The Taming

by Imogen Keeper

  He pulled his boots off the console. Their thuds echoed off the matte-black metal surface of the walls.

  “Which one?” His brothers’ faces flashed in his brain. Dillan, stoic and silent, born to be a leader. Brawny Gaspart, always laughing and eating and fighting. Quiet Jeor, the baby of the family. Which one was gone already?

  “Dillan.”

  He sucked in a long breath and caught his head in his hands. Dillan was the heir to all of Tamminia. The future Regio.

  Eyes shut, he thought about the way Dillan had slapped his back when he’d boarded the transpo that took him away from Vesta the last time, the look in his eyes, understanding and just a touch of envy. Dillan had hated their father every bit as much as Tor had.

  “How?”

  His mother’s mouth twisted. “One raid too many.”

  Tor squeezed his hands. Their father—and the Alliance, the tyrannical government he served—had thrived on raids, constantly sending soldiers on an endless stream of dangerous, bloody missions, heedless of the men who lost their lives. “How?” he asked again, he had to know. He dreaded knowing.

  She broke eye contact—she never broke eye contact—and looked down. He’d have sworn her lips were shaking. “A month ago. A stomach wound. He bled out for days.”

  Tor swallowed thickly. Even the bravest of warriors feared stomach wounds. “And Father?”

  She shook her head. “He was found dead in his study by a steward one morning.”

  “When.”

  “Two weeks ago.”

  He blew out a long breath. His father had been dead for two weeks? And Dillan a month. And he hadn’t known. He leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees, unsure what to say.

  “You should call home more often.”

  “I’m sorry.” His father had been an asshole. Corrupt, selfish, immoral, cruel. But for whatever reason, Mother had been loyal to him. The perfect selissa.

  Her mouth tightened.

  “Was he murdered?”

  “We don’t know.”

  “Sanger?”

  “We don’t know.”

  “Autopsy?”

  She sniffed. “I would burn the cassia to the ground before I let them perform an autopsy on Regio TaKarian.”

  Of course, she would. He lowered his head into his hands, scrubbing his fingers through his hair. Dillan was dead. His father was dead. And now... that meant... he was...

  “You need to come home and claim your place as regio.”

  A weight settled, thick on his chest. He looked up at her. “Bu—”

  “No arguments, Torum. You are the only Prime born of your father’s seed.”

  She’d always hated that he had an illegitimate sister and a Prime half-brother. “You’re still pretending Sanger doesn’t exist.”

  “The only legitimate Prime born of your father’s seed. You need to come home. Gaspart and Jeor have been ruling in your absence, but they c—”

  He blew out a long breath. “Then let them keep ruling. I don’t want to be the regio.”

  “They can’t. They aren’t Primes. The Alliance has sent an Emissary here. His name is Pijuan. He’s making moves to have himself appointed as acting-regio.”

  “Can he do that?”

  “With the Alliance behind him? They’d love to see us deposed and replaced with a puppet. They’ve already been doing everything they can to weaken our position. There have been riots.”

  “Why?”

  “Food shortage, rebellions.”

  He frowned. In Tamminia? That didn’t make sense. Tamminia was the breadbasket of all of Vesta.

  “You need to come home.” Like walls closing in, he saw the rest of his life disappear. No more bounties, no more adventures, no more foreign planets. He’d have to go home, and everything he did once he got there would have to be for his people. He closed his eyes.

  He had to take Jasto home first. He owed it to Jasto’s family. Jasto would have gotten him home, no matter the cost. “Hold him off. I’ll come back as fast as I can.”

  She was going to argue. It was painted all over her face.

  “Sorry, Mother. Dillan was a good man. The best of all of us. Can’t say the same for Father, but I know you loved him.” He stabbed the button on the comm and disconnected. The holo shrank down, but the image of her sad, dark eyes burned into his brain.

  TOR STARED INTO SPACE through the viewscreen.

  Dillan was dead. And he was regio.

