Chapter One
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Early the next morning
Cam came awake the moment his communicator buzzed on the nightstand. The first thing he felt was a warm body snuggled against his side. The first thing he saw when he opened his eyes was a thick strand of blue-streaked hair curled invitingly over his bare chest. He inhaled deeply and a newly familiar perfume filled his lungs.
Ria, the luscious karaoke singer. Memories of the night before filtered into his brain one by one, bringing with them a relaxed, satisfied attitude. After she finished her song, the crowd gave her a standing ovation and quickly requested she sing another.
Her cheeks colored prettily. She seemed surprised by the audience’s vocal approval, but she complied with a soulful, angst-filled rendition of Heart’s Alone. Again, she sang for Cam. Again, it felt like they were the only two in the room. He liked it.
As the last notes faded and the audience clapped and hollered their approval, she came straight to Cam’s table and sat next to him on the sofa. She mashed her leg up against his from knee to hip as if they were already involved and couldn’t keep from sucking together like magnets when they got close. He liked that, too. A lot.
Her gaze never strayed far from his face the entire time they spoke. He couldn’t quite remember the details of what they’d discussed, but she eagerly accepted his invitation to spend the coming weekend with him. Her lovely hazel eyes lit up the moment he suggested a more intimate setting for a further discussion.
Cam’s communicator sounded stridently once more, rattling across the surface of his nightstand and bringing him back to the present. He recognized the caller on the number display, picked it up and answered, “What?” He tried not to sound as grumpy as he felt over the interruption.
“Cam!” Axel, his typically happy-go-lucky brother, sounded uncharacteristically uptight and worried. “Thank heavens you answered! You’ve got to come here right now!”
“Come where?” He glanced at the clock on his nightstand, grimaced when he realized he’d only been asleep for about two hours. It was not enough rest, according to the ache growing inside his head, no matter how pleasant the reason for his lack of sleep.
“To the passenger lounge,” Axel said impatiently, as though he expected Cam to read his mind. That wasn’t going to happen, especially not on so little sleep.
“Why?” Cam began to mentally drift as he waited for an answer.
“There is someone missing. Someone important.”
Cam’s eyes opened and his brain did, too. “Missing from Alienn?”
“No! Why would I care about that? A passenger is missing from the Royal Caldera Forte cruise liner! They are set to depart in less than two hours, but they obviously can’t leave until the missing passenger is found.”
Cam glanced at Ria, head resting on his shoulder. She seemed sound asleep. He didn’t typically discuss below stairs issues when he was entertaining, but found he didn’t want to move to a more private location. Her warmth felt too good curled against his side.
“I thought they were leaving after the weekend. Was there a schedule change?”
“Yes. There was a significant volcano blast on an uninhabited planet along the route. Didn’t you get that memo?” Axel didn’t give Cam time to answer. “They’ll lose a day each way going around it. The eight days out just became ten days because they are losing the weekend here. And now with this missing passenger, this has become a veritable space potato storm about to hit an industrial-sized fan. Are you on your way yet?”
Ria stirred. Sliding her palm tantalizingly across his chest, she hooked a hand around his other shoulder and hugged him even closer. He looked into her sleeping face. She sighed, smiled and sent his attention blasting into several incredible memories from the night before. He gently grabbed a fistful of her rich, soft hair and kissed her forehead. He wished he could go back to sleep snuggled up against Ria. Or maybe wake her up…
Axel shouted, “Cam! Are you still there?”
He sighed. “Yes. Still here.” But I’d rather be re-living my memories and creating new ones.
“Are you on your way?” Axel asked again. “Please come and help me. I’m in the passenger lounge with… Director Patmore.”
Cam stifled a groan. Since Axel whispered the name, Cam guessed the man in charge of passengers on the Royal Caldera Forte must be within earshot. He really had no choice.
“Okay. Fine. I’ll be right there.” He disconnected and eased away from Ria. If it were anyone but Axel, he might have brushed them off and told them to figure it out. However, Axel didn’t often get so riled. He was the most easygoing of Cam’s five brothers.
