Science Friction: 15 Book MEGA Sci-Fi Romance Bundle (Excite Spice Boxed Sets) Page 29

  “No, I don’t so just say it,” K said. “Tell me what you’re talking about.”

  “Well...” Vanja cleared her throat. “It’s just... the first candidate might not survive your encounter together. The second either. Really it’s best if you try to save the one you really want for your third or fourth pick. That way most of your mating rage will be spent on the first two or three and the one you want as a permanent consort should survive.”

  “Survive?” K raised her eyebrows at the older woman and stared at her. “Survive? Are you telling me I’ll be so irrational, so completely out of control with lust I might actually kill the male I mate with?”

  For the first time, Vanja looked distressed. “I know the idea of killing someone is frightening and appalling, dearie. Believe me, I do. But you have to think of it this way—all the candidates know what they’re getting into when they are called by the Empress. And they consider it a great honor. If they die, they lose their lives in service to their home planet. Don’t you see?”

  “It’s you who doesn’t see.” K turned to face her again. “It’s not the killing that bothers me, Vanja. I killed my first man at the age of twelve—it earned me a step up in rank. But if I’m really going to be that deadly—”

  “Not until you reach the third phase of your cycle, my love,” Vanja said earnestly. “And you’ll have plenty of warning—your eyes will go pure gold just before the mating rage takes over. By then your royal mother will have all the candidates for consort assembled. She’s calling them together—they should all be here in the palace by tomorrow morning at the latest.”

  K felt numb. The Empress was calling together a group of strangers for her to mate with—males who would contaminate her over and over. What was she going to do?

  Suddenly she had a comforting thought. Boone knows genetics. He’ll be able to help. I just have to get to see him. She grasped at the thought desperately. Yes, Boone—she had to see Boone. Of course.

  “I’m in pain now, Vanja. I don’t want to wait for tomorrow morning.” She gestured at herself. “I need help... someone to help me.”

  The older woman rose heavily from the bed. “I’ll just go have them call someone for you.”

  “No.” K frowned. “I don’t want anyone but Boone.”

  “But dearie,” Vanja began patiently. “I’ve already explained to you why you can’t have him. He can’t satisfy your needs. And even if he could, you’ll want to leave him be if you truly care for him. There’s nothing worse than killing the one you love and waking up later to realize what you did.” She stepped over to K and looked at her earnestly. “Believe me, child, I’ve seen it happen.”

  “You have?” K looked at her uneasily.

  Vanja nodded. “It happened to your mother. Her first cycle—it was one of the worst I’ve ever seen, before or since. She put the one she really wanted as her consort second in line—the first candidate was such a big, burly fellow, you see. Much like your giant. Your mother thought he would last through most of her mating rage and then she could have the second fellow—the one she really wanted—as her permanent consort.”

  K put a hand to her throat. “What happened?”

  “She killed him,” Vanja said sorrowfully. “The one she really wanted. The first didn’t last very long at all, you see. She ripped out his throat after the first few matings and then it was on to number two. And then three and four.” She sighed. “Actually, it was the fifth candidate your mother ended up with as her consort. And she never really loved him, you know. It was one of the greatest sorrows of her life—made her afraid to love again. I think that’s one reason she let you imprint on me when you were born.”

  “I... see.” K ran a hand through her hair again. The story hit home in a way Vanja’s other warnings hadn’t. What if Boone couldn’t help her after all? What if...? But she pushed the thought away. If he couldn’t help, she would do whatever was necessary. In the meantime, she’d never know if he could help or not unless she got to see him. And considering the entire squadron of heavily armed guards the Empress had left outside her door, it was clear she was going to need some help getting to him.

  “Let me get you someone, dearie. Your eyes are glowing more all the time,” Vanja said.

  “No, please...” K forced herself to put her hand on the other woman’s arm. The skin-to-skin contact wasn’t as bad as she had feared—maybe because she’d been imprinted on Vanja when she was little—but it still made her skin crawl. Purity, she needed Boone now.

  “Child...”

  “Please,” she said again. “I swear I just want Boone to help me through the second phase—that’s all. But there’s no way I’ll get to him without your help, Vanja. The guards they have posted outside my room—I’ll never get by them alone.”

  Of course, she could have taken out the entire squadron with the stun gas capsules she had in her skinsuit but she wasn’t certain she could drop them all before they sounded an alert. And then she would also have to take care of whatever guards were posted outside Boone’s door and somehow get them both out of the palace...

  Vanja sighed heavily. “There is a way you can get to your giant. I shouldn’t tell you, though.”

  “Please.” K tried to beg though it was foreign to her nature. “Please, Vanja, I need to see him—to be with him again. He’s the only one I want to touch me. Please.”

