Going Green : Celestial Mates (Science Fiction Alien Romance) (Vialea Book 2) Read online

  Going Green

  Celia Kyle

  Erin Tate

  Contents

  Going Green

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  About the Author

  Going Green

  How far will Rhea go to escape Earth? Mate a big, bad (in the best ways), and occasionally green alien.

  Rhea is leaving Earth and nothing will stop her. Not her controlling governor father, her asshole ex-fiancé, or the Department of Population who want to impregnate her. Which is why she contacts the one organization out of their reach—Celestial Mates. A questionnaire and blood sample later and Rhea is matched to a hunky, deliciously tempting, and alluring alien.

  Erudan—once known as Teon, brother to the High Warlord of Vialea—did not register with Celestial Mates. Or rather, he’d never submitted his application. Yet a curvaceous, dark haired, green eyed human stands before him and demands they mate. Immediately. He lost his honor long ago and doesn’t deserve a female like the seductive Rhea, but that does not stop the wanting.

  Unfortunately, others from Earth want her returned and Erudan is happy to show them the error of their ways. No one challenges a Vian warrior… and lives.

  One

  Thankfully Rhea didn’t really do the whole hovsick thing. Simply because if she did… the contents of her stomach would have ruined the perfectly clean, perfectly perfect furnishings in the Celestial Goruza’s private observatory. And stars only knew how much it’d cost to replace everything.

  Well, she’d managed to make it across the galaxy in the Celestial Mates ship, she could manage another few minutes while the spaceship gradually lowered through Vialea’s atmosphere.

  Vialea—her new home. She swallowed hard. Not just her new home. Something more. Something better?

  She wasn’t sure yet.

  She pressed her palm to her stomach. The closer they drew to the planet’s surface, the more her gut churned.

  Relocation wasn’t a big deal. As the daughter of Lewis Lux—governor and career politician—she’d moved homes more times than she could count. Hell, she enjoyed discovering new places. Of course, most of the people in those new places were human.

  Whereas the people on Vialea… were not.

  Bright side? She’d convinced herself it was be the biggest, most exciting adventure ever! Good since she was pretty damn sure it’d be her last relocation.

  Mainly because of her primary reason for traveling to Vialea. There was someone who called Vialea home—Erudan, her new mate.

  Mate with a capital M and lowercase forever-and-ever.

  Rhea took a deep breath and released it slowly. She’d had the entire trip from Earth to Vialea to get used to the idea of an alien mate. That was why she’d gone to Celestial Mates in the first place, right? She’d handed over thousands of credits to be matched with her perfect mate and they’d found him… on another planet. That’d led to climbing aboard the Celestial Goruza.

  She rose from her chair and wiped her sweaty hands on her pants. Moving closer to the clear viewing glass that formed one wall of the observatory, she stared at the nearby green and blue planet.

  Below, Vialea grew larger and larger as the Celestial Goruza descended.

  Night had long blanketed the planet’s surface, wide swaths of blackness interspersed with electric lighting. During the day, those darkest spots would be the vibrant green of large hewo trees, but for now they remained hidden.

  She trembled, fear and excitement warring for power within her. The first look at Vialea’s surface wasn’t comforting or welcoming. It scared the hell out of her. Not even the knowledge that her mate was down there eased her rapidly growing anxiety. She memorized the picture of Vialea after dark, the Celestial Goruza swaying as it lowered to the port.

  Soon it’d lock into place and it’d be time for her to depart to begin her new life.

  She wondered if it was too late for take-backs.

  Clunks and thuds vibrated the ground while the scrape of metal on metal overwhelmed all other sounds. The crew was securing the ship, which meant it was past time to put on her big girl panties and pull herself together. Anxiety needed to hit the road.

  Besides, it wasn’t like her to get so stressed. She’d made her choice, dammit. Vialea and an unknown mate was better than a life of her father’s choosing or one spent marching to the beat of the Department of Population’s drum.

  There was no going back. Ever.

  Back was a world of heartbreak and betrayal. Back was a dickhole fiancé who liked Papa’s money, not her. Money Papa had paid so she wasn’t forced to endure bearing service at the Department of Population’s governmental hands.

  Back meant becoming an incubator, not a mother. Someone else would raise the child they implanted in her womb.

  Forward? She took another deep, cleansing breath. Forward—even if it meant mating a stranger—could only be better.

  The door to the observatory whisked open, revealing the Celestial Mates employee who’d accompanied her on the long journey.

  It seemed “forward” had arrived.

  Now or never.

  Rhea mustered her widest smile and her best, bright perky voice. She’d fake it til she made it. “Is it time to go?”

  “Yes. We hope your journey has been pleasant and that your coming union will be fruitful.” The employee spoke in a soft, lyrical voice. Like her golden wings, pale, glowing skin, and pointed ears, the melodic manner of speech was a hallmark characteristic of her race.