  A noise down the hall jolted him back to life.

  The woman.

  He pushed out of his seat and walked up the passageway just as she exited the bathing chamber, a towel around her torso and a second over her shoulders, clutched tight in her fist.

  Damp, pale hair hung down her back. Her skin was still pink from her bath. She didn’t look at him. Merely drifted around his ship.

  “Are you lost?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “What the hell do you want?”

  She opened the door to the armory closet.

  She glared down her nose at him, or rather up. She was tall for a woman, but she was still a damned sight shorter than him. She tightened her grip on the towel, knuckles whitening.

  He could well imagine what was under the thing. She pointed with a dainty finger at her lips and offered a placid smile before continuing down the passageway.

  Silent treatment again.

  When she poked her head into the engine room, he’d had enough.

  She flicked on the light, ducking her head inside.

  He pushed off the wall and stomped down the passageway after her. “I asked you a question.”

  She blinked, pulling her head back from the doorway, her brows raised.

  He moved in closer, invading her space. That haughty glare didn’t change. He took another step closer. “Answer me. What are you looking for?”

  She pinched her lips shut, but for a split second, her eyes blazed wide with what looked a hell of a lot like fear.

  The passageway ended.

  There was nowhere else for her to go.

  She bumped into the bulkhead.

  He laughed.

  She shifted to the side.

  And so did he.

  She shifted to the other side.

  And so did he, in a strange battle dance. He stepped closer.

  Her haughty mask slipped.

  Her neck craned back, her gaze locked on his. The scent of soap—his soap—drifted up to his nose from her damp hair. She smelled like him, but underneath that was the fruit, and it made him crazy. He knew that smell from somewhere, but trying to remember was like trying to grab at air. And it wasn’t just the fruit, there was an undercurrent there too, not quite as potent as a felana in heat, but close. It was a powerful aroma, and it messed with his brain.

  When he stepped even closer, she whimpered and squeezed her eyes shut.

  It made him smile. “That’s a really shitty self-defense.”

  Gray eyes popped open.

  “Your response to a threat is to close your eyes? Because what? If you can’t see me, I’m not really here?”

  Her lips tightened. “Are you a threat?”

  “To you? Absolutely.”

  “I don’t think so. If you wanted to hurt me, you’d have already done it.” It was tiny, the tremor that ran through her body, but he saw it.

  “I asked you a question. What were you looking for?”

  She didn’t move a muscle.

  “Still not talking. That’s a bad choice.” He took the final step, the hard leather soles of his boots touching down just inches from her soft, tender toes.

  With a finger and thumb, he tugged the towel from around her shoulders.

  “No, don’t!” She batted at it, but it was too late. It slid away, exposing a lot of delicious skin.

  He tossed the towel behind him.

  A long neck. Elegant shoulder blades. Full, round breasts. Just the tops were visible above the remaining towel.

  He c
aught her chin in his hand.

  “Don’t,” she said, but it came out like a squeaky whisper.

  He slid his hand down her neck, around to the nape, to clasp a handful of damp fruity-smelling hair, and whether it was pheromones or not, he got hard.

  Her chest rose and fell. Her skin was silky smooth as he trailed his finger down to the valley between her breasts, to dip into the dark shadow below the remaining towel.

  Her pupils dilated, and her mouth fell open.

  It would be so easy to pull off the last towel. See that whole graceful body bared before him. To learn what color her nipples were and if the hair between her legs was the same bright gold as the hair on her head, get more of the scent of arousal that pooled and heated between her thighs.

  It would be a welcome distraction from the maelstrom in his mind, still reeling with death, politics, and the end of his freedom.

  “Don’t play games with me. You will lose. Every time.” Moving slowly, deliberately crowding her space, he pressed his hips against her belly, thrusting against her, and a little moan came from the back of her throat.

  She tried to pull away, wincing when he clutched her hair in a tight fist.

