Enhanced: Brides of the Kindred 12 (The Brides of the Kindred) (12 page)

“I
love you, Tess…” His deep voice was a low, needy growl. “Love you forever…”

And
then, with their eyes and bodies locked, Tess felt him spurting inside her,
filling her again with his cum, bonding them together all over again. But this
time he was looking into her eyes and the expression on his face—the look of
love so great it was almost pain—sent her right over the edge.

With
a low gasp, she let herself go, flying over the peak of pleasure and moaning
his name as her inner muscles caressed him.

“Garron,”
she
sent through their link.
“Love you too, so much…”

And
then she collapsed onto his broad, heaving chest with a moan of pure
satisfaction.

They
were both trying to catch their breath when a familiar voice came drifting
through their link.

“Hello?
Garron, can you hear me? I hope this isn’t a bad time…”

“Truth?”
Garron
sat up with a jerk, causing his still semi-hard shaft to move inside Tess and
forcing her to bite back a moan.
“In fact, this is
not
a very
opportune time to talk. Why are you bespeaking me?”

Tess
climbed hastily off Garron’s lap and crawled under the sheet, feeling like her
brother-in-law had just walked in on them having sex. Could he sense through
the link she shared with Garron what they had just been doing?

“Well,
he can if you keep on thinking about it so loudly!”
another
voice, which sounded rather amused, spoke in her head.
“Hi, Tess—this is
Becca. Truth and I are sorry for bothering the two of you in the middle of your
hot and heavy action but this is really important.”

“Rebecca
is right—Commander Sylvan asked us personally to bespeak you,”
Truth’s voice
said.
“It is a matter of utmost importance.”

“Well,
what is it?”
Garron sounded grumpy and Tess couldn’t blame him. If there was
any drawback at all to having a mind and soul bond to a hot Kindred warrior,
this had to be it.

“Did
Kat finally have her babies?”
she sent in what she hoped was the general
direction of Becca.

“Not
yet but Sylvan says any day now—the poor thing is just huge and absolutely
miserable.”

“Rebecca
please,”
Truth growled through what was now a four way link.
“Kat’s
pregnancy is not what we are calling about.”

“Well
what
are
you calling about, Brother?”
Garron demanded.
“Hurry
up and tell me. I enjoy my link with Tess but having it with anyone but her is
mentally taxing and confusing.”

“I
agree,”
Tess sent.
“I feel like I have too many people in my head
right now.”

“Then
we’ll be brief,”
Truth sent.
“Tess told Commander Sylvan that she met the
Dark Kindred who was dream sharing with Mei-Li, Senator Hastings’s daughter
when the two of you visited Zeaga 4, correct?”

“Well,
we didn’t exactly visit the planet’s surface since no one without enhancements
is allowed there. But yes, I met him on a medical barge orbiting the planet,”
Tess
sent.
“His name is Six. But he told me he wasn’t planning on coming to claim
the senator’s daughter at all.”

“Well,
he must have changed his mind.”
Becca’s mental voice sounded grim.
“Because
he just showed up tonight out of the blue and literally carried Mei-Li off like
some kind of a caveman.”

“Oh,
that’s bad!”
Tess shivered, remembering the scary, Terminator-looking Dark
Kindred with his metal hand and the red laser beam where his left eye should
have been.

“It
is worse than you suppose,”
Truth sent.
“Word has reached her
father, Senator Hastings, and he is calling for an immediate meeting of the
World Security Council.”

“We
think they might declare war on the Kindred!”
Becca
sounded really upset.
“Which is going to be bad news for any Kindred who are
left down on the planet—like Garron.”

“Oh,
no!” Tess said aloud, clutching Garron’s broad shoulder. She’d just found her
man—she wasn’t about to lose him!

“It’s
all right,
lin’del.
We won’t lose each other,” he murmured soothingly,
stroking her hand. But Tess wasn’t soothed and Truth’s next words only made her
more worried.

“The
Kindred High Council is advising any and all Kindred warriors who are still on
Earth to come back to the Mother Ship immediately,”
Garron’s
brother sent.
“Unfortunately, the ban on Tess remains in effect.”

“Which
is completely ridiculous, of course.”
Becca
sounded indignant.
“I don’t
know what Chancellor Terex is thinking!”

“I
don’t either but I’m not coming back to the Mother Ship without Tess,”
Garron
growled.

