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Jill’s lips quirked despite the exasperation she felt at her friend’s complicated machinations. “It’ll be our secret, but I don’t want to hear another word about me holding out when you’ve been doing so with them in your home.”
Her friend patted her cheek affectionately before striding past. “There is a difference here, hon. The boys and I are playing a game. It’s all fun and games and part of our bonding experience as we get to know each other and become comfortable with our new life together. You hid from what was going on and your own feelings because you didn’t understand them even though you couldn’t ignore them, and they ate at you.” She paused and glanced back at her speculatively. “I bet you even told yourself that you were simply giving into instinct and seeing how it all played out, didn’t you?”
Jill’s eyes widened as she suddenly felt at a loss for words. Diane was right. She hadn’t been able to understand her feelings and simply refused to acknowledge them and just went with everything because it was easier to go with an alien mating instinct than acknowledge her own feelings to any depth.
“It’s okay, Jill,” Diane chuckled. “We’re all only human and the gods know I have plenty of my own hang ups and bullshit. The guys would even confirm that if they were here. For now, come into the kitchen, and I’ll put on some tea. It’ll warm you up. You certainly look half frozen and in desperate need of it.”
Wordlessly, Jill followed her, the kitchen nearly identical to the one she’d spent so many weeks in upon arriving. She felt completely ambivalent to it other than the wrenching sensation of feeling so out of place outside of her own kitchen at the rookery where Duke would be wiggling around her feet and her mates quick to clasp her in the warm hug of their wings. She was completely separated from them for the second time, but this time, instead of feeling aimless and alone, she felt desolate and lost.
She clamped down on that feeling, holding tightly to the memory of the love that they so freely showered on her every day. Though they never offered the words—possibly because she had been of no inclination to acknowledge that every bit of it had been love and not simply a primitive, biological response drawing them together in such a simple and uncomplicated fashion. They had shown her that they loved her, and she couldn’t wait until she was with them again so she could finally share her love with them in turn.
Swallowing, she lifted her gaze to meet her friend’s eyes. “I need to borrow your comm.” She gestured to her wrist. “Mine broke.”
Diane looked at her with surprise but nodded and fetched her comm from its cradle in the kitchen and handed it to her. “What are you about to do?”
“Summon the fucking calvary,” Jill muttered as she searched through the directory database until she found a single contact number connected to the administration office of the High Rookery. “Close enough.”
Selecting the connection, she waited patiently to be put through and didn’t let the coolly polite greeting on the other end deter her in the least.
“I need to speak with Zherist.” She scowled at the scoff she was greeted with. “Look, I don’t care what it takes, but my mates are in danger, as are a number of others due to a sudden situation at Mercurium port. If anything happens to them, I will personally find a way to get down there and kick your ass myself. No, I’m not joking. What? Five foot seven. It’s enough height to find a way to make you suffer or at least have a good view of you being punished if anything happens to the Geminidae stuck down at the port. Now put me through!”
The conversation with Zherist was considerably politer and shorter. He was away from the High Rookery and had not been aware of what was happening there but assured her in a few clipped words that he would handle it and see to it that she had her mates returned to her. That could have been after she threatened to remove his feathers one by one if he disconnected her. She couldn’t really remember with all the anxiety racing through her blood but wasn’t hallucinating the sound of another, quieter male voice along with that of a human, and very feminine, laughter in the background.
Who the hell was that?
Diane peered at her for a moment but seemed to know the perfect remedy for Jill’s sudden case of anxiety as the taliazon snapped anchorless around her with her loss of connection with her mates. Her friend took that moment to push a cup of tea across the counter to her in a silent offering.
The tea, as it happened, did warm her and more importantly, sipping slowly on cup after cup gave her something to focus on and to occupy her time as she waited endlessly for some word or for the Geminidae to return and come rushing through that door with her mates in tow. Diane didn’t say anything. They watched the door together as Diane poured cup after cup for them. The news was muted on the large screen fixed to the living room wall. They didn’t need the sound to know that the situation was tense.
