Chapter 13
Jaxin
“Rummicaron don’t mate for life, right?” she asked me, her body a sleek curve between my legs as she twisted to look over her shoulder.
So tempting, so sweet, it felt like the air between us was charged with the force of desire I felt for her.
My little empath could probably feel that.
The secret was out, and she did not seem to judge me for it.
Why would she? Her entire being was about feelings, her own and those of others.
“We do not mate for life, no,” I agreed.
Though once, very long ago, the stories said that we did.
The possessive aggression that came with claims had nearly torn our society asunder; it had kept us in the mud and the oceans.
It wasn’t until scholars and priests came together to devise a way to subdue our volatile feelings that the Rummicaron rose to become a powerful, spacefaring nation in the Zeta Quadrant—a nation that rivaled others, like the Kertinal, the Asrai, or the Aderians.
“What did you mean earlier, when you said, ‘unless I want to tangle with the true Rummicaron beast’? Is that what you’re hiding?
Here?” She turned completely, one hand bracing against my thigh and sending a scorching sensation through my flesh straight to my cock.
The other rose to lie against my sternum, against the space that, several months ago, had been cracked open wide.
My breathing halted, stuck in my lungs. In response, the gills on my neck flared wide, but they could not draw in air any more than my frozen lungs could.
How could she ask that? How could she not?
She did not know Rummicaron history; she was not that kind of scholar.
She had not sensed the truly beastly thoughts running through my mind, the ones I’d had when seeing her naked form.
“I know you feel, Jaxin,” she said when I didn’t answer. “And I know you ache.” Her fingers gently stroked my chest, a sensation I knew was there but did not quite feel through the armor I wore. She had unerringly touched the long muscles that ached with strain after days of hard labor.
“It’s nothing to worry about,” I told her with a shudder, because at least this I could answer.
“Old injury from months ago, but it won’t affect my ability to protect you.
” I tried to force myself to move away, but she had too much power over me; I couldn’t move a muscle.
I tried to tell myself I needed to check where the giant was, that I was failing in my job by not doing so, but it did not help.
“What happened?” she asked—a simple question.
She leaned in and studied my chest with her all-black eyes, their shiny surface reflecting myself back at me.
If she could, I was certain she’d peer straight through my armor and skin to see the bone and muscle beneath.
I didn’t want to answer; it was still too raw and still made me feel too much like I wasn’t strong enough.
I’d failed. I’d nearly died from that claw, would have, if not for the sacrifice of my poor Bex.
Withdrawing took a great amount of self-control and at least six repetitions of one of my most effective mental exercises.
I rose to my feet and paced away, then came back to pick Bex—but not-Bex—up.
“I’ll check where the giant is. You can rest until I’m back.
” I did not check if she agreed with that, but left her kneeling in the grass by the small stream, surrounded by tall grass and flowers, the silk of her hair still heating the palms of my hands.
The giant was exactly where he’d been since we’d gotten to this clearing.
When I scouted a little closer, he did not back away, and I appreciated the guts it took to stand his ground that way.
He was no idiot; he knew that not-Bex could kill him in a heartbeat.
We stared at one another, one warrior to another, and when he inclined his head, I knew he was telling me we did not need to be enemies.
I backed away then, circling the clearing as I tried once again to clear my head.
Any equilibrium I had managed to restore shattered when I caught sight of Dani.
Her sleek body, so much smaller than mine, gleamed in the late afternoon sunlight.
She was dancing. There was no other way to describe the slow, gentle motions her body made as she swayed through the clearing.
A leg went up in an athletic lift, arms going wide like a bird’s before she lowered into a graceful curl.
She flowed from one graceful motion to the next, some slow and simple, others clearly about balance and strength.
I had never seen anything quite like this before: a dance without music, and not even with a particular rhythm.
She seemed enthralled, her expression serene.
She also knew exactly where I was, because as her motions returned her to a normal standing pose, her head tilted my way. “Hi, all still well?”
I did not mean to close the distance between us so rapidly, but when alarm crossed her face, I realized I’d scared her.
My hand caught her chin, lifting it so I could gaze into her intriguing eyes.
“All is well,” I told her in a rush, and then my instincts got the better of me, and control crashed and burned.
My mouth covered hers, a claiming kiss that scorched me to the bone.
She tasted like fire and summer, like the heat of the warm sun and the flowers she’d harvested for her cure. She tasted like she was mine.
Her hands clung to my shoulders, and not-Bex swayed against my back on her strap.
I felt like chaos was about to rain down on us—my world shattering—but it didn’t.
It was just me and Dani, swaying together as I tasted her mouth, her skin.
She shouldn’t be so willing, but she was.
Her desire was slick and sweet, dancing in the air between us, and I wanted to taste it so badly I ached.
“Jaxin,” she moaned. “Take me, please. I don’t care if you’re rough.
I just know that I want you, I’ve never known that before.
” Her words made very little sense to me; all I could gather from them was that she was consenting.
That she wanted my claim, and she wanted it right now.
The rational parts of my brain—the Rummicaron conditioning—no longer existed.
I felt it then: the primal urge that lived beneath our facade of civilization.
I became the beast I’d warned her existed beneath my skin, a primal growl rattling from my aching chest.
I backed her up until we were beside the stream, then swept her off her feet and laid her down.
Pinning her beneath my body, I dragged Bex’s strap over my head and placed the cannon in the grass next to us.
Then I covered her mouth again, licked her skin, tasted the hollow at her throat.
She had already taken off her shirt earlier and wore only a small, tight top that restrained the modest spill of her breasts.
I recalled the soft, anthracite mounds with their dark tips from last night and desperately wanted to see them again.
“He’s watching us,” Dani said on a husky moan.
I didn’t know if that meant the giant had gotten closer; I just knew I didn’t care.
Let him watch, let him witness my claim to my tiny scientist. I felt deeply satisfied by the idea that another male would witness how thoroughly and truly I was about to make my female mine—all mine.
“I don’t care,” I told her, and my claws curled around the edge of her top.
At the last moment, I allowed her to change my action from shredding to undressing.
Her small hands guided me to lift the top over her head.
It tangled with the long braid I’d made, but I liked that too.
I might enjoy a witness to my claim, but he did not get to see her naked body the way I did. That was all mine.
“Jaxin,” Dani squeaked, as if she meant to protest the presence of our witness some more.
I silenced the sound with another kiss, this one with a hint of teeth, so she knew what kind of danger she tangled with.
Her gasp became a shuddering moan, and the scent of her heat filled the air.
“Jaxin,” she said again, but this time it was a sound of surrender, of encouragement.
It was the last bit of tinder thrown onto the flame.
I lost it then, I knew I did. A white haze descended on my brain, and every action after that small sound was instinct, beastly desire, and passion beyond any I’d ever known before.
The pleasure she and I created was so intense that I knew it was forever changing me.
Through it all, my eyes were locked with Dani’s black gaze—mirrors that reflected myself back at me.
A small voice at the back of my mind gave shape to what I saw: beast, teeth, monster, raw power, and domineering control.
This was wrong… I was wrong… but Dani, she never turned me away.
***
Danitalin
The passion was just like last time, a crashing tidal wave that washed over me and awakened an answering, primal passion within me.
I had not lied when I told Jaxin that, with him, for the first time I knew exactly what I was feeling.
I felt his passion break around me, but it did not overwhelm; it incited my own instead.
It was exhilarating, it was powerful, and it was better than anything I could have ever imagined.