by Lea Linnett
“No, I like it. Have you always been a tease, or is that my fault, too?” she asked, her teeth flashing.
“You bring out the best in me.”
A giggle escaped her which she quickly stifled. “Don’t make me laugh. Noe’s out there, and we’re supposed to be healing you.” Then, her smile faltered, and she bit her lip. “I need to wrap this around your chest to hold it all in place, if that’s all right?”
Marek pushed his suit down further, holding back a shudder of unease. Bree wrapped the strip of leather around his shoulder and across his collarbone, but as she moved behind him to tie the ends together, her hands stilled.
“Your spine…”
Marek’s heart sank. He knew it was hideous. The white knobs punching through his scales were not bone, but they did look like it, and like the ridges in his scalp, they were the vestigial remainder of spinal armor he should have developed as an adolescent, as Urek had.
He said nothing, unable to even form words with his lips pressed so tightly together, and Bree hurriedly continued her work. “Okay, test it,” she said after she’d secured the loose ends, and Marek zipped up his suit and raised his arms. It was tight, but not enough to restrict movement, and he turned back to Bree, forcing a smile
“You are skilled at this.”
“We all get combat medic training,” she said with a shrug. “An overly tight bandage could hamper a soldier more than the injury itself, Luis says.”
“I am sorry that you must learn these things,” Marek said softly, but Bree shook her head.
“It’s coming in handy now, right? I’m glad I can help you, after everything you’ve done for me.”
“Bree…” Marek shuffled forward, running his hands up her arms. “I have done nothing.”
“You got us out,” she breathed, her eyes huge and dark in the blue firelight. “I can’t explain what that means to me.”
“You do not need to.” Trust shone in her gaze, her perfectly full lips parting on a shaky breath as he touched her shoulder, her neck, her cheek. He pressed his mouth to hers and breathed in her scent—fresh earth and the slowly fading echo of the chem-shower—as she welcomed his seeking tongue, and when his fingers threaded through her sleek hair, her neck arched into the touch.
He pulled the thin curtain around their pallet, blocking out everything but the mesmerizing female in his arms. Her nipples were like glass scraping his chest through their suits as he settled himself over her perfect body, and when she wrapped her legs around his hips, the heat of her core against his cock brought it roaring to life.
This was when he should pull away, when he should sink down between her thighs and focus on pleasuring her, because that was safe. That was a compromise that he could permit. Countless voices rushed through his mind, repeating every rule and expectation that had ever been asked of him. There was a method to being levekk—to being more than sub-species—and if he wanted that life, he would have to live to the highest standard possible.
All this, while his father sat in the other room, never a part of his lessons.
He saw the hypocrisy in it, in his mother, but he also knew why it was so important for her. The Constellation was not a good place to be sub-species, especially not for hybrids like himself. She had kept him, when many others would have suggested that he be sent away. She had sacrificed much for him in the hopes that he would live the same life as his brother, and who was he to waste that?
He slammed back into the present as Bree’s fingers found the catch on his suit yet again, and he stilled her hands, preparing for the worst.
But to his shock, her brows tented in concern, not anger. “What’s wrong, Marek?” Her voice was soft, barely a whisper. “Why won’t you let me touch you?”
“It is not—”
“And please don’t lie to me,” she said. “I saw how you reacted when I saw your back.”
Marek didn’t want to lie to her. So much of their time together had been built on lies, and here he was, bringing more between them. But the unknown scared him. Before his mother’s passing, his life had been predictable, steady, levekk. After, it had been chaos, and it had taken time to find a dull stability in the mine. Bree’s reaction was an even more unknowable quantity—one that he cared for more than he could possibly have expected.
He choked on his words, his heart beating in his ears. “Bree, I…”
“Is it your body?” she asked. “Because if you think you’re not absolutely breathtaking, then I shudder to think of how you see me.”
“You are the most beautiful being I’ve ever seen,” Marek assured her, frowning fiercely. “I have thought so from the moment I saw you. Do not joke as if you are not.”
“Then don’t act as if you’re… disfigured,” Bree said, her frustration clear. “Why do you think that?”
“Because…” There was that lump in his throat again, like a dam holding back a flood of words that he just wanted to spill. That he had to spill. They were no longer just poisoning him, but Bree as well, and that pained him more deeply than the words themselves. “Because it is a line that I was taught to never cross.”
She said nothing, just nodded encouragingly, and Marek tried to focus on breathing.
“It is not only my body. It is many things. I was always told that, to be levekk, I had to be perfect. I could not show volatile, ugly human emotions. I could not have human or sub-species friends. And I could not ever take a sub-species lover.”
Bree’s breath hitched. “Marek…”
The words continued, the dam splitting. “I could only lie with levekk, but to the levekk, I am nothing. There are not many females who would look upon my clawless hands and plateless brow with favor. So, I convinced myself I did not need such things. And I believed it, until I met you.”
He touched her face, brushing his thumb over her warm skin. “You are impossible to resist. You awaken my desires. When I tasted you, I did not think about what I should want, only what you wanted of me. I wished only to bring you pleasure, nothing else.”
