Night Calling (City of Hope Book 3) Read online

  NIGHT CALLING

  City of Hope, Book 3

  Copyright © Kali Argent

  NIGHT CALLING

  Trick McCall isn’t like most humans in Hope. For one, he doesn’t mind the schedule or routines. He doesn’t care that someone is always watching him, and he actually prefers the Aleucian’s telepathy to verbal communication. Not a whole lot gets to him, and he doesn’t need much to be happy. In fact, the only thing that would make his life perfect is if a certain female would stop fighting and just agree to be his.

  Assigned to Hope as punishment, Aziza Dakar is more confused by the human inhabitants than anything. They never do what she expects, and that’s doubly true for the gorgeous bartender who makes her want things she can never have. Claiming a human isn’t against the rules exactly, but she’s just a guard, a lowly grunt with zero authority. Besides, she’s already in enough trouble with the Council without waving a human mate in their faces.

  But she can’t seem to get Trick out of her head. When he convinces her to spend just one day with him, she knows it will never be enough. Now, she just has to decide how much she’s willing to risk…and if the rewards are worth the consequences.

  NIGHT CALLING

  Copyright © October 2018 by Kali Argent

  Cover Art by Black Butterfly Designs

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal, except for the case of brief quotations in reviews and articles. Criminal copyright infringement is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  PROLOGUE

  It was in the late twenty-third century when the Aleucians first made contact with Earth. A race of warrior beings with long fangs and ethereal, sapphire blue eyes, the males stood well over six feet tall, most reaching closer to seven feet, and even the females towered over many of the humans.

  Their initial arrival was met with fear and hostility as the humans raged against what they didn’t understand. Eventually, the smoke cleared and the discord settled, and ten long years later, Earth welcomed the Aleucians as both friends and allies.

  Unfortunately, their continued presence on the planet soon attracted other visitors from across the galaxies, and not all came in peace.

  Wars ensued.

  Cities burned.

  By the end of the century, only a fraction of the population remained, and Earth had been reduced to nothing more than a barren wasteland. The Aleucians offered refuge and safe passage to their homeworld, and as their own planet died, humans had no choice but to accept their generosity.

  Still, survival came at a cost.

  The arid surface of Aleucia reached deadly temperatures during the daytime hours, and its thinner ozone meant the sun produced third-degree burns in humans within a matter of minutes. The nights, on the other hand, turned bitterly cold, well below freezing, with brutal, arctic winds.

  While covered in slender, transparent scales that protected them from severe temperature changes on their homeworld, the Aleucians quickly realized the environment would be uninhabitable by what remained of the human race. In response, they’d built a vast, sterile, underground city that reached seventeen levels and nearly two miles below the planet’s surface.

  There, the humans remained, never to see the sun, moon, or stars again.

  It was the price they paid for safety, security…survival.

  Welcome to the city of Hope.

  CHAPTER ONE

  “You’re in my seat.”

  Perched on a bench in the middle of the crowded mess hall, Trick McCall tensed, his body priming for a fight as he lowered his fork to the table. He’d mostly finished his meal, though he couldn’t have said what he’d eaten. The display on the replicator told him he’d ordered spaghetti, but pretty much everything on the menu tasted the same. Fuck, what he wouldn’t give for a steak and a giant baked potato with all the toppings.

  “You deaf?” the beefy guy next to him asked. “I said—”

  “I heard what you said.”

  Glancing to his left, he blinked at the green shirt the man wore. It had been almost six months since the introduction of color to their wardrobes, and while he liked it a hell of a lot better than the constant sea of blinding white, he still hadn’t gotten used to it.

  Calmly, he rose, stepped over the bench seat, and turned to face the asshole who had interrupted his lunch. The guy stood several inches shorter than his own six and a half feet, but he held his shoulders back and his spine rigid. A muscle in his jaw ticked, and his green eyes flashed with defiance as he slammed his tray down on the table next to Trick’s. He was young, full of testosterone and anger, but his mess of red curls made him look almost innocent. The kid even had freckles, for fuck sakes.

