The Alien’s Equal: Drixonian Warriors #7 Page 6

  Her eyes misted. “I’d like that. Tell me about life Corin. What was it like?”

  Usually I avoided thinking about my home planet, but I found myself wanting Justine to know what it was like. I told her about Granit, a shining, bustling metropolis where buildings rose high into the sky containing offices and the streets were lined with vendors selling homemade wares.

  “I grew up in a small village with Daz and Sax called Norjic. It wasn’t anything fancy. I grew up in a hut similar to this, but we had everything we could have wanted—food, clothes, toys. There was a large moke tree in the center of our village which we played on all the time. It was where I’d learned to climb and how to fall. I learned how to fight under those branches.”

  Justine sighed wistfully. “It sounds so nice. I have to admit, I’m a little jealous at your upbringing.”

  The images of my home planet vanished as I focused on the female in front of me. “Justine, as long as I’m alive, I’ll make sure you don’t have to seek the company of the dead to be treated like you deserve, as a smart, brave female who will sacrifice all she has for her friends.”

  Her body jerked and with tears swimming in her eyes, she turned away on a sniff. Swiping at her cheeks, she blew out a breath. “Dammit Nero,” she muttered. “You’re lethal, you know that?”

  “Lethal to what?”

  I swore I heard her say, “my heart,” before she cleared her throat and slapped her hands on my control panel. “Well, daylight’s burning. We should get started. Don’t you think?”

  I nodded and resumed teaching.

  * * *

  I’d expected yesterday to be grueling. I’d tried to teach some skills to warriors in the past, and while some knew enough of the basics to fill in for me if I was injured, none picked it up as fast as Justine.

  Satisfied with the progress we’d made yesterday, I started explaining the specific plan we’d created with the Kaluma. They’d get us in the walls undetected, but after that, we were on our own. The Kaluma couldn’t blank forever, as it used up a massive amount of energy for them. Unfortunately, we couldn’t operate any of their long-range weapons—which they’d used to shoot down Xavy’s cruiser—because first, they’d be detected by the Uldani and second, they couldn’t do much to an underground facility. The only way we could disrupt the network was hands-on in the control room.

  “In short,” I explained, “We have to access the security database, pass the ten permission levels, and then wait for the shutdown sequence to finish.”

  “In short,” she deadpanned. “Yeah, easy peasy lemon squeezy.”

  “I don’t know what that means.”

  She huffed a wry laugh. “It means if this was any other job, I’d say we’re fucked. But you’re a genius, and I’m a genius, and we have literally everything riding on this, so I’m going to give it my all.” She huffed out a determined breath. “I want to be an aunt to some damn alien babies.”

  “Do you want chits?” I asked, throwing the question out there thinking she’d side-eye me and refuse to answer.

  She surprised me when she shrugged. “Not really. I mean, on Earth, absolutely not.”

  “And here?”

  “Now? No, we’re on the verge of war.”

  “What about after the war?”

  She sighed heavily, and I braced when her shoulders slumped defeatedly. “I’m not trying to evade your question, but that’s not something I can answer. In an ideal world, would I like to be a mother?” A small smile brightened her face. “Sure, I loved taking care of my sister when we had food to eat and proper clothes to wear.”

  I stiffened. “Our chits would always be able to fill their bellies and clothe their bodies. I’d make sure of it.”

  Her grin widened as she patted my arm. “I believe you. How’s this for an answer? I’ll have this conversation with you when we step foot on Corin.”

  There was another reward that I wanted so very badly dangling just out of my reach. I answered her with a tight nod and ignored the frown that crossed her face at my reaction.

  After going over more of the plans for her, we broke for the mid-day meal. Bazel delivered our food with a big smile, clearly pleased she’d been asked to do a job. She babbled away about filling our plates before wandering around my room, her little fingers hovering just above the control panel.

