“Stop, Leila.” The screech pierced my head.

I scrambled to my feet, and ran, leaping over rocks and sprinting for the hills. That one thing I’d learned from last time was to minimize exposure to the surface.

“I said stop.”

I reached the base of the mountains, pulse thundering, and sprung up rock.

“Deceiver.” Macca’s voice amplified. “Traitor.”

There wasn’t time to argue, I had to make it to the cave. Sweat trickled off the end of my nose. My breaths amplified in the helmet. I reached the ledge to the cave in half the time it’d taken before.

A high-pitched sound cut through my skull. The world went bright. I went to a knee, almost slipping off the ledge, and grabbed the sides of the helmet.

The sound grew more intense. Pain drove into my temples as though my head expanded. “Stop, Macca. I can explain.”

The heat . It poured around me, in me, through me.

The frequency silenced.

“You have betrayed me, abandoned Prespherona, neglected your people.”

“You’re one to talk about betrayal.” I held onto the rock, and dragged myself to my feet. “Nonetheless, that’s not what’s happening.”

“You swore to help me.”

“I’m trying. I have a fucking plan.” I scooted sideways toward the cave. “If you calm the hell down, I can tell it to you.”

“I know your only plan human.”

Shade fell over me, giving relief from the burning sun.

“Your only true desire is for your warrior. You sacrifice us for him.”
“That’s not how it is.” But my chest panged. Because the first part was true. “Just listen for once would you.”

“I have listened, and listened, and listened. And I have learned. You are mindless to all but your feelings.”

I reached the entrance to the cave, and almost cried in relief as the air cooled. “I’m doing what I have to do.”

“You were the only human I trusted to protect Prespherona. The only I trusted to lead.”

The cave darkened, and green moss spread over the walls. I flopped down onto the floor and removed my helmet, dragging in lungful’s of fragrant air. “If you trusted me you’d hear me out now.”

“I trust you no longer. If your plan were true you’d have spoken of it.”

My blood still pumped at overtime. “I knew you wouldn’t agree.”

“You were correct. I do not agree. This is not your place. Your place was with us.”

I wiped the sweat from my face with a gloved hand. “Macca…”

“I will not risk Prespherona if alerting the Baratican to our presence is your clever plan. A highborn Crestonian is too valuable to them.”

“Macca just—”

“You have chosen.”

A sound droned.

I glanced up in the dark cave. “Wait, is the ship leaving?”

Silence met me. A deep and absolute silence.

“Macca?” I rolled up onto my knees. “Macca, are you there?”

My breath held. There wasn’t even the static in my ear, only an odd blankness.

The implant…it was off.

They’d left.

They’d left me alone here.

I swallowed. That was fine. Better they did.

Better they went and found their sanctuary. That wouldn’t change what I had to do here.

I reached for the cave wall, no lantern to light my way this time. Macca was right about one thing—I’d made my choice.

And there was no undoing it.

Pale blue light filtered through darkness.

Trickling water gave life to the quiet.

“Thor,” I called, then found my voice and called louder. “Thor.”

Light glittered off the cave walls and I increased my pace to the spring.

I collapsed to my knees and put my hands into the stream, slurping warm water through cracked lips. I washed my face, then removed the space suit from over my bodysuit.

Another sound added to the roar of water.

I leaped to my feet. “Thor?”

A beastly figure hunched at the entrance of the merging tunnel.

Fuck no. I stumbled back. Not again.

Not another horny alien. My foot slid in water. What if Thor didn’t win this fight?

My heart rioted.

The warrior snarled, slinking closer.

I almost wished I hadn’t called for him. Now he’d show up and have to battle for me a second time. The Baratican weaved toward me, his growl low, his movements more…my pulse rattled. More animistic than the other Baraticans.

I backed closer to the spring. That hole in the ground seemed pretty damn appealing right now. The warrior moved on all fours, sharp horns directed at me.

I inched to the tunnel.

A snarl froze me. My system jolted. Thank god, he wore his helmet.

Each Baratican has his own unique genetic linage… And this one. I gulped. Better I never saw how monstrous this one was.

The Baratican drew closer. “What doing here?”

My pulse quivered.

No . Nope. Couldn’t be.

“Thor?” My hand moved slowly, cautiously, to my chest. No, this creature couldn’t be him . “Is that you?”

“Told La La go.” The growling got sharper.

I stumbled back against the wall. No . This wasn’t my Thor.

My eyes stung. What had I done to him?

I scanned his hunched form. What had I reduced him to?

“Thor, it’s okay.” I held up my hands. “I came to tell you something.”

