Chasing Dare (15 page)

Obviously, the doctor was just as useless as Brak and the other men. She would have to find a way to save the Valendran on her own. He would be worth the effort though. She would make sure of it; she thought as she stormed into her assigned bedroom and slammed the door. It didn’t block the sound of their laughter.

“She’s out of control.” Brak’s simple statement mirrored the thoughts of the doctor and the others.

“I agree. I think she could be dangerous, more so to our experiment than to us. I will talk to Grai about her and her behavior. Until we know what he wants to do about her, I want all of you to keep a close eye on her. I don’t want her near that room or the test subjects. Is that understood?” The doctor leveled his gaze on Brak as he asked the question.

The doctor was no fool and knew the only thing keeping Brak from Dare was his fear of Grai’s vengeance. He had heard all about Grai’s lack of patience where problem people were concerned. Apparently, Grai believed that elimination was a perfectly good solution to almost every problem, and he employed the strategy often enough to make an impression on his men.

“My orders are to protect this experiment and those involved. Until those orders change, that is exactly what I intend to do. You would do well to worry more about that psychotic bitch, because right now she’s much more dangerous to the female than I am.”

“I suggest you change the codes to the lab and any equipment she may have access too. The last thing we need is for her to get hold of something that she can use to kill the subjects or one of us.” Brak wanted to make it very clear to the doctor that he answered only to Grai and not to him. He stared down the doctor for long moments until the doctor looked away, before storming off to ride the perimeter again.

After Brak left the room, the others quietly dispersed to attend to their duties while Dr. Camarasa went back out to the lab to change the codes as Brak suggested and make a private call to Grai.

*****

Dare was the first one to get into the bed that night. She laid on her side of the bed, nervously hiding most of her face under the comforter while she waited for Baldy to finish in the bathroom.

After they had both come out of the bathroom earlier, they had both been starved and dug into the now-cold dinner still waiting on the bed. They really hadn’t spoken at all, and that was why Dare was so nervous. Was he regretting what they had done? Was she? Hell no, she didn’t regret it at all. But what if he did? Could she pretend it didn’t mean anything to her?

Putting her nerves and her doubt aside she tried to remain calm as he slid into the bed beside her and pulled the comforter up to their noses.

“Are you all right?” That really hadn’t been on the list of things she expected him to say first, and she was kind of lost for a moment.

“Uh… yeah I’m great. Are you all right?” Maybe if she played this cool, she could figure out how he felt without him really saying it.

“I’m wonderful Dare. Why are you so nervous?” Yet another thing she didn’t expect him to come right out and say. She had to give him credit; like her father, he was straight forward and to the point. Taking a deep breath she decided to be just as blunt.

“I know things seem a little awkward between us after… well… you know.” Dare hedged, hoping that if she left things open-ended enough that he would jump right in and tell her how he felt.

“I don’t feel awkward at all. In fact, I feel much closer to you. Do you not feel the connection that seems to be shimmering around us?” Dare took in the puzzled expression on Balduen's face and realized that he was being serious. Looking at him more closely she tried to see the connection he was talking about, but she didn’t see anything around either of them.

“What do you mean? I don’t see anything.” Dare was so intent on finding what he was talking about that she didn’t realize she had sat up and was speaking out loud until he pulled her back down next to him and cuddled her up to his chest.

“I didn’t say you could see it. I said you could feel it.” Baldy told her with a chuckle, his hands roaming her back in light caresses, needing to touch her.

“How can you feel something like that?” Dare asked curiously, settling comfortably against Baldy’s side with her head on his chest. She felt much calmer since he had willingly cuddled her up next to him.

“I’m not really sure. Honestly, I don’t think I would have been able to feel it before I connected with beast. But, what I feel is almost like an electric thread around the two of us, which binds us together. You don’t feel anything?” Baldy was curious if she felt anything at all for him.

Dare was quiet for several minutes, trying her best to feel what he was talking about. But, she felt nothing like that.

“No, I don’t feel anything around us. Maybe I can’t because I don’t have a beast?” Dare asked, hoping it was something like that preventing her from feeling what he did, and not that there wasn’t anything there for her to feel.

“I do not know. I am unfamiliar with communicating with the beast and using his abilities; I might be wrong about what I am feeling. I have also never had a mate before, so I could be feeling what the other mated men normally feel, and I wouldn’t know it since I can’t ask one of them.” Baldy gave her a wink and chuckled slightly. His peaceful and playful demeanor was contagious, and she found herself squeezing him tighter and winking back.

“So you think you’re just confused about the whole mating thing then?” Dare’s heart had skipped a few beats when he had brought up the mating again. She was hoping that he was still thinking they were mates and hadn’t changed his mind after what had happened in the shower.

Having never been around anyone who had just learned they were mates, Dare wasn’t quite sure how this was supposed to work between them now. Were they supposed to act like a couple? Were there rules they had to follow? Were they already considered married?

Dare hadn’t realized that she had spoken out loud until Balduen began to laugh… hard. He was shaking the bed with his chuckling and for some reason, that irritated her. Grabbing his side, she gave his skin a sharp pinch. Not enough to leave a mark, just enough to get his attention.

“Hey! What was that for?” Baldy asked her with a grin on his face; his light-blue eyes flashed with hints of dark-blue.

“That was for laughing at me! It’s not like I have a freaking clue how this is supposed to work. There weren’t exactly a bunch of you guys around when I was growing up so the lessons on Valendran mating rituals were not something that my mother regularly discussed with my sister and myself.” Dare defended her lack of knowledge on the subject. Baldy grabbed her hands in his own and placed a kiss on her knuckles.

