Where There is Hope [Taos Wolven Mates 2] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) (2 page)

“Hello, Colonel, are you in accord with your life-mate?”

“I am.” Joran looked as though his answer left a particularly bad taste in his mouth. It seemed no one liked to ask Carella for help.

“And it does not matter where you must go to find your female?”

“No, it does not,” they both answered together.

“Computing…computing…comp—” There was a long pause then Carella said, “I have found the woman best suited to you and your partner.” There was another pause. “The only woman suited to you both is far, far away.”

“I don’t give a damn,” Braxton practically snarled. “Send us there and give us a way to find her.”

“According to my database, you will find her within two-hundred paces from where I intend to drop you. You will have thirty minutes at most to secure her for the return trip or I will bring you back without her. You cannot stay in her world.”

Braxton frowned. “Why only thirty minutes, Carella?”

“There is only one thirty-minute window of opportunity. If you cannot secure her, you will have to wait until I can find you another window and that can be a very, very long time. I can’t see how long before we will have another opportunity until this window passes.”

“Why can’t we just stay there with her?”

“Because, General, they have a very advanced civilization and you do not have credentials there.” Carella sounded almost impatient. “I will begin transport in one hour. Please take the time to avail yourself of the facilities. You won’t want to meet your mate in your present condition. I have taken the liberty of setting out clean clothing in the bathing chambers in your suite.”

“She had a very matter-of-fact way of telling us we stink.” Joran shook his head as he paced beside him then laughed. “She thinks of everything.”

“Of course she does. It’s her job. She’s a computer.”

“But she’s sentient. Have you ever wondered if she would rather do something else like…oh, I don’t know, research?”

“Like us, she chose where she wanted to be. For some reason, she allowed her consciousness to be removed from her old ship into this new behemoth of a warship.”

“Apparently, the chancellor fears that the elitists will attack. He wanted a warship here to protect Earth and its inhabitants from annihilation. Even uninhabited, this ship is a force to be reckoned with. After all, Carella never leaves and she is a crew all on her own.”

After their showers, they had a meal while they waited. The ship’s menu had a plethora of choices, and most of them were hot.

“I can’t get over how good this tastes, just because it’s cooked.” Joran took a bite of his fried chicken and closed his eyes. “I might have an orgasm right here.”

Braxton laughed. “Now I
know
we need a woman if a plate full of fried chicken and mashed potatoes can make you come.”

“I just thought we would have found our mate by now.” Joran shrugged. “I know we would have waited much longer on Taos, and even then the female may not have been a complete match and we would never have had children.” He took another bite of his chicken and closed his eyes with a moan. “But with all the women here on this world, I didn’t think it would take so long to find her.”

“Two years is not a long time in the grand scheme of things.”

“No, it’s not,” Joran said, shaking his fork at him, “but I still thought we’d be mated and happily celebrating the arrival of our first cub by now.”

“Me, too,” Braxton said on a sigh. “Me, too.”

“General?”

“Yes, Carella?” Braxton pushed his plate away and stood.

“I’m ready if you are.”

“We’re ready.”

“Good. The clothing looks good on you, by the way.”

“Thank you.” He looked down at the jeans and boots he wore. The workmanship was of a much higher quality than the canvas pants they bought from that miner out west. The plaid shirt was as well. The tightly woven fabric was thin and light. “I would love a wardrobe full of this type of thing when we return. Do you think it would raise eyebrows?”

“I’m certain it would, General, but you could tell them it’s foreign and name an exorbitant price you know the humans would never pay.”

Braxton grinned at the idea. Sometimes Carella had some good ideas, even if most of the crew found her annoying.

“Ready, General?”

“Yes. We’re as ready as we’ll ever be.”

“Stand up and brace yourselves. This could be a difficult transition.”

Hopeful made her way home from the bus stop. Her feet and back hurt from walking most of the day. She’d broken a heel and her stockings had a hole in them. Things couldn’t possibly get worse.

She strode by an electronics store window and stared at her reflection. Was that really her with her hair standing up in all directions, her shirt half untucked, and listing to one side because of her one broken heel?

Squinting her eyes, she took a better look and her shoulders sagged. Yep. That was her all right. No wonder none of the potential employers she visited had wanted to give her the time of day.

Tears burned her eyes and the back of her throat as she stood and stared at herself, speechless. No wonder her husband left her for a younger woman. How long had she looked so bad? Was it just because she’d been out in the unforgiving heat all day or was it because she really was over the hill like her ex-husband had said?

It wasn’t fair! Why did men dump their wives for younger women as they got older? Why was it okay for a man to get old, while a woman couldn’t just age gracefully? For some reason, a woman never aged gracefully. Someone always tagged them with the over-the-hill label.

Turning away from the window, her eyes filled with unshed tears, Hopeful Ackerman headed home. She was well on her way to rock bottom and there was nowhere else to go but farther down.

It had just started to rain when she rounded the corner of her street. What else could go wrong? Staring down at the sidewalk in front of her to keep the raindrops out of her eyes, she started to run…or tried to, anyway. It was difficult with her broken heel. Preoccupied, tears blurred her vision as she ran and she didn’t see the long, jean-clad legs and cowboy boots until she plowed right into the man they belonged to.

Looking up and up and up, Hope swallowed thickly. Before her stood the most handsome man she had ever seen. In his late twenties to early thirties, he wore his blond hair cut to what appeared to be a military cut, though not a high and tight like her brother had worn before he lost his life in Iraq.

