Chapter 22
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Lila
My brain is foggy, and my body aches with need as Ghosie carries me farther into the ship. I rub my body against his. His silky fur is deliciously soft, and I can’t wait to rub my naked body against him.
He enters his room and gently lowers me to my feet before stepping back against the door. I start to chase after him, but he holds his hand up. “Wait, just give it a moment.”
I’m confused. What is he talking about? Doesn’t he want me? I feel a tear trickle down my cheek, the ache in my body acute. My hands come up to cup my breasts, trying to ease the heaviness I feel.
“Please,” I beg and start to step toward him.
“No,” he shouts, and that seems to have some effect. “Just stay over there.” He’s almost pleading with me at this stage, so I stay where I am.
Now that I’m no longer in his arms, it doesn’t take long for the foggy feeling to fade and the ache to dissipate until I’m clear-headed again and fucking mad.
“What the fuck?” I look around the room and find I’m in a bedroom. The bed is neatly made, and the room is tidy, which is a big difference from the room we just left. It was filthy and messy with dirty plates and cups and trash everywhere.
“I’m sorry. It was the best I could do with short notice.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” I am so fucking confused.
“You are Lila Adams, the new Skarrian mimic, aren’t you?” Gone is the foul-mouthed asshole, and in his place is a quiet, softly spoken, polite male.
“Yes, but you already knew that because that traitorous weasel Glup told you.”
“Yes, Glup contacted Lizis. They have a transactional agreement. Glup tells him when there are interesting females on the station, and Lizis pays him to turn a blind eye when we arrive and procure them.”
“Procure them? You mean you steal them,” I retort, and he has the grace to blush but doesn’t argue.
There are so many questions running through my head. I start pacing back and forth, avoiding the bear who watches me with bright eyes.
“What was that?” I ask, pointing to my body, and he sighs, knowing exactly what I mean. “I wanted you to bend me over and show me your one-eyed Care Bear stare.” He frowns, and I know my words have confused him. “Your cock,” I clarify, and he nods with understanding.
“Our fur has aphrodisiac pheromones, and as long as you are touching it, you will feel needy.”
“So you just take women and roofie them with that soft as fuck fur and then keep them?”
He sighs, running agitated hands down his body, trying to smooth his fur, but he’s having no luck, and it continues to stand up like it has a mind of its own. It’s actually freaking adorable, but I refuse to smile while I’m so fucking angry.
“Yeah, it’s our way,” he says, shrugging.
He leans his body against the door, which makes his round belly stick out a little bit more.
“It’s always been our way for as long as I can remember.
Some say we were cursed by a vindictive goddess.
Once upon a time, we had females of our species, and long ago, one of our rulers got arrogant and used his fur to seduce this goddess away from her mate.
She insulted him, and he wanted revenge.
When she came out of her fog, she placed a curse on all of us.
The only way we would ever be able to find mates was to coerce them.
We would never know the feeling of true love.
The pheromones, which were once voluntary, became something we had no control over, and our female population slowly dwindled until there were none.
We had no other options. A lot of us don’t like our way, but without it, our species will die out.
” He sounds so sad, and I find my anger waning.
“You can’t change a whole society overnight, and as you saw, there are many who embrace our ways now. ”
“And you’re hoping I will be able to fix that for you?”
He closes his eyes, and I see his body stiffen as his fur sticks out even more.
“There are many of us who believe you are the answer to our prayers. We have been searching the galaxy far and wide for a mimic to help us, but until now, we haven’t been able to find one.
I didn’t want this. I wanted to find another way, but I was overruled.
If I hadn’t claimed you as mine, they would have passed you around without a care. ”
“They can’t force me to mimic them,” I argue, and he just looks at me, shaking his head sadly.
“Did you feel what touching me did to you? You would do anything to please me, and all I would have done is ask you to mimic me, and you would have done it.”
I shudder because he’s not wrong. “So why did you let the fog wear off?” I ask, and now it’s his turn to start pacing.
“Because I don’t want this. I don’t want to force you. I want you to contact your mates and tell them where you are. We have a few more minutes because I sent them off to steal more women. They are occupied.”
“Why?” I question, still so confused.
