by Zoey Draven
He almost groaned when he scented her, a scent so delicious, so right, that his cock gave a responding throb that threatened to bring him to his knees.
Her shocked gaze collided with his. Kirov growled as his pupils dilated, as his eyes roved over his female’s features for the first time, memorizing them with care.
Her eyes were blue, similar to his own, though she had white surrounding their color. Her features were delicate, her nose was small, her lips lush and pink. Her skin was pale, little dark dots peppering her cheeks and the bridge of her nose.
And her hair…
Fates, her hair was the color of fire embers, unlike anything he’d ever seen before.
She was his.
Kirov purred low in his throat and, still acting on Instinct, wrapped his arm just beneath her lush breasts. Later, he would curse himself. Later, he would wonder where his mind had been.
But right then, he could think of nothing but her and the knowledge that she was his fated mate.
“Luxiva,” he growled softly, down to her, noting that she only came up to the middle of his chest. Vrax, how tiny she was. “Vellixa.”
Beautiful.
His head jerked back when she screamed, his muscles tightening at the harsh sound. His ears rung.
“Female!” he rasped.
“Let go of me!” she screamed, bucking against his body, though she didn’t budge him. “Let go of me!”
Kirov’s mind froze. Unfortunately, so did his body, so he didn’t do as his female requested. If anything, his arms locked tighter, more in fear that she would slip out of them and away from his reach forever.
In the distance, he heard a male sprinting towards them. Kirov’s head snapped up. It was Vixron, the warrior that had been assigned to the human females, as their guard.
Vrax!
Kirov couldn’t help but growl at the sight of him. And his reaction was shocking. It was his Instinct, he realized, threatened by another male, so close to his female when she was unmated and unmarked.
Kirov shook himself, straightening, but not releasing his grip on his luxiva.
Vixron drew up short, his eyes narrowing, as he took in the sight before him. The red-haired female stopped struggling in his arms when she saw Vixron and jealousy cut through Kirov like a blade.
Did she trust this male, over him?
Then his female snapped, “Well, it’s about time! What if I was being kidnapped or murdered? Talk about a lackluster response time!”
Kirov’s brows knitted together and Vixron straightened at the female’s words.
“You are…unharmed?” Vixron asked hesitantly, his eyes flitting to Kirov, wariness evident in his gaze, his hand hovering over the weapon sheathed at his hip.
Kirov growled darkly at the implication. “Remember who I am, warrior,” he said, his tone measured and careful. Which surprised him because Kirov felt anything but measured and careful.
He felt…unhinged. Wild. Reckless. Like nothing made sense anymore.
Vixron’s spine snapped at the words, words Kirov purposefully spoke in English, his female’s language, though the language, which he’d rarely used, still felt muddled on his tongue.
“Yes, Ambassador,” Vixron addressed, lowering his head just slightly as he greeted him. Not as low as Vixron would greet Vaxa’an, but still low enough to show respect for Kirov’s high rank. “Forgive me.”
It took until that moment for Kirov’s mind to catch up to the situation. And it looked bad. Very bad.
There he was, naked, hard for the female struggling in his arms, and his cum, which had covered his own body after he’d orgasmed, now covered her tunic. Some even glimmered off the flesh of her inner arm, from when she’d fought against him.
A savage, primal part of Kirov craved that sight, needed to mark her further with his cum. Oh, the wicked ways he would do it…
The logical, somewhat intelligent part of Kirov knew that unless he acted fast, this situation could spin out of control.
Though he loathed it, Kirov released the red-haired female immediately, making sure she was steady on her feet before letting her go completely. He felt the loss of her touch like a physical ache and he clenched his fists to keep from reaching out for her.
It pleased him when the female didn’t turn towards Vixron, but rather went to put her back to the building of Cruxan’s dwelling, assessing the situation in her own way, with a wary gaze that flickered over him. Kirov could see how her nipples were hardened underneath her tunic.
