by Marie Dry
He came to her and picked her up. “We will practice and you will become used to my touch.
He laid her down carefully. She thought he’d take off her bra and touch her breasts, but he was back to playing with her hair. “I have scars,” she blurted.
He stilled and slowly, so slowly his gaze moved from her breasts to clash with her gaze. “Show me.”
She pushed up her sleeves and showed him the marks the chains had left. “My back also.”
“I will return to the basement tomorrow and inflict some more scars on those woumbers.”
Sarah stiffened and pushed him back. “No, please I couldn’t bear it.”
He glared at her, those ever-changing eyes shooting sparks at her. “You dare choose them over my wishes.”
Every hair on her body stood on end.
16
Keeping a careful eye on him, she sat up. She was too vulnerable lying down on the pelts. Sarah stretched out her hand. “Please, Zaar, I’d never choose those criminals over you. I hate and despise them, but I just can’t bear such suffering.” She put a hesitant hand on his arm. His muscles bunched beneath her touch, as if he prepared to throw her off. “Please let them die.” She’d seen the pleas for the release of death in their eyes. They’d known they would never be free again.
If anyone had told her she’d ever feel sorry for her captors, she’d have laughed in their faces.
“You would show mercy toward those that have hurt you? It is not the Zyrgin way.”
Sarah leaned forward and put her free hand on his chest. “I know it’s not the Zyrgin way. But I’m not a warrior—I can’t bear such cruelty.
He touched her hair, loosened her braid. “You are too soft, my breeder.”
She looked up at him, tried to show him how serious she was about this. “Would you want me any other way? Would you like me to be able to go down into that basement and torture them and laugh at their suffering?”
He stared down at her and speared his fingers through her hair. For a long time, their gazes locked. “No,” he said at last. “I will have them killed. But never again do you interfere in warrior business.”
Sarah bit her lip.
“Never again,” he insisted.
“I don’t want to know what you do in your wars and battles, but the women on this planet and how they are treated is definitely my business.”
“No, it is not. We will not discuss this again,” he said arrogantly. “We will kiss again and do another attempted first knowing.”
Sarah narrowed her eyes, but kept quiet; they’d just have to see about that.
He kissed her and she forgot the men in the basement, the women trapped in their homes, and all she could think of was to experience his kiss again. He picked her up and carried her to his pelt.
His patience relaxed her—the way he stroked every inch of her skin from the top of her head to her toes. He wiggled each toe and glared at her when she giggled at the ticklish touch. Then he used his lips and she was gasping and twisting with pleasure. She touched his ridge, followed it over his head with exultant fingers. He stilled.
“I know, I know, I’m not supposed to move.” How he expected her to stay still when he drove her mad with pleasure was a mystery. She could do this, she could make love with him. He leaned down and nipped at her breasts and she put a hand on his shoulder. He kissed her neck, his breathing heavy in her ears. Sarah screamed and kicked and punched.
“Breeder.”
She screamed and struck out at the raider—
“Breeder. Sarah.”
She blinked. That didn’t sound like a raider. His voice was too deep, his accent too sexy. She blinked and saw Zaar watching her.
Her shoulders slumped. “I’m sorry.”
“You do not need to apologize, my conquest is going as planned,” he said magnanimously.
Unable to smile at his arrogance when she felt like such a letdown, she held her shirt closed and went to her own pallet. Sarah lay on her side on her pallet and tried not to feel like a failure. A woman who couldn’t be with her man.
She was aware of him walking closer, and she wanted to turn and kiss him again and keep kissing him, until she forgot that she’d never be clean. That she couldn’t respond to her man like normal women did every day. No matter how many times they tried, she became hysterical the moment he moved on from arranging her hair. This time it had been his heavy breathing that set her off.
Zaar came and sat next to her, his back against the wall. For an arrogant Zyrgin with such unlimited power, he was amazingly patient with her. The silence lengthened. She wanted to say something, to break the awful quiet. But all she could think about was that kiss. She wanted to do it again.
