"What's so damn funny?" John demanded.
Hari held up his hands. "You've got me so emotional…look how my hands shake. I'm trembling from head to toe." He drew in a deep breath.
"You'd better talk to the draconis, then," John said, "and get them to stop your shakes."
"You don't talk to dragons, Kuno, you um…" Harimal rolled his eyes. "Just don't ask!"
Steeling himself, Harimal placed his spread hands over his chest and inhaled, his brow furrowed in concentration. Sam watched as azure light oozed from his fingers tips to encase his body.
Minutes later, the glow absorbed into his flesh and Harimal stood before her, now an old man, but as she blinked, she saw it was her Harimal, then he resorted to the oldster again.
"Is this a glamour?" she demanded.
"One I use to avoid entanglements."
"It's not working, because I see you as Harimal."
"That's because we've shared the two levels, Samantha, so neither of us can hide our true selves from the other."
And where are your draconis bodyguards? John asked.
"What bodyguards?" Sam demanded.
"You heard that mind-speak?" John demanded. "You weren't supposed--"
"Don't keep secrets from me. If you try to, I'll get angry! I mean it!"
"Sam is linked to you, Kuno, so she can hear your thoughts, especially when you're emotional, you broadcast loud and clear."
John lifted his hand a fraction from the bed, his fingers weaving in the air in a complicated pattern. Sam frowned. She frowned even deeper when she saw Harimal respond with flicks of his fingers.
Another felinus trick. She glared at each brother.
"Uh-oh. I don't like that look," John said.
"You'll like what I plan for you even less, so tell me what this means." She mimicked his hand signal.
Harimal grimaced. "That's the rudest thing you can sign, Samantha."
"I only did what you did."
"Not quite, kitten." John chuckled. "You sent an insult…something about a comparison between his brain size and his feena--"
"Well, maybe I did mean to sign it that way."
"If you did, Sammi, and anyone else but Hari received it, I can tell you that you wouldn't sit down comfortably for a week."
"Minimum," Hari agreed.
"You wouldn't dare."
John nodded. "We wouldn't, but some felinus men aren't as forgiving. So if you want to sign danger need draconis…" He looked at Hari, brow raised.
"Tell her, Kuno."
John signed again and Sam frowned. "You did is so fast, I couldn't follow."
"I slowed it down for your benefit, kitten."
"It's fast and it's not easy to learn, "Harimal said. "For good reason. So that outsiders never truly understand it. They might think they know the signs, but after a few movements we can detect an imposter."
"But surely you'd detect an imposter through your other senses?"
"True," John said, "for most of the time. The signing was invented during the wars, when we were hunted, trapped by drugs and imprisoned. Now, we use it for when we want to keep something private, or when we can't speak with mind or tongue for whatever reason, then we sign in the air, or, if in darkness, against flesh."
"Something your assassin friends taught you?" Sam demanded. "Like the meridian killing points?"
"Yes."
"Kuno, you may show her the signing. That'll keep you occupied while I'm away."
"I'll be fully occupied with other things, Harimal."
"But you will show me?" Sam persisted.
"What?"
She slapped his thigh. "The sign language. Don't play dumb with me, John-Kuno."
"He doesn't have to play dumb," Harimal whispered.
"And Prince or no, you don't insult my John and get away with it."
The two brothers were suddenly still, intense gazes upon her.
"She's laid claim to you, Kuno, in my presence."
"Yes."
"It is good."
"More than good," John agreed.
"Are you going to let me in on this secret? Just how many damn secrets do you bloody cats have?"
"One thousand and one secrets."
Samantha grimaced. "There's that magic number again."
"Yes," John said.
Sam gave them her bitchiest look but it only made them laugh at her. She sighed and gave up. "So, where were we? Ah yes, talking about bodyguards. What's draconis?"
"Dragons, the fiercest, most dangerous shifters you can imagine, when they're on duty. And when they morph--you never tangle with one of them."
"I've never heard of draconis."
