I laughed, loving it. “Denzel Washington? Your gran had a crush on Denzel Washington?”
“You know it.”
I looked up at Rezzer, who watched everything with a quiet calm I knew was deceptive. “Can we order movies out here in space?”
“Of course.”
I clapped my hands together. “Great. We’re doing a Denzel marathon.”
The lieutenant chuckled. “I’m all in. Couple other guys will be too.”
“How many of us are there?” I asked.
He shrugged. “Less than a dozen humans on the entire planet, but we’re all here, on Base 3. And that includes the women. We aren’t as big as the other races. They don’t want us in the mines. Slows down production.”
I had no idea what to say about that. “So what do you do instead?”
Rezzer wrapped his arm around my waist and pulled me to his side in a show of blatant possession. “The Lieutenant is an excellent sniper. His cyborg enhanced vision allows him to see targets almost two miles away.”
“Holy cow. Really?” I asked. Denzel nodded but shrugged it off.
“Not much to shoot at out here.”
“Yet.” Rezzer said, and both men grew tense. Happy Earthling reunion time was officially over.
“Governor Maxim said you would wish to know that the sensors in the cave picked up movement.”
I felt Rezzer stiffen beside me. He glanced down at me. “Come. I will work through my list with you later.”
I didn’t know what was going on, but I knew it was important. After what they’d done to Rezzer, I wanted to meet one of the enemy, too. Punch his lights out for hurting my mate. Yes, I could be just as possessive and protective as my big alpha male. And now that I had a child to think about, nothing and no one was going to take my man from us.
The Earth Coalition fighter escorted us down the corridor, Rezzer at my side as we followed him to the governor’s command room. As soon as the door opened, Governor Rone looked up from a map and graphics on some kind of screen imbedded in the table in front of him.
“Rezzer. Good. Marz and Kiel are on their way with the rest of the team.”
“What team?” I asked.
Rezzer pulled me closer, his arm around my shoulders as the others filed in, their footsteps heavy. He introduced me to the men. “Marz. Trax. Kiel. Warlord Braun. This is Lady Caroline. My mate.”
They bowed, which was awesome and intimidating at the same time. Kiel was the only one who looked totally human, but he didn’t move like one. He was too quiet and had too much contained power in his body. None of them were small, the Prillon warriors, Trax and Marz, both at least six-six. Marz was fair, like a Nordic god, and he had a strange silver ring of flesh around his eye and the eye itself was…like liquid silver. Oddly beautiful. Not quite as hard to accept in an alien face rather than a human one. The Prillon Trax was much darker, like a black man back home, but his hair was a deep rusty brown, like cinnamon sprinkled on coffee. His eyes were amber ringed with bronze, like tiger-eye gems. They were large warriors, attractive and terrifying, but none compared to my mate and the other man, Warlord Braun, who I recognized as an Atlan. A beast. Like mine. “Hello everyone. I’m CJ.”
They rumbled off greetings, but I could tell they were distracted by the reason for the summons. I, too, was curious. They gathered around the governor who had done something to make the map he’d been looking at hover in front of him like a hologram. The image looked like a series of worms twisted around one another in the air. But as the others spoke, I realized they were caves.
“The sensors depicted movement here.” Governor Rone lifted his hand to an area of the tunnels that turned red when he touched it.
“That’s close.” The one called Marz said, but I already knew it was bad news by the way Rezzer’s hand twisted in the back of my dress. I wasn’t even sure if he was aware of the movement. This news had him upset.
“You’ll leave immediately,” Governor Rone added. “We need to double patrols on the south side of the base. But that’s not going to be enough.”
“We need to go back into the tunnels.” The beast named Braun crossed his arms and I noticed just how many weapons were strapped to every available inch of the Coalition armor he wore. His hair was a very light brown, almost golden and the warm color matched the dark gold of his eyes. He was, next to my Rezzer, the sexiest man in the room.
Not that I was prejudiced in favor of Atlans. Nope. I’d deny it if asked.
They all wore the same form-fitting black armor. I was surrounded by a feast of man-candy. I knew the governor had a mate, the copper collar around his neck the Prillon version of wedding bands, but I wondered about the others. Either way, their mates, or future mates, were lucky women. Not one of the warriors was as gorgeous as my Rezzer, but still. Not bad. Not too bad at all.
I needed to talk to the Earth woman, Lindsey, the public relations specialist I’d yet to meet. Rezzer had been too busy knocking me up for me to do so before now. Maybe a “hot men from the Colony” calendar would get more brides here. If that kind of campaign could get donations for fire stations back home…
“I’ll lead the team.” Rezzer’s rough growl pulled me back to the present.