Prime Selection (40 page)

The Antarean’s lidless eyes glistened darkly. His split-tongue tested the air.

Something akin to fear came and went in his reptilian eyes. “This-s-s-s cannot be.” His Standard was stilted but fluent. “You smell as she does. You are … one?”

His opponent sought out someone behind him. Nadia! The bastard was staring at Nadia.

“Wulf, get Nadia out of here. He’s fixated on her.” Huw moved to cut off the enemy’s line of sight. “
Gemate
, go back into the cave.”

“No. He’s not any danger to me. He has three dart guns aimed at him. He moves toward me … he’ll die.” Nadia’s words and tone were a threat. A quick glance confirmed she held a dart gun in one hand and a battle blade she must have taken from one of the downed Antareans in the other.

The Antarean stood still. His gaze was defiant as he looked from Huw to Nadia, who now stood to his side and slightly back to give them both fighting room. “She is-s-s your mate, Prime?”

“She is my battle-mate, Antarean.” Huw again blocked the pseudo-reptile from staring at Nadia. He didn’t want the enemy even sullying his mate with his leering looks.

“This cannot be. We killed many, many of your women. Two whole generations-s-s of progeny were los-s-t.” The Antarean shook his head. “She is-s-s Terran. You are Prime. This-s-s cannot be.”

Nadia stepped to Huw’s side. She ripped his already torn shirt the rest of the way off, revealing his mark. Before he could stop her, she peeled her pants down enough to display her mark. “We’re one, Antarean. There are others.”

“They lied to us-s-s.” The Antarean’s eyes turned livid with his rage. “They offered a pact … they lied!” He attacked.

Huw slashed at the Antarean’s chest. His mate went for the Antarean’s legs with the unusual battle blade she’d appropriated. She aimed for a hamstring.

Both found their targets.

The Antarean dropped like a stone, bleeding from multiple wounds and regenerating with every breath. Huw and Nadia couldn’t let down their guard. A wounded Antarean was as deadly as a healthy one.

Wulf ran forward and dropped to his knees near the downed enemy. He held a knife to the pseudo-reptile’s jugular. “Who offered the pact?”

The Antarean’s lipless mouth turned into a parody of a smile. “One … of yours-s-s … Prime. One … of yours-s-s.” Then he laughed weakly and impaled his throat on Wulf’s knife and twisted, severing his carotid artery.

“
Ansu bhau
!” Wulf leapt back from the arterial spray.

The Antarean bled out quickly, dying with a sneer on his slitty lips.

Huw kicked at the body. “
Diew
, Wulf. The fanatics are working with our most hated enemy.”

“That’s what it sounds like.” Wulf wiped the enemy’s blood from his arms with a shirt one of the soldiers handed him. “He wanted to die, knowing we’d be frustrated at his last words.”

Scowling, Huw turned toward his brother. “Well, it worked.”

Six Hours Later, on the Galanti

Huw gently urged Nadia from the lift into the corridor leading to his, now their, suite of rooms. She felt the olio of emotions coming from him: anger, love, fear, and oddly enough, amusement. The fact he maintained a calm facade and a gentle touch soothed her; however, she read his need to chastise her for placing herself in danger.

Nadia smiled and managed not to snicker at the images in his mind for the planned punishment—all the scenarios had them naked and on the bed. She couldn’t wait; she needed him with an unceasing ache. He could’ve died on the planet, and that was unacceptable.

As soon as they entered their quarters and the door swished shut behind them, Huw had her turned, her back against the door, and her pants ripped off within seconds.

“Never.” As he tore her uniform top off, he breathed the word against her ear before nipping the lobe sharply. “Ever. Again.”

He fumbled with the placket of his trousers and then shoved them down his thighs.

With one hand on her ass, he hoisted her up until her wet and aching pussy was level with the tip of his massive erection.

She wound her arms around his shoulders as Huw held her head still for his rough kisses and nips along her jaw, down onto her throat, and then along her shoulder.

“God, Huw! Up! Up!” She sent him an image.

With his eager cooperation, she toed off her ankle boots and managed to wrap her legs around his waist. She let go of one massive shoulder, tightened with his tension and lust, to grasp his cock and slide it through the copious juices moistening her slit.