“It’s going to be a miracle if this gets resolved any time soon,” Diane sighed as she pushed a cup of herbal tea in her direction. “Not unless that Zherist person calls the calvary in, and at this point, I kind of wish somebody would. This is ridiculous.”
Men and women with strained expressions reported on the events and cut to scenes of people milling about as they screamed or barked orders. It was chaos, but at least the flames from the explosion had been put out. Lifting what had to be her eighth cup—this time a decaf herbal tea, to her mouth, she paused halfway, her gaze fixing on an intimidatingly large and very familiar looking Geminidae storming through with a leaner but just as mean looking gray male with pale feathers at his right. There was a human female between them hustled at Zherist’s side, her jaw clenched furiously with an expression on her face that would do a mama bear proud. Jill’s brows shot up in recognition. The mother on the ship… and the alien commander. Zherist. He was there as promised and had the appearance of being prepared to tear shit down… or rip a few new assholes, whichever the case may be.
Diane whistled softly from where she leaned against the island counter between them. “Damn, he looks pissed. So does the girlie at his side.”
Jill nodded. “I believe that would be the calvary.”
Her lips trembled and she pressed them tight to keep them from quivering with emotion but that didn’t stop the fullness from settling into her chest. Surely, something would be done, and she would have her mates with her again soon.
Chapter38
Agor hissed at the Geminidae males who’d taken the place of the humans blocking the exit. They were keeping him prisoner for his own safety, they said. Idiots! They wouldn’t even listen to them when they insisted that they needed to find their human mate and had, in fact, laughed at the idea. This was exactly what came from keeping information from their populace. Whatever Zherist’s intentions had been by delaying in making the matter known, it had quite clearly blown up in all of their faces. They were seeing the humans as rivals and aggressors and nothing more when their own mate could be there somewhere among them.
Spinning away from the door before he was tempted to attack the human staring smugly at him, Agor flicked his wings, giving the male his back as he met his twin’s watchful gaze.
“Calm down. Getting worked up isn’t going to help our situation any,” his twin murmured as he pressed in close to his side in a gesture of solidarity and comfort. “We will get out of here soon enough. Zherist would have been informed of the situation by now and taken a flyer directly to the port to deal with matters.”
“That doesn’t make me feel better. What about Jill? We don’t have any idea what has happened to her. The faint, distant response of her taliazon joined with ours is the only thing that gives me any comfort at all because at least I know she’s not lying dead or injured somewhere,” he commented bitterly. “Her human senses being weaker, she probably doesn’t have the same knowledge, and we can neither go to her nor comfort her.” His wings spread and flexed in anger. “Keeping us here is cruel.”
“Contrary to what you might think, they are trying to keep you in one piece,” a familiar voice rumbled in irritation from behind him. “Something that was done on my orders to any Geminidae within the vicinity until I could work out a peaceful resolution with Rhapsody and Mercurium Port.”
Agor whipped around, ready to demand his release but was silenced by Zherist’s cutting gesture as the male loomed over them.
“I do not even wish to hear it,” he growled. “Did you think just showing up here and flaunting your human mate would truly keep you safe? Your orders were explicit. You were to not leave the rookery. While what happened here has nothing directly to do with you nor can be blamed on you, do not think for even a moment that what you’ve done wasn’t noted.”
“It was a mistake, Aerhal,” Brydis interjected as he nudged Agor in warning with his wing. “All of us, including our talia, believed that we would be able to accomplish our business here more smoothly if we had a human in our company to smooth the way. It was a gross miscalculation on our part in that we assumed no one would think anything of it as our species have been living side by side for some months now.”
Zherist nodded and sighed. “The logic in itself was not faulty, unfortunately it was badly informed. We caught wind of rumors among the human populace that we were stealing humans and bringing them into our mountains. Apparently, you and your twin weren’t the only males to have done so, though somehow, the others managed to escape our attention since they were never on our radar to begin with unlike the two of you. Apparently, the humans had been preparing to deal with recovering a potentially stolen human. They were on the watch and your altercation with the other males brought their attention directly to you.”
