Her Mate and Master: An Alien Warrior Romance (Zandian Masters Book 6) Read online

  Well, turns out it had. She had a death sentence hanging over her head now for a different reason. King Fluut would have her executed if the Zandians didn’t trade their refugee prince for her by the end of the week. Pah. She wasn’t holding her breath for that to happen.

  Her thoughts drifted back to the prisoner as she rubbed frantically at her swollen flesh. He’d been at least a foot taller than her and massive in size. Bulging muscles, strong jaw, sharp, intelligent eyes. He watched like he’d been expecting to see her, but she knew she hadn’t seen him before. She would’ve remembered.

  What would it be like to be taken by a male like that? She had to believe his cock was in proportion to those spectacular muscles. Would it hurt? She stifled a groan. Nothing could hurt more than this ache between her legs right now. What in the hell was happening to her? It had to be the crystals.

  Suddenly, the prison fell into complete darkness. For a moment, there was no sound—no whir, no hum of machinery, no buzz of lighting. Then shouts and clangs filled the air.

  She scrambled to her feet just as the door to her cell scraped open. Not the automatic whoosh of the door, but the mechanical grind of a mechanism forced.

  A hand closed on her forearm. “I got her! I found the female!” a gleeful male voice rang out.

  “Shut up, asshole. Do you want to have to fight the rest of them for her?” Another male entered and tugged the cell door shut. “Where is she? I get her first.”

  No.

  She wrenched her arm in the first male’s grasp but only succeeded in twisting her own flesh. She kicked out with the heel of her foot and heard a grunt.

  The noise around them grew louder. Guards shouted commands, prisoners whooped, laser shots lit up the corridor with temporary blasts.

  One of the males backhanded her, and she fell to the floor but used the position to scamper between his legs, toward the cell door. It clanged open again and she heard the scrape of a boot but couldn’t see who’d entered.

  He shouted something in a language she didn’t understand.

  She grabbed his ankle and sent him sprawling into the other two men. The crack of fists against bone filled the cell, but she didn’t stay to see who came out a winner. Instead, she slipped out the cell door and into the corridor.

  Big mistake. Prisoners choked the artery, fighting each other and the guards. Shots lit up the passage like flashes of lightening; bodies fell below her.

  A male grabbed her and dragged her into a cell, then shoved her to her knees.

  She rolled away and kicked in his direction, hoping she’d connect with his groin. She couldn’t see a damn thing in the darkness. It didn’t seem to do much damage because, the moment she stood, he had her by the waist again.

  The flash of more laser fire illuminated a huge horned male in the doorway. He shouted something at her in a foreign language. A shiver of recognition went through her. The Zandian. He’d been the male who’d entered her cell and fought the other two. He wanted her for himself.

  He shoved her back into the darkness and the slam of flesh on flesh was followed by a heavy drop to the floor. She wasn’t sure which male’s fingers closed around her wrist until the urgent words came from his throat again with the repetition of the word Talia.

  Maybe she should be glad that her first sexual experience would be with a male of her own species. She had been fantasizing about exactly this a few short moments ago. But being raped in a prison cell wasn’t her idea of a good time, no matter how good-looking the male.

  She whirled into him and brought her knee up. This time, judging by his grunt, she did connect with groin. It didn’t stop him though. He snaked an arm around her waist and slapped her ass, still speaking his melodic language.

  She fought for freedom, managing to get a punch in somewhere on his head.

  He caught both her wrists, pinned them to the wall and slapped her ass again. Her body responded as if this were foreplay, not assault, nipples tightening, blood rushing to the juncture between her thighs. Her bare ass tingled, coming alive to his slaps. “Do you not understand me, Talia?” He switched into Ocretion.

  “No. And who’s Talia?” she panted. He stepped even closer to her, caging her against the wall with his larger frame, holding her prisoner. Would he take her like this? Up against the wall from behind?

  Heat flushed through her body and damn if her muscles didn’t go weak, as if they’d already decided surrender was inevitable. Her knees trembled, breath sawed in roughly.