“In. In.” She attempted to line up her ready opening with his cockhead.

“Hush. Not yet.” He muttered the words against her shoulder. “Hold onto me. Both arms. Now.”

“But Huw…” Her vaginal opening clenched and unclenched, needing his thick, hard penis inside to send her over the slim precipice she balanced upon. The man had gotten her so hot, so quickly that all she wanted to do was come … not rehash what had happened on the planet.

“Shh. Not. One. Word.” He licked along her right shoulder, pausing to teeth the tendon running to her neck. Then he followed the same path in reverse with his tongue.

“Don’t ever,” he squeezed her ass tightly, “ever scare me like that again.” He bit her shoulder lightly. “I died a thousand times in those seconds. He could have…” he slid into her hungry heat with one solid thrust of his hips “…killed you with one swipe of his hand.”

Huw muttered in Prime as he peppered feverish kisses over her cheeks, eyes, lips.

“Then I’d be forced back into the solitary darkness I dwelled in before I met you.”

“I was scared … too.” Her head slid up and down the door as he steadily pumped his cock into her throbbing depths. She stared him in the eye and slapped his shoulder. “You could’ve … died!”

“Never.” His voice was thick with fiery lust and loving devotion. “I’ve just found you,
gemate lubha
. I’ll never leave you alone.” He paused, fully embedded within her.

She counted the beats of his heart in the pulsations of his cock. She tightened her vaginal muscles, fisting him. Her body screamed for release.

“Shh, sweet, I’ll take care of your need. All of your needs.” Huw withdrew his penis slowly; its thickly veined surface rubbed her sensitive nerve endings, heightening her arousal.

She moaned low in her throat. “So good. So good,
zaychik
. Take me. Hard. I need you so much.”

“No more than I need you.” Huw slowly, torturously pushed back into her.

She hissed, a mixture of pain and pleasure, as she felt every single blessed millimeter of his length drag across highly sensitized tissues. He was so big and filled her so full …

and he was being too frigging gentle. Gentleness could come later when they were in their bed and the edge was off. She wanted the heat that had him shoving her up against the door.

“Huw … is this your punishment? I need to come, my
gemat
. Do I need to beg?”

He brushed a gentle kiss over the tip of her nose before bracing his forehead against hers. “No, you never need to beg me for your pleasure. Patience,
lubha
. I need you to understand…” He set a rhythm of deep, firm push-pulls, keeping her on the edge of orgasm. If he’d meant to punish her for placing herself in danger, he was doing a good job of it. “If something had happened to you—my people would have had to kill me to keep me from hurting others.”

Never halting the movement of his hips, he tilted her chin until her gaze met his. She had never seen his eyes so dark before; they were almost brown with the pain and fear he didn’t bother to hide. His emotions poured off him in great, rolling waves, pounding against her mind, her heart, her body. He truly believed what he’d said—he would’ve been dangerous if she’d died protecting him.

“I didn’t know…” she soothed the tense muscles along his shoulders and at the base of his neck with gentle touches, “…I knew Prime males were protective … but not to the extremes you’re describing.” She kissed his lips lightly, gently to soothe the ravening beast inside him. “I promise not to knowingly place myself in danger without telling you.”

When Huw growled angrily in the back of his throat, she nipped his lower lip. “This time you hush. I’m a starship officer. I’m a soldier. I’ll encounter dangerous situations …

you know that. You have to be willing to cut me some slack in the execution of my duties.”

His hips increased in speed and forcefulness. His cock reached ever more deeply within her, giving her the most pleasurable type of pain.

“Stepping in front of me as I face an Antarean is not one of your duties.” Huw’s words were barely more than a guttural sound.

“Huw…” She shook her head. He kissed her, cutting off her scold.

“Hush,
cwen
.” He nipped her bottom lip with his teeth. “I understand your point …

but that doesn’t mean I like it or accept it blindly.”

His lingering rage was translated into harder thrusts into her body, lifting her so her back slid up and down the door’s cold surface. “I can’t help it. You…” he rotated his hips on the up thrust, “…in danger … not allowed.”

