Chasing Mayhem Read Online Free Page B

to say his name again, force her to think of him as a living, breathing being, a male with friends, perhaps a family.
    Kralj had set that rule for a reason. She’d broken it, would break it again, and there would be a price to pay for that, a pain to endure. 
    Imee held his gaze for one, two, three heartbeats, a token protest, balm for her pride, and whispered, “Mayhem.”
    This time, the male didn’t ask her to repeat herself. He stepped backward. “Don’t try to shoot me again.”
    Fuck him. Imee reached for her weapons and grasped air. The daggers in her boots, the knives hidden in her breast covering, the blade strapped to her spine, all of them were gone.
    She was defenseless. “You stole my weapons.” Panic churned her stomach.
    For a moment, she was twelve solar cycles again, a lost little girl dropped on a strange, hostile planet by the Humanoid Alliance, armed only with an ancient malfunctioning gun and a private viewscreen, told that if she didn’t steal a ship and retrieve her quota of beings, the family she loved would die.
    “You planned to use those weapons against me.” Mayhem showed no sympathy for her plight. His eyes glimmered with humor. A smile curved his lips.
    Imee stared at him. The hilt of her small dagger was visible in the sheath over his heart, placed next to his larger blade.
    She saw nothing funny in her current situation. Her target had her weapons. Intoxicated by his kisses, she hadn’t noticed her disarming.
    An unarmed Retriever was a dead Retriever. Her kind was hated by all. Even the Humanoid Alliance, the beings owning her allegiance, wanted to kill her.
    Dead Retrievers didn’t make quota. She’d made her quota for this solar cycle. When she missed her quota for the next, the Humanoid Alliance would kill her mom, her sister, her brother.
    Allowing herself to become distracted was a foolish mistake, one only an inexperienced Retriever would make. It might have not only ended her lifespan but also her family’s lifespans.
    Imee folded her fingers into tight fists, shaking with shock at what she’d done, angry at herself and at him. “You’re a bastard.”
    Mayhem’s smile wavered. “Imee--”
    “No.” She had to get away from him, from the confusion he evoked within her.
    And she had to rearm. She’d stashed guns in the transport she’d borrowed from Kralj. Imee stalked toward the gap in the stone wall, the passage she’d entered through. She’d replace her arsenal and form a plan.
    “Giving up so soon, my female?” Mayhem trailed her, his tread soundless.
    When she was hunting him, his steps had been noisy, heavy. He had wanted her to chase him, to find him. Her lips twisted. And she, like a untested Retriever, had fallen for his tricks. “I have no guns.”
    “You don’t need guns. I’ll protect you.”
    “I don’t care about myself.” She only cared about her family, about safeguarding them. If she died, she couldn’t do that.
    “Whom do you care about?”
    “Not you.” She couldn’t care about him, about anyone other than her mom, her sister, her brother. It took all of her resources to keep them alive.
    “My female--”
    “I’m not your female.” Imee continued to walk, kicking up the white sand. “Get that through your thick head. I plan to get my guns and capture you, take you back to the Humanoid Alliance.”
    “You told your friend Kralj you’d escort me to the Refuge.”
    “Kralj isn’t my friend.” Friendship was yet another luxury she couldn’t afford. And her mentor didn’t expect that from her. He was using her for his own purposes. Once she ceased to be a weapon he wanted to wield, Kralj would either banish her or kill her.
    Imee entered the small transport she’d borrowed. The first ship she’d stolen hadn’t been much bigger. Its owner, thinking it a vessel no being would covet, had run into a beverage outlet, leaving the doors unlocked and the engines running. She’d taken the ship, almost crashing it into a nearby