Love Galaxy (The Intergalactic Dating Show #1)

Chapter 6

Chapter Six

Sorin

“ U mm… ” Briar is staring at me, wide eyed. She runs a hand through her hairs, and her fingers catch in the tangles. “You’re… Thuck! I mean, fuck . I wasn’t expecting—” She presses her lips together, cutting off the end of her sentence.

Despite her obvious confusion, there is a little more color in her face than when we first met. Hopefully that is a sign she is beginning to feel better. I administered one-quarter the usual dose of antiseptic painkiller, concerned more would be too much for her small physique and equally concerned it would not be enough to alleviate her pain.

“You were not expecting what?” I ask, but of course she still cannot understand me.

She slides off the table and walks a circle around the kitchen, pausing to stare at the control panel set into the wall and to tug at some of the cupboard doors, trying to open them.

“Like this.” I step forward to show her how to press at the top corner to release the seal, and the cupboard door springs open to reveal a turntable holding clean cups. I then press the corresponding buttons on the control panel, causing the turntable to rotate as a cup is selected and then filled. The hatch in the bench top opens then, and the filled cup is raised. I pick it up and take a sip.

Do cupboards not exist on her home planet? Does she not have a kitchen of her own? Isolated as we are, we have only the barest of technology, yet she does not seem to know how to operate even the easiest of controls.

Dread swirls around my stomach as I consider the limited information I have discovered about Briar. No translator. No understanding of the Common Tongue. No knowledge of cupboards. A deep-seated fear of medical units.

“You are a barbarian.”

“What?” She wrinkles her nose, confused by words she cannot understand.

I do not need her confirmation to know I have stumbled onto the truth. She is of a species which has yet to develop intergalactic travel. Planet-bound. Barbarian.

All contact with such species is strictly illegal, as decreed by the Interplanetary Guild. Their planets do not appear on any official space chart, their location strictly guarded by those tasked with policing the known universe.

That she has been taken from such a planet, presumably without her consent, is despicable. My stomach churns thinking about the cut on the back of her head and how she must have been treated to have received such an injury.

“This is real. Really real .” She points a finger at my chest. “I’ve— Are you—” She lets out a shuddering breath, as if steeling herself. “I’m on an alien planet, with actual aliens. And for what? LOVE GALAXY? Is that a genuine show or a fucked up ruse to get me into Mr. Smith’s office?”

John Smith. Pah! I want nothing more than to confront the Drah’os Male, to demand he explain his treatment of Briar, to demand he vacate Ril II. And if he refuses, it will become very clear to him how little power he possesses all the way out here, on the very edge of civilized space.

I clench my fists.

He and Chloe are on our farm, our home. They have no advantage over Killan, Roan and me.

Guilt twinges at the thought of how disappointed Roan is going to be, but I know he will see things my way. He will not want to be paired with an unwilling Mate, and he absolutely will not want to risk hurting Females. Barbarian Females.

“Hey? Are you alright?” She touches my arm. Then, seemingly realizing what she is doing, she snatches her hand back, holding it to her chest. “You’re turning blue.”

I glance down at myself, as if seeing my scales for the first time. Blue tinges my usually green complex, betraying the strength of my feelings. I imagine sinking my fist into John Smith’s fleshy face.

“Wait,” she breathes. “Can you understand what I’m saying?”

“Yes.” I am holding my muscles so tense with anger that I have to pry my jaw open to speak. “I have a translator. Here.” And I touch the scales at the back of my neck, under which my translator chip is located.

“Does a nod mean the same thing to you as to me?” Lines mar her expressive brow.

I have to forcibly resist smoothing them away with a gentle touch of my thumb. I will not touch her without her permission, not after everything she has already gone through.

“I’ve got an idea,” she says. “If you can understand me, raise your right hand. I mean, hands.”

I raise said hands.

“Oh, wow. Okay. I guess it’s just me that’s confused about what’s happening here. You didn’t help abduct me, did you?” But before I can respond, she is already shaking her head. “No, not you. You looked almost as surprised to see me as I was to see you. Does that mean you abducted too?”

I raise my left hands.

“No.” Another frown, more lines across her brow. “But you’re to be a participant on this reality show, same as me?”

I raise my right hands. Yes.