  “Ah, dearie... I never could refuse you anything.” The older woman shook her head. “All right then. Come on.” She led K to a corner of the bedroom which was hung with pink satin drapes. When she pulled the heavy, silky material aside, a small archway carved with tree branches was revealed. “In here,” she said, motioning for K to enter. “It’s your old library.”

  “Real books—not reading cubes.” K stepped into the room and ran her hand over their leather bound spines in wonder. There were fairy tales from Earth-that-was as well as the usual Eros classics. “Berlita and the Talking Bearicorn... The Princess and the Cawrin... The Boy who cried Garneg... I forgot about these,” she murmured. “I forgot so much...”

  Whatever memory block the Purists had used on her, it had been extremely extensive. Only now, when she was finally coming face to face with her old life was it finally giving way. A sudden thought came to her—maybe this was why the High Sentinel had been so against letting her see the Erians she was supposed to kill. Maybe he feared the sight of people from her home planet would trigger her memories.

  But why had the Purists taken her in the first place? And why train her to be one of them? Why not just kill her outright? K didn’t have any answers and didn’t expect to get any. Her body throbbed with need reminding her that right now, she just wanted to get to Boone.

  “If you forgot about the books, you probably forgot about this too,” Vanja said, coming up behind her and laying a hand on the bookshelf. She tapped the spine of one ancient book—Alice in Wonderland, K saw—and then tilted the book ever so slightly outward.

  To K’s amazement, a narrow section of the bookshelf slid out, revealing a dark, cobwebby space behind it.

  “The secret passage!” she exclaimed as yet another memory clicked into place.

  “That’s right.” Vanja smiled. “You used to play in it when you were little. You just loved popping out of the woodwork and scaring the life out of me.”

  K poked her head into the narrow space and pulled back, frowning. “I remember it being a lot bigger than that. It used to seem like such a vast black tunnel.”

  “Well, you’ve grown considerably since you last played in the secret passage, my love.” Vanja smiled a bit sadly. “It might be a bit of a tight squeeze now.”

  “I’ll manage,” K said grimly. “I have to.”

  “Do you remember the way to the West Wing?” her old nurse asked. “That’s where they put your giant—in the blue room, I think.”

  K closed her eyes for a moment, reaching for the information... and it was there, like a map in her head.

  “I remember,”
she said, nodding.

  “Then go,” Vanja said. “But please, my dear princess, be quiet and be careful. I love your royal mother with everything that’s in me but I must say she has a temper on her. If she finds out you’ve defied her orders to keep away from that giant of yours, she’s going to be very, very upset.”

  “She won’t find out,” K promised. At least not until it’s too late. I don’t care who she is, if she thinks she can keep me here against my will she’s sadly mistaken.

  “Go then,” Vanja said, smiling. “Enjoy one last night with the one you really want.”

  “But you’re sure—absolutely sure he’ll be safe?” K asked anxiously.

  Her old nurse nodded. “I’ve seen girls and their cycles—so many of them, dearie. You’ll be in the second phase until morning, I’m certain. Don’t worry—you won’t go into the mating rage until your eyes turn gold.”

  “Thank you, Vanja,” K said, really meaning it. She had a sudden, foreign impulse to hug the old woman—a holdover, no doubt, from her half remembered childhood—but she couldn’t quiet bring herself to do it. Instead she squeezed Vanja’s hand before ducking into the narrow passage.

  “I’ll wait a few minutes before I close it behind you,” the older woman called. “Be careful, dearie.”

  “I will be. Thank you, Vanja.”

  K took a moment to orient herself in the dark, cramped space and then began moving in the direction of the West Wing. In the direction of Boone. Already her body was crying out for his touch—for the forbidden yet soothing feel of his big hands on her bare skin.

  Boone, she thought. I’m coming. I just hope you can help me when I find you.

  Because if he couldn’t, she didn’t want to think about what she might have to do.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Boone was pacing back and forth, his hands clasped behind his back, his brow furrowed in concentration when he heard the strange noise coming from behind the ornately carved stone fireplace.

  “What the hell?” he muttered, looking in that direction. The room they had put him in was huge—even for someone his size—and opulently appointed. There was a vast sleeping platform so wide it looked like a small yacht floating in the center of the deep blue carpeting and a bookcase full of real books which appeared to all be priceless antiques. There was a wet bar in one corner with every imaginable liquor and alcohol and a fresher with a marble tub big enough to swim in. In fact, the only thing Boone didn’t see was a way out.

  Must be imagining things, he thought and kept pacing.

  He was pacing because he was worried—he could never sit still when he had something on his mind. K, he thought, where are you? How are you handling all this?

  It had to be a shock to her—finding out she was a long lost princess with a mother and a people she was supposed to rule at some point. There were bound to be a lot of messy, uncomfortable emotions involved and K was dealing with them all on her own.

  But how well was she dealing with them?

