Stolen Desire (Outlawed Realm) (17 page)

Qatar actually puffed out his chest as though he were proud. “Bring one of them down here and interrogate him.”

“If he won’t talk,” Bruda said, “we’ll simply resort to torture.”

Simply?

“We’d have to bring him here first,” Zekin countered.

Paige didn’t understand. “How would you do that?”

Qatar spoke before the others. “Zekin will have to go to the surface to kidnap him from the outpost.”

“And risk his life to do so?” Paige said. “Uh-uh. No way.”

Bruda ignored her raised voice and turned to Qatar. “He could distract one of the guards with a female. While the guard was focused on her, Zekin could strike.”

Qatar nodded. “We could send Eeete with—”

“
No.
”
Paige pushed to her knees, trying to maintain her balance as she covered as much of her nudity as she could. “No one’s putting Eeete in harm’s way, not while I’m here. Your people have put her through hell. She’s never had a life. No childhood. No adolescence. Not one single moment of happiness or freedom. No damn way will I allow her to be harmed to save my sorry ass.”

The men exchanged a glance. Eeete kept her head bowed, no doubt prepared to do whatever they wanted, even if it meant her death.

“Do. You. Understand?” Paige asked.

Bruda’s eyes narrowed slightly as though he wanted to frown at her snotty tone but couldn’t quite bring himself to do so. “Not entirely. We’re not familiar with some of the words you’ve used.”

“I could take one of the other females,” Zekin offered.

“No,” Paige cried. “I don’t want anyone getting killed because of me.”

Zekin touched her hand. “She may not get killed.”

May not? “Are you serious? These are human beings we’re talking about. They’re not toys you can use for your own purposes as if they have no feelings. They bleed just like you and I do. I don’t give a damn if they were grown in artificial wombs or how they came to be. You’re not using them. Why would you even consider doing such a thing? What in the hell is the matter with all of you?”

Bruda and Qatar offered no comment. Paige might as well have been talking to blocks of stone.

Zekin sighed. “Without a female to distract the guard, there’s a chance I may not succeed. Over time, the guards have grown cunning. I’ve had to wait long periods for them to emerge from their post so I could gain entry. We’ve concluded they’re using the device more and more to travel through portals for the things they require—even most of their food and drink. Before they brought you to their outpost, I was on the surface for nearly a week, hiding in the drifts. If not for the guard who’d been outside, disposing of the slaves they’d already killed, I might not have been able to rescue you.”

“So true,” Qatar said. “And once they lose their fear of E3, they’ll probably manipulate the device to send their victims there rather than tossing them outside. Then we’ll have no way to enter their outpost. Until that happens, we have to use whatever means are available to us. If a female calls out and pounds on the door, their curiosity and lust will overcome any reservations they may have. They’re barely above animals in intelligence. Nothing more than savages.”

“It’s the only sensible way,” Bruda chimed in.

Paige wanted to laugh at their ludicrous and prejudiced reasoning. She could scarcely pull in enough air. Slightly dizzy and nauseated, she said the only thing she could. “Then I’ll go. I’ll distract the guard.”

Zekin stared at her. He pushed up and warned, “No.”

“It’s the only sensible way,” Paige said, saying exactly what Bruda had. She cleared her throat. “I’m the one who needs to get back, so I should be the one to—”

“You saw what it’s like up there,” Zekin interrupted. “You want to go through that again? You’re telling me you’re not afraid?”

“I’m scared shitless,” she muttered. “I want to hurl.”

“Hurl,” Bruda repeated. “Unfortunately, we don’t understand that—”

“Throw up,” she said, then raised her voice to drown out Zekin. “I’m so frightened, I feel sick, all right? However, that doesn’t mean I won’t do it.”

Zekin crossed his arms over his chest and tightened them to keep from grabbing Paige, shaking her until she was able to think clearly. “You could get both of us killed if you go.”