He moved, his clothes rustling against the bear pelt he sat on. “I will allow you to try your solution,” he spat the words like bullets.
Sarah frowned. “My solution to what?” Whatever it was, she knew he hated it. She clutched her Zaar bear close and felt those black eyes boring into her back.
“I have decided to make the ultimate sacrifice to help you overcome your fear of me.”
Sarah wanted to protest, tell him that it wasn’t him she feared, but the specter from the past… Wait, what did he consider the ultimate sacrifice? “What kind of sacrifice?” Visions of eduki’s burned at the altar flashed in front of her. She turned over to face him.
He sprang up and paced up and down. His hands clenched and unclenched. Did his claws extend for a fraction of a second? “I will allow you to be on top.”
“On top of what?” Then it hit her, like twenty bear eduki things fell on her. Her heart started to beat the way a Zyrgin warrior ran. Her eyes widened and got stuck like that. “Oh.”
“Yes, oh, as you so eloquently put it.” For a guy who didn’t get sarcasm he could really dish it out well.
Maybe she misunderstood. “You mean you’ll allow me to be on top during uh—” She blushed at her stammering. But she wasn’t exactly prepared for him to suddenly agree to this.
“Yes.” He pulled his shoulders back. “You will be on top during fucking.”
“Don’t call it that—with us it’s making love,” she said sharply.
He stared at her a long time. “We will do the first knowing—your making love, backward, but you will never speak of this.”
Like a robot, he walked to his pallet, jerky and uncoordinated. He stepped out of his boots and pulled his pants and jacket off. The way he lay there, so rigid, reminded her of a Victorian bride, about to do her duty. She bit her lip. He was a very tall, muscled warrior far removed from a maiden. She could see from the way his big body trembled and his clenched fists that this went against every instinct he had. Tenderness overwhelmed her for this sometimes cruel, but mostly caring warrior.
She knelt next to him, clenching her hands until her knuckles ached. A hysterical giggle escaped her tightly pressed lips. This was such an unreal situation. Who would’ve thought she’d end up here?
“Why do you laugh?” It was more a threat than a question.
“We’re a sorry pair.”
“I am a magnificent warrior, not a sorry one,” he said, his jaw clenched so tight his lips barely moved. He stared unblinking up at the ceiling. She reached out a trembling finger and traced the outline of those tightly pressed lips. “I like your lips, how they feel, how they taste.” She continued stroking him. “I could do it the whole day. If I wasn’t so broken and afraid all the time, I’d be kissing you every time we part and meet up again.”
That hot gaze flicked to her. “I will find a solution and you will not be broken anymore. We will kiss with tongue every time we touch foreheads.”
She nodded. The fact that she could look forward to kissing him was a gift. She’d count all her wins until they destroyed her fears.
Watching him for any sign that she was doing something forbidden, she touched the bone that dissected his head. “Can you feel this?”
“Yes.”
She traced his forehead, the way
he’d done with her. “I love your forehead—the shape and the feel.” She tapped her fingers against the bone. Followed the patterns on his skin. “Why is your skin green and copper? If it evolved to blend into the environment, you’d stand out against all the brown.”
“Millions of year ago, Zyrgin was a green planet,” he said from between clenched teeth. It was obvious that he held onto control with sheer willpower.
“And your copper form?”
“Our scientists allowed us to change to this form to be more pleasing to females of other races after our breeders died out.”
Sarah smiled and traced a vein over his arm. “I like both your forms; you don’t need to be one or the other to please me.” She stroked upward until she reached his forehead. “And the ridge on your head? I’ve noticed Srinisisa doesn’t have one.”
“It is a Zyrgin characteristic. A warrior’s ridge is built to protect our brains. We can withstand much trauma to our heads during battle.”