  “You don’t remember how to speak Zandian?” He released her.

  She took the opportunity to dart for the door, but the warrior—there was no doubt in her mind that’s what he was—moved too quickly. He caught her elbow and hauled her back.

  She swung for his face again, but her fist only caught air.

  “Stop fighting me,” he growled. Two more sharp slaps fell on her bare ass.

  How did he see in the dark? When she continued to fight, he wrapped an arm tight around her waist and hauled her off her feet, her back against his front. She clawed at the massive forearm cinching her belly.

  “I’m here to rescue you, female.” His hot breath puffed over her ear. He strode forward, out of the cell and shoved his way down the corridor with her kicking the whole way. “Every minute you fight me is time we could use escaping.” Lights flashed, and he ducked under a fist flying his way. “The generators will come on any moment. Now, will you do as I say and walk on your own feet?”

  “Yes,” she agreed, mainly because she couldn’t breathe with him squeezing her diaphragm.

  He dropped her to the ground, smacking her ass again, presumably to keep her moving. She shot a glare over her shoulder even as her pussy dripped from the attention he kept giving her nether regions.

  Laser light lit up the opposite end of the corridor, illuminating the enormous warrior. The warrior’s gaze burned with fierce intensity, swallowing her and the path in front of them. His nostrils flaring, he swung his fist in her direction. She screamed as it slammed into someone just behind her. She blinked, her retinas imprinted with the vision of the warrior’s magnificent arm used as a lethal weapon. So strong and capable.

  “Here.” He pressed something soft into her hand. A piece of fabric. “Put this on.”

  Her fingers untangled it as they ran. His shirt. He must have taken it off for her to wear. She yanked it over her head, arms fighting for passage through the holes as his scent washed over her, masculine and clean. Like leather and wood and soap.

  They reached a T in the corridor, and he shoved her to the left. She sure as hell hoped he knew where he was going.

  “Every being face down on the floor!” a Finnian guard shouted just ahead of them, scattering laser fire everywhere.

  The warrior shoved her down behind him and lunged at the guard. She heard the thud of a body hitting the floor and the clatter of a weapon. In the next flash of light, she saw the Zandian had the weapon. “Come on,” he urged, helping her to her feet. He closed his large hand around hers and dragged her down the hall. At the end of it, they reached a set of stairs. Instead of going up, the warrior pulled her behind them. It sounded like his hands were running over the wall, as he whispered something in his language.

  It was a beautiful language. She wished she understood it.

  A click sounded, and the wall rolled away with a rumble. Behind it, damp air greeted her, along with more darkness.

  The warrior gripped her hand again and pulled her down stone steps. “What’s wrong with your eyes?” he demanded. The wall rolled closed behind them.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You can’t see in the dark.”

  “You can?” That explained how he moved so fast in the pitch black. “Ow!” She stubbed her big toe on a rock.

  The warrior emitted a low curse and scooped her up into his arms. His scent hit her like a blast of heat, warm and inviting. It was all she could do not to nuzzle her nose against his thick neck.

  “What w
as the name you called me?”

  “Talia. You’re Talia, daughter of Seke, master of arms to the Prince of Zander.”

  Something slithery and cold twisted in her solar plexus. An unnamed discomfort. “No. No, I’m not.”

  ~.~

  The pleasure of carrying Talia exploded beyond all expectation. Feeling her small form tucked up against him, her bare legs smooth and soft against his forearm, invoked the fierce protector within him. The same piece of him that had roared to life the moment he saw her in captivity. But that was nothing compared to the hunger that simmered below all heroics. Forgetting the feel of her ass under his palm or that she was bare beneath his shirt was an impossibility.

  He wanted to lower her to the floor and explore every inch of that soft flesh with his hands. With his tongue. His teeth. And veck, yes, with his cock. But that wouldn’t be happening. Talia was Master Seke’s daughter, not to mention the only Zandian female of breeding age alive. A common-born warrior like him wouldn’t be worthy of mating her. And to claim her without intending to mate her would be dishonorable at best, and a violation of Prince Zander and Master Seke’s trust at worst.

