Invasion Earth (2 page)

The communications officer got her on the
radio and her voice had dribbled like honey across Alrik’s skin,
smooth and warm. Panic edged her voice, unusual for someone so cool
under fire, and she escaped from the ledge in haste.

Deciding his brother needed apprising about
this newest development ASAP, he passed the chore of planning the
surrender talks to a junior general. Halfway down the winding
steps, he felt her again and ducked into an armory blasted into the
mountain side. The vision in her mind was so vivid he was grateful
for the privacy.

He stood with his back against the wall,
breathing hard, while his mind joined her in pleasuring herself.
Cock hard and throbbing, he knew it would be hours yet before he
could seek his own release. He vowed to find a creative way to make
her pay for his discomfort. He smiled at the thought, imaging her
on her knees, mouth wrapped around his erection. Or maybe he would
spank her. She so clearly deserved it for putting him through this
unfulfilled torture. But first, he would bury himself so deeply in
her she wouldn’t be able to say where she began and he ended; and
then he would say the prayer needed to bind them together
forever.

Chapter Two

He couldn’t
believe
this assignment.
Barak Trace, Spy Master of the Delroi, reduced to babysitting.
Un-fucking-believable as the soldiers said on this planet. At least
it was almost over. Two of Alrik’s household guard would be taking
over shortly.

An Earth general, bag slung over one
shoulder, hurried down the dirt pathway and stopped to knock on the
doorway across the temporary road. With a grunt, Barak edged back
into the shadows of the buildings he stood between to watch.

When it opened, the enemy Sergeant Major
stood on the threshold, her arms crossed over her chest and legs
braced slightly apart. Barak had excellent vision, so even without
field glasses he saw her face change. It went from expressionless
to panic in a matter of seconds. She would be getting news of her
changing status now.

Months ago he’d argued bitterly with Alrik
and Daggar over the woman’s fate. What she’d done at Roses had to
be responded to, all the innocent lives she’d taken had to be paid
for. He’d infiltrated the Earth army months before the Delroi
armada arrived, could have easily carried out the assassination,
but had been denied. Repeatedly.

Daggar had agreed with him, though. He
remembered the murderous look in his lord’s eyes, the fury etched
on his face. It was Alrik who had refused. Alrik who had insisted
the murder of a woman, any woman, was beneath them. He had swayed
Daggar to his side, but Barak wasn’t sure how. He’d been dismissed
for the remainder of the argument between the brothers. He’d been
angry for months over that decision, but now only felt immense
relief after learning of her importance to Alrik. Some instinct
must have been at work when Alrik refused to allow the
assassination, the most primitive instinct of their species that
wouldn’t allow a man to kill his
der’lan
even if he hadn’t
met the woman yet. Somehow Alrik’s soul had known who she was.
Barak wasn’t overly concerned with how that had worked, just was
glad now that it had.

The enemy general left and the woman slammed
the door shut behind him. Barak squeezed his eyes shut and offered
a quick prayer to the Gods. Thank them all he hadn’t disobeyed
orders and killed her anyway. He’d been damned tempted more than
once, hadn’t seen the point in letting her live.

He glanced at his timepiece and watched her
quarters. The woman needed to get a move on. He supposed he needed
to stop thinking of her that way. She was Alrik’s
der’lan
after all, the new Lady Torfa. Unless Daggar took a mate, she would
bear the next heir.

She finally left the building and he followed
at a distance, frowning. Being the Commander’s mate would
definitely provide her with some protection, but Barak wasn’t sure
if that was enough. Many of the warriors disliked her in the
extreme, if not flat out hated her. And there was another
consideration he hadn’t let himself dwell on before. Could she be
trusted? Would she meekly enter into this peace treaty and her role
in it between their worlds?

He reached the prearranged area and nodded to
Alrik’s guard, who would now take over Barak’s babysitting duties.
The Sergeant Major continued towards the landing area while Barak
watched her straight back walking into the distance.

Shaking his head, he forced himself to move
and turned to leave. There was work to be done. She was now someone
else’s problem.

