Hero's Bride (Alien SciFi Romance) (Celestial Mates Book 7) Read online

  Unwilling to distract her during a life and death situation, he tried to remain calm.

  A male voice shouted. “Step out of the way. You can all go free. We just want the Terillian freighter.”

  His brave female seemed intent on not letting them escape justice a second time. “Fuck you. Five of your men are already dead, including your ignorant sergeant. You idiots are not walking off this ship.”

  The man’s voice dropped an octave, becoming low and mean. “We’re going to get that freighter, even if we have to go through you to get it.”

  Arac hissed, “Stall for time.”

  She nodded and continued her banter back and forth. “I don’t give a shit about freighters. The Maruvians will already be looking for us.”

  Never stopping to consider other options, the suborn man persisted. “We’re never going to escape in this vessel. We need the freighter.”

  Tara’s voice turned more neutral. “Step out where I can see you.”

  “I’m not a complete back birth. If I step out, you’ll shot me.”

  Shooting him a look, she began trying to manipulate the foolish humans. “You let the bugs take us, you stupid piece of shit.”

  “We’ll take you with us.”

  Pretending to warm to the idea she asked, “Where are you going? I’m handy with a gun and can pull my own weight.”

  “We’re headed for the Sylon home world. Earth has a colony there. We’ll blend in and disappear. I hear people like us can get along good, cause no one wants to own up to there being problems. They’re afraid of getting thrown off the planet.”

  There was a scuffle and as each of the men came tumbling out, she nailed them. When Arac’s brothers pressed forward, she dropped her guns and rushed to his side. “This was my worst nightmare, you getting hit. How bad is it, baby?”

  “I think their projectile weapon hit my spinal cord. I can only move my arms and head.”

  Drale came forward with a long bar, Arac nodded and Drale placed it on the front of his body. Activating it, he held Tara back as the stasis field slowly closed around him. Her beautiful blue eyes leaking tears down her face was the last thing Arac saw before everything went blank.

  Chapter 17

  ~ Arac ~

  Music Mix

  The sound of female voices penetrated the darkness. One was calm and serene and the other quite worried. “Are you certain the tissue regeneration worked?”

  “Our physician confirmed the match. The Shardon Clones are experts with that kind of thing.”

  “I can’t believe he was still moving and talking with the massive amount of damage done to his spinal cord and the sensitive nerve clusters at the base of his wings. If he couldn’t fly again, I know he’d be devastated.”

  “He’s going to be fine. Did you know that your mate saved my life during the great battle?”

  “No, but it doesn’t surprise me at all. He’s amazing.”

  “Shar was so grateful that he called his best surgeons in to ensure everything possibly was done for your mate.”

  “I don’t know how to thank you.”

  “There’s no need. Arac is my own personal Hero. I was pleased to be able to repay the life debt. The Shardon Clones take such things very seriously.”

  “So this is what females talk about when they think males are not listening?” Opening his eyes, he looked up to see his lovely mate and the dark haired female that he had put in stasis during the great battle.

  “Thank God, you finally woke up. I’ve been so worried.”

  “How long was I out?”

  Tara frowned. “Seventeen days.”

  “That’s longer than we’ve even known each other.”

  Smiling indulgently, she responded. “When human women meet our Mister Right, we jump right on board. Life’s too short to beat around the bush.”

  Keiko stood, “I’ll leave you to visit.”

  “Where am I?”

  “We’re onboard the Shardon flagship. Shar Jalon insisted on responding himself, when we sent out a distress call.”

  Grasping her hands in his, he spoke softly. “I’m glad it was me and not you.”

  “I’ve spent the last seventeen days wishing it had been me. Apparently, humans are very malleable. They could have had me up and walking in a couple of days. Between the spinal cord injury and the injury to your wing base, they had a lot more to manage. They also report your Maruvian biology is not as quick to respond to their medical interventions. They had to get pretty creative to put you back together again.”

  “I’m sorry about Jax.”

