The chirping began anew as the aliens debated who knew what, since Darla couldn’t understand anything they said.
They finally stopped—and one of them pointed their weapon at Darla and her sister. “Come with us, female in the back.”
They planned to force her sister to have sex with Gnaw.
Darla immediately wanted to attack but knew it wouldn’t do any good. Becky squeezed her hand so hard it hurt and pressed against her back, her body trembling.
“It’s me,” Darla blurted.
She shook off her sister’s tight grasp and stepped forward, staying between Becky and the aliens.
“I was talking to the Veslor on the shuttle. If one of us might be his mate, it’s me. He only talked to me.”
“Darla!” her sister hissed, grabbing hold of the back of her shirt.
She turned her head, holding her sister’s gaze. “I love you. Stay calm. Don’t give them any reason to hurt you.” She turned back to the aliens.
They pointed their weapons at her. She waited to feel pain or to be thrown back by a blast to her chest, but they didn’t shoot. “Come,” one of them ordered.
Her sister clutched at her frantically. “Don’t go!”
“I’ll be fine.” She had to grab her sister’s wrists and yank her shirt from her fingers. “Remember, I love you.”
Darla slowly walked toward the aliens, holding her hands open at her sides, trying to look as unaggressive as possible. She really didn’t want them using their weird weapons on her.
They backed out of the room into a well-lit, wide, sterile-looking corridor. She kept advancing, despite the dread pitting inside her stomach.
The walls and floor of the hallway were the same stark white as their cells. She followed them, keeping about eight feet of distance as they moved on their tentacles to the left. There was a hiss behind her, and she turned to find a solid wall where the opening to her cell had been.
“This way, female. The Veslor awaits.”
Chapter Three
The wall to Darla’s left opened, revealing another room. The cells were right next to each other. Shock hit as she saw Gnaw, struggling and strung upright in what appeared to be some kind of torture contraption. He’d been washed; his hair wet and his previous clothes were gone. They’d put a pair of dark baggy pants on him. They were too short for his long legs, falling just below his knees.
Her gaze left him to dart around the rest of the room. There was a large exam table bolted to the floor, similar to a med bed, with tons of restraints attached to it in the corners.
She walked into the room, turning to watch the Elth as they hesitated at the opening.
“Make him impregnate you,” one of them ordered.
She glanced at Gnaw. He stopped struggling and unleashed a terrifying snarl. Her gaze darted back to the Elth. “I can’t while he’s in that contraption.”
“You will or you die. Then we will bring in the replacement female.”
She inched closer to Gnaw. He bucked once more in the restraints and snarled again, his beautiful eyes looking enraged as their gazes met for a brief second. She focused back on the Elth.
“Notice how tall he is? I can’t breed with him in this. It’s physically impossible.” She stepped closer to make a point. The Veslor stood well over a foot taller than her.
“The Veslor will kill you if he’s released. He’s murdered fourteen of us.”
“I’m not your kind,” she pointed out. “I didn’t kidnap him. You did.” Her hand trembled as she reached out, placing her palm on Gnaw’s chest. His skin had a velvety-soft texture, stretched over firm muscles. She could feel them flexing with every heavy breath he took. He was also very warm.
One of the Elth responded. “The Veslor will kill you. He has refused to comply with our demands. I wished the other female to die at his hands, but not you. You haven’t angered me yet.”
She noticed that Gnaw’s wrist device had been removed. That was how he’d contacted other Veslors. It may have been a tracking device. If it was gone, they probably wouldn’t be found.
A sharp pang of disappointment replaced her hope of being saved by the fleet soon.
“He won’t hurt me. Just let him go. Please?” She glanced up at Gnaw, attempting to plead with her eyes. “Listen to me.” The words were directed at the aliens but meant for Gnaw. “We understand that you’ll kill us if we refuse to be your experiments. Both of us want to live.” She shot him another beseeching look, holding his gaze longer. “Gnaw is a smart man.” She reached up with her other hand and gently touched his wrist, where his watch device used to be, lightly rubbing the skin there.
Gnaw stilled, his eyes narrowing.
She purposely tore her gaze from his to glance briefly at where she touched his wrist, before staring into his eyes again. “Is that a problem, or do we just need some time to get to know each other?”
He seemed to calm. “I’ll comply. We just need time.”
She felt relieved that he would play along. Hope flared, too. Did he mean that they could still be found, even if his wrist device had been taken? Some races had trackers implanted inside their bodies. They’d had a Dorian alien get lost on her planet two years before. His people had found him by using an implant to pinpoint his whereabouts. Maybe Veslors did that to their people, too.
She faced the Elth. “You heard him. He’ll comply. He won’t kill me. We’ll test to see if we’re mates.”
“You’ll breed,” one of the Elth demanded, his tone harsh. “Often and immediately. We want your young.”
Gnaw’s chest under her hand vibrated as he snarled.
“We’ll do that,” she promised. “Just let him down and give us some privacy.”
“Move, female.”
She backed away from Gnaw.
A yellow light shot from their ball-shaped devices, all three, and the laser lights slammed into Gnaw’s torso. He instantly sagged in the restraints, his eyes closing.
She gasped, horrified. Had they killed him?
She panicked for a long second until she noticed that his chest rose and fell as he continued to breathe.
The restraints on his limbs and throat opened, and his body fell forward before she could react, his head bouncing off the unforgiving floor. Darla lunged at him and dropped to her knees. Bright red blood shone as she gently turned his, where it had struck the hardest.
A hiss sounded, and she looked over her shoulder.
The Elth were gone and the wall closed.
“Shat.”
Gnaw was unconscious and hurt. She darted a look around the room again, examining every inch closely. The cell wasn’t like the last one. That had just been a room with nothing but floor, walls, and a ceiling. This one had that upright torture device, the exam bed—where she figured bad things took place—and along the wall was a cleanup area. There was a sink-like vessel in the corner, with supplies piled up at the end of the counter attached to it. She got to her feet and went over to inspect them.
Most of the supplies were folded towels, some liquid that, based on smell, might be soap, or maybe some kind of cleanser for—
It hit her then.
The cell was for torturing their victims.
She didn’t want to think too much about that—or about how that sink may be where the evil aliens cleaned blood from their tentacles after brutalizing their victims.