Brevan
Ilooked down at Carys. Bare skin. Flushed cheeks. Her brown eyes dark with want. She’d just come apart in my arms and she was already asking for more.
Perfect.
I was still inside her. Still hard. My body didn’t want to withdraw. Didn’t want to leave the heat and tightness of her.
“You’re certain?” I asked. “Vinduthi stamina isn’t—”
“I don’t want careful.” She clenched around me. The sensation made my vision blur. “I want you. All of you.”
Control. I’d spent days maintaining control. Charming her. Planning with her. Protecting her while keeping my distance.
That control was gone now.
I withdrew despite her adorable sound of protest and grabbed the dress as a cushion before flipping her onto her stomach and pulling her hips up.
“Brevan—”
“Trust me.”
I positioned myself behind her. Ran my hands over her back. Her waist. The curve of her hips. She was beautiful. Real. Mine.
Not officially. Not yet. But she would be.
I entered her from behind. The new angle let me go deeper. The flanges dragged against different nerve endings. She gasped. Arched.
“Yes,” she said. “Like that.”
I set a rhythm. Harder than before. Less controlled. My hands gripped her hips, held her steady while I took what I wanted, what she was offering.
Each thrust buried me completely. The triangular head of my cock sealed against her cervix. The flanges rippled along her inner walls. Creating friction. Pressure. Pleasure that I could feel.
She pushed back against me. Meeting each thrust. Taking me as deep as I could go.
“You feel incredible,” I said. My voice was wrecked. “So perfect. Made for me.”
“Yours,” she gasped.
Not yet. But soon.
I reached around, my hand brushing the heat of where we were joined. Touched her there while I moved inside her.
She cried out. Her body tightened around me. The flanges responded automatically. Flexed faster. Creating more stimulation.
“Again,” I said. “Come for me again.”
I worked her with my fingers. Matched the rhythm of my hips. Driving into her while touching her exactly where she needed.
She shattered. I felt it. The way her body clamped down. The way she cried out my name. The complete surrender to pleasure.
It pushed me over. I drove into her one last time. Buried myself as deep as possible. My own orgasm hitting hard. Filling her.
“Mine,” I said. Couldn’t help it. The possessive instinct was too strong.
We collapsed together. Both breathing hard. My body covering hers. My cock still inside her. Still reluctant to leave.
After a moment, I rolled us onto our sides. I settled her back against my chest. Let her feel my heartbeat. My warmth. She settled against me, her breathing evening out. The adrenaline and exertion were finally catching up.
I held her. Let myself have this moment. This quiet. This peace.
Because I knew it wouldn’t last.
A sharp hiss of static shattered the silence, vibrating right against Carys's collarbone.
"Brevan. We have a problem."
The synthesized voice was flat, loud, and came directly from the silver chain around her neck.
I flinched, my combat instincts overriding my exhaustion. I snatched up my blaster and aimed at the tunnel entrance before my brain finally registered the source.
Carys bolted upright, gasping as she scrambled away from the noise at her throat. Her hand clawed at the necklace, eyes wide and unfocused. "What—?"
"It's the cat," I realized, lowering the weapon but keeping my finger on the trigger guard. My heart was hammering against my ribs. "He hacked the audio feed."
"Flinx?" She gripped the pendant, staring at it.
"What is it?" I demanded, shifting into a crouch.
Flinx’s voice crackled again, tinny but distinct.
“How?” I looked at Carys. “The collar is gone.”
She was already moving, her eyes wide. She pointed to the bundle of torn silver fabric on the floor. “The dress. Tarsus gave it to me. He must have woven a tracker into the fabric.”
Flinx jumped onto the ruined dress, his optics scanning it.
Flinx warned.
I found my clothes. I pulled on my pants, then grabbed my shirt.
“Here.” I threw the shirt to Carys.
She pulled it on. It was huge on her, the hem hitting her mid-thigh, but it was cover.
“The dress,” I said, grabbing my jacket. “Bring the dress. The tracker is our only advantage.”
She scooped up the bundle of torn fabric. I put on my jacket, the Regalia heavy in its inner pocket.
Flinx scrambled onto my shoulder.
We moved. Away from the entrance. Deeper into the ruins. Following passages that led into darkness.