***

“What?” Laney yelled, more exclamation than
question. She was already running on pure caffeine. Organizing the
Army’s withdrawal was taking more time than she’d first thought it
would. Now she had to deal with
this
? Standing outside her
door, General Black shrugged and shouldered his bag.

“Your name was on the revised hostage list
they just sent over. Need to get a move on. Transport is due any
minute now.”

He was someone Laney only knew in passing,
since they’d never been in the same command, but she saw something
flare in his eyes. Something that looked suspiciously like
knowledge. She narrowed her eyes. He knew more than he was saying.
He turned on his heel and left before she could question him
further and she forced her mind to move on, shutting the door
behind him.

The analytical part of her took control while
she made a quick and thorough search through her locker drawers,
sending items flying through the air to land on the bed.

The Delroi had insisted on an exchange of
hostages for the duration of the talks. An effort to keep everyone
honest, no doubt. She’d even approved of the move before she’d been
added to the select group. They’d been allowed to pick their own
hostages and she wondered briefly who she was replacing. She
pressed her lips together and dug out her duffle. None of that
mattered now.

Hostages might be too harsh a word, but it
worked. Three Delroi military leaders would stay planet-side and
three Earth soldiers would stay on board. The rest of her people
would be ferried back and forth every day to the Delroi ship, where
the talks would take place. She had planned on being one of
them.

She unzipped the bag and quickly stuffed it
with necessities, making a mental list of things she needed to pass
on to her lieutenants. But the other part of her mind stood back
and huffed in irritated exasperation.

This evening’s conference had been intended
has a meet-and-greet in addition to settling in the guests, as the
Delroi insisted on calling them. The blond enemy general’s image
rose in her mind. She’d already met the three Delroi being
exchanged with Earth and he wasn’t one of them. She squeezed her
eyes shut, forcing his image out of her mind. Distance hadn’t made
him less appealing, hadn’t made her want him less. The last thing
she needed was to spend her nights onboard their ship. How was she
going to resist the urge to find him and rip his clothes off? Panic
began to set in and she shrieked silently.

Really, was that necessary?

Yes! Why the hell do they want me there?

Great. Now she wasn’t just talking to
herself, she was arguing with herself. Rolling her eyes, Laney
locked the door on her way out and grasped for a sense of calm. She
could handle this the same way she handled everything else. Calmly.
Efficiently. Emotionlessly. Even if she had to stomp on certain
feelings and cram them into a box deep in the recesses of her mind.
She’d done it before. She’d just have to do it again.

She met her aide outside and quickly filled
him in during the jog to the airstrip where one ship had landed and
another was coming in.

It was an easy one-mile run and she arrived
to see the waiting generals and dignitaries queuing up. She hung
back, watching the second ship land next to the first. The door
slid open and a ramp lowered. A hatch on the underside of the
transport opened and a ground crew began tossing in the bags of the
other hostages. She kept her duffle slung over her arm.

“Sergeant Major?”

Laney looked over her shoulder to see three
of the enemy warriors behind her. She arched an eyebrow.

“Yes?”

“Come with us, please. The General would like
a private word with you.”

She turned back to see the boarding completed
and the transport lifting into the air. Record time. It was
impressive. She couldn’t get something done that fast if she stood
over people cracking a whip and threatening a court martial.

The second transport loomed silently nearby,
suspiciously inactive while she considered her options. The
shortest of her “escort” was pushing six-foot-two. She cursed her
lack of a weapon and noted theirs. No chance in a fight and
probably no opportunity to run.

There could only be one reason to single her
out. They called her the Butcher of Roses. Roses for the name of
the town the Delroi had originally headquarted in. Butcher because
there were so many civilians there. How was she to know they
brought non-combatants to war with them? She would have snorted if
she hadn’t felt her audience’s hard gazes on her back. So she won
one battle. Well, a few actually. It was a war after all. The point
was to win. When the Alliance agreed to this surrender, the Delroi
promised no retribution. The ship’s ramp lowered and she sighed,
resigned.

