by Ivy Barrett
“I’ll ask Sintar. I have no idea.”
Their footsteps echoed off the walls, accenting the eerie emptiness. “This would make a good set for a post-apocalyptic zombie movie.”
He laughed and slipped his hand into hers. “I’m not sure what that is, but it sounds entertaining.”
“If you catch me in the right mood I can roll with it, but I’m not usually a fan.”
“What sort of films do you prefer?”
“Why do you know so much more about human culture than your brother? In fact, you seem unusually familiar compared to any of the other Ventori.”
His smile was enigmatic and he shrugged. “I’m an intelligence officer. Research has always been a big part of my job.”
She wasn’t sure it was that simple, but she let it slide. She already had Sintar figured out, but Tarlon was still a mystery. He was different than his first impression, infinitely more complex.
Suddenly his hand tightened around hers and he pulled her into one of the abandoned stores. Natural light spilled in through the mall entrances, but the interior corridor and most of the shops were dark.
“Where are we going?” Her voice was hushed with uncertainty.
“I’ve been the nice guy long enough. If I don’t taste you, I’ll die.”
It was the only warning she got before she found herself pressed up against a wall with Tarlon’s mouth devouring hers. Startled by his sudden aggression, she just stood there allowing the kiss without participating. Then his scent swept in and his taste filled her mouth and she was powerless against the sensual onslaught.
She opened her mouth for him and arched into the heat of his body. She needed this, needed it from him. After their harsh treatment the night before, she was ravenous for affection and Tarlon was always gentle and patient. Well, almost always.
They kissed and kissed, mouths sliding and repositioning over and over. His hands stayed on her neck or head, which made her breasts ache and her core throb. She followed his lead, only running her hands through his hair.
Finally, when she was so desperate for his touch she wanted to scream, he unbuttoned the front of her dress and slipped his hand inside. She fumbled for the seam release on his uniform top, but he caught her hands and drew them above her head.
“Don’t move.” He pressed her hands against the wall for a moment to make sure she intended to obey. When she held the position, he released her and went back to caressing her breasts. He stroked her skin and teased her nipples, rolling, pulling and lightly pinching the sensitive tips.
She moaned and gasped, his willing captive. He bent and sucked one nipple into his mouth while he touched the other with his fingers. It felt wicked, naughty. She knew their chances of being discovered were practically nonexistent, but it was fun to pretend.
With an impatient growl he drew her skirt up as if he’d tuck it into the waistband as he’d done before. It was a dress, not a skirt, so the maneuver didn’t work. Refusing to be deterred, he pulled it up and off, leaving her naked and aching with her arms raised above her head.
He stroked her boldly then, his touch possessive and thorough. One hand continued to explore her breasts while the other slipped between her thighs. “Open your legs.” She moved her feet farther apart. “More.” She complied with a whimper of need. He parted her folds and circled her clit with his middle finger. She trembled, hovering on the brink of orgasm.
“I’m going to come,” she whispered. “Please, may I come?”
“Yes. Come for me. Come now.” And he thrust his fingers into her pussy to make sure she obeyed.
Her inner muscles rippled around his fingers as sensations throbbed through the rest of her body. She squeezed her eyes shut, riding the pleasure as far as it would take her. Then he was fucking her with his hand, driving his long fingers fast and hard into her needful body. It felt amazing, but she needed pressure on her clit. Suddenly the heel of his hand pressed against her clit, rubbing the sensitive nub against her pubic bone.
Her eyes flew open. Had that been a simple coincidence or was he reading her mind?
“Again!”
The command shoved her speculation to the back of her mind. She never came this fast, not a second time. But her body didn’t seem to know that. She cried out as another orgasm ripped through her, leaving her dazed and shaky.
He knelt suddenly and lifted one of her legs to his shoulder. His mouth covered her slit and his tongue continued what his fingers had begun. His fingers penetrated her deeper, creating fullness as well as slide, but this was so starkly erotic, so inescapably intimate that she came again a few minutes later.
