Vanquished (6 page)

Securing her discharge had been a
dance, orchestrated with the aid of a very skilled military lawyer and the
threat of the truth coming out. The threat of certain hidden away materials to
be released to the press should the military refuse to let her go. She would be
eternally grateful to the friends she still retained among the ranks and the
way they stood by her—and organized and documented the evidence for her to
utilize if the need arose. She still felt guilty for using the evidence of
Alexi’s murder at the order of her superiors to secure her own escape, but the
alternative forced her hand. There was no way she could have stayed in that
life and be reminded each and every day of her failure.

Her disappearance from the
Astris
would create considerable relief
across the board, and this time her superiors would keep a lid on the news. No
one would even know she was gone.
The frightened part of her
blinked out, cast back into the shadows.
Following that relief, utter
sadness overwhelmed her.

 
“Neira?”

His voice interrupted the painful
trip down memory lane and headed off a very probable topple into the abyss.
Being taken and held against her will was indeed unlocking all the carefully
locked and guarded doors and dismantling her shields. Kidnapped…and something
else she couldn’t seem to defend against, at least not until she successfully
identified it. But it definitely was emanating from this Shadalla and she
was
losing control. What if that
frightened part escaped its binds?

“I’ll be right out.”

The face regarding her above the
sink cracked in a twisted smile.
So domestic.
So accommodating.
I’ll
be right out.
Darling.
Sweetheart.
Like she had any choice.
The feeling of being
powerless gnawed at her and on impulse she hammered both hands against her
thighs, the dull pain serving to ground her as she curled her toes against the
floor. She sucked in two huge draughts of air and straightened her spine. She
was made of sterner stuff than this.

Vayne regarded her from an
indolent pose near the bunk as she entered his quarters. She could see the
sexual interest written large across his handsome face, and once again that
feminine part of her tried to escape her sensible side. At least he was
dressed—in the same style of uniform he affected the previous day, though his
boots were different. The new footwear was more suited for space travel than
for boarding vessels that might have lost their gravitational integrity, she
supposed.

Her nudity had never bothered her
before. She’d been naked around both men and women in barracks and in the
showers for much of her career. And she’d been kept mostly naked as a captive,
basic confinement 101, something she’d been trained to endure, along with other
things. Things she didn’t care to think about. Things that had actually
happened, in addition to other forms of torture no one had considered. But she
was absurdly aware of how
unclothed
she felt in front of this male. Not vulnerable, exactly, certainly not
humiliated, so she supposed
unsettled
was the best way to describe it. He made her feel very aware of herself as a
woman, and that wouldn’t do.

With her head high, she met his stare
and watched those turquoise-blue eyes shimmer with refracted light before they
darkened in a manner that made her twitch. He nodded at the bunk and she forced
herself to look in that direction. The coverings were pulled up and tucked in
tightly, and she thought perhaps a servant had attended him while she was
having her mini breakdown in the latrine.
Because surely a
sovereign didn’t stoop to such mundane tasks.

“Please sit,” he invited, and she
skirted him, hopefully without being too obvious about it, to perch on the edge
of the mattress. His scent and heat enveloped her as he leaned to tether her
wrists yet again. It was getting old, but she was damned if she’d let him think
it bothered her. Better he come to allow her freedom on his own when she could
use the element of surprise. Surely at some point he would relax his guard.

Vayne kept his gaze on her face,
but she was only too aware of the way his underclothing tented over an enormous
erection.

To distract herself, she said,
“I’m hungry.”

“You didn’t eat much yesterday,”
he agreed. He reached to a tray on the small table. It spoke to how distracting
he was that she hadn’t even noticed the food. He offered up a folded piece of a
bread-like substance. Bright red fruit coated the end, and her taste buds
salivated in anticipation.

With her hands secured, it was
awkward to reach for the sustenance, and to her surprise he placed the offering
against her lips. Feeling remarkably like a child being fed by a doting parent,
she nipped at the food and nearly closed her eyes in joy when the taste of
something quite like fresh strawberries burst over her tongue.

The sovereign smiled and tucked
another piece between her parted lips. “It’s my favorite too, Neira. We are
able to grow the fruit in abundance in certain areas on Nibiru.”

She swallowed and managed not to
smile back, wishing she could feed herself. Undeterred, he continued to provide
her with mouthfuls of the bread and preserve, balanced with sips of a hot
beverage that tasted a lot like strong, sweet tea. He didn’t touch his own dish
until he was assured she was full, and she strove to keep her guard up. Her
kidnapper wasn’t going to soften her resolve by caring for her.

“I would like to spend the day
getting to know you.”

She could refuse, she supposed.
Refuse to cooperate in any way, but then she might lose an opportunity to learn
something that could conceivably lead to escape at some point, if not deter him
from his goal. She nodded, working hard at not seeing how the pleased grin he
gave her added immeasurably to his attractiveness. Were her brains turning to
mush?

And so began the dance. It
reminded Neira of a preliminary interrogation, one she turned out to be on the
wrong side of—again. But she parried and deflected all his questions, from one
as simple as a request for her last name, to one inquiring about her family.
The latter pricked a little bubble of pain and regret. Being an orphan and
having lost track of her two younger sisters during the war wasn’t something
she wanted to think, or talk, about. It was interesting that she couldn’t drum
up a sense of outrage against Vayne and the role his kind had played in that
war. She hated her superiors far more, especially when it had come to light how
the powers that be had refused the hand the Shadalla offered in friendship and
initially attacked, instead.
Xenophobic bastards, all of
them.

