CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
On the other side of the knoll, Arek gazed out over the Altarian sea, shaking his head. "I don't know how we came to be assigned partners," he told T'Van. "But Mia is... she's unexpected. Strong, for a civilian."
"Too bad she's so short," T'Van said, waggling his brows. "We could train her as a warrior."
Arek snorted. "I don't think she has any aspirations toward the military."
"Or a spy, then," his irrepressible friend went on. "You said it yourself—Tygeans are sly, sneaky as all hells."
"Not this one," Arek said slowly, the words dragged from the depths of his heart. But the sec he'd voiced the words, he knew they were true. Mia was hardly a slinking felinoid. "She wears her emotions on her sleeve, bright as that damned Race medallion."
A beep sounded, and T'Van straightened, looking to the surveillance com on his wrist. "Huh," he said. "Then why is she outside our perimeter, headed straight toward your competitors' camp?"
"What?" Anger firing in his gut, Arek turned and jogged around the pod, and to the top of the hill. T'Van signaled for him to drop near the top, and they crouched behind the tallest clumps of grass, and peered down the hill.
There stood Mia, facing Tenn. The two humans were laughing together. Arek cued his com, and their voices sounded in his ear.
"You got that right," Mia said to Tenn.
"Your partner is as big a disappointment as mine, huh?" the smarmy human asked her, oozing sympathy.
She answered, her voice edged with bitterness. "Well... let's just say I trust him to keep me alive, but not for much else."
Arek realized he was growling under his breath when T'Van nudged his arm, and gave him a 'what the hells' look. He blew out a breath and fought for his habitual calm. Why would the Tygress mistrust him? He was the one who had cause to not believe her.
"Whoa, thought you and he were a tight team," Tenn was saying, moving closer to Mia.
"So did I," Mia said quietly. "I thought we were getting to know each other, you know? But I've just been proven wrong."
Wait, what? Arek stared at the back of her head, his mind racing. She'd just been proven wrong? What did that mean?
T'Van nudged him again, and pointed to the copse. Arek saw movement in the trees. He stiffened. The Serpentian, Naali was there, slithering nearer and nearer to Tenn and Mia. And she had her laser drawn.
Either Tenn's appearance was a trap set by him and Naali, or Naali suspected Tenn and Mia of colluding against her. In any case, she looked ready to shoot someone. And furious as he was at Mia, Arek sure as hells wasn't going to sit by and let her be harmed—not in any way.
Someone else dropped into position on T'Van's far side. L'Nola, with a long-sight laser in her grasp. "Want me to take out the Serp?" she breathed, already sighting in with her weapon.
"Fry her weapon if you can," Arek decided.
The blonde curled her lip in disgust. "If I can?"
She fired, and below them the Serpentian woman gave a hissing cry of pain and staggered back, clutching her empty weapon hand.
Tenn ducked, then grabbed Mia and hauled her in front of him, facing up the hill. "Don't shoot!" he yelled, holding Mia as she struggled, her eyes wide with shock.
"Tenn, what the hells are you doing?" Mia demanded.
"Staying alive," the man said. "Now stop fighting me. I don't want to hurt you, but I will if I have to."
"I got a good headshot," L'Nola told Arek. "Want me to take him out?"
Then Tenn screamed, and Arek smiled crookedly as the man staggered back, letting go of Mia to clutch at his hands.
"What've you done?" he wailed, holding up his hands, now oozing blood.
"No need to shoot," Arek said. "My partner's got this one." He vaulted to his feet and headed down the hill.
"What did I do?" Mia was yelling at Tenn. "You're the one who tried to-to... I don't even know. But you and your disgusting partner were up to something, that much is clear! And ugh—now I have your blood all over me."
As Arek reached her, she was wiping her hands on the short grasses that filled in under the taller clumps.
Tenn was whining and carrying on, cradling his wounded hands as his partner ran from the copse to his side. "Don't go near the feline," Tenn told Naali. "She's some kind of shifter freak. She clawed me."
"She's a Tygress, you spineless idiot," Arek told him. Then he pulled back his arm and punched the man square in the nose, feeling cartilage crunch under his knuckles.
Tenn fell backwards, pulling Naali with him. They landed on the ground in a tangle, Naali hissing in fear and fury.
"Can I shoot them now?" L'Nola called from the hilltop.
"Sorry, not today," Arek said. "But you can put them in restraints and put them back on their ship. Their Race handlers can come and pick them up—or not. I really don't care what happens to them, as long as they're out of our way."
"I don't understand any of this," Mia said, hands on her hips. "Why did one of you shoot Naali, and what are she and Tenn even doing here?"