Shit! She hadn’t asked permission that time. Why couldn’t she remember that rule? The question made her laugh. She couldn’t remember her own name when his mouth was on her pussy. He slowed, licking her folds and teasing her clit instead of fucking her core. It all felt so damn good, she didn’t care what he did as long as he didn’t stop.
He lowered his arm and speared her with his fingers as he persistently licked her clit. It was a command, she could feel it. “Can I come? Oh, God, please let me come.”
“Yes.” His breath caressed her as he spoke the word and then his tongue flicked her clit.
She cried out sharply, not caring if the entire camp heard her. Pleasure blasted up through her and hard rhythmic spasms gripped her core. She shook with it, groaning helplessly as her knee buckled.
He caught her before she hit the floor, kissing her with the same intensity he’d unleashed on her pussy. Her taste was still strong in his mouth, but it only made the kiss hotter.
A few minutes later, he separated their mouths. “We should get back. The transport is due right after lunch.”
She eased back and looked into his eyes. “Don’t you want me to return the favor?”
“I’d love it, but I can’t.” He stood, pulling her up with him. “I’ve come inside you twice, while Sintar has only had you once. If you absorb more of me than Sintar, the bonding—if you decide to allow it—would be uneven. This won’t be a problem once we’re bonded.”
“So don’t come in my mouth.” She blushed so hotly she had to look away.
“Giving you pleasure gives me pleasure, and I’ll fuck your brains out tonight.”
It was hard to argue with that, so she simply nodded and accepted her dress when he handed it back to her. As she dressed she remembered how he’d seem to respond to her thought. “Can I ask a question?”
“Of course.”
She quickly pushed her arms into the sleeves and pulled the dress closed over her breasts, but her concern seemed so silly now, so farfetched. Mind reading wasn’t real. “Never mind.”
He pressed his hand against the side of her face and searched her gaze with his. “Sweetheart, you can ask me anything. What do you want to know?”
“Have you ever been in a serious relationship before? Has Sintar?” She was intensely curious about their pasts, but this was a total copout.
His gaze narrowed as if he didn’t quite believe her. “We were both relatively young when our planet was destroyed and the Protectorate moves from place to place on a regular basis. We have shared pleasure with other females, but neither of us has ever been in a serious relationship.” After a tense pause, he asked, “Have you?”
Her friends had warned her not to bring up past lovers, but Tarlon clearly wanted to know. Still, she kept the information vague. “One of my relationships lasted almost two years, but I wasn’t as important to him as he was to me.”
“Then he was a fool.” He accented the statement with a breath-stealing kiss.
They went directly to the school and Tarlon helped her find Jessica and Amanda before he went and checked in with Sintar.
The multipurpose room was set up as a cafeteria, but most everyone was finished eating. Jessica and Amanda had been deep in conversation when Nikki arrived, but they didn’t seem upset by the interruption. They invited Nikki to join them and she did, anxious for some girl-time.<
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“I think there are some sandwiches left,” Amanda motioned toward the kitchen. “I’ll go grab you one. Would you like turkey or ham?”
“Either,” Nikki said. “I’m not picky.”
“Cool.” Amanda left, giving Nikki a few minutes alone with Jessica.
“That was the nice one, right?” Jessica nodded toward the door through which Tarlon had exited.
“Can’t they both be nice?” Nikki asked for the sake of argument.
Jessica scoffed good-naturedly. “Not with Ventori males. There is always at least one mean one.”
“Yeah, Tarlon is much easier to get along with than Sintar.” Except when Tarlon decided to use anal sex to shatter her composure. Nikki shivered, but didn’t fight the images. She was through running from her emotions.
“But you want them both?”
She didn’t know Jessica that well, but she desperately needed someone to talk to. “I want the mean one even more than the nice one. How twisted is that.”