“Because you don’t deserve this. None of the women who get stolen by us do.”
“But you keep doing it,” I point out, and he throws his hands up in agitation.
“I’ve never fucked any of them. I’ve always let the fog wear off, and in exchange, they agree to pretend.”
“That’s what the douchebag blue bear meant by you shooting blanks?” I ask, trying to make sense of everything I heard while I was foggy.
“Yes. Now stop asking questions and call your mates to you.”
I hold out the hand that has the power dampening bracelet on it. “But how? I can’t with this thing on me.”
Ghosie stares at the offending piece of metal in dismay. “I can’t let you use the ship’s communication because they will know what happened. Fuck.”
“Don’t panic, we can think of something,” I tell the stressed bear who has started to pluck his fur with distress.
“How can I not panic? If you aren’t off this ship before it leaves port, then all is lost. They are not going to be satisfied with trusting me.
Lizis has been eyeing my leadership position for a long time now.
If any of them have reason to doubt my loyalty or question my allegiance, I’m as good as dead.
They will want to see you in your carevasta form.
They may even demand to watch me fuck you. ”
“It’s fine. We can work something out. I just need to work on getting this bracelet off.” Then something occurs to me. “I can’t mimic.”
“What do you mean?” he asks, and I wave my hand with the bracelet on. “I can’t mimic your form without you removing the bracelet or at least deactivating it.”
His eyes widen, and a smile creeps across his lips, and holy shit, the bear is handsome.
His dad bod just makes me want to snuggle into him and wind my legs around his waist and…
Nope. What the actual fuck, Lila? There must be something wrong with me.
I can’t be thinking that way about the life-sized version of my favorite stuffed toy.
No, it must be some weird, repressed shit that occurred when I lost my parents and ended up in the foster home, bouncing from family to family with only my friendship bear for company.
Yeah, we’re not even going to touch that.
“Okay, yes, we can work with this. Straun has the controller for that. When they arrive, I will demand it from him. Then, as soon as I deactivate it, you can call your mates here or teleport out or whatever it is you can do to get away from us.” He sounds happy now, and I notice as he turns away from me to pace in the other direction that he has a short, stumpy little tail, and it’s wagging furiously with this information.
Oh my god, it’s fucking adorable. I just want to scratch his big belly and watch it wag for me.
Fucking focus, Lila. “I can probably telepathically tell my warlock mate to come and get me, but what’s going to happen to you?” I ask him.
His tail stops wagging, and he turns back to face me. “You’re going to have to knock me out, and I can say your warlock got the drop on me.”
“Do you think they will believe that?” I ask him, and he shrugs.
“It won’t matter as long as you’re safe.” Fuck, now he’s being sweet too.
“What will happen to you?”
“Lizis will probably challenge me for leadership. It’s a death match, but I’ve been challenged before, and hopefully I will live to be challenged again.
The big issue is if there is mutiny because I lost the first real chance we had at fixing our society.
I wouldn’t survive that. Then again, I was surprised they were so insistent in trying to capture you.
I thought most of them liked our ways. I’m not sure if they realize things will change if they actually have female bears to mate with, but then with how our pheromones work, I doubt things will be different except we can mate with our own species.
I’m sure most of them will still take away their choices.
There is a large portion of our society who really takes advantage of it.
Most of our males will only use their gifts occasionally when they want to have children.
Some of us have never used it.” He won’t look me in the eye when he says this and busies himself at the communication panel of his room when it suddenly lights up.
Shut the front door. Is he saying what I think he’s saying? “Are you saying you’ve never used your gift to have sex?”
“That would be dishonorable,” he says without looking back at me. “I want a woman to see the real me, not the foggy version my fur would cause her to see and feel and want.”
“Are you saying you’ve never had sex?”
He scoffs and shakes his head before turning back to face me. “I’m a romantic but not stupid. I’ve had my share of male lovers.”
“Ah, okay, but never had sex with a female? How do you know you’d even want one? That you aren’t gay?”
“Because when my hormones are fogging those women I’ve struck deals with, and they’ve rubbed themselves all over my body, my dick gets very happy,” he says somewhat dryly, and I guess he has a point.
