by A. G. Wilde
“We made it!” Song exclaimed, a grin on her face that was so infectious Piper found herself smiling as well.
The last time she’d seen the woman, Song had been a blubbering mess.
She looked entirely relaxed now, Piper noticed.
Beside her, an alien she had barely taken note of before was standing close, his arm draped around Song’s waist. That made Piper’s eyebrows rise as soon as she noticed.
“Athena!” Evren shouted, a grin on her face. “Or should we say, cat woman?” Evren ran her eyes over Athena’s outfit—a skin-tight black suit Piper hadn’t even realized the woman was wearing.
Athena grinned. “I’m so happy you all are okay.”
But as the other women spoke, Athena turned her concerned gaze back to Piper.
As she approached, Piper wondered what the look was for, but Athena’s whispers soon cleared up her confusion.
“Did he hurt you?” Athena whispered, her gaze dropping to Piper’s lips.
Absentmindedly, Piper touched the spot that Athena was looking at and realized her lip had a bruise there.
She wasn’t sure when she’d received that wound. Could have been anytime. She wouldn’t be surprised if there were other wounds she’d been too busy to notice as well.
Frowning at the question, Piper asked, “Who?”
“The one you were imprisoned with,” Athena whispered.
Shaking her head, Piper was about to answer when Crex suddenly turned and stalked over to her.
Before she could protest, he threw her over his shoulder and headed down the hall, ignoring her squeal of surprise.
She could just about hear the gasps of the other women as she was carried away.
Again, beating into his back didn’t produce any results.
It was literally as if she was banging her hands against a wall.
When he finally stopped walking, he lay her down on something soft.
A bed?
Mildly disoriented, Piper glanced around the room.
It was obviously his private quarters.
There was what looked like a shower off to the side and in front was a table stacked with food. In the center of the room was the bed, a thick horizontal square with soft material on top, on which he’d placed her. He was busy placing items on a tray as she gaped at him.
“What is wrong with you all of a sudden?!” She felt like screaming at him but tried to keep her voice level.
He didn’t answer her and she felt herself fume.
As he brought over the tray and placed it beside her, she eyed the contents begrudgingly.
When she didn’t move to eat, he took up a yellow fruit and moved it to her lips.
“Food.” The deepness of his voice vibrated close to her ear and it made him sound delectable...just as delectable as the food looked. Involuntarily, she licked her lips. She wasn’t sure for which one, him or the food.
Blinking away the thought, she accepted the food he offered, trying her best not to take his fingers into her mouth.
As she chewed, Crex watched her closely.
It was definitely fruit; something like a mango mixed with an orange. She’d never tasted anything like it before.
“Mmm,” she moaned, grabbing another piece and stuffing it into her mouth.
There were several other types of fruit on the tray and Piper dug into all of them, pausing only when she was half-way through to look at Crex, her mouth half-full.
“Aren’t you going to eat any?” She mumbled between bites. He wasn’t eating. Just watching her delve in with interest.
“I don’t eat fruit,” he said simply.
Piper blinked at him for a few minutes.
“Then why do you have a table full of fruit?”
“They’re not mine. They’re for you.”
Piper blinked a few more times as she tried to understand. “How did you...?”
“I sent a message to Kyro while we were waiting on the Isclit ship.”
“How?” But before he could respond, she answered the question herself. “Yce.” Then she frowned, the implication of that almost blowing her mind.
“He can communicate with people so far away from him?” She asked, eyebrows raised.
“His abilities, even I don’t understand,” Crex answered before standing and heading towards the shower area.
Looking down at herself, she realized she badly needed a shower as well. She’d have to do that next. It would be good to wash all the filth awa—
Her thoughts stopped abruptly as she watched Crex. He was stripping right in front of her as he walked, his pants dropping to the floor to give her an ample view of his ass.
Piper’s eyes widened, but she found it hard to look away.
Instead, her head seemed glued to that one position of allowing her to stare at him.
It didn’t help that the shower had nothing like a shower curtain. He stood under the spray, his back turned to her, his ass muscles taut, and by God, she couldn’t look away even if it would save her life.
His shoulder muscles flexed as she watched the water run down those ridges along his spine and his dark hair hung limply over his shoulders as he braced his arms against the wall.
“You seem surprised.” His baritone reached her ear, causing her to jump.
“Surprised? I’m not surprised. It’s just that...you’re naked,” she whispered the last part.
He turned his head to the side but not enough to look at her. “Your species only undresses when alone?” He asked.
“Well, no. But technically, when a man is naked in front of a woman there is usually more going on there.”
He turned to look at her then and she found herself gasping and looking away, shielding her eyes in the process.
She did not need to see his dick! I mean, she wanted to...but she didn’t need to.
Apparently, modesty was a human construct.