Behind us, I heard boots. Weapons. Orders being shouted.
They were coming.
We ran through the ancient chambers. Stone blocks. Carved archways. Evidence of whoever had lived here before.
The passage narrowed. Twisted. Led down a steep incline.
“Where are we going?” Carys asked, her voice tight as she ran, clutching the bundled dress.
Flinx sent.
Might. Not ideal. But better than definitely dying.
The passage opened into a cavern. Huge. The ceiling disappeared into darkness above. Natural pillars rose from the floor. Water dripped somewhere in the distance.
I pointed to a passage at the far end. “There.”
“No,” Carys said. She pointed to a narrow, dark opening to our left. “We go that way. It goes this way.”
She bundled the torn dress, and threw it as hard as she could down the right-hand passage.
Behind us, lights appeared in the cavern. Tarsus’s guards, fanning out.
“There!” One of them shouted, his motion scanner pointing. “The signal. Northwest passage! Move!”
The entire unit, nine of them, charged past us and disappeared down the wrong tunnel, following the signal.
“You just bought us time,” I said.
“Let’s use it.” She was already running for the real exit.
We ran. The passage twisted. Rose. Then opened unexpectedly into daylight.
Daylight.
We were on the side of a cliff. The cave mouth behind us. A massive ravine ahead.
And spanning that ravine was a bridge. Ancient. Industrial. Rust and decay obvious even from here.
“Flinx, scan that bridge,” I said.
“Will it hold us?”
Behind us, we heard shouts of rage from the cave. They’d found the decoy.
“They’re coming back,” Carys said. “Maybe thirty seconds.”
I looked at the bridge. Looked at Carys. She was just in my shirt, her legs bare. “Can you make it across?”
“Can you?”
“I’m heavier. I go first. If it holds me, it holds you.”
“Brevan—”
“No argument. I test it. You follow if it’s safe.”
I moved toward the bridge. Tested the first few meters. The metal groaned but held.
“Stay here,” I told Flinx. “Go with her.”
I continued across. Each step careful. The bridge swayed. Creaked. But it held.
Ten meters. Twenty. I was maybe halfway when I heard Carys behind me.
“I said wait,” I called.
“And I don’t take orders from you.”
Stubborn woman.
I kept moving. Almost to the far side. The bridge was holding. We were going to make it.
Then I heard it. Metal screaming. Something giving way.
The bridge lurched.
I turned. Carys was in the middle. The section behind her was collapsing. Falling away in chunks of rusted metal.
She was stranded.
At the same moment, the Mondian guards burst from the cave entrance. Nine of them, led by the same one who’d held the blaster to her throat. They fanned out, weapons raised.
The lead guard’s comm crackled to life. Tarsus’s voice, tinny and amplified, echoed across the ravine.
“Carys! Step back off the bridge. Come to me.”
She froze, trapped between us.
“The bridge is collapsing,” Tarsus’s voice continued. “You have no escape. Come back to me, and I will let the Vinduthi leave Valyria alive. You failed my test, but you are still valuable. This doesn’t have to end with your death.”
The Mondian guards held their fire, waiting.
She stood there. The bridge failing. Tarsus’s will behind her. Me ahead of her.
The ultimate choice.
She looked at me. Brown eyes meeting mine across the distance.
I held out my hand. “I’ve got you. Jump.”
She looked back at the Mondian. At the cave. Then back at me.
“I’m with him!” she shouted, not to me, but to them. “I’m not your property!”
She ran. Toward me. Toward freedom. The bridge screaming under her.
“Fire!” the lead guard roared, lifting his weapon.
Metal gave way behind her. Sections falling into the ravine as blaster fire strafed where she’d been.
She was ten meters away. Five.
The bridge collapsed completely under her feet.
She jumped, Flinx wrapped in her arms.
I reached out and grabbed her wrist. Pulled her across the gap. We fell together onto solid ground.
Behind us, the entire bridge fell. Crashing into the ravine below.
The Mondian guards stood on the far side. Rage contorting their features. Their blasters useless at this distance.
“This isn’t over!” the lead guard screamed, his voice hoarse. “He will find you! He will make you both pay!”
I pulled Carys to her feet. “Come on. We’re not done yet.”