Chapter Four

Dammit, dammit, dammit, dammit, dammit.

Ty sighed and sagged back against the door to Samira's house. How could he be so stupid? Tuning into the thoughts of another person was extremely intimate, which is why it was something that only mates, with a few very specific exceptions, shared. It was part of the bond that occurred between the men of his kind and their women, and it allowed them to stay fully connected. This could be very helpful when they needed to find each other, when one needed the help of the other, or they wanted to express something private to each other without anyone else hearing it.

The fact that he could already connect with Samira was startling to say the least, considering they had never even touched each other much less bonded. Now he had been dumb enough to not only listen to her thoughts, but reply to her both speaking to her and sending his own thoughts to her. He knew he was probably scaring the hell out of her, or at the very least making her think that she was crazy. He hadn't even decided yet what he was going to do about these intense feelings he was experiencing for the stunning but so young woman that was now dressing in the house behind him. This was not a good time to start toying with her by listening to her thoughts and sending her his without her understanding what was going on.

He had been chastising himself for a few minutes when he felt the door give way behind him and fell back. Samira let out a scream and he turned as he fell so that he came down on his hands rather than on his back. His fall had caused her to fall and land on her back, which meant that he landed over her, his hands on either side of her and his face level with hers. They lay there for a few tense seconds, staring at each other. Their breaths came out ragged, mingling between them and surrounding them with a sound that only partially concealed the pounding of their heartbeats.

Ty could see something flicker in her eyes. It looked like desire and when she licked her lips, he almost lost the control he had been struggling so hard to maintain around her. She was even more startlingly beautiful when he was this close to her, but she still looked so young. He felt like he would be taking advantage of her if he gave into his craving for her at that moment, and if he did that he would never be able to forgive himself.

She was not tiny like Eden, Eliana, or Leia, but taller like Zuri. The extra inches made it so that their bodies lined up perfectly and he had to move extremely carefully to get out of the position hovering over her so that she didn't feel his raging cock pressing down on her. It was like it had a mind of its own, straining against his pants as it tried to get to her, just knowing that hers was the body it was made for.

"I'm sorry," he muttered, climbing backwards and standing up.

He wanted to reach down to help her up, but he worried about being able to maintain his self-control if he touched her in that moment. It was already taking everything that he had not to sweep her off of her feet and carry her back into the bedroom where he could spend the rest of the day bonding with her. He didn't want to test his capacity to withhold himself if he touched her skin, even just her hand, in that second.

"It's alright," she said, standing up and brushing herself off, "I'm sorry I didn't realize you were leaning against the door."

He looked at her fully and saw that she had put on a pair of tight black pants and a black shirt that hugged her curves and dipped low over her breasts, creating an enticing swell of cleavage. His mouth watered and he felt his heart start to pound. They needed to get out of her house as soon as possible.

A few minutes later they were walking through the compound toward the meeting hall. Ty noticed that she was able to keep up with him without struggle thanks to her long legs and a fast pace that made her breasts bounce and her long, thick hair sway across her back. Suddenly she turned to him.

"You never answered me when I asked how the house was ready for me if nobody knew I was coming until right before I got here."

"That house was originally intended for Zuri. It was the one chosen for her when she came here the first time for her teaching position, and when she left so suddenly it was just left there without anybody living in it. We assumed that whoever took her place as the new exchange program professor would end up moving into that house, but then we found out that Ero had gone after her and that she would be returning with him."

"So if that is the house that was supposed to be hers, where is she living now that she's back?"

Ty glanced at her strangely. He assumed the human girls would have filled her in on all of the gossip from the planet, especially the mating between Zuri and Ero considering she was Zuri's friend.

"She's with Ero. She's his mate, that's why he went after her."

"His mate?" she asked, sounding surprised.

"They didn’t tell you any of this?"

"Everything was kind of a whirlwind. I wasn't even expecting to see Zuri again for months. I had no idea that she had come home so quickly after leaving. I was staying in her house after an issue with my stepfather and she showed back up, and then the next morning Ero got there and it was all very fast after that. I didn't ask any questions."

He could see the hurt and fear in her eyes and felt the need to comfort her. Ty lifted an arm and rested it gently around her shoulders. He worried that she would pull away from him or be intimidated, but she didn’t. Instead, she seemed to relax a bit at his touch. She stepped a little bit closer to him so that her hip brushed his as they walked.

"May I ask what happened with your stepfather?"

He wasn't even sure what the term meant, but from the way she said it he could tell that whoever that man was, he had done something terrible to her. Samira must have noticed the hint of uncertainty in his voice because she glanced up at him with a smile.

"You don’t know what a stepfather is, do you?"

Part of him wanted to pretend that he did so that he didn't look dumb in front of her, but at the same time, he knew that the goal of the exchange program with Earth was to bring humans over so that they could educate the Denynso about the cultures, customs, and history of the planet and its people so she was probably not surprised that he was unsure of some of what she said. Finally he shook his head.

"My mother and my father got divorced when I was pretty young, then she married…," she hesitated as if she couldn't bring herself to say the word that was right at the tip of her tongue. She closed her eyes and let out a breath, "she married her second husband, which is what a stepfather is. Does that make sense?"

She didn't say it like she was mocking him and Ty realized that he really enjoyed learning more about the other planet, even if it was something that broke his heart even to think about.

"I guess. I mean, I get what you are saying, but I have to admit I don't really understand it. We don’t have divorce among the Denynso."

She looked surprised.

"You don't? Everybody just stays married no matter what?"

"Well, no. We don't get married. We bond. There is only one other person in the entire existence that can create a bond with each of us, and once we have found that mate and complete the bond, it is for life. There is no such thing as two mated people just deciding that they no longer want to be mates and then finding new mates. They are with their mates, or they are alone. That's just the way it is."

She got a soft, almost sad look in her eyes and Ty stopped walking so that he could turn her to face him. He wanted to be closer to her, just to look at her. The feelings building inside him were threatening to overwhelm him, and even though he felt guilty for even thinking about her that way, he needed to feel her near him.

"And they're happy?" she asked, looking up at him.

Ty nodded, reaching up to brush a strand of her dark hair away from her face. He traced the curve of her jawline with one fingertip. She was so beautiful. He had never seen any woman that looked like her, that was so breathtaking he literally couldn't stop looking at her.

"I have never seen Pyra, Gyyx, Ciyrs, or Ero as happy as they are now. Finding our mate is something that we look forward to our entire lives. We know that once we find her, we will be complete. The bond is something that can't be broken and I have never known a mated pair to ever be unhappy together."

"Never?"

"I mean, they argue, of course. There's always going to be bickering and disagreements between people who truly love each other. They don't last, though. Nothing keeps them from wanting to be together."

As they spoke their bodies had drawn closer to each other and Ty could see her trembling slightly. He touched her face again, bringing his fingers beneath her chin so he could tilt her face up to look at him again. He wondered if she could feel it too; if she understood what was happening between them and what it meant. She tilted her face so that her cheek pressed further into his palm and Ty started to ask her what she was feeling when he heard someone shouting his name from behind them.