The Chameleon Soul Mate Read online

  Solfa helped Mrs. Hosp with the wig and the dark glasses that hid part of her face. While this was going on, Tarsea had a few words with Koel regarding logistics if anything went wrong. Tolfer handed Starc a couple of bottles of fermented keen, as the two left the house.

  People were getting re-situated in the common room as Koel left to follow Starc and Mrs. Hosp. Tarsea knew he would be able to breathe a little easier once he got a telepathic confirmation from Starc when they were safe.

  Tarsea faced Solfa, his fists clenched at his sides. “Never ever bring a targeted individual to this house again. I will not jeopardize my soul mate or my parents. There is no discussion on this topic.”

  The woman had the good sense not to say anything, she merely nodded. Tarsea looked at his little pixie to see if she looked angry. Fortunately, she looked fine, but he had to know for sure. “I hope you are not angry at my dictate.”

  “I agree with you. We were blindsided by her presence here. Solfa or Starc should have communicated to you through the warrior’s channel and gotten instructions on where to place her. I concur, your parents should not be implicated in any of this. We can talk later about my role going forward.” Tarsea smiled, it was more than he had hoped for. He knew she was going to be put in harm’s way in the future, but he also knew he would be right alongside her.

  “Tarsea,” Alexandra said, “I do have a question though. How are you going to get Mrs. Hosp through the portal with patrols monitoring its activity?”

  “The portal only has an energy signature on the receiving end when the event horizon opens. We can track when a gateway is opened to our world, not when we open one on this side. They are not physically standing near the gate, although there are regular patrols at the bottom of the trail. A physical presence at the portal may become a reality if we cannot identify the culprits involved in the plot. For now our government is more concerned about who is entering our world.”

  “Darden,” Alexandra appeared to still be struggling with how the portal worked, “how do you know where you are taking Mrs. Hosp?”

  “I enter the gateway and through my crystal, I can manipulate the energy signature to open a portal in a particular world. For instance, there is a certain frequency that will open the natural gate in Sedona, Arizona.”

  “Can the person re-enter a portal they came through?” his soul mate asked.

  “Alex,” Darden answered, “I am afraid not. The portal closes on the originating side as the last person exits on the arriving side. It is too dangerous to enter the portal on the event horizon side due to the energy emitted.”

  It appeared his best friend had answered his soul mates questions for now. Tarsea wanted to get the meeting back on track. The sooner he got the answers he wanted, the sooner he could get Alexandra into bed.

  “Darden, I want to know what is going on with Benko Jarlyn. His being alive now has to be weighed in the decisions we make going forward.” Tarsea knew that eventually he would go through the portal where his soul mate was born and meet with the man himself.

  “I met him eight years ago, along with his daughter. Had I not accidentally touched Cassie, I probably would have kept walking and never met the man. We had an immediate connection and the soul mate telepathic channel opened instantaneously.

  “You can imagine Benko’s reaction when his ten year old daughter had found her soul mate.” Darden must have felt Tarsea’s mother’s intense stare. “I promise, I have been a perfect gentleman, Leenea.”

  “You better be, young man.” His mother had always given Darden a hard time about all the girls he had dated when he was a teenager. When Darden turned eighteen he just stopped dating and his mother had been concerned about his best friend. They had no idea that Darden had stopped going out with women to be faithful to his young soul mate.

  “Naturally, from that point on, I visited them as often as I could. There were barriers because of her age, but I was able to watch her grow into the beautiful young woman she is today.” Darden smiled, he must have been thinking of his soul mate. Tarsea did not know if he could have displayed the willpower Darden had shown over all those years.

  “The last time I was on Ginkgo Terra, I tried to talk to him through the warrior pathway and succeeded. Benko knows the legend of that pathway and what it means. I sense that eventually he will come back home. His first priority is getting the girls here.”

  “What girls?” Solfa was a couple days behind in all the excitement that had occurred with Alexandra’s arrival.

  Tarsea decided he would take over at this point. “The people who went through the portal with Benko passed away. There is an agent in the air that attacks our telepathic brains. They left four girls behind. Most of us found out about this when Alexandra fell through a portal that Darden opened, before it closed.”

  Solfa shook her head and stared at her cousin. “I guess I was so consumed with the assassination attempt, the warrior channel, and Alexia. It did not dawn on me that she came from another world rather than another province. I had just assumed that some time ago Starta came back with Alexia and placed her in Norri’s care. Some intelligence officer I am!”

  “I have been working with Benko to bring the girls home. By some miracle Alexandra ended up on the same hiking trail where the natural portal is in Sedona. She was not supposed to be the first one I was to bring over. On my next trip, I will bring her best friend Shirl to our world.”

  Tarsea squeezed Alexandra’s hand. He knew what having Shirl in this world meant to her. From time to time he saw a faraway look in her eyes. He knew she was thinking and worrying about her two friends.

