Tribe Protector

by Stacy Jones

  Deciding she’d made as much progress with Trrak’s training as she was going to that day, she followed Tor’s prompting and sat in a circle with the guys, all of them taking a late lunch break.

  Drrak sat on her right, Arruk on her left, and Tor in front of her with Trrak at his side. She was acutely aware that she was the center of attention as she nibbled on her melon. She could feel their eyes on her as if they were waiting for her to do something interesting and, aside from making her uncomfortable, it made her nervous.

  After about ten minutes, when she couldn’t take the increasing tension anymore, she did the first thing that came to mind in an effort to distract them; she asked a question.

  “How did you get scarred?” she blurted, then immediately cringed and slapped a hand over her mouth, darting a wide-eyed look up at Drrak next to her.

  What the hell has happened to my brain-to-mouth filter?!

  She’d wanted to know the answer for a while now but hadn’t intended to ask quite so abruptly, or so rudely.

  Tor choked on his bite of food, coughing and sputtering, while Arruk went ramrod straight beside her. Drrak, clearly not understanding the question though he’d picked up some of her words, frowned at all of them before opening his mouth.

  Reaching up quickly, she covered his mouth with her hand to stop Drrak from speaking, having absolutely no desire to translate the thoughtless, ill-mannered question she’d asked.

  What she should have done was cover Tor’s mouth.

  As soon as she covered his mouth with her hand, Drrak’s eyes slowly dropped to her. If he’d had eyebrows, she was pretty sure they would’ve been touching his hairline… if he’d also had a hairline.

  While she was busy staring at him and the taken-aback expression he was giving her, Tor filled the silence, doing exactly what she didn’t want; translating what she’d said.

  “Lily tuuk rekrr. Pari tul kavarr ,” Tor said gently, his tone straightforward but soft, surprising her with the show of tact even as he went against her clear wishes and explained her thoughtless question.

  She flashed Tor a narrow-eyed glare of disapproval, regardless of how nicely he’d said it, but turned warily back to Drrak when she felt his lips move under her hand. Grimacing, she had an apology on the tip of her tongue as she looked back up at him, but it remained unspoken at seeing the smile in his eyes.

  It was her turn to be taken aback when he delicately wrapped the fingers of his upper hand around her wrist and lowered her hand from his mouth, pressing it to one of the bigger scars on his chest instead.

  With his big hand over her much smaller one, Drrak traced her fingers over his scars, first one then lower to another, holding her eyes with his as he did so.

  Lily, stunned by his reaction, didn’t fight him. She let him guide her touch, feeling the injured skin covering his brawny chest and stomach glide silkily beneath her palm.

  She caressed his impossibly muscular chest while staring into his penetrating gaze, feeling that look all the way down to her bones. Being the sole focus of his attention was affecting her even more than their hug the other day, the one she couldn’t stop thinking about.

  Her heart was in her throat, her rapidly growing desire for the massive male was spreading through her like fire, and their point of connection was sending tingles up her arm, growing and expanding as they swept through her.

  Without looking away, still directing her touch, he addressed Arruk.

  “Suuk tul mer , bror ,” he uttered lowly .

  Caught in his gaze, she listened to their bass voices blend together; Arruk’s deep voice behind her interpreting Drrak’s words as he told her what had happened to him.

  “Drrak nu me… same. This ha no known, naa seen. Evrr. Us know naa Chosen by Pashas. Us… iztari . Pashas no want, no want see, no want Choose.”

  “Outcasts? Just because you’re twins?” she asked, appalled.

  “Mmm, ess . Us same nu ana big so no want,” Arruk explained, telling her they were outcasts and unsuitable mates not just because they’re twins but because they were apparently too big. “When us young, four hands utek , Drrak want be onska ; like to see, to lurrn, farr away.”

  “A wanderer,” she whispered, understanding immediately what Arruk was saying.

