Chapter 4

Thar’oc

She said her name was Rikki. I liked the sound of it; it was a two-vowel name with a staccato sound to it, which reminded me of typical Kertinal naming conventions. I tried hard not to picture her beneath the spray of the shower, but that was difficult when I could hear her splash around. Was she rubbing her pink, silky skin with a cloth? Suds running off her sweet curvy figure?

I groaned, muffling the sound against the pillow on the bed. My cock rose sharply to attention in the tight confines of my pants, her sweet scent teasing across my senses. I shouldn’t be having these lustful thoughts when Rikki had just gone through a horrible ordeal. My body had other ideas, it wanted me to strip out of my armor and join her in that shower stall.

Cursing, I shoved up from the bed and paced around the tiny, dank motel room. I’d rented it just to get away from the crowded bunkroom I shared on the Varakartoom, and now I was relieved I had a place to retreat to with the human. With my female, my mind supplied helpfully. Mate. That was stupid because the Kertinal didn’t do mates. They picked a good female willing to procreate, and that was that. We were a warring race; practical expansionists with no room for soft things like love.

I cursed out loud that time. Why the fuck was I even thinking of love now? I needed to focus on the immediate issues, like how to get Rikki to Strewn. The Captain would let me take her when the ship left here in a couple of days; I was sure I could convince him to take us both. At Strewn, I could crash with my friend Ru’ol for a while, until I figured out what to do with her. Until then, we needed to lie low and avoid that sicko or others from getting their dirty paws on what was mine.

I shook my head wildly, hoping to dislodge those thoughts, but they wouldn’t leave. Rikki was mine. I wanted her, and I wanted to make sure she could never offer such a dangerous trade again in exchange for safety. I needed to keep her safe, forever. Glancing at the shut door to the tiny bathroom I winced, certain I’d sent her screaming in the other direction if she knew how possessive my thoughts were.

With my med kit in hand, I tried silently berating my body to behave. My tail swished, and my leg started to go tap-tap against the floor. That’s how Rikki found me when she left the shower accompanied by a cloud of steam. Her curls were wrapped up in a thin white towel, her rosy skin covered to mid-thigh by one of my casual shirts. I dropped the med kit on the bed and fisted my hands behind my back. Then my tail wildly lashed and I grabbed hold of that, pinning it against me and out of sight so she couldn’t see what kind of crazy effect she had on me.

“Thank you,” she said softly, padding over to the bed to sit down. She pulled the blanket over her legs, crossing them demurely to the side. Even covered from neck to toe, her shape obscured, I found her the most beautiful creature in the entire Zeta quadrant.

“For what?” I barked out, and I wanted to slap myself for how bad my people skills were. It was worse than usual and it was all because of her. She offered me a soft little smile that I felt like a punch to the gut. Like my bark hadn’t scared her. I didn’t have a supersensitive nose like some species, but I knew mine was more developed than hers and I eagerly took advantage of that. She didn’t smell scared any longer. I could tell because her sweet scent had lost that hint of acidity.

My tail drooped in my fist, finally relaxing, and I dared to let it go so I could grab the medkit. She didn’t flinch back when I set it down next to her on the bed and joined her. “A quick health check,” I informed her, raising the handheld scanner. When she nodded, I turned it on and started running it over her body from a respectable distance. My fingers itched to replace the scanner with a touch; I wanted to follow the path of that gentle light beam.

“And? What’s the verdict?” she asked. “You said it was Thar’oc, right? So am I healthy, Thar’oc?” My cock responded eagerly to the sound of my name on her lips. This was going to be a really long night, but it just proved that I’d made the right choice when I ignored the advice of my friends and stole her away.

“Some deficiencies, nothing major,” I said, and I dug around the bag to locate one of the supplemental shots I kept around to aid in healing when I needed it. It would have everything and then some in it to help her rebound from what was clearly a very long time in stasis. Now I knew where she’d come from. She was one of those rare pod humans that sometimes surfaced on the black market. Most of them were peddled by none other than the Crime Lord Drameil. Although I’d heard that lately, he had suffered some very major setbacks.

I held up the auto-injector and when she shrugged and nodded; I pressed it against the side of her neck. It hissed as it deposited the dose directly into her carotid vein. Her eyes were a soft brown, with a darker edge around the iris. It was an eye color that did not occur among my species, and I found myself drawn into those velvety dark depths.

“Uh, is your tail supposed to do that?” she asked, and I jerked backward, dropping the injector. My tail had curled around my hip and then wound itself around her wrist, the bladed tip lying innocently against the outside of her clenched fist. The lines on my flesh glowed vibrantly. They revealed that I was riled up beyond normal levels, but at least Rikki didn’t know that.

I tried to uncurl the appendage but it wouldn’t obey, so I resorted to physically unwinding the unruly thing. “No,” I told her curtly. “My apologies.” When that made her giggle, the sound so sweet and fresh, I glanced up. Pink had streaked across her cheeks, and she’d raised a hand to clasp it over her equally pink mouth. Mirth was dancing in her pretty brown eyes.

“Okay,” she said and then giggled again when I finally got my tail free of her wrist, only for it to coil right on back as soon as I let it go. “I guess we’re stuck?” She had no idea how stuck she was with me, but she’d figure it out eventually. I gave up on pulling my tail from her skin. Instead, I flicked the knife from the tip so it couldn’t accidentally harm her.

I shucked my boots and my belt next, carefully scenting the air and tracking her reactions. Still not scared; could she already trust me? I needed to warn her that she shouldn’t be so ready to give people the benefit of the doubt out here, but I’d leave that for another day. Tonight, I was just grateful that it had happened. When I stretched out on the bed next to her, she froze in place and then shrugged. “I guess we can share.” Her eyes darted to the limited floor space at the foot of the bed, and she nodded thoughtfully. “You are really huge.”

I lowered my head to the pillow next to hers and promptly slammed my horns into the headboard. That was definitely the truth. “All the better to protect you,” I said, and I adjusted my position so I could better fit. Pretending my tail wasn’t still wrapped around her wrist, I closed my eyes, hands on my belly. “Go to sleep,” I told her. I pretended I did that too, closing my eyes and evening out my breathing. It took her a while to get comfortable next to me. It wasn’t until I was certain that she’d slipped into dreams that I allowed myself to do the same.