He straightened in one violent movement—all billowing fur and rearing helmet. “Not need hear untruths of yours.”

I gasped. Pain shuddered through me. But didn’t I deserve that?

Didn’t I deserve to be distrusted…

My mouth went bitter as poison. Didn’t Macca warn he wouldn’t want me now?

“I’ve been dishonest.” I reached behind me and tugged the tag at the back of my neck twice. “And now you worry my feelings are insincere.” The captains suit loosened. The thud of my heart boomed. He would hear it. He would’ve heard it a hundred times. “But there’s some things that can’t be pretended, and I think you know them. I think you know my secrets.”

The growling expanded.

His vibration shuddered under my feet. Supersonic . Like a helicopter gearing up to take off.

He hadn’t had his special juice…

For the first time since I’d gotten to know him—I was actually afraid of him .

“I know what you did.” I wet my lips. “I know you sent me away because I put myself in danger trying to leave.”

He fell back to all fours.

“Because you think that’s all I really want. To leave.”

His entire being shook. He blurred. Actually, fucking blurred with movement.

“Because you don’t want to hurt me. Even if not hurting me hurts you worse.” I found the courage somewhere to pry the suit from my shoulders, and pushed it to my waist. “But I don’t want to go. I don’t want to leave you. I don’t want you to hurt.”

He moved in a dash.

I grabbed the horns of his helmet as he materialized in front of me. “I didn’t speak false about one thing.” My fingers shook around the sharp horns but I managed to drag the helmet off him.

Thor knelt in front of me, head bowed.

“You won the courtship.” I tossed the helmet, and reached under his chin and released the clasp of his cloak. “I love you, Thor.”

His head snapped up.

The look on him almost stole my courage.

Wild . His gaze flickered with feral intensity. Was the man I knew even there?

“I love you the way you earned it.” I pushed the cloak off him. “With my mind, and my heart, and my body.” I moved to the suit at my hips and pushed it down. “Not mating you is the worst hurt I could have.”

He grabbed me. One hand on my hip, and pulled me to the dirt floor.

His body covered mine—hard, armored to invincible, and so fucking hot it burned.

“Please.” I grabbed his hair, slowing him. “Kiss me.”

He blinked, and in that instant the frenzy cleared, and I saw him—my lovely Thor.

His mouth slammed over mine.

I opened and all I could do was accept him. His wild, ferocious, warrior kiss. My jaw strained wide, and his long eye tooth caught my lip.

I tasted metal.

He grabbed my hair in his fist. My scalp stung. I took his passion, and drove my tongue into the heat of his mouth.

My chest flooded with feeling.

He reared back, tearing the suit off my ankles, and hauled my legs apart.

I shivered. He hadn’t had his suppressant. This wouldn’t be gentle the way he’d promised before. And for once I couldn’t care.

He dropped between my thighs, face to my belly, and breathed me.

Breathed me in as with a need-drenched shiver as though the joy of our closeness slayed him.

Then his growling ceased.

Something in me died.

He went still.

My heart kept beating but the sound turned off.

He rose over me.

I made my eyes stay open. Made myself watch him respond.

“La La, what did to you?” His features contracted in anguish.

The evil whisper in my head was back but this time only as a memory —so long as you could be bred.

Tears burned my face.

I breathed through my teeth. But I couldn’t say any of the things I wanted to. No explanations. I couldn’t say “I’m sorry”, because I wasn’t.

Macca was right. I didn’t want to be his breeder.

I wanted him to love me like I loved him.

Unconditionally .

He looked at me as though I’d put his Baratican steel right through his chest.

I gasped through the tears. There was only one thing I could bring myself to say. “Am I still your only, only?”

His expression flattened.

My chest felt wrenched open.

He grabbed my throat.

Oh, god. His strength was limitless. Each finger poised with deadly power, flexing at my neck.

“La La.” He shook with so much more than his usual vibration. “This love move forever than Warrior.”

I let out a sob, and gripped his shoulders.

He moved and with no preparation his cock pushed into me.

I gasped, body jerking. Too big, His cock shoved in. My flesh strained around him. But there wasn’t any amount of discomfort that could convince me to ask him to stop.

He pushed deeper.

I moaned, the stinging satisfying fullness crackling through me. He squeezed my throat. My heart seemed to beat into his grip, just for him.

He pulsed there, halfway in me.

I couldn’t take in the air to shout. The curve on his fucking cock. It hit right there . His growling resumed.

Vibration flooded my pussy.

“ Oh, no…” My back bowed. Not so fast .

He nudged up and up and up. Right there. Vibration streaked into my womb. My muscles seized. Pleasure rushed over me. I came around him, each contraction in my pussy making him that fraction too much—all over again.

