Mail-Order Bride [Taos Wolven Mates] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) (5 page)

Ah, so that was it, was it? Poor Fleur was much like herself. She had no dowry. Well, that wasn’t quite true of Dana. Danabella Marie Worley had had a large dowry until the day her father died. That was when her uncle stole it and did goodness only knew what with it. No matter what her uncle did with the money, it still left Dana with nothing.

“I don’t know, Fleur. I only know that no matter what they want with us, it is a good sign that we are still alive.” She placed her hand over her roiling stomach as Fleur’s words echoed in her mind. What if the two men wanted wives? Was she prepared to give all to one of them in the same way she had agreed to give all to her unknown husband-to-be?

Tarin checked the time and frowned. Lorcan should have returned from his visit with the ladies by now. As much as they both hated the thought that they had kidnapped the three women from their world, he knew they only did what they must to survive.

Without mates, their civilization would eventually crumble and die. They had no choice but to search out new worlds and hope to find compatible species with which to breed.

The rest of the crew was already excited at the prospect of a world filled with humans with whom they could procreate. Some of them already contemplated going back to Earth and living there among the inhabitants to help protect them as well as finally get families of their own. Their kind was both cursed and blessed with longevity. If one didn’t find their mates, their long life could be like a prison sentence. He could see why others would choose to stay on that world. In fact, he and Lorcan had contemplated the same no matter what their people said.

A part of him wanted to go back now, to use the transporter to return to the planet’s surface and to stay there amongst the humans to protect them from the invasion of a more advanced civilization, but that wasn’t up to him. It also wasn’t up to Lorcan. There were steps they all must take in order to list this world amongst the protected before they returned. Unfortunately, returning to their home world would put all of them in danger when the elitists found out about a world filled with humans who were of a compatible breed.

The elitists were a fanatical group who felt as though no matter how dire the straits of their world, they needed no new genetics introduced. They wanted their race to remain as pure as possible until the bitter end, and end it would.

According to their top geneticists, their civilization would see its last generation in approximately fifty years. Tarin and Lorcan refused to let their kind end so quickly and without a fight.

With these humans and their world filled with both male and female mates, there was no reason wolven kind should reach extinction. To insist on the pure blood of a race that had been diluted for thousands of years was simply ridiculous.

Tarin glanced toward the door, wondering what took Lorcan so long. He’d gone to check on the women, not seduce them. Why had he not returned? He looked at the clock and verified that his best friend had been gone for over an hour.

“What do you think is taking the captain so long, Tarin?” Benjin, the navigator, frowned at the door. “You don’t think the women have some sort of strange power we haven’t detected, do you?”

With a chuckle, Tarin shook his head. “The only power they have that I can think of is their feminine wiles and an ability to give every male on board a raging hard-on with their scent alone.”

It was true that the aroma surrounding Dana had nearly sent him over the edge more than once. The heady scent of her arousal mixed with fear was a potent combination. Any wolf would have been attracted by the smell of her fear. Tarin didn’t know a male wolf in existence who wouldn’t revel in the scent of a submissive female with the courage of a warrior. It was a strange mixture they all loved. Being a bit of a submissive in the bedroom was one thing. Being terrified to stand up to an aggressor who pushed too hard was quite another. It made them little better than prey. It was a measure of Dana’s courage that she hadn’t fainted dead away when she saw them on the train. She had only succumbed to the oblivion of unconsciousness when they stunned her.

Hell, his cock pulsed with need just thinking about her. Tarin stood to readjust his jumpsuit over his growing erection then turned to the tactical officer. “I’m going to see what’s taking the captain so long. You have the bridge, Benjin.”

“Yes, sir.” Benjin snapped his heels together and bowed. For some reason, the man always stood at his station unless ordered to sit.

Turning, Tarin left the bridge with a frown. He wasn’t sure what was wrong, but he knew something was up. He felt it in his bones. He also felt a slight ache in his groin, and in his ribs, reminiscent of the time that Lorcan fell from a tree and racked himself up when they were younger. He had even tried to contact him through their mental link with no luck. Something was wrong. It was time he found out what.

After a stop at the armory, Tarin headed for the guest quarters. He could see how the women might think they were prisoners. In a way, they were. Unless the wolves who mated them wanted to return to Earth, they would never see their home planet again.

A shaft of guilt shot through him at the thought. They needed Dana. They hadn’t needed the other two women. It was providence that they were even on the train in the same car as the rest of them. What better way to convince their government that Earth must have protection than to bring back two potential mates along with their own female who had, however unwittingly, sold herself into bondage by accepting their marriage proposal?

No matter how many times he told himself what they did was necessary, he still couldn’t shake the guilt that rode him over kidnapping the three women. They all had the right to believe that they would live out their lives on their own world, with the people they loved. Yet here they were, aboard this vessel headed for Taos with the three women in tow, whether they liked it or not.

Sometimes, Tarin couldn’t help but wonder how he would feel if someone stole his sister away the way they had stolen these women. It was different with Dana. She had admitted she had no one other than her uncle who planned to sell her to a whorehouse for her virginity. She deserved better than that. They all deserved better than the lives they would have had with a human male.

With a wolf, on Taos or on Earth, they would know the true meaning of equality, of partnership, and they would never want for anything for the rest of their lives.

Tarin stood outside the door to the passageway leading to the guest cabins, his gut telling him that all was not right. Depressing the switch, the door opened and he immediately smelled blood. Breaking into a run, he headed for Dana’s room, hoping to find her still in her room and unharmed. The room was empty. The next room was also empty. However, the sight that greeted him at the third room nearly brought him to his knees.