“They are back, and they are demanding to see you. Are you ready for this? You’ll be under the influence of my pheromones, and I’ll try to move away from you once they remove the bracelet. ”
“It’s fine. I’ll be okay,” I assure him.
“I apologize for everything that comes out of my mouth, but I have a role to play if we’re going to make this work.”
I wave my hand at him. “Don’t worry about me.
I will play my part, and if, for some reason, I can’t get away, you do what you have to do to keep us both safe.
I won’t be upset if you have to cop a feel or if you have to do something to reassure your crew that you’re serious about this. Just don’t let me be passed around.”
“What if they demand a demonstration?” he asks, looking me in the eye.
“If we can get the bracelet deactivated, we won’t even need to worry about it.
” I sigh and think about what he’s really asking.
Would this be considered cheating? I find myself incredibly attracted to this bear.
I can still feel my kraken inside of me even though I can’t shift into her form, and she is fully on board with helping the bear in whatever capacity he requires.
My whisperer form is quiet, but that’s no surprise—she is a two-cat woman—and I can feel that my mimic is intrigued.
It wouldn’t take much to convince my body to mimic Ghosie’s form.
I think my mates would be okay with whatever happens, especially if it helped me escape. What they wouldn’t be okay with is him taking my choice away from me, but he’s not doing that, and I am grateful for that and happy to play along in any way.
“You do what you have to do to keep us safe. I am okay with that,” I assure him, and he holds my eyes for a moment longer, really looking to see that I’m being honest.
“Okay, Lila. Let’s go and put on a show. My life and your sanity depend on it.”
“Wait.” I hold up my hand as he steps toward me, and he freezes. I look down at the floor, a little nervous to ask for what I want. “Um, would you maybe kiss me before we go out there? I kind of feel like I need that before I can face all of them.”
He inhales sharply. “You want me to kiss you?” he asks, the words flowing out in a hurry.
“Yeah, so we can, you know, get all the awkwardness out of the way, and we can perform authentically.” Fuck, that excuse sounds lame even to my own ears. I kind of just want to feel his lips on mine. His sweet gentleness is attractive, and the fact that he’s a virgin for females is a temptation.
He steps toward me, one side of his mouth quirking up slightly. “Just so we’re not awkward, even though you’ll be in a pheromone induced fog, right?” he asks, calling me out. Meh, I guess I kind of asked for it.
“Yeah, exactly.” I’m not admitting anything.
“Okay, well, don’t touch me. Just close your eyes and stand there with your hands behind your back,” he demands, and I want to squirm on the spot, because his voice just got all growly and commanding, and I am so here for it, but I need to remember what’s about to happen.
I do as he asks, puckering my lips and closing my eyes with my hands firmly clasped behind my back. I want to be fog free for this.
I feel him lean in, his breath against my face, as he gives me little Eskimo kisses with his cute button nose. My lips tip up in joy. Just as I feel his lips ghost across mine, a buzzer sounds throughout his room.
“What the fuck are you doing in there? Pull your cock out of her cunt and get out here. We want to see what she looks like.” The voice comes through speakers set somewhere.
My eyes snap open, and I see Ghosie glare at the door before sighing loudly.
“Are you ready for this?” he asks, stepping back, and my heart sinks a little in disappointment, but I nod and pull the zipper down on my top, tossing it to one side of his room, before toeing my shoes off.
I unfasten the button on my pants and shimmy them down my legs.
Ghosie’s eyes widen when I pull my hair out of my ponytail and shake it around, giving it that well fucked look.
“What are you doing?” he asks, almost sounding panicked, and I hold up a hand.
“Relax, dude, they think we’ve been fucking.
I’m just setting the scene, and I didn’t want you to feel bad for having to do it when I’m fogged.
” The panic clears, and I have just enough time to lean in and steal a kiss, my fingers burying into his fur before the door slides open.
Ghosie is quick and drags me in, lifting me to wrap my legs around his body before turning with an annoyed glare aimed at the intruder as I feel the needy fog descend on my body.
“Oh God, you feel so good,” I say as I rub my face on his furry chest. “Please stick that big cock in my pussy.”