He drew in a deep breath and froze. Because underneath the alluring scent that was simply her, he smelled something else. Arousal.
Kirov’s fists clenched further until his claws bit into his flesh and he felt the sting as his blood surfaced.
She’d been aroused watching him masturbate. She’d liked watching him.
The knowledge filled him with relief. With lust.
Then he shook himself. He needed to deal with Vixron first because the warrior was looking at him with poorly veiled suspicion.
Like all Luxirians, Kirov wasn’t ashamed of his nudity, so he hardly blinked an eye as he addressed Vixron directly, still naked, “You ought to keep a better watch over the females, warrior.”
Vixron inclined his head again. “Forgive me, Ambassador. She said she wanted to go outside onto the terrace. I—”
“You did not think to check on her whereabouts?” Kirov growled, his muscles shifting and growing. From the shadows, he heard the female’s slight gasp. “You are their protector here, warrior.”
Beyond his lust, beyond the haze of disbelief, Kirov knew that Vixron should’ve been out on the terrace the moment Kirov returned. He should’ve heard a hovercraft approaching, should’ve checked on the female. Had he been any other male…or a desperate warrior…
He shook himself and then he inhaled a quick breath, his mind beginning to race. His eyes drifted over to his female, saw that she was watching him with those stunning blue eyes from the shadows, the moon casting shafts of light across her cheekbones. Her gaze drifted down his body and he straightened unconsciously at her blatant perusal.
Her gaze snapped up, her eyes widening, when Kirov said to Vixron, “I was pleasuring myself to release some tension.”
Vixron made a sound in the back of his throat, though Kirov felt no embarrassment at the omission.
Then he continued by saying, “She was spying on me from outside my window. How long she was there, I do not know.” He turned to her. “How long were you there, female?”
His luxiva’s mouth dropped open and a flood of red washed over her cheeks. “You…you…I…I never—”
“Possibly from the beginning,” Kirov continued, holding her gaze as he said, “until the very end.”
Her breath hitched at his unspoken meaning and he wondered if she was replaying the moment of his orgasm in her mind, when he caught her gaze. Because he was.
The breeze shifted and Kirov almost groaned when he caught another hint of her arousal. His mouth watered.
The female blinked and then seemed to shake herself.
“How dare you!” she seethed suddenly and Kirov watched, in complete rapt fascination, as her cheeks only reddened, as her lips puckered with frustration, and her eyes glittered with anger. “I was not spying!”
Kirov almost grinned. She reminded him of a disgruntled baby privixi.
Kirov widened his stance, crossing his arms over his chest. It pleased him when her gaze dropped between his legs, her lips parting at the sight of his cock.
“Then what were you doing, standing outside the window of my sleeping quarters as I pleasured myself?”
“Will you stop saying it like that?” she hissed. Out of the corner of his eye, Kirov saw Vixron shift again, clearly uncomfortable with the situation he’d found himself in.
“Like what?” Kirov asked, tilting his head to the side. He reached up to slide a hand over his straightened horns and his hand trembled at the restless energy stored up inside him.
Fates, his luxiva was standing before him. His luxiva! And he had to act like he was indifferent to her when all he wanted to do was steal her away to have his wicked way with her, to see what other maddening words he could make come out of her mouth.
Vrax!
“You…you keep saying ‘pleasuring yourself’!” she hissed.
“Tev. And?” Kirov said. “That was what I was doing. Do you not agree, female? You were there, after all.”
“Oh, for Pete’s sake!” the female burst out, throwing up her hands. “Fine! Yes, I was there. I was spying on you like a total perv. So, sue me!”
Kirov blinked, amusement warring with lust inside him. This female had a tongue on her and he wanted her to use it on him, in whatever way she pleased, even if it was to spew confusing words he didn’t yet understand. One span, however, perhaps she would use that tongue on him in a much more mutually pleasurable way.
“Who are Pete and Sue?” he asked. “And what is a ‘perv’?”
