Alien Intention Read online

  Alien Mate 3: Alien Intention

  By Cara Bristol

  Our attraction unleashes a perfect storm…

  I’m Stormy Weathers. My love life on Earth is one natural disaster after the other. I’m attracted to bad boys, rebels, commitment-phobes. In a crowd of choirboys, I’ll manage to find the jerk. All I want is a man who’ll love me and my young son, so I’m going to an icy planet to become an alien’s mail-order bride. This time will be different! The chemistry I feel with Romando is electric. It doesn’t matter what my sister or her mate or their tribe says, mutual attraction this strong can’t be wrong, so I’ll do anything to get him…

  I’m Romando, an outcast in my own tribe. One rash, angry act turned me into a pariah and almost got me banished. But what everyone resents the most is that I’m one of the lucky few who’ll be getting a mate. The instant Stormy Weathers blows into Dakon with the other Earth females, my horns tingle. She is meant for me, but I resist the instinct to claim her. You see, she’s related to my nemesis responsible for my outcast state. Honor and pride dictate that I reject her as a suitable mate before she undermines my good intentions. If only I could get her out of my mind…

  Alien Intention (Alien Mate 3)

  Copyright © July 2018 by Cara Bristol

  All rights reserved. This copy is intended for the original purchaser of this e-book ONLY. No part of this e-book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without prior written permission from the author. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  eISBN:

  978-1-947203-02-0

  Editor: Kate Richards

  Copy Editor: Nanette Sipe

  Proofreader: Celeste Jones

  Cover Artist: Sweet ’N Spicy Designs

  Formatting by Wizards in Publishing

  Published in the United States of America

  Cara Bristol

  http://carabristol.com

  This e-book is a work of fiction. While reference might be made to actual historical events or existing locations, the names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Epilogue

  Titles by Cara Bristol

  Free Book

  About the Author

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter One

  Stormy

  “Stormy!”

  I swung around. “What?”

  “Not you.” Rolling her eyes, Cyndra exchanged a smirk with her two friends before returning to peer out the observation lounge window as we orbited Dakon.

  Oh. She’d been commenting on the planet’s weather and not trying to get my attention.

  “She thinks her name is Blizzard,” Cyndra snickered in a stage whisper to ensure I’d hear. Her BFFs giggled.

  “What did I ever do to her?” I muttered.

  “Don’t let her get to you. She never matured beyond the mean-girl stage. She’s rude to everyone,” Vanessa said.

  I appreciated my fellow passenger’s sympathetic support, but Cyndra’s rudeness was personal—I could tell. The moment we’d boarded the ship, she’d taken an instant dislike to me and never missed an opportunity to express it.

  “She’s sexually frustrated,” Vanessa whispered.

  I snorted. “Like the rest of us?”

  Women outnumbered men on Earth, so the good guys went fast, leaving only jerks and commitment-phobes.

  She grinned. “Yeah, except Cyndra doesn’t handle it as well as we do.”

  Ergo: our presence on the S.S. Redemption. We’d all applied for the Terra-Dakon Goodwill Exchange Program in which Earth traded women for rocks. No joke—rocks. Dakon was loaded with illuvian ore, an energy-rich mineral that could power anything. You’ve heard of the Gold Rush? The Illuvian Ore Rush was about to begin; Earth’s government had hit pay dirt and would do anything to get its hands on the mineral, including trading excess females.

  Hey, we weren’t complaining. Due to the dearth of eligible, respectable bachelors, a flood of women had signed up, resulting in a waiting list a parsec long. If I hadn’t had connections through my sister Sunny, I might not have been accepted. The “rocks for brides” program was the best thing to happen to women since the male birth control pill. Better, because you couldn’t trust a man to take the pill, as I’d discovered through personal experience. Still, I wouldn’t trade my six-year-old son for anything.

  Vanessa leaned in close. “Do you ever get second thoughts?”

  “Never.” I shook my head. The moment I’d heard about the program, I’d been interested. But Devon had had a congenital heart defect and until he’d had his operation, we couldn’t leave. Dakon had “healers,” but they weren’t cardiac surgeons specializing in cybernetic medicine. “Are you having doubts?”

  She rubbed her palms together. “What if it doesn’t work out? What if nobody picks me? What if the Dakonian who gets me decides he doesn’t like me? What if I don’t like him? What if he turns out to be a jerk?”

  “I’m sure none of those things will happen. You just have a case of nerves,” I reassured her. “Everything will be fine.”

  “We’re like mail-order brides about to be married to men we’ve never met. Not any men, aliens. Who knows what will happen?”

  “All right! Attention, ladies. Ladies!” When Madison Altman said “ladies,” you knew he meant “crazy broads.” The coordinator’s job was to shepherd us through the trip to ensure we got to Dakon safe and sound, but through body language and tone, he’d radiated disdain for us and the program that employed him. “I need you to stop talking. Now, ladies!” He clapped his hands, actually clapped his hands, like we were preschoolers racing around on a sugar high.