  “He’s fine. Armon’s grown quite fond of him. They responded immediately when they heard he’d been seriously injured and your father is nursing him back to health.”

  “I am glad that he is there and we are here. He would have much to say about our situation.”

  “He’s as contented as a cat lapping cream.”

  “Are we talking about the same Jax?”

  “I know he’s always been forceful and grumpy but Armon’s pack apparently decided since he was willing to lay down his life for his queen, he can be trusted with Miss. Nahara.”

  “He’s mated?”

  “They sure did like the idea of us being together. Since Penny’s sister is mated to your brother, we practically family in Armon’s opinion. Just between you and me, I think Armon just repeats everything Penny says.”

  “Do not make me laugh, my love mate. It hurts too much.”

  “Sorry, baby. Nahara has not left Jax’s side, nor have I left yours.”

  “May it always be so, my beautiful Tara.”

  “You couldn’t get rid of me if you wanted to. I love you.”

  Pulling her down to rub his nose along her neck, Arac replied sincerely, “I love you too, my Tara.”

  “I’ve been thinking. Let’s never do that again.”

  “A boring life with me is looking very good right now, is it not?”

  “Any kind of life with you has always looked good to me.”

  “You say sweet words to lure me in.”

  “Start that again and I’ll beat you myself.”

  “You say the sweetest things.”

  “I’m still intrigued by the mystery. For example, how many young do you have?”

  Pretending to think really hard, he mumbled thoughtfully, “Let me think, there is Helec… and Malik.”

  “Your father brought another that I didn’t recognize when he came to visit.”

  “Ah, that must have been Salik.”

  “So you have a total of three?”

  Nodding, Arac tried not to break out in fits of laughter. Learning that he had forty-three sons was a bit much to expect his female to deal with all at once. Arac had it in his mind to simply introduce another one each day until she had met them all. By then he would probably be carrying her young. Since his caregivers assisted him with his young, having so many should not negatively impact her life. Unless he seriously miscalculated, she was going to love them all. Her hand reached for them almost as soon as she saw one of them. Arac could easily see her taming them all to her loving hand. As he continued to weigh the pros and cons of coming clean, she commented with no small amount of fascination.

  “I’ve got my eye on you, mister.”

  “That is all it will ever take for everything to stay right in my world.”

  Her adoring expression locked her firmly in his jaded heart as she laid down beside him and reached up to caress his face.

  “I can do without everything in this life except your loving touch and my young.”

  “Thank goodness you’ll never be without either of us.”

  Pulling her to his chest, Arac thought of what the future might hold for them. For the first time his future was looking like something he might enjoy living.

  Bonus Series 1

  Ice Planet BarBEARians (Book 1)

  C.J. Scarlett

  Chapter 1

  “You should come,” Greg said, grinnin
g widely. He wore a light-pink oxford shirt and a pair of khaki cargo shorts. Jenny’s secret-recipe barbecue sauce dotted his shirt and lined his fingernails. He had a bit of barbecue sauce on his cheek as well, and bits of grayish meat stuck in his teeth. I wanted to suggest floss, but from the yellow tint to his teeth, I had the feeling that he wasn’t much of a flosser. “We’re going next weekend. We’re supposed to get a lot of rain on Thursday.”

  “Oh?” I asked vaguely. I caught a woman staring at me from across the yard. She was a stranger, weird for a small town. But then, Jenny’s crowd was a wide demographic. I frowned at her, and she smiled at me, like she knew me. She’s probably drunk, I thought. Uncomfortable, I looked up at the sky, and noticed that the sun began to get that late afternoon slant. I sighed deeply. Part of what Jenny called my “Cinderella Syndrome.” I rarely stayed at any party for more than three hours. I’d had enough of being around people, and one person in particular. It wasn’t yet dark out, but Jenny had already turned on the chili pepper lights that had been strung across the blue-painted ceiling of her porch. I was in desperate need of a few hours of R&R, involving a book and a nice, fluffy bubble bath.

