Page 358 of Gladiators of the Vagabond Boxset

Vagabond

Fierce

I stalked down the hallway, ears twitching as I tried to catch even the slightest sound.

Hina said she’d be working on her not-wisteria today; I remembered how excited she’d been to get started this morning.

Yet, she wasn’t in the lab. Had she gone to the hydroponic bay to get more samples of her flowering, climbing vine?

“Fierce Hunter can’t find Fierce Female?

” Snarl inquired over our bond. I could hear the amusement coming from the beast, and I tilted my head down to growl at him, showing off my sharp teeth.

Fellow was riding along on the back of the Ferai beast, and the little black-and-white rodent chittered at me as if he were trying to chastise me.

“Hina is her own person. She goes where she wants to go,” I asserted.

That wasn’t something the beast understood very well.

To him, those who were pack should all stick together, especially mates.

He didn’t understand why I was often looking for my female, when I should never have left her.

Sometimes I thought the same, but then I remembered how happy Hina was to go to her lab and look at her plants through the big lens.

Ducking through the door into the big hydroponic bay, I drew in a deep breath. This was a place that Jakar and Hina had created aboard our ship, and I liked it here very much. There she was. Even with the many scents that filled the humid air, I could never miss the scent of my mate.

She was standing at the back of the room, where the not-wisteria was growing thickly along the wall.

Her midnight-black hair hung down to her shoulders, curling at the temples from the humid air in this place.

In her white, shapeless lab coat, I couldn’t see her figure, but I knew each and every sexy curve.

I loved the focused expression on her face, down to that little scrunched-up wrinkle on her brow.

“Hello, mate,” I said, announcing my presence from the doorway.

Hina jerked upright and spun to face me, hand clutched to her chest. Despite my best effort to warn her, she was still startled by my appearance.

I smirked, amused by the sight. She was always so absorbed in whatever she was doing; it was cute.

“Fierce!” she exclaimed, her expression transforming into a big smile.

She abandoned what she was doing and came to me.

Her eyes roved over my body, lingering on my left shoulder, which had been badly dislocated and broken a couple of months ago.

Though I had long since healed, it had become a habit for her to check my physical well-being each time she saw me.

“Prruh!” Fluffy purred, her head appearing from one of the big side pockets in Hina’s coat.

My arms were suddenly full of my mate, and I gladly held her tight, basking in her presence.

Fluffy the Riho climbed up my chest, curling her slinky body around my neck.

Yeah, that was why I’d gone looking for her: I wanted a hug and some kisses.

She obliged when I pressed a finger beneath her chin, tilting her face eagerly up to mine. Our breathing mingled, and I was starting to think I might want more than kisses. The buzzing of the com device strapped to my wrist distracted me; a message!

My mate laughed when I pulled away to look at it, and I sheepishly grinned back.

She knew how excited I got when someone sent me something, now that I could read it.

I loved getting messages. This one was from Jakar, who never failed to text me during the day.

When I tapped on it, a holographic image unfolded above my wrist, and Hina and I both gasped in shock.

Akri was in the picture; he’d been missing for months now.

Worse, I could see the warnings above and below: “Wanted,” it said.

Wanted for murder. This was a wanted poster; it couldn’t be good.

“Puppy in trouble?” Snarl asked with an anxious whine. The hound rose on his hind legs, slinging one front paw over my wrist so he could look at the image. Fellow was squealing and chortling on his back, acting like it was just another fun game.

“Yeah,” Hina said gently. “But look, he’s got himself a girl!” She grinned at me while pointing at the image of a brown-haired, pale-skinned girl in Akri’s arms. His head vines were curled around her, clutching her close.

I lifted my head and smiled. So, he was in a little bit of trouble, but he’d found himself a mate.

“Good for him. Let’s go see what the others think.

We need to find out where they are and extract them.

” Only a little disappointed that our private moment had been interrupted, Hina and I headed for the mess hall.

A mate would be good for Akri, like it had been good for me.

She could teach him what it was like to truly live.