“Jesus H. Christ,” she muttered under her breath. Before he could open his mouth, she turned to Vixron and said, “Look, this is just a big misunderstanding. I’m fine. Nothing happened. He just startled me is all. I want to go to bed now, okay?”
Kirov tensed when she pushed off the wall, everything in him rebelling at the thought of letting her out of his sight. His chest squeezed in panic simply at the thought.
What if he never saw her again? What if she was just a hallucination, a cruel trick by the Fates?
Kirov became aware that Vixron was still watching him and though it was the hardest thing he’d ever had to do, he jerked his gaze away from his retreating luxiva and focused it instead on the suspicious warrior.
“Ensure the female makes it to the dwelling safely,” he said. “And stay posted at the door for the remainder of the night. I will see about relief duty for you in the morning since you are clearly in need of rest.”
“Yes, Ambassador,” Vixron said, jerking his head in a nod.
Kirov’s body relaxed, the tension in his muscles releasing when Vixron turned his back, striding down the terrace.
Kirov could still see her. He watched the graceful sway of her body as she walked, a longing ache building inside him. It joined his restlessness, his excitement, his fear at discovering his fated mate. Vrax, how did Vaxa’an, Lihvan, Rixavox, and Vikan stand this worry, this despair? The awakening of his Instinct had been like an extraction. A vital part of him had been torn out of his body and buried within her. Forever.
And she was walking away from him.
He could do nothing about it, lest he make Vixron even more suspicious about what had just happened between them.
“Vrax,” he rasped under his breath.
Then, just before the female slipped back inside the dwelling, she paused. As if she could feel his eyes on her, she turned to look at him over her shoulder. Her red hair swayed down her back and though he couldn’t see the color of her eyes, for she was too far away, he knew they shone with beauty.
Feel it too, luxiva, he urged silently. Feel what it will be between us.
His luxiva looked at him for one, two, ten moments. Then Vixron stepped between them and the connection was ended.
Kirov felt the loss of it, of her, like a severed limb.
Chapter Six
The hot water from the giant bathtub/pool greeted her when Lainey sunk in, neck-deep. The muscles in her body loosened, lengthened, and she sighed, though it sounded more like a shuddering gasp to her own ears.
Reaching up a trembling hand, she pinched the bridge of her nose, squeezing her eyelids shut. Her heart was still racing and her body…her body was still humming.
She was reeling from her encounter with the Ambassador. Everything about it seemed like a strange dream, an out-of-body experience. Not only could she not believe that she’d actually watched the alien masturbate to a shattering orgasm—so powerful that she felt like she’d had one with him—but that he’d caught her and confronted her about it.
Lainey wrapped her arms around her naked, shaking body, running her hands up and down from her elbows to her shoulders. Her gaze strayed to the grey tunic lying in a heap at the steps of the stairs leading into the bath.
It had been covered in his…his cum. It was something that should repulse or disturb her, but Lainey felt decidedly…undisturbed.
In fact, she felt quite the opposite. Which didn’t make sense. Which was why she was trying to calm her mind, to get it on straight before she headed for bed, so that she could wake up in the morning the same person she’d been before. Not this strange, altered woman, who felt like something cosmic had just shifted.
Because something had happened the moment she saw him.
And it had happened for Cecelia too, Lainey couldn’t help but think. It had also—most likely, most definitely—happened to Taylor, Beks, and Kate too.
No, no, no, no.
Lainey put a halt to her thoughts, to the strong sense of dread and foreboding, and ignored the way her body still tingled from feeling that alien Ambassador’s strong arms wrapped around her. His smell, his massive height, the way his eyes gleamed with something sensual, something wicked, something unknown when he’d looked at her. Those goddamn piercing blue eyes would haunt her dreams if she let them.
Get a grip, she told herself.