“Of
course you’re not, honey,”
Becca sent soothingly.
“Nobody would
expect you to. What the two of you need to do is find someplace safe to hide
out until all this blows over.”

“But
where?”
Tess sent despairingly.

“I
don’t know, but you’d better find someplace quick,”
Becca
sent.
“If things go down like we think they will, it’s going to get awfully
hot for any Kindred left on Earth.”

“This
comes at a particularly bad time for everyone since Commander Sylvan had just
made the announcement that we would start calling brides from Earth again
today,”
Truth put in.
“If only Six hadn’t decided he
had
to
come and claim his bride right now we might be all right.”

“He
made a big scene, too,”
Becca sent.
“Apparently the police were
called in and an elderly neighbor said she saw him taking Mei-Li away by
force.”

“Don’t
forget the male they found with multiple broken bones at the scene,”
Truth
sent.
“The news media on Earth are trying to make it out that he was a
friend of Mei-Li and Six flew into a jealous rage and nearly killed him.”

“Is
that true?”
Garron asked.

“We
think it’s more likely he was attacking her or trying to hurt her in some way,”
Becca
sent.
“You know how Kindred men get when they think their female is
threatened. They go into rage all right—just not the jealous kind. More like
the I’ll-kill-you-for-trying-to-hurt-my-woman kind.”

“But
Six
can’t
go into Rage for his female,”
Garron
protested.
“He has no emotions. In fact, he was held out to us by the
surgeon who performed my implant surgery as a shining example of success when
it came to emotion dampers.”

“Yes,
but we know how long your implant lasted,”
Tess reminded him.
“The
minute you started having strong emotions, it failed completely.”

“I
had only had mine for a day, though,”
Garron pointed out.
“Six has had his
for years. And I had my dr’gin inside to contend with.”

“I
think every Kindred has a beast inside when it comes to protecting their
woman.”
Becca sounded thoughtful.
“I’d be very surprised if Six is
able to keep his emotionless state once he starts feeling possessive and
protective of Mei-Li.”

“He’d
better keep it,”
Tess said grimly.
“If he doesn’t he can be killed.
Yipper—the Tolleg surgeon who did Garron’s implant—told us they don’t allow any
emotion at all on Zeaga 4. If anyone gets caught feeling, they’re gotten rid
of. Purged, I think he called it.”
She shivered.

“What
about Mei-Li? How will she survive down on Zeaga 4 during the Claiming Period?”
Becca
asked.

“Apparently
they give special dispensations to visiting dignitaries and the like who wish
to come to Zeaga 4 but retain their ability to feel,”
Garron
sent.
“But on one rule they will
not
bend—everyone who visits the
planet’s surface must have an enhancement.”

“And
not a boob job or an eye lift either,”
Tess put in.
“We’re
talking some kind of mechanical addition like a scope for your eyes or a brand
new bionic leg or something like that.”

“Oh,
that poor girl!”
Becca sounded horrified.
“What is she going to do?”

“A
better question might be what will her father do?”
Truth
sent grimly.
“When his cherished daughter comes back modified in ways the
citizens of Earth cannot and do not want to understand, what kind of vengeance
will he try to take upon all Kindred because of the actions of one?”

“It’s
a pretty scary scenario,”
Becca sent.
“Which is why we need to
break this connection now and let the two of you get moving.”

“Your
best bet is probably to go back to the HKR building in Asheville,”
Truth
advised.
“I believe the Commander there has some extra resources at his
disposal.”

“Oh
yes, Commander Stavros,”
Tess exclaimed.
“He’s the same one who
loaned us the shuttle to go to Zeaga 4 in the first place. He also gave me a
change of clothes and let me call you guys when we thought Garron had gone
D’fex.”

“I
had
gone D’fex,”
Garron said aloud, taking her hand in his. “You
saved me, Tess. If you hadn’t come for me—”

“Oh,
Garron…” She climbed into his lap again and pressed her face to his throat,
breathing in his warm bonding scent. “I just—”

“Still
here, guys—okay? We can’t hear what you’re saying but we can guess what’s going
on,”
Becca sent.

“And
as romantic as it is, you don’t have time for it,”
Truth
added.
“Get up and get back to Asheville
now!”

“Right.”
Garron
gave Tess a swift kiss and the two of them got up and started pulling on their
clothes.

“We’ll
go right away,”
Tess sent.
“But try to stay in touch, okay?”

