by Zoey Draven
“So you tell me, vellia, is that love? Is what I feel for you love?” he murmured, his fingers cupping her chin, stroking his thumb across her cheek. “Because I think it very well may be.”
A sound burst from her lips, a half-sob, half-laugh. She buried her face into his side, smiling into his skin, hiding her expression.
Which he wasn’t having any of because he immediately brought her chin back up, so those swirling eyes could peer down at her face. That hardened expression softened and she stared at him in shock.
Because that expression told her everything she needed to know. Why hadn’t she seen it before?
It hit her fast and hard. The answer she’d been seeking.
And that answer was Tavak and it always would be.
“Yes,” she whispered, going up onto her elbow, wiping the back of her hand across her wet cheeks, giving him a soft smile.
She leaned down, her hair curtaining around them, and Tavak met her kiss with soft and gentle thoroughness. She gasped against his lips, pressing closer to his hard, strong body, as his hand went to the back of her neck, holding her there.
Too long.
It had been too long.
Against his lips, she murmured, “Yes, I think you might love me after all, Tavak.” Then, she pulled back to give him a teasing smile, her eyes half-lidded from his kiss. “But we can wait until we’re back on Dumera to really decide for sure.”
Those eyes flared. “So you’ll be returning with me?” he asked, his voice guttural and husky.
Her brow furrowed. “I was always going to come back,” she informed him. “I just thought it would be good for me to…get away for a little while.”
Briefly, his eyes closed in relief. “Reji said…I thought that…”
“If I was leaving for good,” she started, seeing Tavak shudder a little at the words, “I would’ve said goodbye to you.”
His hands tightened around her, those eyes fierce when he said, “And I wouldn’t have let you go.”
She touched her fingers to his lips, feeling the softness of them. “I—I think I realize that now.”
A deep sigh rolled from him, his muscles relaxing, his relief palpable. Was this something he’d been worried about?
Stella leaned down to kiss him again, to further soothe those fears. Instead of gentle this time, his kiss was consuming. His tongue sought entrance and it licked and stroked at her. Her head began to spin as his grip on her tightened and squeezed.
Soon, her hands began to tremble. The cool sheets began to feel too constricting and hot. A ragged gasp escaped her throat when his palm dipped under her tunic to feel her skin. His hand was so hot it felt searing, a brand on her skin.
“Tavak,” she whispered against his kiss.
With a growl, he pulled back to look at her half-lidded gaze, searching, seeking. Then she recognized that familiar need, growing and growing between them. Until…
“Yes,” she whispered, feeling him push her thin white shorts to the side. A shiver and gasp followed when he stroked her slit. She sighed, her forehead dropping forward, pressing into his chest. “Please.”
A rough hiss escaped him, feeling her more than ready for him. His touch lit her on fire. And it had been too damn long.
Tavak rolled her, pressing her back into her pillows, ripping the sheets away from the bed so he could see her properly. They didn’t wait. They didn’t even bother undressing. Tavak slid between her splayed thighs, tugging at the laces of his pants, and he groaned when Stella reached forward and gripped him tight. Scorching hot and hard and thick in her palm.
He held the seam of her shorts away as she slowly fed him into her body. Goosebumps broke out over her arms and a shiver raced up her spine once he was fully seated inside her, stretching her and filling her in a way she’d forgotten.
Tavak dipped his head, capturing her mouth again as he began to rock into her, thrusting slowly and thoroughly, letting her feel every inch of him sliding inside her.
“Pax,” he groaned.
They huffed and moaned. The longer Tavak was between her thighs, the more control he slowly began to lose. His measured, even thrusts became faster and more powerful as he suckled on her nipples underneath her tunic. She gripped his wide shoulders, feeling that hot tongue lash at her, tease her.
They both needed it too much. They had all the time in world for longer, teasing, passion-filled lovemaking that would no doubt make them lose their minds. But right then, all Stella wanted was to feel him come undone, wanted to hear that delicious groan as he released himself into her.
So when Stella’s sex began to flutter around his cock, when that tight, gripping heat blossomed between her thighs, and pleasure roared through her body, a moment later, she felt Tavak jerk against her.
He muted his bellow by shoving his face against her neck, snapping his hips hard and quick, as thick heat flooded her.
Sublime, she thought.
Perfect.
No matter what, it always was with them.
When his teela began to work its magic, for a moment, Stella was surprised. As if she’d forgotten.
Tavak pulled back, though he still remained seated deep inside her, watching as she continued to come undone.
“So beautiful, mellkia,” he murmured, stroking her hair, seeing her through the pleasure. “Vauk, what did I ever do to deserve you?”
“Mellkia,” she whispered, her lips parted, eyes wide. “W-What does that mean?”
He’d called her that before. On Dumera.
His smile made her belly flutter.
He leaned down just as another orgasm hit her, making her back arch though she never looked away from him.
Against her lips, he told her, “It means ‘my love.’”
Chapter Forty-Four
Tavak had never felt anything like it.
This sense of peace and happiness.
For once, he finally understood Khiva’s and Dravka’s need to spoil their females, to worship the vauking ground they walked on.
