Aedian: Alien Warrior: A Sci-Fi Alien Invasion Paranormal Romance (13 page)

If there was one thing he'd learned, it was that he needed to trust his instincts, and this, whatever this was, was probably no different.

"I'm busy," Roxanne replied, turning back to the woman who was staring between them with wide eyes and her mouth slightly open.

"You could be less busy," Aedian offered, trying for patience.

"You don't own me," she said.

And, Creators, Aedian was so tired of hearing her say that. He was
trying.
He treated her with respect the only way he knew how, and he'd thought he was doing an alright job, but now every other day she was throwing that in his face, and it was completely irrational and annoying.

"Fine," he bit out and then turned to leave.

As he walked away, he could hear the other human woman murmur in a shocked voice: "I can't believe you talked to him like that."

He couldn't see Roxanne, but she sounded like she didn't care at all. "Well, if he's going to deserve it, then I'm going to do it. Now, are you sure you haven't seen anything?"

The rest of their conversation was lost as he turned the corner, but his brows were furrowed. What would the other woman have seen? What was Roxanne looking for?

If he were more irrational than he was, he might have assumed that she was having an affair with another of his kind, but since she seemed to barely be able to stand him, he was willing to bet that it wasn't that. Which didn't put him any closer to figuring out what was going on.

He was just going to have to ask her. It was going to risk him getting his head bitten off most likely, but they couldn't continue like this. Any day now the Platoks could come and make their stand, and the Calphesians would have to make theirs in return. Aedian didn't want to have to worry about fighting with Roxanne while that was going on. He wanted her to trust him enough to know that he would keep her safe.

Because he would. She was
his
as much as she insisted that he didn't own her, and he wasn't going to let a Platok get its filthy hands on her. Not in this lifetime.

The pattern continued like that until one night when Aedian was preparing for bed and realized that Roxanne wasn't there. He hadn't seen her all day, so wrapped up in meetings and gathering weapons and practicing with the others. As one of the champions, it was expected of him to be on the front lines. It was his job to help defend his people, and it was an honor to have that position.

To a Calphesian, fighting and dying in battle was more honorable than hiding in the back and surviving. There was nothing to be gained from that in their eyes, and so Aedian, while not ready to die at all, would take his place where he belonged. And that meant long hours of training and making sure that his skills were sharp enough to prove that he could handle it.

So he hadn't been around much that day. Roxy seemed to leave more days than she didn't, but she was always back by the time they went to bed. She always laid down in their bed beside him, even when it seemed like she didn't want to be there.

But now it was late at night, and there was no sign of her.

With narrowed eyes, Aedian put off his bedtime preparations and stalked out to the place where Roxanne usually parked her car. To his relief, it was gone. That at least meant she wasn't somewhere in the compound with someone else. If she was cavorting with another Calphesian, then Aedian would have to fight him for her, and he didn't have time for that. None of them had time to be fighting amongst themselves right now.

That still meant he had no idea where she was, though, and he sighed, leaning against one of the pillars. It was probably stupid to be worried. It wasn't like she'd been snatched by an enemy of his, and he trusted that she could handle herself out in the human world. She'd been doing it for years before he'd shown up in her life, after all.

But she wasn't there with him, and that was the problem. He tried not to think of her as a possession because there was nothing to be gained there and it just made her angry, but he was used to her presence by now. He was used to having her there when he laid down to sleep and the fact that she wasn't there just made things odd.

Just as he was considering turning around and going back into the compound to wait for her, the bright beams of her headlights swung around, and he shielded his eyes from the glare to watch her park the car.

At first, she seemed not to see him, muttering to herself as she got out of the contraption and shut the door with a bang.

Her face was drawn down into a frown, and she was tugging absently at one of her curls. She would walk right past him if she continued like that, and the thought of being ignored when he was standing there waiting for her made him angry.

Before she could pass completely, he reached out and grabbed her arm.

Roxanne yelped and whirled, eyes wide and hand raised. He knew first hand that her hits didn't hurt that much, but she was mid swing already when he ducked back. "Stop that."

She frowned, squinting in the darkness, and then she scowled when she saw it was him. "What is your
problem?
" Roxy demanded, trying and failing to tug her arm out of his grip.

"I could ask you the same thing," Aedian hissed, tightening his fingers just a bit.

"Me? You're the one sneaking around in the dark. What were you even doing?"

"I was waiting for you!" he snapped. "And I was not sneaking around. Calphesians do not
sneak
."

She snorted and rolled her eyes. "Oh, that's right. Silly of me to have forgotten. You just march in, weapons drawn and start making demands and killing people. You're hurting my arm."

Aedian dropped her arm like it had burned him. Hurting her wasn't what he wanted to do, after all. He didn't even want to fight with her, really. Mostly he just wanted to pull her over his shoulder and cart her off so that they could go to bed. But judging from the look on her face, that wasn't going to happen.

"Where were you?" he asked, trying to keep his voice even.

"Why does it matter?"

"Because I want to know. You were gone all day, and it feels like you're hiding something from me."

Now she laughed outright, turning and walking off in the direction of the stairs that led to the living quarters. "
I'm
hiding something. Okay. Sure. We'll pretend like that's true."

Frustration and anger and exhaustion were warring inside of him, and Aedian decided all at once that he'd had enough. They'd been dancing around this for over a week now, and there was no telling when the Platoks would show up, and he was tired of it. He didn't have time to be bickering pointlessly with her, and he didn't even want to. Not when things were so dire.