Jessica patted Nikki’s shoulder. They sat side by side at one of the tables. Three other women had started to clean up, but they simply worked around the stragglers. “I know exactly how you feel. Dare’s a sweetheart, very easy to love, but it’s Rook who commands my fantasies. Dare is always there too, but Rook…” She just sighed and rested her chin on her hand.
Amanda returned with a sandwich and some chips on a paper plate. She also had a can of cola. She handed them to Jessica then returned to her seat. “What’d I miss?”
“Nothing important,” Jessica assured. “We were just talking about the contrasting personalities of our males.”
“We all have a two-male pod. Can you imagine having four or five?” She shivered. “That’s way more attention than I’d ever want.”
“There were a couple of the skin workers who would love it,” Nikki said softly, feeling sort of mean-spirited.
“Knowing Erin’s luck, she’ll end up with a huge pod,” Jessica muttered. “I can’t believe they didn’t let her go.”
“You’re being courted by the new governor,” Amanda said, a hint of resentment making her tone needlessly sharp. “Can’t he do anything about it? I heard he was on the high command before being transferred here.”
“Sintar didn’t want this position, did nothing to convince the chancellor to pick him,” Nikki defended. “Is your mate still really angry?”
Amanda shrugged, but it was obvious even she was upset about it. “Loax understands that things are different now, but it still feels like a kick in the teeth.”
“I’m sorry and so is Sintar.”
“Can he do anything about Erin?” Jessica asked, likely hoping to defuse the sudden tension.
“He’s no longer on the high command. Whatever influence he might have had is irrelevant now.”
The other two nodded, neither happy about the outcome, but they seemed willing to move on to a less frustrating topic.
“So why do they want us to ‘welcome’ the strippers?” Jessica asked suddenly. “Being subjected to a mutual drama doesn’t make us friends. You and Erin were the only ones I clicked with at all.”
“And I don’t know any of them,” Amanda pointed out. She hadn’t been part of the kidnapping.
“Well, I might be the governor’s mate, so I guess it’s my job.”
“‘Might be’?” Amanda challenged with her first tension-free smile. “Is there really any doubt?”
“Yes,” Nikki stressed. “Wanting to screw their brains out and wanting to spend the rest of my life with them are two very different things.”
Amanda looked at Jessica and they both laughed. “She honestly thinks there’s another option.”
Jessica turned back to Nikki. “If you reject this pod, they’ll just hand you over to your next best match. Each of us has hundreds, maybe thousands of compatible pods desperate for a mate.”
“So they keep trying to seduce me until I encounter one I can’t resist? That’s depressing as hell.” She focused on her sandwich for a moment as she digested what she’d just learned.
“They’re fighting for the survival of their species,” Amanda reminded.
“What’s waiting for you out there?” Jessica asked. “All the opportunities left in the human world are just as depressing, maybe more.”
She was right. Humans were so shell-shocked, so devastated by loss and anger that most were incapable of forming new connections. Lord knows she’d been when she arrived. Then her stubborn potential mates had laid siege to her emotional fortification. They’d forced her to feel, really feel for the first time in months. And they offered security and companionship, adventure and the most amazing sex she’d ever experienced in her life. Was there really a down side to being their mate?
“I just don’t like thinking I have no control over my life.” It was the best excuse she could think of, but she didn’t quite believe it.
“You not only have control over your life, silly human,” Jessica teased. “You’ve got control over theirs.”
Chapter Seven
Sintar wasn’t able to pull himself away from his responsibilities until well after dark. He was tired, grumpy, and in desperate need of his mate. He’d been hard off and on all day, had been desperate enough to relieve the pressure himself, but it hadn’t really helped. He needed her snug pussy, not the frantic motion of his own hand.
When he found her snuggled against Tarlon’s side on the sofa in the living room, his control snapped. He pulled her to her feet and kissed her savagely. “I need you, now.”
