Stolen (Tribes #2) - Milana Jacks Page 0,15
I can’t tell him I wanna go hunting because the female needs shoes. I think if I do, he might leave me out here, which would be to leave me for dead. We both know Gur rigged the games so neither of us can win, or if we happen to win, we’ll need an exit plan, which was precisely why Mas planned not to win, only to compete against Gur, who should’ve entered the games. “We’re fucked.”
“Finally, you come around,” Mas says. “Yes, please, do continue.”
“We are super fucked. Fuckety fucked.”
He’s nodding, leaning in, waiting for me to come up with something, to help us proceed forward because we need a plan for tomorrow and we need to set something up today, maybe even tonight when the Ra are sleeping, when only the guards roam the camp. But the female needs shoes, and all I can think about is how I’m gonna get her shoes. I can’t make them or produce them out of thin air. We stole her pod, and Hart gave all her clothes to his female, leaving this one with very little.
Though it didn’t escape my notice how the clothes I brought from the pod seemed too large for Michelle's frame, as if they didn’t belong to her. Since her people’s fashion isn’t familiar to me I don’t really know how they wear clothes, only that they cover the parts they waste from, which is terribly inefficient. Our vertos are a better choice. She ought to have worn the one dress I brought.
“Anything else?” Mas asks, anticipating something from me.
“I got nothing.”
“You have the wind.”
I chuckle because an irritated Mas is funny.
“Don’t laugh,” he says, serious, and I laugh again, then see Mas’s hunter pushing to the surface, flashing me with his eyes, drawing out mine.
My heartbeats accelerate, muscles relax, bones begin rearranging, and I growl. “I’ll sleep on it,” I say.
“We can’t sleep on it.”
“We have to.”
“Gur is out there”—Mas points in the direction of the platform—”planning on killing you when you win and—”
“You think I’ll win?”
Mas curses and walks away.
“Hey!” I shout after him.
He parts his verto and shows me his bare ass.
I laugh. “I’m gonna have something for you soon.”
“I doubt it,” he throws over his shoulder.
“Where are you going?”
“Elsewhere.”
“Come back and sleep here tonight.” He lost the dry shelter the tent provides, and now I truly feel bad. “I mean that.”
“I heard you.” Mas disappears from sight, and I stay out here, listening to the rain, watching it hit the puddles, wondering where I’m gonna get her shoes. The shoes win the female. Tomorrow, when she gets up onto that platform and has to spend the entire span there, rain or shine, she’ll wish she could move over the wet, dirty, cold floor, and I can tell this female isn’t used to discomfort. It’s in the fine way she eats, taking little bites, chewing thoroughly before swallowing, making sure her blunt teeth don’t make a mess. It’s refined and…and feminine. Like a goddess.
A thought occurs to me. If Amti lives among us and with Hart, what if another goddess decided to take up the flesh of womankind. Bera? Mae? Or maybe even Herea, goddess of the hunt? No, no, neither of those. I rack my brain, trying to think if I had unknowingly called up a goddess, but can’t think of anything like what happened with my brother Hart, who called up Amti, goddess of madness and lust, then pissed on a fire, effectively marking the goddess for himself.
Thunder and lightning strikes in the distance, lighting up the camp.
I walk back inside and see the female bundled under the pelt. Smiling, I get cozy on her fur-made bed.
Chapter Eight
Michelle
The alien lies down, his body not touching mine, so I’m trying not to freak about the fact he’s behind me while I lie on my side. I fist the corner of the pelt he gave me the way a toddler might fist her comfort object. The fire’s dying down. The temperature has dropped, and minutes later, I can’t feel my toes. A shiver runs down arms, and I’m cold again with partially wet hair.
“I know you’re awake,” he says in a voice laced with something terribly sexy. A soft rumble emanates from his chest. I think he’s purring. I’m fond of cats, always have been, have three at home I’m unlikely to ever see again. At least I know my sister will care for them.
Not that the male is a cat, far from it,