Hitched to the Alien General Read online

  “Didn’t get much choice,” Billy grumbled bitterly. A hard look from Dex shut him up fast, and he fiddled with his rifle, the dressing on his arm making his movements clumsy.

  “The planners decided on the planet, not us,” Dex explained smoothly. “Turns out the predators hibernate. There was no evidence of them when they did the surveys.”

  Xaan’s lips compressed into a line. That seemed reasonable. Terran technology was much less advanced. It was entirely possible they couldn’t track death rates and causes in the local animal remains. Frustration surged through him again as his joking words to Kenna came back to haunt him. Humans really were space toddlers who shouldn’t have been allowed out of their own solar system.

  It didn’t take them long, walking in silence, to reach the next tower. Unlike the first, this one was clear of bloodthirsty vines. But, unlike the first tower, the beacon housing was bent and buckled like something hard had hit it repeatedly. One hinge was broken, and the door was twisted in the frame. He frowned.

  It looked like the damn thing was stuck in there. Approaching, he ran his fingertips around the edges of the door, testing to see if there was even the slightest bit he could get a grip on. But no, there wasn’t even a hairsbreadth lip he could grab onto.

  Stepping back, he studied the door, shaking his head. “Nope, that dr—bastard is totally jammed in there,” he said, quickly correcting himself.

  “Do you need a lever or something to open it up?” Dex’s voice was distracted and he was looking at his communication device again. Xaan shook his head, looking back at the door again, frowning.

  “Hmmm, nope. I think I got it.”

  Stepping up to the casing again, he slammed his booted foot into the door. It impacted heavily with the bottom corner and the door popped free with a metallic screech of complaint.

  “Woah!” Rob whistled. “Lad’s got some skills.”

  “Percussive maintenance,” Xaan chuckled as he knelt down to open the casing fully and look inside. He was so focused on looking for a problem that he didn’t notice at first that the beacon was fully operational. It was only when he couldn’t immediately spot the fault that he realized. And frowned. What the draanth?

  Sitting back on his heels, he was about to ask Dex how the beacon relays were set up, but his words were cut off as something hard and metallic pressed against the back of his skull.

  He froze. The feel of a muzzle was unmistakable, no matter what species technology it belonged to. Without moving, he opened up all his senses. He knew it was Dex directly behind him, a gun pressed up against his skull. He could smell the tang of the male’s sweat and his cologne, different from the nothing the other two males wore.

  He also knew Dex was too close. And that was because they didn’t have any clue who or what Xaan was. They thought he was Steve Renner, an ex-marine, outer systems trader on the edge of his luck. They had no clue what he really was. If they did, they’d have been running the other way. They certainly wouldn’t have set up this little scenario.

  Anyone who knew anything about the Lathar and its warriors knew you didn’t get within range like this. It would take less than a heartbeat for Xaan to twist, yank the gun out of Dex’s hands and put a bullet through his brain.

  The problem was the other two. Just because Billy and Rob were human didn’t mean he’d discounted them as a threat. He’d seen how they handled the rifles they carried. And even panicked, Billy had a damn good aim. He couldn’t be sure they weren’t good enough to nail him as soon as he moved a muscle.

  Before he could formulate a plan, though, Dex’s next words ensured he wouldn’t fight back. “Play nice, or your pretty little wife will die.”

  9

  Kenna had made it back to the group, and to her berry picking partner, without incident. She’d even managed to explain away her extended absence with a grimace and a muttered comment about the good food “going right through her.” Since it was a common occurrence when going to real food from space rations, Sami just sympathized and handed her basket back so they could continue picking berries. But the scales were off Kenna’s eyes now. Even if she didn’t betray it by so much as a glance or a change in expression, she was hyperaware of everything and everyone around her.

  Who were these people? The fact they weren’t the original colonists, at least not all of them, was obvious. She’d bet her life that the original colonists were buried in that mass grave. And those ruined buildings. That was a colony with at least a few years’ growth. More than enough to explain the discrepancy in time and the extra chiller cabinets in the hospital bay. She’d been wondering about that since yesterday.

