Marauder Kain: Scifi Alien Invasion Romance (Mating Wars Book 5) Read Online Free Page A

says. “I will procure rations from my ship. You’ll want to eat well before they take you hostage.”
    He rips the inner door open, shuts it behind him, and tightens the seal.
    Felicia looks at me with a wide-eyed expression.
    “Don’t say it,” I say.
    “He’s kind of hot–”
    “God!” I shout. “I told you to not say it!”
    “He’s clearly not interested in me,” Felicia says. “But I think you have a real shot–”
    “Felicia. We’re about to be taken prisoner on Darkstar. I’m happy if I have a real shot at ever seeing the sun again. “
    “Those cheekbones, though,” Felicia says. “And it’s hard to tell with his armor, but he looks... strong .”
    “I guess he’s hot in an ‘I AM GOING TO FLAY THEIR SKIN!’ kind of way,” I smirk, rolling my eyes.
    I won’t admit it to my sister– and she knows I won’t admit it– but Kain is hot, and considering how awful our current situation is that we’re in, his offer to protect me is quite moving. Minus the skin flaying, that is.
    “At least he’s going to get us food,” I say.
    “See,” Felicia says, grinning. “He wants to provide for you.”
    I bite my lip to stop myself from smiling.
    “Is this really any better?” I ask. “Before Kain found us, we were most certainly going to starve to death. It would have been painful, but if he turns out to be all talk, can you even imagine what those other Marauders will do to us?”
    Felicia leans back in the pilot’s seat. “I suppose we could have just not plugged the heat in. We could have just slowly frozen to death. That wouldn’t have been so bad.”
    “So what’s our plan?” I ask.
    “Uh, does it even matter?”
    I look out the window and see Kain already exiting his ship, carrying a big crate.
    “Of course it matters!” I snap. “We need to know everything we can about Darkstar. The more we know, the more likely we can get rescued.”
    Felicia forces a confused smile at me.
    “What?” I ask. “Were you just planning to sit on your ass and see if he’d rescue us?”
    “I wanted to at least have a small break from fighting tooth and nail to survive. These last few weeks have been rough.”
    I shake my head. “Do you have any idea how rough it can get as a prisoner on Darkstar? No, you don’t, because no one has ever, ever , come back from being held captive there.”
    I see Felicia’s neck bulge as she swallows.
    “So as soon as that sexy skin-flayer gets back,” I say, “we press him, hard.”
    Felicia grins. “Maybe he’ll press you , hard.”
    I kick the back of her chair, and it tips forward on its pivot, dumping her onto the console.
    She starts laughing. “You asshole!”
    The airlock wheel starts to turn, and Kain bursts back inside.
    He drops the crate down onto the ground. “I have food.”
    Felicia and I nearly dive into the crate.
    It’s full of dried fruit, jerky, vacuum-packed curry, rice, chocolate …everything I’ve ever dreamed of while slowly starving the past few weeks.
    I tear into the chocolate and bite into it. I feel a crunch. “Oh, my, God,” I say, my mouth still full.
    “What?” Felicia says, tearing the chocolate out of my hands.
    I point at the bar. “Almonds!”
    She wolfs it down even more greedily than I was doing.
    Kain removes his helmet and bites into a stick of jerky.
    Felicia swallows the chocolate in her mouth, then elbows me. “Press him hard,” she whispers, then takes another monstrous bite of the chocolate.
    “Kain,” I say, looking up at him. “Can you tell us exactly what will happen once we are on Darkstar?”
    He furrows his eyebrows, and his ears pull all the way back. He doesn’t speak.
    “It’s going to happen whether you tell us or not,” I say. “If you tell us, we’ll at least be prepared. Escaping is going to require work on both ends– yours and ours.”
    Kain’s ears are still pressed back all the way against his head. Like a dog who was just caught tearing up a pair of shoes.
    “Come