  She struggled harder, pushing at his chest, a little pulse beating frantically in her throat. He let her fight but didn’t budge an inch.

  “Get used to it, amiera. You’re on my ship, you do what I say. I tolerate your presence. Don’t piss me off.”

  Questions brewed in her stormy eyes. The vein along the side of her neck pulsed, pulsed, pulsed. Her nostrils flared slightly, and her tongue came out to wet her lips.

  Partially out of curiosity, partially out of spite, and mostly just because he could, he lowered his lips to hers and paused when there was only a millimeter of space between them, enough to feel the electricity, the magnetism drawing them together, the snap and buzz in the air between their skin.

  She didn’t pull away.

  He closed that last breath of space, and their lips touched.

  She didn’t gasp in dignified shock or try to slap him.

  Her whole body jerked against his. He pressed his thumb into her jaw, urging her lips to part. When his tongue touched hers, she let out a deep, earthy moan and pressed closer, opening wider, and her knees started shaking. It was like she was vibrating.

  Her tongue touched his, almost hesitantly. Warm and soft and wet. Plummy sweet and heady as a glass of the finest yikseh on all of Vesta. Definitely an aphrodisiac. She tasted like heaven.

  His hand on her hip tightened and moved down to get a grip on her ass, holding her in place so he could press more tightly against her, daring her not to run away.

  Her ass was as tight as the rest of her.

  She didn’t run away screaming or collapse into a fit of tears. No, she flattened her breasts against his chest, lifting up onto the tips of her toes, fitting her hips against him, widening her mouth, lapping at his tongue, tugging at his shoulders.

  Her hands came up to touch his upper arms, digging into the muscles there, before sliding around him.

  She didn’t seem scared. Not even a little bit.

  With a muffled curse, he slanted his mouth over hers so he could get deeper, shoving his tongue into her mouth in deliberate invasion. His cock pulsed painfully against her, demanding that he pull off the remaining towel, spread her legs, and fuck her right there against the bulkhead.

  He tugged the towel down and took a hungry handful of a warm, round breast.

  When he traced his thumb over a rigid peak, she moaned again, and it was the softest sound he’d ever heard. He did it again just so he could hear it one more time. She closed her hand in his hair, demanding, and the last shred of his control snapped.

  4

  He’s a dick

  KLYM’S WHOLE BODY felt like it belonged to someone else. It was as if she was on fire, but the burn was good, it was as if she’d been given some dangerously addictive substance and all she wanted was more, like she’d been possessed by some sort of beast, a wild beast that was hungry and knew exactly what it wanted.

  It didn’t even care how. His tongue in her mouth, his hand on her breast, that hard, pulsing part of him against her belly, it wasn’t enough. The fiery-drug-beast Klym wanted more. More of his smell. Like wood and musk and spice, and it made her eyelids feel like they weighed about a hundred pounds.

  Except this was wrong. So very wrong. If they were to go any further, she had no idea what might happen. Their physiologies were so different. Her people only mated once in a Bonding that made them incapable of going more than a few hours without repeated intercourse. They’d be stuck on this planet if it went too far until the lust ran its course. Would she be addicted to him? Or he to her? Both? Neither?

  Strangely, it didn’t seem that big of a deal at the moment. It seemed like a very good idea, in fact. Even better if he was addicted to her. She could just picture him on his knees before her, begging for he—

  He gripped her bottom, thrusting that hardness against her, and the thought evaporated under the onslaught of a fresh, violent blast of heat. He smelled so good.

  A distant memory stirred, even as she moaned and pressed onto the tips of her toes, pulling him closer.

  He did something on her breast that made her writhe.

  There was a reason she shouldn’t be doing this. A someone, a someone who was important.

  Who wasn’t a beast, who didn’t turn her into a beast.

  Torum’s eyes slitted open, the heavy black lashes sweeping up to reveal dark, unreadable eyes. His brows moved, and he straightened, muttering unintelligible Vestigi. His hand dropped from her breast.

