Chapter 16 Clare
Clare
When we'd both finished our meal, I was full, warm and in surprisingly good spirits.
Yes, we were on a hostile alien planet, but I'd enjoyed getting to know Venom a little more.
I'd got used to seeing his sharp fangs when he smiled and had come to appreciate his sense of humour.
We may have been from different species but that didn't mean we couldn't laugh about the same things.
"What's for dessert?" I joked.
"If you're still hungry, I can prepare another ration for you. Or you could snack on the berries the chii gave us."
I rubbed my belly. "I'm not sure I could eat even a single berry. This was so filling."
"It is supposed to be. And you just ate a portion created for a species much b-bigger than you."
He shivered slightly. Was he getting cold again already? I was slightly chilly now that I'd stopped eating, but the meal had warmed me from the inside.
"I can look for more blankets," I offered.
He gave a small shake of his head, his long black hair sliding over one shoulder.
“I highly doubt we’ll find any here. The game makers wouldn’t send items of comfort down here.
Food, yes, b-but the rest will be weapons, technology, tools to keep the resident monsters in check.
There won’t be any blankets. We’re lucky the chii thought ahead and g-gave us ours. ”
His words came out stiffly, lips tight, fangs barely visible. He was trying to control the tremble in his voice, but I could hear it anyway. He wasn’t just chilly – he was freezing.
“That’s not good enough,” I said, rising to my knees. “You’re no use to either of us if you turn into a naga popsicle.”
“I will b-be fine.”
I raised an eyebrow at his chattering voice. “Are you sure about that? I don’t know much about your species, but if you’re even slightly similar to the reptiles we have on Earth, you need warmth to function.”
“I will be fine,” he repeated. He refused to look at me, which told me everything I needed to know.
I narrowed my eyes. “Liar.”
He huffed a breath that might have been a laugh. “I’m trying to b-be optimistic.”
“Optimism doesn’t keep you warm.” I shuffled closer and reached for the blanket I had wrapped around my shoulders. “We’ll share this one. If we sit beneath a blanket together, my body heat should warm you as well. Do you think that will help?”
He didn’t move. “Clare…”
“What?”
“This might… n-not b-be safe.”
I paused. “Are you going to hurt me?”
“N-never.” His voice cracked like ice.
I held his gaze, steady despite the shiver down my spine that had nothing to do with the cold.
He wasn’t trying to scare me – if anything, he looked scared of himself.
“I trust you,” I said quietly. I wasn’t sure why I said that – I didn’t know him, knew barely anything about him, and yet…
It was true. I trusted him. And my instincts were always right.
Maybe it was the chii. I trusted them and they trusted Venom.
They had formed a bond with both of us. That had to count for something.
His eyes widened. “You shouldn’t. If I g-get too close to you so soon after tasting your b-blood… I don’t know if I’ll be able t-to stop myself.”
I hesitated, my fingers tightening around the blanket. That wasn’t what I’d expected him to say. I’d thought he was worried about impropriety or physical awkwardness – not losing control because he’d tasted me.
“You mean like some kind of predator instinct?” I asked carefully.
His throat bobbed as he swallowed. “Yes. N-no. It’s m-more complicated than that.”
“That’s not very reassuring.”
He finally met my gaze, and the look in his eyes made my breath catch. It wasn’t hunger, not exactly. It was fear. Of himself.
“I’ve t-trained for years to k-keep it contained,” he said softly. “B-but training can only g-go so f-far. Especially when the scent is… overwhelming.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. My brain skittered between questions. Did I want to know what I smelled like to him? Was this just about the blood? Or something more primal, more…dangerous?
“And what if I tell you I’m not scared?” I said, but the words came out softer than I meant them to.
He didn’t smile. “Then I’d say you d-don’t know enough about me yet.”
A beat of silence passed. The air between us was thick with tension – not quite sexual, not quite hostile. Just wary. Charged.
I took a deep breath. “Okay. Then tell me.”
He blinked. “What?”
“Tell me what I don’t know. Help me understand what you are… what this is. Because if we’re stuck together, and sharing a blanket is going to turn you into a slavering beast, I think I deserve to be informed in advance.”
That got a reaction – a soft snort, almost a laugh. His fangs flashed. The tension in his shoulders eased a fraction.
“I’m not g-going t-to attack you,” he said. “But m-my instincts… they’re n-not subtle. When I’m near you, especially after b-blood has been exchanged, they want things I m-might not.”
I frowned. “Like what?”
He hesitated. “To m-mate.”
Oh. Fuck. We were back to the mating talk. Although I was pretty sure that this time, he didn’t mean being in a relationship. He was talking about sex.
I swallowed. “And do you want that?”
Another silence. Then, with agonising restraint: “Yes. B-but not like this.”
I found myself relaxing, just a little. That mattered. It meant he was still in control, even if something more primal was tugging at him beneath the surface.
I unwrapped the blanket from my shoulders and held it open between us. Cool air kissed my skin despite the scarves I had wrapped all around my body. The blanket had kept the chill out more than I’d realised.
“Then we do this carefully,” I said. “For warmth. Nothing else. If you feel like you can’t hold back, tell me. Communicate. I will move away if it becomes too difficult for you.”
He studied me, long and hard. “Y-you’re sure?”
“Yes.”
I moved first. Quietly, deliberately, I crossed the space between us and sat down beside him.