  “Table’s all yours.” Leashing his own anger, Trick turned away to pick up his tray, which was why he didn’t see the meaty paw aimed at him until a fist connected solidly with his jaw.

  His bottom lip split open from the impact, spraying blood across the ivory tabletop. The kid was spoiling for a fight, but Trick wasn’t going to be the one to give it to him. Wiping the back of his hand across his mouth, he grimaced when it came away bloody, but made no move toward his attacker. It wasn’t that he couldn’t fight. Heaven knew he’d been in his share of bar brawls. He always came out on top, and he always felt like shit for it afterwards.

  “You’re barking up the wrong tree, kid. Enjoy your lunch.”

  “Pussy.”

  Trick shrugged. “Whatever you say.”

  Menace sparked in those green irises, and the kid hauled his fist back again, but he never got a chance to land a second punch. Long, slender fingers wrapped in radiant, bronzed skin surrounded his wrist, twisted sharply, and jerked his hand behind his back, torquing it up between his shoulder blades.

  “Again, Brian?” With the barest hint of a smile, the female guard swept the man’s legs, tripping him forward so that she could force his face down onto the table. “What did I tell you about irritating me?”

  Trick was instantly hard.

  Thank fuck Star Donavan had convinced the director of Hope to change the dress code within the city, because he’d be giving the whole cafeteria an eyeful if he still had to wear those godforsaken white harem pants. Not only had bright, vibrant colors replaced the boring white, but she’d also made it possible for the residents to have access to the same leather pants the guards wore.

  As it stood, his cock swelled, straining against the button fly of his leathers, and his pulse pounded up into his throat. Which was why it surprised him how steady he sounded when he spoke.

  “Hey, Aziza.”

  The female pinned him with her sapphire blue eyes. “Trick.” She nodded, her gaze settling on his busted lip. “You good?”

  Other than his lip, nothing was bruised except his pride. “I’m good.”

  “Hey!” Brian yelled, squirming beneath Aziza’s hold. “Let me go.”

  Tangling her fingers in his red curls, she lifted his head a fraction of an inch, then slammed it back down on the metal table. Her nostrils flared, and her upper lip curled over her teeth to reveal the tips of her fangs.

  “Stop. Talking.”

  Brian whimpered when she wrenched his arm higher up his back, but he was smart enough to shut his trap. Back on Earth, a crowd would have started to gather by that point, but sudden outbursts of violence weren’t so uncommon in the underground city. Putting that many people—especially that many men—together in tight quarters, it was bound to happen.


  Trick grinned.

  Officer Aziza Dakar was stunning. She had the kind of long, ebony hair a man could sink his fingers into, and those intense blue eyes sent a flash of heat through his veins every time she looked at him. He didn’t usually go for the biker-chic look, but damn if the black leather that encased her sleek curves didn’t flick his Bic.

  “Thanks for the rescue,” he teased. “You’re my hero.”

  Aziza fought the urge to roll her eyes, even as her stomach did a slow somersault and her heart fluttered in her chest. Trick McCall was big for a human, almost as tall as the Aleucian males but without their substantial bulk. The male didn’t need rescuing. He was more than capable of fighting his own battles, especially against someone like Brian Gold.

  She stared down at the head beneath her palm and snarled, letting her upper lip curl over her canines. Gods above, the little shit pissed her off to no end.

  Ignoring the fluttering in her stomach and the way her skin tingled from Trick’s heated gaze, she jerked Brian up from the table by his hair and spun him toward the exit. “I don’t care what you do with him,” she told her friend and fellow guard, Zevon Krex, “just get him out of my sight.”

  Zevon grinned wickedly as he clamped a hand down on Brian’s shoulder hard enough to make him wince. “Just can’t stay out of trouble. Let’s take a little walk, shall we? I’m sure the captain is just dying to see you.”

