Page 13 of Alien Mercenary’s Wife (Lathar Mercenaries: Warborne #7)

She looked him up and down, and he couldn’t help but puff his chest out slightly, even though he knew her assessment had nothing to do with him being male.

Instead, he knew she was cataloging weapons, stance, and probably calculating his threat level and potential usefulness.

When her eyes met his directly, it felt like the earth ricked beneath his feet.

"Good for you, handsome. Whatever the fuck that means."

The casual dismissal should have stung. Instead, he bit back his smile. Most people either cowered when they heard the Warborne name or tried to impress him. This woman had called him handsome and dismissed him in the same breath.

He liked her. He more than liked her.

"It means we're very good at killing people who need killing," he replied.

"T'Raal and his crew are the best in the galaxy," Tank cut in. "They saved me, and they'll do the same for you."

The Captain studied his face with professional intensity. Whatever she saw must have satisfied her, the tension dropping out of her shoulders.

"And what's the price for this rescue operation?" she asked, glaring at him again. "No one does anything for free."

His head lifted as voices drifted between the containers, growing louder. Close. Too close.

They needed to move. Now. "Tank asked me for help. That's all that matters."

"Just like that?"

"Just like that." He met her gaze. "You're family to her, which makes you family to us. The Warborne take care of their own."

Something flickered across her expression… surprise, maybe. Before she could respond, the sound of light footsteps reached them.

"We can argue about this later," he said. "We've got company converging from three directions. Time to go."

Her demeanor shifted instantly, sharpened. "How many?"

"At least eighteen, probably more." He gestured toward the maze of industrial wreckage. "They've been setting up containment for thirty minutes. We're about to be in the middle of it."

"Exit routes?"

"Limited and getting more limited by the minute." He studied her face, noting the way pain tightened the skin around her eyes despite her efforts to conceal it. "How mobile are you? Because we’re going to need to move fast over shit terrain."

Pride hardened her expression as she stood taller. "Don’t you worry about me, I can keep up."

The lie was obvious, but he respected the effort. Admitting weakness wasn’t easy for people like them.

"Good." He activated his comm. "Skinny, we’re going to need pickup. We’re about to go loud."

“Got it, boss,” Skinny’s deep voice filled his ear. “On our way.”

T'Raal turned his attention back to Payne.

"Ready?" he asked, noting the way she automatically checked her weapon placement. The sound of approaching footsteps brought her head up, and she glanced at him.

The net was closing.

“As I’ll ever be,” she gave him something that might have been a smile. “Now let’s get the fuck out of here.”

The first shot cracked past Reese's ear as they broke cover, close enough to feel the heat displacement against her cheek. She hissed and threw herself sideways behind a rusted loader.

"Multiple shooters, elevated positions," T'Raal's deep voice was calm. She watched as he moved like liquid violence, flowing from cover to cover with the kind of grace a man that big shouldn’t possess. She felt clumsy by comparison, especially with her exo-legs.

"Four confirmed positions, probably more. Shit. They've got overlapping fields of fire, boss." Tank yelled over the noise, braced against a shipping container, and already returning fire. Her rifle spat controlled bursts toward the rooftops where muzzle flashes bloomed like deadly flowers.

Reese drew her pistols. Smaller than the rifles the other two were using, but easier to conceal and perfect for close-quarters work.

A figure moved between shipping containers fifty meters ahead, trying to flank their position. On instinct, she turned and fired in one movement. The figure dropped with the boneless finality that marked a perfect headshot.

"Nice work," T'Raal called out, though his attention remained fixed on the tactical situation developing around them. "How many rounds?"

"One." She turned the pistol, checking the count. "How far to the extraction point?"

"Four minutes if we move fast." His rifle barked three times in rapid succession, each shot perfectly placed. A frown creased her brow as, behind him, a figure fell from a rooftop. None of them had fired that way.

T’Raal spotted the direction of her gaze and grinned. "Red's got overwatch, picking off the roof teams. We run hard, stay low, don't stop for anything."

The plan sounded simple enough. Run four minutes through hostile territory while being shot at.

Reese checked the exo-legs charge readout panel at her waist. Not fully charged, but it would be enough. It would have to be.

"Moving on three," he said, and she felt rather than saw his attention focus on her. She refused to look his way. He was probably calculating how much she'd slow them down.

Fair enough. She'd be making the same calculations in his position.

"Three." Tank shifted position, rifle trained on the most obvious ambush point ahead.

"Two." T'Raal's stance changed subtly, coiled tension that she tried hard not to watch in fascination.

"One."

They moved as a unit. Even though she’d never worked with T’Raal and it had been years since she and Tank had been in combat together, that didn’t matter. Between them, they had decades of combined combat experience, and that translated into coordinated action that didn’t need any discussion.

T'Raal took point. She watched him from the corner of her eye, trying hard not to notice how nice his ass looked in those tight combat pants.

Definitely not looking at his ass… she was watching how he moved.

It was just professional assessment, she told herself, though the way her pulse spiked had nothing to do with tactical appreciation.

He was beautiful. Not pretty-boy handsome, but beautiful in the way that predators were beautiful… all controlled power and lethal efficiency. The kind of man who made smart women make stupid decisions.

Tank moved up to cover their left flank, her rifle barking whenever targets presented themselves. Reese held the center, tucked in behind T’Raal with her pistols ready for any threat that made it past the other two.