  “It’s a lot of fun,” Greg said, his eyes wide. I looked back toward the woman to find her gone. I returned my focus toward Greg. He was waxing poetic on his favorite pastime. I’d known him since high school. He had a pattern—when at a party, he made the rounds of every girl who found herself alone. He’d slowly try to work his way in to make his move. I had the distinct luck of talking to him at least once. I was surprised that he still thought it a possibility after so much time.

  “And you call it ‘mudding?”” I asked, frowning and crossing my arms over my chest. I’d heard of it, being a small-town inhabitant… but I certainly wasn’t going to partake.

  “Naw,” he replied, running his hand through his straw-like blond hair. “Muddin’. You drink a few brewskis and then drive your truck through mud puddles, big ones, like.” I looked at him skeptically. I had just spent over an hour listening to the finer points of his muddin’ adventures, where he and his buddies would drive their trucks through puddles of mud with a blood alcohol level decidedly over the legal limit. Lacking much of a death wish, it had very much convinced me that it was definitely not my thing.

  “So, you drink and then drive your truck through the mud.” More statement than actual question. I comprehended what he was talking about. I couldn’t understand why the activity that he seemed so excited about was a thing.

  “Yeah,” he said exuberantly, interpreting my words as a question. I nodded, looking at the ground. I cleared my throat.

  “Well, um, I have to find Jenny,” I said. He nodded.

  “Okay. I’ll catch you later, Shay,” he replied. “Let me know if you want to come with.”

  “For sure,” I said, turning.

  “Do you have my number?” he called hopefully. I waved my hand over my shoulder, quickly forcing my way through the mass of sweaty, beer-quaffing bodies. I looked about me for Jenny’s shock of Harley Quinn-esque platinum blonde hair.

  I made my way through the crowd, looking for Jenny. I found her by the corner of the backyard, lighting one of the strategically placed tiki torches that lined her fenced-in backyard. I had wanted to be gone long before this. Damn Greg and his stupid muddin’. I glanced behind me, hoping that I hadn’t been followed and could thus make my exit speedily.

  “Hey, lady,” I said, standing beside her and watching as the flame caught. The barbecue at her house was in full swing, the air redolent of grilling meat and chlorine from the pool.

  “Hey,” she replied. “You heading out?” I was a notorious introvert, and Jenny had been my friend since middle school. She knew all my quirks, and seemed to appreciate them.

  “Yep.”

  “All righty,” she said with a firecracker-red lipstick smile. “Night.”

  “Night! Thanks for everything!” I said. “The ribs were amazing.”

  “Sure thing, boo,” she flicked her bleach-blonde hair over her shoulder as I began to walk away.

  “You’re leaving already?” the real reason why I was leaving the party asked. He had a disappointed puppy-dog look in his eyes. “It’s not even seven thirty.” I looked at him, eyes wide.

  “I’m tired,” I said bluntly.

  “You—you want me to come with?” he asked hopefully. Inwardly, I groaned, cursing whatever men’s self-help blog he read religiously.

  “I wouldn’t want you to miss the party,” I said, forcing deep concern into my voice. I was grasping at straws while he was going balls to the wall. Attempting to come up with a way out of the situation, I tugged uncomfortably on the strap of my black-eyelet sundress, then toyed with my favorite necklace—a tiny silver Ouija Board planchette. I ran a hand through my hair, wrecking the soft, beachy waves that I had spent so much time on earlier that day. I was getting flustered and annoyed, and by the look on his face, he thought it was cute.

  “Oh, it’s fine,” he said brightly. Cottoning onto what was happening, Jenny came to my rescue. She placed a hand on Greg’s shoulder.

  “Dude, if you leave now, you’ll miss my homemade beergaritas,” she said emphatically. Beergaritas are a sickening mixture of frozen limeade, tequila, and cerveza that makes one feel as though there is a gaping hole rotting through one’s stomach lining. “You love my beergaritas.” He seemed to struggle. We both watched as the rusted wheels turned slowly behind his murky brown eyes. He shrugged. Evidently, getting into my black-lace panties wasn’t as important as beergaritas because he shrugged again and turned away from us.

