Chapter 13
SEVERIN
Sev reached the kitchen expecting blood, violence, or death.
What he found instead was Cassandra backed up against the counter with a long stirring rod clutched in both hands like a weapon, her eyes wide and her lush body still wrapped in that absurdly inadequate red silk nightgown.
The thin fabric clung to her curves and barely reached the tops of her luscious, thick thighs, which would have been distracting enough under ordinary circumstances.
But ordinary circumstances did not include Ravik standing stark naked in the kitchen doorway, dripping bathwater all over the floor.
For a moment, Severin could only stare in dismay.
His best friend was enormous at the best of times—seven feet and more of muscle, scars, and Beast Kindred intensity.
Naked and wet, with his long black hair slicked back from his face and water running in rivulets down his broad chest, he looked even bigger…
somehow more primitive…more dangerous. His golden eyes had gone cloudy again, the pale film creeping over the irises like frost spreading over glass.
Severin’s heart sank and he sent up a hasty prayer to the Goddess.
Oh no—not again, please. Please don’t let him be regressing!
“Ravik?” he said carefully, taking a step into the room. “What are you doing here?”
The big Beast Kindred turned his head slowly, as though Sev’s voice had reached him from a great distance.
His hands were hanging at his sides, fingers curled slightly—not quite claws but close.
His chest rose and fell with deep, slow breaths and his nostrils flared as though he was trying to catch a scent he couldn’t quite reach.
“Mate,” he rumbled at last.
Cassandra made a strangled sound.
“He keeps saying that,” she said, her voice pitched higher than usual. “And believe me, I appreciate the compliment or the delusion or whatever it is, but I was just trying to cook supper and then he appeared in the doorway completely naked like some kind of giant wet caveman!”
“Mate good,” Ravik said, nodding as though this explained everything. “Mate make food. Ravik help Mate.”
Cassandra stared up at him.
“That’s very thoughtful of you,” she said carefully. “But most people who help with dinner wear pants.”
Ravik looked down at himself, then back at her, apparently unconcerned.
“Ravik wet,” he said.
“Believe me, I noticed,” Cassandra said, nodding.
Despite the seriousness of the situation—despite the fact that his latest anti-viral had failed and Ravik was clearly regressing again—Severin felt a sudden, unwilling burst of amusement.
He swallowed it down at once. Now was not the time to be amused.
Ravik’s speech had deteriorated from full sentences to broken phrases in the space of less than an hour.
The white film was returning to his eyes and his body language had changed from protective and purposeful to confused and instinct-driven.
The Hunger Virus was still there…waiting…clawing its way back.
“Ravik,” Severin said, keeping his tone calm and even. “You were supposed to remain in the bathing room.”
“Missed Mate smell,” Ravik said, his gaze sliding back to Cassandra. His voice was lower now, rougher. “Good smell. Need Mate.”
Cassandra’s expression changed—irritation giving way to alarm.
“Need me how?” she demanded. “Because I am really not in the mood to be needed in any more weird alien ways today. I have been thrown out of a city, bitten by a zombie lizard, kidnapped by a huge Beast Kindred, stripped, scrubbed, tested, and told my blood is doing something ‘fascinating,’ which is not a word you want a scientist to use about any part of your body.”
Severin barely heard the last part of her little speech because his brain had grabbed onto his best friend’s words and wouldn’t let go.
“Missed Mate smell. Need Mate.”
Slowly, his mind began putting the pieces together, each one clicking into place with increasing precision.
Ravik had been lost for months—mute, fogged, and slipping further and further into the viral haze no matter what anti-viral cocktail Severin injected into his bloodstream.
Then he had gone out into the Dead Zone and returned with Cassandra over his shoulder.
And he had spoken. Not much at first—just a few words. “Woman.” “Human.” “Mate.”
But after he’d held Cassandra—after he’d pressed his face to her hair and inhaled her scent—he had spoken more. He had understood more. His eyes had cleared and his cognition had improved so dramatically Severin had assumed—hoped—that the latest serum was finally working.
But the sample under the scope had told a different story.
The anti-viral wasn’t working—Ravik was. Or rather, something was working on Ravik…something Cassandra carried.
Something in her scent.
“Cassandra,” Severin said slowly, turning to her. “I need you to let Ravik hold you for a moment.”
Her eyes widened.
“You need me to what?”
“Let Ravik hold you,” he repeated.
She looked from him to the huge, naked Beast Kindred dripping water all over the kitchen floor and then back again.