  Tech was expensive, so colonies were often on a budget when it came to the fancy toys. Most things were sent with component parts and matter printers so the colonists could print out what they required to build whatever item they needed. They saved space and weight that way. But certain items, like medical equipment, were delicate and needed to be specially built to specific tolerances, so they were sent prebuilt. Like chiller cabinets. But each colony usually only had four, not eight. Eight was a lot for one colony. Too many. She’d been explaining it away by the possibility this was a medical research colony… but there weren’t enough doctors.

  No, she mused, as the group trudged back to the colony with full baskets. A scavenger colony made much more sense. Especially now she’d seen the remains of the previous one. They weren’t common, operating solely on the outer edges of human space. No one was sure how they’d started. Perhaps two colonies in the same system, one failing, which then decided to take over its neighbor.

  However they’d started, rumor ran rife in the colony community about them. How they descended from the skies, razing the colony buildings to the ground and killing people before taking over. They usually killed the men and children, just leaving alive fertile women to breed with. And not in the way the Lathar took women to breed with either. Those captured by scavengers were little more than sex slaves.

  She needed to tell Xaan, and they needed to get the hell off this planet. Her expression was set, jaw working as the settlement came into view. As soon as they reached comms range, she needed to let the authorities know. Scavenger colonies were the lowest of the low. They needed fucking over as badly as they fucked their victims over. She’d settle for them being thrown in Mirax Ruas.

  They reached the edge of the compound, walking along the fortified walls toward the main gate with their boots kicking up dust as they went. The fortifications made more sense now. She doubted it was anything to do with native predators, and far more to do with the fact that they were worried about someone attacking them. There was more than one scavenger group out there and this world was a peach of a prize.

  The gates opened for them, not fully but just enough to let them through single file. The group dutifully filed through the narrow gap between the heavy metal sheets. As soon as Kenna stepped through, all her senses went on alert. Two men, armed with rifles, cut off her escape from behind and Dex walked toward her, his face set in grim lines.

  “Sorry, gotta go,” Sami muttered, grabbing Kenna’s basket and making a break for it. Kenna didn’t argue. The situation had obviously gone to hell in a heartbeat, so she needed both hands free. A basket full of fruit wasn’t an optimal weapon.

  “W-what’s going on?”

  She played up her confusion in a breathy voice, looking from the two men behind her to Dex with wide eyes. Let them lap up the act of the surprised and less-capable-than-them female trader. Traders weren’t usually aggressive. Accustomed to pirates, they often gave over their cargo without a fight, preferring to keep their ships and their necks intact for another day.

  “Come with me please, Mrs. Renner,” Dex said, his voice low and measured, the deep tones serious. “I’m afraid there’s been an incident with your husband.”

  “Oh my god,” she reached Dex’s side, her expression painted with concern, some of it real. “Is he okay? Did he get hurt?”

 
; Dex slid her a sideways glance, his pale eyes guarded. “A little yes, but it was self-defense…”

  “Self-defense? What do you mean?” She frowned as he hurried them along. They skirted the outside of the main settlement—she couldn’t even bring herself to call it a colony anymore—buildings. There was another group set behind them. From the age and design, as well as the placements, these must have been garages or workshops from the original colony. The matter printing was different, obviously done on an older machine than the rest of the colony. So that was at least two colonies they’d scavenged from.

  Dex stopped her before they entered the largest building, his expression one of concern as he reached out to touch her upper arm in reassurance. “I’m sorry to tell you, but… he attacked one of our workers. Nearly killed him. Rob had to drag him off.”

  She managed to hide her raised eyebrow behind a stunned expression. She heard his words, but she just couldn’t make them jive in her brain. There were two problems with what he said. One, Xaan would not have broken cover and just attacked someone… and two, if he had, there would have been no way a human could have pulled him off, injuring him in the process.

