I walked to the door and waved my hand over the control panel. Nearly silent, the entry slid sideways, revealing Rachel standing on the other side. She was dressed in the green that I’d learned meant she was part of the medical staff, a doctor. Her dark brown hair was pulled back in a braid and her face was bare of makeup. But her skin practically glowed, and I shoved aside a bit of envy. With her olive colored skin, she looked like a Greek goddess. I should have hated her for being at least three inches taller than me. I’d always felt like a white orchid that just melted or burned to a crisp in the sun. With my blond hair cut in a pixie style, my pale skin nearly translucent, and all the extra junk in the trunk, I felt like an ugly duckling facing a dark swan. I wanted to hate her for all of it, but she was too nice. She forced me to adore her, which just wasn’t entirely fair.
Then again, I was used to women prettier than me. But even as the usual self-deprecating thoughts ran through my mind, a formidable, primitive part of me rose up and filled me with confidence and feminine power. Rachel was beautiful and brilliant. A scientist who’d figured out what the Hive had been up to a few months ago, when her mate, Maxim, had become ill and a human named Brooks had died. She’s solved the puzzle and saved the lives of everyone on this planet. Not the powerful Prillons, not the Atlan beasts. Her.
But Tyran and Hunt didn’t want her, they wanted me. I wasn’t a scientist, I wasn’t tall and dark, but I was theirs. I was strong and relentless. I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt just how violent their feelings for me were, because I could sense everything through the collars. Felt it with every touch. Reveled in it with every orgasm.
They didn’t pretend to be obsessed with me, to desire me. Their obsession, the intense attraction was real. And that gave me more confidence than ever. I’d never felt stronger, more capable.
Unfortunately for them, it also made me less likely to stay in this room like a good little mate while they went out into the world hunting bad guys without me. No. Fucking. Way.
Rachel lifted her brow as I peeked over her shoulder into the cream colored corridor. Behind her stood not two, but four additional guards. Two Prillon I didn’t know, an Atlan named Rezz and a dark, brooding Everian Hunter I’d met yesterday at dinner. They were all new arrivals on the Colony and Hunt told me he was confident that serving guard duty over the governor’s mate would be a good way to make them feel included and part of the community without giving them too much opportunity to cause trouble. One of the missing men, Captain Perro, had been their friend.
Hunt wanted to keep an extra close eye on them. Guess he’d succeeded. Especially since they were working with other, long-time Colony residents.
The assignment to protect me or Rachel must have felt like traffic duty for city cops as far as I was concerned. Boring as hell. If I was safe inside our quarters, there wasn’t too much danger right outside the doorway. I actually felt bad for the two Prillon standing guard. Captain Marz was new to the Colony, and one of my personal shadows anytime Hunt and Tyran had to go to work. If I got to leave our rooms.
If my mates were protective, Governor Rone and Captain Ryston were, evidently, twice as bad. Four guards? Cue the eye-roll. Seriously.
“Hi, Kristin. Are you all right?” Rachel’s words were in English, and I grinned. The NPU worked wonders, translating the various languages spoken on the Colony almost instantly, but it was still nice to hear someone from home.
“Hi. I’m fine. Just mad. Can we talk?”
She nodded over her shoulder before stepping inside my quarters, the door sliding closed behind her so we could speak alone. I sighed.
“And now there are six huge-ass warriors wasting their time standing outside my room.”
Rachel laughed, her brown eyes sparkling, which helped cool some of my temper. If anyone knew what hell I was going through at the moment, it had to be her. “They do tend to be a little over-protective.”
I wasn’t one to mince words, not when it came to work. “I need armor and a gun.”
The humor in her gaze faded quickly and she studied me with a somber expression. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
“Has anything like this—the missing warriors—happened on the Colony before? How many of these guys are skilled investigators? I know they all fought in the war, but killing bad guys and talking to them are two very different skill sets.”
She paced from the door to the tiny table in the makeshift eating area. The place was set up like an efficiency apartment back on Earth, a barely-there kitchen—because most times the warriors ate together in the community dining halls—two couches and the S-Gen unit in the corner. There was a chair I could imagine curling up in to read, and a very large bed that I couldn’t bear to look at just now. Remembering what my mates had done to me in it would distract me from my plan.
“I know you’re right, but these aren’t drug dealers or pimps, Kristin. And this isn’t Earth. They’re Hive.”
I shook my head. I knew enough. “I’ve been reading about them. Reading the reports. I’ve pored through hundreds, maybe thousands of documents in the database over the last few days. I know what I’m getting into. They’re trying to re-assimilate everyone on this planet, to take it over, and I’m not going to let them have my mates, or anyone else.”
“What?” Rachel’s dark brows winged up and she stopped cold. “What did you just say?”
I crossed my arms over my chest, my dark blue tunic and pants annoying to me now when I wanted to be wearing armor like my mates.
I sighed. “Come on, Rachel. Are you trying to tell me that’s not exactly what you think is going on here?”
She shook her head and took a couple steps closer to me, her voice slow, each word drawn out as if she was thinking about them even as they left her mouth. “No…but how could you possibly know that? We haven’t told the rest of the citizens on the Colony for fear it would start a panic. How did you find out?”
Tilting my head to the side, I raised one brow and knew the skepticism showed on my face. “Really? It’s all there, in the reports. You just have to read between the lines.”
“Shit.” Rachel laughed. “You are good.”
I grinned and it felt fabulous that my assumptions had been validated. “It’s what I do.”
“Yes, you’re right. Fine.” She sighed. “I’m going to get in trouble for this, but all right. I’m in. If we’re going to be BFFs, we might as well start raising hell and breaking them in. I’d been doing it all by myself up until now. It’ll be better with a partner-in-crime. What do you want to do?”
I hugged her. Hard. I couldn’t help it. “BFFs,” I agreed.
She grinned, hugging me back, her face full of mischief. “Okay, Miss FBI. What kind of trouble are we going to get into today?”