  She was curious, so while Justine began to eat, I showed Bazel how to perform a few tasks, such as switching the monitors between my eyes at our borders. She picked it up quickly, murmuring, “Wow,” while taking in the screens before her.

  “But remember, no touching any of this without me or Justine here, okay? I’ll show you whatever you want, but it’s important for now that we supervise. I control a lot of things that are vital to everyone’s safety.”

  Bazel turned to me, a solemn look in her eyes when she nodded. “I promise, Nero.”

  I ruffled her hair. She was a good chit, and the future of her species. Just knowing a female with Drixonian blood lived was enough for me to do anything to ensure her survival. “Good.”

  Bazel left shortly after, promising to return with our last meal of the day. I whispered to her to include a bottle of Xavy’s spirits and she shot me a grin before jogging out the door.

  I joined Justine at the table and dug into my food. She was quiet for a while, and I knew by now when Justine was quiet, she was working on something in her mind. So, I let her think it through until she said softly, “You’re good with her.”

  “Bazel?”

  “You didn’t snap at her to get away from your controls. You treated her with respect, taught her a few things, and explained the importance of what you do.”

  To stall, I placed my antella leg back on my plate and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. Like Justine, I went quiet when I had to think hard about something too. “No, I didn’t snap at her.”

  Justine’s eyes were on her plate. “She’ll remember that.”

  “Justine.”

  She lifted her gaze, and her eyes swam with tears. I cursed under my breath and reached for her, but she held her palm up to ward me off. With more self-control than I realized I had, I held off pulling her into my arms.

  “She’ll remember how you treated her,” she swiped at her cheeks. “Because I know what it’s like not to be treated with that respect as a child. It sucks.”

  I didn’t like how a few words from her about her past was enough to make my head hot with anger. I gritted my teeth. “If I had a way to travel to Earth, I’d go there now and pound every male who treated you with anything less than respect.”

  Her laugh was short and humorless. “The list is short, but boy, did they manage to pack a punch.”

  My hands curled into fists. “Who were these males?”

  She inhaled sharply. “They don’t matter now. One is dead and the other is two galaxies away.”

  “They don’t matter, but what they did to you does, because it still affects you today.”

  Her head dropped between her shoulders, and she looked so defeated that I almost told her to forget it, that she could keep her secrets. But I was selfish, and I wanted her, all of her. So, I held my tongue until she lifted her head with a resigned sigh. “I’ll give you my tragic backstory just this once and then I won’t bring it up again. My mom died when I was young. I went to live with my aunt—her sister—and her husband. He was always creepy but when I… matured.” She held her hands out as if she were cupping her breasts. “He took it to another level.”

  I sought to control the rush of fire flowing through my veins. “How?”

  “Comments. Touching. The only reason he didn’t take it as far as he wanted was because I had a bedroom door that locked from the inside, and I was really, really good at sneaking around behind his back. I got my sister out of that house before he could pay attention to her.”

  This was … unheard of to me. “You were family?”

  “Well, we weren’t related by blood—”

  “A
male from your family touched you when you were a chit?” I was going to pop a blood vessel in my eye.

  She cringed at my shout. “Um. Over the clothes stuff. Kissing. So … yes.”

  I pounded the table with a closed fist. Plates rattled and a jug of qua toppled over. Justine caught it before it spilled and placed it upright with a shaky hand. “Nero—”

  “I need a moment,” I said through clenched teeth. I imagined a Drixonian male leering at Bazel, and my vision blurred. I panted through my anger, only holding on by a thin hair because of the fear in Justine’s eyes at my reaction.

  “Okay,” she whispered.

  “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “I know,” she whispered. “I had a lot of therapy to reach that conclusion though.”

  “Tell me,” I swallowed. “Tell me what you mean about getting your sister out of the house. Tell me why you’re who you are now.”