Plus, Patmore was a real “pain in the patootie,” as his unconventional aunt Dixie often said about difficult people. Smiling to himself, he amended the mental phrase to, “Patmore is a pain in the patootie.” He attributed his goofy attitude to the woman snuggled up in his bed. For the first time in a long time, he had a happy start to his day. He dressed quickly, intending to rescue Axel, but not stay in the basement of the Big Bang Truck Stop any longer than he had to.
He leaned down and kissed Ria’s cheek. She opened one eye and saw him fully clothed. Dismay filled her features. The other eye opened drowsily. “Are you leaving me already?” she asked in a husky, totally sexy, voice.
“Only for a little while. I have to take care of something at work, but I’ll be back as fast as I can. Okay?”
She pushed out a sigh, snuggled her face into his pillow and said, “Okay. I’ll just wait here, then.”
Ria was asleep by the time he whispered, “Good, because I’m not nearly finished with you yet.” He kissed her temple, breathing in her delectable scent once more. Biting back a groan of delight and the urge to climb back in bed, Cam exited his room, pausing in the doorway for one last look at the sexy woman. He hated to leave. Every fiber of his being wanted to ignore Axel and crawl back into bed, snuggle up and get more sleep.
He frowned. When had that ever happened before? Well, there was that one other time. He dismissed the bad memory and all the baggage that accompanied it. He truly was over his last disastrous relationship. He knew he was over it, because he desperately wanted to wake Ria up, kiss her senseless and repeat every moment of last night. It was a sensation resurrected from the time before he’d been hurt, and he liked that quite a lot. Maybe Ria and her blue-streaked hair and lust for life had cured him of his forlorn outlook on love with earthlings. He took a step toward the bed.
Cam remembered the extreme tone of Axel’s worry. He needed to go. If he didn’t leave now, he wouldn’t. Pushing out a resigned sigh, he turned on his heel and exited his home. He’d take care of this problem quickly and return to Ria. It was likely a passenger miscount. It had happened before.
Axel didn’t typically take care of the passenger manifests. As head of security, that was Cam’s job. He cut his brother some slack and quickened his pace. His house wasn’t far from the Big Bang Truck Stop and the underground facility that housed all of their secret alien technology and served as a way station for passing cruise ships and other spacecraft from Alpha-Prime.
Cam parked his SUV haphazardly in the employee lot and strode through the secret underground entrance, quickly making his way to the passenger lounge. His brother stood with the annoying director and a woman from the cruise liner’s elite First Class deck. He’d seen her the day before when the passengers disembarked upon their arrival. She looked at their simple way station like she wasn’t certain she wanted any of Earth’s air to taint her expensive clothing or her person.
Axel appeared to be more than relieved when he saw Cam. He raced to his side, talking a mile a minute. “Good to see you, Bro. What took you so long?”
Cam opened his mouth, but Axel interrupted. “Never mind. Doesn’t matter. You’re here now.” He didn’t take a breath, just continued, “So I’ve done two tallies and Director Patmore did his own secondary count after his initial discovery of the discrepancy. All four of the totals say we are missing one person.
“The director’s count was obviously more detailed, so he actually came up with a name while you were on your way here. Turns out it’s a missing girl. The lady next to the director is the mother.”
Cam immediately felt sick he hadn’t rushed to get here. “Are you telling me a child is missing? Why didn’t you mention that before?”
“Because she’s not a child, she’s an adult. But she’s the daughter of a former Governor and her widowed mother is very distraught.”
Cam relaxed a notch. He was less concerned the person in question was the daughter of the Earth equivalent of a wealthy VIP, and more concerned she was actually missing. “Okay. What’s the name of the missing adult girl?”
Axel looked at a piece of gray paper in his hand. “Her name is Alexandria Latham Borne, which sounds like the name of a princess to me, but her mother is about to come right off the rails and the director is threatening all sorts of dire things if we don’t find her pronto and—”
“Right, I got it. Relax, Axel. Take a breath. She can’t be too far away. The cruise liner only docked yesterday afternoon.”
