Alexandre (3 page)
“Ouch!” Shit, that hurt! Lily fingered the sore spot and came away damp with blood.
Masculine hands seized her around the waist and pulled her to safety. Suddenly she was up close and personal with the alien, her heart thudding loud enough to wake the dead, her senses swamped with him. Lily looked deep into his amber eyes, mesmerized—dazed.
“Are you injured?” His hands skimmed her body in the most delicious manner. She tried to concentrate on the fact she wore granny pants under her skirt but it was difficult when she stood so close to him. “Where does it hurt?”
God, it hurt everywhere. Her breasts throbbed and lower her pussy tingled with longing. Said granny pants felt uncomfortably damp. She shuddered, unable to speak for fear of blurting out her desperate need of him.
“You’re bleeding.” He stepped away from her, and Lily wanted to protest. Then he yanked off his shirt, and she forgot how to breathe. The need to run her tongue across the broad expanse of his hairless chest pounded through her confused brain. She really didn’t enjoy sex, but oh, man, she wanted to do it with him.
Panic of colossal proportions assaulted Alex as he trailed his hands across Lily’s silky skin. His tom stirred, pressing against his Earth clothing with an insistence that was almost painful. He closed his eyes and tried to think of anything but the warm, feminine body he held in his arms. A spasm started in the biggest digit on his right foot. This felt like bonding to him, and he damn well didn’t have the time or inclination, even though her hips fitted the span of his hands perfectly. That bloody charlatan of a medical man had given him faulty travel pills. The only explanation. The pills should halt the bonding urges. The thought pounded through him with relentless truth.
One thing was sure—the second he set foot on Dalcon again, he intended to sue. After he’d exacted his pound of flesh from the pompous little windbag. Was it his fault he was allergic to the quills they sourced from Dalcon’s fodo bird to inject the travel inoculations? No, the medical man had assured him if he took the pills, he’d be sweet. He’d have no problems with the trace elements in Earth’s atmosphere. No problems with illness and certainly no fuckin’ bonding for life with a receptive Earth female.
Lily sighed, her warm, moist breath feathering across his chest to hit his nipple. Alex suppressed his shudder of pleasure while he frantically pondered possible solutions. There must be some way to escape this situation. He hadn’t felt the bonding ties until he’d touched her. Maybe if he refrained from physical contact again? Swift on the heels of this thought came another. Luke and Janaya Morgan were gonna kill him.
He was dead meat.
Lily edged closer to him and sighed again—a soft breathy sound that sent lusty thoughts roaring out of control. Alex clenched his teeth and fought against the desire to remove her clothes, part her legs and claim her as his mate. That couldn’t happen. Despite his royal connections, he had no means of support. He’d risked everything he owned to get his new business off the ground. If he gave in to the need coursing through his veins, he’d be back where he started. A pampered pet for the women of the royal court to paw over and use for their gain. Damn it, he wanted his own identity. He wanted people to look at him and see a self-made man instead of standing in awe of his pretty face. Was that too much to ask?
The woman stirred again, reminding him of how he’d gotten himself into this mess. She’d hurt herself. Alex inched away, and then steeling himself against the jolt of sensation he knew he’d feel, tilted up her head to see the extent of the damage. Blood had trickled from a scrape on her temple down her face and neck. He grabbed his shirt off the desk and started to wipe the blood from her face.
Voices outside the travel agency made him pause.
Familiar voices
. The sound of the door handle turning made Alex turn. No! He stiffened and waited for the painful death beam of a blaster.
“What the hell have you done to my sister?” Luke Morgan clenched his fists and loomed over the desk that separated them. The man looked ready to rearrange Alex’s features.
The devil-spotted dog bounded into the office with a threatening bark. “
Woof
. I’ll bite him before he eats more blood.
Woof
!”
“I told you to keep your hands off my sister,” Janaya snarled.
Resigned, Alex waited for his punishment. Two more people—Hinekiri, Janaya’s aunt, and Richard, Luke’s father—crowded into Lily’s office.