“Let’s go, Sergeant Major,” the speaker said.
He was tall, broad-shouldered and -chested, with short-shorn black
hair. His eyes were not unkind, but his hard tone made it clear
they weren’t taking no for an answer. She was a little surprised no
one grabbed her arm to lead her to the shuttle.

She followed him and the other two hulking
warriors brought up the rear. With luck and cunning, she could find
a way out of whatever ambush they had planned. She hadn’t reached
her current position by being stupid. She experienced a rush of
excitement. It had been a long time since she’d had a good
challenge.

She walked up the ship’s ramp and looked
around curiously. The Alliance had captured some of these ships
before but she was always too busy to check one out. It was like
the inside of a small, stripped-down jet. Instead of plush rows of
seats, bench seats lined the interior walls. A curtain partition
blocked off the cockpit.

“Welcome aboard, Sergeant Major.”

How had she ever thought that voice gravely?
It was rich and smooth, like her favorite French Vanilla
cappuccino. It flowed over her and worked its way into all her
secret places. Bitter realization made her heart skitter to a stop.
Impossible! It was bad enough to be in the enemy’s hands, but she
would
not
let the mere sound of his voice arouse her.

Slowly she turned, taking careful note of the
position of the cabin’s occupants. He held her gaze with steely
grey eyes. Her skin flushed as she got her first close up look at
him, heat rushing down her chest where her nipples had begun to
throb painfully. She struggled to control her reaction, control her
breathing. She did it by forcing herself to break the gaze, to look
around and take stock, to look for an escape route.

Behind her stood a pilot in the cockpit and
before her the golden-haired warrior. He leaned casually against
the back wall, and she watched with dismay as the ramp rose and the
doors slid closed. She was cornered. Trapped. Reaching for a center
of calm she wasn’t sure she felt, she nodded in greeting. “I’m
afraid you have me at a disadvantage.”

“Yes.” He grinned. “I do.”

She narrowed her eyes, irritation and
curiosity warring with lust. Somehow, she realized with shock, it
all just combined to more lust. Her hard-earned control slipped
away. Oddly, she wasn’t afraid of him. He looked too much like a
golden-haired god to fear. She had the absurd urge to rub her body
up against him like a cat in heat. Dear god, she had to get a grip!
Silence stretched as she tried to manage her response, to slow the
pulse pounding in her neck and to will the dampness between her
legs away. Damn the smug bastard. He
knew
the affect of his
nearness. He smirked at her not four feet away.

“I know who you are. Sergeant Major Laney
Bradford.” He dragged out her rank and name, as if savoring the
taste of it on his lips. “The Butcher of Roses. I was beginning to
think I would never get my hands on you.”

She stiffened. “We were assured if we entered
into talks with you there would be no retribution against
individual officers.”

“But you aren’t an officer are you?”

She glared and wondered how much he knew of
their rank structures. There were basically two tiers—officer and
enlisted. Officers bought their commissions, entering as
lieutenants whereas an enlisted soldier just signed on the dotted
line. Since they didn’t buy in, they found themselves starting out
on the very bottom rung of the hierarchy. As her division’s
Sergeant Major she was currently the highest ranking enlisted
soldier in the Alliance army, a well respected and coveted
position. She now had more power than most officers, all except the
most senior generals. Pride fueled her aggravated response. “The
spirit of that agreement clearly included anyone involved with
planning and executing orders in the war.
Not
just
officers.”

He nodded, straightening from his casual
pose. “It did, of course. But I could hardly pass up the
opportunity to meet the only strategist who fought against us and
won.”

He looked past her shoulder. “The seers were
correct,” he said.

What the hell? Who were the seers?

“Yes, and the Gods have a sense of humor,” an
amused voice drawled behind her. “I don’t envy you, brother.”

She turned and bit the inside of her lip to
hide her response. Brother, huh? These two had won the genetics
lottery—the brother was actually an improvement over the Adonis’s
golden looks. He stood arrogantly tall and straight, dark and
handsome. Commanding. Regal. Confused, she looked him up and down.
He looked good, great in fact, she appreciated the package, but he
left her cold. He didn’t wake up every nerve ending in her body the
way his brother did.