Arek moved to her side. "Team Daybreak has been camped on the other side of these trees. When you walked down here, Tenn saw you and came to chat. Naali didn't like that, probably because she knew her partner wants to do a lot more than talk with you, and came to get rid of her competition, both Race and romantic."
"Romantic?" Mia repeated, looking repulsed.
"It was his idea," Naali said, shoving Tenn away. "He said if we captured her, you'd come looking for her, and we could get rid of both of you. But he was too stupid to notice your friends camped right over the hill."
"Hey!" Tenn protested, sitting up. "The trees hid them, and their noise. Or maybe it's this fucking planet, I don't know. Go ahead and call the Race handlers. I just want to go home."
"Don't think you're gonna be going home, boyo," T'Van said, jogging down the hill. He was followed by two more of the Aurelian warriors, one carrying soft restraints. "More like Deep Six."
Tenn sneered. "I don't think so. My mother is an executive at Octiron. Their lawyers will keep me out of trouble."
"Damn," T'Van said. "Maybe I should let L'Nola shoot you."
Mia put her hand on Arek's arm, and he looked down at her. "Your friends won't really shoot them, will they?" she asked.
"No," he said. "We don't need any blood on our hands. Are you worried about Tenn?"
"No! I just don't want your friends to get in trouble."
Turning her back on him, she stalked over to Tenn. She set her hands on her hips and looked down at him in disgust. "I may be a 'shifter freak', but I'd rather be that than a spineless Pangaean garden worm like you. So consider yourself lucky I only clawed your hands, not your balls!"
She turned on Naali, who regarded her warily. "And as for you, if you're stupid enough to do his dirty work for him, you deserve whatever happens to you."
With a toss of her long hair, she strode away, up the hill, leaving the warriors grinning behind her.
"Hear, hear," L'Nola murmured. As Arek passed her, she tipped her head toward Mia and nodded her approval.
Arek grinned wryly, then followed his Tygress. One thing about this quarking Race—there was never a dull moment.
Mia stopped in the middle of the Aurelian compound. Looking around her, she realized she had no idea what to do next, or where to go.
She clenched her fists, a scream of pure frustration building in her throat.
"Mia." This time, the deep voice was the one she most wanted to hear—but only if he had a very big apology on his lips.
"Yes?" she asked, not looking at Arek.
A big hand settled in the small of her back. "Walk with me," Arek said.
And somehow, she found herself doing so, around the pods to the hill where they could look out over the sea. The place where he'd stood earlier, and made fun of her with his friend.
"I do not appreciate," she said, staring out over the sea, "Being referred to as sly, sneaky, or hot-tempered."
There was a short silence.
"Well," he drawled. "You are pretty hot-tempered, kitten. Even you have to admit that."
She whirled, glaring up at him. "I am not—" she began.
She blinked. He was smiling at her, with a light in his eyes that was almost—if her eyes did not deceiver her—almost tender?
Mia took a step back, and let out a mrowwl of distress as her heel met only air.
But swiftly as any Tyger, Arek's arms lashed out and caught her. Held her, and pulled her to him, not stopping until she was held securely in the circle of his strong arms, away from the edge of the hilltop. Right where she wanted to be.
"So maybe I'm a little hot-tempered," she mumbled into his chest. "But the other things—those are not true."
"I know that now," he said. "And I finally figured out—slowly, I know—that Octiron played us today. The Egg showed me your first interview, in which you referred to me and my people as cold, heartless killers. So, I must assume they also played my first interview for you?"
She nodded, and finally found the courage to tip her head back and look up at him. "I'm also sorry. Very sorry that I said those things about Aurelians. I realize now they're not true."
He smiled, his gaze warm and crystal-bright. "Thank you, kitten. And if I'm not mistaken, you figured out more quickly than I what the Egg was up to, didn't you?"
"Yes. I tried to explain earlier."
"And I froze you out. Something you should know about us Aurelians. We're not heartless, but we do have a great deal of pride. Some say too much pride."
"So do we Tygeans," she admitted. "And Octiron is trying to use that against us. They want to divide us."
"In-fighting, to make better holovision," he agreed. "And Team Daybreak played right into their hands, too." His arms tightened. "God, Mia, when I saw that Serp with her laser aimed at you..."
"I know," she said, her arms going around him. "I felt the same when all the mawwr bots leapt on you."
He grimaced. "Don't remind me, please. I nearly lost you twice today.'
Sweetness unfurled inside her, and she parted her lips invitingly. "I'm here now. You found me, what are you going to do with me?"
His eyes crinkled at the corners as he bent to her. "I seem to recall you had some ideas yourself, of what to do with me."
"Mm-hmm. But not here. Your friends will no doubt show up at the worst possible moment."
"Agreed. So how about if we head back to the cruiser, and you can have your way with me."
"And you can have yours with me... again."
"Oh, yes. That, you can count on."