“We’ll
try to. We’re not sure if Earth has technology that can block the Think-me
calls now or not,”
Becca sent.
“According to Sylvan,
they’ve been working on a lot of new things which could spell trouble for us up
here on the Mother Ship. And unfortunately, a lot of it is based on technology
the Kindred gave them in the first place!”

“Stay
safe!”
Tess sent.

“You
too, hon! And now we’d better let you go. We’ll bespeak you later with more
news if we can.”

“Goodbye,
Brother. Be well,”
Truth sent.

And
then the four way connection was broken and Tess only felt herself and Garron
in her head.

“Whew.”
She looked at him worriedly. “What are we going to do?”

“Get
back to Asheville
to start with and see if Commander Stavros can help us. If he can’t…” He
shrugged. “I’m not sure what might happen next.”

“I
don’t understand why they can’t just send someone after that girl and bring her
back,” Tess said, buttoning her blouse.

“Are
you serious? Remove a female from a male who is claiming her?” Garron gave her
a wide-eyed look as he pulled on his black flight leathers. “That is absolutely
never
done—it would be interfering with the sacred will of the Goddess
who puts all males and females together.”

“Well,
I don’t want to stomp on anyone’s religion,” Tess said, struggling into her
jeans. “But it seems like maybe they could make an exception to avoid an
international incident. Or an interstellar one, I guess.”

Garron
shook his head. “Didn’t you see Zeaga 4 when we were orbiting it? It’s a highly
mechanized and advanced society. They have formidable weapons—trying to reverse
Six’s claim on the Earth girl would doubtless end in bloodshed. And the Dark
Kindred have a much better chance of hurting the Mother Ship than anything they
might have developed here on Earth. At least, that would be my guess.”

“Well,
I don’t understand why Six claimed her at all. He seemed so emotionless, so
cold
when I met him.” Tess made a face. “What does he want with that poor girl
anyway if he doesn’t feel anything for her?”

“I
imagine he’s asking himself that right about now,” Garron murmured. “But I’m
afraid he might not like the answer…”

Chapter
Eleven

Six watched Mei-Li from the corner of his
eye as they approached the medical barge. She hadn’t said a thing since their
last exchange, not even when they flew into the rift—the huge red gash in space
which took them from her part of the universe to his instantaneously. She
simply sat there, her long, silky black hair like a curtain between them so
that he couldn’t even see her small, lovely face. All he could glimpse from
time to time were the black frames of her oculars.

He wondered if he ought to say
something—maybe apologize again for making her uncomfortable. He hadn’t known
that the simple act of healing her knee would cause such a strong reaction. Not
in Mei-Li…or in himself either.

Against his will, he remembered the warm
scent of her arousal. Gods, it had been intoxicating…bewitching. Like nothing
he had ever scented before. And it wasn’t just her scent he found enthralling.
There was also the salty-sweet taste of her skin and soft little sounds she’d
made when he licked her—Six didn’t think she knew she was making them which
only made them that much more intriguing. Altogether, healing Mei-Li had been a
unique experience—one which Six had to admit, had affected him deeply.

For a moment, he had actually wished to
lick higher, to pull back the lacy barrier of her panties and explore her pussy
with his tongue. This wasn’t something he had expected to want, not even after
he had read the Claiming Period rules and learned that it would be expected of
him in their third solar week together. But just for a split second the urge
had been so strong he could hardly stop himself from burying his face between
her thighs and finding out if she tasted as good as she smelled. Only his
promise to Mei-Li that he wouldn’t taste her on this occasion had stopped him.

Six frowned. Why had he had such strong
urges? Why was it so difficult to make himself stop?

It was simply a new experience,
he told himself uneasily.
And more Kindred instincts
coming to the surface. After all, the entire point of claiming a female is to
breed with her.

Not that it would actually come to that, he
was certain. Oh, he was willing to follow the Claiming Period rules to the
letter, as Chancellor Terex had specified, but bonding sex would not be
possible—not with his emotion damper implant still in place. And with no bond
to tie them together, Mei-Li would have to return to her home world eventually.

Six experienced a strange hollowness in
his stomach at the thought. He tried to imagine himself flying in the other
direction, taking Mei-Li back to where she belonged but somehow he couldn’t do
it. Couldn’t—

“This is Med Barge Three calling
unidentified shuttle. Please identify yourself and state your intentions,” said
a voice from the incoming speaker.