Because Tavak would do anything for the female quietly resting in his arms, sated and flushed and tired but smiling up at him. She was stroking his bare chest, tracing lines over it, and the sensation almost made him purr in contentment.
And I came very close to losing her, he knew.
A mistake he never intended to make again.
His arm tightened around her just thinking about it.
“Has Ravu decided if he wants to stay with Haase?” she asked quietly. “Haase told me today they won’t be coming back to Dumera for quite a while.”
“I believe so,” Tavak murmured, sliding his hand down her bare spine, feeling the little rounded bones glide under his fingertips. “He’s chosen this. At least for the foreseeable future, I think he will see it through.”
“Your jivera will be quiet without him,” she commented.
A rough sound escaped his throat. He met her eyes when he said, “Perhaps not.”
Stella’s lips parted and then a small smile crossed her lips. “Is that you asking me to move in with you?”
Tavak’s brow furrowed. “I thought it was a given that you would be. There’s no way you’re spending another night away from my bed. Our bed,” he amended.
Her breath went a little shallow and her little nails curled into his chest.
“When you commit, you really commit, don’t you?” she asked quietly.
“Pax,” he said. “Does that…frighten you?”
“No,” she whispered, leaning up to press a kiss to his lips. “Not one bit.”
His hand curled around the nape of her neck, keeping her there for a brief moment as he tugged at her bottom lip with his teeth and lapped gently at her tongue. Kissing her brought him so much contentment and pleasure. He thought he could do it for the rest of his life and be perfectly happy.
Eventually, Stella pulled back with a sigh and Tavak felt doubt slide in his chest, abrupt and unpleasant.
“What is it?” he asked, fro
wning.
“Did Reji tell you about the bar?” she asked softly. “When you went to see him?”
Ah.
“Pax,” Tavak said, inclining his head slightly to nuzzle behind her ear. Her breath hitched. He had an idea when it came to Reji but he hadn’t had the opportunity to discuss it with Stella. “He did.”
“Then you know I won’t have work when we get back to Dumera.”
And it was obvious that that fact displeased her.
Tavak knew it would. His Stella liked to work. She liked to be kept busy.
“I have to search for other work but it might take time.”
“Stella,” he murmured, pulling back to look at her, wanting her to understand something, especially when he heard the worry in her voice. “You know that I can take care of you, pax? The credits from the labs are more than enough. And…I have others. From Everton. You don’t have to worry about credits anymore.”
At the mention of Everton, her jaw clenched but she said nothing about it. Perhaps, a little ball of fury was still burning in her chest at the thought of the New Earth colony.
“I know, Tavak,” she whispered. “I know that you can take care of me but it’s important to me…to take care of us too. To contribute. I would lose my mind if I had nothing to do, if I had nothing to work towards.”
“I thought you might feel that way.”
She cocked her head to the side. “I suppose you’d feel a certain way about me working in the mines?”
Tavak growled. “Absolutely not. Don’t even tease like that, female.”
Her lips tugged up at the corners but it wasn’t a full smile. “It might be the only work available right now.”
Tavak blew out a breath, eyeing the stubborn, maddening female with her cheek pressed to his pectoral.
He decided to tell her. To see what she might think.
“I contacted Reji two days ago,” he informed her. “Patched a Coms call to him.”
Stella frowned. “Why?”
“Because I want to purchase the bar.”
Her breath hitched. She began to sit up, pushing up from his chest, wrapping the sheet around her bare breasts, though it exposed his cock to the cool air. Briefly, her eyes drifted down to it, seeing it twitch in response to her stare, before her gaze snapped back to his.
“What?” she whispered quietly.
Tavak reached out to hold her hand, rolling onto his side to face her. Her back was pressed to the window. Behind her, he saw the darkness of space, the bright spots of stars.
“We negotiated a price,” Tavak said.
“But a couple days ago, we hadn’t even…we hadn’t even decided if we…”
“I know,” Tavak murmured. His lips quirked though it felt more like a grimace. “But I had hoped to bribe you with it. I was a desperate male.”
He was relieved when a little disbelieving huff of laughter escaped her. “Seriously?”
Tavak grunted, feeling her fingers squeeze his. “I thought I was out of options. I thought I was running out of time with you. Truthfully, I don’t know what I was thinking but I’m beginning to understand that love makes you do some incredible things.”
Her expression softened, ever so slightly. But she said, “Tavak, I—I don’t want you to buy the bar for me.”
Tavak looked down at their entwined hands. “You don’t want to run it anymore? You want to find different work?”
“It’s not that,” she whispered. “I love that place, even when I complain about it.”
“Then what’s the issue? The credits? Because I told you that you don’t have to worry about that.”
She took a deep breath, biting her lip. She seemed to be thinking about something. Quiet and pensive.
Finally, she looked at him and asked softly, “What if we split it?”
His brows furrowed. “Kruvu?”
“What if we bought it together?”
Something settled in his chest as he pondered over her question.
Understanding.
