Chapter 20
CHAPTER TWENTY
Something new is happening to me.
It starts when a salty, refreshing musk tickles my nose. A clean scent that sinks into my lungs like a gust of rain-drenched ocean air. Cool and tingly, but somehow soothing. It swept over me the moment Cylus made his final joke about my feet.
Is it… me? I don’t think so, but Cylus practically balked the second it hit. Then he promptly stomped out of the room without a word.
So much for being not-friends with the not-doctor.
His holograms blinked off as the slab-like door rolled closed behind him. I’ve been staring at the blank space since they disappeared.
Resounding emptiness echoes through the vast dawn-lit room. I blink at the space where the half-furry, ice-blue alien stood over me, feeling a deep pang of something totally unacceptable.
Because I am not sad.
That would be insane.
Although at this point, I’m either totally crazy… or I ought to be.
Okay, I think forcing myself to my feet. Okay.
I’d say the odds of all this being real are pretty fucking high. Which means…
My entire being cringes away from the implications. Because I’m pretty fucking sure it means I’m stuck here. Being bred.
What’s worse—after my time in the Alien Pound, I think I might be lucky.
At least the people here—Roktusians, Cylus said—are attempting to respect my wishes. No one has tried to skin me or eat me. Hell, their king was on his knees within seconds of seeing me for the first time.
Plus, I’m in this swanky suite. Dressed in whatever Khanos’s equivalent of silk is. And—and—
What is that smell?
The fresh saltiness has taken on a rich quality I don’t understand. Warmer and deeper, lighting the synapses in my brain as I gulp it into my tingling lungs.
The window, I think weakly. Fresh air.
I thought Norabi had left it open all night, but up close, I see an invisible force field stretched taut across the entire expanse. It ripples when I touch it, not allowing my hand through. It does, however, let cool wind sweep in.
It’s actually… sort of amazing. A semi-permeable window.
The part of my mind that has always been fascinated by the most random things snags on that notion for a moment. It doesn’t last, though. Because as a clean breeze floats off the periwinkle horizon, with its fading stars and slight rosy glow, something inside of me snaps.
It isn’t the fun, unhinged kind of snapping. I don’t want to scream or stab my ex thirty-two times. No, as the shifting air blows the salty, oceanic scent away from my face, I want to cry.
Honestly? I think I deserve it. I might be the most practical of my friends—the one with the boring job and boring dates, who had generally accepted my lot in life without falling into despair—but this must qualify as an extraordinary circumstance.
So, okay.
Fine.
One good cry.
I settle myself on the wide step-like ledge of the suite’s panoramic vista, figuring I might as well have a nice view while I finally indulge in a long-overdue breakdown.
Setting my chin on my knees, I try my best not to notice the way the smooth fabric of this odd, glimmering robe whispers over my legs. And how much I don’t hate it.
God, what is wrong with me?
The emotions themselves make sense, but everything feels magnified.
Including the terror that strikes when a huge pink male suddenly appears on the other side of the not-window.
I start to shriek, but the blush blur comes to a swift halt, hovering just beyond the clear membrane, his enormous wings flapping subtly to help him tread the open air.
His straight, slanting features hit my brain in a dizzy rush. Those high, thick cheekbones, the point of his chin. The hooking horns and quicksilver eyes.
It’s the one who saved me from that damn cage and brought me here.
Rask.
That’s what Norabi called this male, admitting he is also her brother. A distant, fogged piece of my mind registers that they have similar coloring, though this guy’s hair is the same iridescent gray as his glinting irises.
I jerk back, nearly falling off my perch as a garbled scream tangles in my throat. Rask looks suitably horrified for a second, then his hands fly up in what is, apparently, the galactic gesture for “I mean no harm.”
“Sorry, little one. It’s only me.”
Of all the aliens I’ve met so far, he seems the least polished. Possibly the least accustomed to giving apologies, too. I can tell this one is odd for him when a small scowl crosses his brow and he shakes his head, dismayed by himself.
The chest-length mane on top of his head blows around his neck. I notice he has markings there that match the ones littering the rest of his body.
And I do mean his whole body.
Trust me. The guy is barely wearing bottoms.
If you can call a short almost-kilt “bottoms.”
Dazed, I try to absorb the sheer size—and masculine musculature—of him, but my mind trips the instant our gazes meet.
Rask’s silver luminescence sinks into me, stopping my breath. Which is a mercy. Because a second later, the darkest, most delicious spice wafts through the invisible barrier between us.
It’s vibrant and soul-melting. So good, my brain blinks out.
The heavy sadness filling my chest doubles. But at the same moment, a wrenching ache springs to life between my thighs.
Rask frowns deeply as I stutter, “W-what—”
I mean to ask him what’s happening to me, but he doesn’t have the patience for stammering. Instead, his four-fingered hand slaps an inconspicuous pad beside the not-window. He must have some sort of security clearance, because the transparent film disintegrates immediately.
“I’m here for you,” he explains.
One twitch of his mighty blush bat wings brings his clawed feet to the sill. I blink at his curved, black-pearl talons scrabbling against the pretty aqua stone, counting his long, strange toes.
Huh. Four on each foot. No wonder Cylus thought mine were weird.
Remembering how the healer abruptly left the room sends another swirl of gut-wrenching hurt through me. Something warm and slippery seeps from my core. A bewildering surge of spiced musk invades my senses again, pricking both nipples to the point of pain.
Is it… him? Rask?
The alien’s eerie, metallic eyes track the way my breasts strain against my borrowed robe. His thick brow rises, but his voice drops lower. “You need an alpha, don’t you, little one?”