  “I give you exhibit A of why we left Earth,” I murmured.

  “Good point.” She giggled.

  “The storm is abating. We have a short window of opportunity to land before the next one rolls in. Return to your quarters and prepare yourselves,” he said.

  “Booya!” Women cheered, and, ignoring his instructions, crowded around the observation glass. We all thought Madison was an asshole. On that point, even Cyndra and I were copacetic.

  A quiet hum turned into a throaty growl as the S.S. Redemption began its descent. “All I see is white.” The cloud mass obscuring the surface seemed as thick as ever.

  “You’re seeing snow on the surface,” Vanessa said.

  That much? “Devon will be thrilled. He’s never seen snow.”

  Vanessa eyed a fuming Madison then glanced at me. “I wish I could be as confident as you that everything will work out. I can’t help feeling that there’s going to be a glitch.” She rubbed her arms as if she felt a chill, but her problem was cold feet.

 
“Whatever happens, it will all be part of the adventure,” I said confidently.

  I’d had few reservations about coming to Dakon. The fact that my sister had preceded me and found happiness with an alien had clinched it. “Everything will work out the way it’s supposed to.” I patted her arm. “Two groups of women have already done this. No one has gone back to Terra. Trust the facts. According to the government fact sheet—and my sister—the men form deep, lasting bonds with their mates. They adore them. Any man who picks you will be thrilled to have you.”

  A few hundred years ago, an asteroid had hit the planet, nearly decimating the population and causing a massive ice age. To make matters worse, the asteroid had been the gift that kept on giving. It had carried a virus causing a genetic mutation resulting in a severe decline in female births. The Dakonians had been facing extinction when a Terran exploration team had discovered them.

  Earth women wanted men for companionship. Dakonian men needed women for survival. You could say Dakonians were motivated to make relationships work.

  I was motivated, too. If I couldn’t find a decent guy on two planets, I never would. I had to cop to some bad choices, a history of involvement with the wrong men, including Devon’s father. In a crowd of choirboys, I gravitated to the jerk every time. I had a weakness for bad boys.

  The exchange program provided an opportunity to make better choices by letting the choices be decided for me. My fate rested with a horned alien I’d never met.

  * * * *

  As I entered my cabin, Devon nearly plowed me over. “Mom, Mom, are we going to meet the aliens, now?”

  “Yeah, baby, we are.”

  “I’m not a bab—” His jaw dropped, and his eyes grew round. “We are?”

  I laughed and ruffled his hair. “We are.” Since we’d left Terra almost three months ago, he’d asked me every day, and I’d had to tell him not yet. “We have to put on our warm clothes, now.”

  “The announcement came through the comm system,” said Amelia, a passenger who sometimes babysat Devon.

  We’d been orbiting Dakon for two days, but blizzards on the surface had prevented landing. “Yep. We’re supposed to put on our arctic gear and meet in the disembarkation corridor. You’d better get ready. Thanks so much for watching Devon—for all the times.”

  “No problem. I enjoyed it. He’s a great kid.” She hugged me and Devon. “Good luck! I hope you meet somebody nice.”

  “You, too! I hope you meet the man—er, alien—of your dreams,” I said, and we laughed. None of us had imagined our Mr. Rights would be horned extraterrestrials. Excitement curled through me. I’d waited three long months for this moment.

  “Put on your warmest clothes,” I advised. “Don’t rely on the snow gear provided by the Terra-Dakon Goodwill Exchange Program. My sister says the ‘scientifically designed’ coveralls are worthless.”

  “Yes, Mom.” She grinned, hugged me again, and then left.

  Once a mother, always a mother. It was hard not to express my maternal instincts since for the past several years, being a mom had been my sole occupation. When your child is seriously ill, your focus shifts to mothering.

  There’d been no men in my life since Devon’s father had abandoned us, and I’d discovered my son was ill. But after he’d received an artificial heart—thanks to my sister who’d come up with the money through her reality show—he’d become a healthy, happy, active little boy. Now I could focus on me again.

  And “me” wanted a man. I wanted to have sex again, dammit! More than that, I hoped to find a partner who would love me and put me first, and who would be a good father.

  Was that too much to ask for?

  On Earth—absolutely. On Dakon—hopefully not. Like I’d assured Vanessa, a gut feeling told me this would work out—but my hunch warred with my head that pointed out all the bad choices I’d made when I’d followed my instincts in the past.

  “Let’s get dressed,” I said to Devon. “Dakon is going to be cold.”

  I emptied an entire drawer of Devon’s cold-weather clothing onto his bunk. “Put this on first.” I handed him a face mask. He tugged it over his head and adjusted it so that his eyes showed through the holes and his nose was centered under the little flap, leaving only his nostrils exposed.