Sarah stared down at that savage face, the warrior body. He was willing to go against everything he believed. For her. For that alone he held her heart in his rough claws.
Images flashed through her mind. Zaar clumsily trying to help by bringing her the best soap he could find. Telling her bedside stories. Giving her a Zaar teddy bear. Installing a button so that she could easily torture those who’d hurt her.
He was hers—somehow, they completed each other. The timid human and fierce warrior.
“You may proceed,” he said. He stared up at the ceiling, his body rigid, as if awaiting a terrible fate.
She stroked his shoulder, his arm, and his tightened fists, and a slight tremor went through his rigidly held body. “I think you are wonderful for doing this for me. I know how hard it is for you.” She traced a vein from his wrist up his arm, lingering to stroke the bunched muscles in his upper arms. She loved the feel of his skin. The way he reacted to her touch. “I love touching you.”
She inched closer to him. Maybe she could pleasure him as much as he’d tried to pleasure her. Her heartbeat sped up. Maybe this time she’d be able to go through with it.
Should she try and explain to him? Her throat closed up tight, just thinking about talking of that horrific year.
She stilled and avoided his gaze. “I’ve experienced many men, all of them against my will. I know about violence and being hurt.” She glanced up and then away. “With us it will be making love and I’m glad my first time making love will be with you.” She trailed her fingers over his chest. “The raiders used the F-word. That’s why I don’t want it used between us.”
His eyes blazed like a sun exploding. “It will never again be a word that describes us.”
She rubbed at his skin, followed the patterns with her fingers while she collected her thoughts. “It’s hard for me to trust anyone. If my own family could betray me like that, how can I trust you? Even if you have the face of my rescuers.” She battled the rage and confusion. “It was my family that sold me. Not a stranger or a slaver. My own family.”
“If she wasn’t dead, your father’s human female would be in my basement.” He opened his mouth, showing his incisors in the same gesture that had sent the men in those cylinders into a frenzy.
“I am ashamed to say this, but if she was down there, I may have pressed that button.” Because family should be your safe place.
She touched his ridge, followed it down his head to his forehead, and then continued on to stroke his nose with the tip of her finger. “Even your nose feels tough.”
“Good Zyrgin―”
“Genes, I know,” she said and followed the pulsing vein on his jaw, stroked his head. Followed another vein down his body. She scrupulously avoided touching his midsection, though she couldn’t resist stealing glances. A small part of her, a part she pushed firmly down, mourned the innocent young woman that would’ve thought he was too big. “I like looking at you and touching you,” she said softly. “I like how you look and smell and feel and I never thought I’d feel that way.”
She moved down his body, the way he’d done with her, and tickled his feet. He kept still. “So you’re not ticklish,” she said, a little disappointed. Revenge would’ve been sweet. She touched his big toe. “Do your claws extend on your toes, as well?”
“Yes.”
A long time later, when she thought he’d grab her and sink into her, he was trembling so much, his penis erect and oozing pre-cum, Sarah moved over him. He was so big her knees barely touched the bed. She struggled to balance and to connect their bodies, but at last she sank down and moaned when he barely rubbed against her entrance. She tried to sink down on him, but only managed to tease herself. He slid just inside her entrance, but no matter how hard she pressed down, he wouldn’t go deeper. “Do you require assistance?” his voice was ragged.
She nodded frantically. “Help me, Zaar, I want to do this.” She was aroused and excited and hopeful all at once. “I need you.”
He grabbed her hips and slowly, carefully pulled her down an inch. She moaned when he lifted her and then slowly pushed her down on him again. “S’good,” she slurred. He kept up that maddeningly short thrust and withdrawal until at last he was deep inside her. Sarah waited for the panic to come, but this was Zaar, the alien whose warriors had saved her. The mate who told her bedtime stories even when he’d have preferred to make love with her. Pleasure, so much pleasure coursed through her body. He throbbed inside her. “Are you ready, my breeder.”