He held me still with his hand, and used the new slickness to thrust right where he was, a little deeper each time.

A dangerous pleasure screamed with every pulse.

“Can’t.” I grabbed at him, whole body twisting. “God, Thor, I can’t take it. Not all the way.”

When the heck did I turn into a just-the-tip kind of girl?

He growled, and his hand moved to the back of my neck. My shoulders strained against his grip, but he pulled me up so I saw him—fucking alien Warrior twice my size—thrusting between my legs.

“Look see.” His other hand held my hip and he pushed from his hips. “We fitting.”

And I had to see it. Had to watch it. My soaked, still pulsing from orgasm, pussy stretching around the craziness of his length and girth—and taking it all.

He buried himself deep. My lungs filled with pressure.

I stared and my eyes could hardly connect the feeling with the sight.

He moved his hips, working in those last two inches that couldn’t possibly squeeze in.

“Holy shit,” I shouted, and grabbed the backs of my shaking thighs.

He had the mercy to remain still. “We fitting everywhere.”

My pussy strained to take him. His growling sped up and he released my neck. My head dropped back. His cock vibrated inside me, from base to fucking tip.

I screamed. Every enormous inch of him like a high-speed magic wand.

“Turn it off.” I dropped my thighs and slammed my palms against the ground, body bowing, abdominals contracting. “I can’t again.”

He dropped down over me, covering me, holding me still—so I couldn’t move, couldn’t get away from a single overwhelming sensation. He held firm and deep and vibrated there. The pressure in my lungs turned to a burn.

Tension snapped through me. My nerves streamed with a current of lightning bright pleasure. Climax seized me as though I took a million vaults.

I spasmed, shook in his inescapable grip, and gushed.

He growled and finally moved, pulling out then rocking into me, gliding his skin against the slickness between us.

I moaned and jerked.

“Want mate you like this.” He rubbed his pelvis into my slipperiness as though he’d won a final prize.

I gasped. Oh, the filthy primitive bastard. He wanted it wet and messy. Wanted to exploit the secrets he’d learned.

He thrust again. The pull and push of his cock, sent a magnet of energy tugging me in and out of my skin. “Will start mate you now.”

“Start?” I moaned, and tapped his shoulders. “Please finish, I can’t…”

Holy fuck . There was no taking more of this. My body no longer felt like a body.

I felt like a bundle of nerves and vibration—like at any moment that energy would spiral and I would no longer be .

“Did we mate on first meeting, would hurry passion.” He gave me a solid fuck. “But wife had no mercy.”

Sensation rocketed through me at the thrust. My eyes rolled back.

“Now will exact all desire on you.” He grabbed my hip and flipped me over, this time onto the sprawled cloak.

I landed on hands and knees in the very same spot he’d first laid the cloak out.

My dirt streaked hands fisted the fur.

He entered me savagely from behind. I fell forward. He caught me by the hair, keeping me up on my knees.

He fucked me like that, with deep fast thrusts just for him. I took him, body jostling, aching ecstasy drawing sharper and more blinding.

He did as promised, exacting his passion. I felt it with every pump, every tug of my hair, and each of his ragged groans—his desire for me.

He hauled me back against him. His arms went around me, and he pushed so deep the sensation bruised.

I sagged into his arms. His rumble softened, and he made a growling sound by my ear.

Sweat coated me, making me feel eel-like against him. Yet somehow, I didn’t slip in his arms.

His hands traveled over the front of me, gliding over my breasts, rubbing my nipples, until my skin buzzed.

I squirmed against him, his huge cock so deep, my pussy so crammed full, each shift knocked my lungs empty.

He held my throat and moved his other hand between my legs, and touched between my folds.

I moaned and sank back against him.

“Mate me, La La,” he pleaded into my hair. “Mate with me.”

He rubbed my slippery clit, and I bucked, jerking my hips, fucking him .

He went warm against me. I rocked myself up and down his cock until another impossible orgasm shattered me.

He fell to the side, turned me, and planted himself to his base.

I wrapped my leg over his hip.

He held the back of my neck, and he curled into me. His face hovered close to mine, his desperate gaze bringing me back to myself. “La La, say love.”

His skin heated hotter. Sweat rolled over my lips.

I press a hand to his chest. “I love you.”

He pushed up with his cock, hard, and held. The heat turned scalding—against me, inside me, on my neck where he gripped. “Love La La.” He groaned then pressed his mouth to mine.

I opened my lips against his, and kissed him. His whole body pulsed, and he came with a flood of hot wet vibration that turned the marrow in my bones volcanic.