She didn’t even have any idea why she was behaving like this now. She’d been naked in front of hundreds of aliens on the Isclit ship. Hell, she’d been naked for most of the time since they had abducted her.
She hadn’t cared about her nakedness then.
She’d been too angry to care.
Anger.
Maybe that’s what she needed to be to regain her sanity. She needed to be angry.
How dare he? Piper frowned as she tried to muster the rage she’d been feeling before. Tearing into a piece of red and purple fruit, she stuffed it into her mouth and chewed hard. Eyes still averted, she turned her back on the sounds of the shower and concentrated on chewing viciously.
How dare he?
How dare he carry her around over his shoulder as if she was his wench?
Then what he’d said on that small ship came back to her almost immediately.
“You are mine.” Had he just been repeating what that bull-man alien thing had said to Athena because...well...because why?
As she deliberated over it, she almost jumped out of her skin as Crex walked past her, naked as the day he was born.
“Jesus!” She exclaimed, jumping back as if caught doing something wrong. Muscles rippled under his skin as he reached into a chest and dug out another pair of trousers.
He’d washed the dried blood off his skin and she noticed his wounds seemed to be healing already. The deep welts from the whipping that he’d endured were still visible, but they were no longer raw or even open at all.
His speed of recovery was perturbing.
As he turned around to face her, Piper’s eyes widened as she forced them to land on where his Adam’s apple should be and stay there.
She could look at apples. Not nuts.
She would not look at nuts and whatever hung above them.
Did he even have nuts?
Curiosity made her gaze falter, but Crex spoke at the same time. Piper swallowed hard.
“You can shower now,” he said, before walking into another section of the quarters.
She found herself releasing a pe
nt up breath.
What the hell was wrong with her?
Maybe almost freezing to death had done something to her mind.
Shaking her head, she glanced toward where he’d gone and when he didn’t appear again, she figured he was giving her some privacy.
Taking a deep breath, she stripped off the towel she’d wrapped around herself and let it fall to the floor.
Glancing toward where he’d gone again, she made sure no one was there before she headed to the shower.
As she stepped into the shower area, she realized the shower head seemed to be built into the ceiling itself, with slats above her where the water would come through.
A simple turn of a lever and nice warm water came raining down over her head.
The moan that left her lips was a mixture of appreciation, relaxation, and comfort as she closed her eyes and just let the water run over her skin.
As she let out another moan, Piper smiled.
She’d always started the day with a good shower. Today, this shower represented the first day of her freedom.
It felt good.
It felt so frickin’ good.
Chapter Fifteen
She’d made a sound that drew him back into the room.
That undeniably sexy sound the Piper made whenever she enjoyed something.
Something like a soft growl...no, it was a moan. Unquestionably a moan.
Why she had to make such a sound, he didn’t know. Why it was affecting him so? Well...he did know why.
He just didn’t want to face it.
She’d done it with the fruit, making the jagazen in his heart swell a little. That’s why he’d showered first, hoping the water would cool him down.
He’d been acting in ways he shouldn’t have been. Been doing things he wouldn’t usually do.
It was as if the jagazen was slowly taking over his mind.
He watched as she tilted her head to the spray and uttered another moan.
Immediately, his body responded, but he stood still, willing his feet to stay planted.
He’d been hoping it would stop, that the jagazen would slowly die as the time neared for them to part ways but the opposite was happening.
The thought of parting ways with the Piper...he hated it. For some reason, he didn’t want that to happen.
He wanted...What did he want?
Running a hand through his damp hair, he gripped the strands tightly.
Watching her during the fight had been tense. He’d felt a surging need to protect her. A surging need as if she belonged to him. As if she was his.
And when he’d seen the intimate exchange between Xul and the human Athena, he’d felt another surge of the jagazen.
It had swelled then as it was swelling now.
He knew it wasn’t right for him to watch her as she washed. She seemed to not like showing her nakedness, though he didn’t understand why.
He’d already seen her naked.
Many times.
As she moaned again and began rubbing the water across her skin, he gulped hard.
The Piper was a curious one.
As she washed the dirt from her skin, he watched her hands move.
He wanted to be those hands.
He knew the thought was bordering on madness but for one second, he let himself feel.
He wanted to touch her...and not in the way he’d touched her before.
He wanted to touch her...as a woman.
She found the soap berries and squished one in her hand, oohing at it as she brought it to her nose.
Obviously liking the smell, he watched her smile as she began to lather herself.
She was just done with rinsing her hair when she began to make another sound.
It was a soft, musical sound. A hum.
She was humming. Humming a tune he’d never heard before and he stood frozen in place as she opened her mouth and began to sing.
He’d never heard a sound so melodious...so sweet. Her singing voice was a lot softer than her speaking voice, almost like a whisper that tickled along his ear before drawing him in.
As she sang, Crex tried to understand the words.