  * * *

  Justine

  That was a loaded question. My stomach was queasy from talking about this, and I hated how my voice trembled when I spoke. But in way, this purging felt good. The thing about trauma was that it wasn’t one and done. I didn’t just magically get over it and keep plowing forward. There were setbacks. Relapses in mental health. And while I had been on a good path on Earth, coming here had dredged up a lot of old, out-of-control feelings I hadn’t dealt with since taking a step on Torin soil.

  Nero was a safe space to lay out my past, and his anger over the way I’d been treated felt a little like vindication. “I… well okay. As soon as I was able, I left my aunt and uncle’s house and gained custody of my sister. She was still a kid then—she’s ten years younger than me. My uncle died shortly after in a car accident. I worked a job and went to school. I guess, you’d consider a trade school. That was where I learned graphic designed and programming.” I waved a hand at his control panel. “Tech stuff.”

  He nodded.

  “It took me longer than most people because I had to work and go to school. Most go to school full-time, but I was supporting me and my sister. But I—” I shrugged. “I didn’t want to have to rely on anyone ever again.”

  He audibly ground his teeth before he asked, “Were there any males in your life?”

  I pressed my lips together before answering. “A few.”

  “Did they treat you with respect?”

  I winced. Bradley had been a mistake I should have seen coming. I ignored the red flags. As soon as I realized how far I’d fallen under his control, I’d managed to drag myself out from under his thumb. I kicked him out the next day and changed the locks. “Not really, because I didn’t necessarily have a lot of respect for myself.”

  His eyes blazed, and reached across the table, feeling the need to soothe him, which was crazy based on this conversation topic. “Hey, I made a lot of progress since then. On myself. Coming here has dredged up a lot of negative thoughts, but I’ve been better.”

  “I don’t understand.” He was seething. I’d never seen Nero like this. “If you were Drixonian, you would have tested high on the aptitude tests. You would have been placed in the development fast track like my sisters, where you would have designed new programs, weapons—” his face fell as his voice caught. “You would have been revered.”

  He said the last word on a near growl, and I felt the word seep into every pore of my skin. It washed away the grittiness I’d often felt, and the bone-deep fear I wasn’t enough. That there was something wrong with me

  There wasn’t anything wrong with me. And the revelation was like a splash to the face with cold water. There was something wrong with my pervy uncle and the way females on Earth were treated. I’d just been born on the wrong damn planet and in the wrong fleshy body. I should have been born with blue skin and horns on Planet Corin.

  “I don’t need to be revered,” I whispered. Because I didn’t need any male’s approval to be exalted. “I just need to be let free to fly as high as I want.”

  “You are now,” he spoke through a clenched jaw, his eyes still firing. “With us, you’re revered and respected the way you always should have been. As soon as this war is over, you’ll be free to fly, Justine.”

  I was not going to cry again. I wasn’t. But Nero’s figure turned a bit blurry until I had to sniff. It was then I realized the only light in the hut were the screens and the soft flickering of the lantern. It was sundown. My deadline.

  Glancing out the dark window over my shoulder, I turned to find Nero watching me.

  He sat with his back straight against the chair, one massive hand on his knee and the other still clenched on the tabletop.

  Needing something to do with my hands, I cleared my throat and stood. With our leaf plates in my hand, I walked over to Nero’s trash bin and tossed the remnants of our dinner. I swiped my palms together and strolled along the front of his massive control fan. “So—” I turned only to find Nero in front of me. I hadn’t even heard him move. I made a squeak in surprise and then swallowed. “Um. So. It’s sundown.”

  He flinched. So quick I nearly missed it, but it was there.

  His throat worked and he ducked his head as he avoided looking me in the eyes. “It is, but I won’t be making a move.”

  I went stiff, and despite my anxiety all day about this deadline, disappointment swamped me. “What?”

  He shook his head. “You want to fly, Justine. I won’t be the one responsible for trying to control you and claim you.”

  I blinked at him, struck speechless. “You… but I thought you said…” I clamped my jaw shut before I could say something I couldn’t take back. Why was I so disappointed? I’d want to avoid his affections, so why was this hitting me so hard?

