His Virgin Bride (Interstellar Brides: The Virgins) (Volume 2)

by Grace Goodwin

  “You want my cock here. It won’t happen. I won’t claim this virginity yet. But I can allow you to feel what it will be like, to give you a taste of what I will do to you.” Collecting more arousal, I coated her inside and out until my finger slid in deep. One finger. Then two.

  She clenched and squeezed and I watched her virgin pussy flutter and weep. Empty. Aching. That was mine too, but I didn’t dare claim her no matter how hard and eager my cock, no matter how my entire body burned with the fire spreading from the mark on my palm.

  “Oh god, Bryn,” she groaned. She was still on my lap, unsure of herself. This was intimate, even more so than me settling between her parted thighs and eating her out. No, this was a deeper level of trust, of acceptance that she belonged to me. And only me. I would claim her as I wanted, as she needed.

  Turning my hand, I brought my thumb down on her damp clit, began to play with it in tandem with my fingers’ thrusts. “Your reddened ass, my fingers probing you here, they’re signs that you are my mate, that you belong to me. Remember. Your punishment and pleasure are mine.”

  Her deep breathing, her cries of obvious pleasure filled the small room, echoed off the metal walls.

  This sign from her drove me on, fucking her carefully, but more deeply, with my fingers even as I pressed on her clit, circled it.

  She wouldn’t remain still now. No, she shifted her hips in time with my thrusts, taking me deeper. Her skin bloomed with sweat, her head thrashed on the bed, her dark hair a wild tangle over the bed.

  Her eyes were closed, her mouth open.

  “Yes,” she breathed. “Yes, yes! Yes!”

  “That’s it. Submit for me. Give yourself to me. Your control. Come, mate.”

  She did, her entire body tightening like a bow, a scream ripping from her throat as she clenched and gripped my fingers painfully. Gods, she would practically strangle my cock when I got it within her.

  Seeing her over my lap, lost to the pleasure I gave her was my undoing. I moved her so she was still stomach down, her bottom on the edge of the bed, her legs hanging off the side. She was wilted, replete. I ripped open the front placket of my pants, gripped my cock. I hissed at the need I felt. My balls were already drawn up, the orgasm at the base of my spine had me biting my lip. I’d never been this needy in my life.

  With my mate satisfied from the pleasure I gave her, her legs parted and her eager pussy on display, her quivering back hole still shiny from my attentions. Seeing her ass red from the spanking I meted had my seed burst forth. It took two strokes to come, spurt after spurt of my seed aimed right for her upturned ass. I groaned out her name as I coated her bright pink flesh.

  Shit. Fuck. Fuck. I’d controlled her as I wanted and yet she stole my iron will from me so easily with one carnal orgasm.

  It took minutes to cool my body, to catch my breath, to be able to fucking see clearly. I retrieved a cloth and wiped the remnants of my emission from her soft skin.

  “Do you know what you’ve done?” I asked, tossing the cloth on the floor and buttoning my pants. I was still hard. Nothing was going to slake my need to be buried in her hot, tight ass.

  She shifted on the bed, settled gently on her ass, wincing slightly. I wasn’t sorry. No, she’d remember her punishment because she was still with me on this damn transport ship. Still in danger.

  She stood slowly, every move seemed calculated to distract me. Seduce me. Fuck, I’d just come and I wanted her again. She reached down, grabbed her pants, slipped them back into place, covering herself. I would never see the Coalition uniform the same way again. “I’m not what you think I am, Bryn. I understand these people. Their code. The way they live. You don’t.”

  Sweet, innocent Katie understood the smugglers and thieves on Rogue 5? My head was moving side to side before I’d voiced the denial. “That’s impossible.”

  Her laughter was cold now, empty, the sound one I’d not heard from her before and it sent a shiver of warning up and down my spine. Grabbing her boots, she sat gingerly once again, but then wiggled, almost as if she enjoyed the sting, welcomed it. The thought should have alarmed me. Instead I struggled to breathe evenly as she put on her boots. I wanted to test her limits, find out what she wanted. What she needed. How much more of herself she’d been hiding from me.