Great
. The gang was all here.
He was going to die.
Lily tugged from his grasp and straightened her top. Alex’s heart wrenched at the separation. But he wasn’t fool enough to do anything about it, not with her overprotective family gunning for his blood.
“What are you doing here? You told me you were staying on Dalcon for at least another month before you headed off again.”
“Aren’t you pleased to see us?” Luke demanded.
Lily looked confused. “Of course I am, stupid. I just don’t understand why you’re here.”
“We’ve come to pick up my fishing gear,” Richard said.
Lily’s brows rose. “All the way from Dalcon?”
They were lying, of course. He knew it, and judging by the expression on Lily’s face, she had trouble swallowing their story too. It had more holes than a fishing net.
“We’re finally going fly fishing in Alaska. There’s a big fishing contest in Anchorage. I wanted my favorite lures. My lucky lures,” Richard added.
“I tried to tell Richard I was going to catch a bigger salmon than him,” Hinekiri chirped with a toothy grin. “That’s when he decided we needed to come back here to pick up his lures.”
Janaya strode up to the desk and scrutinized Lily closely. She winged a glare at Alex. “Have you bitten her neck?”
Trust the bodyguard
. She never let go of what was important. They trained the best on Dalcon.
“Well?” Janaya snapped.
Alex took a step back, eying her warily. The fire in her eyes wasn’t good.
“What do you mean?” Lily asked. “Alex hasn’t bitten me.”
Luke put his hands on his hips. “Then why are you bleeding?”
Killer barked, the hot air she expelled heating Alex’s leg even through his Earth jeans. “Vampire,” she barked.
“I am not a damned vampire,” Alex snapped. Royal princes didn’t have permanent fangs, for a start. The spotted devil behaved more vampire than him. Look at the way she was eyeing his buttock flesh.
Lily patted him on the arm. “No one said you were a vampire.”
Interesting that everyone understood the dog except Lily. The dog slinked closer.
“Tell them how you hurt yourself,” Alex said, giving Killer a suspicious look. She was awful close, definitely within biting distance.
“I hit my head on the desk when I was getting my pen,” Lily said, looking at her feet. Her head jerked up again to glare at her brother and sister-in-law. “You know how clumsy I am.” Both her words and her body language spoke of mortification.
Luke laughed. “You hit your head? Klutz. I could never understand how you managed to be so good at bowling a cricket ball when you were so clumsy the rest of the time.”
Alex clenched his fists angry on Lily’s behalf. He made an instinctive move to comfort then jerked his hand back before physical contact. Lily was his employee. His means to make his plans for the future come true. He couldn’t afford to touch her again and cement the bond further.
“We told you to have your inoculations,” Janaya said with a bite in her voice.
Alex backed up, moving closer to Lily. No way was he stupid enough to let Janaya within striking distance. But then perhaps this wasn’t a good move either. His heart felt the pull, the tug of Lily’s soul calling. Alex jumped away, glaring at them all. He would not sacrifice his dream.
Lily broke the taut silence. “If you’ve come back to collect your fishing lures, why are you here in Papakura? Why aren’t you in Sloan?”
A perfectly logical question.
Alex smothered a smirk. That was his little moon heart. He arched a brow at Luke and waited for the Earthman to extract himself from the hole he’d dropped into with their fabricated excuse.
“We came to see you,” Hinekiri chirped when Luke hesitated. “You’re family. Of course we’d want to see you.”
Surely, Lily wouldn’t buy the blatant lie? Alex narrowed his eyes then groaned inwardly as he glanced at her. The sunshine smile said it all.
“Alex and I were about to discuss our itinerary,” Lily said.
Alex bit back a grin. Her words had her family sharing panicked glances although they rallied quickly. There was a lot of silent communication going on between Luke and Janaya. He couldn’t let them talk Lily out of helping him. He needed her expertise.