  “’Bye, Shay,” he mumbled. With that, he was off to find his next mark. Jenny and I looked at each other. Her eyebrow was raised. We burst into laughter.

  “Ah, man,” she said. “There’s a winner. You sure you don’t want to stick around for more of that?”

  “Nah,” I said. “Hard sell, though.” I waved and made my escape.

  I exited Jenny’s house, making my way to my car, which I had parked out on her street. I checked the time on my phone: seven thirty-five. I had been at the party for four hours—a personal best. I was lightly sunburned, and stuffed to the brim with grilled meats, chips, and beer. I had a bit of a headache coming on. I cursed myself for not drinking any water, but at least I was sober enough to ace a breathalyzer.

  When I reached my habanero-orange Volkswagen Beetle, I paused, frowning. I thought that I had heard a crunching sound nearby, as though someone had gently put a foot down on a patch of dirt. I looked up and down the street. All the cars that were parked along it seemed empty. No one walked along the sidewalk. There were a few kids on their bicycles in the front yard of a house about two hundred feet away. Their voices were soft, the chirping of tiny, faraway birds. They were completely focused on their play, but I had the overwhelming sense that I was being watched. I fumbled with my keys nervously as I unlocked my car with the fob and slid into the driver’s seat. I slammed the door shut and pushed the button to lock the doors. I looked around again. Seeing no one, I started my car.

  I drove out of town, the neat little streets populated by tiny houses disappearing in favor of farms and fields full of crops or cows. It began to grow very dark, and in front of me, I saw pulsing blue lights. I figured that it must be an accident—lights from a cop car, probably. I slowed a little as I went into a sharp turn, thinking nothing of the lights until I found myself careening right into their source.

  I had, in the split second between seeing aliens for the first time, and my car colliding with their ship, thought them beautiful. I mistook them for humans—perhaps ones who had been born with defects that made them inhumanly tall and beautiful. Their ship was enormous, and shaped like a massive, white yacht. It had elaborate, elegant curves, and beautiful pulsing blue lights, almost like a heartbeat. My car hit it, the entire front end folding in on itself, while leaving not a scratch on their ship. Listening to the sound of hissing emitting from my car, I took stock of
my injuries before I got out, shakily. I had hit my head, and blood dripped into my eyes. My ribs on the right side were on fire, and my arm hung limply as my wrist pulsed with the heat that indicated a sprain. I was angry because none of them had come to help me.

  “What are you doing?” I snapped as I stumbled toward them. “You can’t park your weird Mardi Gras float in the middle of the road!” I had been to New Orleans several times, since it was only an eight-hour drive from my small town in Texas. The never-ending parade orgy atmosphere was the closest approximation to what was going on right now.

  They all watched me with their bright, glowing eyes—a group of about five. With my head injury, my memory of that moment wasn’t exactly the clearest. I walked right up to them, pausing and waiting for an explanation. The one nearest to me reached out, grabbing for my throat. His bright eyes gleamed with a dangerous light. I recoiled, finally getting the feeling that these people weren’t who nor what they seemed.

  The maniacally fierce look that then flashed across the creature’s face betrayed his foreign nature and turned my perception of life completely sideways. It had hissed, baring sharp, white, almost translucent teeth, similar to that of a deep-sea fish, and his skin luminesced like a pearl, and his green eyes glowed brightly, dangerously. And, he was blue—about the neck, and his arms were set slightly higher on his back than that of a human’s, causing them to have a remarkably straight and elegant posture. I noticed this all in the split second before I took off into the cornfield by the side of the road, running for my life. Luckily, I was a runner—in the best shape of my life. Unfortunately, I was injured from the crash—probably concussed, and they, too, were in excellent shape.