"You wouldn't. They keep to themselves. Their talons are very useful in a fight, or in bed."
John snorted. "You haven't fucked a dragon, Hari!"
"Who says?"
"You're crazy."
Harimal's brows rose. "Me crazy? I haven't tangled with a Vanara, so we're even."
Sam looked from one brother to the other. Men--the same the galaxy over, playing one-up and telling tall tales of conquest. Men, honestly! She bit her lip. From shock or to stop from laughing at their banter, she wasn't certain. John's cheeks were flushed, so were Hari's. Their gazes taunted each other. "What's a Vanara?" she asked.
"You don't want to know," John said.
"Yes, I do." Sam paused, eyeing each brother. They'd done it to her again--teasing her, distracting her. "You gonna tell me what's going on, or do I get John to tell me?"
"Sammi, you can't get me to tell you anything I don't want…aaah…." Her fingers probed between his legs, finding the place beneath his sacs.
Harimal laughed. "Hold out for as long as you can, Kuno." He leant across the bed and rubbed his right cheek against Sam's, then did the same to John.
"Farewell, brother mine and sister mine. Take care. Be careful. Kuno!"
"Okay, Okay, I understand." John paused. "And, Hari, we mightn't be here when you get back. Sam and I have to go home, back to Broome. Business."
Hari raised his brow. "You like being called business, Samantha?"
"No, Starwatch business." John explained about the GTC.
"Ah. I understand. You'll like Broome, Samantha, the water is especially invigorating. Now, I must leave. Kuno, you'll travel as I decree. San-duran. Remember?"
John nodded tightly.
Harimal strode from the room, the door hissing shut behind him.
John sighed. "Damn!"
Sam glanced at him. "What?"
"I worry about Hari."
"He can take care of himself."
"Yes, but he's my brother. I love him. I know he hurts."
"How does he hurt?"
"Loneliness, Sammi. Felinus suffer it the most."
"But cats are solitary creatures."
"That's a fallacy."
"How can Hari be lonely? I mean, look at him! He has women trailing after him, their tongues on the ground…"
"In lust, but not love." John drew Sam into his arms. "Hari might laugh, tease and fuck, but he's tormented. I feel it, feel his sorrow."
"He's going to Chizan, maybe he'll find his mate."
John smiled tightly. "That's the worst of it. He's going home without a mate--again. He has certain obligations to our clan. He'll face their censure and their maneuverings. He wants to do the best for his people, but he just can't feegle the first pure-bred woman he meets."
Feegle--that didn't need an interpretation. Fuck…without emotion, without commitment--just a feegle. Sam bit her lip. "I want Hari to be happy, like me." She turned to him. "Are you happy, Kuno?"
"Yes," he whispered. "If Hari never finds a woman, Sammi, for his own…?"
"I will love him," she said. "I promise you. I will love him forever, love you forever."
John's eyes glittered with tears and he inclined his head.
She slapped him. "That's for keeping secrets from me."
"I…what…? You are a hissing, spitting she-cat. One moment p
urring, making me cry, the next minute hurting me." He arched a brow in challenge. "You gonna claw me or bite me, Sammi?"
"What's that the felinus say? Claw me, bite me, love me--one thousand and one ways in one thousand and one days."
"Yes," John said, uncertainly.
"I'll do a bit of biting, some clawing and maybe if you're really, really good, I might do some loving."
"What if I'm really, really naughty?"
"Same thing."
"Sounds good to me." He reached for her and she eluded him.
"I want to talk to you." She picked at the quilt with nervous fingers. "You want me to go back with you to Broome? Truly?"
"Of course, why wouldn't I?"
"It's your home."
"Your home now, Sammi. If you like it." He shrugged. "If you don't, well, I do have a villa on Tau Ceti."
"With all those tentacle-shifters?" She shuddered.
"Nothing wrong with tentacles," John said.
"Obviously you don't think so. Did one really go inside you?"