  “When gone, he rekkr— hurrt by anskrim . They bite, take Drrak to watrr, want kill. He fight, get away. Me, Frrar, Tor druur… find,” Arruk paused there, his voice filled with remembered pain and panic.

  Slipping her hand out from under Drrak’s, she stretched back, wrapping Arruk’s arms around her waist and leaning back against him when he scooted closer to her, needing to comfort him however she could.

  She remembered how terrifying the water-dragon people appeared when she’d seen them back at the cave. She vividly recalled how vicious the one who had glimpsed her looked. His teeth were long and sharp, his pale, cloudy eyes holding awareness and malice in equal measure.

  Imagining Drrak in the clutches of one sent a flutter of panic through her. Seeing the damage they had inflicted, understanding the majority of Drrak’s scars were from a single horrendous attack instead of many smaller ones as she had assumed, she was amazed, shocked he had survived.

  Drrak startled her and brought her attention back to him when he touched her cheek, collecting a tear she hadn’t realized was there. He frowned down at where the drop of moisture balanced on his finger, then lifted it higher, inspecting it before raising his questioning gaze back to hers.

  She’d forgotten their people didn’t cry and was about to explain what the tear meant but, before she could, he licked it from his finger, staring at her all the while.

  The breath she’d sucked in to speak gusted from her in a shuddering sigh and her rounded eyes dropped to his mouth, the sight of his grey tongue doing things to her libido completely disproportionate to the situation.

  Why the hell was that sexy?

  Arruk and Drrak began speaking again simultaneously, abruptly reminding her how very inappropriate it was to be aroused during such a heartbreaking tale. She focused again on what they were saying, pointedly ignoring how her cheeks felt hot with embarrassment and discomfort.

  Arruk’s use of her language let her hear the emotion coloring his voice where Drrak’s guttural growl hid them. She would have thought he wasn’t affected if she hadn’t seen the sadness, and what she thought was bleak acceptance, flowing over his face, tightening the corners of his eyes and pulling his full lips down as he spoke.

  “Drrak close to Shakti , to death, but us Motherr ha Daturi , Healrr. I carry Drrak back to tribe. Long travel, think many times I lose bror but us make it. Motherr save Drrak, but he scarr mushh. Lose tail. No hope be Chosen evrr if uknaa mate dance so he iss iztarka ; fight, prrotect, die tul shevari, but no be mate. Fight more, scar more, but he save many shevari ,” Arruk finished, his voice communicating his anger, sorrow, and pride in equal measure.

  Lily felt like her heart was breaking.

  She couldn’t imagine what that must have been like for Arruk and the guys, to find their brother and friend like that and then to have carried his bloody, wounded body so far, not knowing if he would live or die.

  The pain Drrak must have been in …

  And to survive against all odds only to know that his gruesome scars, and the loss of his tail, put him even further from being chosen as a mate than he’d already been.

  It took her a moment to realize her hands were shaking with anger and outrage at the injustice of it all.

  She’d seen that Drrak was uncomfortable around his people the few times they’d ventured closer to the tribe over these last days, that he seemed to much prefer only being around her, her guys, or alone, but she’d had no idea why.

  Well, she knew now and almost wished she didn’t.

  How must it feel to have been shunned by your people because of things over which you have no control? And at only sixteen years old after surviving such a grisly attack?

  Lily felt more tears slip d
own her face but couldn’t decide if they were tears of sorrow or anger. Perhaps both. She was pissed and filled with grief for him and, yet, felt infinitely closer to him than she had before.

  She knew what it was to be abandoned, to be discarded by someone who was supposed to love you unconditionally.

  Her scars had been internal after she lost her mother, but they had still been enough for her father to leave her, to decide he couldn’t be bothered with her, dumping her on Grams and disappearing.

  It had to be worse for Drrak.

  He still had to see the people that rejected him, protected those people from danger at risk to his own life even though they thought him undeserving of love, thought him damaged and unworthy.

