Authors: Kate Douglas
Dream Unchained (4 page)
Her life would never be the same, no matter what the outcome of Mac Dugan's plan. Her emotions were so tangled up in this man, so connected that it didn't make sense. Not after knowing him for only a couple of days.
Even knowing he wasn't human changed nothing.
She clutched his broad shoulders with both hands, digging into solid flesh that would disappear when he took his natural energy form and returned to the ship. “Be safe. I want time to explore what we're building together, okay? Don't take unnecessary risks. Promise you'll come back to me.”
He nodded. “I promise I will do my best.” Then he kissed her quickly and disappeared in a swirl of blue and gold sparks. Kiera stared at the empty spot in the shower, at the water beating against the tile. Everything felt desolate, empty beyond belief without him.
How could that be? It made no sense, but at the same time, she couldn't deny the feelings welling up from deep inside. Maybe it was the fact he'd been inside her mind, a part of her thoughts as much as he'd connected with her body. Maybe it was just that he was everything she'd dreamed of in a man, and yet, until now, had never expected to find. For whatever reason, Tor filled a need she'd not known she had. He made her whole. Complete in a way she'd not imagined.
And there was the terrible, frightening possibility that she could lose him, long before she'd really had a chance to know him. Sighing, Kiera turned and shut off the tap. Reaching blindly for the towel, she methodically began to dry her arms and legs. Sponged the water out of her hair, rubbed the towel across her eyes. A sob caught in her throat. Another and then another, and she knew there was no hope of regaining what little control she'd struggled to hold close.
Giving in to all the fears she'd tried so hard to block, Kiera buried her face in the soft folds of her towel and wept.
It wasn't only because her heart was breaking. Analytical as ever, her thoughts seemed to twist around a single thought, that now, after she'd finally discovered a man she could trust, one she could possibly love, she might truly learn the meaning of loss.
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Liz shivered in the morning chill as she crossed the open area between her cabin and the main lodge. This was quickly becoming her morning routine, to get up a little after six, work out in her cabin for a bit, take a quick shower, and then head to the lodge for some of Meg's delicious coffee and a couple of rolls. It gave her plenty of time to walk over to the dream shack and relieve Finn in time for her eight o'clock shift.
That was a favorite part of her day, too. Seeing Finn. Go figure. Opening the door, she stepped inside, inhaling the rich aroma of fresh coffee and the sweet smell of hot cinnamon rolls.
“G'morning, Lizzie.”
“Hey, Mac. I didn't see you. Hello, Mr. Dinkemann.” She didn't break stride on her way to the counter with the coffee, but after she got a cup and a plate with a couple of warm rolls, she walked over to the comfortable chairs by the front window.
It was weird enough, being on a first-name basis with a guy as rich and brilliant as Mac Dugan, but Nils Dinkemann, too? She knew she must be grinning like an idiot when the famous newsman stood to greet her.
“Don't get up.” She took a seat beside him on the big couch and set her plate on the coffee table.
“Then don't call me Mr. Dinkemann.” The emphasis was definitely on the
mister,
but he was laughing as he flopped back down on the couch, and damn but his teeth were as perfect as they looked on television, his smile just as sexy. Of course, so was the rest of him.
mister,
but he was laughing as he flopped back down on the couch, and damn but his teeth were as perfect as they looked on television, his smile just as sexy. Of course, so was the rest of him.
She raised her eyebrows. “Nils?”
“Dink. That's what Mac's called me for years. At least the only name acceptable in polite company.” He glanced at Mac with enough affection in his eyes that Liz didn't have any doubt at all where he'd spent last night. Then she noticed the twinkle in Mac's blue eyes and hoped like hell she'd been blocking her thoughts.
This telepathy thing was really cool, but it could sure get a girl into trouble. “Okay. Dink it is,” she said, shoving all inappropriate thoughts out of her head.
Coffee. Think coffee. Coffee's safe.
Coffee. Think coffee. Coffee's safe.
“Mac tells me you've been part of the Mars project. I'm hoping to do a story on that when it's ready for launch.”
She sipped her coffee and nodded. “I was, before signing on for this. It was my first NASA job and I really learned a lot.” She laughed. “Nothing like what I've learned here.” She rolled her eyes. “Wow.”
“And you're like, what? Twelve?”
She glared at him, but it was hard with a mouth full of cinnamon roll. Even harder not to laugh when she growled, “Try twenty-five,
Mr.
Dinkemann.”
Mr.
Dinkemann.”
“Ouch. I take it age is a touchy subject?” He flashed her that perfect grin that women all over American had fallen in love with on the nightly news.
“Just a bit. At least the Nyrians don't seem to mind my rather youthful appearance.”
Mac shot a quick glance at Dink before turning the full wattage of his sexy smile on Liz. What was it with the men here? “I take it you had visitors last night.”
“Oh, yeah.” She giggled, as much at herself for blushing as the fact she was even having this conversation with two gorgeous men older than her father. “You never explained the terrific benefits with this job, Mac. I mean, we're talking way beyond your standard health plan.” She shot a quick glance at Dink, who was obviously trying as hard as she was not to laugh.
Mac grinned as he nodded. “Yeah, I imagine there aren't too many companies that can promise employees will get to experience exquisite alien sex with multiple partners.” He glanced at Dink. Both of them cracked up.
