Kade: Alien Adoption Agency #2 Read online

  “Atlas might be a little shy at first,” the man said, walking toward her with the baby.

  “That’s fine,” she said, turning and leading the way down the hill. “I don’t intend to be too hands-on until he’s older.”

  She didn’t hear his footsteps behind her right away, so she turned back.

  He was wearing a surprised and amused expression.

  “What’s in here, unprocessed electrum rods?” he asked, picking up her case with a grunt as his expansive muscles rippled with the effort.

  He promptly began chuckling at his own joke before she had a chance to answer.

  She was relieved to see it was just a typical chauvinistic joke about a woman having heavy luggage. In truth, he had no idea how close he had come with his guess. Only what she was keeping in the trunk was far more valuable.

  She headed down the hill without further comment, and the man followed this time.

  The wind whipping off the lake was actually quite brisk and pleasant. Phoebe found herself admiring the green and blue landscape of the lush moon as they walked.

  “The forest is beautiful, but it’s very dangerous,” the man pointed out. “By the way, my name is Tyro.”

  “What’s so dangerous about the forest?” she asked, ignoring his blatant attempt at permission to call her by her first name.

  “Only the normal things during the day,” he said. “But at night there’s a sort of cleansing - first the piranha pigs clear the surface and then the under cats burrow up to eat anything too big for the pigs, and of course, the pigs themselves.”

  “Under cats?” she echoed.

  “Sort of like Terran tigers, but without fur or eyes,” he said. “But don’t worry, it just means you have to be really careful after dark if you’re outside the town and beach area.”

  “I’ll be living on a farm,” she reminded him. “How will this impact my crops?”

  “Oh, it won’t,” he said, grinning at her.

  The baby chose that moment to let loose with a string of strange sounds and motions of his chubby hands.

  “Are you excited to go live on a farm?” Tyro asked him.

  And though the man’s voice was so deep and loud it made Phoebe’s organs reverberate, the baby was not at all frightened, and instead banged him on the head approvingly with a small arm.

  “Aww, thanks, buddy,” Tyro said with a satisfaction Phoebe found irritating.

  “Isn’t this the lake?” she asked, pointing at the rocky shore.

  “Yes, we’re on the other side, though,” Tyro said. “Past the village.”

  She buttoned her lip in displeasure and walked on.

  The village was small at least. Walking through it wouldn’t take too long.

  The stone streets were dusty, but the little houses with their terra cotta style roofing were rather charming, in a frontier homestead sort of way.

  Along the main street, vendors stood under tents, offering their wares.

  She scrutinized each stand as she passed, knowing that she would be doing business with some of these shop keepers one day soon. The owners with the neatest tents and best selections would be able to pay the highest price for her crops.

  “Are you hungry?” Tyro offered, clearly misreading her interest in the stalls.

  Her stomach chose that moment to grumble.

  “Say no more,” he laughed. “Now let’s see, I think this will be the best one.”

  He pointed at one of the more modest tents.

  “He hardly has anything on display,” Phoebe protested.

  “That means he doesn’t have to advertise,” Tyro told her. “Come on.”

  He marched into the tent, leaving her no choice but to follow.

  She listened while he dickered with the shopkeep, the two of them negotiating in a friendly way until they came to some sort of an understanding.

  The man wandered into the back and came out again a few minutes later with a huge sack.

  “Okay, princess, I’ve only got two hands,” Tyro said, arching an eyebrow. “What do you want to carry? The baby, the groceries or your trunk?”

  She blinked at him in unhappy surprise, then grabbed the sack.

  “Ha,” the shopkeep’s rusty laugh cut the air.

  “Come on,” she said crisply to Tyro.

  “Cheers,” Tyro said to the shopkeep, giving a little salute.

  They headed back onto the street.

  The sun had begun to dip in the sky, and only one or two other customers were walking around. Phoebe recalled reading about the significantly shorter solar cycle on Clotho. That would take some getting used to.

  Despite her feelings about being put to work hauling the goods, she had to admit that the food in the sack smelled incredible. She peeked inside to see some sort of baked goods wrapped in paper and a couple of pounds of unrecognizable produce.

  “There’s no milk,” she said.

  “There are cells in the icebox, don’t worry,” he told her. “That was all set up for us ahead of time.”

  She nodded, satisfied. That made sense. Of course the droids would have been programmed to ensure that she had a full larder. She was curious to see exactly what kind of equipment had been provided for her. She was prepared to be roughing it this far from the inner rings, which probably meant only a small contingent of older-model droids. But she had always been resourceful, and she was determined to make do.

  They walked along in peaceful silence, passing a general store and then a saloon. There didn’t seem to be a bookstore, Phoebe noticed sadly.

  A woman in a scarlet gown, with long, pale tentacles streaming from her head sauntered out of the saloon as they passed, her eyes fixed on Tyro.

  Phoebe felt a pang of sudden anger, shocked by how much it felt like jealousy.

  Ugh, he’s a guard, not a suitor. Chill out, Phoebe.

