Read Online Terran (Breeder) by Cara Bristol - Free Book Online Page A

He tightened his arms, enveloping her in a cocoon of his warmth and strength.
    Marlix, the big baboon, the Neanderthal, her abductor, said nothing but rested his cheek against her head and rocked her.
    * * * *
    “Monto!”
    A shout awakened Tara out of a dead sleep. She jackknifed to a sitting position. Masculine features had twisted into an expression of horror.
    “What is it? What’s wrong?” She followed Marlix’s horrified gaze to the red stain beneath her, all over her.
    Oh great. Just what I need . She did a quick mental calculation. Yep. It was that time.
    “I must summon the physician.” He raked a hand through his hair and leaped out of bed.
    “Urazi!” he shouted.
    “No! Stop!” Tara lunged for his arm. “It’s okay,” she said in a soothing voice. “I’m all right.” She knelt on the bed and hung on to his wrist, aware of the stickiness between her thighs. She avoided looking at the embarrassing mess.
    “I have injured you. I never should have used you. I knew you were too small.” With his free hand, he thumped his chest hard. He appeared stricken. She glanced at herself and winced. Blood smeared her hips and thighs and spread across the bedding as if she’d bled pints instead of a fraction.
    “I am not hurt,” she reassured him. “This happens every month.”
    “You bleed like this every month? How do you survive?” Though still wide-eyed, he appeared a little calmer.
    She released his arm and yanked at the bed covering, then wrapped it around her waist. Sheesh! She even had reddish-brown smudges on her chest and abdomen from having touched herself without knowing it. She looked like she had after Bobby— “Parseon females don’t menstruate?” she asked.
    “Monto! Of course not.”
    “How do their bodies prepare to carry a baby, to give birth?”
    “Not this way!” He swept a hand in an arc. “This is normal?”
    “Yes, but it doesn’t happen like this. Usually I can predict when the bleeding will occur, and I can prepare so it doesn’t create a mess. I don’t have the stuff with me.”
    “What do you need?”
    “It’s called a menstru-cup .” She had to use the Terran word due to a lack of a Parseon equivalent. “I insert it, and it captures the—” She broke off. Marlix had paled. Sweat glistened on his forehead. He had whitened like he might pass out. “Okay, too much information.” Tara suppressed an amused smile. Men were such babies.
    “I doubt such a device exists on Parseon,” he said.
    It didn’t. She’d been briefed she would need to stock up on supplies. “I have what I need at my housing unit and at my shop at the Bazaar.”
    “At the Bazaar? I can retrieve it for you,” he said.
    Tara could have kicked herself. Idiot. Idiot. Idiot . How stupid could she be? She’d blown her best chance for escape. If she had let Marlix believe he’d injured her, he would have called the physician, probably a Parseon one, and given their unfamiliarity with her physiology, she might have been able to convince them to rush her to the Terran infirmary. Marlix had concern for her welfare, and she should have played on his sympathies.
    She assembled a quick plan. “I can write down what I need.”
    The memory of his tenderness as he held her while she cried, his accommodating sexual behavior, and his horror when he thought he’d injured her triggered a frisson of guilt she was betraying him in some way. He kidnapped you! Tara hardened her resolve. “You can take the note to Ramon. He can retrieve what I need.”
    Marlix’s face tightened. “Ramon.” His name sounded like a curse.
    Tara gaped. Good grief, he’s jealous! She suppressed an amused snort. She had a hunch a possessive Alpha was a dangerous Alpha, and she had no wish to jeopardize Ramon’s life. She no longer worried about her safety; Marlix wouldn’t hurt her. That she believed.
    The inappropriate sense of guilt returned, but she ignored it, chalking it up to the beginnings of Stockholm syndrome in