Page 31 of Monsters in Love: Lost in the Stars
Margot
I’m going to kill Aiken.
Emily whimpers beside me, and my protective-best-friend instincts kick into overdrive. Before I know it, I’m stalking down the middle of the aisle, clutching my bouquet so hard I’ve lost all sensation in my fingers. I don’t care. This overgrown brute is going to get whacked over the head with them six ways from Sunday for messing up Emily’s big day.
Aiken puts his hands up, like that’s going to stop me. “Margot, I?—”
“Save it,” I hiss. Everyone’s staring at us. “You are ruining the most important day of your best friend’s life and mine and?—”
A thud on the other side of the door interrupts me. Aiken blinks and spins around, his plasma rifles out and pointed at the door.
“Are you serious?” I snap.“You weren’t supposed to bring weapons in here!”
But Aiken ignores me, as usual. Murmurings in the crowd echo throughout the hall. Then there’s another thud against the door, like someone’s trying to batter it down. Some of the staff members exchange confused and concerned glances, and one of them moves to open the door, but Aiken pushes the young man aside.
“Don’t you dare open that door,” he growls.
“Aiken,” I say, and step toward him, my hand outstretched. “What is it? What’s the problem?”
The doors fly open, and everyone goes silent. A ten-foot-tall alien strides into the room, not even sparing Aiken or myself a glance. With a lizard-like head, tail, and claws, I clock him as a Denorran. They inhabit asteroids throughout the universe.
He looks vaguely familiar … no, very familiar.
Seeing this man makes my insides liquify, because he looks exactly like General Atraxis, the Denorran who still haunts my dreams.
He was the head of a crime syndicate on Nocturne, an asteroid known for its gambling hells and dens of debauchery. Kallista had a job there a year ago, but it went poorly. So poorly that the general vowed vengeance against her and collaborated with Kallista’s rival, Lacie, then tried to kill her during her concert on Cristal.
If it wasn’t for Xavian, we’d all be dead right now.
Xavian lets out an audible growl and stalks forward. “You,” he yells, “should be dead.”
“You must be thinking of my predecessor,” the Denorran lilts. “How unsurprising but disappointing that you can’t tell the difference between us.” He straightens as he clasps his claws behind his back.
A young male staff member approaches the Denorran warily, his hand extended. “Sir, this is a private ceremony. Invitation only. I’m going to have to ask that you?—”
The Denorran lifts his plasma pistol and shoots the poor man right in face, killing him before his body has time to hit the floor. Emily screams and Aiken grumbles something under his breath, as if what just happened was a momentary inconvenience. But Xavian fumes silently beside Emily. His normally calm face screws up into one of rage, and I wince as he lunges forward and raises his fist to punch the general.
Aiken grabs his best friend by the arm, and pulls him aside, stopping him. Two more Denorrans, a male and female, enter the room. The male clutches a pair of plasma rifles while the female brandishes her long, graceful tail like a whip. They cackle as the young staffer lets out a whimper and slinks back toward the benches.
Xavian moves Emily behind him. Aiken turns to do the same with me, but I push past him. There’s no way I’m going to cower behind a man while my best friend’s wedding is ruined. I worked too long and too damn hard for this day to go up in smoke.
I growl at the Denorrans, my teeth bared like a feral wolf’s. Their leader looks me up and down with his yellow eyes, and his lips narrow into a thin line.
“Look at you. Lunan female. Ready to pounce, are you?” He moves forward and snatches my chin in his claws. “Sumptuous enough to work for me, I suppose. We’ll leave you alive.”
I spit in his face. My saliva slides down his beak, but he doesn’t move to wipe it off. Aiken loosens a growl as Xavian tries to hold him back. Emily screams something from behind Xavian, but I can barely hear anything over the throbbing of the blood rushing in my head.
“Little kitty has claws. Cute. We’ll remove those, of course,” the general says, then nods to the male and female at his sides. “Cherise. Abel.”
The female Denorran, Cherise, is at least six feet tall and slender. Her tail is even longer and wriggles like a snake. I’ve never seen a female of their kind before, but they look even deadlier than the males. Fuck. The male, Abel, is at least six-foot-seven and appears to be missing an eye, replaced with a glass orb.
Some of the guests begin weeping quietly, while others wail. And then someone gets the bright idea to scream, “I’m getting the hell out of here!” from somewhere in the crowd.
Chaos erupts as the wedding patrons rush for the doors. Xavian grabs onto Emily and shields her from the stampede with his body. Aiken howls with fury, grabs onto my waist, and hoists me into the air, yanking me away from the general.
The Handmaiden bots chase the guests who managed to escape, and their eyes turn red all at once, like someone flipped a switch inside of them. They take aim at the crowd with their palms, and gunfire fills the air. I let out a strangled scream.
No, no this can’t be happening. This isn’t happening! And gods dammit, I knew those bots were shady.
Aiken tosses me under one of the benches and pushes me down with a meaty claw.
“Stay. Down,” he growls into my ear. I nod.
The screams are deafening. From the gap of the bench, I can make out a Zenosian nobleman slide forward to shield a young woman with his body. I wince, expecting him to go down … but instead, he absorbs the plasma beam with ease.
“Everyone, behind me!” the nobleman bellows, and dozens of patrons get behind the mass of gelatin and eyes.
Using his body as a shield, he allows the guests to escape mostly unscathed, and I heave a sigh. Thank goodness for small mercies, I guess.
But where are Emily and Xavian? My heart leaps into my throat when I hear the Denorrans cackle gleefully and attack Aiken, who grunts and growls as he fends them off. While everyone’s distracted, I crawl along the floor on my belly in hopes of finding Emily or Xavian, but Aiken reappears by my side and presses his hand into the small of my back.
“Dammit, woman! I said stay down!” he snarls.
“Emily!” I cry. “Where’s Emily?”
Not only that, but where are the damned police?! This place should have been crawling with security and cameras. They should have been here ages ago with squad scrammers.
I have to get to Emily. Have to protect her from all of this. This was supposed to be the best day of her life, but now it’s turned into a nightmare. This can’t be happening. Not after everything we’ve been through.
I watch as Aiken’s feet move away from me while plasma rays crackle through the air like streaks of lightning. Xavian lets out a scream, and I hear Emily call for him from across the room.
Fucking hell. She sounds so terrified. I can’t hide under this bench forever. I slide out from under the bench and crawl away while Aiken charges into Cherise. While they fight, I shred the bottom of my gown and toss it aside.