  “You’re not Talia?”

  “No.”

  “Then who are you?”

  She was quiet for a moment. “I don’t know.” Her voice cracked. “Maybe I am…” She squirmed in his arms. “Put me down,” she said sharply. “Put me down now.”

  He knew nothing about females. Nothing about managing a being’s emotions, yet he knew without a doubt she wanted out of his arms to retreat into herself. He didn’t want to allow it, yet he couldn’t stomach refusing her request, either. He settled for easing her to the ground but keeping his arms locked around her waist.

  She lunged away from him, but he held her fast. “Where are you going, starshine? You can’t see in the dark, and you don’t know the way out.”

  “I don’t know,” she spat. The brokenness in her voice flayed him.

  “Who do you think you are, starshine?”

  She drew in a ragged breath. Her body trembled against his, her back to his front, the soft curves of her bare ass torturing his thighs.

  His cock thickened against her back.

  “They...called me Ray. Until ten weeks ago, I thought I was a human slave.”

  His arms involuntarily tightened, the insult against her making him ready to slay every slave master she’d had. “Vecking stars, Talia, I’m sorry.”

  She turned in his arms. “Don’t call me that. What makes you think I’m Talia?”

  He brushed a strand of hair back from her face, nearly groaning at how perfectly her cheek fit in his palm, cradled there a moment before she pulled away. “Your father recognized you in the transmission from Fluut. He and I have been looking for you for the past forty planet rotations. We just found out you and your sister might be still alive.”

  She struggled once more in his arms, and this time he allowed her to leave. She stumbled until she hit a wall and leaned her forehead against it. Her sniffle ripped his chest open.

  He wanted to draw her back into his arms, soothe away her shock. “Do you remember anything from...before?” Before she was a slave. Before Zandia was overtaken by the Finn. Before the survivors were separated from their families and home.

  “Not a thing,” she whispered.

  He couldn’t resist going to her now. His fingers closed lightly on her shoulders. Standing there in the dark, it seemed he knew her completely, understood her, even though they were perfect strangers. “We understand your airship crashed on Stornig. A guard had taken you and your sister and a laborer named Rok from the castle. He was shot down over Stornig. Rok was rescued and fostered by a Stornigian family. He never knew what happened to the females or the guard aboard his ship.”

  “How old was I?” Her voice came out rusty, crackly.

  “I’m not sure. I think you were six solar cycles. Maybe more.”

  “And my sister?”

  “Hasn’t yet been found. But we only started the search recently, after Rok told us about his escape.” He slid his fingers down her arm and clasped her smaller hand in his palm. “Come on. Can you walk? I’ll feel better when we’re out of these tunnels and away from the capital.”

  She gripped his hand and followed his lead, walking gingerly along the rocky surface. “Who are you?”

  “Forgive me.” He stopped walking, faced her, and bowed, even though she couldn’t see him. “I am Tomis, a member of Prince Zander’s Royal Guard, apprentice to Master Seke, who is our master of arms and your father.”

  “What if I’m not who you think I am?”

  He caught her hand and started walking again. “If you’re not Master Seke’s daughter? It doesn’t matter. I’m here for you, whoever you are.”

  “Because they want me for breeding?”

  Something cold slithered through his chest, and a prickle of foreboding touched the back of his neck. He didn’t want to lie, so he went with a different truth. “Because the moment I saw your hologram in Fluut’s transmission, I knew I had to be the one to rescue you.”

  She snorted. “Bit of a hero complex, then? What if I didn’t want to be rescued?” She stumbled, and he swung her back into his arms without thinking. Where he’d wanted her from the beginning.

  She kicked her lower legs as if annoyed, but her slender arms snaked around his neck for purchase, which he didn’t mind at all.

  “I’d say you don’t have a choice.” He sounded gruffer than he meant to, but it was the truth. He wasn’t budging from Talia’s side until he’d brought her somewhere safe. Actually, he’d prefer to never leave her side again, but quite a few other Zandian males might take issue with that. His teeth bared at the idea of challenging males. A wild beast clawed at his chest, ready to defend his turf, pierce his female and mark her forever as his.

