Her pulse rang in her ears as she waited for Maxu to respond. She knew he’d heard her. How could he not have? As soon as the words were out, his whole body had gone still. His gaze remained trained on the controls to her cuffs, but he hadn’t released them. A bit of fear curled in her belly. What if she’d read him wrong? What if she’d just locked herself up and worked him up into a rage?
“On Earth,” she continued. “I’m technically still married.”
His head snapped up, his features covered with something icy and fierce, though she couldn’t tell if it was anger exactly. “Hear me, Meg,” Maxu growled. “You have no husband. You are not married. And unless you want that male found and gutted, you won’t speak another word of it.”
“But I want you to understand.” Sweat gathered under the metal at her wrists. “I don’t consider him my husband anymore. It’s been over nine months since I was taken from Earth. We didn’t have a happy marriage. But I think maybe you and I could have one. I mean, granted”—she peered at her restrained wrist out of the corner of her eye—“this is a little…unorthodox. But I’m starting to believe that we were put together for a reason.”
The tension radiating off his body in the heavy silence felt like a blow. Had she just opened herself up for nothing?
She jumped when he suddenly whirled, presenting her with his back. One hand stabbed through his hair, the other was planted on his hip. He paced away, then stilled, staring out through the sheet of water falling from the roof above.
Meg chewed on her lip as his hand dipped into his pocket and he pulled out his communicator. The tension in her cuffs relaxed, and her throat tightened. I shouldn’t have told him. Stupid. Stupid.
“I’m sorry for upsetting you. I’ll go.” She waited for her cuffs to fall away from her wrists, but they didn’t. Should she just leave with them attached? He was so still, radiating a dark energy that sucked all the dim light out of the room.
“Come here.” His deep firm command fluttered through her and made her shiver, for it was most definitely a command.
Her neck craned to peer at the door. She could just leave, but that wasn’t why she’d come here.
He slowly rotated, his black gaze lighting a fire under her skin. His tongue flashed over his bared teeth, an impatient lion waiting for its prey to wander within reach.
Be brave, Meg whispered to herself. She kept her eyes locked on his as she took one step, two steps, three steps closer. The cool air licking her skin sparked with electricity the closer she got, until she was standing before him all but vibrating.
His neck remained straight as he stared down his nose at her. “You don’t consider yourself married to this…human?” he spat.
She shook her head.
He nodded sharply, as if praising her for answering a rhetorical question. “No. Because you’re mine now. Correct?”
Meg’s lips pursed. She knew they were just words. Just a statement. Possibly something he even needed to hear, but she couldn’t bring herself to say it.
The right side of his mouth curled dangerously, and he gave a small shake of his head. “You want to be vulnerable for me, vahpti? A favor for a favor?”
Meg’s lips parted, but her trapped breath remained in her lungs. She nodded.
He hummed out a low growl. “On your knees.”
It took her a few moments of internal fighting, but slowly, she sank down, down, down until she was craning her neck up at him. After a pregnant pause, he grinned, all brazen and lecherous and gloating. And damn whatever trauma was doing it but her sex throbbed at the powerful set of his thighs and shoulders as he loomed over her.
“Why have you been avoiding me?” she asked.
The fabric of his pants rustled as he crouched in front of her. With his thumb and forefinger, he pinched her chin, lifting her face. “I think I need to see you a little more vulnerable before I can tell you that.” His knuckles glided over her jaw, his gaze following their progress hungrily, leaving goose bumps pebbling on her skin. He dipped his forefinger between her breasts and pulled her bodice forward. “How about we take this off?”
Meg lifted a brow in challenge. “Fine.”
His gaze held for a moment , as if giving her a chance to change her mind. When she remained silent, his finger moved, tracing the round edge of the fabric over her breast until he stopped at the seam on her side where the garment was fastened into place.
She’d imagined he would rip the petals free. Clean, easy, quick. But what he did was so much worse. Turning his palms over her rib cage, he searched for the hidden pins and clasps holding the leaves in place. The snaps of the fastenings popping open boomed through the hushed space as he pulled them apart. A bolt of heat raced to her pussy with every firm tug of his fingers until she felt the insides of her thighs grow damp and hot.
He’d unfastened the garment completely but hadn’t yet peeled it away when his nostrils flared. He stared at the vee between her legs. The black of his eyes seemed to darken. She shivered when he licked his lips, as if he could see through the fabric still covering her.
“No underwear, little human? That’s a very dangerous thing to do.”