  At first, the gentle tone coupled with the ship’s near-silence had been soothing. Now, Rhea wanted the noise and bustle of a city. And to hear the sound of her mate’s voice. Being so close, anticipation shoved aside her anxiety and she ached with the need to get off the Celestial Goruza.

  “Okay.” Rhea jerked her head in a quick nod. “I’m ready.”

  Maybe. –ish.

  The Celestial Mates employee’s smile widened and she gestured toward the door. “Your mate awaits.”

  “Awaits?” She swallowed hard and her eyes went wide. Awaited? Already? She’d expected having to endure immigration security. Not an immediate face to face while she smelled of travel and the sterile surroundings of the ship. She didn’t stink but she didn’t feel like herself. She’d hoped to have time to wash her hair, maybe a bit of perfume…

  The employee drifted away, seeming to float across the smooth ground and leaving Rhea behind. The angelic female turned left, gliding over the metal grating that lined the hallway.

  Rhea stood in the observatory’s doorway, watching her guide draw farther and farther away. “Wait! I need my suitcase. My things?”

  The employee glanced back, a placid smile in place. “It will be handled.”

  Rhea grimaced and looked to the right, staring at the long hall that led to her suite. She turned left and followed the angelic woman. “Everything I own is in my luggage. I’d rather get it myself.”

  Not entirely true. She still had her personal carry case filled with precious mementos, money, personal information, and a photograph of her new mate.

  Still, everything else was in those two cases. Everything.

  She nibbled her lower lip and allowed herself to be
led to the ramp that connected the Celestial Goruza to Ikkim—the largest land-side trading port on Vialea.

  Despite the darkness that blanketed the planet, the dock teemed with activity. Night hadn’t lessened the crowd of aliens—some humanoid and others very, very not—filling the space.

  And somewhere in that chaos was her mate.

  In theory.

  Without taking her attention off the crowd, she addressed her handler. “So… now what?”

  “Now, you join your mate. He will care for your needs.” The lyrical tones washed over Rhea in a soothing wave.

  Movement on Rhea’s other side snared her attention and she watched a crewmate heft her suitcases down the ramp and deposit them on the dock. Her feet moved out of necessity, unwilling to let her life out of sight. Sure, they were only holding clothes and toiletries, but what they represented concerned her. Her last connection to her former life. Sure, she’d wanted to come to Vialea because she had no other choice, but not everything had been bad about Earth.

  It wasn’t until she reached the end of the ramp that she realized the Celestial Mates employee hadn’t followed. The crewman who’d lugged her cases off the ship hadn’t remained either.

  She was alone.

  On an alien planet.

  Glancing behind her made her turn, drawing her attention back to the ship. The ship whose doors slowly emerged and slid to a close immediately followed by the ramp withdrawing back into itself. A hiss and wave of smoke and air was followed by the retraction of the docking clamps. The engines roared to life, heat flaring and washing forward to wrap her in a heated embrace.

  And then the ship left. Left.

  They were in the sky and Rhea was alone on an alien planet surrounded by aliens.

  She watched them, not taking her gaze off the rapidly retreating ship. It grew smaller and smaller in the night sky, a single glowing dot rising from the planet’s surface until it winked out of sight.

  She swallowed hard and reached into her bag, her fingers caressing the familiar rectangle tucked inside—an image of her mate. It wasn’t very good—grainy as if it’d been taken from a security camera—but that didn’t change the fact that he was hers.

  She squinted at the image and then scanned the flowing crowd, searching for the male from the photo. Not him. Or him. Or him.

  There was no one. No handsome Vian male who was excited to greet her.

  She breathed deeply and then released the air with a hacking cough, the stink of the Celestial Goruza’s engines still clouding the air. Note to self…

  “Okay,” she whispered to herself, and this time she kept her breath shallow. “Relax. He’ll be here. He wants you as much as you want him. I mean, I want him. Or whatever.” She shook her head. “Gah. Whatever.”

  With the size of the crowd, Erudan was just running late. Caught behind a hovtruck making deliveries every hundred feet or something.

  No reason to panic. She totally wasn’t panting and on the verge of a panic attack. She wasn’t dizzy because of a raging dose of “freaked the fuck out.” Maybe it was the change in gravity. Vialea wasn’t Earth, right? The differences could cause hyperventilation.

  Yeah, she’d keep telling herself that. Forever, if needed.

  She flexed her hand and turned around, reaching for the handle of her suitcase.

  Step one, grab suitcase.

  Step two, move aside.

  Step three, meet mate.

  Except how was she supposed to make it through steps two and three if the necessary parts of step one were missing?

  Rhea closed her eyes and counted to three—three was a lucky number, right—and reached for one of her cases again. Her fingers wiggled in air, latching on to nothing at all.

  Her throat tightened and dread washed through her, driving away the panic that’d consumed her only moments before. She cracked her left eye open and peeked down to where her suitcases were supposed to be waiting for her.

  Yeah, still nothing. At all. Her suitcases were gone.

  God—of Earth and Vialea—hated her. Did Vialea have more than one god? If so, they all hated her.