Lainey took a deep breath, distracting herself instead with the peace she’d felt standing outside on the terrace, soaking in moonlight and fresh, cool air, before the alien had crashed into her life. She’d felt free then. After being locked away in cages on the alien fight club planet they’d come from, to being locked away in a room on this strange planet called Luxiria. Even being in the bathroom made Lainey antsy. She wanted open air, to feel no walls surrounding her.
But she was afraid that if she went back out to the terrace, she’d do something stupid. Like try to catch another peek of the alien that had sent her heart skipping. And no man in her entire life had ever made her heart skip. It was almost a badge of pride, that no man had control of her heart. Only Lainey did.
She made a frustrated sound in the back of her throat and grabbed a handful of soap granules that Crystal must’ve found somewhere. At least she hoped it was soap. And she scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed her body until her skin was pink and she felt a little more like herself.
When Lainey retreated to her room that night, she couldn’t help but look at the window, almost half-expecting to see him standing there.
It took her a long time to fall asleep that night, but once she did…she dreamed of him. In the middle of the night, she woke up in the midst of an orgasm, her mouth opened in a silent cry, her hips grinding into the furs. And as she looked up at the ceiling of her quiet room, her chest heaving with the force of it, Lainey knew she was in trouble.
Lainey yawned as she walked in the living room the next morning, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. Her stomach had woken her, growling, and not for the first time she wondered if these Luxirians had anything that remotely resembled coffee.
She’d had it sparingly back on Earth. Caffeine made her hands shake and shaking hands didn’t make for an effective session at her piano bench.
But with no piano in sight, all Lainey wanted was coffee. Black coffee with half a teaspoon of sugar, just the way she liked it. Bitter with a slight sweetness she had to search for. Just like me, she thought with a twist of her lips, though her chest felt hollow at that thought.
As she stepped into the living room, the hairs on her arms stood on end before she even heard his voice. Or saw him. Like her body sensed him before her mind did.
It was unnerving. She stopped just on the threshold of the room, frozen in place. The alien Ambassador’s back was to her and he was speaking with Vixron near the front door of their house. The strange, guttural words and sounds that streamed from his lips were oddly mesmerizing and the rich, deep tones of his voice made a shiver of awareness race down her spine.
God, why did h
e have to sound so delicious?
With strange fascination, Lainey watched as his shoulders stiffened. He stopped speaking. He shifted and suddenly, those blue eyes were on her and that regal, fucking beautiful face was turned towards her.
Lainey’s knees actually shook and she had to force herself not to nervously adjust her Sleep Hair as his eyes seemed to memorize every inch of her. She hadn’t been prepared for this. Not this early in the morning, not when she was coming off erotic dreams of him.
Something became clear: he was even more devastating in the sunlight than he’d been in the moonlight. His skin had taken on an almost blue, silvery hue the night before—all Luxirian skin shifted with changes in light—but now, it glowed a subtle gold.
Mentally, she shook herself. She’d seen plenty of men in her life that had left her speechless. None quite like the alien standing in front of her, but still. Lainey could deal with this until they got off Luxiria and returned to Earth. No problem.
So, true to her nature, as she did with any major problem in her life…Lainey ignored it. She deflected.
“Vixy,” she said, turning her gaze from the Ambassador, whose name she still did not know, to the guard behind him, “who do I have to bang around here to get some breakfast?”
Poor choice of words, perhaps, she realized the moment they slipped out of her mouth.
Oh well.
Vixy frowned, but she swore the Ambassador’s lips quirked up a bit, as if he was amused by her.
Lainey didn’t know why, but that grated.
“Vixron is leaving, female,” the Ambassador said, stepping forward. Lainey’s eyes ran down his body, almost unconsciously, and she was both relieved and disappointed that he was dressed. Tight, leather pants, and a soft grey tunic that molded to his generous, bulging muscles.
Lainey’s hard swallow seemed to echo around the room.
“Why?” she asked. Why did her voice sound so nervous?
“He has had no relief in three spans. He needs rest,” the Ambassador said, taking another step towards her. “I will stand guard until he returns.”