Lorcan lay in a puddle of his own blood, unconscious. He ran to the other man, knelt by his side, and willed his energy to heal his best friend and triad mate. Biting into his wrist, he held it to Lorcan’s mouth. “Drink, dammit. I don’t have a doctor with me, and you need blood fast.” A transfusion would have been better, but Lorcan was almost out of time. This was the best, fastest way to get him the blood he needed so desperately.

“Where are the women?” Tarin wondered for a brief moment if the women were responsible for the condition of his best friend then shook it off as ridiculous. He feared for them. Whoever could do this to a wolf would have no difficulty harming a defenseless earthling. The women had no strange mystical powers other than to bring an otherwise strong wolf to his knees by their scents alone.

No. It was the elitists, he was sure of it. After Lorcan took all the blood he dared to give, Tarin stood and made his way to a communications shelf and contacted the medical bay. “Get down here to level six, cabin one, and bring a couple of bags of blood and a stretcher with you. I think we have an elitist on board. Someone has attacked Lorcan, and the women are gone.”

“Yes, Tarin. We’ll be down there in less than two minutes. I’ll transport a tech in with a bag of blood right away. Go search for the women before someone harms them.”

“I’ll stay until your tech arrives, Darin. I don’t want to leave Lorcan vulnerable. The man responsible for this attack may decide to come back and finish the job.”

“As you wish, sir.”

After about thirty seconds, there was a slight shimmer and the tech arrived. It was Leesa, a female from the Harrod province. She mated two of the security personnel about a year ago when they were lucky enough to find her living off the land in the remote province on Taos.

The discovery of Leesa and her two brothers only fueled the elitist claims that there were still many unexplored areas on Taos where a wolf could find his or her mate.

It wasn’t true. There were very few places above ground that they had not explored, and the areas below ground didn’t breed wolves with genes compatible with wolven kind. The den wolves were just that, wolves and nothing more.

Assured of Lorcan’s well-being, Tarin rushed from the room and immediately shifted shape, wishing his clothing away as he did so.

Using his wolf senses, Tarin scented the three women and took off after them at a dead run. Along with their scents, he smelled something familiar, yet couldn’t quite place the wolf.

Whoever had attacked Lorcan had used a mixture of
leelan
spice and
parada
pepper to cover their trail. It was an old trick, but still effective.

No matter. He would catch up soon enough and then he would identify the criminal hiding in their ranks. His only hope was that the culprit worked alone.

Dana led the way through the large vessel, hoping to find a way off. She knew it was a futile effort, but she couldn’t give up the hope that they were still somewhere in Pennsylvania or maybe Ohio in some vast, impossible machine people only saw in their most vivid nightmares.

Deep down, she knew there was no help, there was no local sheriff and the three of them were on their own. In fact, she would have taken them all back to their rooms if she thought she could find them again.

They were lost, plain and simple. It was time to admit that something odd, even fantastic had happened to them, and somehow, they were on some sort of strange spaceship owned by the legendary sky people.

Her only question was, what did they want with her and the other two women they had taken? Gooseflesh covered her skin at the thought. Somehow, letting Lorcan or his friend do the things the soiled doves at her uncle’s establishment had told her about didn’t seem so bad. Did that make her a bad person, a wanton?

Dana hoped not. Because, God help her, she even had visions of loving them both together. The women at Agatha’s had done their best to educate her with all aspects of the duties her new owner would expect of her, including the possibility that he may want to share her with another man or two. At the time, the idea seemed terrifying. Not so with Lorcan and his friend. In fact, it seemed appealing, even though she would never admit it out loud to anyone.

You
are
a wanton, Dana. It is as plain as the wart-covered nose on Uncle John’s face.
Still, it didn’t matter how wanton she believed herself, no woman deserved to be sold into sexual servitude. Nothing would ever convince her that she should not have escaped her uncle’s clutches.

“Where do you think we should go?” Fleur asked as she dragged her stepmother with her. “Come on,
Maman
Amelie. We cannot dally. They must be looking for us by now.”

“I don’t think there is anywhere for us to go. We are on a ship.” Dana didn’t want to elaborate on their whereabouts. The stories her father read her about traveling underwater and through space seemed so preposterous that she hadn’t given them credence. What were they to do?

“There
is
nowhere for you to go, you stupid Earth sluts!”

Amelie and Fleur turned with a gasp. Amelie, ever the difficult one, turned with a snarl. “Don’t you dare call any of us that, you—you cretin.” She raised her chin in the air, looking down her nose at the man. “
We
are ladies.”

“You are bitches.”

“Oh!” Amelie, obviously having had enough of the man’s insults, stepped closer and slapped the man. “We are
ladies
!”

“No, cunt.
You
are dead.” Suddenly, the man was no longer there. In his place was a hideous creature like those Dana had seen on the train. After a moment, even that creature was gone, replaced by a snarling, ugly, mangy-looking wolf.

Saliva dripped from its gray muzzle as it stared down the older woman. Its head lowered, it stalked Amelie like prey, moving slowly closer and closer as it growled and snarled during its approach.

Amelie and Fleur screamed while Dana stood still, staring at the creature, her mouth clamped shut with shock. Unable to move, she remained frozen with fear, her hands fisted at her sides as she watched the…the
thing
lunge forward and attack Amelie.

Fleur screamed and jumped on the creature’s back. “Help me. This demon will kill
Maman
Amelie!”

Spurred to action by Fleur’s cry, Dana used the new freedom afforded her by her new attire and kicked the wolf in the jaw, barely missing Fleur’s and Amelie’s heads in the process.