Read Paired Objective: Matched Desire, Book 2 Online
Authors: Clare Murray
Tags: #ménage;aliens;m/f/m;sf;futuristic
She went quiet for a minute while they waited her out. When she continued, her voice was quieter. “Then pickings got to be slim. We started to take more chances. Callum…died because of that.”
It was on the tip of his tongue to ask why. But Russ reminded himself they’d only known each other for a matter of days. If this worked out…
“It will
.
”
He ignored Cam’s interruption. If it worked out, she’d tell them more in her own time. He didn’t know much about dating or relationships, but he did know you didn’t spill everything on the first or even second date. Still, he couldn’t help but squeeze her close.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Yeah. It was a few years ago now. Ought to be over it by now. Anyway, Mom and I eventually stowed away aboard an eastbound cargo train. We leaped off in upstate New York.”
“No car?” Cam interjected.
“We hacked a moped, but it didn’t get us far. Besides, you could hear us coming from half a mile away since it had an old gas engine. So we mostly walked, sometimes hitched rides. We hadn’t lost our faith in humanity yet, and a few of the rural communities were pretty welcoming.” Abby hesitated. “That’s where Mom died, actually. In a barn on a bed of hay. Better than on the side of the road.”
“Hey, you don’t need to tell us this if it’s upsetting for you.” Russ bent to press a kiss onto her forehead, and she let out a shaky sigh.
“I know. It’s…just that if I don’t tell anyone, nobody will know. And if I die, the story dies with me.” She struggled to a sitting position, blinking tears away. “Nobody had the time to listen to each other back in Headquarters. Servants were discouraged from chatting.”
“Probably paranoid about you plotting an escape attempt,” Cam said.
“That, and discussing how messed up the conditions became.” Abby took a deep breath. “Anyway, after Mom died, I worked for the farmers in the area, helping them shore up their wall and get alien defenses in order. Once I’d helped plant the fields, though, I felt like moving on. Couldn’t stay there any longer, missing Mom. I needed new surroundings, and I really wanted to go back to Grammie. So I hitched a ride on a wagon in the direction of DC, figuring I’d get a train from around there.”
She paused, looking into the near distance as if to compose herself. With some effort, Russ held back from encouraging her to continue, knowing she needed time and space to process what had happened to her. Across the bed, he sensed Cam holding back too.
“Just outside the walls, I was offered a temporary job as a servant. It…wasn’t exactly the way I pictured touring the White House. Headquarters. Whatever they want to call it.” Abby made as if to shrug it off, sitting up and hugging her knees to her bare breasts. “I’d better get dressed.”
She was going to need to talk about what had happened to her. If not to them, to someone else. When Russ skimmed the top of his brother’s mind, he found Cam’s thoughts to be perfectly in accord with his. Well, there were therapists at the Complex, and Patrice could help. Now they just had to get there.
“I’m getting uneasy about the Shadow Feds,”
Russ sent.
“We’ve been in one place for almost the entire day. I’d feel a whole lot better if we were on the move.”
“We’ll deal with Uther’s shit, then we can roll out in the morning,”
was Cam’s reply.
His brother got out of Abby’s way, reaching for his clothes as he did so. Since it was such a small space, Russ waited until Cam was done before rising. He caught Abby’s gaze lingering upon his abs, and couldn’t resist flexing them ever so slightly. His super-sensitive hearing picked up the ragged edge of her breathing.
So she wasn’t sated, not yet. Satisfaction made his lips curve upward.
“We could always go back to bed
,
”
Cam suggested.
“I’d like our first time to be somewhere other than here,”
Russ replied dryly. He slipped his shirt on and double-checked the weapons he kept secreted about himself, including the UV-saber on his wrist. The saber wouldn’t do anything against humans…but night was coming.
Russ frowned as he remembered where Uther’s compound was located—right on the damn edge of Cleveland, jammed up against the wall itself. That had likely been a strategic move on the government’s part.
Here, have this prime piece of land!
Not that there’d been many attacks on Cleveland, but even a single Bark could rend a human from limb to limb if the alien caught someone unaware.