“Lily is organizing her relief staff, and we’re leaving this weekend.” Alex met Luke’s frown without a flinch. As far as Alex was concerned, this was war. He’d get Lily to help him through fair means or foul alien tricks. Apart from the bonding. He agreed with her family about that.
“A suggestion,” Hinekiri said. “Lily isn’t going to get much done with us underfoot. Why don’t we leave her to sort out things and meet her in Sloan? Perhaps tomorrow morning?”
“Good idea,” Janaya said before Alex could offer an opinion.
Panic jumped in Alex’s gut. Frankly, he didn’t want to let Lily out of his sight in case she changed her mind. With her travel background and her knowledge of aliens, she was the perfect candidate for what he had in mind.
He checked Lily for her reaction and froze. For an instant, lust fogged his thoughts—a vision of naked skin and luscious, plump breasts offered up for his tasting delight danced through his mind, leaving him breathless. Wanting. His tom twitching in readiness to follow the through.
Hinekiri coughed loudly. “Alex, you can drive down to Sloan with us, and Lily can come down once she’s sorted everything here.”
His vision dissolved into reality. They were trying to come between him and his goals. There was more than one way to pluck a fodo bird. This was war.
* * * * *
They stowed his bags and piled into a vehicle called a land something or other. Luke and Killer took the passenger seat and Richard drove. They hemmed Alex in the rear, making him a potential target of the bodyguard and the explorer. The only weapon he had to protect himself with was an Earth jacket.
Alex clicked the seat belt into place and cast a sardonic glance at each of the Dalcon women who flanked him. Time for the attack to begin.
“I told you,” Janaya stated in a hard voice, “to make sure you had travel inoculations before you left Dalcon. I told you of the consequences.”
“You informed me of the dangers of bonding and made it clear what would happen if Lily was coerced into a bond with me. I listened to everything you said, but there was a problem. I’m allergic to fodo quills.”
“Why didn’t you tell us?” Luke demanded, his bronzed face darkening with anger as he glared from the passenger seat. Killer punctuated her displeasure with a low, hair-raising growl.
“I’ve been thinking about that,” Hinekiri said, breaking the sudden tension. “He needed Lily, so he didn’t mention his allergy. This business venture of yours must be real important to you.”
They didn’t know the half of it
. If he’d stayed in the palace for much longer, he’d have lost every brain cell. A problem since insanity wasn’t the done thing for a prince. No telling what indignities the King would have forced on him in the nature of a tonic-fix.
“I’ve invested a lot of time and money,” Alex said in wry understatement. Not to mention run away from home, dodged his bodyguards and spent a fortune on the Driscoll witch spell to disguise his looks. Money well spent since none of them seemed to recognize him as Prince Alexandre. The old crone who’d sold him the spell had assured him he would appear the exact opposite in appearance. Dalconians would see him as dark and plain, the same reflection he saw whenever he looked in a mirror now. It had taken a little getting used to seeing a stranger, but he had grown to love the anonymity. Alex considered conducting a test of sorts to ease his agitation but gave up the idea. He didn’t want to call attention to himself any more than necessary. “Why did you give me an introduction letter if you didn’t trust me?”
“We had second thoughts,” Janaya stated with quiet dignity. “We wanted to pick up some fishing gear. Besides, you told us you had the inoculations covered.”
“The medical man prescribed pills.”
“Then why didn’t you take them?” Janaya speared him a look of distaste. “If my sister-in-law must bond with a Dalconian, then at least he should have a few looks going for him.”
Hinekiri reached past him to slap Janaya on the leg. “Manners. I’m ashamed of you. The male can’t help how he looks.”
Alex wanted to chuckle and cheer aloud. Proof that the spell was working. “Don’t worry. I’m used to it. Looks aren’t everything.” He just wished everyone else didn’t put such stock in his looks. “I took the pills. I’m still taking the pills. I’ve no idea why they’re not working. Lily seems pleasant, but I don’t wish to bond with any female.”
Hinekiri took hold of his chin and stared deep into his eyes before looking at Janaya. “If you ask me, the male’s telling the truth.”