  Snow pants came next, and then I wrapped a scarf around his neck before he put on his parka, and I zipped it. He sat on his bunk while I shoved boots on his feet, and then I plunked a hat on his head.

  As I helped him dress, he maintained a steady stream of questions.

  “Do aliens really have horns?” he asked. I’d shown him vids of the Dakonians, and he’d vid-conned with Darq, my sister’s mate, yet he still wasn’t convinced about the horns.

  “Dakonians do.”

  “They’re little, though.” His brows drew together.

  “Relatively speaking,” I said.

  “What does that mean?”

  “They’re little.”

  “What do they feel like?”

  “I don’t know,” I replied, but I was curious, too.

  “Will I grow horns?”

  “No.”

  “But I’ll be a Dakonian, right?”

  “Yes, but you’re still human.”

  “And a cyborg.”

  I smiled. “And a cyborg.” After he’d received a mechanical heart, Devon had decided he’d become a cyborg. “I’m part boy, part machine,” he’d explained.

  “Here are your mittens.” I handed them over. “Don’t lose them.”

  “I’m too hot,” he said.

  “You won’t be.”

  Beneath our feet, the floor shuddered; the ship rocked and then went still. The engine’s growl silenced. I gulped. “We’ve landed.” I exhaled to quell a sudden attack of jitters. I anticipated a positive outcome, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t nervous. I would be marrying an alien sight unseen.

  “Attention, ladies,” Madison’s sneering voice piped through the communication system. “Please report to the disembarkation corridor. Be sure to wear your winter overalls. We will deplane shortly.”

  Hurrying, I pulled on coveralls, boots, and a hat, and thrust a set of gloves into a deep pocket. Robos had collected our suitcases to be unloaded to the planet’s surface. We’d been allowed one trunk per person. Devon’s clothes didn’t occupy much space, but he’d brought quite a few toys.

  I grabbed the wrapped box I’d left out of our luggage. “Let’s go!”

  “What’s in there?” he asked.

  “Chocolate for Aunt Sunny,” I replied. We waddled out of the cabin.

  Chapter Two

  Romando

  “I need to talk to you.” Polonio stomped the snow off his boots outside my hut.

  What now? Reluctantly, I stepped aside so he could enter. “I need to leave for the Meeting Place.”

  “That’s what we need to discuss,” he said.

  “Am I not getting a female, after all?” So much had gone awry with the selection process, I couldn’t count on anything going as planned.

  “As far as I know, you’re still getting a female,” he said. “I came to tell you I’ve received word Darq and his mate will be there when the females arrive.” Polonio paused. “Don’t do anything to further demean the honor of this tribe.”

  That he felt a need to warn me was an insult, but I could offer little in rebuttal. My past actions had dishonored my clan. The tribe had appeared to support me in front of outsiders, but within camp their defense was no more solid than a wisp of smoke. I’d become a pariah.

  “I won’t embarrass the tribe,” I said tightly.

  “Good.”

  Neither my apologies nor the fact I’d been provoked into abducting another man’s female had lessened the animosity.

  “How many kel do you have left?” Polonio asked.

  “Three. I’ll finish during the next Thaw and will be able to assist with the planting and harvesting.” As punishmen
t for the abduction, Enoki, the head of the Council of Dakon, had ordered me to prepare and deliver ten kel hides to the communal coffers. That had caused resentment because hunting and preparing the kel had prevented me from contributing to my tribe’s welfare. But mostly, they resented I’d been given a second chance to get a mate when they hadn’t had a first one.

  I’d lost the chit exchangeable for a female, and Darq, from another tribe, had found it and used it. My chit. My female. In anger and frustration, I’d abducted her. I hadn’t intended to keep her; I only wished him to experience what it felt like to be robbed.

  At first, Polonio had supported me, advocated on my behalf when my chit was misappropriated, but after I took the female, he’d felt I’d put him in a bad position. He either had to admit he’d erred in throwing his support to someone who didn’t deserve it, or publicly continue to pretend he’d been right all along. Rather than lose face with the other tribes, he’d chosen the latter.

  Within our own camp, he made no secret of his anger and displeasure.

  Enoki had granted me another chit to replace the one wrongfully claimed by Darq. Competition for females was fierce, and the fact that I’d received two chits when others hadn’t gotten any lodged like a stone in my tribe members’ boots.

  “Why will Darq be there?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. Perhaps he wishes to observe. Don’t cause trouble,” Polonio growled.

  I had a hunch the tribe leader wished he could banish me. However, Dakon needed to repopulate itself. I’d dishonored the clan, but Polonio wouldn’t exile a man who would be getting a mate and might produce children for the tribe.

  “I’ll conduct myself with restraint.” And avoidance. I wanted nothing to do with Darq or Sunny.

  I shoved my hand into the pouch of my kel. With my thumb, I traced the number chiseled on my chit. One hundred—the last one. I would get a female, but I didn’t get to choose who. I’d receive whoever was left after all the other men had picked theirs.