Moss-green eyes stared down at her as though he thought he was dreaming, or maybe having a nightmare, considering how she looked. Large hands gently held her shoulders, thumbs stroking almost absently over her collarbone as he stared down into her eyes.

At that moment, everything else seemed to fall away. It didn’t matter that she stood on the sidewalk still a quarter of a mile from her apartment with the cold rain pouring down over her. It didn’t matter that the water drenched her hair, plastering it to her head until she was certain she must look like a drowned rat.

All that mattered in that moment was that she felt caught in a snare. The heat from his gaze warmed her in the cold downpour. Her panties grew damp with more than rainwater as she nervously licked her lips.

Hope couldn’t look away. She tried, but something about the man held her immobilized. It could have been the way his hands tightened on her shoulders, holding her in place. It also could have been the way he started to draw her near him before he seemed to come to his senses and let her go.

“Excuse me, Miss…”

Hope knew he was fishing, but she didn’t give a damn. It had been a long time since a man flirted with her and even longer since one as handsome as this one even looked her way with anything even resembling interest.

“Hope,” she said, unsure as to why she was standing here in the rain telling him anything about herself in the first place. She should have pulled from his grip and run for her apartment before she did something stupid, like jump his bones, but she couldn’t for some reason. It must have been the shock of seeing another incredibly handsome man standing just behind him. Hope had always been a sucker for tall men with dark hair and blue eyes. Backing away, she almost cried when he backed up too, but she was nothing if not a realist. What would a man like
him
want from her anyway?

“Does Hope have a last name that’s as beautiful as her first?”

Holy cow! Not only was the devil tall, dark, and handsome, but he was a charmer to boot. Hope shook her head. “Not hardly. Ackerman is my ex-husband’s name. I haven’t gotten around to changing it back to my maiden name.” In truth, she wasn’t sure she wanted to go through the hassle.

It didn’t seem possible, but the two men seemed to get better looking when they smiled. Hope swallowed thickly. Why did those smiles look more predatory than humorous?

“Ex-husband?” The blond’s smile got bigger as he held out his hand. “I’m Braxton and this is my best friend, Joran. It’s good to meet a friendly face.”

She wasn’t sure why, but his smile reminded her of Little Red Riding Hood. Maybe it was his strangely pronounced incisors and inordinately large smile.
Oh, what a big smile you have, Braxton.

“It’s nice to meet you two as well. Are you new in the neighborhood?”

They shook their heads, their faces still split with their strange, wolfish grins. After a moment, they glanced at each other, their expressions becoming intense, and they moved to flank her. “No, beautiful Hope. We came here for you.”

Fearing that they had something nefarious in mind, Hope jerked free and tried to run to her apartment building. She heard an odd humming sound come from behind her just before everything went black.

Joran stared down at their beautiful mate. “She’s going to hate us, you know.” Though he knew they had no choice, he had hoped to stem her fears, but how did one do that with a woman they had just met? Nothing could have convinced her to trust them this early in their relationship.

“She started to run. We had no choice.”

Deep down, Joran knew Brax was right. She’d been running from them because she thought they were going to hurt her. Hell, harming her was the farthest thing from their minds. They wanted nothing more than to care for her, love her and make her theirs in every way.

Taking a deep breath, he drew in her scent. Already he loved the way she smelled. The mixture of perfumed soap and the delicate scent of her arousal made his cock throb with the need to sink into her moist heat. Just scenting her as they made themselves known was enough to tell them she was the one they were here for. Her sweet scent called to them. It was an enticing aroma he found he couldn’t ignore.

He took another deep breath. His wolf snarled to get free. It wanted to bury its snout deep into her aromatic pussy and drink the sweet cream he could smell drenching her hot slit.

“I hope Carella can bring us back from here.” He looked around at their surroundings. “They seem more advanced, but they are still not advanced enough to travel far into space.”

“Or to protect themselves from attack.”

That much was easy to tell. They had automobiles and airplanes, but by the looks of it, they were still far from having any type of flying automobiles or ion cannons.

He looked toward the sky and wondered if Carella was still out there in the cold black of space protecting this world from an alien attack. It was only a matter of time before the enemies of all humanity found them and tried to annihilate them.

Holding her close, Joran leaned down and scooped her up in his arms. He looked down at her closed eyes, wanting to kiss each dark-red crescent. He’d never seen a woman with such fiery red hair and dark-blue eyes that rivaled the beauty of the sky during the midnight sun in the Alaskan Territory.

Checking his timepiece, Braxton led the way to an empty alley. They hid behind a large bin full of trash. The smell left a lot to be desired, but at least they were out of sight of prying eyes. “We have approximately five minutes before Carella retrieves us.”

“Then I will hold her until Carella transports us back.” He glanced around. “Let me know when to shift for transport.”

The form they must transport in was much hated by their people. It was their weakest form, leaving them open to attack as they awaited the beaming technology to move them from one place to another.

Half wolf, half man, they looked like the monsters of human legend, only they were weaker than when in their human form and definitely not as strong as when they were in their wolf form.

He could only imagine Hopeful Ackerman’s terror had they appeared to her looking like the monsters in her legends. Luckily, Carella had dropped them down two hundred feet away as she’d promised. She couldn’t have known that Hope would stop and stare at herself in the store window for several minutes before continuing to her apartment.

It was a good thing she had. If she had headed straight home, she would have passed this alley and seen them as they shifted back into their human forms and straightened the clothing that had gone askew during transportation.