The first hundred meters went smoothly. Too smoothly. She was almost beginning to think they’d make it, that the tide and her luck had turned.

Then her left hand cramped.

The muscle spasm hit without warning, fingers curling into a useless claw just as one of the enemy popped up out of cover behind a concrete barrier thirty meters ahead. She hissed and holstered the pistol before she dropped it. Instantly, she half-turned, lifted her remaining weapon, and fired.

"Captain!" Tank’s warning came a heartbeat before the world exploded.

Heavy weapons fire erupted from three directions, turning their path into a maze of ricochets and flying debris.

Reese dove for cover behind a shipping container. The servo motors in her exo-legs whined as they compensated for her failing balance, keeping her upright when her body decided to stage another small rebellion.

“Stay down!” T'Raal bellowed as he moved through the gunfire like he was dancing, impossible grace that made mere human reflexes look pathetic by comparison.

She couldn't stop watching him, even as bullets cracked past her position.

The way he flowed from cover to cover, the controlled violence in every gesture—it was beautiful.

Mesmerizing in ways that had nothing to do with professional admiration and everything to do with the way her body responded to watching pure masculine competence in action.

His rifle cracked with deadly accuracy, each shot dropping a target with the efficiency of someone who'd been killing professionally for longer than she could imagine.

A hostile tried to rush him from the right flank. She caught her breath as red dots appeared in the center of T'Raal’s broad back. She opened her mouth to yell a warning, scrambling forward to get a shot off. She didn’t get the chance.

The big alien’s head snapped around, catching sight of the enemy in his peripheral vision.

He wheeled away, moving with inhuman speed as he closed the distance.

Knocking the man’s rifle aside, he wrapped his enemy up in what looked like a dancer’s move, twisting and spinning the guy until his arm was around the human’s neck.

One sharp crack later and the body dropped to the dirt as the Lathar span away again, returning to his firing position.

No wasted motion. Just brutal, applied violence.

She watched the entire sequence unfold in what felt like slow motion, her heart hammering against her ribs. Gorgeous and deadly. The combination should have terrified her. Instead, heat pooled low in her belly. Totally inappropriate.

"Keep moving!" T’Raal bellowed as something big and loud buzzed them overhead. “Our ride’s here!”

She pushed herself to her feet and they ran again, pushing through the kill zone with desperate speed.

Her breath rasped in her ears, her muscles screaming at her as the motors in her legs whined under the extra stress.

They skidded around a corner onto an old parking lot.

In the center, a squat, ugly-looking combat shuttle was waiting for them.

She’d never seen anything so beautiful.

That's when the sniper found his mark.

The round struck her left exo-leg servo, and it died instantly, leaving her biological leg to handle the full weight load. She yelped as pain exploded up her thigh.

She stumbled, fought for balance, felt herself starting to fall?—

Strong arms caught her before she hit the ground.

“Hold on!”

T'Raal lifted her like she weighed nothing, cradling her against his chest as he ran.

Being carried should have been humiliating. Should have been a reminder of how far she'd fallen from the woman who'd once commanded a combat unit. Instead, pressed against his chest, she felt something else entirely.

Safe.

The realization shocked her with its intensity. When was the last time she'd felt genuinely protected rather than just protected by her own careful planning and superior firepower?

His heartbeat was steady and strong beneath her cheek, unaffected by the physical exertion of carrying another person while being shot at. Alien physiology had advantages beyond enhanced reflexes and superior senses.

"Contact front," Tank called out, her rifle already swinging toward new threats. "Moving to intercept."

T'Raal shifted Reese's weight to one arm—one arm, like she was a child rather than a grown woman in full combat gear—and drew his sidearm. His first shot took the lead trooper between the eyes. His second and third shots dropped two more before they could acquire targets.

“Get your asses in here!” The woman standing on the lowered cargo ramp of the alien shuttle opened fire with a heavy machine gun.

She was tall and lean with flame-colored hair, her expression focused as she cut down anyone threatening them with methodical precision.

"Move your asses, people," the woman called out over the weapon's roar. "Pursuit's right on your tail."

T'Raal sprinted across the open ground with Reese still cradled against his chest, Tank running behind them. Bullets cracked past them, close enough to feel the air displacement.

They reached the shuttle's cargo ramp, thundering up it.

"Red, time to go," T’Raal ordered. “Skinny, get us the fuck out of here!”

The machine gun fell silent as the woman stepped back into the shuttle. "Multiple air assets inbound. Time to disappear."

The ramp rose behind them as T’Raal set Reese on her feet. She clung to his shoulders, the deck vibrating underfoot, her left leg useless now that the damaged exo-leg wasn't providing mechanical assistance.

He wrapped his arm around her waist, holding her steady, and her pulse raced. Small gestures, she told herself. Professional courtesy between soldiers. Nothing more.

The shuttle lifted off with the aggressive acceleration of a pilot who understood that staying on the ground meant dying on the ground.

"Sprite's in orbit, ready for immediate departure," someone reported from the pilot's station.

T'Raal smiled down at her as he helped her settle into one of the jump seats, and that stomach-dropping sensation returned with interest. There was something in the way he looked at her—not pity, not charity, but something else entirely. Like she mattered.

Maybe that was enough.

For now.