“Three women,” she says, almost as if she is speaking more to herself than to me. “Three lizards… ahh—” Heat flushes her face, highlighting the tiny dots that decorate her nose and cheeks, and she glances up from under her eye hairs. “Three of you. Plus Mr. Smith and his assistant.”

As though her words have summoned them, footsteps sound on the steps behind me, and we both glance across the kitchen to the stairs.

“Hey.” She grabs one of my hands, her fingers cold against my own, and this time she does not hurry to stop touching me. “Promise me you won’t tell the others I’m awake, okay? You can’t tell them about any of this, not until I’ve had time to think. I need a plan. I need—” Voices accompany the approaching footsteps, and what color her face has gained since the antiseptic painkiller drains away. “Promise me,” she insists in a fierce whisper, her fingers tightening on mine.

I open my mouth to tell her I cannot. I cannot let what John Smith has done go unpunished, but the fear in her eyes silences me before I can say anything, and I give a quick nod, raising my right hands.

“ … spend most of our time down here when we are not working,” Roan is saying as I turn around to face them, putting myself between Briar and the approaching others.

Behind me I hear the legs of a chair scrape on the floor, and then they are stepping down into the kitchen.

“There you are, Sorin.” Roan strides across the room to stand beside me. “I was telling our guests how you do not live close by but still spend time in this kitchen, when we have our family meetings.” He claps me on the shoulder.

“Yesss… ” I drag the word out, surprised and confused by their lack of reaction. Glancing behind me, I see nothing of Briar. Even the cloth I used to clean the blood from her head has disappeared from the table.

Can Humans turn themselves invisible? Or is she camouflaged, her skin now the same color as our pale walls?

“Are you feeling ill?” Roan asks me, narrowing his eyes at me in what is clearly a silent act normal , you scudding fool . You are embarrassing me.

I must be the least of his worries, though, for Killan has his upper arms crossed over his chest and refuses to cross the threshold, as if his kitchen has been tainted by the cameras that Chloe is clipping to the workbench and onto the doors of the storage cupboards.

“I am well, Roan. Very well… ” I search the faces of the two-person production team trying to decipher if they have yet realized Briar has escaped their spaceship. John Smith is examining a datapad, clicking between camera angles, checking directions and focus, while his assistant hovers at his shoulder, waiting for new instructions.

Where is the Female? I study the walls, searching for any small inconsistency that might alert me to where she is hiding. That she does not want anyone else to know she is here has me keeping my silence, even though I cannot look at John Smith and not want to strike him.

“ … Sorin?”

The Drah’os Male is looking around the kitchen with an air of disinterest and hardly appears to have noticed me, so focused on pointing out areas where he wishes cameras to be placed.

“Did you hear me, Sorin?”

I could toss John Smith’s body to the wind until he is nothing but white bone, and nobody but my brothers would be any the wiser. We are so far from civilization.

“Sorin?”

Is that why he brought the abducted Humans here? Because he knew that even the Interplanetary Guild would not have the resources to send to the edge of civilized space in the Humans’ defense?

“Sorin!” Roan knocks me with his shoulder.

“What?” I stumble sidewards and bump into the table, pushing it a few inches along the ground.

“Ouch,” comes a soft gasp from between chair legs, and my heart beats a stampede in my chest.

“What? I demand, speaking much too loud in my attempt to cover Briar’s hushed exclamation. “What did you say?”

“I said that when they have finished setting up cameras here, you can take them to your house.” Turning to John Smith, he continues. “Sorin lives against the southern-most boundary.”

It takes only a few more minutes of work for the production team to satisfy themselves that the multiple kitchen cameras are correct, and then they follow a still talking Roan through the main entrance into the underground arboretum. His voice quickly fades from hearing as the door closes between us.

I lean against the table, trying to act natural as Killan, the only one to have remained behind, watches me closely.

“I knew you would not like the cameras.” My older brother steps nearer.

“At least I am not being openly hostile,” I retort harshly.

Briar is here, I should say. But there are cameras watching us, and I cannot bring myself to force the words from my mouth.

