by Alison Aimes
Air gone, the scene before Grif faded, except for one thought.
Furball would pay.
3
Twenty-Eight rotations later…
The steel toes of Grif’s boots skittered close to the edge of the pit, the early dawn light from the two suns casting the deep hole in soft light.
A handful of dirt pinged down the side of the hole, landing on the blurred lump below. It—she—didn’t even twitch.
He’d done it.
He fingered the rope at his hip, excitement humming beneath his skin. The first sensation besides rage he’d felt in a long time.
She was in his pit. Finally.
He’d been waiting for this moment since he and the others broke out of 223’s camp. He’d scoured the area, tracked down every potential lead, blistered his hands digging a hundred pits, and put up with a lot of worried looks from his teammate. It was all finally worth it.
It had taken longer than expected, but he’d run his prey to ground.
He gave the longer cable he’d attached to a nearby boulder a sharp tug. No give. Perfect.
Launching himself over the edge, he landed in a crouch by his quarry’s side. The line pulled tight against his knuckles, the extra length pooling in an S-shape by his boots.
The shapeless pelt that covered every inch of her was filthier and more ragged than before, but it was still as memorable as ever. No sign of the glowing spear, but he knew it was here somewhere.
He’d find it, deal with it, and eradicate the threat. Like always.
His orders were simple: interrogate the target, extract the intel, and put the hostile down. Clear. Straightforward. Uncomplicated. Just the way Grif liked his lines.
And, yes, this time there was a personal component to the mission. A little personal revenge and redemption added to the mix, but he wouldn’t let it get in his way.
He intended to prove to his commander that he was the right choice to take over as second-in-command.
He knew the chance of finding the missing females alive was grim at this point, but dead or alive, he was bringing them home.
Scanning for the weapon, he stalked closer, stepping over a pair of dirty small fur slippers, the ripped foil that had held the drugged food crinkling under his boot.
His captive didn’t even flinch. No surprise. It wouldn’t take much to knock out so small a predator and she had to have been starving.
Once he’d rediscovered her tracks, he’d stolen the prey from every trap he’d found. Then he dug up all the root and plant sources in the area. He’d tightened the noose until the hostile had no choice but to forage exactly where he wanted her to go. He’d made sure his pits, covered in debris and nearly impossible to see after dusk, were primed and ready.
Rubbing away the dirt on his right wrist, he traced the wound from their last run-in with his fingertips. A perfect human bite mark—except for the two small fang-like incisors. Thirty-two dents. Thirty-two savage red marks. Thirty-two reasons for revenge.
Payback was finally coming due.
He crouched down, hand outstretched to shove the covering aside. His stomach gave a little kick. After so much time picturing what was under that pelt, he was more than ready to see the bitch’s face.
Images of a hairy, hideous demon with fangs and fury tits had woken him up more than a few nights.
His fingers gripped the fur.
Without warning, his prey bolted upright, the hood slipping from her face and bringing them nose to nose.
He stilled. Everything shifted.
Of all the countenances he’d imagined, he would never have predicted this one.
Iridescent cobalt blue eyes fringed by thick, dark lashes flashed in a feline-like face caked in mud and grime. Her features were delicate and fine-boned, her wide eyes almost too big for her face, her hair a wild mane of tangled chocolate-colored strands mixed with tawny stripes.
Far from demonic and hideous, her nose was small and upturned with three faint ridges near the bridge and pointed ears that only enhanced that feline look. Humanoid, for sure, but not like any New Earther he’d ever seen before. She was young, gorgeous, and exotically other. Fucking pixie-like in appearance, except for that cupid-bowed, carnal mouth.
His dick stirred in interest.
In the next heartbeat, those lips stretched wide—revealing two tiny sharp incisors—no bigger than his teeth, but a hell of a lot pointier.
How the fuck had he forgotten those?
A piercing screech rent the air.
Something hard and thin—and oh-so-familiar—slammed toward his temple.
Except he was ready for her ambush this time. Ducking to avoid the spear tip, he seized the handle and wrenched it from her grasp. No damn way was he being brought low by the same weapon twice.
What he didn’t expect was the simultaneous strike from the other direction.
Fuck him, Furball was resourceful.
Thankfully, there was no energy surge this time. But the strike did carry the force of a regular punch. He rocked sideways.
His not-so-drugged quarry took immediate advantage.
Skittering over his shoulder, her heel clocked him in the jaw, the other foot smashed his neck.
He recovered fast, but his grasping hands only caught air as she seized the rope he’d left for himself and scaled upward, a dirt-streaked blur of fur and tangled striped hair. She was fast. Faster than he would have expected from such a tiny thing.
With a roar, he launched himself after her. Bare, dirty feet flashed just out of reach as he stretched to close the gap, biceps flexing.
She disappeared over the edge.
He threw himself upward, ignoring the protest of his recent injury.
His hand locked around a delicate ankle.
With a shriek, she kicked back.
A rush of air breezed by his cheekbone.
With a snarl, he used the rope to leverage himself the rest of the way out of the pit. He landed on top of a squirming mass. Hard. The stink of tigos and a surprising fresh water scent mixing in his lungs as he pressed down, using his weight to immobilize her. “Got ya.”
