Faros

by Layla Nash

  The pirate pulled off her boots and started to unbutton her uniform trousers, muttering under his breath in irritation. “I will put you in robes. They are much easier for…quick access.”

  “That better not be a sign that everything will be quick,” she shot back, and would have laughed at his expression if she’d been even partly joking.

  Faros’s growl vibrated through her and he was abruptly over her, hands denting the bed next to her shoulders and his knee pressed between her thighs. His lips brushed hers and he breathed, “You will beg me to finish you, girl,” and kissed her slow and leisurely.

  A kaleidoscope of colors exploded under her eyelids and Violet arched her back, seeking more contact. But Faros held himself above her and took his time. When he retreated, Violet raked her nails down his sides, barely making a scratch in his scales despite the Xaravian almost purring at the sensation. Her face heated but she wasn’t about to apologize. She wanted him. She needed him.

  When Faros retreated to start removing her trousers again, Violet lay back to watch him. She lifted her hips to make it a little easier. Faros’s eyes glowed as the lights in the room dimmed, and she blushed more. But there was no reason to be embarrassed. She meant to enjoy his body and hers, and their bodies together, and that would be the end of it.

  She gripped his shoulders and urged him to move faster, so she could feel his weight and move with him, but Faros gripped her wrists and put her hands on the wall behind her. “Don’t move those.”

  That lasted about half a heartbeat after he released her; Violet stretched and reached for his sides, lifting her hips to meet him.

  Faros’s eyes narrowed and his grumble turned more growl-like. He planted her wrists against the wall once more. “Violet, be patient.”

  “Oh, so you’re the authority on patience?” She lifted her head to kiss him, for some reason wanting to taste the hint of spice on his tongue. “You’re the last person who might—”

  “Violet,” he said, stressing her name, and Violet shivered.

  She loved the way he said it. She even loved the tight pressure around her wrists and the pressure of his hard, muscular thigh against her core. She waited.

  His eyes reflected her own eyes back at her, until she felt completely lost in his gaze. His head dipped and his lips brushed hers, then traced along her cheekbone and over to her ear. He nipped her earlobe and his voice deepened until she groaned with need. “Put your hands there and do not move them.”

  Part of her wanted to rebel just to see what he’d do, but he reached between them and his hand slid under her underwear and all of her seized up. She left her hands on the wall.

  Faros chuckled and dragged his teeth down her throat. He backed off enough to loosen her shirt and kiss her stomach, then tugged her panties down her legs. Violet wanted to help him—she wanted to strip everything off in a flash, and drag off all of his clothes, too. But the moment she started to move her arms, Faros gave her a warning look and shivers ran through every inch of her.

  His hot breath on her skin made her tense as his scales created delicious friction where he lay between her legs. She groaned as he rubbed his cheek against the inside of her thigh and sent sparks straight to her core. Heat pooled low in her stomach. Violet held her breath as Faros inhaled from her most intimate, vulnerable skin, and then almost burst into flames when he practically purred in anticipation.

  She’d never heard a Xaravian make a sound like that before.

  She didn’t have much time to think on it, though, because Faros started to devour her in the next moment. Violet gasped. It took all her will to keep her hands on the wall as Faros gripped her hips and tilted her up so his lips and tongue could reach all of her. Her head fell back against the flat pillow and she squeezed her eyes shut as pleasure spiked so high and so hard it felt painful.

  He might not have known much about Earther anatomy to start with, but he figured it out fast enough she hardly noticed the change. It probably helped that she moaned every time his tongue teased her clit and his broad fingers slid into her channel. The pirate acted like it was a game or a symphony, orchestrating her voice and cries with his clever mouth.

  “Wait,” she said, her back arching. “By Newton, you have to wait.”

  He retreated and she lifted her head to look at him, though her breasts got in the way as she panted and her chest heaved. Violet groaned as the painful ecstasy retreated. She’d almost lost all control right there in front of him, even though... Even though it could have been amazing. She had to stay at least semiconscious and in control.