She looked dazed, but didn’t object when he turned her around and bent her over the sofa right next to Tarlon. Sintar flipped up the back of her dress and kicked her legs apart.
“Nice to see you too.” She sounded annoyed, so he forced himself to slow down.
“I’ve thought about you all day, ached for you.” He pushed his hand between her thighs and stroked her with as much gentleness as he could muster. “I need you. Do you understand?”
“Yes, but…”
He found her clit with the tip of his finger and apparently scattered her thoughts. She was already wet and growing wetter with each caress. “Do you consent?” he whispered it into her ear with just a hint of mockery.
“Yes,” she whispered in return.
Still teasing her with one hand, he opened his pants with the other. The angle wasn’t quite right, but he bent his knees and found her entrance with the head of his cock. “Push back onto me. Offer me your cunt.”
Slowly she rocked back and impaled herself on his hard length. She arched, tossing back her hair and groaning loudly.
“That’s right.” He stroked her clit, reveling in the hot snugness surrounding him. She felt so damn good. He didn’t want to move, knew it would be over in moments as soon as he started. “Come for me. Come all over my cock.” He plucked on her clit persistently, thrilled by her ready responses.
“I can’t unless you move,” she muttered, trying to rock her hips and force the slide. He slapped her pussy and she cried out.
“Stand still and come.”
She stilled, harsh panting the only sound she made.
Tarlon slid over and drew her face toward him.
Sintar glared at him. She needed to learn to obey, to find pleasure when and how they commanded. Instead of kissing her, like he’d obviously intended, Tarlon captured her gaze and asked, “To whom does your pussy belong?”
“You and Sintar,” she said, her voice breathless and tense.
“Then surrender. Offer us your pleasure.”
Sintar switched to a circular motion, rubbing around, then over her clit. She still wiggled a little too much, but she was at least trying to remain still. He paused to spank her clit again, then went back to rubbing.
Her inner muscles tightened with the pain, but went lax again as he caressed her. Interesting. He spanked her a bit harder, drawing a startled cry from her throat. It happened again, so he delivered three firm spanks before he stroke
d her again.
“Stop,” she sobbed. “It really hurts.”
“You need the hurt, hellcat. Now stop fighting it.” He rubbed her clit briskly, then spanked her with careful, yet steady swats. A cruel smile spread across his lips as the telltale spasms burst into a strong orgasm. She cried out and shuddered, momentarily lost in the pleasure.
Thrilled with his discovery and her reluctant submission, he moved his hands to her hips and fucked her fast and hard. Gods, how he needed this.
He slammed into her over and over, feeling savage and wild. She arched and raised her hips, but didn’t try to control the motion in any way. He rammed into her, drilling her, claiming her with his cock, the way he wanted to claim her mind and being. She would be his! She would be theirs. He wouldn’t stop trying until it was so.
The possessive thought pushed him over the edge. He wrapped his arms around her hips and buried his entire length inside her pulsing cunt. She was coming again, he realized with a grin. And she’d done so without permission.
* * *
Nikki’s fingers dug into the sofa’s upholstery as Sintar’s cum jetted into her core. She’d been angry when he grabbed her and bent her over the couch like a whore, but what followed had been amazing. And enlightening. She got off on pain! How could she not have known that about herself?
“Are you going to jump me when you get home from work every night?” She panted out the words, not ready to let him off the hook for his rude behavior.
He pulled out and slapped her bare butt, utterly unapologetic. “I feel better!”
The response was so outrageous that she couldn’t help but laugh. “You are really in caveman mode, aren’t you?”
He just grinned.
“Did you eat already?” She smoothed down her dress, trying hard to ignore the warm wet slide of her well-fucked pussy. “We saved you a plateful just in case.”
“I ate, but it’s sweet of you to be concerned.” His expression gentled a bit. Then his next sentence assured her that his caveman mood was here to stay. “Get naked. I’m not nearly finished with you.”