  Brian’s face paled, and he swallowed audibly but made no protest as Zevon led him out of the cafeteria. With the situation neutralized, Aziza had no choice but to return her attention to the male who had consumed her every waking thought for months.

  “Are you sure you’re okay?” she asked into his mind, thankful for the first time since the humans’ arrival that the telepathic link didn’t work in reverse.

  Trick shrugged. “I’m okay.”

  At first, she’d found the sound of their voices grating, and their need for vocal communication to be absurdly inefficient. Worse, many of them found the invasion into their minds distasteful and requested that she and the other guards speak aloud. It had been frustrating and uncomfortable, and for a long time, she’d refused.

  As time passed, however, she began to find the differences in dialect and cadence from the humans intriguing rather than irritating. Now, she often flowed back and forth between spoken words and telepathy as smoothly as if she’d always done so.

  “You don’t look okay.” The corner of Trick’s bottom lip had been split, but it didn’t look too bad, and it had already stopped bleeding. Still, humans were so fragile she never knew what constituted serious injury for them. “Maybe you should see a medic.”

  “I’m fine, Zi. It’s just a busted lip.”

  A tingle rippled down her spine, and her pulse sped when he smiled at her. Damn, he was breathtaking, and his cocky grin said he knew exactly how he affected her. She would never permit anyone else to call her by such an informal nickname, but everything was different with Trick. Coming from him, it felt more like an endearment, and the gods help her, it made her feel special.

  “Still, I’d feel better if you had someone see to that.”

  “If that’s what you want,” he answered, his voice low and seductive. “Will you walk with me? I might get lost without an escort.”

  Knowing she should refuse him, but unable to do so, she grinned back. “Come on, human. Let’s go.”

  Trick waved his hand, indicating she should lead the way, but he didn’t fall into step beside her until they’d reached the corridor beyond the sliding doors of the cafeteria. She could feel his eyes on her as she passed, and when she chanced a look at him, the hunger in his deep, brown eyes confirmed her suspicions. Unwarranted, heat spread throughout her body, and a deep ache she hadn’t felt in a long time began to throb between her thighs.

  She thanked the stars he wasn’t an Aleucian male, and therefore, couldn’t scent her reaction to him. If only the Council didn’t frown on the intermingling of the races, she’d make Trick hers in a heartbeat.

  Oh, she wasn’t the first to desire a human, but Captain Otar and Director Wyeth held positions of power, and therefore, could bend the rules as they saw fit. She, on the other hand, was just a guard, a lowly grunt, and she had already been put on probation with the stuffy councilmen. Hence, how she’d ended up assigned to Hope in the first place.

  In retrospect, she and Zevon probably shouldn’t have been chasing a civilian at high speeds through a densely-populated business district. Still, it wasn’t like she’d purposely ran up onto the footpath and crashed her subcruiser into that solarpost. Nor did she see how the resulting fall of said solarpost through the windows of the Interplanetary Consulate building had been her fault.

  At the nearest lift, she pressed her palm to the bio-pad and waited, not wanting to look at Trick but still unable to resist a quick, sideways glance. Great swirling galaxies, the male was gorgeous. She still remembered the first she’d ever seen him. It had been seven months ago, at the end of a long, exhausting day when she’d been called to Last Stop on Level 8 to break up a fight. The offenders secured, she’d turned to address the bartender—and had instantly forgotten how to breathe.

  Although he stood only a few inches taller than her own six-feet-two-inches, Trick McCall carried himself in a way that commanded attention, especially hers. He wasn’t arrogant like many of the younger males in the city, not prone to aggressive displays of dominance. There was no need, not when his every move was saturated with a confidence most males couldn’t hope to imitate.

  His dark hair was a little longer now than it had been when she’d first met him. In fact, she found it utterly distracting how the ends curled slightly around his ears and brushed his nape just above the collar of his fitted shirt.

