Jade and Pearl stood near the supply hut, their eyes bulging as they stared in the vicinity of the cooking pot. A long, green arm was stretched at least twenty feet from the trees and snaked beneath the stone table. Gnarly fingers had a grip on the baby dinosaur. Its mouth opened and closed but Bronto couldn’t hear it chirping through the commotion starting to take place. His gaze followed the arm to a five-foot-tall alien hidden behind the crisscrossed branches of two evergreens exactly where the rabbit had entered. The frigging things appeared to come in all sizes.
Bronto instinctively reached for his bow but he was damn near naked, let alone not carrying a weapon. It wasn’t often he was caught without one. Unfortunately this was one of those times. He barely had time to think when the children woke him plus grab his knife or bow. He wasn’t a braggart about his archery skills but he was pretty damn proud of his proficiency with a bow as well as a knife. A few days ago he’d knocked off a mutant by a hurling his blade. Mutants. The aliens’ creepy, gone-wrong result in their experimental attempt to mix human DNA with dinosaurs. They were harmless so far but their patches of scaly, reptile skin and black, vacant eyes could frighten anyone of sound mind.
Nearly twenty men, all perimeter guards, fled to the area but not a single one took action. Then a loud bang burst through the yard. The gnarly fingers released the baby and the alien arm retracted, springing into the trees.
Bronto turned. Vulcan stood nearly two hundred yards away near his hut with the Barrett aimed at the forest. That rifle could blow the alien to pieces and he had no doubt it had.
As the echo of the shot faded, silence reigned.
“And so it begins,” Bronto mumbled under his breath. How many aliens would charge to its rescue only to discover it dead?
As Vulcan strode toward his fallen target, Bronto followed. The other men fell into step behind them.
When they reached the forest, Vulcan squatted and separated the branches. The alien lay on its back nearly blown in half. With the exception of its green skin, the commander was right about one thing—the species did resemble humans. Everything from its long, straggly black hair to its seven fingers and toes. Okay, maybe not every physical aspect about them matched exactly but damn, they were close. They bled, and there was an abundance of red blood splattered on the ground and in the trees.
Vulcan grabbed the alien by the ankles and dragged it from the forest floor.
“Fire?” Bronto asked.
“Yep.”
“Let me help.” After Vulcan released one ankle, Bronto grabbed it and they pulled the alien to the fire pit.
Rocko slid his hands beneath its arms and lifted its upper body then they tossed it into the flames. A green haze billowed into the air as the alien went up in smoke.
“Stay back in case it’s toxic,” Vulcan instructed. “Who knows what kind of disease we’ll contract by breathing in that shit.”
Vulcan stepped backward and bumped into Wisteria, who’d approached so quietly no one apparently noticed. Bronto certainly hadn’t. But he did notice, as she stood chewing her lip and gazing at the ground, her solemn demeanor and the tears in her eyes.
“Whoa, sweetheart,” Vulcan blurted. “You can’t sneak up on a man. You could get trampled.”
She nodded but neglected to look in Vulcan’s eyes. He lifted her face by the chin. “What’s the matter? Why are you crying?”
Yes, he was definitely whipped. He’d turned off the chieftain persona and turned on compassion by the sight of a tear. Though Bronto had to admit those tears touched him somewhat too.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
Sorry? What did she have to be sorry about? She hadn’t done anything wrong. Nothing Bronto witnessed. He hoped this had nothing to do with intimacy. Hell, where’d that come from? Why’d he even suspect it had something to do with making love? He just wasn’t strong enough to hear anything concerning that topic right now. One inappropriate word and his cock would salute the sky. And with Ivy standing a hundred feet or so… He spun around. Where’d she go? “Ivy?”
“I’m right here,” she shouted.
Again he spun, homing in on the direction of her voice, and there she stood beside Jade near the supply hut. In the background behind her he discovered a problem. A six-foot, barbaric problem who answered to the name Grunt. Bronto felt as if someone punched him in the gut. Probably because it was exactly what he’d like to do to the man.
Bronto had half a mind to call her away but she appeared to be enjoying Jade’s company. Fucking her once didn’t give him the authority to start bossing her around. Technically it did but he wasn’t that guy.
“Sweetheart, why are you apologizing?” Vulcan asked, recapturing Bronto’s attention as if he were talking to him. The day Vulcan referred to him as sweetheart, there’d be some bloodshed. Specifically from Vulcan’s nose.
“You can get rid of the babies,” Wisteria said. “They put your tribe in danger. I didn’t realize they’d draw the aliens.”
“Wisteria,” Bronto responded, feeling the need to interfere. “I don’t mean to impose, but that may not be a bad thing.”