  Not. His.

  She was the daughter of Seke, his mentor. The male who’d been like a father to him after his escape from Zandia. He had no right to veck with Seke over rights to his female offspring.

  “We’ll see about that,” she muttered, and another twist of foreboding tickled his nape.

  But he was Talia’s protector, whether she liked it or not. He’d keep her safe. Even if he had to keep her prisoner to do it.

  Chapter Two

  So it isn’t true that there are no Zandian females of childbearing age?

  King Fluut had taunted Master Seke with this question when he’d threatened to kill her.

  The idea had made goose bumps stand up on her arms then, and her skin crawled even more now that Tomis had confirmed how badly they wanted her.

  If he thought she was sticking around to become a breeder for the Zandian species, he was sorely mistaken. She hadn’t escaped a lifetime of slavery to become sexually enslaved to a different master, even if this one did have the same color skin as her.

  No thank you.

  While she appreciated the rescue from King Fluut, she needed to cut ties with Tomis as soon as possible. There was no way she’d allow him to take her to his Prince Zander or the male he claimed was her father. That story could be a giant hoax to make her come along without a fight. He painted some kind of happy family reunion, when, really, Seke could be nobody to her. She had no memory of a father. Of a family. A sister. Nothing. The language wasn’t familiar to her. Nothing had jogged any memories loose of Zandia or their species.

  Talia. Ray turned the name over in her mind. It rang no bells. Was she the female Tomis believed her to be? Part of her didn’t want to completely reject his story. Especially considering how appealing she found the male.

  He carried her like she weighed nothing, weaving through the underground corridor for kilometer after kilometer. He was an incredible specimen of malehood. Broad-shoulders, iron-muscled, and, yet, so gentle. The worst he’d done was deliver a few slaps to her ass. Which, unfortunately, had thrilled her. She wished to hell she knew if his story was true.

  But she couldn’t risk following
him blindly.

  After several hours, Tomis reached what appeared to be a dead end. He placed her lightly on her feet.

  “Did you take a wrong turn?”

  “No. I memorized every map of our planet before I came. We should be outside the city walls now. This must be the exit.”

  Our planet.

  That much was true. No matter what she believed about her species, this planet certainly was hers. Her body had responded the moment she arrived, strengthening. Ripening.

  Tomis ran his hands along the stone wall.

  She joined him. “What are we looking for?”

  “A small lever or catch made of metal. That’s what I found when we entered.”

  Her fingers brushed over a protrusion. “I found it.” She lifted it, but nothing happened. Tomis’ large hand closed over hers and, together, they pressed it down. She ignored the flutters of excitement that ran through her at his mere touch. It must be the crystals making her body more sensitive because sensation seemed to shoot up her arm, straight to her chest like tiny prickles of heat. Or awareness.

  What if she tried this male before escaping him? What was the harm in that? She’d managed to keep her virginity all these years—it was the one thing she could say for Thurn as a master. He’d protected her sexually—never allowed the males they served in the tavern to touch her. Why, she couldn’t fathom. He could’ve made a great deal more money selling her body than using her as a barmaid. Perhaps because he’d raised her from childhood, he’d kept some semblance of protectiveness for her.

  But now that she was on Zandia, she had no interest in maintaining her maidenhead. Her body desperately craved the feel of a hot-blooded male between her legs. To satisfy the ache that grew worse every day.

  She didn’t have the slightest clue how to seduce this male, though. He hadn’t shown any interest in claiming her. No—that wasn’t true. She’d felt his cock pressing against her back earlier. She tilted her ass backward as a wall of stone rolled aside, but it was too late to catch his attention. Tomis was in warrior mode, pulling her behind him as he peered around the wall into the starlit night. The corridor had been hidden in the crevice of a giant boulder, blending into the natural surroundings. They appeared to be in an unsettled area of Zandia.