He followed her up the stairs, neither of them speaking as they made their way back to their rooms. Aedian watched as she pressed her hand to the sensor to let them in and then strode inside.

"Sit down," he said firmly.

"Excuse me?"

"Sit down. You want to know what it is I'm hiding, and I'll tell you. We don't have time for this argument."

Roxanne looked confused, but she did as she was told, sitting down on the couch in the main room. Her dark eyes were serious where they were trained on him, and Aedian found that now he'd gone and opened his mouth, he didn't know where to start with the telling.

At the beginning, he supposed, since it was important for her to know what exactly was happening.

"When we lived on Calphas, we were in charge of the entire quadrant for the most part. No one crossed us and lived. Many tried, but we put down threat after threat, doing what we had to do to cement our place. We also kept those who were weaker than us and loyal to us safe, in exchange for resources or aid when we needed it. That was always the way things were, and there was a balance.

"But then we had to flee Calphas. Our planet was dying, and there was no choice. There is no weakness in survival when it's the only thing you have left. Death is an honor when it's earned on the battlefield, fighting for what you believe in, but it's senseless when it's just because you were too stupid to know when to leave. I know that now."

"What does this have to do with anything?" Roxanne asked, brows drawn down.

"I'm getting to it," Aedian replied. "You have to understand. When we were there, we kept the balance. But when we left, the balance was upset, and another race moved into the space we'd left behind. The Platoks. They have tried to beat us several times, though they always failed before. But with us gone, they had free reign to conquer the ones we left behind. And conquer they did. They have had ten of your years to grow and pillage, and that's what they've done. And now... Now they've turned their eyes to Earth."

Roxanne's eyes were large in the dim light. "They...they're coming here?" she asked.

Aedian inclined his head.

"What do they want?"

He shook his head. "We aren't certain. To wipe us out, more than likely. They probably think us weakened since we've been here for so long, becoming used to peace. They think that we've forgotten how to fight."

"Well, that's definitely not true. What about us? About the humans? Do they...are they coming for us?"

"That I do not know. We're only guessing at their motivations, but we know they're coming. And we know that they won't hesitate to kill or enslave your kind if they can. That is just the way the Platoks are. They have no honor and seek to win at any cost."

"And they're coming here?"

"Yes."

"When?"

"Any time now."

His words fell heavy in the room and silence followed them as Roxanne seemed to process that. Her face was a mess of emotions, shock and fear winning out. When she looked up at him again, there was understanding there. "That's why you've been gathering weapons and training so much," she murmured. "You're going to fight them."

"Yes," Aedian said again. "Of course we are. This is our home now, and you are...well, you are as good as our people."

She seemed surprised to hear him say that, and he supposed that made sense considering some of the things he'd said about humans before. But things were different now. Everything was different now.

Aedian moved to sit down next to her, unsure of whether or not she would welcome being touched. "Do you have something you want to tell me?" he asked. "Like how you knew about the weapons?"

Roxanne blinked, seeming to come out of a trance. "Oh. I...well, I saw some of your kind carrying them around. I thought. I thought maybe you were preparing to break the treaty or something. I didn't know there was an outside threat. I don't think any of us thought anyone else would be coming from out there." She waved her hand in the direction of the ceiling.

The slight to the honor of his people made him tense, but then he sighed and relaxed again. It was a reasonable assumption, he supposed. After all, Calphesians had been planning for what to do if the humans broke their part of the treaty for years.

"We would not do that," he said gently. "And most other races avoid Earth. There are so many of you and you're unpredictable, which makes them think you aren't worth the time. It just so happened that we didn't have a choice in the matter and that is why we showed up."

"Makes sense," she said. "So...what's going to happen? Why aren't you telling anyone?"

"We wanted to avoid a panic," he explained. "But soon each head will be approaching their human representative. What happens from there is up to your kind. But we will fight."

Silence reigned again, and Roxanne let out a shaky breath. He could understand how she felt. After ten years of peace, humans had probably assumed they were safe. And now this. He wondered if she'd blame them once she figured out how much this was their fault. He wondered if it would change things.

"I will keep you safe," he said after a moment, watching her in the semi-darkness. "I vow to you that I will. I will keep as many of your kind safe as I can."

Her eyes were surprised but kind when she glanced at him. "I thought you didn't care about humans all that much," she murmured.

Aedian shrugged a shoulder. "You have your uses."

She cracked a smile at that and leaned against him, pressing her face to his chest. He let his arms come up around her, one hand going to the back of her head as he held on. It was the most they'd touched in days, and Aedian was shocked at how her touch calmed the storm of feelings inside of him.

It was impossible to know what was going to happen in the next few days, but Aedian was determined that he wasn't going to let anything terrible happen without putting up a fight.

Chapter 11: Spilling Every Bean

Roxanne understood the concept of a secret, she really did. She understood that the Calphesians thought they were doing the right thing in not telling them about the invasion, keeping the peace and all that. Once it got out, it was inevitable that people were going to panic. That's just how things like this worked. People panicked when they were faced with the thought of the unknown.

Aedian told her that she wasn't supposed to just go scream the news from the rooftops, but that didn't mean she was going to keep it to herself. Not when she had family and friends who deserved the chance to get out while they had the chance.