  I wanted to break her open and learn every dark desire, every wish, every fantasy. I needed to know what would break her so she couldn’t hide from me again. The idea that she’d fooled me until now made both my cock and my heart hard. How was I supposed to give her what she needed if she hid the truth? Hid her desires? Her soul? They were mine. All of it was mine and the urge to unravel the mystery of this woman bore down on me with a merciless need I knew I would never be able to ignore as she finally lifted her gaze to me, the darkness behind her eyes clearly on display.

  “I wish I didn’t know their kind so well. But I’m not what you think I am. I’m not pure and innocent and naïve like the other brides at the Touchstone. I’m a fraud, Bryn. I grew up surrounded by evil. By drugs and crime and death. I grew up on the streets, Bryn. My brother ran with an MC until it got him killed. My parents sold drugs on the corner to support their own habit.”

  I frowned. “MC?”

  She shrugged. “A motorcycle club, a gang, like the legions on Rogue 5. I know how they think, how they operate. I know their kind too well.”

  “But that’s not you.” Stepping forward, I lifted my hand to her cheek, relieved when she allowed me to touch her. “Your brother. Your parents.” I didn’t want to think about her surrounded by that kind of evil, that darkness. “None of that was you.”

  Dark blue eyes blinked slowly. “But it was. I started shoplifting when I was seven. I could steal a car by the time I was twelve. At fourteen, I was breaking and entering, hocking stolen electronics to keep groceries on the table until my parents overdosed and died in a crack house three blocks from our shithole apartment. My brother got shot two months later. He was eighteen, my guardian. I spent about three months with the MC after my parents died, learning the ropes.” A sad smile flashed across her face before is disappeared. “When my brother was alive, their leader treated me like a sister. He and my brother protected me so I wasn’t touched. But I was young and pretty and I could walk right past the cops, get into places they couldn’t. But after my brother died? Well, there was no one left to take care of me. To be my legal guardian. They put me in the system until I aged out.”

  I only understood about half of what she was saying. What system? Aged out of what? The NPU didn’t translate everything. Stealing was a word I understood. But it seemed as if she’d stolen to survive, to eat. “I’m not familiar with most of what you just said, Katie. But it doesn’t matter. You shouldn’t be here.”

  She smiled up at me as if I were the fool. “What was your plan? Huh? Land this thing and then try to sneak around until you either get caught or find the man you’re looking for?”

  She made it sound as if I was a wet-behind-the-ears rookie. “I am very good at sneaking around.”

  She snorted. “Not that good.” Lifting her hand, she wrapped her fingers around mine. “You can’t just walk into their territory and snoop around. You need permission. If the leaders of Everis are after this guy, then he’s hot. He’s going to draw too much attention. He’s going to bring too much heat down on them. They’ll want to know what he did. If they’re not idiots, they won’t want an entire ship of Hunters swarming their little moon. It’s bad for business when the fuzz is around too much.”

  “What the fuck are you talking about? Fuzz? Bring heat down? And Garvos is not hot.” I wrapped my hand around her hip, pulling her toward me, into the hard ridge of my cock under my pants.

  The lights buzzed yellow along the ceiling and her eyes darted to the side with curiosity. When I didn’t react, she returned her attention to me. “Where is this Garvos guy?”

  “Our information suggests he’s in the Styx territory.”

  She huffed. “You even talk like
a stiff.”

  “Excuse me?” She had me riled all over again. My palm was itching to spank her into sweet compliance once more. But dammit, nothing about her seemed subdued at the moment. She’d obviously liked the spanking and had no issues with submitting to me. At least not yet. I hadn’t found her boundaries, her breaking point, but I would. She thought she’d surrendered to me when I tossed her over my knees, but she hadn’t. Not yet. Not until she was so wet and desperate she begged, sobbed, surrendered completely.

  I traced her bottom lip with my thumb, imagining the moment when she would truly be mine, when her hurt and rage was spent, laid bare, surrendered to my care, when her body quaked and shivered in response to my lightest touch, when she was desperate and vulnerable and so aroused the feather-soft brush of my lips on her clit would make her come, screaming my name.