It was a song about petals and sunshine, and something called a dandelion in a meadow...
He didn’t know what those were but from the sound of her voice and the way the tune sounded, he knew it wasn’t a sad song.
Her voice was captivating, and before he knew it, he was moving toward her, the trousers he was carrying thrown to the bed haphazardly.
As she washed the lather from her skin, she turned around and stopped abruptly, her mouth and eyes forming Os.
Crex paused. He hadn’t realized he’d moved that far into the room.
What was wrong with him?
He was usually much more aware of himself. His movements and his thoughts didn’t usually go so wild.
He was just an arm’s length away from her and they were both frozen as they stared at each other.
When she didn’t say anything, he found himself moving closer till he was right in front of her and the water began running over them both.
It was warm. Very warm water. And it wasn’t helping the fact that his heart was starting to pump hard and swell again.
Crex swallowed hard as he looked down at her, wishing she’d scream, wishing she’d push him away.
Why didn’t she run?
This would be so much easier if she just...hated him? Was afraid of him?
He didn’t know. But he wished she’d do something, anything!
As the Piper’s gaze fell, it dropped to his lips then to his chest and he watched as she slowly licked those soft lips of hers.
He wanted her to do something, but not that!
Drak, not that.
He didn’t think. Caging her against the wall with his arms, he stared down at the little soft thing. His little soft thing? Could it work? Would she accept him? Even with his demons?
No. He was sure she’d rather go to a refugee station and stay there with the rest of her kind whom they’d rescued.
“Crex,” she breathed as she looked up at him.
He couldn’t take it.
He’d had problems controlling his emotions before. But he’d learned over time to bottle his depression and release his rage. But this, whatever it was, it wasn’t something he was used to.
He didn’t know how to control it.
He wanted her to do that strange thing she’d done on the Isclit ship.
He wanted their mouths to mate again.
Dropping his gaze to her pink lips, he tilted his head and brushed his lips against hers.
The soft sigh that she released brushed over his skin and encouraged him to run his tongue over her lips.
She tasted pure, as if she was something he didn’t deserve.
But he wanted more of this feeling. He’d never wanted to feel so much in his life.
One of her palms rested over his swollen heart and the other arm reached up and grasped his neck, pulling him closer.
As the kiss intensified, he heard her let out another moan, causing him to press himself against her, his manhood between them, hard and ready.
As it throbbed against her skin, Piper pulled away, her eyes wide again as if she was trying not to look down.
“You’re naked,” she breathed.
He didn’t answer; he was too mesmerized by everything. Her big green eyes. Her pale skin. Her pink lips. Her softness.
He felt himself throb again and watched as her gaze finally dropped.
“Holy fuck,” she breathed as she gaped at him.
Finally looking down at himself, he wondered what the reason for her exclamation was.
He was sure he was regularly endowed.
Did human men have even bigger mating organs?
Looking at the Piper, he wasn’t sure how that would work. She looked as if she couldn’t even manage the size of his. It was unthinkable that human males would be bigger.
But as the thought
s swirled in his head, a sudden touch on the tip of his erect manhood made a deep growl erupt from his throat.
As she looked up at him, he stared back at her.
How was it possible? How was this possible?
He couldn’t deny it. His body, his swollen heart, his jagazen...he’d bonded to the Piper and there was nothing he could do about it.
He’d never lost control like this before.
It was inexcusable.
Dangerous.
“Why aren’t you afraid of me?” He whispered, voice hoarse.
“I don’t know,” she whispered. “I don’t have reason to be.”
“You should be.” His voice was low and he leaned into her, their lips touching again. “You should be.”
She opened her mouth to him then, pushing her slick tongue past his lips and into his mouth.
Hand still on his dick, he felt as she closed her palm around his tip, and as he throbbed against her hand, his growl met her moan.
Was she by chance feeling the same thing?
Did humans have jagazens? Bonding organs embedded within their hearts that bounded them to one soul for eternity?
When she finally broke the kiss to catch her breath, she raised her eyes to his, her chest heaving.
She was here.
She was his.
He couldn’t deny the feeling.
But he couldn’t take what was his, even when it was here, within his grasp.
He’d never allowed himself to feel before.
Not since...not since his mother’s body had been dumped back on his home planet.
Back then, his propensity to love had been replaced with boiling rage and anger.
If he loved, he lost.
And the thought came to him clearly.
He didn’t want to lose the Piper.
If he loved her, it was only going to hurt too much when he lost her.
The Piper.
His Piper.
Chapter Sixteen
Crex had exited the shower, dried himself off, and left the quarters without another word, leaving a confused Piper under the spray.
As she toweled herself off, her brows knitted into a frown as she tried to break down what had happened between them.
There was something there. She couldn’t deny it.
She didn’t know if she could ignore it either.
