Chapter 41
RAVIK
Ravik was having the strangest dream. He and Severin had gone to a planet full of lizard people to do science and surveillance—which wasn’t unusual. But while they were there, the lizard people all went fucking crazy and started wanting to eat each other—and him and Sev too.
Then the two of them had run to an underground bunker where there was nothing but shitty lizard people food to eat. Their shuttle had been torn apart by the Infected—those bastards—and one of them scratched Ravik and he…he…what?
He couldn’t remember that part. Or at least, the dream didn’t show him. It was like a fog had drifted over his mind and nothing made sense anymore.
Then a beautiful woman came—a Mature Elite sent by the Goddess herself. Ravik brought her back to the bunker and the three of them were…were what?
The dream wouldn’t show him. He only had a feeling that the woman—Cassie was her name—was incredibly important to both of them. She was…was…
His dream dissolved when someone elbowed him in the stomach.
“Oof!” He opened his eyes and looked around. “What the fuck?” he muttered.
“Sorry—you were snoring right in my ear,” a woman’s voice said.
Ravik looked down and realized it was the woman of his dreams—Cassie. The Mature Elite was looking gorgeous with her tousled hair and sleepy eyes.
“Cassie?” He shook his head. “I was just dreaming of you.”
“You were? That’s nice.” She looked at him speculatively. “You know, you’re sounding a lot less like a caveman this morning.”
“A caveman?” He frowned. “What’s that?”
“I believe the early humans who lived on Earth many centuries ago stayed in caves,” Severin said, sitting up on the other side of Cassie. “They had a primitive way of communicating—that’s what Cassandra is referencing.”
“I still don’t see how…” Ravik shook his head. “Hey, why are we all sleeping together in the same fuckin’ bed?”
Cassie’s eyebrows shot up.
“You mean…you don’t remember last night? The two of you holding me between you?”
“Holding you between us?”
Ravik frowned and tried to think. He had some vague memories but there seemed to be a fog over them that he couldn’t lift.
“Why would we do that?” he asked at last. “Beast Kindred and Blood Kindred don’t share women like Twin Kindred do.”
He saw Cassie and Sev exchange a look—a look that said they knew something he didn’t. But Cassie only shook her head.
“Never mind. It’s just good to see that you’re feeling better today.”
“Feeling better? I didn’t know I was sick,” Ravik protested.
“You were scratched by one of the Infected when we were fleeing the Dead Zone to get here,” Sev explained.
His best friend didn’t seem to be in the least upset that the three of them were in the same bed together, Ravik thought.
It was like they slept with a woman between them every night.
When of course, the only other time that had happened had been with that Tenebrian woman when Ravik had been really drunk on Goldsheill ale.
He’d woken up with a pounding headache and a secret sense of shame after that encounter—and a promise to himself never to do anything like that again.
But this morning it was almost like he was coming out of a fog.
His head didn’t ache at all. The only thing different that he could tell was that Sev’s scent was very strong in the room. It wasn’t a bad smell—just intense.
He shook his head.
“I vaguely remember the whole Infected thing. Are we really on a planet of lizard people then?” he asked.
Sev nodded.
“We’re on Visslick Prime. We came here to do research and got stuck when our shuttle was destroyed by the herds of Infected after the Hunger Virus broke out.”
“Fuck—it’s just like in my dream!” Ravik ran a hand through his hair. “Gods—how long have I been out of it?”
“You’ve been halfway infected for almost four solar months now,” Sev told him. “Listen, I need to go run some tests in the lab,” he added. “But I want you to stay close to Cassandra—all right? You need to be near her scent.”
“I do? Why?” He frowned in confusion.
“It helps keep you from slipping back into caveman territory,” Cassie, sitting up and facing him.
The sheets were pooled around her hips and she was naked.
Ravik couldn’t help noticing that she was shaped just like he liked his women—full-figured and curvy with big breasts, wide hips, and thick thighs.
Gods, had he really slept with her in his arms all night in that state? And he hadn’t tried anything?
Not that he would ever force a woman—that went against everything the Kindred stood for. But it was hard to believe that he and Sev had slept with her between them, all naked and tempting, and nobody had done anything at all.
He strained his memory to see if he could remember how they had gotten into this situation in the first place and if anything had happened, but he was still drawing a blank.
“Er…why are you looking at me like that?” she asked, frowning and he realized he’d been allowing his eyes to linger on every inch of her gorgeous, curvy body. Also, the sight had given him a raging hard-on.
“Fuck, sorry, baby,” he rumbled, forcing himself to look away. “You’re just so fucking gorgeous all naked like that.”
She frowned and put a hand on her hip, which caused her breasts to jiggle.
“You saw me like this last night, you know. In fact, you did more than just look at me. You—” She broke off abruptly, probably because he was frowning in confusion. “Wait—you don’t remember anything we did, do you?” she asked.
“No, but keep going.” Ravik made a hand gesture. “Don’t stop now—it was just getting good.”
But Cassie seemed to be miffed at him now.
“No, I don’t think I’d better. I think I need to get dressed.”
She went hunting around in the copper colored sheets of the massive bed until she came up with a tiny red scrap of fabric which she pulled over her head.
The silky little slip barely did a thing to hide her luscious body, though. It clung to her curves and Ravik could clearly see the tight points of her nipples pressing against the thin fabric.
Fuck—his cock was aching now! He needed to get out of here and go take care of himself!
“’Scuse me,” he muttered, climbing out of the bed.
But as he headed for the door, he saw that the beautiful Mature Elite was following him.
“Hey…” He frowned at her. “What are you doing?”
“Coming with you,” she said and there was grim determination on her pretty face.
“Coming with me? Why?” Ravik protested.