  Rhea looked around the station, attention swinging wildly from one side of the other until… A larger person—thing—hurried away from her, body moving awkwardly as if they carried something heavy.

  Like her suitcases.

  “Hey!” Her yell didn’t even make a dent in the loud rumbling of the crowd, but shouting was all she had so she did it again. “Stop! Those are mine! Stop!”

  Well, she assumed that was what he carried anyway. And yeah, she knew that assuming “made an ass out of you and me” but she’d rather assume than be stuck with nothing but the clothes on her back.

  If she was wrong, she could apologize later.

  With every passing moment, she grew more and more certain she wasn’t wrong.

  She clutched her personal bag and abandoned the dock, bolting into the slowly moving crowd. She shoved and squirmed her way through the mass of aliens. Ones who didn’t seem to want to let her pass.

  Assholes. Some of them even looked like assholes, so she wasn’t wrong.

  She shoved and nudged, pushing her way past one particularly slimy person-thing, until she finally broke free of the unending tide of bodies. The moment she had room to breathe, she stumbled to a stop and changed her mind. Maybe it was a better idea to let the thief have her crap. Because the wide-open dock wasn’t so wide open any longer. A network of dark alleyways snaked off in every direction, hiding who only knew what in the shadows. They were like open mouths just waiting for a tender-fleshed human woman to wander into their deadly traps.

  Ugh. Why had she thought watching classic horror vids was better than lighthearted romantic comedies? It didn’t matter. What mattered was that she refused to turn into the first casualty of the movie. She wasn’t too stupid to live.

  Rhea turned to go back to the dock, her figurative tail tucked between her legs, when a flash of pink danced around a corner.

  Neon pink. Her favorite color. The color of her personal bag, which matched her suitcase.

  With renewed energy, she raced into an alley on her right, all thought of movie casualties a thing of the past.

  Down one alley and then another. Left, right, left, left. Shit, had she already passed that clump of mystery waste once already?

  It didn’t matter. She’d run until she couldn’t anymore. Those were her belongings, dammit. She didn’t haul them across the galaxy only to have them stolen.

  No. Way.

  She pushed onward, giving chase until she couldn’t take another step. Literally couldn’t continue. Not because her body gave out on her—though it was definitely hating her ass—but because she couldn’t pass through walls.

  “Dead…” she wheezed and bent over, sucking in air while she stared at the dirty, metallic wall. “End?”

  Dashing sweat—not tears, dammit—from her eyes, she peered at the tall swath of stained metal in front of her again.

  Yup, still a wall.

  Okay, not the end of the world. She’d lost her clothes. And her favorite perfume. And those shoes that made her legs look awesome. But it wasn’t like Vians ran around naked. They had their own fashions she’d end up having to adopt anyway, right? And their own flora they used to make perfume. It’d suit her just as well. She’d simply embrace her the new culture immediately rather than easing into life on Vialea.

  It was more important to book it back to the docks to wait for Erudan, anyway.

  If he dared. She wondered if he would dare since he was late, which left her unprotected and vulnerable to the perfume-stealing, slimy alien wolves.

  “Jerk,” she mumbled. Being mad at him was better than the fear that threatened to overwhelm her. She’d been hopped up on adrenaline when she’d darted into the dark alleys. Adrenaline that’d long deserted her.

  Maybe Erudan was already at the docks, waiting for her. She bet he’d be the one panicking because he couldn’t find her. The thought ch
eered her a little. No sense in her being the only one freaking out. She straightened her shoulders and turned back the way she’d come, determined to make it back to the dock with her head held high, not scurrying like a defeated mouse.

  Buuut no.

  No.

  Rhea was back to the gods of Earth and Vialea hating her. And really, staring at her new friend, she wondered if a few other alien gods decided to join the Rhea Lux dogpile.

  A massive, lumpy shape blocked the mouth of the dark alley—humanoid but not. A subtle light drifted across the mouth of the path, dim light flickering at the alien’s back to reveal that he had two humanoid legs, but they were accompanied by four arms. And a tail. And horns.

  Horns.

  Horns, which were typically used to gore things. Like people. People-things, which was a category she fell into.

  The creature bent at the waist, lowering those horns, and shining red eyes met hers. He took one step and then another, picking up speed as he lumbered forward.

  “I am so fucked.”

  Two

  A turning past, Erudan hadn’t known anything about the cramped, impoverished blocks in Ikkim’s space port. He had not ever smelled the dank odors of the tight quarters.

  A turning past, he had been far removed from the dark alleys in this area of Vialea. The Vians and off-world immigrants residing on the outskirts of Ikkim led lives that seemed simple, but that was far from the truth. The residents struggled to earn compensation that would never elevate them from the poorer districts of the station. Then they would be preyed upon by those without conscience.

  Those who cared nothing for others.

  It was those beings Erudan vowed to hunt. He stalked the hidden streets, alert to predators who would further reduce the most vulnerable of his people. He drew in deep breaths of the surrounding odors, immersing himself in their lives.