  Fuck them. If they can’t see how amazing he is, that’s their loss.

  Drrak was wild, yes, and unpredictable a lot of the time, often behaving more like an untamed animal than a person, but who wouldn’t be after spending the majority of his or her life alone?

  If the shevari were anything like humans—and she thought she could say with confidence they were—being in relative isolation for so long changed people. Hurt them in ways not always visible at first glance.

  Drrak stared at her while she wrestled with her emotions with what looked like a guarded but fervent kind of hope before resignation slowly settled over his features, like the sun sinking behind the horizon, as his eyes dropped from hers.

  She could feel the tension suddenly emanating from him, could almost see him shutting down, closing himself off from her. The breath froze in her lungs as she realized he’d been waiting for her to make some kind of move, to give him some kind of sign that she didn’t see him as damaged goods .

  By focusing on her own anger over his situation, as well as her past pain, she’d just hurt him.

  Q uickly sitting up away from Arruk, Lily moved to her knees and reached out to Drrak, cradling his sharply-squared, velvet-covered jaw in her hands. Her heart was pounding in her chest as she guided his face up, bringing his now shuttered gaze back to hers.

  Seeing his previously intense, expressive, bright eyes turn blank, hiding his emotions from her, she got a small taste of what losing him would feel like and it made her realize something.

  In that moment she made a decision, and while it felt right, it still made her nervous as hell .

  Her decision was motivated in part by empathy; she wanted to take away Drrak’s pain and show him he was worthy of love and affection… but it was more than that.

  Being completely honest with herself, she acknowledged that she’d been attracted to him since the moment they met, had felt drawn to him when all she could see were his bright eyes piercing her through the bushes. That attraction had done nothing but grow the more she was around him.

  The kindness he’d shown, his protectiveness of her and the cub, his intelligence—they all made him infinitely more attractive than he’d already been. Learning that he risked his life to protect the people who’d rejected him told her how honorable and brave he was. The more she saw her guys interact with him, the joy she witnessed spreading over their faces when he was near, and the positive changes he brought out in them, all intensified her draw to him.

  What had been holding her back from considering a relationship with him wasn’t uncertainty that he would fit perfectly with her guys because she knew he would, had seen it with absolute clarity.

  It wasn’t worry that he and she would make a good match because something in him called to her just as strongly, just as deeply, as Arruk, Frrar, and Tor had when she’d met them.

  She admitted to herself in that moment that she wanted him, but it was so much more than that.

  She already knew he wanted her and knew her guys wanted them together, but fear had held her back, had hidden the true depths of her feelings for him even from herself.

  It wasn’t just how very far outside the bounds of normal human relationships this situation was that made her initial reaction to balk, or the pressure of knowing it was all or nothing with them and the weight that put on her decision. That had been a big part of it, but she realized with sudden clarity as she stared at him that it was fear he would take the last piece of her heart, and she would belong to her guys entirely.

  Before that moment, she hadn’t been aware she’d held that small piece of herself back, but she had.

  Her intimate experience with rejection had built a wall and while her guys had smashed it almost completely with their love, devotion, and care, there was still a small section remaining.

  Opening herself up to give that last piece to Drrak was terrifying and felt like leaping off a cliff… but she knew it would be worse to hoard it to herself and lose him in the process.

  He already meant so much to her, had somehow become someone she couldn’t imagine not having in her life, and that hidden piece of her heart was already his.

  She just had to take that leap and give it to him.

  Gently sweeping her thumb over his full lower lip, ignoring the way her hand trembled, she leaned forward, ever so slowly closing the small distance between them, her eyes open and locked to his all the while. She pressed a feather-light kiss to the scar bisecting his lips and watched as his eyes widened, heard him suck in a sharp breath against her.

  The relief she felt when the shutter dropped and his emotions again blazed in those bright depths nearly staggered her. Tilting her head, she aligned their mouths .