More color drained from her face. Her skin was greasy with sweat. “Then don’t come,” she mumbled. “I can do this without you. In fact, I’d prefer it.”

Qatar made a sound that on E2 resembled a stifled laugh.

Zekin frowned at Paige. “You intend to do this alone?”

“I’ll need some of those darts you used on the guards.”

“The ones that killed them.”

She looked like she might be sick. “Do you have any like the kind I’m presuming they used on me?” Cautiously, she touched her neck and the wound from where the tip had pierced her skin.

Zekin glanced at her naked breasts.

As though she remembered them suddenly, along with Bruda and Qatar being here, she snatched back her hand and draped her arm across her breasts again. “Just make certain the tranquilizer is enough to put the guard out. Once he’s down, I’ll—”

“What?” Zekin challenged. “You’ll drag him across the frozen terrain? You’ll fight the creatures up there? You’ll locate the body of water where these pods are located? You’ll—”

“I’ll do my best,” she cried. “It’s all that I can promise. But at least I won’t have harmed anyone here. Yeah, I’m scared. I don’t want to die. I’m terrified at the thought of being hurt even a little. However, I couldn’t live with myself if anything happened to anyone else, especially you and Eeete.”

“I want what Zekin wants,” Eeete said. She spoke just above a whisper, her manner typically meek. “I’ll gladly do whatever he wants, no matter what happens to me.”

A tear slid down Paige’s cheek. She wiped it away with the back of her hand. “Don’t you worry, sweetie. Not one damn thing is going to happen to you. Not while I’m here. I’m going, you’re staying, and that’s final.”

Zekin squeezed his arms so tight, his muscles hurt. “Leave us,” he ordered the others. “I want to speak to Paige alone.”

No one argued. They looked relieved.

Paige waited only until his men and Eeete were out of earshot before she warned, “No matter what you say, you’re not changing my mind.”

“That’s because you’re using emotion.” He uncrossed his arms. “Not reason.”

“I don’t want you or Eeete to die.”

“You want what you can’t have. Listen to me.” With his hands on her arms, he forced her to turn back to him, to understand and accept the inevitable. “Eeete has no future here. None of us do. The guards will eventually try to take the colony back. We may not win the next time. I didn’t rescue Eeete or the others believing they’d have a long and pleasant life. I wanted to stop their immediate pain. Even if we were all to die tomorrow, at least there was some peace, a measure of freedom before we—”

“Don’t.” She’d pressed her fingers against his lips to stop him. “I can’t bear to hear it.”

She still refused to accept reality. Zekin would have gladly given his life to spare her this pain, but she needed to face the truth so she could eventually return to her realm. To people who were the same as she was.

He wrapped his fingers around her wrist and pulled her hand away. “You’re the only one we can save.”

“No.” She kept shaking her head. The ends of her hair swayed, a few strands sticking to her tear-dampened cheeks.

Zekin watched, captivated by her emotion, disheartened at how everything she did affected him. A reminder of all that he’d never known until he’d met her. Desire he couldn’t abide. He had to chance everything so she’d be able to go back, no matter how much she resisted. No matter how much he’d miss the sound of her voice, the way she met his gaze so directly, her fragrant heat, loving kisses, sheltering embrace.

“Please,” he begged, “don’t fight me on this. I’ll go to the outpost to get the guard. If you don’t want Eeete to come with me, I’ll choose one of the other women. Before we leave, I’ll order Bruda and Qatar to send two others to the surface—one of our own kind and another female—if the first slave and I don’t return.”

Paige’s shoulders trembled.

He whispered, “I’ll get you home safely, just as I promised.”

An anguished cry escaped her. She threw her arms around him. “No. I can’t let you.”

“You’ll die here with the rest of us if you don’t.”

She rubbed her face against his shoulder. Her breath glided over his skin, soft and hot. “I’m not doing that either. Someone has to watch out for you down here and up there.”

Was there no reasoning with this woman? “Not you,” he insisted. “I won’t allow you to do this.”

