Born of Shadows (14 page)

“Excuse me.” She tried to pass the stranger.

The person stepped in front of her, intentionally blocking her way.

A sudden flash of silver caught her attention as a blade came out from under the cloak’s folds to dart toward her throat. Her training kicked in. She caught the attack and head butted her assailant. Another knife came up in the other hand, slashing for her arm.

Desideria dodged and went low to sweep at the legs. But the moment she did, someone came up behind her and caught a garrote around her neck. Gasping, she was jerked back, off her feet, and dragged down the hallway toward her room. She tried to call for help, but the tightness around her throat kept her from making anything more than a hoarse croak.

“We need her dead. Remember, it has to look like she committed suicide in shame.”

Her vision dimmed as she kicked her feet, fighting for her freedom and her life. She would not die. Not like this. Not at the hands of a coward who attacked from behind. Desperately, she clutched at the hands holding on to the garrote, but she couldn’t get a good grip on them. Rage scorched her. She couldn’t stand someone getting the better of her. The fact that they were going to kill her if she didn’t win made it all the worse.

Her vision dimmed.

She was losing this fight…

Suddenly her attacker went flying into the wall beside her. The cord dropped from her throat, allowing her to breathe again. The sudden rush of unencumbered air into her lungs left her light-headed and faint. She wheezed and coughed, trying to get her bearings as she turned over on the floor. But all she saw was a dark blur as it attacked her assailants and threw them every which way.

It wasn’t until he caught the first attacker and rebounded the masked figure into the wall that she realized it was Caillen who’d saved her.

And just as she suspected, he fought like a seasoned soldier, not an aristos.

She’d barely pushed herself to her feet when she saw Pleba and Tyree rushing down the hallway to assist them. Now her attackers would pay and her mother would know she wasn’t stupid for trying to protect her.

But her relief was cut short as they went for Caillen and not her attackers.

Holy gods…

They were in on the plot!

Caillen saw the assassin’s eyes narrow past his shoulder. Since the Qill Guard was in front of him, he knew it meant reinforcements were coming at his back. He turned just in time to catch the first one and launch her into the assassin.

The second one lifted a blaster. He dodged the blast an instant before it would have exploded his head.

The one he’d thrown picked up her link and shouted into it for security. “Help! We’re being attacked by the Exeterian prince! He’s mad. He’s trying to assassinate our princess. We need immediate assistance.” She leveled her own blaster at him as she muted the link. “Give my regards to the gods.”

He gaped, then dodged her blast as he realized they were setting him up to die. “You harita!” he snarled at the cute Guard he’d thought he was saving when he entered the fray. How could he have been so stupid as to think a Qill would be hurt?

Idiot!

Not only had he embarrassed his father—again—he was about to be charged with a crime he hadn’t committed. And all because of
her
.

Nice revenge from their bitch queen.

Desideria was baffled by his insult and the look of hatred blazing in his eyes as he glared at her. But her confusion died as she saw Pleba set her weapon for kill and open fire on them. She had to do something or they were both dead.

Reacting on instinct, she launched herself at Caillen and knocked him into the wall, out of the line of fire. The moment she did, the wall shimmered and opened, dumping them into an escape pod.

Thank the gods for small favors. She hadn’t realized a portal was there.

Now she had to seal it before Pleba and the others shot through it. Unable to read the panels which were in a language she didn’t know, she made a guess as to which button would shut the door and notify security. Red most likely would launch them, so she hit an orange button in the center of the console. The door shot down, protecting them from the others.

Relieved she let out an elongated breath and sat back to wait for security.

Until she realized the engines were firing and the pod was launching while they were trapped inside it.

Crap…

10

His head throbbing from being slammed into a hard steel wall by a wom/fo wanted to throttle, Caillen cursed as he regained his equilibrium and realized what was happening.

They were launching away from the
Arimanda
.

Mobilizing, he climbed over his female annoyance who appeared frozen in horror by her actions, but by the time he reached the console, it was too late.

They were adrift and the ship was leaving them in its wake.
Son of a…

Would the misery of this day never end? He sat down in the black leather chair next to hers and shook his head as deep aggravation filled him.

There was nothing he could do to stop this. Nothing. He let out a slow, agitated breath and cursed his crappy luck that had betrayed him yet again. Of all the flipping shit…

“Can’t we catch up to the ship?”

Oh yeah, there was an award-winning question of the day and it set his temper boiling.

He gave her a withering glare. Not even the vulnerable look on her face that made her extremely attractive could cut through his need to want to launch her out an air lock head first. Still, he forced himself to keep his tone even and his sarcasm at an acceptable level that wouldn’t quite motivate her to murder—no need in both of them being pissed in tight quarters. “We have one small thruster that’s only strong enough to safely land us on a planet.”

Caillen pointed out the window to the ship that was quickly becoming a silver dot in the darkness. “In case you haven’t noticed, they’re moving a lot faster. I don’t know about the laws of physics on your planet, but where I come from an object moving at subclass speed can’t catch up to one running at starclass. But if you know something about turbines, thrusters and engines, quantum or classical physics that I’ve somehow missed, then please enlighten me.” Yeah, okay, so he’d never been the best at corralling his sarcasm.