“You want me to let the naked, dripping wet Beast Kindred hug me?”
“Yes.” Sev nodded.
“Of course you do.” Her voice was flat. “Why wouldn’t that be the next logical step in this nightmare?”
“I know he’s naked and wet and this is asking a great deal,” Severin said, forcing himself to speak gently when urgency was clawing at the inside of his chest. “But I need to test a hypothesis. Please,” he added, since he knew humans valued good manners.
“A hypothesis?” Cassandra exclaimed. “Severin, I’m barely dressed and he’s naked.”
“I noticed.” He nodded again.
“Well, I’m glad somebody did, because he certainly doesn’t seem bothered by it.” Her eyes shifted to the area between the Beast Kindred’s thighs where a truly enormous shaft hung down the inside of his thigh.
It wasn’t the first time Sev had seen his best friend naked and it didn’t bother him. He was glad, though, that Ravik wasn’t hard—that would have made what he was asking that much harder for the curvy little human.
“What if he gets the wrong idea?” Cassandra demanded, motioning at herself—her full breasts pressing against the thin silk nightgown. “Then what?”
“Ravik is not currently processing social norms at his usual level,” Sev said, keeping his gaze on her face with an effort. “But he doesn’t wish to harm you.”
“Mate cold,” Ravik rumbled suddenly. “Ravik warm.”
Cassandra glanced at him and Severin saw something flicker across her face. It wasn’t fear this time—not exactly. It was something softer and more uncertain, which she clearly tried to hide by tightening her grip on the stirring rod.
“I’m not cold,” she said.
This was plainly untrue. Her nipples were visibly hard beneath the thin red silk and she had crossed her arms over her chest as though trying to conserve warmth.
The kitchen, like most of the bunker, was kept cool to slow viral degradation and preserve supplies.
It was tolerable for a Kindred male. For a human female wearing nearly nothing, it must have been uncomfortable—Sev was sure of that.
“Warm Mate.” Ravik took a single step toward her.
Cassandra immediately held up the stirring rod, her brown eyes flashing.
“Stay right there, big guy,” she said.
Ravik stopped and just stood there, staring at her.
Severin felt another jolt of shock—the Beast Kindred had stopped because she had told him to.
Not because Severin had given an order and not because he had been physically restrained.
He’s stopped because Cassandra had spoken and some part of him—some deep, mate-driven, protective part of him—had listened.
It was surprising that his best friend was so willing to comply with his new “mate’s” wishes, but it only strengthened his theory that Cassandra had something to do with Ravik’s apparent recovery.
“Please,” he said quietly to her. “Can’t you see how he reacts to you? Just for a moment, let him hold you. If he frightens you or gets too rough, I’ll stop him—I swear it by the Goddess.”
Cassandra shot him a look.
“You said that about the bath too,” she pointed out.
“And I did stop him from massaging you with oils,” Sev pointed out.
“Yes, but you let him scrub every other part of me—including my breasts and between my legs,” she snapped.
A flush rose along Severin’s cheekbones.
She wasn’t wrong. Ravik hadn’t hurt her, but he had handled her far more than Severin should have allowed.
At the time, he had told himself it was necessary to avoid triggering a Rage response in a half-infected Beast Kindred.
But that didn’t change the fact that Cassandra had been frightened and overwhelmed and far too naked in front of two strange males.
“You’re right,” he said, acknowledging her truth, even though he wished he could refute it. “I should have handled the bathing situation better. I’m sorry.”
Her expression shifted again, the sharpness faltering. For a second, she looked tired—more than tired. It was like she was bruised in some place he couldn’t see. Maybe her soul.
“Don’t do that,” she said with a sigh.
“Do what?” Sev frowned.
“Don’t turn decent on me when I’m trying to be mad at you.”
Sev didn’t know how to answer that, so he didn’t. He simply waited, hoping she’d agree to do what he was asking.
At last, Cassandra blew out a breath and lowered the stirring rod.
“Fine,” she said. “One hug—one. And if he starts rubbing me again—or biting me, or licking me, or trying to give me another bath, I am holding you personally responsible.”
“That seems fair,” Sev said gravely.
“It does not seem fair. Nothing about this seems fair. But apparently this is my life now.” She looked at Ravik and pointed a finger at him. “And you—no funny business. I mean it. Hug only.”
Ravik frowned as though he understood only part of that.
“Hug Mate,” he said.