  And that damn shirt was an entirely different problem.

  It had been hard enough to banish thoughts of the human when he’d been wearing white, flowing material that hid his physique. With the introduction of tight leather that molded to every valley and ridge of his chiseled body, she found it nearly impossible to focus on anything else.

  The electronic chime of the lift pulled her out of her thoughts, and she looked up just as the doors slid open to permit them entrance to the cylindrical compartment.

  “Ladies first.” Stepping to the side, Trick held his right arm out, fanning it toward the lift.

  Aziza snorted as she slid past him. “Thank you, but I am no lady.”

  The first time she’d heard the phrase, she’d been intrigued. Upon researching the subject, however, she’d been left with more questions than answers. Back on Earth, it seemed human females had wasted a remarkable amount of time and energy on their appearances.

  The photos of elaborate hairstyles, painted faces, and dainty dresses had made her shake her head, but the shoes had been the most confounding. The females could barely walk in them, let alone run or fight. If that was what being a lady meant, she wanted no part of it.

  The lifts in Hope were designed to be big enough to fit at least four people, but with Trick crowded in beside her, the space felt significantly smaller than usual. She couldn’t think when he stood so close. His scent permeated the filtered air, and every inhalation of the heady fragrance made her body quiver and her head spin.

  “Did you hear that the Interplanetary Consulate is preparing for visitors to the city?” Of course, he’d heard. They’d spoken about it only days ago, but she needed something else to focus on other than the way the vein in Trick’s neck pulsed with his heartbeat.

  “You mentioned something about it last week.” He nodded a couple of times, and his deep voice resonated through the lift, a hint of gravel in his tone. “Some bigwigs from another planet.”

  “No.” Her eyebrows drew together as she frowned. “The Karehe don’t wear wigs. In fact, they have no hair at all.”

  Trick chuckled, the sound warm and inviting. “It’s just an expression.” With another quiet laugh, he leaned sideways to bump their
arms together. “It means they’re important. Authority figures.”

  Her arm tingled where they’d touched, and she could hardly breathe, let alone think. Not trusting her voice, she sent the answer directly into his mind. “Then, yes. Prince Eitan and his royal guard.”

  The lift slowed to a stop, and the digital display above the door flashed, indicating they’d reached Level 12. Trick appeared lost in thought, his head down, and his gaze unfocused, but he reached out as Aziza began to exit, absently settling his hand on the small of her back. Once again, the contact sent a wave of heat across her skin, and another shock of energy coiled along her spine.

  Fuck, she needed to get ahold of herself. Even if the council didn’t frown on interspecies relationships, she didn’t know how much longer she would be in Hope. She’d been sent to the city as punishment, and once her probation ended, she’d likely be reassigned to a post in Aleucia’s capital city of Javahara. Either way, she didn’t have a future with the handsome human, and pretending otherwise wouldn’t change anything.

  “So, tell me about them,” Trick said as they strolled side-by-side down the nearly empty corridor that led to the non-emergency clinics. “What are they like, the Karehe? Why is this prince visiting Hope?”

  “I…” She shouldn’t have said anything. The information was still classified, and the council didn’t intend to inform the humans until plans for the visit had been finalized. “Here we are.” She waved her hand toward a set of automatic glass doors. “The clinic.”

  “Okay,” Trick muttered, his eyes crinkling at the corners with amusement. “Keep your secrets.”

  Feeling flustered and slightly frustrated, she took a step back to put more distance between them. “I should get back to my patrol.” She never should have left in the first place, but she hadn’t been able to resist stealing a few extra moments with the male. “Goodbye for now, Trick.”

  She nodded and even dared a small smile, but before she could turn to leave, Trick caught her by the elbow and moved in quickly to brush a chaste kiss over her cheek. Then, just as fluidly, he released her and sauntered toward the doors of the clinic.