She was breathing fast now, her pupils wide and dark. “And you make me want to please you,” she whispered. “God, Marek, all I’ve wanted since you touched me is to touch you back. To feel you inside me, connected to me.”
His cock surged against her thigh, and he groaned.
“That isn’t your world anymore, and you never have to go back if you don’t want to. They never should have tried to change you like that.” She reached up again, running her hand over his scalp where the vestiges of the brow plate he should have had erupted through his skin. “And I don’t care about these. I don’t care about your lack of claws. I don’t even care about your scales. It’s you I want. Only you.”
The space between them suddenly felt airless, Marek’s lungs burning as she ran her hands down his neck to his arms and over his chest.
A small smile pulled at her lips. “Okay, so maybe I want to get a feel of these muscles, too.”
She squeaked as he crushed their mouths together in a brutal kiss. There was nothing he could say, not with the blood rushing in his ears, because Bree’s words had floored him. No one had ever said they wanted him. No one had ever told him he was enough just as he was.
And when Bree clutched him closer, mewling softly as he plundered her mouth, he finally believed it. There was no mistaking the grasp of her fingers, the arching of her back, or the desirous look in her eyes when they broke apart, breathing heavily.
This time, when she reached for the catch on his suit, he didn’t stop her. She dragged it down, revealing his chest inch by inch, and Marek forgot how to breathe when her eyes widened.
“Skin… and scales,” Bree whispered. She pushed the sleeves down his arms and away, leaving him naked to his waist, and then her hands were all over him, his muscles jumping under every touch as she felt the varying textures of his body. She touched the scales dusting his shoulders and chest, ran her fingers over the soft, vulnerable skin covering his sides and belly, and then
grazed the jagged, puckered rise of the scar running down his left side. “What’s this from?” she asked softly.
“An accident in the mine.”
“Is it sensitive?”
“No. It is an old wound.”
She nodded, her gaze still flicking over him, until suddenly, she grinned. “What about these?” she asked, tweaking one of his sandy-colored nipples and making him hiss.
Those had been an even worse trial than his uneven skin, especially when surrounded by his peers as a youth. He’d often cursed them as the most human and embarrassing thing about him, and he covered Bree’s hand with his own. “They are…”
Her eyes flashed, as if she knew exactly what he was thinking. “Normal. A normal part of you. And maybe a fun one,” she added, brushing his hand away and grazing her teeth against the sensitive skin hard enough to make him grunt and jerk away. Bree chuckled. “Or maybe not.”
“Enough of me,” he murmured, sliding down the catch on her own suit. She drew in a shaky breath as he exposed her breasts to the warm air, her tan skin looking otherworldly in the soft, blue firelight. Regardless of how he felt about his own human characteristics, he doubted he would ever look poorly upon hers. She was compact in all the right places, her skin was soft and supple in even more, and she arched her body as he drank her in, putting herself on display.
Then, she looped an arm around his neck, breathing into his ear, “I’ll never have enough of you.”
He stifled a groan as the words tickled the sensitive spot behind his ear, his cock swelling. He could not hold back anymore.
He dragged the suit from Bree’s body, his fingers trailing in its wake as he devoured the soft sounds of pleasure that slipped from her lips. His cock jumped at the sight of her naked beneath him, and if he’d had any second thoughts, they were gone now.
Bree’s body wasn’t waifish and delicate; there was strength in the legs that hooked themselves back around his waist, and she bore the marks and scars of someone who braved the wilderness everyday and fought for their existence in a world that didn’t guarantee them safety. She was beautiful in her strength, and unlike any human Marek had ever met before.
And he wanted all of her.
She gasped as he laid himself along her body, his mouth finding her fluttering pulse and his cock pressing tight against her heated core through his suit. Her thighs gripped his sides, her fingernails scraping the mangled scales along his spine, but she did not recoil from them. She dragged her lips across his temple unthinkingly, so close to the rough and ugly scales that covered his brow. And when he threaded his fingers into her hair, she leaned into the touch, uncaring—perhaps enjoying—the absence of the claws that were so important to every levekk he had ever known.
When she tugged at the waist of his suit, her eyes fierce with need, he could not deny her. He shucked off the remaining material and knelt between her thighs with his cock rising proudly above her, the beginnings of his spend collecting at the tip.
Bree sat up, her eyes wide, and his heart stopped.
“Bree, you look…”
She smiled as she glanced up at him. “I look what? Impressed? Because I don’t know what levekk females expect, but by human standards, that’s the nicest-looking cock I’ve ever seen.”
“As far as I know, it is not for looking at,” he teased, his confidence returning as he eased her backwards.
Bree caught his wrist, stilling him. Before he could ask what was wrong, she shifted onto her knees on the pallet, bowing her back before him.
“Bree?”
“Sit back a little. I want to finish what we started in your office that day,” she said softly. Her small fingers ran down the length of him and back, making him hiss. She was close now, her hot breath fanning across his sensitive, golden skin. “Don’t make a sound. I don’t want Noe barging in here.”
She licked his tip, gathering his spend on the flat of her tongue, and Marek had to swallow the growl that threatened to leave him as she drew the head of his cock into her mouth.
