Chapter 15

MANDY

I squirm in my seat at the dining room table, aware of Kameer’s unblinking gaze on me. Unlike humans, Darrvasons don’t seem to have a problem with staring, and the fact that my mate rarely blinks makes this habit of his all the more unsettling. Though I haven’t displeased him today, or at least I don’t believe I have, nerves keep flitting in my stomach and I can’t seem to sit still.

Will he always make me nervous?

Or will I eventually start to feel more at ease in his presence?

He refills my cup of water and nods at my plate. “Aren’t you hungry, pretty human?”

I pick up my utensil. “Of course. Famished.” My cheeks heat when I realize the double meaning of my response, and I quickly glance away, unable to hold his intense red gaze for another second.

We eat in silence for a few minutes, and I feign a particular interest in the Darrvason fleet, constantly staring out the viewscreen at the huge alien ships and smaller shuttles that move between them. The hyperdrive bubble appears more luminous than usual today, though since Kameer doesn’t seem alarmed by it, I’m not particularly worried.

He clears his throat, and I glance in his direction but don’t quite meet his eyes. We’ve been mated for four days now, but he still strikes me as a complete stranger. I don’t know a thing about him, other than that he’s an engineer and he’s in possession of great wealth.

I’m curious about his wealth, and I’m close to asking him why he’s so rich. But I remind myself that in order to maintain distance between us, to stall the formation of the heartbond, it’s better if I don’t learn anything about him at all. If I start to see him as a person…

Ugh. That sounds bad. Okay, I know he’s an individual, as real as any human, but I must allow him to remain a stranger to me, the brutal male who bought me, paid actual money to secure me as his mate. I must do whatever I can to keep my upper arms from tingling.

Sadness descends as I realize I must also stop finding solace in his arms. How strange that I never realized how lonely I was, how starved for affection, until he came into my life. But, lonely or not, I cannot belong to him forever.

I think about the first spanking he gave me and try to convince myself he’s cruel, only to remember how calmly yet authoritatively he’d scolded me before delivering the punishment. He hadn’t shouted at me or called me names, nor had he given me a cold silent treatment that lasted for days.

Most surprising of all, after spanking me, he’d held me in his arms and offered me comfort.

My throat burns at the memory of how shockingly intimate it felt to sit on his lap after he’d reddened my bottom. He'd stroked my hair and my back while murmuring to me in a gentle tone.

If I’m being honest, I’ve been expecting true cruelty from him, yet he hasn’t delivered. He’s shown me the opposite, and I’m not sure how to take it.

Will he ever be intentionally mean?

Will he ever be like… my father?

I swallow hard and wish I weren’t making the comparison, but I can’t help it. Though my father has never laid hands on me, he’s scared me plenty of times and made me feel completely rotten. Honestly, given his frequent fits of screaming, it’s a surprise morality officers only visited our quarters once, on the day they took me away and delivered me to Kameer.

“Are you all right, Mandy?” The concern in the Darrvason’s voice is enough to make my throat burn.

Fucking hell. Why can’t he just be mean?

Why can’t he make it easier to hate him?

I lift my chin. “I’m fine. Just thinking about how much I miss my family. That’s all.” It’s not a complete lie.

A hesitant look comes over him. “Would you like to see them soon?”

“Of course I would.” Well, maybe not my father, but I can’t exactly exclude him. He would take great offence, then my mother and Tasha would suffer for it.

“Perhaps I could arrange for you to see them soon.”

“I would like that. Thank you.” Does he mean it? I push away the surge of hopefulness, not wanting to later experience the crushing blow of disappointment. Even though I ought to embrace such a letdown. It would make holding Kameer at a distance a bit easier.

“I must confess,” he says in a thoughtful tone, “I envy you for your family. Do you have any grandparents, aunts, uncles, or cousins? Or just your parents and sister? I looked you up in Jansonna’s database and learned the identities of your parents and sister, though I didn’t delve into any possible extended family.”

Oh, man. My spirits sink as I finally meet his gaze. It makes perfect sense that he envies me for my family. How many of his friends and family members perished during the Darrvason-Yelltzin war?

“Um, no grandparents. They died when I was younger. My mom was an only child, and my father had one brother, my uncle Tony, but he didn’t procreate, and he died during an uprising several years ago. He was a security officer and got ambushed by a group of rebels.” I don’t mention that it was during this time, in the midst of his grief over losing his only sibling, that my father became obsessed with the idea of marrying me and Tasha off to Founders. He looked down on rebels so much that he wanted to get as far away from them socially as possible, and only a few Founders have participated in rebel uprisings.

“I am sorry about your uncle,” Kameer says. “Were you close to him?”