His fingers teased over her, like tentacles, probing and inserting. Samantha began to understand. Tentacles could be good…
* * * *
Flames swirled around her, consuming her. Someone was screaming, crying--it took her a few moments to recognize John's voice. He sobbed and groaned.
Sam started awake, her heart hammering against her ribs. Disoriented, she stared up at the ceiling.
"No," John moaned beside her.
She turned, her smile freezing. Horrified, she could only stare.
The sheet was twisted around John's body, wet through with his perspiration. His skin was streaked with red.
Alarmed, she sat upright and leaned over him. He muttered in felinus, words too fast for her to catch, except kitten-mine, repeated in frenzied whispers.
She touched his cheek, recoiling from the heat. He was burning up. On fire, as she had been moments before in her dream.
Sam shook his shoulder. He groaned. "John." No response. "Kuno? Kuno, listen it's me, your honey-cat."
His eyelids fluttered. "Honey-cat. Kitten-mine."
What the damn hell was wrong? Something he ate? Nope, the only thing he'd eaten for the past few hours was her…and she sure as hell wasn't off.
She grasped him by the shoulders and shook him as hard as she could. It was like trying to move a mountain. She probed her fingers into his pleasure spot, his absolute favorite, the hollow between his sacs.
He moaned, but didn't wake up. His cock was multiple ridged, erect and heavy across his stomach. He was bigger than ever…
"Tosca-Sammi, ah!" John whispered.
Sam reared back as if he had slapped her. John was calling for Tosca--her once alter-ego. He'd never call her that unless he was delirious, because he knew how painful her memories were.
She leaned forward. "I'm here, Kuno. Tosca."
"Need…"
"Need what, darling?" she asked.
"Need her. Bite her, claw her, love her. Now."
"You want me, now? You're asleep."
Smiling, he shook his head from side to side on the pillow. "Tosca. Answer my mail. Damn you, where are you?"
Samantha stroked his blazing cheek. He was in the past, remembering those times when she had blocked his emails, when he had gotten too close… How she must have hurt him--frustrating his attempts to be-friend her.
He turned his head into her palm, his tongue darting out to taste her flesh, teeth nibbling her wrist. She sat back on her heels, chewing her lip. He was felinus, more cat than man, despite his dual parentage. He needed something…someone. She guessed she was it.
He kicked off the sheet. His body was livid with red welts, like hives. She also saw bleeding nail-scratches in his skin, where he had torn at his own flesh.
"Need you," John whispered. "Need. Need. Must."
Her man was hurting. There was only one thing for it. No matter what. Carefully, Sam lay down over him, covering his body.
He reared up to her, his arms hard across her back, holding her so tightly she could hardly breathe. His legs wrapped around her, crossing at the small of her back. His mouth sought hers. He danced the oral with her, hard, fast, total exploration and consummation.
He had always been careful with her. But not now. Now he unleashed the cat.
John growled low in his throat, then purred and kissed her again as his fingers traced every meridian point. His body burned and she was consumed, caught up in his inferno.
Sam found his sex points, and he cried out, moaned, spoke in agitated whispers against her mouth.
His eyes snapped open and Sam gasped. His black pupils were elongated, but his irises were burnished gold--on fire, as every part of him blazed.
"No, Sam. No."
"No?" She almost smiled, cupping his body. "I think you're mistaken. You want me."
"I can't have you."
She closed her eyes against the pain of his words. She knew it would come to this…sooner rather than later it seemed. She was not enough for him. Sam forced herself to look at him.
John held her gaze. "It's the Call. Home. Must go Chizan. Mate. Not here."
Not with me… Sam wanted to cry, but the hurt was beyond tears.
"You want a felinus?" she asked. "I…I can find Kareena."
John's eyes narrowed. He hissed, like a cat. His nails tore into her skin. "Want you. No other. Can't. I'll hurt you. Desire too strong."
What the hell was he talking about? Then from somewhere she remembered the whispers, the jokes, passed between humans who did not know the felinus that said cats had to go home to mate, or die. Something to do with the energy currents on their homeworld. A renewal of body and spirit, achievable only during mating. Was there truth in the gossip?