His brother inhaled deeply and let out a long exhalation. “Okay. Yes. Only yesterday. You’re right. What’s next? What should we do?”
Axel must be extremely rattled if he didn’t immediately grasp the most obvious next step. “Do they have a picture of her?”
His brother nodded. “The mother said she brought one, but I haven’t seen it yet. She was waiting for the ‘actual’ man in charge of security, not the fill-in guy.” He rolled his eyes and Cam got a much clearer picture of the person he was about to deal with. He sighed internally and bore up to hate this coming conversation.
Cam and Axel joined the director and the Governor’s wife.
“Are you the one actually in charge of security here? Are you here to find my baby?” the woman demanded, managing in one short exchange to sound stricken and dress him down for not working twenty-four seven. “I’m so worried about her. We must find Alexandria. Her future fiancé, Douglass Barnard FitzOsbern—who is a Technician’s son, by the way—is beside himself with worry.” Given that Douglass Barnard FitzOsbern wasn’t in attendance, Cam wondered if that was the truth. Not that it mattered. An Alpha-Prime Technician was at the top of the social tier, definitely wealthy, and deference was always accorded to such VIPs and their associates.
Director Patmore broke in to make the formal introductions. “This is Governess Ruth Latham Borne, wife of the late former Governor Robert Borne.
“Governess Latham Borne, this is Cam Grey, the primary security officer for this Alpha colony way station facility.”
Cam was typically good at reading people. He couldn’t read the minds of Alphas like he could humans, but he had a better-than-average feeling for what motivated people. This situation was no different. He took one look at the mother of the missing girl and had her figured out before she spoke another word.
Ruth Latham Borne was obviously upset. And while she said one thing, she was worried about something else entirely. He needed to figure out what, but suspected he understood exactly what was going on here.
She was a Governor’s widow, part of the upper middle class, while her daughter’s fiancé was a part of the elite Archetech class.
A Technician was as good as lower-end royalty, after Planner and Designer, but royalty nonetheless. Cam had the rest of the story figured out in about two seconds.
The Governor’s daughter didn’t want to marry the Technician’s son—surely a lucrative arranged marriage, from her mother’s point of view—and she’d run off in protest or to escape a less-than-appealing fiancé. This wasn’t the first time an arranged marriage had been thwarted, but the event was rare.
The old traditions—popular or not—held firm sway with many folks, and he guessed Governess Latham Borne was no different.
Cam didn’t blame her, nor did he plan to lose any sleep or any more personal time dealing with what he considered manufactured drama. Alas, protocol dictated he couldn’t say what was really on his mind. Instead he took a more disciplined attitude. “Everything that can be done will be done to find your daughter, Governess Latham Borne. Do you know why she might have run off?”
“What makes you think she ran off?” The woman’s acidic tone came very fast on the heels of her I’m a heart-wrenched, worried mother attitude of a few moments ago.
The director’s eyebrows went straight to his hairline. “Madam, did you have knowledge that your daughter might have disappeared on purpose?”
“Of course I have no such knowledge,” she said unconvincingly, sniffing deeply several times as if she’d just developed an allergy to telling lies. “That’s preposterous.”
“Oh? Really? Does your daughter suffer from an arranged marriage, by any chance?” Cam asked bluntly.
Governess Latham Borne drew herself up to her full height and said imperiously, “Be that as it may, she needs to be found. Immediately. What are you going to do about this situation, Security Man?” Her tone implied she substituted the word “servant” for “security” in her head.
Cam wanted to answer, “Big fat nothing!” but he cleared his throat, ignored her intended slur and said, “Do you have a picture of your daughter?”
She pulled a paper thin, transparent, postcard-sized Alpha-Prime photo generator from the pocket of her expensive caftan, swiped the bottom edge a few times to find the right image and handed it to him. Cam glanced at the upside-down picture and noted a dark-haired figure dressed in equally expensive clothing, but didn’t study it. He simply placed his communicator over the surface, pushed a button and drew his device across it, transferring the image.