  But looking at the pirate where he lay between her legs and fixed her in the spotlight of his eyes... Violet gulped for air and tried to wiggle her hips. “It’s too much. You’re…very good, but I can’t—”

  “You have to let go,” he said, voice as rocky as Earth’s moon. His fingers dug into her ass and Violet sucked in a breath. Faros’s touch wandered and he murmured, “Just let go, Violet.”

  It was easier said than done. Far easier said than done. She started to shake her head as her brain re-engaged and she reconsidered the wisdom of getting naked with a pirate, but the Xaravian breathed against her and she tensed. What the hell was she doing?

  Chapter 18

  Faros

  Faros had not expected the strange sweetness of her flesh, but the moment he tasted her he knew he would never get enough. She was addictive. Every movement, every sound she made... He was lost. He’d demand that she stay on the Sraibur so he could have her near. There was no way to go back to not knowing how delicious she was, all naked and warm and soft.

  But she tensed and asked him to stop, so he gathered what remained of his self-control and retreated. But he didn’t go far. He couldn’t stand the thought of leaving her there unsatisfied; he wasn’t an expert in Earthers but he knew she hadn’t climaxed. She denied herself even that.

  He didn’t like it. He wanted her drowning in pleasure. He wanted her relaxed and enjoying life and releasing whatever kept her so restricted and restrained. Faros grumbled at her to let go and gently stroked the soft pink flesh between her legs. She shivered and a guttural sound escaped her throat.

  “You look incredible,” he breathed against her. “I’m going to taste every inch of you.”

  A whimper was her only response.

  He teased her at first, with glancing touches and soft strokes, building up the pressure and speed until she tensed or moved or acted like she’d stop him again, then he backed off. He loved it—like chasing a ship and boarding it and battling the other captain. He could conquer her just like he’d conquered countless ships and towns. Faros wasn’t familiar with defeat. And even though Violet posed a hell of a challenge, he wasn’t about to fail.

  The cadence of her breath gave him clues when she liked what he did and when he perhaps went too far, too fast. Like playing an exquisite instrument. He wanted to listen to her for hours. Days, even. Maybe years.

  Maybe forever.

  The thought almost launched him out of the bed and away from her. He wasn’t interested in or ready to have a female in his life again. He needed to take care of his little debt to the Tyboli, retrieve his son from the rebels, and go on about his life with his kid. Females had no place on a pirate ship, and he wasn’t going to take a mate only to leave her on a planet somewhere. Not even a possibility.

  But even those thoughts couldn’t distract him from Violet for long. She sighed and started to relax, though she remembered to keep her hands out of his way. Faros smiled as he slid two fingers as deep into her channel as he could, curling them to explore every surface of her body. The look on her face when he told her not to move... He thought maybe she enjoyed being told what to do, having some of that control taken away. He had to remember that for later.

  As soon as he got her off, he could bury himself in her and hopefully forget all the madness that made him want to claim her. Faros listened to Violet’s murmured urging and lowered his mouth to tease her more. The smooth
skin of her thighs abruptly closed around his head and he chuckled. The vibration apparently pleased her, because her hips lifted for more and a moan escaped.

  He repeated the motions again and again, sucking her flesh and moving his hand to drive her toward her climax. Violet started to murmur about waiting, about holding back, but Faros put it aside. Her muscles tensed and her legs wrapped still tighter around his head and shoulders. He held onto her hip with his free hand.

  She writhed and pushed against him, searching for more—so he gave it to her. He used the edge of his teeth on the bead of nerves among her folds and pressed three fingers into her again and again and again until Violet panted and her hands came off the wall to grab his hair.

  She went rigid as all her muscles clenched and clutched at him. She moaned in a deep, sensual roll that set his scales rattling and nearly pushed him beyond his control. Faros’s spikes stood up from his shoulders as he sensed the female close to completion. He didn’t stop. He couldn’t have stopped. Not for anything in the universe.