  “Aren’t you a big strong one?” the woman sang out to Tyro, wiggling her hips.

  “Yes, thank you for noticing,” he replied politely, looking at her eyes, not her bottom.

  “I might have you give you a discount,” she tried again gamely.

  “Great,” he said. “What are you selling?”

  The woman’s eyes widened slightly and her tentacles fell flat to her shoulders.

  Phoebe couldn’t blame her disbelief. How dense could this guy be?

  “Whatever you want,” the woman replied in a sultry tone, eyeing him in a way that he surely couldn’t misunderstand.

  Phoebe saw the instant that Tyro recognized what was going on.

  His eyebrows jumped up and he blushed an even deeper shade of green.

  And somehow, in spite of everything, Phoebe began to laugh.

  2

  Tyro

  Tyro turned in surprise.

  The little Terran’s sudden laughter was like a waterfall, sparkling and merry.

  She had seemed so cold and unhappy until now.

  It made the big warrior feel light inside to see that serious face alight with mirth, and he couldn’t restrain his own laughter.

  The situation was funny. He was a soldier, after all. And while he wasn’t a regular of the brothels and pleasure ships, he should have recognized an invitation to pay for coupling.

  The trouble was, he was so distracted by the curvy little Terran that he hadn’t really paid much attention to anything going on around him.

  First, he had horribly overpaid for groceries, and now he had dealt with a businesswoman as if he were an innocent dragonet instead of a grown man.

  There was something about this Terran - something that was making his dragon behave strangely, pacing and groaning in his chest.

  “My apologies,” he said to the saloon woman, bowing as low as he could with the baby in one arm and the unbelievably heavy trunk in the other.

  “Don’t worry about it,” the woman said, looking a little miffed.

  “We weren’t laughing at you,” he assured her solemnly. “We were laughing at me.”

  �
�I knew that,” she replied in a warmer tone, winking. The pale tentacles on her head lifted once more, wiggling happily. “Come back and ask for Saana if you ever change your mind.”

  Satisfied that he had made things right, he turned back to the Terran.

  “We should continue,” he told her.

  “Lead the way,” she said.

  He hadn’t noticed before that her voice had a melodious quality. He wondered exactly where she was from. So many of the Terran planets had different dialects and accents.

  He assumed she was from one of the lower Terras. A wealthier woman from one of the uppers would be unlikely to walk away from everything they knew to raise a child on a frontier moon.

  Her amusement at bawdy humor supported his theory. He made a note to himself that she liked jokes. For some reason he couldn’t explain, he was unusually interested in pleasing her.

  “Would you like to know more about your son?” he asked her, belatedly remembering his manners.

  “Yes, please,” she said, eyeing the babe with an expression that almost looked suspicious.

  “You may already know that the warriors of the Invicta are sworn to protect our homeland,” he began.

  “Yes, I’ve heard that,” she said.

  He wasn’t sure, but he thought she was being sarcastic. He decided to ignore it.

  “We once committed a tragic mistake that we cannot unmake,” he said. “The details are unimportant, but as a result of our actions, the gentle society of Imber was destroyed. Recently, the Intergalactic Council ruled that the Invicta could use the preserved DNA of the lost Imberians to create pod babies. The babies will inherit all the mineral riches of their planet when they come of age. Until that time, the Invicta are sworn to guard them.”

  “Most of that was in the brochure,” she said, nodding. “It doesn’t explain why the baby is green.”

  “The people of Imber have chameleon-like abilities,” he explained. “Because I have been his guard, Atlas has imprinted on me, so he shares my green coloring.”

  “And you’re green because?”

  “My own genetics,” he told her. “Dragons of different lines have different skin tones and slightly different abilities. My green coloration and iridescent scales indicate my lineage.”

  He expected her to ask a follow-up about his abilities, after all, most Terrans viewed those as the most interesting thing about the dragon warriors.

  Instead she walked on with a determined expression.

  “I’m sure you’re tired,” he said after a moment.

  “It was a rough flight,” she admitted. “It will be good to get some rest.”

  The lights of the village had disappeared behind them and the docks were in sight now. It wouldn’t be much longer.

  “We’re nearly there,” he told her as he spotted the tent where they would spend the night.

  His dragon roared at this and showed him a graphic image that made his heart forget to beat.

  Mate, the dragon insisted.

  That couldn’t be right.

  This strange little Terran couldn’t be his mate.

  But he closed his eyes and saw the image again.

  His big green body covering hers, his hands tangled in her sun-colored hair, his cock sunk deep inside her, both of them screaming with pleasure.

  Suddenly, the tent ahead of them seemed impossibly small.

  ***

  Thanks for reading the sample of TYRO!

  Do you want to see what happens between Tyro and Phoebe when the refined daddy’s girl finds out the farm she was promised is underwater? Are you dying to learn about the secret that Phoebe keeping from everyone, and what she’ll do when the locals decide she doesn’t belong? Do you want to know what Tyro has been lugging around in that heavy trunk of hers?

  Then grab your copy NOW!

  Tyro: Alien Adoption Agency #3

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