3. Seth
three
Seth
I don't know where I'm going. I just know that I can't be near Adam when he gets all post-orgasm asshole on me. I swear he does it just to prove he's so hard, so badass. Who needs feelings? Not him because feelings are for pussies. Or some bullshit like that.
Stupid idiots, both of us. Him for being so awful and me for putting up with it. He loves me, though, more than anything else, so much that it scares him. I can feel it in our tether.
Right now, he's in there panicking, thinking he took it too far. I'd never tell him I can feel those emotions. I think he might die if I did. He's hard enough to get close to without him knowing that I know it's all a front for how scared he is. Not that he knows what he's feeling is fear. He still thinks he can't feel it, and for the most part, he can't.
Make him think he's losing me? His fear skyrockets and masks itself with anger.
He was cloned from a super soldier made during the height of panic after the invasion. Two hundred years ago, scientists, attempting to make a human strong enough to beat off the alien species that invaded us, created a subsect of humans taller, stronger, and more aggressive than any other. Some of their DNA was kept to be experimented on because some people just can't help themselves.
I might've been in the same unit as Adam, but we were handled differently. I was experimented on long before the invasion as scientists tried to give humans super senses. I was given heightened senses to see how far humans could be stretched in that direction. Adam had his emotions carved away, and his responses to fear dulled.
Military researchers wanted to see if they could make living, breathing killing machines. Their only mistake was making us bond. They thought having one person who could center the emotional messes they created would help to keep them controllable.
They thought they could use me to make Adam comply. And it worked until they hurt me. I wasn't even hurt that bad, just one intern overzealous with the controls to my slave collar. But that was enough for Adam, so he found a way to break us out.
I clench my teeth and force my thoughts away from the bad memories of our past. We're moving on now. We're going to be better, do better things.
When we get our new identification cards and have the implants that mark us as clones removed, I'm making Adam talk to someone. I don't know who, and I don't know how. But he's going to talk through his problems because he has so many. His plan of hiding all of them underneath this false bravado is exhausting.
"What are your impressions?"
I pause in the hall near an open door when I hear Alik's question from inside. It's not too hard to figure out he's probably asking for impressions about Adam and me. Not that we left a good first one. Adam couldn't stop staring them all down and wanting to fight them. His jealousy would be cute if it didn't risk us getting booted from this ship.
"I don't know." It's a feminine voice. She doesn't sound as melodic as she did when she was asking Adam who put a slave collar on him, but it's the same woman, I'm almost sure. "Adam, the dark-haired one, was angry. I don't know if it was at the situation or me in particular."
I have the answer to that one. Both. I thought the golden woman was pretty, and the aura she was giving off seemed more than a little interested in us. That was enough for Adam to decide he hated her, or at least strongly disliked her.
Does it matter that while we were on Earth, he'd sometimes bring a woman back and want to share her between us? Nope. Apparently, he can want someone to join us, but me even thinking about it is off the table.
"Seth seemed kind enough, but he's not in charge of their pairing."
"The nice ones never are," Jovi says.
I don't like being told I'm not in charge, but it's more or less the truth. Adam listens to me, but only when he chooses to, and he makes it abundantly clear that he doesn't need to plenty of times.
"They're hiding something," Alik says, and my heart races. We're hiding plenty, but none of it has to do with them taking us to the aliens who can give us new identities.
"Are you going to eavesdrop all day?" a disembodied voice beside me asks.
I jump, letting out a yelp of surprise as the air beside me shimmers until the same scaled male that Adam called a lizard stands next to me. He's not completely naked, which means a pair of boxers snuck up on me. Weird. He laughs at my reaction, and unfortunately, my yelp alerts everyone else that I'm hiding out in the hallway.
"The pendant's red, Phial," Alik says, lower hands on his hips as he stands in the entryway to the room they're all in. "Don't bother them."
"So I just leave him to stand in the hall?" Phial asks, his feathers rustling on top of his head.
"No, it's fine," I say, hoping not to strain relationships even more. "The red is for Adam. He's in a mood." I press my lips together and take in a deep breath. "He's always in a mood. But we aren't keeping secrets. Nothing more than the usual amount of secrets that two clones who broke out of a research facility might have."
Alik looks at my body up and down, deciding something for himself. He tilts his head back toward the room he had come from. "Want to come talk with us? We're eating right now."
"Yeah, actually, that sounds nice." I rub the back of my neck, ignoring the warmth on my face. I'm too pale to care much about it. I get even slightly too emotional, and my cheeks are bright red. Before I enter, I pause and cringe a little. "Adam's probably going to come find me at some point, and he won't be happy."
Alik looks down at me, his lips pressing more firmly together as he assesses the situation. "Will he hurt any of us?"
