8 Vitus

I leave them behind and cart my female into the first-floor bar where the others have gathered. It is one massive party that will run all night. We have time.

Other males compliment me on catching her.

My female makes a disgusted noise.

"Going to take some work for her to know her place," a Jorbiun remarks in their typical nasally tone. He's picked a submissive blue. I'm not surprised.

A growl starts in the back of my throat, but I keep walking. I don't want to talk to my female here. I want privacy.

The other males set their catches down inside the mingling center and share nuzzles, conversation, or get right down to business. I find us a quiet corner and draw her over my shoulder. As her voluptuous body slides down my chest, molten-hot desire rushes through me.

I catch only the scent of amino gel on her breath before she twists herself in my grasp, drops through my arms, and bolts inside a closing security door.

Her technique of escape baffles me. But I have never held a human female, only other Nytheralians at formal dances to satisfy my father's demands.

I catch the door just in time and chase after her.

She is fast.

The way she climbs ladders and leaps from one catwalk to the next inside the thermal maintenance room, trying to deter me, is only making me want her more. Her perfect backside jiggles with every hard landing. But it is her determination that motivates me.

She is a survivor, doesn't give up easily, and has surprised me with her tactics. We could use fresh ideas on our planet. But I have to catch her to talk to her.

I'm not making progress by staying a step behind. I need to be proactive and catch her in her path. I'm familiar with engine rooms. I can tell by her scattered route that she isn't.

I leave her behind to charge through an adjacent maintenance shaft. It parallels the life support heaters necessary to keep the lunar city warm. I sprint harder than I have in years to be sure I am ahead of her when she exits.

As I run, I question if this is right.

She doesn't want to be someone's mate.That much is clear. I don't have time for one. And yet I'm driven by a force that's come alive in me, something I pushed into submission many sun-cycles ago.

I want to know her story.I need to know why I am so broken down by her into this creature of nearly uncontrollable lust.

I get in her path. But as she leaves the room, her surprise turns to conviction. Her brows knit as she jumps, tucks her knees, and barrels at my chest.

She's a fighter, and it's turning me on.

I spread my feet and catch her, my groin throbbing with lust.

She wriggles hard, slipping from my arms. The female swipes a foot toward my head, which I dodge. Her fight is admirable, but I'm twice her size.

The female scrambles to a railing and jumps.

There is nothing below but the boiling engine. She will be mere paint on the metal. My heart breaks for her and for the long-buried part of me she awakened.

I catch her wrist.

She can't die. I think she may be the only person in the universe who could understand me.

She cries out and tries to pry my fingers from her wrist.

"I serve no man ever again!"

So that's what this is about.

"I am not a man," I say. "But I do not want you to serve me either way. Mates are equal in my culture."

I haul her up and over my shoulder again. She fights me, but her efforts wane, and I'm certain she is tired.

Hearing voices, I sneak us through a side door.

It takes me a moment to get us back on track, and sort which direction will lead us back to the rooms.

"Please, let me go," she begs.

"I am not going to let you die. And your pattern of behavior suggests that is what would happen if I did."

She remains quiet. It is like getting an uncomfortable taste of my own behavior. I see now why Darsus is so open. There are no secrets with him, and everyone knows what he thinks and expects.

When we are about to enter a public space with cameras, I stop. The scent of her skin is addicting and hard to push out of my mind. "I can protect you."

"Don't need it."

She clearly does. I don't understand why anyone would put such a gorgeous creature in a collar, but humans and some other species are known for it. "So the bruises are not from a shackle meant to punish you if you disobeyed?"

Her hands are small but strong when they press into my back. She lifts herself and takes a breath. "They are."

"What kind of business were you forced into?"

She slumps. "Capturing dangerous mutants to be sold as exotic pets."

That explains her physical skills. We need a safer place to talk than a shield maintenance room, so I walk out into the hallway.

Another Nytheralian finds us in the halls. "You caught her."

He's from the civilian sector by the high gloss of his scales. I'm not.

"Mine ran off after a Tlaeli. I don't suppose you'd be interested in negotiating."

"No." I can only claim her in one way that will shut him up for good. He won't care about her struggle because he knows only safety in the city.

I bite her hip and growl at him. My female jolts and lets out a little yelp that makes me want her even more.

He lifts his hands and backs up. "I'll just go mingle."

I take the elevator to my room with her still over my shoulder. The door to my suite opens with a tap of my wristband to the black panel on the wall.