“How will you stop me? You’re going to put me in chains as the guards do with the pleasure slaves and the women they kidnap? You’re going to make me your prisoner? You’d actually do that?”

“If I’m forced to.”

She kissed his shoulder. “No you won’t.”

Her tender caress defeated him. Zekin couldn’t think clearly. He held her as close as he could, struggling to find a way to get her to listen to him, to accept his decision. There had to be an end to this.

As he strained for the correct words, Paige whispered, “As you said earlier, we have so little time. Let’s not use these last moments to argue. No matter what you say, you won’t change my mind. I’m going to the surface.”

Chapter Twelve

Zekin didn’t argue anymore, nor did he plead. On what sounded like a frustrated or pissed sigh, he released Paige, left their bed and pulled on his clothes.

He was definitely pissed.

She didn’t bother to ask where he might be going. No damn way was she about to let him out of her sight. As far as his stony silence was concerned, Paige had endured far worse from jerks she’d dated, clients she’d tried to appease, the full-of-themselves partners at her law firm and snotty retail clerks. She could take whatever Zekin doled out. As long as he didn’t carry out his plan alone.

Whatever his plan might be.

She pulled on her shirt and padded after him through the numerous halls and pods, her quick steps causing the floor to rattle.

He slowed and looked over but didn’t say anything. Nor did she. On his next frustrated huff, Zekin continued past the dining hall and a series of what might have been offices. Men who resembled him sat in front of circular monitors, the screens’ green glow tinting their complexions a sickly color. Paige guessed their equipment were some kind of computers. For security purposes? To detect if anyone approached, like Vakar’s men or the guards?

She could only hope.

Qatar and Bruda spotted her and Zekin. Immediately, they stopped conversing with another look-alike guy. Zekin motioned for them to follow. The two men fell in step behind Paige, keeping an appropriate distance, whispering something she couldn’t make out.

Zekin stopped at the intake area. With nowhere else to go, he turned to Bruda and Qatar.

“Paige is accompanying you to the surface?” Bruda asked.

“Yes,” she said, before Zekin could tell them no.

He tightened his jaw, saying nothing until his expression was as blank as theirs. Then he addressed them in their language.

It was harder to follow than Greek spoken at supersonic speed. “Aw, come on, guys,” she cut in. “English, please.”

Zekin stopped mid-word, sentence or curse, Paige couldn’t be certain. His shoulders tensed.

“I need to know the plan the same as you,” she said. “Keeping me in the dark isn’t going to make this safer for me.”

“How many darts do we have?” Zekin asked Qatar in English.

“Enough for both of you. Of course,” the man added, “try not to use them unless you absolutely have to.”

“Why?” Paige asked. “If we take them with us will that make you vulnerable here?”

“No,” Zekin answered, not glancing her way. He kept his attention on his men as they discussed their current supply of darts and the additional ones they were making, both the tranquilizer type and those that killed.

Zekin wanted to know most about the lethal variety. How quickly it would bring a man down, not allowing him to even blink.

Paige found it difficult to listen. If anyone threatened Zekin, she’d do whatever it took to protect him. A natural instinct. However, the thought of shooting a guard, watching him die, didn’t come easily.

She turned away, surprised to see Eeete at the area’s entrance. The young woman remained there, not moving closer. Coming here at all was most likely the boldest action she’d ever risked, driven by her adoration for Zekin. Paige ached for her. She wanted Eeete and all of the rest here to have a future. She wanted to give Zekin everything. A chance to laugh, love, be free.

Again, she had no idea what he and the others were talking about. They’d slipped back into their own language, undoubtedly so Zekin could tell them his real plans.

Didn’t matter. She’d made up her mind and would go to the surface even though she couldn’t stop trembling. Paige recalled how scared she’d been after her dad had died, leaving her alone without any close relatives to care. That had been so awful. This was a thousand times worse. Not only was she afraid for herself, she didn’t want anything happening to Zekin. Especially on her behalf.