Waterborne by Katherine Irons Read Free Book Online Page B

she’d been shot. Normally, her memory was photographic. She should have sensed Varenkov before he reached the deck. Something had blocked her ability to pick up on his intent. It was unnerving. And everything that she’d experienced since waking up here in this room stretched the bounds of sanity. Not that she hadn’t seen her share of craziness, but a talking octopus ? A new heart? At what point did she assume she’d taken a bullet to the brain and was suffering from a loss of gray matter?
    But despite whatever had happened during and after the fiasco on the deck of the Anastasiya, she seemed to be thinking clearly now. And every ounce of self-preservation told her that this wasn’t someplace she wanted to be. Something was wrong here, and the sooner she got out, the better.
    She’d passed by two bubbles, both empty, but the third was filled with a pink liquid. Suspended inside the eight-foot-high capsule was what appeared to be a large maroon and yellow jellyfish. It was football-shaped and definitely alive because she could see pulsating organs, rather she assumed they were organs, and she could see the multiple trailing tentacles writhing. Each tentacle seemed to bear rows of cactus-like mouths. The thing gave her the creeps, and although she couldn’t see any eyes, she had the distinct impression the coelenterate was staring at her with malevolent intentions.
    Still looking for other doors, Ree moved past another empty capsule and then one with an injured dolphin inside. The dolphin had evidently gotten the worse of some encounter because it had several jagged wounds around its head and midsection. The dolphin had eyes, but they were closed, and the animal appeared to be sleeping or in a state of unconsciousness. The liquid in that bubble was a pale green. Ree felt none of the apprehension concerning this patient that she had with the jellyfish.
    Abruptly, an inner warning went off in Ree’s head. She took shelter behind the dolphin’s capsule and crouched down to conceal herself from whoever was coming. What rather than who was accurate. Ree’s heart lodged in her throat. She hadn’t expected this, but what this was, she wasn’t prepared to make a guess.
    Had the man been human, Ree would have classified him as a Pacific-Islander, probably Samoan or Maori. He was six and a half, maybe seven feet tall and wide as a tree trunk, spiky green hair cropped short, hands and feet like canoe paddles. His gorilla nose was cut in two by a grotesque scar; his teeth were filed into sharp points, and the coral war club in his hand could have battered down a house. But the thing that burst into the infirmary wasn’t human. Ree was certain of that. Not only wasn’t it human, but it definitely wasn’t friendly.
    “Shit,” Ree muttered under her breath as she looked around for some kind of weapon. But the only thing she saw within reach was a tiny blue and silver sea horse bobbing up on the outside of the dolphin’s capsule—hardly an equalizer.
    Stand back. I’ve got a sea horse, and I’m not afraid to use it. “Double shit.” Whatever this thing is, it hasn’t come to bring me candy and flowers.
    Ree rose to her feet, her gaze locked on the Samoan. He had stopped just inside the doorway and was scanning the room. He tilted his ruined head back and sniffed, as though trying to catch her scent. Then he lunged forward, coming at a full run, directly toward her hiding place.
    Discretion was the better part of valor. Ree remembered that from her earliest lessons. She turned to run and slammed into the arms of her blue man.

CHAPTER 5
     
    T he woman’s eyes widened when she caught sight of him, and she tried to duck away, but Alex caught her and pinned her against his chest. She was far stronger than he would have expected from one of her species. He grunted as she drove a hard knee into his groin and attempted a potentially fatal strike with the flat of her hand to his throat. He caught her wrist and pinned it