Her squirming grows frantic.

"I'm not going to mate with you." I kick open the door, wait for it to shut, and drop her on the bed. She scrambles for the exit. "You clearly don't want to be here any more than I do."

She slows, then stops, huffs, and crosses her arms, then drags her eyes to me. "You don't want to be here?"

I tell her about Rhynin. "We have been friends since we were teens."

She looks at an oblong glowing vase filled with an array of condom shapes in packets on the nightstand.

I walk to the windows and glare out at the grounds.

"Then why bring me in here?" she asks.

"Tell me why you want the money." Tell me why you want it more than a mate.

She toys with the sleeve of her suit. A surging need to tear it from her body alarms me. My instincts teeter on the edge of making me do things without thinking them through.

She is broken. I won't take her until she is whole.

"Just wanted to start a self-defense school for women."

"How much will that cost?"

She mumbles out a pathetically low number.

"I will give you ten times that if—"

"I won't sell my soul to you," she blurts.

I pause at this. "I'm sorry you've always had ultimatums. But I meant that I would just give you the money for the business if that's truly what you want."

"Why do that for me? I'm nobody to you."

With every passing second that her warm scent fills my room, I find it harder to envision returning to my old life and forgetting I ever met her.

"I have the money. I'm always working with my soldiers. We have bunkers to defend and systems to maintain to keep our home planet safe. I have no time to do anything with what I have.

"Your idea sounds constructive. Nytheralian females would benefit from such training. Few of them join the military, but we could use a civilian instructor to keep our females strong. Our battles with the Nebulous Empire grow more frequent. So that would be my one request."

This gets her attention. She turns to face me. "I am happy to go anywhere but back to Earth. Can I have time to consider your offer?"

"You have this week to think it over. Then I will return to war." But her body beckons me and makes me need more than just a promise of potential.

When her knees shake and she blinks slowly, I find my opportunity.

I walk cautiously to her position, brace her shoulders, and help her sit on the bed. "You're exhausted. I am familiar with it in my soldiers."

Her eyes gloss with sadness and maybe a bit of fear. The way she hunkers on the bed, rubbing her neck, makes me wonder what it would take to see her fly up another mountainside. Just thinking back to her curvy figure ascending the rocks with such drive and confidence provokes a new question and makes my pants tighten and my sex strain to be buried in her.

It has been so long since I dated that I had forgotten the consuming power of a female.

My duty has long been to the health and well-being of my soldiers. We are stronger if we work together.

The need to feel her skin against my scales blurs my thoughts. I want to explore her body and prove to her that not all males are hell-bent on hurting or controlling her. I'm just not sure what will work and what will frighten or turn her off.

"When was the last time you felt good?" I watch her closely for even the subtlest hint she doesn't want me to touch her as I ease toward her. "Before this race?"

"What's your name?" she asks.

I'm an idiot for forgetting their custom of names first, personality second. "Vitus."

I spare her my title. She's clearly not in a position where she cares, and I definitely don't want her to think I'm pulling rank on her. She's a civilian, a feisty one, like a red-band, but emotionally docile like a blue.

"I'm Cylene."

The name stuns me. "Cylene?"

"Yeah?"

"Like Cylenethia?"

"I guess. But I'm Cylene Athia Monrova. I don't know why my mother picked it."

I lower myself before her, humbled. "You are named after the herb that healed our blister disease, the one that caused us to lose patches of scales centuries ago."

"My mother was a biologist. I guess that makes sense."

Her eyes narrow with pain. She reaches a hand toward my cheek. The moment her fingertips touch my scales, all I can focus on is the heat of her and the sweet musk of her flesh. She doesn't drown her natural scent in perfumes or lotions like many others. She is real, raw, and driving me mad with need.

"What happened to your face?"

"Nebulous Empire has been stealing from us." It's a struggle to get the words out through the high her touch gives me.

I gently take her wrist and draw in a deep breath of her scent. I'm tired of talking. I must crush at least a fraction of my lust, or I fear I will make a terrible mistake.

My heart is the one running the race now. I need to quiet it so I can think. But I can't rationalize any other way down from this high Cylene's ignited. I crave more of her. All of her. But I am not a Denarso, Novark, or Grehop. Those forceful species are not invited to Abr.

"Cylene, I must know one more thing."

The pits of her amber eyes widen as she gapes at my large hand around her wrist. She swallows and splutters. "Okay."

"Will you let me serve you?"