A knock on the door startled Abby backward. Russ caught her easily, propping her against him as Cam undid the latch and opened the door. Snake Eyes lounged on the other side, faux-casually, in a way that didn’t at all conceal the large knife that swung sheathed at his hip. The latent tension in the man’s body was cause for concern. If Russ read him right, Snake Eyes didn’t much care for his boss. Equally, however, Russ didn’t much care to be used as a pawn in whatever game this man was about to play.
“The fights are going to kick off,” Snake Eyes told them. His gaze flickered to each of them in turn, not lingering upon Abby this time. “Are you armed?”
“Should we be?” Russ retorted.
“Weapons aren’t allowed in the ring, per long-standing rules.” Snake Eyes jerked his head to motion them after him as he began to walk. As they caught up with him, one gold-capped tooth glittered as he opened his mouth again. “
Outside
the ring is where it’s really no-holds-barred. Ought to keep my mouth shut about that, but…I hope you’re coming prepared.”
* * * * *
Abby couldn’t figure out whether Snake Eyes was trying to be helpful or intimidating. As they walked, she settled upon his message as a friendly warning. She didn’t miss his almost imperceptible nod to Katya as they passed her in the courtyard. A scrawny boy ran by, herding the last of the hens into their coop for the night.
Katya was on her knees tending to a potted plant—radishes, by the look of it. As they passed, she stripped off her gardening gloves and threw them atop a small pile of other gloves. Most were in small or medium sizes—certainly none would fit Russ or Cam, so it wasn’t much of a stretch to assume that women and children did the gardening around here.
Other people were migrating across the courtyard in the same direction, including two men carrying a case of what looked to be recently scavenged beer. Abby remembered drinking a Corona with a lime, her first sneaky beer as an underage drinker. Limes were pretty much a thing of the past now. So were beer snobs.
One of the Twins placed a hand between her shoulders as they exited the courtyard, propelling her forward when she would have balked at the sight before her. Evidently, the fights were hosted smack dab against the boundary wall. It reared above them in concrete glory, studded here and there with exposed rebar. Barbed wire gleamed atop it. Two sentry towers, simple, wooden affairs, already had guards inside who were scanning the horizon for impending alien attack.
And yet life went on down here as if the threat outside barely existed. Abby rolled her eyes to the night sky. Humans were so stupidly self-absorbed.
“Get yourselves seats if you want,” was Snake Eye’s parting shot to them. He strode off toward the makeshift ring. Behind it, in prime viewing position, lounged Uther. The man hadn’t missed their appearance—he’d chosen not to acknowledge it. Abby narrowed her eyes. Asshole behavior clearly wasn’t limited to Headquarters.
Also, she figured the leader’s lack of greeting didn’t bode well for them. Had she been alone, she would have found a way to hightail it out of here. With the Twins at her side, however, she felt fairly secure. They were two of the most dangerous-looking men she’d ever encountered. When Russ had peered at her inside the wrecked control room at Headquarters, she’d instantly known that he was nobody to tangle with.
It was almost daunting to know they lusted after her.
Abby hadn’t lied though—she needed touch, had always craved it. Not necessarily sexual touch either. She missed being able to lean against a friendly shoulder while watching a movie, go for a walk holding someone’s hand, or enjoy a simple hug. Sure, she and Callum had done their fair share of making out, finally consummating their relationship in a fortified basement. He’d been a fine young man, solid and dependable.
Still, he couldn’t have held a candle to the Twins.
Abby swallowed guiltily. That was enough of that line of thinking. Callum had died five years ago. He’d deserved more than a roadside burial and a makeshift cross.
When Russ put his arm around her to guide her to a seat, she nearly jumped. Why must their every touch provoke her? She couldn’t seem to get enough of both men, and that meant things were moving downright fast, because she barely knew them. She perched on a rough-hewn seat in between both men, feeling absurdly taken care of despite their surroundings.
She leaned into Cam as he shifted in his seat, and he put his arm around her waist. Near them, seats were filling quickly. People came quietly out of the woodwork, looking wary as opposed to excited, although there were smiles here and there. Nobody sat directly in front or behind them, and the seats right next to the Twins went unfilled.
One of the men behind Uther went over to fetch more beer from a stash kept carefully away from the general public. A few heads turned, watching him refill Uther’s glass, and some people muttered under their breaths. There was a keg of what looked and smelled like low-quality moonshine. Most of the crowd had availed themselves of that. Still—moonshine versus quality beer?