At least he’d tried. That counted for something, right?

She curled her lip. “You don’t have to be an asshole.”

Now the gloves were off. “Oh, baby, this ain’t asshole. Trust me. There’s a hole keg of asshole I haven’t even begun to tap yet.”

The expression on her face was so scalding he felt the burn of her anger even from his seat. Another time and place, they’d be getting naked.

But this wasn’t the place and it definitely wasn’t the time. All he wanted right now was to finish what her fake attacker had started. Choke her until her eyes bulged out. “Don’t even give me that look. Not after what
you
were planning.”

She scowled at him as if she were baffled by his words. It’d be a nice expression if it were real. “What? Protecting my mother?”

What the hell was she talking about? She hadn’t appeared to be protecting anyone while she’d lain on the floor being strangled. “Yeah, no. That whole act of setting me up for your queen so that she could get her vengeance on me for calling her crap crap. Nice move. But I’m not
that
stupid.” At least not today. And definitely not for her.

“Are you on something?”

She was good. He could almost believe that innocence she was trying to sell. But he’d been around actresses and grifters before who were much more convincing.

“Like you don’t know what I’m talking about.”

She shook her head. “I have no clue and you’re wasting my time.” She pointed toward the sector where the
Arimanda
had vanished. “We have to get back to the ship before the assassins go after my mother. It’s imperative.”

He paused in confusion. Was her mother one of the Guards or someone else? “What are
you
talking about?”

Desideria had never been more frustrated in her life. The man was insane. Did he have some kind of mental problem that he couldn’t recall what had happened right before they fell into the pod? How hard had the imbecile struck his head?

“Hello? Remember the fight you broke in on? Me on the floor being choked? The bad guys who attacked you…”

“I didn’t break into a fight. You were setting me up by allowing them to choke you.”

He really was mentally defective. Did he honestly think she’d allow herself to be choked like that? On purpose? What kind of people did he run with that such an idea would even enter his mind? She pointed to the nasty burn on her throat she was sure was bruised if not bleeding. “Does this
really
look like I was pretending?”

Caillen paused as he focused on the purple welts that belied his accusation. Actually it did look painful and authentic. Not to mention the fact that it would probably scar and most women he knew resisted permanent disfiguration.

Still, there were people who’d maimed themselves before for a lot less reason and Qills weren’t normal in any sense of that word. For her queen’s pleasure, she just might be insane enough to ruin her neck, scar her face or even eat small babies for breakfast. “You were serving your country well. I’m sure they’ll decorate you for it.” That was, after all, what her people lived for.

She screwed her face up in disgust. “What do you think was happening when you barged in?”

Barged in? Yeah, she was a piece of work. In his neighborhood it was called helping someone. Which just proved what he knew, she wasn’t really in any danger.

“I don’t think. I know. I heard your boss lady call security and say that I was trying to kill your princess. That is a cold, hard fact.”

“And which of the women in that hallway do you think the princess was?”

Caillen went over the people who’d been there. Two robed figures whose gender was unknown and the three Guards. A princess wouldn’t have Guard duty so it left the other two he’d been fighting. “ssume one of the people in the robes or no one at all. The bitch just lied.”

She rolled her eyes. “You understand quantum physics and you can’t rationalize this?
I
am the princess, nescient.”

Yeah, right. Sure she was. That didn’t even make the least bit of sense. He’d seen the way the others had looked at her and treated her—like dirt. If she was the daughter of their sadistic queen, they wouldn’t have dared such. Not to mention one small other thing… “I wasn’t trying to kill
you
.” Though he might if she didn’t bring that attitude down a notch.

She gave him a duh stare.

And that made him feel like a total fool as he got what she was trying to tell him. “
You’re
the princess.”

She nodded.

“They were trying to kill
you
and frame me for it… you fice.” He wasn’t about to let her insult slide without adding one of his own.

By the light in her eyes, he could tell she’d like to beat him into little bloody nuggets. “All right, stop with the high-end insults.”

“You started it.”

She raked him with a repugnant sneer. “What are we? Four? Please cease before you call me a doodie head. I really don’t think in my current mood that I could survive such a juvenile attack.
That
might actually undo me.” Curling her lip, she flicked her nails at him—an obscene Qill gesture. “You need to respect the fact that at the moment it’s taking every ounce of willpower I have to not hurt you.”

He laughed at her threat. While she was muscular, she was tiny in comparison to his size. So long as he kept his cock guarded, there wasn’t much she could do to hurt him. “Baby, I’d like to see you try. Believe me, I’ve had men and women who eat your lunch try to kill me and here I am. Still standing. Still kicking ass.”

She scoffed. “Explain to me how is it possible that the three of us actually fit into this pod?”

Now he was the one who was baffled. Did they do math differently on her planet too? “Three of us?”

“You, me and your extremely overdeveloped ego.”