  He closed his hands on her shoulders and gave her a little shove against the bulkhead. “When I ask you a question,” he said, forcing his voice to come out as hard and emotionless as he could make it, “you answer me. What were you looking for?”

  How could he kiss her like that one moment, and in the next make her feel lower than a germ?

  She pulled the towel up over her breasts, shaking her head to clear it. Cold air rushed up to cover all the skin that had been so hot just a minute ago.

  “Don’t make me ask again.” His voice hit her like raked gravel.

  “I-I just w-wanted to find a bedchamber. Somewhere I could sleep.”

  “If you need something, you ask me for it. There are only two private bunks on this ship.” He pointed at a doorway. “You can have this one.”

  She didn’t look at him. She couldn’t look at him without remembering what it had been like to have her tongue in his mouth, and the way it felt when he’d cupped her bottom and pulled her closer, dragged his thumb over her nipple. The noises he’d made in his throat.

  “Thank you,” she whispered, and wanted to die.

  He yanked the door shut behind her, leaving her to a restless night, with no idea what he intended to do with her or how she’d get home now.

  AT SOME POINT IN the night, he’d brought her clothes back from the bathing chamber. She found them hanging over the door in the morning. Strangely thoughtful of him.

  She dressed carefully and tiptoed to the bathing chamber, hoping to avoid seeing him for as long as possible.

  Her bouquet still sat where she’d left it, draped over a shelf in the bathing chamber, long white leaves cascading off the edge, the blue flowers so bright they almost glowed in the dim lights. They seemed unfazed by their night in the moist confines of the bathing chamber. If anything, they seemed bolder. She gathered them carefully.

  He was leaning against a wall, idly sipping from a mug when she came out. Eeffoc. Rich, and dark. Even just the aroma made her more alert. Her mouth watered. She refused to ask.

  “Hungry?”

  “Yes, please.”

  When she dropped her gaze away from the darkness of his obsidian eyes, they landed on the smooth skin of his chest. Bare, scarred, muscled and swirling with inky black.

  Honestly, did the man lack clean shirts? She’d happily volunteer to do
the laundry if only he’d pledge to wear them.

  He inclined his head and led her down the passageway to a little galley. Another scar as long as her hand, angry red and welted, sat squarely in the center of his shoulder. More scars trailed down his arms.

  He rounded the corner into the galley, and she followed. She’d never been in a kitchen on Argentus. Her food had been strictly regimented and delivered on trays.

  There was something that resembled a sink, but no faucet. Only sleek black cabinets.

  He leaned against the doorjamb, looming over her from his ridiculous height. “Help yourself.”

  A row of white cups gleamed under blue lights. She grabbed one, arranged the flowers in it carefully, and set them by what she hoped was the sink.

  Bread, labeled in the swirling Vestigi script, smelled of yeast and comfort. Painnea. Thick and brown, bursting with seeds, nuts, and dried berries, but no plates or knives.

  Her mouth watered. At the Institute, she’d always been limited to one very small piece of bread daily. Precut and prepared just for her, based on her height, skeletal structure, and the ideal weight for optimal fertility.

  She cast a furtive glance at Torum. His face bore nothing but bland curiosity.

  He took a long, slow sip, eyeing her over the rim of his mug.

  She glanced back at the bread.

  Her stomach rumbled.

  Blocking his view with her body, she tore off a chunk of the painnea and stuffed it in her mouth. Rich and moist and sweet and salty. She nearly groaned.

  “Need a plate?” Torum’s voice burned in her ear, far closer than she’d expected. How had he crossed the room without her hearing?

  She spun, mouth full, bread clutched in her hand, and nodded. “Pffeaze.”

  He opened a cupboard over her head, and pulled out a plate, offered her a sharp knife. It was only a second, but he hesitated, the knife hovering in the air over her head, then replaced it. He offered her a blunt-tipped one instead.

  She swallowed the bread. “Afraid of me?”