  “Everyone,” Tarsea said, “we need to see if we can build our network with the people Mrs. Hosp provides. Alex and I should be able to vet them to determine if they are legitimate. I would not be surprised if we get more links into the warrior channel before long. Darden, you need to continue to pressure Benko, we need his commitment. Solfa, anything else I am forgetting.”

  Her face brightened, Tarsea knew she felt guilty about having brought Mrs. Hosp here and this was his peace offering. “I will interrogate Allaine Hosp.”

  “Great,” Tarsea responded, “when you are done, coordinate with Darden to get her through the portal. You take point on the extraction. Leverage Koel for any logistical planning. He appears to be a happy dolt, but he is an excellent tactical planner.”

  With those words, Tarsea stood and brought Alexandra up with him. “I am calling it a night. Alexandra has had a long day and I want to take her to bed.” He literally dragged her out of the common room as she was wishing everyone a good night.

  They had barely stepped into their bedroom when Tarsea was all over Alex. There was a frontal assault on her clothes that were removed before she even caught her breath. The clothes had been so loose fitting, it had not been much of a challenge for Tarsea to remove them.

  He lifted her against the door and she wrapped her legs around his waist. She really liked this side of Tarsea, the out of control animal. He snarled and muttered to himself as he held her, kissed her and messed with his leggings to pull himself free. His urgency fed her own.

  Tarsea entered her with one powerful thrust. The momentum had such force, her head slammed against the door. “Sorry,” he growled and started to carry her to the bed. His foot got caught on the rug and they both went flailing onto the floor. Tarsea took the brunt of the fall, but did not skip a beat in tasting and touching her.

  Alex started to laugh as Tarsea continued to make love to her on the rug. She could sense his urgency, evident from the slapstick lovemaking. She utterly adored this man.

  He continued to enter and withdraw from her, keeping a constant rhythm she kept pace with. It was over, almost before it began, both climaxing at the same time. “Oh baby, it has been such a long nerve wracking day. I have been holding back for hours.”
r />   Gathering her up in his arms, he brought them to the bed. He gently placed her down and laid next to her, bringing Alex into his arms.

  “I wanted to be there at The Palace to bring you home and make love to you as soon as we got here. My father said it would be better if I sent my friends. I think he was concerned I would endanger us both if your interview did not go well. Darden, Koel, and Starc had been outside the building just in case.”

  Alex knew Tarsea would have had some operation related to her safety activated while she was at The Palace. It did not surprise her that his friends were backing him up. Solfa’s presence must have really thrown them. She would have loved to listen in on the conversation they were having in the warrior link. Sometime she would have to ask Solfa about what she heard as they walked to the house. In the meantime, she could at least get a response from Tarsea.

  “You must have been so happy when I came home with Solfa in tow.” She extended the ‘so happy’ part of the statement. Alex could not help but giggle. Funny, how often she did that. She never considered herself a giggler.

  “Let me say my first impulse was to kick her out of the house and grab you.” She could tell that sparked something in his mind. He got that frown on his face when he thought too intently. “Who the hell is James Bond? I have been meaning to ask you.”

  Alex nuzzled his neck and ear. She decided to use their link, since she felt her mouth had better things to do. “He is a fictional character in a series of books. James Bond is a British Secret Service Agent. They made a bunch of movies from those books. The best James Bond was Sean Connery, but the sexiest is Daniel Craig.” Alex pulled back and gave Tarsea a critical look. “That is who you remind me of, Daniel Craig. It has been driving me crazy trying to figure it out. You are way better looking, but your body type is like his.”

  “So you like my body?” Tarsea crowed. The man was so full of himself, but he had a reason to be. She loved his body and it was now all hers to enjoy.

  “I love every inch of it,” she said as she grabbed the tunic he was still wearing and helped him pull it off. Tarsea then got rid of the leggings around his knees at this point.

  Tarsea was fully erect again. She rose onto her knees, positioning herself over his stiff rod. Slowly she brought him into her body, torturing her soul mate with each tantalizing inch of him. He had been fast and clumsy, now she was going to be slow and methodical as she made love to him. There was no urgency this time, she had all night.

  She could sense he was about to flip her and drive into her again. “Tarsea, don’t you dare change our positions. It is my turn and we are going to go nice and slow. I am going to drive you crazy!”

  He groaned, but he did not attempt to change their positions. He grabbed her waist and held on as she rode him. “You are ruthless, my little pixie. By The Prime, I love this!” She could only grin at his reaction to what she was doing to him.

  They both came at the same time, Alex experienced the most intense orgasm she had to date. She set that one as the benchmark and would strive to outdo that one each and every night. Yes, she thought, that was an excellent plan.

  She collapsed next to him and Tarsea brought her into his arms. Alex knew the topic she was going to bring up was not going to thrill her soul mate.

  “About tomorrow,” Alex asked, “who are you going to have follow me when I have my date with Raine Narmouth?”

  “What makes you think I am going to have you followed?” Tarsea had the gall to look surprised. Alex gave him her ‘you can’t be serious’ look.

  “You trust Narmouth as far as you can throw him,” Alex told Tarsea. “You are going to have someone with me from the moment I walk out that door.”

