrissi said.

There was another knock. “Oh my goodness,” said Tikki. “We have been keeping him waiting and he is so busy with the launches. At least after next week, things should quieten down.”

“Until we come back,” Chrissi said.

“Yes, until you come back. With good news, I hope,” Reja said.

And then they left, leaving Chrissi to ponder what they had said, or more importantly, what they hadn’t said.

He headed back to his quarters as quickly as he could. As far as he could tell, all the equipment they would need was packed. The rest of the ground team were going through the inventory now, double-checking everything before the launch tomorrow.

Excitement was bubbling up inside him, making his hands stay a permanent shade of yellow—not very attractive. To combat this, as he walked he tried to think of mundane thoughts, although these didn’t hold his attention and he resorted to going through the launch sequence three times until he reached his rooms, feeling once more in control.

And then he opened the door and saw her standing there in a new blue dress, and his colours flashed golds, oranges, and reds, like the flame of his passion spreading over his skin. She blushed when she took in his stare and understood its meaning, looking down self-consciously at herself, and saying, “Do you like it?”

“Yes, it brings out the green in your eyes, you look beautiful,” he said, coming towards her, feeling the strength of his arousal stretching his pants.

“Thank you,” she said, and her eyes met his, not letting him go. And as he drew closer, his mouth wanted to taste hers, so badly.

“You had visitors,” he said, talking when there was no need for words. This was the moment he should take her by the hand, lead her to the bed and remove that damn dress that made her body look ripe and round in all the right places.

“Yes, Tikki and Reja. They gave me some clothes. Although I wasn’t sure where to put them,” she said, looking at the clothes on the bed.

“We can find somewhere in the closet. When we go to my real home, there will be plenty of room,” he said, the walls of his rooms closing in on them, pushing the two of them together until it felt as if they lived in the same space and breathed the same air.

When she turned back to him, her eyes lit up in wonder, and he knew his colours were flowing freely once more. She opened him up to parts of himself that had been hidden away for so long. But was this right time? With the mission tomorrow, would it be better to put off their joining or was he simply making excuses?

“Chrissi,” he said, putting his arm around her waist and pulling her to him. She didn’t resist.

“Malik, I’m not sure… I mean… I’m scared,” she said.

“I won’t hurt you, Chrissi.” And he kissed the place where the bruise stood out as violet as the evening sky at sunset. “I hate that someone hurt you.”

She pulled back and he let her go, not wanting to force her to do anything. “There was a man, my boss…”

“Your boss?” he asked.

“He was in charge of the people who worked for him in this factory. He wanted me to… He wanted to have sex with me,” she said quickly.

“And you didn’t want that?” he asked quietly.

She shook her head. “No.”

“And he hit you?” Malik asked, feeling his fists clench up, ready to strike, but it was too late, the man who had hurt her was on Earth, and they would never return there. So he released the tension in his body.