She bucked. Hissed. The soft fur of her pelt rubbed against his bare chest. Her toes dug into the dirt for leverage. As wild as an outraged newborn furball.
But he was a wily, Old Earth panther in comparison, too big and mean to even be winded by a kothi kitten’s puny efforts. He pressed down harder, doing his best to ignore the friction of her perfect round ass against his groin. “Calm the fuck down. You’re not going anywhere.”
The strange trilling sounds out of her mouth were shrill and sharp, and incomprehensible.
He stored that information away for a calmer moment.
She clawed at the ground. Bucked once more.
“Quiet.” He knew she understood New English. 223’s guards had spoken it to her. His free hand patted her down, looking for more unusual weapons. He wasn’t about to be taken by surprise again.
Her head slammed back. Dodging the hit, he reared upward and deliberately let her slither out from under him, her fur covering clutched in his hands.
Nice as it was having her stretched beneath him, he wanted a look at the rest of her. Plus, there was always the possibility that she had another weapon hidden somewhere on her body.
She popped up an arm’s-length away, bared to him without the pelt, her form bathed in the strengthening light from the two suns.
Beneath the dirty pelt, his captive wore nothing.
His lungs stuttered.
Golden skin shimmered in the suns’ light. Golden. Skin.
Not a trick of light, after all. Her unusual skin color made her appear even more pixie-like.
No weapons in sight, either.
Just amber-tipped nipples crowning full breasts, while her belly gleamed bare and firm and a sweet honey-colored pussy peeked out at him between firm, supple thighs.
As far as he could tell the only hair she had was the striped tangle of chocolate and gold on
her head. No fucking wonder she’d worn that covering in the camp. The sight of her would have caused a full-scale riot.
Glowing golden symbols snaked across her navel and up her arms and thighs. Her curves were lean and strong. Her concave belly and gaunt cheekbones hinted at hardship and hunger, the kind he was likely responsible for, but she still held her spine straight, her head high.
He could already imagine how amazing she’d look, elbows and wrists bound, his ropes coiled like a spiderweb harness around her tits and hips, the knots pressing tight against her golden flesh.
Even too-thin and covered in dirt, her hair a tangled, wild mess, she was gorgeous. Hands down, the most stunning female he’d ever seen. She looked like a warrior princess or some kind of nubile young priestess. One blessed by the gods and insanely angelic looking, aside from those tiny fangs, of course.
He knew the truth.
Running his hands along the bite marks, he welcomed the reminder.
“On your knees.” He freed his rope from where he’d looped it around the rock.
He placed her at around twenty-four planetary rotations. Old enough to know better and to shoulder the consequences when she didn’t.
“N-no look.” She spoke New English in a lyrical accent that sounded like a song.
Her arms wrapped around her breasts and belly in an attempt to shield herself as she backed up another step. Without her glowing spear, she clearly knew she was no match for him.
“Do as you’re told.” He snapped his rope in warning. “I don’t want to bring you to ground again, but I will hog-tie you if I have to.”
She whirled. Ran.
Not unexpected.
He had to admit, she was fast and graceful for an evil flesh trader, her lean thighs flexing as she bounded over the rocks.
Breath steady, he took his time uncurling his snaring weapon, the same whip he’d reclaimed from Bully before he took the bastard’s life. It might not glow or emit a strange surge of electricity, but it was effective all the same.
He swung the looped end over his head a few times to build momentum.
She was several lengths away, lush hindquarters bobbing like a perfect target, when he let the lasso soar.
4
Something scratchy slipped over her head, gripping her shoulders.
With a gasp, she went to shove it off. Too late. It cinched tight, pinning her arms to her chest and checking her forward momentum.
She screamed. Stumbled back and sideways.
Not long ago, she’d thought the Ancients had finally softened toward her. The pack had been grateful for the bounty she’d brought from the Others’ camps. Even Talg had seemed less angry.
She’d told herself the culmination of her greatest hopes could not be far behind. She’d told herself that, despite the curse, she would finally gain acceptance, a real position in the pack, a slice of approval from those who mattered.
She’d told herself one more trip to trade with the savage Others would not be a problem.
She should have known better.
Or maybe this was her punishment? She could not deny that a part of her had wondered what would happen if she saw the dark haired, green-eyed savage again.
A hard yank. Her body jerked backward, her feet sailing out from under her.
Her spine hit the ground.
A scream for help clawed at the back of her throat. She cut it off. All such noise would do was draw unwanted attention. No one from her pack was out searching. They would never risk coming so close to Other territory. She was on her own.
Some things did not change. No matter how much she wished otherwise.
Her glowing whalh spear might have saved her, but it had broken during her fall into the pit. Her chest pinched at the memory. That spear had been a gift from her pack’s best hunter, Ramm. It was one of her few treasured possessions—a steady companion in an unsteady world.
Now, it was gone. One more loss to lay at the feet of the savage Others.
She hadn’t realized she could hate them more than she already did.
Digging in her heels, she struggled to throw herself upright. It proved impossible with her arms bound tight to her waist.