"He shouldn't, but…"
I wince as I try to figure out how to say the next part without making it seem like there will be issues between us and the golden female. I don't want there to be issues. No, what I want is to maybe get to know her, have Adam admit he thinks she's kind of hot, too, and maybe figure things out from there. But that's wishful thinking, something I try not to do.
"The golden female."
"Essa," Alik cuts in with her name, and I nod.
"Essa can't be near me," I say, crushing my eyelids together and bracing for any sort of anger at that statement.
I open my eyes and take a deep breath when there's nothing but a long silence. Phial's frowning at me, his playful smile wiped away. He diverts his attention to Alik, and I cringe when I see the hard expression on his face.
Alik opens his mouth to say something, maybe to ask me why. Thankfully, he doesn't get the chance before long golden fingers tipped with sharpened black nails wrap around his shoulder.
"I can go," Essa murmurs. Her body's still hidden in the entryway, but her hand remains on Alik's shoulder as he lifts his hand to touch it. His nostrils flare, and his jaw ticks in the corner. "I'll go. I won't cause issues."
I want to tell her it's not her causing issues. It's my overprotective, needy, jealous boyfriend who doesn't realize that just because most of his fear receptors were destroyed doesn't mean he isn't still scared of stuff—stuff like losing me. I don't get a chance to tell her, though.
She walks out of the room, and her beauty takes my breath away just like it did in the living space when I first looked up at her. My mouth is dry, my eyes wide, and I look foolish. I can't help it when she's just so beautiful.
Golden skin that shimmers under the light, dark hair tied in a bun on top of her head between dark spiraling horns. She's taller than me, taller than Adam too. But she's thin and lithe, her muscles small but toned. The cropped tank top she wears shows off her abdomen and the small swell of her breasts. She doesn't have any curves, but I don't mind that so much. Plus, there's the tail. It was twitching like crazy earlier. Now, it's lying close to her right leg, wrapping around her ankle like it doesn't want to be in anyone's way. Her yellow eyes meet mine before ducking and looking away.
"Sorry," she murmurs as she walks past me.
Her cargo pants make a swishing sound as she walks too quickly past me. Her fangs are gone now, but I saw them earlier. I know because I wanted to offer her my throat, ask her to bite into me. I never thought I'd be into that kind of thing, but then again, I've never had a female so enraged at our scars she'd offer to kill for us. It did something to me. It did the same thing to me that happens when Adam says those kinds of things. Maybe I'm just into people taking care of me.
"Why the fuck did Essa leave?" another woman asks. Sloane, I'm guessing, since she's standing so close to the angry Varon.
Alik's eyes flick over to me, and they narrow in unison. "Maybe you should go keep her company."
"Did they hurt her?" Sloane's glare swings over to me. Oh, she's furious. More so than I've seen anyone else on this ship besides Essa, who had me feeling like I was about to piss myself when she was looking all scary and staring down Adam.
"Only her feelings," Alik says, cupping Sloane's cheek.
"That's like worse!" Sloane says before wrapping her arms around Alik and placing a kiss on his cheek. For me, she shoots me another death glare. "You'll fix this."
I hold my hands up, lowering my eyes. I'm not the problem here. I'm not going to take the blame or try to rile anyone up. That's for Adam to do. I wouldn't be in this awkward situation if not for him. He can fix all this, and I'll make sure he does. It'll probably involve a lot of dick sucking, but I'll survive it.
"I fucking mean it." Sloane pokes my chest with her finger.
I lift my eyes enough to look at her, to see the righteous fury in her gaze. She cares for the golden-skinned female, and if I want to get close to her, I need to smooth things over with this human. I nod the slightest movement, but it's good enough for her.
"I'm watching you. And your friend. I don't let anyone fuck with the people I love."
I smile at that, knowing Adam might even like it. Too bad he's still sulking in the bedroom. I won't be surprised if I get back and his hands are bloody from hitting the walls. It wouldn't be the first time. Though I will be having a stern talk with him if he hurts himself like that again.
Sloane walks past me, down the same way Essa disappeared. I close my eyes, trying to center myself. I want to reach out to Adam to tell him he needs to apologize now because he's made this more difficult for me than it should be. He won't, though. He's not in the right headspace. He might not be for a while.
"You already made her leave. You might as well come in," Alik says, forcing me to open my eyes. Phial and Alik are both staring at me, varying levels of anger on their faces.
"I didn't mean for her to leave," I say, blowing out a long breath.
I follow them into what I now realize is a kitchen with an attached dining area. Jovi sits on a barstool, arms crossed over his chest and abdomen, lips flattened in displeasure. He must take pity on me because of the glares I'm getting from everyone else and the yelling from Sloane because he sighs, grabs a plate and a slice of pizza, and hands them to me.