  She’d seen Xaan fight. Even healing from the horrendous injuries he’d received in his last battle, he was still the most lethal thing she’d ever seen on two legs. There was no way any human could beat him. Which meant one thing. He’d let them beat him.

  “Oh my god,” she managed, covering her mouth with her hand. She even managed a small tremble of her hand and a wobble in her voice. She needed to be on the stage for that one.

  Dex’s expression softened a little and he reached out to touch her arm reassuringly. “He’s not badly hurt, but…”

  His expression twisted a little. “How long have you known him? I’m sorry, but I think he might be a spy for them Latharians.”

  He was so near to the truth Kenna nearly laughed right in his face.

  “What?”

  Dex nodded, obviously taking her gasped exclamation to be shock. “I’m sorry, my dear, but it’s the only explanation. He damaged the radio beacon rather than helping us mend it and attacked Billy when he spotted it. Them Latharians… they’d kill to get this planet. And our women. Sexual deviants, they are. Need women for their breeding programs. Got ‘em lined up in wards, being fucked over and over by different alien men until they get pregnant.”

  She blinked, shaking her head. If only they knew. The Lathar didn’t need to steal any Terran planets, much less one scratty little planet in the ass-end of beyond. And breeding programs? That idea was so ludicrous she couldn’t even muster a laugh. If this guy thought any Latharian male would allow another anywhere near his female after he’d claimed her… that the Lathar as a whole would disrespect women like that… Was this the shit about the Lathar that was being pedaled as truth within the Terran systems?

  “Oh my god.” Back with the breathy voice, she added a little step toward Dex, casting a look about her as though she expected Latharian warriors to jump out of the shadows and kidnap her away to put her in one of these breeding programs. “You think so?”

  “Uh-huh, yes.” Dex nodded, not clever enough to hide the pleasure in his eyes that she seemed to be buying into his fairytale. “Now brace yourself, my dear. I need you to talk to him. We need access to his ship systems so we can look at his coordinate and comms logs. See how much contact he’s had with them so we can pass it along to the authorities. Unless you know the codes to unlock the ship?”

  So that’s what they were after. Even though Xaan’s ship appeared to be a Terran trader, it had component parts they could use. Instantly she knew that her and Xaan’s future contained an unmarked grave somewhere out in the wilds behind the new settlement.

  “No,” she shook her head, her eyes still wide. “He never lets me have them. We’ve only been married a few years. I-I don’t know what he did before that.”

  Dex’s eyes narrowed. “I thought he was a marine. Combat engineers?”

  That was what he’d told them? A sudden image of Xaan in marine uniform made her suck in a breath, but the image quickly reverted back to him in his combat leathers. She shook her head slowly.

  “I don’t think so? I think he grew up in the Aarborian Borealis?” she added, naming a famously pacifist sector of space. The worlds there didn’t believe in violence against others. Personally she thought they were tree-hugging idealists, but to each their own.

  Dex’s grin was as swift as it was quickly concealed. Triumph flared in his eyes. “I knew there was something off with his story. Are you ready, my dear?”

  She nodded, allowing the settlement leader to herd her through the door into the shadowed interior of the building. The light touch of his hand on her lower back made her freeze up a little. She’d grown so unaccustomed to male contact, so used to the formalities and customs of the Latharian court, that to be touched without her permission by a male she wasn’t intimate with almost had her spinning around and introducing Dex’s nose to the wall. Several times.

  Keeping the impulse in check, she walked with him down a short corridor and into a room. A quick scan confirmed they were in what had once been a garage and machine workshop. However, the interior had been stripped and cleared. Instead of the benches, cranes and jacks she’d have expected in here, there were cells. Honest to god cells. Two down either side of the room. The two opposite were occupied.

  Her gaze narrowed. Xaan was in one, sitting down, leaning against the back wall while the other held a human man lying on a rough pallet who looked like he’d been well and truly worked over. Some kind of bot was in the cell with him, in a heap like a puppet with its strings cut.

