Devoured Read online

  Brides of the Kindred

  Book 11: Devoured

  Evangeline Anderson

  * * * * *

  PUBLISHED BY:

  Evangeline Anderson Books on Kindle

  Brides of the Kindred

  Book 11: Devoured

  Copyright © 2014 by Evangeline Anderson

  Kindle Edition License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Amazon.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

  Author’s Note #1: Though I have tried to handle it in a delicate way, readers with a past history of domestic abuse may find parts of this book disturbing. Sadly, all of the situations my heroine encounters are taken from true accounts of abused women. If you are in an abusive situation, please seek help.

  In the US you can visit the National Domestic Abuse Hotline online or, if you’re afraid your computer is being monitored, call 1-800-799-7233

  If you are in the UK, you can call the Freephone 24 Hour National Domestic Violence Helpline at 0808-2000-247

  Author’s Note #2: For those of you with friends who haven’t tried the Kindred yet, I now have the first four books collected in one volume. It’s called Brides of the Kindred Volume One and you can find it on Amazon or at my website store. It’s a great way to dip into the Kindred world and you save a couple of bucks buying it as opposed to buying the first four books individually. If readers seem to like it, I may put the next four into another compendium and the next four once I have book 12, Enhanced written.

  Author’s Note #3: Please no piracy. The Kindred pay my mortgage now and without them, I’d have to go back to doing MRI full time. Since writing hot sex and complicated emotions is way more fun than shoving people into a magnetic hole all day, I would ask that you please buy your book instead of trying to find a pirated copy and encourage your friends to do the same so that I can keep writing and you can keep reading. Thanks!

  Hugs and Happy Reading to you all,

  Evangeline Anderson June, 2014

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Chapter Thirty-five

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-one

  Chapter Forty-two

  Chapter Forty-three

  Epilogue #1

  Epilogue #2

  Enhanced Chapter One

  Glossary

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  “Are you sure it’s safe?” Tess Evans-Hughes looked around the Human/Kindred Relations building, or the HKR, as the people who worked there called it. One of those people happened to be her good friend, Di, but what she was suggesting made Tess awfully nervous.

  “Safe?” Di raised one silver eyebrow at her sardonically. “Sure, hon—a hell of a lot safer than you are down here in Tampa.”

  “But what do I do once I—” One of the massive Kindred warriors walked by and Tess dropped her voice to a whisper before continuing. “What do I do once I get up there?”

  “Hide, of course. Until it’s safe to come back down here and move to Hawaii or China or the Moon or wherever you can think of that Pierce won’t follow you.”

  Tess closed her eyes for a moment. Don’t bother running, Princess, Pierce’s voice sneered in her head. You’re mine and I never let go of what’s mine.

  “There’s no place he won’t follow me,” she said in a low voice. “No place he won’t find me.”

  “Correction, hon—there is one place he can’t and won’t find you because he can’t get up there. And that’s the place you’re headed.”

  “But—”

  “No ‘buts,’” Di insisted. “My next tour of the Mother Ship leaves in fifteen minutes and it’s a big one—big enough that nobody’s going to notice if we come back with one less tourist who’s dying to check out the Kindred way of life.”

  “But I don’t know anything about them,” Tess protested. “I’m not even registered for the draft.”

  The draft was an agreement the governments of the world had with the Kindred that allowed males of their race to call brides from Earth. Being something like ninety-nine percent male because of a genetic mutation—supposedly the same mutation that made them all over six foot six and hugely muscular—meant the Kindred were always short of women.

  All unmarried women of a certain age were supposed to be signed up for the draft but Tess wasn’t because technically, she was still married. That was because Pierce wouldn’t sign the divorce papers no matter how often she sent them over.

  Instead, he just kept coming over to her apartment and talking about how he’d changed and he wanted her back. Tess had been down that road before so she had refused. But now it seemed he was done asking. The last time she’d sent the divorce papers she came home to find…

  Tess shook her head. She didn’t want to think about what she’d found inside her apartment. Just remembering made her feel like she might cry or throw up. Poor Gus…

  “You don’t have to know anything about the Kindred except they’re good guys and they don’t beat and imprison their women,” Di said, interrupting her morbid thoughts. “Unlike certain ex-husbands I could name.”

  “He’s not technically my ex since he won’t sign the papers,” Tess pointed out.

  “You wanted him out of your life badly enough to cough up for a divorce lawyer when you could barely afford to pay rent,” Di pointed out. “Just because Pierce is being an asshole about it—like he is about everything—doesn’t mean he gets to win. As far as I’m concerned, you two are splitsville.”

  Tess smiled at her friend and pressed her hand.

  “Thanks, Di. You know, you’re the only friend I’ve ever had that could see through him. He can act so charming when he wants to—he even had my mom fooled, right up until the end.”

  “You mean when he refused to let you go see her in the hospital?” Di shook her head. “Yeah, I see through him all right. Bullshit is bullshit, no matter how you try and dress it up.”

  “Thanks.” Tess pressed her hand again and wiped away a stray tear. Even though her mom had been gone for well over a year, it still hurt to think of her. Hurt to think she had died alone because Pierce was too crazy jealous to let Tess go see her in time.

  She turned her head for a minute to try and get control and s