Chapter 21 #2
“Too late,” he said, pushing her arms back down. To make his point, he took a long swig of the drink. “And do not try to take control from me again. Things moving fast around my face is not…okay. I will hurt you, and that is not a thing I want. I also do not want to be more…sorry.”
He ate, picking small bites of whatever she’d given him, wondering how many brands he’d earned himself by now. At least a dozen. Feeling strange that he ate alone, he gave her the brown, flaky square sitting off to the side of the tray.
“For the record,” Nora said, looking down at the small bite she’d taken from the pastry.
“I don’t believe that—that you’d hurt me, I mean.
I don’t think a man who sewed me shoes and saved my life could ever hurt me if he had the choice.
” She glanced at him. “I am sorry. For everything—running out, what happened at the water, trying to touch you when you said no. I’ll be more careful with you. ”
Pulse racing, with breath to match, Airik gripped the tray tight. Everything she said was wrong and impossible, and yet he didn’t want her to stop.
“I will be more careful with you, too,” he said, to which she responded with a shy hum and smile.
He could not stop gazing at her from the corner of his eye, grateful that the night’s darkness kept him from her view.
Even if all he could see was the tip of her finger fidgeting in her lap or the sway of her hair as she turned her head.
He was annoyed that she sat so close to him.
Even more so that she wouldn’t come closer.
The rain slowed, and small night creatures skittered across the plains, rustling the grass around the ramp. Airik shut his eyes, soaking the peace into his skin. It wouldn’t last, but maybe his body could remember the calm before they had to get moving again.
“I won’t stay here anymore,” he said to her, setting the tray aside. “When the rain stops, it will be time to go.”
Nora sucked in a sharp breath. “I thought you said we need to stick with the ship, that this is where help will come.”
“The ship will die soon. Taking its clean water maker. I need a better roof. There is a river in the forest with water clean to drink. And inside the city, there will be another way to call for help. A…call box.”
She chewed her lip, her right leg bouncing. “Are you going to come back?”
“Nothing left here.”
She pushed her knee down and held it still. “All right. Well… Do you want to split the rest of the food? I have more than enough if you think help will arrive soon—”
“No.” His stomach roiled at the suggestion that he would ever leave her.
For whatever very irritating reason, he needed to see this human at all times to make sure she still existed and hadn’t found a way to die.
Airik tugged on her braid, forcing her to look at him.
“I said the words wrong. I am not leaving you.”
Nora stilled, her face relieved before going wary again. “But I don’t think I can keep up. My foot isn’t doing so well.”
His finger twisted around her hair. “I will carry you if I must. No choice for you but to keep up with me. I will make you stay with me.”
Her lips curled up. For someone who carried sadness and tears just beneath the skin, always ready to burst, she was much too generous with her smiles.
The urge to protect her surged. He leaned in, their faces close so even her deficient human eyes could see his intent when he spoke. “I decide again that you are mine…until help comes.”
To his unexpected pleasure, she didn’t retreat. Instead, she wiped a stray tear and giggled. “Look at you, Major Airik. Already mastering the English language.”
“Not a major. A morazir,” he corrected, finding himself leaning closer to catch more of her scent. “Major has many people over and under them. I am only one. And I answer to no one but six.”
Nora shook her head with a smile, as if shocked. “You amaze me. I was sure you wouldn’t know what major meant.”
“So…you test me?” For a fleeting moment, he wanted to tell her why he knew that specific word. That his ancestors had stolen military secrets from her people hundreds of years ago. Rank, formation, and classified weaponry were how he’d learned some of his first human words.
Deciding not to frighten her further, he relented and offered her a small smile, keeping his teeth hidden. His scar pulled, but he pushed past it. “Keep testing me, human, because I…”
Like it, he realized.
She leaned closer. “You…what?”
He relished the beautiful pink of her flushed cheeks. How easy she was to rouse. How awful of him to want to tease her to have more of it.
It was becoming easier to talk to her, and yet… “There is much you say I do not understand. Like fucking or fuck or fucked. You use these words often. Explain.”
“I knew it was only a matter of time before you asked,” she said, burying her face in her hands. “It’s a bad word—you don’t need to know it.”
“I decide what I want to know. Tell me…Nora.”
Now he knew what it was—what made her blush as she did the moment he said her name. Embarrassment. Adrenaline. Perhaps even…that incessant heat within, wanting to escape any way that it could.
He felt it all, too. That fire in his cheeks. A tingle deep in his chest. And a heat much, much lower—driving him to say her name again as if simply the sound of her tasted good.
“All right, you won’t have to ask me twice.” She raised her face to look at him. “Fuck is what I like to call word spice. I use it to emphasize —”
“Slowly,” Airik reminded her.
“Right, sorry.” She took a breath before starting again. “It’s one of my favorite words, but as I said, it’s not considered polite, so don’t use it in a formal or even semiformal setting.”
“I will never in any human setting. Ever.”
Something flickered in her eyes—joy and sorrow together. It seemed she couldn’t separate the two.
“It’s a noun,” she continued. “Or a verb or an adjective—the possibilities are endless. You can use it to emphasize anger or confusion. Sometimes excitement. Or…” She touched her lip, the rest of what she wanted to say on the tip of her tongue.
He tugged her hair again. “What else can it mean?”
“Well…I guess you can also use it to mean sex. Mating. You know…fucking.”
Airik drew in a sharp breath, recognizing the word now. “Do you mean…breeding?”
“Yeah…breeding is another word for it.”
Holding back a groan, he turned slightly from her to hide his hardening cock. Any previous effort to keep food, Nora, and breeding separate in his mind evaporated with a single word. “It can mean all of those things? At once?” He kept talking for some reason—why? “A magic…fucking word.”
Nora’s hand flew to her mouth as she burst into laughter—deep, breathy laughs, free of the pain he had seen in her before. “Your accent—it’s incredible. Please say it again.”
Without hesitation: “Fucking. Fuck. Fucked.”
“Thank you,” she said, tears brimming on her lashes. Though the moon didn’t shine through the clouds, her eyes sparkled bright.
Airik blinked. Though he wasn’t a religious man, for a moment, he thought he caught a glimpse of divinity in her unexpected joy.
A different woman—perhaps the one she was meant to be—beneath all that golden skin, dark hair, and sad eyes.
If he weren’t careful, that light of hers would pierce him, letting her slip past his defenses and coil around his heart.
There was no telling what fatal damage she’d inflict if allowed that close.
But worst of it all, a wretched part of him wanted to find out.
“You are…welcome,” he said, not entirely able to resist temptation and unable to fight his body’s need to be near her. “Have I mastered the word fuck?”
“I’d say so. Your English is excellent—for a person who’s never met a human.” She raised a hand, covering a yawn.
Airik couldn’t help but chuckle, the tickle of its vibrations unfamiliar in his throat. He stood and offered her his hand. “Time to get up. For you to go to fucking sleep.”
“You’re good,” she said, taking his hand. “Maybe a bit too aggressive in its usage. But we can work on that.”
He walked her to his door, watching as she went to his bed.
“Good night, Airik,” she said, sitting on it.
Something hot burning with him, he allowed himself a moment to take her in. Among his few belongings, knowing her smell would linger long after she was gone.
She smiled nervously. “Do you want your bed back?”
“No,” he said. “I want you in it. Good night, Nora.”