Free GalacticInferno by Mel Teshco Page B

Escaping the mother ship. Racing down the dark Ally. The dog
attack.
    Her eyelids jerked wide apart. Pain lashed her head, her
eyeballs. Her leg and back.
    Fuck.
    Renate’s large form blurred before her, then came into
focus. “They caught us?” she asked, horror thickening her voice.
    “No. I…I brought you here.” At her obviously shell-shocked
look, he gathered one of her hands in his and said hoarsely, “I had no choice.
You needed help.”
    Something inside her chest tore. She’d been wrong about
Renate. He was no different to the other men she’d had in her life. She
snatched her hand free. “You lied to me.”
    He frowned but didn’t deny it. She wasn’t even sure if that
was a good or a bad thing. Tears threatened. She willed them away. Even if it
killed her she wouldn’t allow him to see the depth of her hurt.
    Another alien stepped close. She stiffened, unconsciously
shrinking back. His eyes, the color of a cold, mysterious sea, narrowed as he
studied her, before he looked to Renate and back to her again. He was more
finely boned than Renate, and his honey-colored hair drifted to the shoulders
of his orange coat.
    This was undoubtedly the man…alien, she’d heard as she’d come
to.
    She lifted her chin and glowered. He was beautiful. And yet
he did nothing for her. He didn’t sing to her soul.
    Renate…he’d been her everything.
    The alien turned to her former lover. In impeccable English
he said, “You should leave. She needs to rest.” Renate opened his mouth and the
other alien interjected, “She won’t be seeing anyone else.”
    Anyone else? As in the other alien men I’m apparently
promised to?
    She pressed her hands to her face, but it didn’t stop
Renate’s fierce voice from penetrating her numbed mind.
    “Ally, I did what I had to do to keep you alive. Maddox has
a gift with plants, a gift with healing.”
    Even with her voice muffled by her hands, none would mistake
its note of bitterness, even self-pity. “You should have let the dogs finish me
off.”
    His shock pressed against her senses like a heat wave. Her
hands locked harder over her face as she repressed a stupid need to appease
him. She was so not going there.
    When she heard his heavy tread moving away, her hands
dropped and she looked up, watching his rigid shoulders push through a throng
of broad, leafy plants.
    Her heart skipped a beat. “Wait!” As Renate paused, her eyes
scanned the room, with its huge domed ceiling and enormous orb of light high
above, like an artificial sun. Though a wall of plants prevented her from
seeing too far, behind her some sort of transparent substance revealed the drop
to another floor below. Aliens moved beneath, in and out of her field of
vision.
    She turned back to Renate, a sick feeling churning in her
gut. “Where is Bonnie?”
    He turned slowly to face her, his posture stiff.
    She glowered, but her voice cracked when she repeated,
“Where. Is. She?”
    “I had to leave her,” he conceded gruffly.
    She shook her head. “No.” Tears welled, then slid down her
cheeks. She didn’t have any strength left to block them. Not anymore. “No.
Please, no.”
    He took a step forward. The other alien held up a commanding
hand. Renate’s eyes glistened. “I’m sorry.”
    When he turned away and retreated through the plants, she
couldn’t stop the shudders of betrayal racking her body. She’d lost her beloved
dog. And now…now she’d lost all faith in the one man she’d thought had been
different from all others.
    The alien cleared his throat. “I will have our queen pay you
a visit.”
    She froze. “No!” She shook her head. She’d lost everything
and everyone she’d ever cared about. No amount of persuading would ease her
pain. “I don’t want to see anyone.”
    Maddox stiffened. “Renate didn’t inform you our queen is
human?”
    She wilted a little under his stare. “Yes. I guess he did.
I…I just want my dog back.”
    The alien male stared at her as if she was