  She blinked slowly, her tongue darting out to taste her flesh where my thumb had lingered. “Never mind. Who’s the leader of Styx? Who’s in charge?”

  I probably shouldn’t tell her, but she was here. Wasn’t going anywhere. We were neck deep in trouble already. I could spank her again and it might make me feel a little better, but it wouldn’t change the facts. If she wasn’t able to transport off the ship, then it was better if she knew what we were up against. “He’s named after the territory, so he is called Styx. He took over the legion about four years ago.”

  The air left her body in relief. “Good. That means he’s stable and should have his people under control.”

  I nodded once, slowly, hiding my surprise at her assessment. “Yes. That is our understanding.”

  She smiled up at me. “All right. Let’s go talk to him.”

  Chapter Three

  Katie

  Bryn looked down at me like I was insane. “Why would we do that?”

  “If we want to hunt on his turf, we better get permission first,” I said as the strange orange light lining the ceiling blinked twice and changed to a pale blue. His gaze flashed to the color then back to my face as the ship lurched under our feet. A few loud bangs and strange sounds shuddered up through our feet and I guessed that was some kind of landing gear dropping down from the bottom of the shuttle.

  “Permission?” He turned away, releasing me and I felt like I could breathe again. When he was close he sucked up all the good air.

  “Yes. He’s a strong leader with an organized, disciplined crew. He’s not going to want a bunch of Hunters or people from the Coalition nosing around in his territory. And if this Gravos guy got on the planet behind his back, that’s even worse. Assuming you’ve lost two Hunters here already, and now they’re sending you, I’m guessing that if you disappear, the Seven on your planet won’t let that stop them.”

  “No. They will send others.”

  “More next time? Two Hunters? Three? A ship full of you guys?”

  He snorted and took off down the small corridor. I hurried, keeping pace with his longer legs. “No, they will not stop.”

  “That’s what I thought.” The ship tilted to the side and I braced myself on the wall to keep from falling, but I needn’t have bothered. Bryn’s arm was around my waist faster than I could track, holding me up, and he wasn’t even leaning funny. Showoff. “Look, he’s not going to want a whole ship full of you guys coming around. And he can’t let something like this go if he’s got someone in his legion doing jobs without permission. He’s going to be mad. You can either sneak around, trying to do this under their noses, or you can tell him what you want and why you’re here. Straight up. He might even help us.”

  He put his hand on my chin and angled my head, forced me to look up at him. “There is no us. I will hunt. You will remain on the ship and wait for me.”

  I didn’t dignify that stupidity with a response. There was no freaking way I was going to hang out on this old shuttle. “Do you want me to have your slippers and pipe ready, darling?” I asked with as much saccharin sweetness as I could manage. Bryn frowned, clenched his jaw. Obviously, he didn’t understand the reference to 1950’s America. If nothing else, Bryn would need someone to watch his back, keep an ear to the ground. I couldn’t do that from the shuttle.

  My mate glanced at a panel to his left and I noticed a view screen showing the inside of some kind of landing area. Ships and people were moving around, and our shuttle had stopped. “How did we land?”

  “Auto-pilot.”

  “Oh.” That was cool. I guess. But it changed nothing. In fact, a group of four men and one woman were approaching the shuttle. They wore black from head to toe and were armed to the teeth. My fingers closed around my ion blaster, but I knew they wouldn’t let me keep it. And I didn’t have the cleavage to hide it there. Maybe in my boot?

  Bryn squeezed my chin to get my attention and I tore my gaze from the Rogue 5 guys standing just outside, silently waiting.

  “You will remain on the ship and wait for me,” he said again, his tone just as deep, just as forceful as the first time.

  Yeah, repeating the same bullshit over and over didn’t make it true. “No, I won’t.”

  “You will do as I command, Katie. You are my mate.”

  I tore my head from his hold and hissed at him. “No. You refused to claim me, Bryn. I don’t belong to you.” When he looked like he was going to grab me, I pulled my ion blaster and pointed it at his chest. I’d never hurt him, but I was angry and the long days of his rejection swirled through me like a storm. He kept me at arm’s distance, refused to claim me even when I’d climbed naked into his bed and thrown myself at him.