She’d known this would happen. Known it the moment she’d slipped off the thick underwear that shielded some of her scent, tossed them into her room, and dashed up to his door.
“You don’t scare me, Maxu.” A lightness cut through the intensity of the moment when Meg registered how true that statement rang in her mind. She wanted to see him like this, forceful and dark and rough. But even though her pulse was soaring and she was on her knees in front of a man who was actively attempting to scare her away, she trusted him.
His jaw hardened at that. “Really?” His hands shot out and locked around her wrists. He forced them down to the stone ground and held them there while a subtle zing told her he’d locked them in place. He waited for her to answer with a scowl.
She lifted her head and gave him the widest grin she could muster. “Do I smell scared to you?”
A surge of pride went through her when his glare faltered, and he swallowed.
“Why have you been avoiding me?” she asked again.
His fingers pulled the petals covering her torso away. Cool air hit her skin, and her nipples hardened immediately. Any embarrassment she might have felt was soothed under the rolling purr that reverberated through his throat as he traced her ribcage and the curve of her breast with his thumb. “I’m not used to explaining myself to anyone.” Before she could answer, his rough palm cupped one of her breasts, and she moaned. “But you’re not just anyone, are you?”
Unable to help herself, she squeezed her legs together to relieve some of the throbbing pressure. “No,” she breathed.
“Open,” he demanded, pointing a finger back and forth between her clenched thighs. She did.
Wrists still held to the ground, her breasts swayed between her biceps as her knees split wide, her ass resting on her heels. He muttered some curse she couldn’t make out that made her flush, not with embarrassment but with confidence.
Maxu fell to his knees and leaned his face into the crook of her neck, angling forward until his calloused hand scraped down her stomach. She shuddered again when he traced a finger over her hip bone. His palm cupped her pussy, pressing firmly enough to send sparks exploding through her. She gasped, letting out a small whimper, when his thick forefinger slipped between her lips and delved inside her wet channel.
“You’re dripping for me, sweetness.” The groan he breathed against her neck was hot. “I suppose I owe you an answer now.”
“Please.” Meg blinked, trying to concentrate past the knot tightening in her belly.
His head rose from her shoulder, and he watched her face as he spoke, all the while rocking his palm against her with delicious even pressure as his finger stroked inside. “I feel changed by you.” His eyes danced over her expression, his breaths coming in deep and even. “You have a piece of me I can never get back. You own it. And all I want is to have a piece of you in return. But I can’t decipher you.”
Meg’s lids slid closed at his words. Finally—he was finally talking to her. All it had taken was her agreeing to be bossed around, bound, and fucked with his skillful hands.
He slipped another finger inside her, stroking lazily but making her knees tremble. He cupped her face with a rough palm, forcing her to look at him again. His brows were drawn, his black gaze studying her features as if trying to work out a riddle even now.
“I don’t know how to win you,” he growled in frustration. “I heard what you said at that interview yesterday.” His fingers had stopped pumping into her, but his palm continued to gently rock, keeping her on the edge but not letting her come. “What are you looking for in a partner, Meg? Repeat what you said yesterday.”
Meg licked her lips, though her cheeks were a bit squished from his gripping fingers. Yesterday, in Pesquen, she’d been torn. Confused why she’d been missing a man who, by all accounts, she should despise. And when one of the citizens had asked her what she looked for in a partner, she’d faltered. Every other time she’d given her rehearsed speech about wanting to find a man that treated her like a goddess, but at that instant the practiced response had felt so shallow.
Thousands of memories had passed through her mind in the minute it had taken to answer that question. She’d thought about Jeremy. Her parents. Their marriage. What they’d wanted for her and what she’d wanted for herself. She’d recalled lying in her cold bed, debating whether or not she should get up, wondering if it’d matter to anyone if she did.
Then she’d thought about Maxu, and an answer had come to her. A real answer.
“I want someone who I can grow with. Someone who makes me better.”
“I don’t know how you’re doing it, but I think you’re making me better.” The harsh lines bracketing Maxu’s mouth softened. “Seeing the world through your eyes makes it brighter than it used to be. I’ve been avoiding you because…I’m not capable of doing the same.”
She hadn’t noticed when his hand had moved, but it now rested on her waist, his thumb stroking over her ribcage. Meg tried to push through the tightness in her throat so she could explain. “Yes, you are,” she whispered. “You’re showing me I can speak my mind and argue and fight and be unlikable.”