“I am just as uninformed as you are. Although, we all hope to find our mate, it is not something that we expect to find. So instead of going to the classes that would have explained all of this to me… well Niklosi and myself generally skipped those lessons in favor of the ones that we felt would have more benefit to us.” Baldy actually looked a little guilty, and it piqued Dare’s interest.

“What other lessons did you choose to learn instead?” By the blush on his face, Dare expected it to have something to do with women. Did they even have porn or magazines like that on Valendra, she wondered?

“We spent our time learning to fight and battle tactics.” Baldy didn’t even attempt to hide the gleam in his eyes when he said it, and Dare knew exactly what he meant.

“So you spent all your time fighting with your friends instead of learning about the mating process?” Dare asked, trying hard to pretend to be shocked and offended. She knew she didn’t pull it off too well when he started laughing again.

“We figured our odds were better that we’d end up fighting more often. In hindsight, we probably should have attended at least a couple of the classes though. Especially since I am the second one of us to fall victim to a mating since we arrived.” Balduen’s eyes glittered with amusement as he watched her reaction to his words. If Dare wasn’t mistaken, he was teasing her!

“You poor baby! Who was this other poor victim? Did he have to be put down to remove him from his misery?” Dare tried to look serious, but the playful mood in the air between them wouldn’t allow for that, and her eyes crinkled at him in amusement.

“Well we did lock them away from each other. Somehow she still managed to sink her claws into him and snatch him from us. It was hard watching him walk around with that smile plastered on his face… he was almost impossible to deal with after the birth of his twin daughters…” Just that easily, the mood in the room changed and Balduen wished he had kept his mouth shut.

“Dare, I’m sorry…”

“Baldy, don’t apologize. This isn’t your fault, or my own. We just got stuck in a bad situation.” Dare wasn’t sure what to say to him. This had to be the most screwed-up mating in Valendran history!

“The doctor said you don’t have to go back until Monday, so that leaves us these three days to plan our escape. I’m stronger now and when I tried the bricks in the window today I had to stop myself from going through the whole wall. We can get out. I’ll protect you Dare.” Balduen squeezed her tightly, anxious to get her out of here. He wanted to leave now. To jump out of the window and run with Dare as far as they could. He would get them away even if he had to carry her on his back.

“Something’s wrong. I feel it in the energy around us.”
The beast interrupted Balduen’s thoughts easily.

“I do as well. Is there any way you can find out what it is?”
Balduen asked the beast, in his head, hoping not to frighten Dare.

“The other female is very dangerous to our mate, but she is not the only danger. I will send out a call for additional sourcing to find it.”
The beast replied.

“What the hell does that mean?”

“Once our kind reaches a certain level of interdependence with our host, I can use our combined energy to send out a call to our brethren for assistance.”
The beast responded.

“What brethren? What assistance are you talking about? Are there others near that you can call for help?”
Balduen was confused; he didn’t remember anything in his training about any of this.

“Like other species, ours also comes from varied planets, but one original source. Although we are different, mostly due to our hosts, we can communicate and share energy among our own kind.”
Beast explained patiently.

“What kind of hosts are you talking about? Wait! Can you reach a specific group? The Tezarian’s, can you reach them? Or just one of them?”
Balduen’s first thought was for Dreadhawk; the ambassador had left him impressed with his demeanor, and he knew Dreadhawk would find a way to reach Scaden or the High Councilor.

“Since I have recently achieved an interdependence with you, I am only now learning how to use my abilities. I can send out a specific message that may be passed along until it finds the particular person you are wishing to speak to, but I cannot say that it will get to him quickly if it has to travel among many energy paths to reach them.”

“We must grow stronger together and bond more closely with our mate before I can learn to communicate with individual beings, even of my own kind. What I will send is more like one of your distress calls and the first to hear will respond. Is that acceptable?”
Beast seemed to warm up to the idea the more they spoke of it.

“Are any of the beings that could hear it a danger to us?”
There was no way in hell Balduen would take a chance like that with Dare. She was in enough danger already.

“All of my kind, exist within hosts who are either allied with your people or unknown to most people. We do not harm our own kind. Our mate is safe from my brethren and would be protected by them as all mates are.”
Beast informed him.

“Then do it! Right now, as soon as you can.”
Balduen had no doubt he could get them out of here, but it would be really nice to have help close by or on the way when they did.

“I will require all the body’s energy reserves, which will send you into a deep sleep. I wait only for our mate to sleep before attempting it.”
Beast warned him.

Dare! Balduen looked down at her frowning face laying against his shoulder.

“I am sorry. I was not trying to ignore you.” Baldy blushed slightly, embarrassed to be caught talking to his beast. After hundreds of years of being taught to suppress his beast, he still felt guilty about his rapidly growing bond.

“Don’t be sorry. I’m glad you are bonding well with your beast. Honestly, I don’t see why your people are so against it. Not only are you pretty calm and reasonable, but you seem to be… I don’t know. More… peaceful than you did before. It suits you. Does he have a name or just beast?”

Dare gave him a shy smile, not really sure if she was supposed to be friends with the beast, or if it even mattered. Geez… trying to figure out a man was hard enough, trying to figure out a Valendran with a newfound relationship with his beast was going to be a real joy to figure out.
Go me!
Dare thought sarcastically.

“I never even thought to ask. Not much of a friend am I?” Balduen felt stupid. How could he not ask something as simple as that?

“I am meant to be named by you when we achieve interdependence.”

Balduen was a little startled that the beast answered the question before he asked it. It still surprised him how aware the beast was to everything going on around them. It was like having another person existing right along beside him within his own skin.