Close, but not quite touching. I draped the blanket around our shoulders like a tent, leaving a gap between our bodies, though I could feel the cold radiate from his scales.
He was even more hypothermic than I’d feared.
He didn’t move. Didn’t reach for me. Just sat perfectly still, his tail coiled neatly around him, hands folded in his lap like he was meditating on a knife’s edge.
Neither of us spoke.
The silence between us wasn’t uncomfortable, exactly. Just tight. Charged. Like the air before a storm.
But he didn’t touch me. Didn’t push.
And I didn’t lean in.
We sat there, shoulder to not-quite-shoulder, two beings wrapped in the same blanket, pretending it was just about the cold. Which it was, right?
I kept my arms tucked in, hands in my lap, determined not to touch him.
And yet…
I could feel him beside me, every still inch of him.
The coolness of his skin radiated even through the shared cover.
I could smell him too – not in a bad way.
Not even in an alien way. Just… Venom. Clean, metallic, with a faint tang of something earthy and sharp like crushed herbs.
It curled into my nose with every breath and settled low in my belly like a satisfying heaviness. I liked his smell.
Which made no sense. He wasn’t human. He wasn’t even humanoid.
But that didn’t stop the way my skin prickled with awareness.
I didn’t know him.
He was dangerous.
He was trying not to be.
And I… was losing the battle to keep my guard up.
I pressed my lips together, glancing sideways at him.
He was pale – not in colour exactly, but in energy. His eyes were half-closed, his shoulders slightly hunched. A tremor passed through his muscles, barely visible but constant.
“Venom?” I asked quietly.
He didn’t respond.
My stomach twisted. “Venom!” I reached out and touched his arm. He flinched, but the movement was jerky and uncontrolled.
“S-still… f-fine,” he muttered, his teeth chattering audibly.
Liar.
His slitted eyes had drifted half-closed, and a visible shiver rippled through his upper body. He wasn’t just cold. He was on the verge of shutting down.
A bolt of concern shot through me. I didn’t understand everything about his biology, but this was bad. He was trying so hard to hold himself together, to fight his instincts, to give me space. But if he kept going like this, he might not make it through the night.
I didn’t think. I just acted. I slipped an arm around his waist and shuffled closer until our sides touched fully beneath the blanket.
My bare skin met the chill of his scales, and I bit back a gasp.
He was freezing. Absolutely freezing. A living, breathing being shouldn’t feel this cold. Goosebumps ran over my skin.
“I’m not doing this for you,” I muttered, more to myself than to him. “You’re just no good to me half-frozen.”
He didn’t resist. Didn’t speak. He just let out a slow exhale and leaned slightly into me, like the last thread of tension had snapped.
I pulled him closer, wrapping myself around him as much as I could by hugging him like a koala, one leg on either side of him. He was so much bigger than me, so I had to make it count.
“Don’t look under the blanket,” I muttered, and pulled some of the carefully wrapped scarves off my body.
My arms and legs were first, but it wouldn’t be enough.
I left only one scarf wrapped around my boobs and one slung around my waist. For modesty.
But if this wasn’t enough, I knew I was prepared to take it all off.
His life was more important than my sense of modesty.
His scales were almost as soft as human skin. I’d expected to feel the overlaps between them, but no. They were cold, so very cold. I felt more and more helpless. My body heat wasn’t going to be enough to warm this huge alien.
His arm came up automatically, loosely circling my back. The rest of him – his long, coiled tail – shifted with a faint rustle as it curled nearer, cocooning us in gentle loops. Not tight, not possessive. Just there. Protective.
My heart was racing now, but not from fear.
I didn’t know what this was. Didn’t understand why I wanted to press closer, or why his scent made something in my chest ache. I barely knew him.
But I knew he made me feel safe. And seen.
I could feel the restraint in him, the careful way he had placed his coils, the way his hand barely touched my back. His breathing was shallow.
And fuck, he was cold. My skin prickled from the chill radiating off his torso, and yet something in me wanted to stay there. To melt into him.
I told myself it was just adrenaline. A survival reaction. Proximity in extreme conditions. But it wasn’t just that. Not really.
I was attracted to him. I didn’t know why – maybe it was the way he spoke to me like an equal, the dry humour, the rare flickers of vulnerability that slipped through his fanged facade. Maybe it was the way he looked at me, like I was more than a prize in a game.
Whatever it was, it was growing harder to ignore.
“You’re still shaking,” I said softly.
“I’ll b-be alright,” he replied, though it sounded more like an automatic defence than truth.
I hugged him tighter. His hip pushed against my core.
He inhaled sharply.
“I’m not going to break,” I said. “And I don’t scare easily.”
His eyes flicked to mine, glowing faintly in the dark. “I’m n-not afraid of you, Clare. I’m af-fraid for you.”
My heart skipped a beat.
Without thinking, I reached up and touched his face – just a light brush of my fingertips along his cheekbone, where larger plates gave way to scales so tiny they almost resembled skin.
“Then stop freezing and take the warmth I’m offering.”
His hand rose slowly, almost reverently, and settled on my waist. Not pulling. Just resting.
We stayed like that for a breathless moment.
Then another.
And when he turned his face towards mine, his lips parted slightly, eyes dark with something that wasn’t hunger – not exactly – but need, I stopped thinking altogether.
I leaned in and kissed him.