  Because he was rejecting me. That was why. I’d laid out who I was, and he’d decided that I wasn’t for him. Well, fine. I didn’t want him anyway. Not at all. Not even a little bit. I sniffed. This was ridiculous. I was ridiculous. I made to turn away, but he stopped me with a hand on my shoulder. I resisted, but he held firm. “What’s wrong?”

  “There’s nothing wrong. It’s fine. You’re right. I don’t want anyone controlling me, and I’m sure you realized I’m a hell of a lot more of a mess than you thought. It’s okay, you’re not the first one who doesn’t want to take on me and my issues.” I shrugged out of his grasp. “We don’t have time for a romance anyway. We have a lot of work to do.”

  But I didn’t get far.

  With a twist of his body, Nero pinned me with my butt on the edge of the control panel, his arms caging me in with his face inches from mine.

  I gasped at the intensity in his eyes, the violet sending off an otherworldly glow as he pinned me with his gaze. “You misunderstand me,” he snarled. Struck dumb, all I could do was stare back. “There is nothing you can do to make me want you less. If anything, hearing about all you are has only convinced me more I’d be honored to have you as a mate. But that’s why, despite my self-control hanging by a flecking hair, I’m trying to respect your wishes and not push. The last thing I want is to be the one who grounds you, little bird.”

  I sucked in a breath, finding so much to analyze there, including how he knew what a bird was. All those feathered thoughts flew out the window when his face loomed closer and the softest brush of his lips coasted across mine. “And as far as us not having time… I’ve committed my life to the survival of my species, but right now, I’d let the whole world burn if it meant I had the chance to make you mine.”

  My heart stuttered in my chest, and my breath caught as my lungs compressed. Unable to vocalize how much his words meant to me, I grabbed the sides of his face and smashed our lips together.

  He let out a grunt of surprise, but that didn’t last long. It was like I’d given him the permission to be let off his leash, because immediately his arms circled my back and he pressed me to his chest.

  He deepened the kiss, sliding his long tongue past my lips to explore every inch of my mouth. I lashed my tongue along his, the feel of his ball p
iercings sending jolts of pleasure down my spine to pool in my core. He kissed me like the world was ending. Because … maybe it was.

  We were still kissing when the door to his hut flew open. Nero pulled away from me on a jerk to hiss, “What the fleck?” as Daz’s body filled the doorframe.

  Daz didn’t say a word about us clutching each other. His eyes were wild as he took a step inside, his bulk clogging the room with tension. “The plan has changed. You two leave now.”

  Seven

  Justine

  “Now?” I shrieked.

  Nero shoved his body away from me to round on his drexel. “The fleck you say.”

  “You have two yoras.”

  Nero’s nostrils flared. “We haven’t had time to practice—”

  “And there’s nothing I can do about it.” Daz’s jaw was hard. “The Uldani are seeking reinforcements from the Plikens. We have to get inside and shut down their communication now.”

  I felt like I had whiplash. One minute Nero had been kissing the hell out of me, and now I was being thrown into the lion’s den with a few hours’ notice. Nero didn’t look any happier about the news. His shoulders heaved and his fists were clenched as if poised to fight. I’d never seen him act like this toward any of his brothers.

  I stepped behind him and placed a hand on his arm. His eyes closed briefly before his shoulders drooped. He let his chin fall to his chest as he braced his hands on his hips, his posture defeated.

  To Daz’s credit, he didn’t mention Nero’s near challenge. He remained stiff and focused. “I’m sorry, brother,” he said. “I don’t want this either.”

  “I know.” Nero’s voice was heavy.

  “Justine will stay here since you didn’t get the full time to train her.”

  “No!” I shouted, stepping out from behind Nero to stalk a few paces to toward Daz.

  Daz jerked at my vehemence and then his eyes narrowed. “This is not your decision.”