This is actually the fifth book in my series set in the far future about genetically engineered warriors and the human women who love them. (TIMTUR would be book 2.5 if Amazon allowed me to number that way. So the series goes AYDARR, MATEER, TIMTUR, JADRIAN and then DARIK).

As I always do, I challenged myself to make sure I made the events on the pages different from the previous stories.  For starters, this is the first book featuring a Badari from the pack which was created using more canine type DNA, rather than the feline/great cat line, and the story starts off with Darik being happy he’s a lone wolf at heart, sent on a mission alone to the far north mountains to check out a new lab.  I figured it was time to highlight someone from the other pack!

I gave him a new companion no one else had ever had at that point in writing the series, a miniature version of MARL, the alien Artificial Intelligence discovered by the heroine in the first book. Darik and MARL12 don’t have a good meeting of the minds and he in fact gets quite exasperated with the AI a time or two. Their assignment is to see how well a Badari and one of the MARL mini units can work together and Darik is pretty convinced for most of the book that it’s a bad idea.

Here’s a quick example from early in the book: “What are the Khagrish playing at up here? What research could their mad scientists be doing in such a small place?”

“The facility extends fifteen stories underground and several of the levels are quite extensive,” MARL12 said. “This level appears deserted for the most part. Several of the subterranean levels show no activity either. My scans are much more thorough than your visual assessment.”

Did he detect a hint of smugness in the AI’s flat tones? Darik suppressed his own annoyance. “The complementary skills are why we’re a team here.” He leaned over and tapped the ovoid with his fully extended talons, moving so fast he managed to take MARL12 by surprise. The AI emitted a high pitched squeal and shot sideways a good fifteen feet. “I’m better at combat,” Darik said with a smile exposing his fangs. Score one for the Badari team member.

The Khagrish lab itself is very different this time, as described a bit in the above snippet. Built underground and not outfitted like any other installation Darik has ever seen, the design and some of the horrors he discovers once he goes inside really shake him up. Why are some of the levels deserted and others locked down tight? We do find out as we go deeper into the installation…

The evil Khagrish scientists are up to even more diabolical ‘research’ than usual this time…

I threw a lot of barriers in the way between Darik and Nicolle, the woman he thinks might be his mate. They didn’t get to spend much time together in the early parts of the book (I’m nicer to them later, I promise). The other Badari in the earlier novels were side by side with the heroine pretty much right away but not this time. Darik and Nicolle think about each other though…to say she’s mad he doesn’t rescue her the first time they meet would be an understatement and who can blame her? Blame MARL12…

And I just might have thrown in a few plot elements as nods to some of my favorite scifi tales like Puppet Masters, Aliens and Outbreak along the way…but remember my motto – I write scifi romance that’s like the movie ‘Aliens’ but with a lot less gore and a lot more romance. So no worries about this turning into a horror story or anything. Lots of action, adventure and romance!

I had a lot of fun writing this book and tasking myself with describing some new situations and problems to be faced.

The cover was, as usual, done by the wonderful Fiona Jayde and Darik is the only guy wearing a shirt in this series of covers but he was just too perfect to ‘be’ the character to pass up, once I saw the stockphoto.

The blurb:

Nicolle James is far from her home in the human Sectors, kidnapped by alien scientists to be the subject of horrifying experiments.  Her only hope might be a mysterious soldier she’d glimpsed outside the laboratory fence. She’d managed to sneak a few words of conversation with him when her captors weren’t watching but now the aliens were taking her inside the lab to begin the experiments.

Darik, a warrior of the genetically engineered Badari pack, is on a solo recon mission to check out a mysterious new lab high in the mountains. His orders are strict – do not engage. But when he has a chance meeting with the woman who might be his mate, he vows not to abandon her, orders or no orders.

Can he get inside an underground lab, find Nicolle and rescue her without getting captured himself? And when he learns the lab’s deadly secrets, can he get word to his pack about the new dangers?

Because the ruthless alien scientist running the experiments wants to get her hands on him too and will stop at nothing to achieve her goals.

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