  Chapter 19

  Violet

  She meant to push him away when things got too intense, but there was a split second when she could have done it—and she didn’t. And then she hardly controlled her own body. A tidal wave of sheer bliss rolled up from her toes. She wrapped her legs around him and gave up on touching the wall. Whatever he wanted to do about it, she wouldn’t mind at all, based on all the talent with his hands and mouth.

  Violet moaned and searched for something to hold onto as her muscles seized and her hips bucked against his face. Her fingers found the rough spikes standing up from his shoulders, and she seized on them. Faros immediately snarled and sucked hard, his fingers thrusting deep and fast into her, and pushed her over the edge.

  Threw her over the edge, more like. Because Violet’s whole body arched away from the bed as sparks filled her vision. She felt nothing but electric ecstasy rippling through her over and over, and every time she thought it would fade away, Faros moved or breathed on her or growled with lust and started the tremors yet again. She gasped for air and gripped his spikes, trying to come up with words to ask for mercy, but the room darkened around the edges and all she could think or feel was him.

  Her legs fell open on the bed as she lost all her strength and couldn’t keep them locked around his shoulders, and Faros slowed the deliberate in-and-out of his fingers. He still watched her with glowing silver eyes when Violet managed to pry her eyes open. She was a sweaty heap, tangled in his sheets, and she had no idea what the hell he’d managed to do to her. She’d never experienced anything like it. Her sex still throbbed, ready for something... more.

  And as Faros shed his robes, she knew exactly what that “more” was meant to be.

  She swallowed hard when she saw his body and the massive erection that had been pressing against her hip when they kissed. She hadn’t imagined it was that big. It looked far too thick to actually fit, and the veins stood out in ridges that made her core tingle with anticipation. She cleared her throat and figured a joke might buy her a second to actually prepare for the fucking of a lifetime. “Your, uh, mass appears to be more than adequate.”

  He blinked at her, head tilted, then laughed so hard the whole bed shook. Faros knelt on the end of the bed and eyed her like the spicy meat he’d devoured at dinner. Or breakfast. Whatever meal they’d shared. Violet couldn’t concentrate on anything. He’d liked it when she played with his spikes.

  He gripped her ankle in his strong hand, just a bit slippery from her own fluids, and growled like a true barbarian. “You’ll see. Adequate is not the word.”

  “That’s why I said ‘More than’—” she started, then squeaked when he fell forward and landed on his elbows above her.

  His weight pinned her hips and stomach, and the sudden heat and friction from his scales ignited the blissful shivers that made her spread her legs to welcome him closer. Einstein’s mustache, she needed him inside her. As talented as his fingers were, they weren’t long or thick enough. The rest of him definitely was.

  Faros took her lower lip in his teeth and reached down to catch her thigh, hauling her leg up to wrap around his waist. He even slapped her thigh when it seemed like she didn’t move fast enough. “Around me. Tight.”

  At least she affected him like he affected her—or so she assumed from the grunting and lack of full sentences. Violet shuddered with pleasure at the sensation of his sides against her thighs as she tilted her hips and tightened her legs around his waist. She tried to drag him close enough to get his cock inside of her, but Faros apparently enjoyed the self-denial of hovering just outside her core. The head of his cock brushed her sensitive flesh and she moaned. He repeated the motion again and again as his scales turned brilliant purple and blue and had hints of silver, too, and eventually she couldn’t take it.

  Violet needed more. Needed all of him buried as deep as he could go, then thrusting as fast and as hard as that massive, powerful body could manage. She wanted rough. She needed hard. She grabbed his spikes and stroked them, groaning. “I need you now. Just fuck me already.”

  He snarled and his hips slammed into her, splitting her open. It felt like his cock invaded all the way to her lungs, stretching her channel and demanding entry into all her secret places. Faros pushed his chest above hers and pinned her shoulder down so he had greater leverage, and started fucking her with the intensity of a man who hadn’t been with anyone in a long time.

