Here’s the link to the Weekend Writing Warriors central page, so you can visit all the participants sharing excerpts today…a fun way to sample new books and find new authors! (Also welcome to the Sunday Snippet visitors!)

This is the final excerpt from my second scifi romance gladiator novel RENNYR. Next week I’ll switch to the third book, TALINN, releasing in the CLAIMED AMONG THE STARS  anthology on July 26.

If you want the full story of what Rennyr and Jaine go through and how they battle to survive and protect each other, and their romance, with all the nuances and details, the book is available wide. 

The excerpt, continuing on with his attempt to break into the arena to rescue Jaine. Since this is the final excerpt I’ll be sharing I’m jumping to the moment he reaches her:

He cleared the last twenty five feet between himself and the men threatening Jaine with a single bound, taking out three of the enemy as he landed. He moved between Jaine and the remaining fighters.

She collapsed onto the sand and crawled toward her weapon. Rennyr approved but she wasn’t going to need it again, not with him to protect her. He made quick work of killing the first man, outflanking him in a lightning fast move. Human reflexes were no match for Badari speed. Pivoting to the last member of the group, Rennyr checked his offensive movement. The man now had Jaine in his grasp, knife at her throat.

“Is this what you’re all hot and bothered about, Beastman?” the gladiator said in a mocking tone. “This little Sectors sweetie?” He pricked her with the tip of the wicked blade and a drop of bright red blood beaded her skin.

Jaine had her hands wrapped around the man’s hand and suddenly pulled his wrist and the knife down, away from her throat, pinning it to her body. With strength born of sheer desperation, she kept her grip on the knife and turned inward, ducking away as she did so.

Her unexpected movement was all the opening Rennyr needed. Taking two steps, he sank his fangs into the neck of the distracted gladiator. The predator inside him was in full on battle rage and as he disengaged from his prey, Rennyr had to work hard to regain control.

Jaine was sprawled on the ground and his heart stopped. Rushing to her, he knelt, checked frantically for wounds but finding only a few superficial slashes. As he’d suspected, the enemy had been intending to prolong the moment of her death.

“You came? You came for me?” she said, clinging to him.

“I said I would.”

RENNYR (BADARI GLADIATORS SERIES BOOK 2) by Veronica Scott

Rennyr was a genetically engineered senior soldier in his Badari Warrior pack until one day he woke up on a strange planet naked, disoriented and about to be sold into the gladiator arena for the rest of his life. Unscrupulous guards faked his death in the lab where he was created and sold him into slavery in the galaxy’s hinterlands. Kill or be killed is the rule in his new life and a Badari never gives up. He’ll fight to stay alive until the Badari goddess sees fit to decree his death and release him from the wretched existence.

Jaine Mitchel of the Sectors was on her way to an exciting research internship until pirates seized the spaceship on which she was a passenger and took her to feature in a gladiator ‘death match’ in the galactic hinterlands. She has no hope of surviving in the arena until a man she only glimpsed in passing breaks out of his cell and saves her life, declaring her to be his fated mate. Given to Rennyr as his reward for winning the death match, Jaine must share a cell and a bed with the handsome, not human, gladiator and together they have to find a way to survive in this merciless world of violence and death. Their mutual attraction is off the charts. Falling in love is the easy part, finding a way to escape or even to remain together is the challenge. At any time their mutual owner could decide thumbs up or thumbs down on one or both of them, or sell them separately.

Their only hope is a mysterious gladiator master from offworld who may be coming to buy Rennyr. Will he take Jaine as well? Could Rennyr win freedom for them both if he does well enough in the arena? Badari Warriors claim their mates for life and Rennyr has no intention of losing Jaine…RENNYR is an 80K word novel and can be read as a standalone. KYDEN is the first book in the series.

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