He’d always known that his female was an independent soul. She’d felt uncomfortable, after all, when he’d purchased her green silk from the marketplace, after all, and that would only be a fraction of the price of Reji’s bar and the land it sat on.
“My mother left me some credits,” Stella said quietly. “I’ve never touched them because it never felt right to me. But…I think she would want this, you know? I think she would want me to use them for this. To build something to start a new life. With you,” she said quietly, a shy little smile crossing her face.
And that little smile undid him.
“I know you have work at the labs,” she said quickly. “Work you enjoy. And I’m not asking you to stop working there, I wouldn’t want you to. But if you could help me fix it up, I think we could really make it into something special. Something that’s not just mine, but ours.”
His chest warmed. His thumb stroked the back of her palm.
“You are really good with your hands, after all,” she teased gently.
Tavak chuckled. And as he stared up at the female that had wreaked havoc on his carefully controlled and quiet Dumerian life, all he could think about was how fortunate he was to have found her.
“It’s a deal, mellkia.”
Her breath hitched.
“Really? Because Valerie told me that Keriv’is can be a little weird about wanting to solely provide for their—”
Tavak grunted, “Pax. But I’m no ordinary Keriv’i male, vellia. And all I want to do is make you happy and I know that you wouldn’t be content to let me give you everything you want and need.”
Those eyes softened even further, another smile beginning to spread.
“A joint partnership for the bar then?” she asked, her excitement blooming. “We can buy it together?”
“Pax,” Tavak said. “And I will help you fix it up however you want. And I will handle the deliveries at port. At least until we hire more help.”
Her brow rose. “You want to hire workers?”
“Pax,” he purred, rising up onto his elbow, tugging the sheet away from her beautiful breasts until they were exposed to his view. He leaned forward and Stella let out a ragged, startled moan when he drew his tongue across one of her brown nipples, swiping it over the budded flesh. “I want you home in our bed every night. Not in the early hours of morning, exhausted from cleaning and serving the patrons all night. I want to wake up in the morning with you and not be rushed to be in town when the markets open.”
He suckled on her nipple and then he felt her push back on his shoulders until he was lying on the bed.
He growled when she crawled over him, straddling his hips, the tantalizing wet heat of her brushing the length of his aching cock.
He knew one of her main concerns about working at Reji’s had been the lack of help. She’d been exhausted and running herself ragged. She’d been lucky to get four or five hours of sleep a night and even less so once they’d begun their bed play. Tavak didn’t want that to happen again. He didn’t want her to feel stressed and trapped and overworked, especially when hiring workers would be an easy fix.
“Have I told you that I’m crazy about you?” she whispered, leaning down to kiss him. “Absolutely over the moon, head over heels in love with you?”
Tavak grinned.
“Let’s hear it again, vellia. Just for good measure.”
Epilogue
Two months later…
“Stop,” Stella breathed, barely able to hold back her laugh in her attempt to sound stern. “You have work to do.”
Tavak raised his head from where he’d been nibbling on her neck, a maddening smirk on those perfect lips. “I don’t get a break?”
Stella swore that Tavak was actually pouting about it. But she’d learned early on that if she let him do whatever he wanted to her whenever he got a familiar gleam in his eyes…nothing would get done.
“Definitely not,” she said, even though she couldn’t help but run her p
alm down his chest, scraping her fingernails over the thick material of his tunic, grazing over the laces of his pants. “But maybe if we finish early and—”
With a growl, he pushed away from her, quickly striding back towards the cellar where he was re-laying the flooring, suddenly very eager to resume his work.
“Fine, but you know how distracting I find you in that dress,” he rasped before disappearing from view. A moment later, she heard him pounding away with a mallet.
Stella chuckled to herself, smoothing her hands down her green silk dress. It was impractical for bar work and Stella always worried she’d stain it or ruin the material. But they were going over to Valerie and Dravka’s jivera for a celebration dinner later this evening and she’d wanted to look nice.
Eve and Khiva would be there as well. Ravu would be calling in on the Coms system from the Third Quadrant, where Haase’s vessel was currently situated. Tavak’s brother would be visiting in another month and Stella knew how excited he was.
As for the celebration, well…Valerie had announced her pregnancy over tea a few days before. Dravka’s contraception implant had worn off and he’d—promptly—knocked her up. They were both thrilled. Eve had burst into tears at the news, so happy that she’d barely been able to speak, but Stella supposed those pregnancy hormones were potent.
“It’ll be your turn next,” Valerie had said to Stella once Eve had finally stopped bawling, a mischievous look in her eyes. “If it hasn’t happened already.”
It was then that Stella knew she wasn’t quite ready for children. She’d known that Dravka and Tavak had received their implant around the same time and, thus, it would be wearing off around the same time.
Of course, Stella wanted children. She dreamed of it constantly, of half-human, half-Keriv’i babies with their father’s eyes.
But she also knew there was no rush, at least for next few years or so. She wanted time with Tavak. Just them, for a little while longer. She wanted to be selfish with his attentions. And they wanted to get the bar up and running smoothly, the renovation work completed, and everything settled before they even thought of having children.