  She struggled to hold on, crying out as her earlier climax triggered an immediate repeat with the hard heat of his intrusion. Stroking his spikes sent him into a frenzy and even seemed to make his cock swell, until a strange bulb at the base pressed into her with each thrust. She’d just gotten used to the additional pressure and stretching when Faros leaned down and growled, “Say my name.”

  “Faros,” she breathed. She didn’t have the strength to say more. She needed him to keep moving exactly as he was, for just... a... little... longer... Violet raked her nails down his sides and seized up, her body clenching around his cock to keep him buried deeply, and Faros cursed.

  “Tell me what you want.”

  “Fuck me…harder,” Violet said.

  He groaned—deep, guttural, primeval—and she came again at the sound. He slammed into her until Violet almost slid into the wall and had to brace herself, but she would have asked for more if she’d had her wits about her.

  And then... he disappeared.

  He withdrew and rolled to the side, shouting, “What?” into the air.

  Her head spun. What the fuck happened?

  Chapter 20

  Faros

  He’d been on the verge of shattering, of filling her completely and tying himself to her, when the emergency beacon buzzed in his quarters. It wasn’t a frequency the humans heard easily, or so he assumed, because Violet didn’t look like she’d heard. Or maybe he was just so good that she forgot the rest of the world existed.

  He knew if he finished inside her and the knot took hold, it would be a while before they could separate safely. Which meant his only option was to pull away and curse every sandsnake that ever slithered in the desert as he shouted, “What?” at whoever activated the beacon.

  If it was a mistake or a joke, heads would roll. He’d kill whoever kept him from finishing with Violet. He couldn’t even look at her as she sprawled in his bed, sweaty and smelling sweetly of her sex and his.

  Wyzak’s disembodied voice echoed in the quarters, making Violet start and drag the sheets up to cover her nudity as if she feared the second-in-command would just materialize. “Tyboli ship approaching at speed. No hailing calls yet.”

  “Fuck.” Faros wanted to break something and kill someone and generally make sure the whole universe felt as fucking frustrated as he did. And he couldn’t even hop back on Violet to relieve the ache in his cock, since he was still too riled up and would end up knotting her anyway. The Tyboli would kill him in the middle of the act. “On my way.”

  He
spun on his heel and stormed into the water closet. He ran the water as cold as it went and doused himself with it, hoping it would dampen his lust enough for him to actually think when confronting the Tyboli. Because the only thing his brain and his body cared about was Violet—still in his bed, still naked, still on the verge of more beautiful, flushed, moaning ecstasy...

  He growled and wrapped his fist around his cock, trying to at least finish so he wouldn’t put a tent in his robes when he confronted the Tyboli. The moons only knew how they would take that.

  Faros grabbed a set of robes from the bin near the water closet and strode for the door, unlocking it without looking at Violet. “Stay here.”

  He broke into a run in the corridor, almost mowing down two of his crewmembers on their way to the bridge. He had many reasons to be glad the Sraibur was a relatively small ship, but none more so in that moment than the short distance giving him time to catch his breath and composure by the time the Tyboli hailed his ship.

  At least they’d called instead of just attacking. Of course, their ship looked like a bit of a clunker compared to his, so perhaps they didn’t want to test the Sraibur’s shields and guns. The Tyboli had probably also heard, since they were scavengers and thieves, that the rebellion had recently “liberated” some badass weapons and propulsion systems from the Dablonians. No doubt the Tyboli wanted a chance to liberate the same.

  Faros did his best to look bored as the viewing screen showed him the Tyboli ship, the Uuurtna, and the bridge. Kryken, the sandsnake who claimed Faros’s debt, kept his substantial gray bulk concealed underneath robes that were a sad copy of Xaravian garments. The round Tyboli, squat and with long arms that dragged on the ground if he didn’t raise them, smiled like a greasy traitor. “I’m surprised you bothered to respond instead of running.”