Adira's Mate Read Online Free PDF Page A

able to hide the reaction. She had a feeling it might have
been a little of both. Easing to a sitting position, he swung his legs over the
side of the bed and slowly put weight onto his leg. “Better,” he muttered. “You
really shouldn’t be apologizing to anyone, especially your enemy. It leaves you
in a weakened position, more so than you currently are in.”
    “ With everything that you’ve gone
through, someone needs to apologize to you. Besides, my future seems to already
be set for me, doesn’t it?” she asked with a frown as she moved back toward the
door and watched him. “We can relax on the flight deck.” Not really a deck so
much as a large space, but still. “The chairs should be comfortable enough for
you.”
    “ Were you the one to cause me this
harm?” he asked. When she shook her head he lifted one of his brows. “Then your
apology is meaningless to me. Only those that caused me harm can tender an
apology that would hold any meaning. Not that they would get much opportunity
as I plan on killing them all as soon as I lay eyes on them again, but they are
the ones at fault, and the ones who must apologize. Lead the way,” he said.
    She nodded and moved to the
flight deck and looked at the seats. “Do you want the pilot or co-pilot seat?”
She wanted him to be as comfortable as he might be able to get.
    “ Co-pilot. It affords more space to stretch
my leg out.” He waited until she’d settled in to a seat she couldn’t do
anything from, then eased into the other. He’d turned
it so he could keep his leg stretched out toward the additional space behind
her seat.
    Leaning the seat back, she
watched the stars as they flew by the screen in front and finally asked him,
“Your people, are they going to kill me on sight?” If he said yes, she would
have to do all she could in order to get free. She would have to try something,
anything. “If so, you could jettison me in the life pod before we get to your
space,” she suggested. “I really don’t want to die.” She was a coward like
that.
    “ Anything is possible, but it is
highly unlikely. Unlike your people, we don’t kill Imarians for no good reason. Depending on what the situation is
when we arrive at the outpost, I’ll decide how best to explain your presence,
should it be required. As I’ve been out of touch for a time I have no idea what
the current climate is like between our two peoples.”
    “ I had thought that we were at a
tenuous peace, but obviously I’m very wrong in my thinking,” she muttered. “I
had begun to study Craegin healing methods with one
of your Medical Ministries advisors. We had been exchanging information all
this time, and I never knew that you were being held,” she whispered in horror.
“What you must think of my people.” The ones that held him were monsters, pure
and simple.
    He was watching her closely while
she spoke, and grunted at her last words. “Our governments claim that peace
still holds, but the soldiers know the reality. Imarian cruisers becoming more and more bold to invade our
space. Then limping back when they are beaten, only to return with more ships
in a desperate attempt to take what is not theirs. It was during one of those
skirmishes I was taken. I’d been on an outpost, assisting our medics in getting
medication to the needy, when the Imarian cruiser
attacked the world. We got everyone onto our tramps to take them back up to the
destroyer. The last one was caught in crossfire, and we crashed. They stormed
the outpost to take me and several others. Some they killed where they lay.
Others, mostly women, were drug away behind their crawler to be used first.”
    “ That’s not good,” she said with a
frown. “I don’t understand it. The only woman in the facility was the one who
had given all that information on your people, and you were the only male. I
had checked all of the other facilities and the two of you were it, unless they
are being held at a military base instead