  No. He didn’t have the right to start issuing orders. Not to me. Not even after the spanking and ass play. My butt still tingled—inside and out—from what he’d done. Liking it didn’t make a difference.

  I might have been his, but he was mine, too, and I was going to make sure he made it off this stupid moon alive. After that, we’d work out the rest.

  “You’re my Marked Mate.”

  I laughed, but wished I could take the sound back, since I wasn’t amused. All I felt was pain. “I might be marked, Bryn, but I’m not yours. You made sure of that.” I started walking again. If I didn’t, I worried he’d toss me over his shoulder and carry me back to the ship. I’d tried Warden Egara’s way. New life. New me. And it wasn’t working. I was just as miserable as I’d ever been back home. And alone. And why was this such a surprise?

  Because I was stupid. I dared to want more. I should have known better. Life had a way of kicking me in the teeth. Which meant I was back to square one…take what I wanted. I wanted Bryn. And that mean I was done playing by his rules. If he needed a push, I was more than happy to force the issue. “You’re not my mate, Bryn. You have no rights over me. I don’t take orders. Never have, never will. Not even from you.”

  His shoulders got even stiffer, if that was possible. He was scary. Dangerous. And the heat in his gaze sent a shiver of pure lust down my spine.

  “And who just finger fucked your reddened ass?” he growled.

  I refused to be baited. Part of me hoped he would throw me down on the ground and pound into me without warning or foreplay. Rough. Desperate. I needed him wild and out of control. No one had ever wanted me that badly. I’d never mattered. Enough to go wild over, to forget reason, logic, even safety out of desperate need. Me? I was just about there.

  Yeah. He was mine. He just needed a little help figuring out that I wasn’t some delicate, fragile orchid he needed to protect. I was hard and dirty. I’d never allowed a man to touch me, but that didn’t make me innocent.

  Ignoring him, I worked my way down the twenty paces to the shuttle doors and hit the button to lower the ramp. His eyes narrowed, but he was too late to stop me. I shoved my blaster back into the thigh holster and lifted my hands over my head as the door opened so they wouldn’t’ shoot me on sight.

  As soon as the ramp hit the floor of the bay area, the four men walked toward us, the woman remaining at the base of the shuttle ramp watching with her weapon trained directly on Bry
n. The action made me smile. Yes. Let her underestimate the stupid little girl from Earth. She wouldn’t be the first idiot to ignore me.

  Bryn did nothing but watch me, ignoring the men around us as if they were nothing. I’d seen the Hunters on Everis move, their speed. When Lexi’s mate, Von, had fought a challenge to win her, the combatants practically flew through the air like nothing I’d ever seen before outside of a movie. I knew if Bryn needed to, he could cover distance so quickly I wouldn’t be able to track him with the naked eye.

  He could probably disarm these guys before they could even raise the alarm.

  But that was just five soldiers. Out of how many? A hundred? A thousand? I had no idea. But no matter how good a Hunter Bryn was, no one could outrun their high-tech communication devices. We were locked inside a tin can floating on the Hyperion moon. Might as well be wandering around a prison cell block. There was only one way on or off this rock. For better or worse, we were here. If Bryn tried anything stupid now, the entire moon would be swarming with killers and thieves—and they’d all be looking for my mate.

  Deliberately turning my back on Bryn, I ignored the huge hands as one of the men patted me down for more weapons. He was efficient and his hands didn’t linger anywhere they shouldn’t. A mark in favor of this Styx guy. He obviously didn’t tolerate any bullshit. The woman holding the blaster seemed to be the one in charge. Another good sign. Perhaps the leader of these people could be dealt with more easily than I’d dared to hope.

  I ignored the man’s clinical inspection and addressed the woman. “We need to talk to Styx.”

  The man on his knees before me grunted, my blaster in his possession, and nodded the all-clear to the woman watching me. She raised a pale brow, her face eerily beautiful. Her hair was too pale to be labeled a color, her eyes a bright, fair gray, almost silver. “And you are?”

  “I’m Katherine. This is Bryn.”