He was an executive assistant, whatever the fuck that was supposed to be. As I was not one of these executives, I was uncertain why he insisted on following me from place to place and ordering me around like a small child. Sometimes he even spoke loudly, slowly, as if I were not only contaminated with Hive technology, but deaf and dumb as well.
“I don’t care about human ratings,” I grumbled.
“But you do care about helping us get more brides to The Colony,” Maxim insisted, and he was not wrong so I did not argue. Many worthy males waited for a mate. Too many.
Sadly I knew what the term “ratings” meant and all the other terminology associated with an Earth television program. “Lindsey wanted me to come to Earth to promote alien mates with the hopes of gaining new volunteers to the Brides Program. Fine. That is what I agreed to. They were supposed to interview me. Get some pictures. Send me to the different bride centers around the planet. What you didn’t tell me was that I was to be on some kind of… entertainment program experiment.”
“Reality TV,” Rachel clarified. I could tell by the way she was biting her lip that she was holding in a laugh. She was not my mate, but I wanted to paddle her ass for finding amusement in my discomfort.
I’d learned all about the concept of reality television the moment I stepped off the transport platform when the producer, the director and two staff underlings met me with ridiculous enthusiasm and wide-eyed stares. Turned out, I wasn’t a representative from The Colony answering questions about life on the planet and the various fighters who were possible matches. I was a tiny, fat Earth animal with a lot of fur. Once Rachel used the term, I had searched Earth’s primitive computer to look up the animal in question. I was, apparently, a rodent kept as a pet by small children. A… guinea pig.
“This is not reality. Why didn’t you tell me I was to be the subject of an entertainment program where a gaggle of females were preselected to spend time with me in organized activities? Females I am not interested in. Why did you not tell me that I would be forced to spend time with them until I narrowed down the females to one to be my mate and receive my mating cuffs?” I asked that last, long question in one huge breath.
“Because you wouldn’t have gone,” Maxim said.
“Would you?” I countered, eyeing the Prillon governor. His brown hair was as dark as his mood. As leader of The Colony, he had a lot of responsibility and only seemed to smile when Rachel was about. He wasn’t smiling now.
Good. He’d given permission for this mess.
“It was necessary, Wulf. The warriors here watch the broadcast as well. They are smiling. Laughing. They are excited on your behalf. There is hope.”
Low blow. I could not let them down, and he knew it. Still I felt the need to warn him. “With all due respect, what if I fail? Would you want to be in my place?”
He shifted in his chair, his cheeks turning as bright a pink as mine probably were from the ridiculous amount of colored powder the frightened female had brushed onto my face. “No. Thankfully I already have a mate.”
“I’m sure volunteers at the brides center must have increased. Let me end this. Get me the hell out of here. All I have to do is walk down to the transport room and I’ll be gone.”
“You can’t!” Rachel practically shouted. “It has to go well, because what about the others? I mean, you’re not the only one who’s yet to be matched. And no, there has been no increase in brides, not yet. I think they are all watching, waiting to see how the show ends.”
“Fuck.”
She tried to smile, but I wasn’t buying it. “Think of the females on Earth who will volunteer because they see you claiming a mate on their TVs. You are handsome and honorable. A human woman’s dream. They’re going to want a Wulf of their own.”
I rolled my eyes. Gods be damned, I actually rolled my fucking eyes like a human.
“Then there’s your fever,” Maxim cautioned me.
As if I needed the reminder. My beast was always right below the surface, ready to break free, ready to stretch my skin, my bones, my size and take over.
I thought of all the fighters on The Colony who were waiting for a mate. Most had been tested by now, but the odds of being matched were slim. Only a small number had found mates, and all the females they’d been matched to were from Earth. Maxim was one of the lucky ones. Rachel, the mate he shared with Ryston, had volunteered to be tested and mated instead of facing a long prison sentence on her home planet. She was too fucking sweet and kind to have wallowed in a cell. She’d worked with Hunter Kiel’s mate, a human woman named Lindsey, to devise this… scheme with some people within the Earth side of the Brides Program. It was the hope that this trip to Earth, that my public courting of these females, would grow the volunteer bride pool, which might mean matches for my friends. Rachel and Lindsey had good intentions, but I was the one paying the price.
Still, I couldn’t let them down. Not the unmated warriors on The Colony, not Rachel nor Lindsey and not Governor Maxim, who had fought for every one of us at one time or another.
“I survived the Hive. I can finish this.” I would control my beast with my last breath. I had no choice.
“That’s the spirit!” Rachel pumped her fist in the air and clapped Maxim on the shoulder. But his gaze did not lighten, and I knew he expected my next words.
“I have remained here and participated in this for the others. But Rachel, this episode is the last.” I would see it through to the end, when I would kindly thank both females and take my leave like a male of honor, while I still could. Before I lost control. Because my fever raged.
“The grand finale!” She smiled and clapped her hands together. “I know. It’s so exciting. I’ve been glued to the screen.”
I frowned, having no idea what that meant.
“Seeing you in a tuxedo… wow, Wulf. You’re hot.”
I looked down at myself in this strange Earth outfit. With the shirt, something called a vest and a jacket, I was hot.
“Are you going to pick Genevieve or Willow?” she whispered as if I might share a secret.
I growled thinking of the two females my beast had disliked the least out of the twenty-four. I was not interested in mating either female. My beast had no desire to claim—or fuck—either of them. Admittedly they were beautiful women. Kind. Thoughtful. Eager to be matched. Eager to leave Earth. The mating fever was pushing me hard to find my mate, but neither of the finalists tempted my beast. Neither would be able to soothe him, let alone control him. A beast answered only to his mate. Without that feminine touch, we were lost.
It would be simple to choose one female on that stage. But my beast would not accept her as a mate, my fever would not be soothed and I would be forced to leave this planet before I hurt anyone when my beast raged and lost control. A false mate wasn’t what my beast wanted, and admittedly neither did I. I wanted her. Whoever the fuck she was. The one to set my heart ablaze. My body, my cock would be perpetually hard for her. To be in her. To make her scream.
Genevieve and Willow didn’t do any of that for me.
“I’m not going to pick either of them.”
Her mouth fell open. “What?”
The lady with the brush had wrapped a small towel around my neck earlier, and the small paper cloth felt like it was choking me. Being here, my choices—or lack of them—was practically strangling me. Tugging the paper off, I threw it on a nearby desk. Fortunately the taping was being done at the testing center, since I wasn’t officially allowed to wander around on the planet. They’d made a few exceptions… for dates. These… organized activities I had to do with the females, which were supposed to be fun. Romantic. I growled at the screen, hoping Maxim would take last-minute pity on me.