He gripped her hips harder, holding her for the rapid pounding of his hips. “Each and every time you’re in danger … I’ll reinforce my claim … in the most primal way … as hard and fast as I can.”

“I don’t want you to fear me when I do.”

He was afraid he’d hurt her. She trusted him more than he trusted himself.
“I like
you wild, my
gemat
. We’ll have a very full and vigorous sex life … because such
situations will happen again.”

“Hold onto me,
lubha
. I need to take you.”

“And I need to be taken. Don’t hold back,
sladkie
. I don’t break easily.”

“Diew
, I love you.”

*

Huw buried his face into the crook of Nadia’s neck and shoulder and thrust harder, faster, driving them both higher and higher. He fed her his love. Bared his soul and revealed the deep, voracious need for her to live and be safe. Admitted the fact she was the only being in the galaxy, the universe, who could drive him over the edge of reason into insanity.

“Huw … Huw…” Nadia held his head to her with both hands as he took her roughly against the door. “Come for me,
sladkie
. Fill me with your seed. Take what’s yours …

only yours, my love.”

As Huw bellowed his completion against her neck, he shared his pleasure with Nadia. She screamed her release to the ceiling, her hands clutching his shoulders tightly.

The tiny dig of her nails, the squeezing of his cock in her tight heat, had him shouting as yet another explosion of pleasure erupted up his spine.

“God, Huw … hold me … I’m … flying.” Her hands fluttered on his arms as she seemed to lose all strength. Her body arched and her head thrown back against the door, she screamed again and again.

Huw held her securely and plunged into her hot, tight sex over and over, nurturing what had become a seemingly infinite climax. Then Nadia went completely lax and fell against him, her head lying weakly on his shoulder.

Concerned he’d hurt her, he stopped thrusting and began to pull away.

Nadia twined her arms loosely about his neck. She dug her fingers into the muscles at the top of his spine, kneading like a she-kitten he’d once owned as a child. “No …

don’t leave me. Stay … stay in me.”

She moved her hips in a small, circular motion and clenched his cock, holding him to her with her vaginal muscles. He groaned at the sensation; his cock somehow found even more semen to jet into her depths.

A small tremor shook Nadia. “I’m not done with you yet, my
gemat
.” She licked the seam of his upturned lips. “Do you think you can get us to the bed this way?”

Huw chuckled. “Nadia, my flower, you are as light as a cloud and I’m a big, strong Prime male. Of course I can.” He settled her more closely against him with one arm holding her hips to him and the other went around her upper back. “Nestle your head on my shoulder,
cwen
. Let me do all the work.”

“Good.” She snickered into his uniform top. “Someone is still clothed.”

“I was in a hurry.” He kissed a dainty ear that peeked out of her soft, blonde curls.

She turned her head and licked his neck, little swipes of her tongue that promised to drive him crazy. His semi-hard cock jerked and stiffened again within her heat.

“Nadia … don’t start something you might not be able to finish.”

As he walked them into the bedroom, she lifted her head and scrunched her nose. It was so cute he had to stop and kiss the tip and then took her lips in a leisurely kiss. He ate at her mouth, dipping his tongue inside to play with hers. He groaned and pulled away.

“Behave, little she-cat. You go to my head too quickly.”

Nadia snickered and tightened her inner muscles around his revived erection. “I’d say I go to the little head also.”

Huw laughed. “Both my heads, then.”

As he resumed the walk to the bed, which seemed like light-years away rather than a few meters, Nadia ran her fingers through the hair at the nape of his neck. He shuddered and chill bumps pebbled his skin. When she traced his
gemat
mark through his shirt, he swore under his breath.

Nadia giggled. “When Mel first told me the marks were erogenous zones, I didn’t believe her.” Her body shuddered against him. Nadia moaned and shoved at his uniform top. “We need to figure out how to get your clothes off without your penis slipping out of me.”

“We’ll figure something out. And if the worst happens and I slip out for a second or two, I know how to put it back in you.” He assured her in a husky voice. “The One knows I could live inside your body. All that sweet heat bathing my cock is the closest thing to the Eternal I can think of.”