"Thanks."
"We're still not friends, but you look like a babe who was just scolded," Jovi says, taking a bite of his slice. "Are you staying?" he asks with a full mouth, the question directed at Phial.
"No, no, making food for Avery and me." Phial walks over to their food synthesizer and starts flicking through it. He decides on something before turning around and leaning against the counter, his attention back on me. "Does the other male fuck you?"
"Phial!" Alik snaps, his hardened gaze moving over to Phial before I have a chance to register the question.
"We're all thinking it. I'm the only one brave enough to ask. " Phial shakes his head. "I saw him looking at Essa. His cock got hard. It's probably still half-mast now. Is that why your mate is upset with her? Afraid she might woo you since he's obviously terrible at it?"
My face is scarlet at everything he's saying. They all already know Adam and I are together even though Adam's so big about no one knowing because it makes us more vulnerable. There's also how I'm being called out on lusting after their friend, but it's not like I can help whether or not I get hard. And my erection isn't even that noticeable in these pants. Not unless someone is looking for it. Which begs the question, why the fuck was Phial looking for it.
"None of that is our business," Alik says, and Phial's feathers stick up a bit on his head. "You can't have the first question you ask someone be about who they're sleeping with."
"It's a good thing it was my second, then," Phial responds quickly. "The first was asking him about spying on all of you out in the hallway."
Alik rubs his temples as Jovi bites back a smile. This must be part of their relationships onboard, something I'm not privy to. But I don't want them to be upset with one another for long, so I intervene.
"It's no one's business who we have relations with." I lick my lips, hoping my face isn't too red. "And why were you looking at my crotch?"
Phial waves his hand in the air as though my question is stupid. "Sometimes the mother wants us to look at strangers' cocks to see if they are hard for our friends. One doesn't question the mother."
"Let's be real," Jovi adds, standing from his seat to move closer to me. His bottom hands are on his hips, and his upper ones are crossed over his chest. "We all wanted to know if either of you had a thing for her because we're trying to get our friend laid."
I make a choking sound and then cough because I'm so caught off guard. "Excuse me?"
"Our plan before we brought you two on board was to get Essa a pleasure crew. She works hard, is a great friend, and she deserves something nice. But then we had to bring you both on board, and those plans changed."
"I don't understand what that has to do with—"
"Because if either of you was interested in her, then we could solve both problems." Jovi cuts me off. "What we didn't expect was that you two were already sleeping with each other, which, fair enough. I get it."
"You do not get it." Alik seethes through clenched teeth, a possessiveness in his gaze.
I don't think they're together in the same way Adam and I are, but I could be wrong. Maybe he's just possessive over the male he shares a mate with. That wouldn't be surprising.
Jovi rolls his eyes. "But if you're not, then we're back to square one and need to get her a pleasure crew."
Jovi shrugs and gives me a 'what can you do' look. I don't like that look or that he just said he wants to bring someone else onto this ship. I'd like to think that my biggest issue with it is that a stranger would be here when Adam and I are trying to be safe and get away.
But I can't fool myself.
I don't want Essa to have a pleasure crew because I don't want anyone else in her bed. I'm not possessive and territorial like Adam, or at least I never have been.
I love Adam. I love our life. But when I saw Essa, I wanted her. I wanted her in ways I've only thought about Adam in. Maybe that's fucked up of me, maybe it makes me a bad partner, but I can't help my feelings.
Jovi steps around me, and my hand reaches out to stop him. He snorts as he looks down at me, a knowing look on his face.
"Don't hire anyone yet," I mumble, keeping his gaze only because I know he wants me to look away.
"Not yet." Jovi nods, the words coming out slowly. "You have seven days to convince Adam. We're supposed to keep you safe, and a pleasure crew won't put you in danger."
"It'll put whoever you hire in danger," I warn, keeping my voice low.
Adam might hate Essa, but he felt lust, too. He felt the calling. I felt it for a few seconds before he caught me looking at her, and then it was overshadowed with hate.
I can't be sure he'll be fine with anyone wanting to touch Essa. No, he might not ever admit he would've been open to this if he had been the one to suggest it. That doesn't mean he won't kill anyone who tries to touch someone he wants. It's a lose-lose situation that only ends poorly if they invite someone else onto this ship.
"Seven. Days."
Jovi pokes my nose with each word, and I startle. I'm not used to anyone touching me like that. He throws his head back in a laugh before moving back to the pizza and grabbing another slice.
I plop down on a stool beside him and put my face in my hands. Things are already way more complicated than they should be, and we haven't even been on the ship for a full day.