And Chizan was a long way away.
"Kuno, what can I do? Tell me!" She held his face between her hands.
"I…love you. Need to love you."
"Well, then…" She moved her body so that his erection separated her dewy folds.
"Different. I am in Desire. I will not be gentle."
"You can't hurt me."
He shook his head. "I…not know that."
"I know it, darling. You have never hurt me, not once, even when I was new to a felinus. I'm tougher than I look." His frenzied gaze cooled for just a moment.
"It's the Desire, honey-cat. A new level, deeper. I'll be unable to control it."
"Then I'll control it enough for the both of us. Trust me. You won't hurt me. I'm ready for anything, Kuno. Anything."
"Need to go home. After…"
"Okay, I understand that, but in your present condition I don't think you could go anywhere. Maybe I can abate the need enough, so that you can get home. Is that possible?"
"Think so. Never happened to me before. Never thought. I am not felinus. Not pure."
She put her hand over his mouth. "You're a cat, John-Kuno. Through and through." She removed her hand and kissed him, her tongue plunging into his mouth. She stroked his inner velvet with careful laps. Then bit his lip.
He screamed and rolled her onto her back.
He took her in one hard fast thrust. She cried. With pleasure. At the absolute possession, as deep as he had ever gone. His hands beneath her lifted her up to him, a nail caressing her ass.
You remembering those tentacles, John-Kuno? It's okay. You do what you need to do. Have to do.
His finger probed. He rode her both ways, not the gentle considerate lover, but a man and a cat in deepest passion. Beyond thought, beyond control. Consumed by the moment, by the madness of desire.
On and on he loved her, moving fast, then slow, but all the while the extreme possession. He filled her with his love, his seed again and again.
He laced his fingers into hers and raised her arms above her head, his mouth against her neck, biting, lathing, as he thrust.
He turned her, raised her to her knees and entered her from behind, holding her breasts as he fucked her--he was feral and Sam
closed her eyes. Fear lurked in her mind that she might not survive this, but sure as hell John would die if she didn't try…
Honey-cat. You hurt?
I'm okay.
I feel pain. Yours?
No. Do that again, it's so good.
His cock moved to the side, found that first pleasure point, then to the left, then the center. Her body tingled with every probe. The starlight washed through her, into her, as his cock teased inside. Stars passed before her tightly closed lids. Her skin burned.
Honey-cat! Star-fire.
What's star-fire, Kuno?
Look.
She opened her eyes and saw her skin awash with pulsing blue light. It eddied around her, plunged into her skin as Kuno, behind her, plunged into her. More than ecstasy or rapture, he drove her to another level, their bodies joined, their minds joined, taking, taken, they had become one entity. And that entity had a name.
Desire.
Starlight Desire.
Their pinnacle came and went. John loved her on her back, against the wall, on the floor--every surface and position and still it was not enough.
He carried her to the conservatory and sitting on a bench, John brought her onto his lap. She fastened her legs around his waist and he surged into her. Scalding her, igniting deeper pleasure. Deeper desire.
Again and again he vibrated in climax. Linked, they became one in mind, body, spirit. Ecstasy, Rapture, now Desire, engulfed them. The light spun around them, like spider webs. The Desire connected them on every level. Tattoos of pulsing blue light swept over their flesh, then plunged into them as their bodies rose and merged, straining against the other.
Desire blazed.
My name is Kuno and I exist for you. He sobbed. Only for you. Now. Forever.
His frenzied whisper from the depths of his being, made her cry. Sam took his head between her hands, threading his dripping hair through her fingers. His eyes burned, and sparks leapt through his hair--golden-red tips and black-streaked--his felinus hair. She kissed him, hard, her mouth open.
"More, Kuno, more."
He obliged.
* * * *
Sam awoke to the pain. She felt bruised. Utterly exhausted. She lay face down on the bed, the heavy warm weight of legs thrown across the back of her thighs, a hand holding her by the hair.
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