  Boone’s main fear was that she would be tempted to put back on the suit. It had seemed like a viable option before but the more he learned about Erian physiology, the more convinced he became that interrupting the Erian mating cycle could be not just dangerous but deadly.

  “Never should have given her back the suit,” he muttered to himself. “She’ll kill herself with the damn thing if she’s not careful. Damn it, K, where are you?”

  The scratching sound came again, this time from the other side of the fireplace. Boone stopped pacing. This time he was sure he wasn’t imagining it. What the hell was going on? Had the Erians put some kind of spy cam there? Something to keep an eye on him?

  He crouched low, examining the stone. The fireplace was carved with a very lifelike image of the Erian goddess of fertility on either side—at least Boone assumed that was what she was the goddess of. She was naked, her lush form surrounded by graceful vines overflowing with plump berries and blooming flowers. If she got any more fertile she might burst, like an overripe melon too filled with sweetness to contain its nectar any longer.

  “Boone!” came a muffled whisper.

  It surprised him so much he jerked upward and knocked the top of his head against the underside of the white marble mantelpiece.

  “Shit!” he muttered, rubbing the spot.

  “Boone!” the voice said again, sounding very familiar.

  Boone’s heart leapt. “K? Is that you?”

  “I’m stuck back here,” she whispered. “The release lever is broken but I think there’s one on your side.”

  “Where at?” Boone started studying the fireplace again with more interest.

  “The goddess on the left—her breasts. Push in the right nipple.”

  Boone did as directed and the goddess on the left side of the fireplace suddenly slid to one side. Looking down, he saw K’s face peering out of a tiny, dusty crawlspace barely big enough to admit a child.

  “Are you all right?” he asked anxiously. “Can you get through there?”

  “Barely...” She wriggled, trying to squeeze out of the narrow opening. It was a tight fit, especially around her full breasts. For a moment it looked like she might be stuck. Then the silky material of the red dress Illesca had given her tore with a low ripping sound and she was through. “Ugh...” she said, standing up and brushing herself off. “That was easier when I was little. And before I had these.” She nodded down at her breasts and seemed to realize for the first time that the rip in her dress exposed them. “Oh...” She moved to cover herself but Boone was already taking her in his arms.

  “K,” he murmured, pressing his face to the side of her neck to breathe in her sweet, feminine scent. “God, I was so worried. Had no idea how I was going to get to you—and here you came to me.”

  “I had to.” She pulled back and looked at him seriously. Her eyes were glowing—the triple golden rings brilliant in the dim light of the massive, gloomy room. “I need you Boone. Need you to... to help me like you did last night.”

  Boone felt his shaft go hard at once but he wanted to be careful and take things slowly.

  “Are you sure, K?” he asked quietly. “I know this morning you had some regrets.”

  “I’m in pain again, Boone.” She bit her lip pensively. “I don’t know why I can’t just ignore it, the way I ignored injuries on the battlefield. But this is so much different. It’s all I can think about.” She looked up at him nervously. “You’re all I can think about.”

  “Been thinking about you, too, darlin’.” He tilted her chin up and kissed her gently, taking his time, feeling the way.

  K seemed frozen at first but then she responded, opening her lips to him, welcoming him in. Boone groaned with desire and slipped his tongue inside her, probing gently, tasting her, letting her know how much he wanted her.

  Slender, strong arms wrapped around his neck and pulled him closer as K pressed against him, obviously desperate for contact. God, what must she be going through with this damn cycle? And how much more would she have to endure before it was over?

  But the thing that worried him the most—the question that wouldn’t leave him alone was this—would he be able to help her? Could he give her enough pleasure to negate the pain? Could he see her through this phase of her cycle, even though he wasn’t Erian?

  “Darlin’,” he said at last, pulling back. “I’m not sure...”

  “Touch me, Boone.” K tugged at his shirt. “But take off your clothes first. I need... need your skin against mine. Now.”

  Boone wasn’t about to argue with that. He slipped out of his clothes—all but his underbriefs—while K did the same, shedding the silky red dress and the panties that went with it and leaving them in a heap on the ground. Then she just stood there naked, biting her lip and looking at him.

  “K?” he asked softly, seeing the tension in the set of her slender shoulders and the uncertainty in her lovely gold-ringed eyes.

  “I want... I need...” She shook her head. �
��This is still difficult for me, Boone. You’re always the one who comes to me. I’m not sure...”

  “Not sure about being the one who touches first? Who reaches out?” Boone finished for her gently.

  K nodded. “It just seems so... I was trained from an early age to avoid contamination. To actually actively seek it out seems so strange, so wrong. I want to but—”

  “Look at me, K.” Boone lifted her chin. “There’s no shame in getting what you need,” he murmured. “And let me promise you here and now, that I will never have a problem with you touching me.”

  “So you don’t mind that I want... that I need...”