Chapter 3 #3
He’d done this with beasts more times than he could count; the movements were instinctual. But he had to remind himself, again and again, that he was not binding Lacey to claim her. He was doing so to protect her from her own foolish decisions.
“What the fuck? Telok!” She planted her feet on the ground and pulled away, managing to gain a couple steps before he caught her other arm and dragged her back.
Despite her struggles and angry shrieks, he finished his work quickly, tying her arms against her sides and her legs together. She wriggled and strained, but she couldn’t accomplish much more than shifting her weight around, and she would’ve fallen if not for him holding her steady.
She glared at him. That fire in her eyes, that rage, was brighter than ever. “You really are an asshole.”
Good. It would be easier to stay away if she hated him. Easier to control himself, to resist.
He chose not to acknowledge how poorly that had worked thus far.
With her restrained, he again hefted her over his shoulder.
Lacey grunted and released a pained groan. “Just you wait, you prick. I’m going to get you back for this.”
Keeping a firm grip on her, Telok stooped to pick up the spear and set out for Kaldarak. Her scent was still mixed with that of her blood.
Telok clenched his jaw and told himself that he was not carrying his would-be mate, now bound and helpless. He was…hauling a harvest back to Kaldarak. Nothing more. He could not let it be anything more.
Though both her struggles and her curses had diminished by the time the stairs to Kaldarak came into sight, Telok had heard several new human insults from her that he’d have to ask Cole to explain.
Elharat and Okkor remained in their places at the base of the stairs. The former tilted his head, mouth opening as though he meant to speak, but he snapped it shut when Okkor hissed and thumped his spear on the ground.
Telok strode past them without a word.
Lacey tensed on his shoulder. “Are you two really going to stand there and let this happen?”
Behind them, Okkor muttered in vrix, “I do not know your words, human.”
“Nor do I,” Elharat said.
That coaxed a savage growl from the bound female. “Liars!”
She was quiet as Telok ascended the steps, but he felt the rage radiating from her, felt the barbed words gathering behind her lips. Yet her silence persisted even after he reached the top and strode toward the human dens on the far side of the city.
As they passed the central platform, where Urkot’s stonetoss games continued, many of those gathered there looked in Telok’s direction with questioning gazes. The humans stared with mouths agape and eyes wide.
Lacey’s body heated against Telok’s hide through the silk.
“I hate you,” she said in a low, raspy voice.
She’d said those words to him before, with far more venom, but the way they’d come out now…
He continued onward, trying to ignore the twinge in his chest, the tightness in his throat, and the lump sinking in his belly.
This is what I wanted, is it not?
Lacey neither spoke nor struggled the rest of the way to the human dwellings.
When he reached her den, he swept aside the curtain hanging in the entrance and ducked inside.
Her scent enveloped him. Despite everything, his desire rekindled.
Clamping his claspers over his slit, he stood her spear next to the entryway, dropped her bag on the floor beside it, and strode to her bed.
Telok grabbed a spare blanket, folded it, and set it atop her bedding before laying her down upon it.
With her damp red hair spread around her head, she glared up at him. “You going to untie me now?”
“No.”
“What? Are you serious? You can’t just—”
“Be silent, little thorn” he growled in vrix, emphasizing the words with a snap of his mandible fangs.
Lacey flinched and pressed her lips together.
“You will stay,” he continued, pointing at the bed, “and you will think. You went into the Tangle alone, bleeding. You gave word to no one. Do you wish for death? Are you that foolish?”
“What do you even care?” she muttered in English.
He surged forward, dropping himself over Lacey with all four hands planted on the bed to either side of her, stopping with his face a thread’s width from hers. She gasped, eyes flaring as his hair fell around them, shadowing the rest of the world and leaving only her.
The spot where she’d bitten him pulsed, the sensation dull, delicious, maddening.
“You are my tribe,” he rasped. “You are my family. You are—”
Mine.
The word caught in his throat, refusing to emerge.
Lacey stared up at him, brows drawn together, eyes searching.
Silence stretched between them, heavy and thick.
This close, they were sharing breath, and he could feel the heat coming off her body. Her scent, more potent than that of any female vrix, made his thoughts hazy with lust.
Fuck.
He needed to leave.
Telok exhaled heavily. Those eyes of hers held him there, beckoned him to lose himself…
Go. Now.
He shoved himself up and spun away, striding to the door. He whipped the curtain up, ducked to move through, and hesitated as something pulled taut in his chest.
Clenching his fists, Telok forced himself to leave her.