“You must be reading my mind.” Lizzie took another bite of her warm cinnamon roll. “Seriously, I've spent quality timeâemphasis on qualityâwith a total of two women and four men over the past couple of nights.” She sighed dramatically. “And not necessarily one at a time.” She fluttered her fingers in front of her face while the guys chuckled.
“I just hope all the Nyrians have connected well enough to you guys to have a body when it's time to escape.” Mac shot a worried glance at Dink.
Liz nodded. “Actually, I think Morgan and Rodie were hoping to get most of the remaining Nyrians last night, and Cam was going to catch any who were left, so they should all have their human forms by now.”
Mac glanced up and grinned. “We can find out how Morgan did. G'morning, Morgan.”
Liz glanced over her shoulder as Morgan headed straight for the morning buffet. “Hey, Morgan. Where's Rodie?”
“Still asleep.” He glanced her way as he poured himself some coffee. “We were up more than we'd planned last night.”
Liz flopped back on the couch, laughing. “I hear ya on that.”
Morgan took a seat beside her and raised his cup in a toast to Dink and Mac. “What'd you want to ask me, Mac?”
“If you and Rodie managed to get everyone covered last night. Did you?”
“All but two.” He sipped his coffee. “We figured we'd better leave someone for Cam. The rescue plan was his idea after all, and when he relieved Rodie after her shift, he said he was looking forward to his first actual sexual fantasy.”
Dink chuckled. “You guys must realize that you're driving me nuts. As an investigative reporter, all these fascinating tidbits and no details I can actually report are killing me.” He took a swallow of coffee. “Though I have to admit, if I were to take the story public right now, no one would believe a word of it.”
Liz glanced from Morgan to Mac and then smiled at Dink. “I'm right in the middle of it, Dink, having killer sex with guys who turn into flashes of light and disappear, and I still hardly believe it.” She shook her head and glanced at Mac. “I'm not complaining, though. Honest.”
Then she saw the somber expression on Mac's face and her heart fell. “Mac? Is Zianne okay? Where is she?”
“At the dream shack with Finn. We took her over in the hope that any Nyrians who might show up today could share energy with her.”
“You're not expecting many?”
“Not really, though we want you at the shack, keeping a steady stream of fantasies going through the array. I have a feeling most of the Nyrians will be preparing for tonight's first shift change when they start their escape.”
“It's getting close, isn't it?” She thought of the men she'd been with last night, so excited they were finally breaking free of the Gar. How afraid they were of failure, but accepting, too. “The guys with me last night, Ian and Darc, are more than ready. They didn't stay long, but they wanted me to know how much this means to all of them.”
Morgan nodded. “Bolt said the same. In fact, I had hoped he'd be the one to teach me how to dissemble, but it seems their shift schedule won't work for that. He was with us last night.”
Lizzie wrapped her fingers around Morgan's and squeezed. “Are you okay with that? With turning into nothing but particles and actually going on board the ship? I'd be scared to death.”
He chuckled softly and patted her hand. “Lizzie, I'm so terrified we don't even want to go there, but I have to do this. I want to, and so does Finn. We talked about it, about taking a risk like this, and we both realize this is bigger than anything either of us has ever been involved in. It's huge. To be part of it, to do something no human being has ever done before . . .” He raised his head and glanced at Mac. “Something else we discussed. If this doesn't work, Mac, if we don't make it, Finn and I don't want you to feel guilty. You're giving us an opportunity that's unique, that's impossible to explain. We don't want you having any second thoughts, because we sure as hell aren't.”
Morgan's comment slammed into Mac. His dark eyes glittered with the passion of his beliefs, yet his words were softly stated, given power by their seemingly offhand manner.
The power of what he offered, the amazing generosity of his words, threw Mac's brain into almost immediate turmoil. He blinked, trying to process what Morgan had said. It was amazing, that men he hardly knew would be willing to die for a goal Mac had worked toward for two decades. Mac's goal, not theirs, and yet Morgan spoke as if the danger was of no consequence, as if the attempt was what mattered most.
Who could expect such a thing? What kind of men were willing to give everything for someone they hardly knew, for creatures not of their world?
And yet . . . as Mac's thoughts went from logical and organized into an emotional free fall spinning out of control, the shift into chaos sent his mind into a rhythm that had been lacking. He discovered a pattern to the myriad twists and turns, the thoughts and ideas that for so long had felt like a convoluted mass of pointless incoherency. Morgan's softly yet powerfully spoken words forced an amazing clarity to Mac's mental process, until the convoluted threads of consciousness once tangled and knotted suddenly shimmered with logic and form.
Opening up in his mind's eye was a perfect tapestry of his life now and to come, woven in all the colors of the rainbow. Instead of a mass of twisted knots, each thread was finding its place within the pattern, forming the image of what was to come.
In that image, he saw Morgan and Finn. He recognized Liz and Cameron, Rodie and Kiera. Zianne was there, and Dink, all of them together, connected by those amazing threads of fate, surrounded in brilliant flashes of energy, a powerful wall of Nyrian souls, free from captivity at last.
Morgan was right. This was so much bigger than any single one of them. It wasn't all about Zianne, or all about Mac and his twenty-year crusade to save his lost love. It wasn't about the innovations or the inventions or even the money. This was about something bigger than all of them. It was stopping the Gar from their marauding journey through space. It was saving the remnants of a once thriving society, giving the Nyrians the chance to live out their days on a world that would hopefully welcome them as the intelligent, sentient beings they'd shown themselves to be.
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