“What can it hurt to tell me your
last name, Neira? And share about your family?”

“I’ve told you, Sovereign. I’m
your prisoner and the less you know about me, the better. I have no interest in
sharing anything as personal as my family with you.”

His affable mask slipped, and she
tensed inwardly, waiting for the punishment she anticipated, but she saw only
mild frustration. “Then perhaps you have questions of me.”

“Why can’t I have my clothes?”

The way his stare slipped over
her body caused a quiver, and her core heated enough to make her thighs flex in
an effort to contain her arousal. There was nothing she could do about her
beading nipples.

“Because I like looking at what
is mine. And you can’t hide from me. Your body tells me much of what I need to
know.”

****

Vayne hadn’t missed the effect he
was having on his little warrior, despite how determined she appeared to reject
him. Her feminine self was well on the way to recognizing its counterpart in
his maleness, and while he could admit to frustration at her strong emotional
resistance, would he want a mate to be any different? The three other men on
board fortunate enough to find a chosen were reporting similar opposition, if
not with such stubbornness. He did his best to ignore a flicker of conscience,
for while the chase was stimulating, this Neira wouldn’t be the one who’d be
his eventual lifemate. A subdued, compliant version of her would surely be just
as appealing. Surely it would…

He watched her bring herself
under control and could only guess at the effort, so skilled was she at hiding.
So much to learn.

“I’m not yours, Sovereign. You’re
deluding yourself.”

“I’ve ruled for several decades
now, Neira. My people are long lived, if prone to losses in succession. I’ve
fought in two wars and have seen things in this quadrant that shook my faith
and challenged my sanity, but when it comes to you, I’m not delusional.
Shadalla know when they find their chosen.”

“How does your kind know?” Her
lips were set in definite askance.

He didn’t like the way she tried
to distance them—his kind versus hers. There was little difference between
their actual DNA, and he supposed the genetic seeds planted on Nibiru and those
on her Home World were from the same source, as was the case in much of this
system.
With some mutations.
And hadn’t that extra
heart come in handy for him?

“Our bodies have a response.” At
her repressed snort, he shook his head. “Not just my cock’s reaction to your
lovely body, Neira. Any healthy male would respond to that. I’m talking about
something in the brain that awakens and telegraphs a message to its host.”

“What kind of message?”

“I could possibly describe it as
a feeling of total and utter need to possess, to protect,
to
…cherish.”

He hadn’t intended to be quite so
impassioned and descriptive but thought it might be worth it, considering the
way Neira’s eyes widened and a faint flush stole up over her throat to paint
her cheeks. For an instant he thought he witnessed a hint of moisture behind
her suddenly lowered lashes.

If he had, it wasn’t apparent
when she fluttered them open and fixed him with a stare. “And if
your
chosen
doesn’t feel the same?”

“It doesn’t work that way, Neira.
There are no mistakes.”

“Maybe not with
your kind.
But I’m not Shadalla.”

Never one to admit defeat, he
still had the urge to upend her and smack her curvaceous bottom—just to see the
bloom of color on her skin and hear her breathy moans.
Stubborn
female.
“We have the same effect on Earth females, Neira. The results
are very positive, I assure you.”

“So the rumors are true, then.
There are other Earth—Home World—women on Nibiru.”

This conversation wasn’t going
the way he’d planned, but he would never outright lie to his chosen. Omission
wasn’t exactly lying. “There are. They…arrived before the treaty, and
afterward, once we discovered the genetic weapon. And before you question me,
they are all placed with their lifemates, and none have regretted it. Not one
have
asked to leave and return to the Home World.”

Neira shrugged, making her
breasts jiggle enticingly. His mouth nearly watered with his need to suckle the
tight red nipples. “I guess I find that hard to believe. People on Earth regret
their relationships all the time.”

Pitching his voice lower and
locking his gaze on hers, he replied, “As you have taken great pains to point
out, the Shadalla are different from your kind. We mate for life, unless one
fades, and there is no reason to think our connection with Earth females will be
any different.”

As he’d hoped, her mouth
softened, and she leaned toward him. “When you say fades…does that mean
dies
?”

She leaned away on the last word
and he sighed inwardly. Patience was not one of his virtues where Neira was
concerned. “It does. We believe our souls fade into the cosmos.”

“I’m not sure I have a soul.”

As a conversation stopper and a
major distraction, Vayne couldn’t think of anything that would have been more
effective. And she clearly wished she hadn’t shared it. Her lovely face assumed
the remote expression he was tiring of. It resonated with despair deep within
him he didn’t wish to revisit, yet he longed to take it from her, absorb the
hopelessness and spare her. She swiveled to draw her legs up and tucked them
beneath her, curling sideways on the bunk. Gooseflesh peppered her skin and he
snatched up an extra blanket, drifting it over her. He climbed onto the
mattress, knowing enough to take a position behind her, despite his urge to
take advantage of her vulnerability and make her face him.

He pressed against her, feeling
how cool she’d become, and let his own heat seep into her until she relaxed a
little and her breathing leveled out.

“Are you all right?”

Her reply was muffled but
seemingly devoid of emotion. “I’m fine.”

That four letter word clearly
meant the same thing from all females across the universe, and Vayne would be a
fool to ignore its portent. And he was definitely not a fool. He chose to try
and distract her. “Would you care to attend the exercise room?”

“Can I wear clothes?” Her voice
was even now, and much clearer.