Stolen and Seduced - Christine Pope Page 0,355

a couple times before answering, “Then we will wipe your memory and send you back.”

“And if I am?” I don’t understand why it bothers me so much, why they need me to be compatible for them.

Aladar merely smiles down at me. “Then you will become our breeder.” And then he places his open palm against my chest, the object in his hand continuing to hover above my body. Pain erupts as he holds down my heart, and my body begins to spasm.

My lips part as I let out a loud, blood-curdling scream. My arms and legs jerk against the straps that seem to be woven entirely out of crystallized energy. My eyes roll into the back of my head. Stars dance across my vision, and my heart goes still as I black out for a second time.

Chapter 3

I’m still looking up at the dark sky when I open my eyes. The sunroof is my only reminder that time has passed at all, although I’m not entirely sure how long I’ve been unconscious. “Congratulations,” Alistar says, and I hear clapping as I slowly turn my head to where he stands near the doors.

“What?” I croak out. My throat burns from screaming, and my chest feels like it’s on fire. My heart beats weakly against my rib cage.

Alistar moves forward, his bright yellow eyes observing me carefully. “You are, in fact, compatible to handle our lineage.”

“What happened to me?” I ask, blinking back tears.

He rolls his eyes heavenward. “You ask many questions, Earthling.”

“Earthling?” The only species that ever calls humans “Earthlings” is aliens. But they can’t be aliens. They resemble humans despite their colored contacts and vampire teeth. They are just men holding me hostage.

Alistar frowns. “What else would you be called?”

“Penny. My name is Penny.” Why I told him that, I don’t understand. It’s if I have no filter at all. But if I talk to him and he gets to know me, then maybe he will let me go home.

“I would find ‘Earthling’ would suit you better,” Alistar says as he moves closer. “Or breeder perhaps.”

“Penny is a lovely name,” Aladar mumbles as he steps through the doorway and sends a glare at his brother.

“B-Breeder?” I swallow hard and look between them two.

Aladar gives an excited nod of his head. “Yes! Is it not wonderful? You are compatible with both of us! We had to be sure, of course, but now everything will work out just splendidly!”

“I’m not being anyone’s breeder!” I shout and twist my wrists to try and break free. The brothers merely watch as I struggle. “I want to go home!”

Alistar is the first to speak. “You mean that home?” He lifts a hand and points a finger. I stop, turning my head to stare wide-eyed at a small porthole the size of a large fist to see where a planet was rotating off in the distance.

“Is that…Earth?” I ask, my mouth falling open. “What the—?”

“You are no longer welcome on Earth,” Alistar continues as if I haven’t interrupted him. “You belong here now, however unfortunate that is. You are our breeder.”

I continue to stare at Earth as if to somehow wake myself up from a horrible nightmare. “Why did you pick me?” Tears fill my eyes. What is going to happen to me? Why am I being called a breeder?

Aladar moves to stand in front of the porthole, and my eyes flicker up to stare at him. The tears spill down my cheeks as I try to twist my head to see the porthole again. “We need a female that can handle our sexual drives. As a race, we are dying. We would not have taken you were it not a dire situation.”

“Race? Sexual drive?” I feel like screaming at the top of my lungs, but it hurts just to breathe. Whatever Aladar did before I blacked out for a second time made it hard to take in any oxygen. It was as if he had used a taser or shocked me with electricity. It was intense, painful, and burned my entire body from the crown of my head to the end of my toes.

Aladar nods and crouches down to my eyelevel. “Yes! The Starling race, our race, is dying. Only males are born. So, every few years, we go to a planet to find us a female that can handle our lineage—”

“The same way you were probed,” Alistar says off to the side. I don’t even bother to look at him.

I’ve been probed. Is that