“You mean fight me,” he chuckled humorlessly.
“Yes,” she agreed easily. “Do you like me, Maxu? As a person?”
The warmth that instantly lit his face had butterflies exploding in her belly. “You know I do, vahpti.”
“But I bit you and screamed at you and ran away from you.” Meg let out a laugh. “I even shot you!” When Maxu didn’t seem fazed by the reminders of her horrid behavior, she went on. “My whole life, I’ve always felt too scared to be myself. I had a personality built for me, and if I didn’t fit into that mold, I wasn’t worthy of love. But with you…even when I’m being a pain in the ass and making mistakes…you’ve never made me feel worthless. You make me feel safe. Like I can say the wrong thing and I won’t be abandoned or judged. I don’t think you understand how liberating that is. I’ve never had that before.” Meg’s lips kept twitching downward as tears rose in her eyes. “I want you to feel that way when you’re with me. I don’t want you to hide from me.”
The smile beaming out of him made her melt. She’d never seen it before. She’d seen smirks and grins and cocky flashes of teeth, but never anything this unguarded. A purr reverberated through his chest as he brushed his lips against hers, hands still tight on her jaw. His kiss was slow and languid. Meg sighed as he slid his tongue against hers. Maxu answered her with a groan of his own.
“I think I like you most when you’re being a pain in the ass,” he whispered, brushing a thumb over her bottom lip.
“Good,” she grinned, lifting her face as far as she could with her hands still planted on the ground. “Because I enjoy getting you worked up.”
He descended on her again, his lips a bit more demanding than they’d been a moment ago. With a whimper, she wiggled her hands. He smiled against her mouth, then went right back to sucking her tongue. One of his hands traveled to one cuff, releasing it, then to the other. Meg launched herself toward him, throwing her arms around his neck and pressing her naked body to his clothed one.
Maxu didn’t topple over, though. He caught her, wrapping his brawny arms around her waist and palming her ass. He shifted so he was sitting on the ground, knees slightly bent, with Meg cradled in his lap. His fingers twisted in her hair, and with a firm tug, he pulled her head back until her spine arched and her breasts were perfectly accessible.
He held her there, just staring. Then his hot tongue landed on her nipple. How did he know just how to swirl and suck and bite to make her breath catch like that? It was unfair. Grasping blindly for his free hand since his other was still clutching her by the hair, she guided his fingers up to the collar at her throat, silently urging him to take it off.
When he did, she snatched it before he could toss it to the side. Maxu pulled away from her nipple, now dark and hard from his unrestrained ministrations.
He eyed the collar clutched in her hand. “Meg?”
“Lie back,” she crooned, biting her lip and urging him to recline with one hand to his shoulder. It was like pressing against a wall.
“I don’t think so, vahpti.” He reached for the collar and missed. She was sure he could’ve gotten it if he really wanted to, but he became distracted by the jiggling of her breasts as she thrust the collar above her head as high as she could.
He moaned and shoved his mouth into the soft tissue under her nipple. Her toes curled, her hand almost losing hold of the metal as he dug his fingers into her hips and rubbed her sex against his shaft through his pants.
Trying to keep her wits from clouding over by lust completely, she angled her body forward, urging him again to lean back. He growled against her skin, nipping at her neck as he pressed her flush to his body, but he did eventually lie back, pulling her with him.
She tried to sneak the collar to his neck, but he stilled her with one hand on her wrist. Growling a warning, he stared up at her with an adorably stern expression. “Why?”
“Because I want to try new things,” she whispered, pressing soft kisses to his firm lips until they softened. “Just trust me.”
Inhaling a deep breath that lifted her body, he released her wrist. And waited, jaw tense, gaze suspicious.
She giggled, then placed the collar over his neck. Nothing would happen without his print, they both knew it, but he didn’t move to help. “Please,” she implored.
A small quirk lifted his mouth, his gaze flashing hungrily. “Beg.”
With a grin, she ducked under his jaw and gave the firm muscles of his neck a lick, then a kiss. “Oh, please, please, please, handsome, strong mate of mine.” She kissed up to his ear, swirling her tongue around the shell, and almost squealed with pleasure when he shuddered.
He grumbled something she couldn’t hear, then lifted his hand to the collar. “Fine, but after you’re done with whatever this is, I fuck you any way I want.”
Meg’s head jerked up and a slow smile spread, a pulse thrumming through her pussy at the thought. “Deal.”