It was ecstasy, the tight, wet heat of her mouth, the slight graze of her over-large teeth as she took in more of him. She bobbed up and down, her tongue swirling experimentally around him, and then his chest went tight as she sucked him down.
He was large enough that she couldn’t take him all the way, and he dug his hands into her hair when she tried, pushing her away and earning himself an annoyed hum. He did not mind, though. The vibration rang right through him, tickling his balls and making him hunch over her, holding himself back.
But it was difficult. She was exploring more of him now, her quick fingers massaging his muscular thighs before they dipped back, rolling his sac between them and almost making him spill.
He pulled from her mouth and hauled her into his arms, inhaling her gasped breath as he kissed her. She moaned in surprise, but he ignored it, pushing her down into the furs and fitting their hips together. They were both slick from need, and her folds parted wetly around him as he stroked along her clit.
“You almost finished me,” he whispered.
She grinned against his mouth while her hips rolled, chasing the friction. “That’s generally the idea.”
“I did not think you wanted this over so soon?”
“Who says it would be over?” Her smile turned mischievous. “Or am I right about levekk getting tired out after only one round?”
“I think you will have no complaints with my stamina,” he said, his teeth grazing her neck, and her pulse jumped.
“Prove it, then.”
He grinned, reaching down to hike her leg higher over his hip and fitting the tip of his cock against her slick folds. “I am sorry. Maybe we need to do more tests. Just where is this supposed to go again?”
“Marek, I swear—”
“Here?” He eased forward so just the head of his cock slipped inside, and then he had to pause, dropping his head into the crook of her neck and blowing out a steadying breath. Her core trembled around him, gripping him closer, but if he didn’t go slow, this might end far too quickly. And no matter how many times they did this, he wanted to savor the first.
“Holy shit, you’re big,” she said tightly, and his head shot up, his enjoyment immediately dampened.
“You are in pain?”
“No! I mean, for a second, but it’s fine.” She cupped his face with her palm. “It’s normal. Just… don’t stop. Please.”
Her dark eyes were nearly black in the dim light, the blue glow turning her full lips almost purple, and he found them again as he sank deeper inside her, seating himself to the hilt. She tensed for a moment, her thighs wrapped tight around his waist, but she kissed him even more fiercely than before.
Then, everything relaxed, her body turning soft and supple again, and she breathed against his mouth. “Move.”
A ragged groan ripped from his throat as he pulled out and shoved back into her, sucking on her pulse. Bree’s mouth found his shoulder, muffling her own cry of pleasure, and she snaked her arms around his broad shoulders. “More.”
He complied, setting a slow but regular rhythm as he brought their bodies together. Even while trying to be quiet, their skin slapped, the pallet creaked, and Bree’s heartbeat raced against his lips. She met him thrust for thrust, her fingernails lifting the scales from his shoulders before she grabbed his face, kissing him to hide her moan.
It only made him want her more. Levekk or human, their bodies fit together perfectly, her soft curves dipping around every one of his harder edges. In this moment, he forgot what he was and who he was meant to be. All that mattered was the warm joining of their bodies, the hungry darkness in her eyes when she pulled back to look at him, and the urgent need with which she stole his breath away.
The high-pitched gasp when he changed his angle and thrust even deeper into her warmth was nice, too.
He quickened his pace, his need rising, and from the ferocity of her touch, she was close as well.
“Now, Marek,” she breat
hed. “Now, now, now!”
He bottomed out right at the moment her walls clenched around him, and spilled himself inside her. She trembled in his arms, her orgasm shaking through her, and then they collapsed in a breathless heap.
All Marek could hear was the sound of their breaths and the whistle of the wind as the storm raged outside, but between them there was only warmth, the meager light illuminating Bree’s sweat-slicked body as her chest heaved.
She was beautiful. Maybe even more beautiful than she’d been on that first day when she’d catapulted into his arms. She had stolen his breath away even then, her dark eyes boring into his with a vigor he’d lost long ago, but he hadn’t let himself see it. Now, he drank in the sight of her, time slipping away from him until she placed a hand on his chest, tweaking his nipple again.
He winced. “Bree…”
“I’m going to make you like it,” she said, her teeth flashing. “Men are sexy when they let go a little.”
“I am not a man,” he argued, but she placed her thumb over his lips.
“I don’t care what you are. I told you that.”
He drew her thumb between this teeth and watched as her pupils dilated. Her hips were already moving in slow circles, making his cock rise once more inside her. “Again?”
“Yes,” she rasped. “Again and again until you stop second-guessing yourself. I want you. Man, levekk, whatever.”
His heart swelled as he stared into her shining eyes. How had he been lucky enough to find this human, on the outer edge of levekk territory on a fringe colony that had outlawed his very existence?
There were no words for the emotion that ripped through his chest, and so he brought their bodies together once again, his mind on nothing but the pleasure of this female that had somehow breached the gap between his two worlds, his two identities.
26
Bree woke to the soft press of furs all around her and Marek’s hard chest beneath her cheek. The bunk was still mostly dark, the blue light of the fire in the next room extinguished, but shafts of gray light from outside peeked through the gaps in the wall, illuminating the male beside her.