Mei-Li jumped in her seat. “What? What did
they say? What language was that?”

“The universal Kindred dialect,” Six
answered her in English. He then asked permission to land in the Kindred
dialect and was directed to a private docking bay for Enhanced Ones only.

“It’s so guttural—almost like German,”
Mei-Li said, frowning at the speaker.

“I do not know that language. The only
Earth dialect I learned was English in order to converse with you,” Six said.
“But you will need to be able to converse in my dialect as well. How rapidly
are you able to learn languages?”

“How rapidly are
you
able to learn
languages?” she shot back. “I’m fluent in English of course, and Spanish
because of work. Oh, and I know some Mandarin because my adopted mother thought
it was important for me to understand my birth culture but I didn’t learn any
of those languages overnight.”

“It took me several hours of intense study
to pick up English although, as we discussed earlier, I am still learning the
connotations of some words.”

“Yes, we
did
establish that, I
guess.” Mei-Li’s cheeks went pink and her heart rate became elevated.

Six berated himself—apparently he had
caused her embarrassment again.

“Forgive me,” he said. “I did not mean to
allude to our earlier conversation about the correct terminology for the female
sex.”

“No, that’s uh, okay,” Mei-Li said
quickly. “But did you really say you picked up English in just a few
hours?”

Six nodded. “Languages are a Kindred
strength. Because we are genetic traders—or our ancestors were anyway—we are
able to learn almost any language quickly. However, I will not think less of
you if you take a little more time.”

“Gee, thanks,” she muttered.

“You say that you cannot learn a new
language ‘overnight’,” Six said. “We can stay at least a day on the medical
barge before we have to leave for the surface of Z4. Will that be sufficient
time?”

“To learn a whole new alien language?”
Mei-Li made an incredulous noise. “Hardly. I guess I’m going to be stuck asking
you to translate so I hope you’re not planning on going off and leaving me.”

“I would not leave you alone in an
unfamiliar situation,” Six said gravely. “But if you really fear that learning
my language will be difficult, perhaps an injection of translation bacteria is
in order.”

“An injection of
what?”

“Translation bacteria. It was developed by
the Kindred for their brides—so that they might understand the languages they
encountered when they traveled with their new mates,” Six explained. “It is not
something we of the Dark Kindred use much since we generally do not call brides
but I am certain Yipper can find some in the memory banks.”

He turned to the speaker and put in a
request.

“Who did you say?” Mei-Li asked. “I…oh…”
She stopped her question in mid sentence, apparently entranced by the sights
outside the viewscreen.

They were docking now and Six was bringing
their shuttle in low, straight through the atmosphere bubble that surrounded
the entrance to the special docking bay. It was a pure black space—with walls
and floors a uniform glossy midnight color.

Several other shuttles were parked within
its vast, black space but Six saw nothing to be surprised about. Yet Mei-Li
exhibited signs of intense curiosity and awe—perhaps tinged with a bit of fear.
Six wondered why. He also wondered if he was reading her correctly. He
thought
he was getting better at recognizing her emotions but they were not nearly
so easy a language to learn as her spoken dialect.

Clearly it would take a considerable
amount of study to be able to read the female he was claiming more clearly. Not
that Six minded. He found he was anticipating getting to know Mei-Li better…in
every way.

* * * * *

Mei-Li stared in awe at the vast, pure
black space they were landing in. The floor and walls were so dark and shiny
she almost felt like they were parking the shuttle in the middle of an oil
slick—an odd, almost surreal sensation.

A memory came back to her—a report she’d
done back in middle school about the famous La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles.
The pits looked innocent—like pools of dark water. Back in prehistoric times,
many thirsty animals had wandered in unawares, just looking for a drink. But
once ensnared by the gummy, sucking tar, large animals like mammoths and wooly
bison were unable to get out. Their cries of distress in turn called carnivores
like saber tooth tigers who came for lunch…and stayed forever. Because once an
animal, for whatever reason, stepped into that oily, sticky black slick, their
fate was sealed and there was no going back.

Mei-Li shivered at the memory.
Don’t be
silly,
she told herself uneasily.
Just because the place reminds you of
the tar pits doesn’t mean it’s anything like them.
But the idea that she
would be stuck and unable to leave Six’s world once she set foot outside the
shuttle was a hard one to shake, no matter what she told herself.

The door opened and Six stepped down, then
turned to offer her a hand. Mei-Li started to take it…then hesitated. She
simply couldn’t make herself take that step.