“Because last time you wandered off on your own you took off your pants and nearly burned the bunker down trying to cook fikka beetles on the stove,” she replied.
“What the fuck?” Ravik rubbed his head. “Why in the Seven Hells would I do that?”
She shrugged.
“Severin thinks it’s because you got too far from my scent—which somehow brings you back out of the Hunger Virus haze.”
Curious, Ravik leaned down and pressed his face to the side of her neck.
He inhaled deeply and sure enough, she smelled amazing.
But he didn’t know how her scent could have brought him back from the virus she and Sev were talking about.
Especially when the main scent he still smelled was his best friend’s.
Clearly he had been close to Cassie last night.
And so had Ravik because he could smell his own scent on her too.
His frown deepened. What the fuck had they both been doing with the curvy Mature Elite and why did she carry both their Bonding Scents?
“Are you done sniffing me yet?” she asked and Ravik realized he still had his face pressed to her hair.
“Uh, sorry.” He straightened up. “You do smell fucking amazing, but I don’t understand why you need to keep near me. I’m going to the fresher to jerk off, you know,” he added bluntly. “So you might want to give me some privacy for that.”
Her cheeks went bright pink, but she lifted her chin.
“That’s fine. It won’t be the first time I’ve seen you come.”
“What?” Now Ravik was really confused. “What does that mean?”
She shook her head.
“You really don’t remember anything, do you?”
“No, but I wish I fucking did!” Ravik growled. What in the Seven Hells had he been doing with the gorgeous little human and why couldn’t he remember it? Why—?
“I have some news.” It was Sev, coming out of his lab and his face was filled with excitement and relief.
“What news? About the sample you took last night?” Cassie asked, looking up at him hopefully.
What sample? Ravik wanted to ask, but his friend was already talking again.
“Last night I made a compound from your honey, Ravik’s blood, and my essence,” he was explaining to Cassie. “But it kept degrading—it killed the virus but I couldn’t keep it alive long enough and it needed a living host—a live delivery system, if you will—”
“Severin, please—” Cassie put up a hand to stop him. “Please for once, just skip the science and get straight to the point. Were you able to make a cure from the sample I gave you or not?”
“Yes.” Sev took a deep breath. “And I need to administer it to you.”
“All right—where is it?” She held out an arm. “Please, give it to me. I’m ready.”
Sev frowned.
“I can’t give it to you in a syringe or an injector,” he explained carefully. “You see, as I told you, it needs to be delivered in a healing medium from a living host.”
“Uh, Sev, what in the Seven Hells are you talking about?” Ravik asked, frowning.
His friend looked irritated.
“I’m saying that I injected myself with the cure, last night,” he said. “I knew it was a risk, but—”
“Wait a minute, wait a minute…” Ravik held up a hand. “You injected yourself with what?”
“The compound I told you about,” Sev said impatiently. “It’s in my system now—I’m carrying the cure.”
Cassie shook her head.
“I don’t get it. If it’s inside you, how do you give it to us?”
Severin took a deep breath.
“You might not like this but…I’ll have to bite you—both of you. The compound will be carried by my essence into your bloodstream and the cure will enter your body that way.”
Cassie had a curious, uncertain look on her face but Ravik was already backing away.
“Uh-uh, no. I don’t think so,” he said, frowning. “Males don’t bite other males—you know that, Sev. Besides, you can only heal the woman you love with your essence—not another male.”
Sev immediately looked frustrated.
“I know that’s usually the way it works,” he said. “But I believe in this case I’ll be able to heal you both because I care for you both.”
“Well, I care for you too but as a friend,” Ravik emphasized. He would do just about anything for his best friend but letting Sev bite him was out of the question.
“You don’t understand—without the cure, you’re eventually going to slip back into the mental fog the virus causes!” Sev exclaimed. “You’re only as coherent as you are now because we slept in the same room last night and my body was incubating the cure, which came out in my scent.”
Ravik frowned at him.
“What the fuck? First you tell me I have to be near Cassie because her scent is keeping me sane and now you’re saying it’s your scent? And you want to bite me? I don’t think so—I feel just fine.”
“You only feel fine because of my scent!” Sev looked really upset now—more upset than Ravik had ever seen him.
“Please, I don’t want to lose you to the fog again!
” he begged. “You don’t know what it’s been like these past three months—working on antiviral after antiviral only to see them all fail while watching you slip away, getting further and further from your right mind and any chance of the two of us ever getting home to the Mother Ship again. ”
Ravik thought uneasily of the strange fog that seemed to cover his most recent memories. Could Sev be onto something here? But he couldn’t just let his friend bite him—he fucking couldn’t.
“Well you can bite me if you want to,” Cassie said, frowning at both of them. She looked up at Ravik. “I don’t understand what the big deal is. Blood Kindred bite their mates every day. I know—I worked with some girls who were bonded to them.”
“Yes, they bite their mates,” Ravik emphasized. “Do you know what the bite of a Blood Kindred does to you?”
“No—does it do something bad?” Cassie asked, looking uneasy. “I thought it just caused pleasure.”
“It does—it makes you fucking come,” Ravik growled. “You don’t understand. Sev asking to bite me is like…like he asked to suck my cock.”
His face got hot when he said it, but it really was the closest comparison he could think of.
“Is that true?” Cassie looked at Sev, whose face was also red.
“Yes, but it’s beside the point right now,” he insisted. “This is the only way to cure both of you—the only way we can all go home again!”
“I’m not going anywhere,” Ravik growled. “You two go—I can stay right here and live on the shitty lizard people planet and eat the shitty lizard people food forever if I have to.”
“Why do you always have to be so stubborn?” Sev’s voice had dropped to a low, frustrated growl. “Why won’t you listen to me? I’m telling you the scientific fact that—”
And that was when the lights went out, plunging the whole bunker into darkness.