  She witnessed everything he was feeling fearlessly reflected in his gaze. Saw heat flare hot enough to rival the sun. Shock. Fierce joy. Staggering relief.

  And… love .

  Seeing love in his eyes scared her, made whispers of how and too soon flutter like panicked butterflies at the back of her mind, but despite those thoughts trying to make her doubt, she felt an answering warmth bloom in her chest and let his show of courage guide her.

  She released the last of her hesitation and fear and let her own feelings fill her eyes, showing him what he had come to mean to her in the short time they’d known each other, time that may have only been a matter of weeks but felt like so much longer.

  She tentatively slid her tongue across the seam of his lips, gasping at the electricity that arched between them when he opened for her. At the first brush of her tongue along his he growled low in his throat, the sound startling in its ferocity, before he grabbed her and brought her to his chest.

  Lily cried out against his mouth, shocked at the sudden move but instantly turned on, her eyelids fluttering shut and her thoughts scattering as lust turned her blood to liquid fire.

  She wrapped her arms and legs around him, gripping him tightly, barely restraining the urge to grind herself down on his lap as need exploded inside her.

  His lower hands gripped her ass while his upper held her to him, one splayed across her spine, the other cradling the back of her head, achingly gentle despite his immense strength.

  The hesitancy of their kiss turned ravenous in a heartbeat. It felt like he was trying to devour her, eating at her mouth like he was starving. His lack of experience did nothing to detract from his effect on her, instead doing the opposite; making their kiss feel raw and untamed.

  She almost came undone when she felt his thick, scarred tail slide up her outer thigh, under her cardigan to brush along her hip. It wasn’t just the intimacy of the caress or his proximity to where she was suddenly wet and throbbing for him, but that he trusted her enough to touch her with the damaged limb, that he didn’t feel like he had to hide it from her anymore .

  He slowed their frenzied kiss before she was ready, his tongue slowing its thrusting and licking until he was exploring her more gently, learning her taste and feel.

  Lily groaned in protest when he pulled back, forcing her eyes open. They stared at each other from inches away, panting against the other’s lips, both their gazes reflecting wonder and need.

  She felt his fingers tuck the hair that had come loose from her braid behind her ear, felt the rough pads trac
e the line of her neck down to her collarbone, before sliding lower to rest over her thundering heart.

  For some reason that touch made her cheeks heat, made her feel shy all of a sudden when moments before she was fighting the urge to grind herself on his bare cock, but she didn’t—couldn’t—look away.

  “Mek tinsa roaerr. Me ha shhk, ” he rumbled lowly, leaning forward so his lips brushed hers as he spoke.

  My little fighter. I am yours.

  D rrak was shaking with the intensity of the emotions and sensations flooding him. Elation, savage satisfaction, and hunger strong enough to bring him to his knees, if he weren’t already sitting, ravaged him until he felt shattered and made whole at the same time.

  Leelee’s slick little tongue licking into his mouth, her small body clinging to his, and her hands gripping him, pulling him tighter to her when they were already closer than he’d ever been to another person, overwhelmed him.

  All he could feel, smell, or think about was her. She consumed him with her delicate ferocity, until he was more hers than his own.

  He embraced the unexpected sensation without fear or hesitation, let it wash over and through him until he felt as though the changes should be visible. Drrak wanted his markings and scars to re-form to reflect her claim, to shift on his flesh to show all who looked upon him that he was hers, now and always.

  He hadn’t known it could be this way before her, hadn’t known he would experience her claiming so deeply, and hadn’t known the press of her lips could make his body come alive in a way he had never experienced before or even knew was possible. He’d seen her touch mouths with his brothers, but he hadn’t known it would be so intense, like being consumed by her.

  And, yet, as much as he didn’t want to, he knew he had to stop her.

  Pulling back from Leelee’s sweet mouth was the hardest thing he had ever done, but he wanted—needed—to do this properly. He had to make certain her mouth mating, and what he saw shining in her gaze, meant what he desperately hoped it meant .