  Her gaze immediately cut back to Xaan. He met her eyes levelly, the tiny movement of his hand giving her all the information she needed. During her time with the Lathar, he’d taught her their field signals.

  Hostile. Cover your ass. Stay free.

  She covered her mouth with a gasp, the small downward sweep of her eyelids telling him his message was received and understood.

  “And you think he’s a spy?” she asked Dex in a whisper, taking a little half step toward the human. He made her skin crawl but she had to maintain her cover.

  “I’m afraid so, my dear,” Dex replied, putting an arm around her waist to comfort her.

  The sudden glitter of Xaan’s eyes told her the instant he got free, Dex was a dead man. Violently dead. She couldn’t find it in her to be sorry about that. Not if this guy was a scavenger. Leaning into him with a sigh, she let a tear roll down her cheek.

  “I think I might be able to work out the codes,” she whispered. “Given a little time. Will you keep him in here? What about the other one?”

  “Yes,” Dex nodded, starting to draw her from the room. “The other one is a spy too. Found him in an escape pod with alien tech. They’ll be tried by a jury of the people for their crimes and executed.”

  She let loose a sob, concealing her laughter as cries of sorrow and let him take her back to the main buildings. She didn’t know yet how she was going to get Xaan and the other man free, but she knew one thing…

  These scavenger assholes were going to rue the day they’d been born.

  * * *

  Pride filled Xaan. Kenna had gotten the message within the blink of an eye. His little female was as smart as she was resourceful. He wasn’t fooled for a moment by her helpless act as she clung to Dex, but the human male lapped it up, shooting a smile of triumph over Kenna’s head as he wrapped an arm around her and led her from the building. It was a look that gloated. A look that said he’d taken everything of Xaan’s—his freedom, his ship and now his woman.

  It was all Xaan could do not to chortle in amusement. No wonder all the human females he’d met so far preferred Latharian males if this was the best their own species had to offer. His hard gaze tracked Dex until they were through the door and out of the building, noting the hand across the back of Kenna’s waist. Dex would pay for that one. Xaan would remove
his hand, at the neck, for touching Xaan’s woman.

  He had noticed the slight stiffening of Kenna’s frame as the male touched her. She was obviously uncomfortable, even if she hid it well, and pleasure filled Xaan’s chest at the small proof his woman disliked being touched by others. That was how it should be. She was his. And as soon as he was out of this damn cell, he’d claim her in every sense of the word, leaving her in absolutely no doubt of that fact.

  He closed his eyes and leaned against the wall of the cell as the outer door slammed shut. A mass of bruises and cuts, his body ached all over. The three men had worked him over with something akin to glee, demanding the codes to his ship, before dragging him back to throw him in here when he wouldn’t give them to them.

  Concerned for Kenna’s safety, he hadn’t fought back, but his instinct had been right about Dex not wanting to kill Kenna as he’d threatened. No, the human male was too interested in bedding her for that. As expected, he’d tried to turn her against Xaan to get what he wanted.

  Idiot human thought he was a player. He had no clue he was being played himself.

  Xaan snorted and stretched as he assessed the condition of his body. The cuts and bruises weren’t too bad. While they might have put a human down for a while… He wasn’t human. He was Lathar. He’d had worse, much worse, and that was just in the course of training. He was fully battle ready and more than these assholes could handle.

  They’d definitely messed with the wrong male.

  Especially as, even through their ham-handed interrogation and beating, they’d totally forgotten to search him. The knife was still safely concealed in his boot. He grinned, unable to stop the small sound of amusement escaping his lips. Really, this was like child’s play. Perhaps he should set something up like this as a training exercise for the young warriors? It was certainly a new situation—one they wouldn’t have experienced before.

  The sound appeared to disturb the occupant of the cell next to Xaan’s. A human male lay on his side, in a much worse state than Xaan himself. He looked like he’d been pulled from a battlefield or an accident of some kind. His uniform was tattered and burned in places, blood-stained in others. He seemed to have a collection of injuries, the newer ones Xaan suspected had been inflicted by Dex and his friends.