“There—he’ll be safe in the cargo hold,” Rarev remarked. “We’ll hold him until we can deal with the humans and then it’s off to Tiberius Four and the Maximum Security facility he was headed for before that crash.”
“That shouldn’t be long,” Baird said confidently. “The male your warrior killed was what my mate, Olivia calls a ‘bag of scum’. And he was also a dealer of drugs—he was making and selling illegal and harmful substances. The humans won’t be too sorry to lose one like him.”
“He’s the same one who disparaged Emilia.” Rarev’s tone had dropped to a low growl. “I was not sorry to see him dead. Thank the Goddess we came back to check his domicile today, though—we got there just in time. Or did we?” He looked at Christine, whom Bard was still holding in his arms. “How is the female?”
Christine wished she could say she was fine, but the power of speech had left her again and this time it didn’t appear likely to come back. Which was terrible, because she wanted badly to explain that Roarn wasn’t really dangerous and that she could help him if only they would let her try. But her tongue felt like a dead thing in her mouth and now even her vision was fading.
“Hey, little female? Hello?” Baird was looking down at her anxiously but his face was blurry now. In fact, everything was blurry, Christine thought. And everything was going gray…
“We’d better hurry,” she heard Baird say. “I think she’s in really bad shape.”
“Get her into the shuttle, I’ll take off at once,” Rarev’s voice was so faint Christine could hardly hear the big Monstrum.
“I’ll bespeak my mate, Olivia, and have her waiting to meet us at the Docking Bay,” Baird responded. “Hold on, little female—we’re going to get you help,” he told Christine.
But she didn’t hear his last words for everything had faded to black.
FORTY
Christine seemed to sleep for a long time—though how long, she didn’t know. She had dreams of people coming to see her—some she knew and some she didn’t. One of them was a pretty woman with blonde hair and silver gray eyes—she said she was Christine’s doctor. She also said something about a surgery, but Christine didn’t understand any of that and it faded away, as dreams do.
Sometimes she dreamed of her time with Roarn, the precious two weeks they had spent loving each other and making each other happy. She ached to feel the big Monstrum’s strong arms around her, holding her close to his furry chest. She longed to look into his golden-green eyes and hear his deep, purring voice telling her he cared for her.
If I could just have one more night with him…
But she knew she never would. And what she heard in her next dream confirmed it.
“How is she?” The deep, growling tones sounded like Commander Baird, who had brought her here in the first place.
“Her recovery is slow but steady,” said the voice of Christine’s doctor—she had introduced herself as “Liv” in a previous dream. “That was some head injury she had—I had to clear a massive hematoma. If you hadn’t brought her in right when you did, it might have compressed her brain stem and she would have stopped breathing.”
“Good thing Rarev and I didn’t leave her to the humans to care for,” Baird’s deep voice was filled with contempt.
“Speaking of the humans, have they finally decided if they’re going to press charges against the Monstrum warrior you and Rarev went to find?” Dr. Liv asked.
“They finally decided not to,” Baird said. “I think it had something to do with the human peacekeeper who’s called a ‘Sheriff’ wanting all the glory for the kills himself. He seemed extremely proud to be able to say he was the one who got rid of that bag of scum dealer of drugs.”
“I think you mean ‘scumbag drug dealer’ honey.” There was laughter in Dr. Liv’s voice.
“Whatever you wanna fucking call him, he’s dead and nobody’s crying about it,” Baird said flatly. “And if the Monstrum hadn’t killed him, I probably would have. He was holding your patient and another female—a young one, barely more than a child—and threatening to rape and kill them both. Fucker deserved to die.”
“I hope they’re getting the girl he took some therapy.” Dr. Liv’s voice sounded troubled. “I know I’m certainly going to offer some to Christine, here, when she finally wakes up.”
“When do you think that’s gonna be?” Baird asked.
“Soon. She’s completely healed now—I’m already scaling back the meds considerably. I just had to make sure her brain wasn’t damaged.”
“It wasn’t, was it?” Baird’s deep voice sounded worried.
“No, she’s fine. Thank the Goddess you got her here just in time.”
“Good. And speaking of timing, I’m afraid I’m gonna be late to Last Meal tomorrow night,” Baird told her.