Us
versus
them
?
No wonder the mood was tense, restless.
“All right, fuckers!” Uther stood, brandishing his half-empty glass like a sword. He swayed a tiny bit but quickly shored himself up as every head turned to him. A strategically placed solar light illuminated his face, revealing yellowing teeth as he grinned at the crowd. Around the ring, four oilcans held burning wood, sending smoke spiraling into the sky. It was full night now, no trace of sun.
“All right!” Uther repeated. “We came for fights, and we’re gonna get that, you dig? But first, one of the fights I been having is with myself. I been thinking the government’s looking at what we have and coveting it for themselves!”
His henchmen erupted in a loud roar, easily eclipsing the anemic cheering from the general crowd. Uther looked around, calculating. Then his gaze settled upon the Twins.
“Twins!” he barked. “They sent Twins to scope us out!
Now
tell me the government don’t want no piece of what I got!”
Another roar, an oddly rumbling one this time. Abby frowned at the sky, wondering… Meanwhile, Uther gulped his beer and bellowed over it, pointing in their direction.
“Two
spies
, you dig? What do we do with spies?”
“We
kill them
!” The shouts went up from Uther’s men, but there were a few pumped-up people in the general crowd as well. Faces reddened by the rapidly dying sunlight looked toward them in a frenzy of excitement. Only Snake Eyes seemed reserved, still hovering directly behind Uther.
“We make ’em
fight
, first.” Uther waved a hand in the air for quiet.
He got none. The air itself was vibrating. “Who left a fucking generator on?” he demanded.
“That’s not a generator,” Russ said, his baritone voice carrying easily over any murmur. “That’s the sound of magnetoplasmadynamic thrusters heading our way. In other words—there’s a spaceship coming.”
Only the tightening of his hand on Abby’s knee gave away the man’s stress. He continued to survey the crowd while Cam scanned the skies.
Abby didn’t know where to look. The encroaching darkness at the edges of the oilcan fires seemed oppressive. Fleeing into it no longer seemed a viable choice.
“Bullshit!” Uther shot back. “Conspiracy bullshit.”
But even his gaze was drawn to the sky as a squat gray ship broke cloud cover to sail directly above them. It flew so low it would have grazed tall buildings—had there been any nearby. Fortunately, it was on course to touch down outside the walls. That knowledge—and shock—held everyone still. Waiting.
With a loud hiss and a distant thump, the ship landed. Abby couldn’t tell where, only that it was nearby—probably in the fields just beyond the wall. She rose, every muscle knotted with fear. No spaceships had flown since the first battles of the Invasion. And that one wasn’t a human ship. What the hell was going on?
Were the rumors true? Abby gripped the rough edge of her seat, stomach roiling. Had someone managed to wake several ships of dormant aliens? Even worse, could they be female Barks?
“Hey! We have a
fight
to witness.” Uther slurred the last two words, then recovered, shouting even louder. “I challenge one of the Twins to fight my champion, Snake Eyes!”
The crowd, on its feet now, warily turned its attention back to their drunken leader, who held that attention by dint of the gun in his hands. He leveled the weapon on Russ.
The Twin’s gaze turned deadly as he stared into the slightly wavering black muzzle. Abby drew breath to suggest they run, but before she could expel it, a shot rang out, whining near her head.
“Down!” Russ scooped her up and hit the ground, rolling so that she was cushioned against him. Two more shots split the air. Abby swore, trying to claw her way from under Russ, but the man was unyielding—and far too strong for her to break away from. She was trapped.
“Stay down,” he snapped through the screaming of others. His command froze her for a short time—perhaps a minute, but her stuttering mind couldn’t seem to count past thirty. When a fourth gunshot cracked out, she was done being still.
The smell of smoke and dirt hit the back of her throat. Panic struck her in the gut, hard enough to send her struggling blindly against the man holding her. She had to get away from here, had to find somewhere safe from both bullets and aliens—if that were even possible.
The moment before she truly lost it, Russ lifted her into his arms. The change of perspective was so dizzying that she flung her arms around his neck out of reflex. Over his shoulder, she saw two forms slumped at the foot of Uther’s erstwhile throne.