With a feeling akin to a physical flinch, I shield away from the thought that mayhaps I do not want to tell Killan about Briar because I do not want to share her. Righteous Killan, who would never let an injustice go unpunished, would dismiss Mr. Smith and Chloe from our planet with all the confidence and authority of being the eldest brother, and then Briar would know it was Killan who could protect her, Killan who could be a good Mate.

I grind my teeth.

Or mayhaps she will meet Roan and be immediately drawn to his passion, his youthful earnestness, his merry chatter and his dedication to finding love, and mayhaps she would choose him over me.

“Is this what you call being not hostile ?” Killan asks, glancing down at my closed fists.

Unclenching my hands takes all my willpower, and only when Killan shakes his head at me, as if he is the only one allowed to be angry today, and follows the others out of the kitchen do I release my held breath.

“Fek.” I bury my face in my upper hands. Already my anger is fading. Already I am feeling ashamed of the strength of my reaction. Never until a moment ago have I hated my brothers. Never until I met Briar did I want to hit them.

“That was way too close,” she whispers.

I straighten and turn to see her crawling out from under the table. She is not invisible or camouflaged. She looks how she did the first time I saw her—coated in dust from head to toe, all messy hairs and cloth-covered skin. Small, weak. Easily broken.

“I can’t stay down here. They’ll probably come back this way any second now.”

“Akh… that was Killan.” It takes a moment for her words to sink in, although I hardly think my translator is to blame, and then I’m suddenly selfishly glad she still cannot understand me because I did not answer her question correctly.

“Kill-an?” she asks, taking hold of my outstretched hand.

“My brother.” It feels too rude not to answer, despite her lack of understanding. “You would not like him,” I grumble. I pull her gently to her feet. The urge to hold her in my arms again, as I did when I carried her down the steps, is nearly overwhelming, and I tuck my four hands behind my back to prevent myself from reaching for her.

What is wrong with me?

She shakes her head, indicating her confusion. “I’ve got no clue what I’m supposed to do. I’m in outer space. Outer space!” Running her hands through her hairs, she turns a circle, making it clear she is talking to herself. And in full view of the cameras. Even now, John Smith might be watching us on his datapad.

Taking her hand, I tug her toward the stairs, but there are surely cameras on the stairwell and in the two upstairs rooms. I hesitate, wracked by indecision, but Briar steps out of the kitchen, taking the stairs two at a time.

“Do you have a spaceship?” she asks, glancing at me over her shoulder. Even on a higher step to me, she is shorter than me. “Could you take me back to Earth?”

“Ear-th? That is your home planet?”

“Earth. Yes, Earth.” She latches onto the only word of mine she knows. “Can you take me there? But we’ve got to get the other women first. There’s no way I’m leaving them behind.” Reaching the top stair, she turns confidently toward the outside door and presses the button to activate the release mechanism.

The door slides silently open, and the wind hits us full in the face. Briar splutters, shielding away from the strength of the air and spitting hairs out of her mouth.

I reach toward her, intending to pull her into my arms (to help her, I reassure myself, not because I want to hold her), but she pushes forward, head bowed and an arm before her face to shield her eyes from the merciless dust.

Despite her small stature, despite the fact that one wrong move could have swept her off her feet, she does not hesitate in her quest. I have not seen such bravery in one so physically insubstantial, and were I not already convinced that our desperate grasp on this tenuous situation was about to slip, I think my mouth would have been open in awe.

Turning, her eyes widen when she sees I have not followed. “You’re not coming?” She has to yell to be heard over the screaming wind. “But I need your help. I can’t read the screens to get those stupid tubes out of their throats.” Evidently fearing I cannot properly hear her, she gestures for me to step forward.

My legs respond before I have fully appreciated what is happening. There might as well be a rope going from her hand to my legs, her wish my every command.

I hurry to catch up, and we fight our way forward, heading toward the director’s spaceship. It is not such a new model that Roan would fawn over it, but it is certainly newer than our own ship, which has been repaired more times than I can count and which I would not trust to carry me into orbit, let alone beyond this galaxy.

She so clearly wishes to return to her home. But there are two problems with her plan.

First, I do not know where this Earth is. The locations of barbarian planets are not listed in the Guild directory for anybody to use. Second, I cannot help her return home without a working spaceship of my own.

I would tell Briar this if she could understand me. Instead, I am left following her, with no plan for how to fix this colossal mess.