Six frowned. “Is something wrong?”

“I just…I can’t.” She looked at him. “You
never answered my question—what happens after a month is up and the Claiming
Period is over? Do I have to stay with you or can I…can I go home?”

“After the Claiming Period is up, you are
free to come back to your home world,” Six assured her rather stiffly, Mei-Li
thought. “In fact, I will bring you back myself.”

“So…you’re not going to try and get me to
stay?”

He shook his head. “I doubt my home world
will be much to your liking. Your kind are not welcome there.”

“My kind? What does that mean? Women?
Minorities? What?” Mei-Li demanded.

“Feelers.” He gave her a flat look. “Those
with emotions. As I have told you before, we have no feelings on Z4—nor do we
want them.”

“Then why come get me at all?” Mei-Li
asked. “If you’re not going to keep me past a month and you don’t think I’ll
like your world, why didn’t you just leave me back on Earth? And don’t say you
wanted to protect me—once you bring me back to Earth, I’ll be dealing with all
the same crap all over again. Guys like Randy Dungston—the one whose bones you
broke—are part of my everyday work.” She had a sudden thought. “Unless
you’re
planning to come back with
me.
But I really don’t think that would
work out. You probably wouldn’t like Earth any more than I’ll like your place.
And besides, we barely know each other.”

“We will know each other better shortly,”
Six said. “But no, I do not plan to return to Earth with you. After the
Claiming Period is over, I fully expect us to part ways.” He didn’t sound
particularly happy about it but then, he never sounded particularly happy about
anything, Mei-Li reminded herself. Doubtless due to the whole “I have no
emotions” thing he had going on.

“Okay,” she said impatiently. “So I’m not
staying with you and you’re not coming with me. Then why did you come to claim
me? Was it the dreams? Did you come get me because of the dreams?”

He frowned. “The dreams we shared were
extremely…compelling. But they are not the reason I came to you. I…” He looked
away. “I was ordered by my superior to come and claim you. I believe it is some
kind of political gambit—I don’t know for certain.”

Mei-Li put a hand on her hip.
Now
they
were getting somewhere.

“So you only came to get me because your
boss
told
you to?”

“I…” He shifted uneasily. “That is…the
essence of it.”

“So this is just business for you.” Mei-Li
didn’t know whether to be relieved or insulted but she was definitely leaning
towards insulted. “You came because you were ordered to and now I get a free
one month vacation in a dystopian paradise and then you’ll bring me back home.
Is that it?”

He nodded reluctantly, Mei-Li thought.

“Essentially.”

“Fine.” She was beginning to be upset
though she hardly knew why. All the stuff she’d heard back on Earth about how
Kindred males were so protective and possessive of their Earth brides clearly
didn’t apply here. Six was just following orders.
What so now you’re upset
that he’s not crazy obsessed with you and won’t make you stay on Planet
No-Feels?
demanded a sarcastic little voice in the back of her head.
You
ought to be dancing a jig for joy that he’s going to let you go with no
problems once this stupid Claiming Period, whatever that entails, is all over.

But somehow she couldn’t muster up even a
single speck of joy. She just felt humiliated and angry. It was one thing to be
stolen away from her planet by a man who was so in love with her that he
couldn’t help himself and just had to come and get her. It was quite another to
be taken for purely business purposes and told she would be returned soon, like
a piece of reclaimed luggage nobody particularly wanted at the end of the
allotted time.

“Your heart rate and breathing have
increased.” Six was looking at her cautiously. “Are you having negative
emotions again?”

“Why do you care?” Mei-Li snapped. “I’m
just
business
to you. Just a piece of luggage you had to pick up because
your boss told you to.”

“That is not—” he began.

“So why are we bothering with any of
this?” Mei-Li went on, ignoring him. She swept her arm out indicating the
medical barge and all it entailed. “Why get me the translation virus or
whatever it is and bother taking me to the planet’s surface at all? Why not
just let me sit on the shuttle and play solitaire until the month is out and
then you can take me back and get rid of me?”

The look Six gave her was honestly
confused. “Clearly you are having extremely negative emotions but I am not
certain why. As to your question, you
must
come down to Z4 for our
Claiming Period just as we must follow the rules and protocols proscribed for
the period exactly. Anything less voids the Claiming Contract.”

“Oh, well, we can’t have
that,”
Mei-Li
said sarcastically.