Red dust billowed into the air. Her body jerked, her back dragging through the dirt as her captor tugged her to him, hand over fist, a flailing, helpless prey on the end of a savage’s line.
But she’d always been counted out.
Spinning, she kicked out, aiming for his thigh.
Her heel slammed into hard rock. Pain rocketed up her leg and along her spine. What kind of beast was more unyielding than stone?
“None of that now.” The Other’s giant paw closed over her ankle. Another sizzling press of flesh that left her dazed and breathless. “I’ll be the one determining when you receive pain. Not you.”
Fighting the unwanted sensation, she reared upward, lips peeled back, fangs ready to sink into his skin.
“Not a second time.” He jerked her off the ground. She flopped back, her target denied.
Her panic grew.
The moment she’d seen this particular savage in 223’s territory, she’d known the winds of trouble were stirring. His olive skin was too close a match to the shadowed crags of the planet’s spartan cliffs, his shoulders and thighs almost as wide as boulders themselves. His swagger too arrogant to put him anywhere but at the top of the food chain. A lethal king among despicable beasts already feared by her kind.
Then he’d dared to touch her.
The burn of his hand closing around her breast had been a jolt of heat and sensation that pulsed against her skin even now, rotations later.
She’d been sure he’d die. Instead, he’d dared to live—and reach for her again. As if the curse really had no effect on him.
Stunned, she’d almost failed to fight back. She could not afford to be so slow again. Her pack was counting on her.
With a hiss, she kicked out with her other leg.
He caught it easily. “Not happening.”
Rough, calloused hands stilled her puny resistance as he lifted her hips and bottom off the ground. The tips of his hard footwear dug into her lower rib as his gaze lasered in on the area between her thighs.
“Definitely all female, and pretty and golden here, too.”
While fleeing she hadn’t given much thought to her naked state. But now, hanging uselessly in midair, her arms bound to her sides while her lower half was bared to him, her vulnerability hit hard.
After hating her anazi pelt for so long, she now desperately wished it was wrapped around her, shielding her from sight.
She still didn’t understand why the Other wasn’t dead. He’d touched her skin several times and still appeared as vital as ever. Her pack leader, Talg, had been very clear about what would happen to anyone foolish enough to press their skin against an abomination like her.
Perhaps her captor was imbued with some dark magic? Or was he simply such an evil creature that touching someone cursed like her didn’t matter?
It was shocking. It was revelatory. It was the culmination of one of her secret hopes, and it mattered not at all.
The beast was her enemy and she’d soon be too dead to even consider the ramifications of what she’d just discovered.
“Flat-toothed savage.” She spat the words at him. Insults and bravado all she had as the unique male scent of the Other—a potent mix of sweat, determination, and hate—invaded her lungs.
“Mouthy, too, huh?” He lifted her higher, muscles rippling with ease as she swayed in his hold. “We’ll fix that soon enough.”
Her stomach shriveled. Seeing him up close in the harsh light of the suns confirmed what she already knew. Her captor was a true beast, every part of him rippling with corded, ropey muscles that screamed brute strength and power.
Unlike the smaller hairless shimmering bodies of pack males, his square jaw and massive chest were covered with shadowed black fur, as if the prickly darkness within had crept its way out. The curling hai
r on his head was dark as a night with no moons. His eyes the same bright green as the thigose when it hunted at night.
He was marked by scars. Everywhere. The most prominent, a thin raised line under his throat and a still-raw burn across his ribs. Strange symbols also decorated his skin. Dark, slashing lines as aggressive as the barbarian himself.
If that wasn’t proof enough of the violent life he led, an array of weapons and rope dangled from the leather bands strapped around his biceps, one thick thigh, and his chest.
Everything about the beast was foreign, barbarian, and terrifying.
Unable to help herself, her gaze flickered to the massive bulge barely contained by the fabric wrapped around his hips. That was another difference from the males of her pack. He was far
bigger there, too. He would split her wide.
Would he touch her while he rutted her? If so, Ancients help her, but the part of her that was so starved for contact wondered fleetingly if it could be worth the agony.
Disgusted by such traitorous, weak thoughts, she struggled harder.
“Stay still and this will go a lot easier for you.” Rough fabric slid between her thighs. Before she could kick out, her legs were forced together, gripped in a single hand-hold. Coarse cord wrapped tight around her ankles, then her knees.
It dawned on her then that he was adding more rope, tying her up tighter.
Thrashing, she tried to break his grip. It proved impossible.
He flicked his wrist. The scratchy fibers between her thighs scrapped sensitive, untouched skin before wedging tight against her center.
She cried out.
It didn’t matter. Dropping her trussed legs to the ground, he straddled her hips before circling the rope around her neck, yoking her like an animal. She flinched. Protested with a whimper. In the next instant, her wrists were bound and her arms crossed over her breasts. More rope surrounded her, pining her arms to her chest as his boot landed lightly on her shoulder.
She had always hated being helpless. Yet look at her now.
With a gentle push of his boot, she was rolled over and over in the dirt, dust filling her lungs as the rope circled her belly, hips, closed thighs, knees, and calves, securing her tight, making movement impossible.
