WarDog: Book Twelve in the Galaxy Gladiators Alien Abduction Romance Series by Alana Khan (large screen ebook reader txt) 📗

“You’re barely proficient at it, Willa. And you're so small. And soft. And I don’t want you hurt.”

How can I not be falling for this guy? Look at his face, his golden eyes swirling with passion. He may sound controlling, but it’s obvious he just wants to protect me. What female wouldn’t want that?

“It’s decided,” I say as I place a soft hand on his thigh. “I’ll be here with you. It’s just a recon mission.”

I think he has an ulterior motive. I believe he’s hoping to not just find Daneur Khour, but to kill him.

“Shadow, promise me someone will be at the comms station every moment. If we need help—”

“You don’t need to ask, brother,” Shadow interrupts him. “We have your back. The captains want the ships cleaned down to the seams in the metal while we’re waiting for your call. Trust me, we’ll be doing nothing more important than tuning into the comm frequency, ready to drop everything to help you. Gladiators will be armed and stationed at the transporter, ready to beam down at a moment’s notice.”

We’ve left the hubbub of the fair, and are hovering toward an expansive forest. Farther west I see what looks like a small city.

“Khour’s compound,” Shadow informs us.

“Whoa!”

First of all, I didn’t imagine it would be . . . beautiful. Even though we saw it on vid, I didn’t realize how large it really is. There is one huge main building which Shadow says is Khour’s mansion, and dozens of smaller outbuildings. The entire complex is made of rock cut by the finest artisans and pieced together in a kind of checkerboard of chestnut and gold stone.

It looks as if much of the compound is old, maybe many centuries. The mansion seems to have been added recently. It was designed to fit in with the rest, though, retaining the same checkerboard look with stones cut and pieced together to look as if they’re from the same slab of rock.

Is that an old covered well in the middle of all the structures? It almost reminds me of a feudal lord’s compound—or a fairytale. Too bad such an evil bastard lives here. I’m sure Khour loves being lord of his castle.

“I guess burning it down is out of the question,” Bayne says glumly.

“No. Stone doesn’t burn,” Shadow agrees, “but it’s not impervious to lasers.” He banks hard to the right and lowers us so we’re skimming so close to the treetops my hands grab my thighs in terror.

“Tell me when you see a campsite you like. We’ll find you something easily defensible.”

“There,” Bayne points off to the right. The trees are thicker there, and there’s an outcropping of rock maybe twenty feet high that we can shelter against.

Shadow can’t set the hover down close to the spot because the forest is so dense, but an hour later we’ve carried our supplies to our campsite, he’s helped us set up a space-age tent, and he bids us goodbye.

“We’re standing by, you two. All we need to know is when he’s in this forest, his coordinates, and an estimate on how many males he has with him. We’ll do the rest, and you two will remain safe.” He swings through the hover doorway, then leans out to tip his head and smile as he tells us, “You might as well have some fun.”

After he leaves, I take the opportunity to investigate our campsite. It’s quiet here, and although it doesn’t remind me of where I used to hunt in Texas, it does remind me of how much I love to revel in nature.

The temperature feels like the high eighties, but here in the shade, it’s comfortable. The round-leaved trees form a canopy overhead, and I hear birds calling to each other all over the forest.

When I used to hunt with my dad or granddad, the sounds of nature and the wind on my face soothed me. When I glance at Bayne, the tightness of his features tells a different story. He’s not having calm, fond memories. Is he back in his village, watching invaders burn it to the ground?

“I wish you weren’t here, Willa. I wish it with all my heart,” he looks at me, eyebrows pulled down tightly in concern. “We’re in a relationship. In my world, that means it’s my responsibility to keep you safe. I’ve met this male, he was evil and heartless years ago, and he’s only grown more powerful since then. I don’t want you on the same planet as him, much less so close to his property.”

My heart swells with affection as my eyes grow misty. We only crossed the line from ‘it’s complicated’ to ‘in a relationship’ three days ago, but I wonder if I’m falling in love with him. ‘It’s complicated’ includes a humungous four-legged dog with razor-sharp teeth, but now that I’ve met the caring male underneath the fur, it hardly seems worth factoring into the equation.

“It makes me feel so cared for that you want to protect me, Bayne. If the situation changes, I’ll comm the ship and have them beam me up. Until then, you’re stuck with me.” I waggle my eyebrows at him, suddenly in a hurry to unpack our bedroll. From the pictures at the outfitter shop that showed a thick air mattress the size of a queen bed, this is about as close to glamping as I’ll ever get.

The tent is amazing. Actually calling it a tent is like calling the Grand Canyon a ditch. The tent is a see-through sphere made of thin plastic. With the touch of a button, it somehow fills with air, inflates, and voila, we’ve got shelter. Not just shelter, but we can see the sun rise and set. It’s going to be romantic.

We unpack the six-inch cube which inflates with a