I gulp past the burning in my throat. “Yes. He always spent time with me and my sister. He was a genuinely nice man, and I miss him.” I don’t add that he was nothing like my father. I don’t admit he was the only person who would sometimes stand up to my father and successfully talk him down from his rages.

A long silence stretches between us, and I try to remain quiet and not show any interest in Kameer’s life or his past or his late family members, but fuck it, I’m starting to feel like an asshole.

Maybe it won’t hurt if I ask him just a few questions about himself. I mean, maybe I won’t like what I hear. Maybe I’ll learn something that will make it easier to dislike him.

“So,” I begin in a cautious tone, “what about you? Do you have any family members in the Darrvason fleet?”

His visage hardens a bit, though I don’t get the sense that he’s angry at me for asking. He gives a rare slow blink and glances out the viewscreen. Then he returns his gaze to me, and there’s no mistaking the haunted look he’s wearing. “I lost nearly everyone I cared about during the war against the Yelltzins,” he finally says. “Including my mate, Xersonna. We were mated for but two moon cycles before I was called to fight in the war and…” His voice trails off and his fingers tighten around the utensil he's holding.

“I heard about what happened to planet Darrva. What the Yelltzins did. I’m so sorry. I-I didn’t know you had a mate. I didn’t realize you were old enough to have been mated back then.” I mean it. I am sorry. I cannot fathom the loss of life and the collective grief the Darrvasons have suffered. Yes, humankind had to leave millions behind on Earth, but it happened several decades ago, well before my lifetime, and I’ve met very few people on the Jansonna who remember what it was like.

His lips twitch as a faraway look descends on him. “I was barely twenty when I mated with Xersonna, and she had just turned nineteen. We were betrothed for several years, an arrangement made between our families, when she went into heat and I took her as my mate.” He leans forward. “Most Darrvason males are older when they claim a mate, but our females are usually around nineteen. But her father didn’t care about my age. I suppose he cared more about my fortune and the engineering feats I’d already performed to help our people.”

“When she went into heat? I don’t quite understand what that means.” A flush overtakes me, and I almost regret asking for clarification, but I’m suddenly too curious about the mating practices of Darrvasons to keep silent.

“Our females reach maturity at the age of nineteen, and not long after this birthday they usually experience their first heat. They are given to their mate at this time.” When he notices my continued confusion, he adds, “Heat means she’s sexually receptive and ready to mate, and she’s ovulating and could easily become pregnant.”

“I think I understand.” My face has never felt hotter. “Thanks for explaining.” Well, I guess that’s why the Darrvasons want human females in the nineteen to twenty-five age range, even though humans traditionally reach adulthood at the age of eighteen. “So, then you’re about forty-five, or forty-six years old?” I think I remember hearing that Darrva was destroyed twenty-five years ago, and if he was twenty when he mated with Xersonna…

“Yes, I’ll be forty-six in three moon cycles.”

Wow. I hadn’t realized he was twice my age. But at least he’s not old enough to be my grandfather. I push away thoughts of Ned. I also try not to think about the fact that Kameer is only four years younger than my father.

We finish our meal and clean up, neither of us saying much. I sense he’s lost in thoughts of the past, and I can’t help but wonder if he’d loved Xersonna. I don’t have the courage to ask.

There are a lot of things I don’t have the courage to ask Kameer. Like whether he killed Ned or perhaps ordered his death. And whether he’ll restrict my time spent with my family once he learns what an ass my father can be. Or if he’ll be reluctant to let me visit the human settlement if there’s unrest.

After the kitchen and dining room are clean, Kameer lifts me in his arms and carries me to the bedroom. He settles a heated gaze on me, and his nostrils flare as he inhales deeply. My pulse quickens and I flush. How am I getting excited already? Why can’t I stop it? Do Darrvason females have it worse when they experience their first heat?

A scary thought hits me. One that I never considered until now. What if Kameer gets me pregnant soon? Oh, God, there would be no leaving him if that happened. Even without the formation of the heartbond, he’s so eager to breed me (as many times as safely possible—his exact words) that I doubt he would ever part with me if I gave birth to his child.

But how can I stop him? Locked in his quarters, I don’t have access to any methods of contraception. Not that I really know much about that sort of thing.

A growl resounds from Kameer’s throat as he sets me down next to the bed. My heart races faster and heat spasms in my core.

He’s going to claim me. Even though I’m still sore from yesterday’s numerous mating sessions, he’s going to claim me. Because he wants a blasted heartbond to form between us, and because he wants to plant his seed in my womb.

I tremble with need as he begins to remove my clothing.

“Pretty human, I am going to rut you so fluxxing hard.”