He handed the device back to Governess Latham Borne and gave his communicator to Axel.
“Make a copy for yourself and then distribute it wide to our search personnel.”
“Wait!” Governess Latham Borne put her hand to her chest, adding dramatically, “You can’t do that.”
“Why not?” Axel asked.
“I will not allow my daughter’s photo to be circulated like she is some gulag-bound criminal. No. Absolutely not! That course of action is completely out of the question. I do not give my permission to have her picture circulated.” Governess Latham Borne said the word like she had to hold her nose to utter the stench-worthy verb.
Cam narrowed his gaze. “What do you expect me to do? Carry her picture around to every home in the state of Arkansas and look for her all by myself?”
Her half-shrug suggested that was exactly what she expected. “That’s your job, isn’t it, Security Man?” Her disdain again came through clearly in her tone. Cam had news for her. He was no one’s servant.
The director stepped between them and tried a more reasonable tone. “I’m sorry, madam, but wide circulation is the typical protocol in a missing person case. Several people looking for your daughter all at once will yield results faster than only one operator out and about searching.”
“She’s not a missing person. She’s my daughter who is more simply lost on a peculiar, uncouth planet. There’s no telling what might have happened to her with bands of humans rambling around causing trouble. Listen to me closely, as I will not repeat myself. I want her found without some backward colony security lowlife ruining her pristine reputation. Can I assume that I am understood in this matter or do we need to contact Alpha-Prime’s Technician League for guidance?”
The Technician League was powerful, but wouldn’t give a rip about a missing Governor’s daughter on a far-off planet. Even so, Cam decided silence was the best response.
He turned away from the woman’s imperious stare and sent Axel a look that said, “Sheesh. Rich people.” The corners of Axel’s lips turned up slightly.
The director, as disagreeable as he typically was, gave Cam a distinctly uncomfortable look of remorse. He pulled both Axel and Cam to the side, out of earshot of his imperious guest. “Please don’t mistake her…well, obvious concern and angst about her daughter for anger. You see, Governess Latham Borne doesn’t understand our established search procedures and—”
“Don’t worry, Director. I get it,” Cam said, forcing calm into his tone. She was rich. She was used to having every wish she expressed carried out instantly and without question and every demand she uttered satisfied immediately, if not sooner. “She’s upset about her missing daughter and the circumstances of her disappearance. I won’t take offense.”
The director nodded, taking the gracious out Cam offered. Cam understood completely, that the woman had no regard for anyone’s feelings or workload, but he didn’t plan to give in to her foolish demands.
“We’ll search a few places first-time visitors to Earth have been known to frequent and linger at, then report back in an hour or so. If she returns to the ship on her own in the next sixty minutes, please notify Axel immediately. He’s taking point on this matter.” Axel’s eyes widened in an expression that said, “Who? Me?”
“Yes. Of course. Thank you,” the director said.
Cam was about to say, “Don’t thank me. Axel is the only one who will be searching. I’m going home to someone delicious,” when he brought up the picture of Alexandria Latham Borne on his communication device. He studied the wealthy girl’s general physique, noting she was every inch the rich, expensively groomed Governor’s daughter. Wearing what had to be an expensive cranberry-colored designer outfit from Alpha-Prime, the young woman in the photo seemed to say, “I’m privileged and I know it.”
His gaze slid to her face, expecting to see a haughty, superior expression. Instead, he saw very familiar rebellious hazel eyes and a mischievous smile.
Cam’s heart stuttered then flipped over in his chest. He brought the photo nearer, as if closer examination would change it. It didn’t. It was her.
There were no blue streaks in her hair, but it was definitely the sexy woman sleeping in his warm bed, waiting for his return.
“I bet you’ll find her first,” Axel said.
Normally, Cam would have said, “I’ll take that bet.”
But not today.