“Yes, my warrior,” she said breathily.
Their eyes locked and he moved while slowly shifting her with his hands on her hips, entering and withdrawing until she felt triumph and happiness as her pleasure crested. Dimly she heard Zaar roar.
A long time later she awkwardly rolled off him, with his help, and lay next to him. He pulled her into his arms. “I am a good warrior for my breeder; I will hold you after our lovemaking—first knowing.”
Sarah smiled and stroked his bare chest. “Yes, you are.” She’d done it—she’d conquered her fear. She didn’t fool herself that it would be like this every time, but she’d made love with her warrior. This was one thing they hadn’t stolen from her in that camp.
“Do you wish me to bathe?”
She slapped his chest. “Don’t start that again. You’re not bathing and I’m too lazy to get up and bathe now. Unless you’d prefer me to?”
“No.”
“Tell me why you dislike me being on top so much. I really appreciate you doing that for me.” His distress had been real, but unfathomable in a male this tough.
“It was a great sacrifice. No other parenadorz has ever had to sacrifice himself like that,” he said.
She’d never get used to how serious he was about this. “Please tell me why you dislike it so much to have me on top? I want to understand how you think, why you do things.” Right now, she could scale mountains, win battles. She’d done it, had overcome the fear those monsters had left her with.
“I am a warrior—a first knowing is done by a warrior to a breeder.”
She still didn’t understand, but let it go.
They lay in silence for a while. “Please tell me another story.” He was still tense, as if he expected dire consequences because they did the first knowing upside down. Maybe a story would help him too.
“History lesson,” he said pointedly. Maybe he thought telling bedtime stories was too soft a thing for such a tough warrior to admit to.
“All right, tell me more of your history.” She held up a hand. “Wait, first tell me why you keep asking me if I’ve washed behind my ears.”
“Humans have to wash behind their ears or they rot and smell terrible. Sometimes their ears fall off.”
Sarah blinked and stared at him. She bit her lip. “So tell me another history lesson,” she said faintly.
“Many centuries ago, a leader took a breeder from a decadent planet.”
Sarah wiggled closer to him, getting comfortable. “So, was this before or after
the decadent Zyrgin?”
“Before. Now be silent.”
She stifled a giggle.
He held out his hand. “Have some chocolate. It will help keep you quiet.”
“Thank you,” she said demurely, biting the inside of her cheek. She was going to bite through it before this night was over.
“Many centuries ago, this leader acted without sense, spoiled his breeder who wanted to live the way she did on her decadent planet. He allowed her many freedoms.”
“So, she walked about freely?”
“Yes, and she consorted with the other breeders out in the open and even greeted other warriors.”
“How shocking.”
“Exactly.” Sarah rolled her eyes, but he continued oblivious. “This was not enough for her. She wanted to be on top and to be the one doing the first knowing.” He gave her a pointed look.
“And he allowed her to do it?” she asked, fascinated.
“Yes, he lived with decadence and liked to try extreme, deviant sexual practices.”
Sarah bit her lip. Hard. “What happened?”
“The day after he did the upside-down knowing, the two biggest lakes on Zyrgin dried up and several planets revolted.” He said it in a dramatic-voice-of-doom kind of way. What made it funny and had her again biting the inside of her cheek to stifle her laughter was the dead serious way he did it.
“How horrible. And everyone believed it was because of the upside-down knowing?”
“It was because of that. Earthquakes shook the planet for many years, water dwindled down to almost nothing, no more females were born. The eduki population almost became extinct.” He delivered the litany of disasters in a voice of doom.
It was incredible that an intelligent male, with such advanced technology, could have such primitive beliefs. Clutching the sheet to her, she sat up. “Surely you don’t believe that?”
“It is fact.”
“What happened to her?”
“She was executed.”
Sarah felt a chill. That poor woman, being blamed for all the natural disasters. Who knew, she may have wanted to be on top for the same reasons than Sarah.