  “You bet your life I am,” Tarsea answered. “He so much as touches you, Koel is going to kill him for me.”

  Alex did not know if he was serious or kidding.

  Chapter 20

  Alex woke feeling groggier than usual. She did not sleep well, due to Tarsea’s comment about Koel killing Raine if he so much as touched her, and him waking her up continually to make love. He was insatiable last night.

  She rolled out of bed and felt her way to the shower. Her body was sore in places she did not know could get sore. Alex adjusted the shower head so it would provide a needle painful current of water against her aching body.

  Tarsea had left out a terrible putty color tunic and legging for her to change into. There was no way she was going to wear that awful outfit, even though she was having lunch with Raine Narmouth. Alex went to the closet and examined the tunics that hung there. She did not want anything that clung to her, but she wanted to wear something that Koel could easily pick her out of a crowd. Today was not the day to blend into the background. She chose a light lavender color tunic and leggings of the same color.

  After dressing, she put on the very basics of a light make-up job. She wanted to cover the huge circles under her eyes. Tarsea probably kept her up all night on purpose.

  She started walking to the kitchen when there was a knock on the front door. Since she was the closest, she opened the door and there stood Raine Narmouth.

  “Hi,” Alex welcomed her date, “please, come in. I am running a little late this morning. Would you mind if I had something to drink before we left?”

  “No,” Raine answered, “please, take your time. I am actually early.” She certainly could not fault his manners.

  Alex had to admit, Raine was very handsome this morning. He had a dark green tunic on and black leggings. Under different circumstances, she would have been thrilled to go out with him. Although, it was a little weird how often they accidentally kept bumping into each other. On top of everything else, she was sleeping with Tarsea. It felt awkward going on a date with a different man. There was no question she needed to stop second guessing herself and get this over with.

  She guided Raine toward the kitchen. There they were greeted by Leenea and Tarsea. Her soul mate did not look happy.

  “Raine,” Alex said, “I believe you already know Tarsea. This is his mother, Leanea. You met her the other day when you came to see me. I thought I would have a little morning pick me up before we headed for the zoo.”

  Leenea knew exactly what Alex was asking for. She had no idea what telepathic challenges she would have today in such a public place. A mug of the herbal blend would make it easier to deal with the communal channels.

  The room was very quiet as Alex drank her beverage. No one seemed interested in small talk. She was too busy trying to get the herbs down her throat, before she had to leave on a date she never should have made.

  “There,” Alex said as she finished the drink. “Shall we head on out? Leenea, I will be back in a couple of hours. I know I promised I would help cook dinner tonight.”

  Tolfer was cooking with Norri assisting. She was just setting the stage to make sure this date would have to be cut short, in case Raine had any ideas to the contrary. She caught a little smile forming on Tarsea’s face.

  Raine took her hand as soon as they left the house. They started walking in the opposite direction from The Palace and the gathering place she went to last night. He thought she was new to the province, so he would not be surprised when everything she saw was brand new to her.

  “Alexia,” Raine asked, “how are your headaches? I hope you have fully recovered from your fall.”

  “I am still getting headaches unfortunately, as well as nosebleeds.” How was that for too much information to provide on a date? The more she turned him off the better.

  “Poor thing, I understand what you are going through. My head still pounds, although fortunately I have not experienced any nosebleeds.” Like Solfa, he pointed out various Aster Province landmarks as they made their way through the city’s streets. There was a cute clothing store, she noted that she wanted to come back to and explore.

>   They walked for about thirty minutes, talking about nothing in particular. She could see they were approaching the zoo. There were purple azaleas pruned into animal shapes.

  “What would you like to do first,” Raine asked, “see some animals or eat?” She appreciated that he gave her the choice.

  “Actually, I would love to see the giant larma beast you mentioned the other day. My mind was coming up with all sorts of images regarding what the beast looked like. I want to see how close I got.”

  Raine smiled at her and said, “This way.” She turned to see if she could spot Koel. He was nowhere in sight, but she figured he was hanging back out of her and Raine’s immediate vision.

  They walked past numerous cages, many of the animals she recognized. There were a few that were new to her. She did not want to make it too obvious that she did not know these animals, in case they were indigenous to the Troyk universe.

  “Here you go,” Raine said, “the famous giant larma beast from the Terra Flora Universe. If you are lucky, I will show you the scar I got capturing the beast.” She liked his playful manner. Maybe she would introduce Shirl or Candy to Raine, after they assimilated to this new world and were no longer under a threat of discovery.

  Alex looked at the animal. Her wildest imagination was not wild enough to do this beast justice. It truly looked like something out of a horror show, scales and all.

  “What does that thing eat?” Alex asked. She hoped it was not small women from the Ginkgo Terra Universe. If she traveled to another universe, she made a note to herself not to go to Terra Flora. She could not imagine facing one of these beasts in the wild.

  “It eats a variety of rodents. The animal has an incredibly slow metabolism, so it does not require a lot of food.”