“No,” she whispered, horror blooming in her. “You couldn’t have.”

“Every. Last. One.” Tane’s face stayed blank as he spoke. “We flew close in that unit, and when I lost myself, the fire spread. The males tried to protect their mates. There was fire everywhere. They all burned. The Arakids were next.”

Kinyi’s hands shook. She tried to hide them, but Tane saw her reaction. His jaw tightened, his gaze sliding to the surrounding boxes.

“Do you get it now?” he asked, voice raspy. “Why I can’t help you? Why I can’t go home? I’m dangerous, Kinyi. I kill anyone near me the moment I shift. I lost control of my Draqon long ago.”

Zayd wanted a bomb, and Tane was the definition of a bomb. The truth of the White Horn’s legend wasn’t what they expected or needed. He’d been right all along. He couldn’t come home.

“We need to get you out of here,” Kinyi said with a sudden rush of realization.

As if the battleship had heard her speak, a deep rumbling grew beneath their feet. A roar built around them, vibrating the metal casing of the storage bay.

“Those are the thrusters. We don’t have much time.” He wove his way toward the front of the ship, staying low, scanning all around him.

Kinyi lifted the gun and followed close behind to watch their backs. They couldn’t afford another soldier coming across them. The rumbling grew as they moved around the boxes. The sheer amount of food needed to feed the human army staggered Kinyi. They planned to remain on Kladuu for a while. There was no other reason they would need so much.

Tane picked up his pace, almost running. Kinyi smelled his mounting fear. She saw signs of it in the hard set of his shoulders and the way he looked around him less and less the closer they got to the scent of fresh air.

Grinding metal shuddered through the storage bay.

Kinyi nearly dropped the gun to cover her ears.

Tane turned and shouted at her.

She waved to her ears and shook her head.

“The ramp is closing!” he yelled. He whirled around and sprinted.

“Wait!” Kinyi shouted after him, but the overpowering sound devoured the word. She took off after him. “The humans! You can’t just run outside!”

But he didn’t hear her, and even if he had, she doubted he would have slowed. A deeper instinct drove him, and it screamed he couldn’t return home, no matter the cost.

They broke free of the rows of boxes, and Kinyi slowed, swinging the gun around in search of any soldiers. But the storage area loomed empty except for the massive, slowly closing ramp Tane was sprinting headlong for.

Kinyi stopped and lowered her gun. Her shoulders fell.

Tane flung himself at the ramp’s top opening as the last few feet closed. His body collided with metal hard enough to bend the ramp’s joints.

The door sealed. An empty silence settled over the storage area.

He slammed his hand against the ramp and yelled.

“Tane,” Kinyi said carefully. “I think—”

“No.” He paced away from the ramp, shaking his head. “There has to be another way out. We haven’t taken off yet. They just closed this door. That’s all.”

If another ramp was open, they would have smelled the fresh air, but she didn’t have the heart to point out that logic in the face of his desperate determination.

As he took off to circle the hold, a part of Kinyi’s brain told her to stay back and hide from any soldiers who might come in to inspect all the noise he was making. If the humans found her, her entire plan would be ruined. Tane was risking everything by running around and yelling.

She readjusted the gun in her hands and followed him to help search for a door—a door they both knew didn’t exist.

By the time they had circled around the entire storage area and returned to the same ramp that had closed Tane in, the scent wafting off the male Draqon had shifted. Kinyi hung farther back, her heart pounding as his anger grew.

At the closed ramp, his shoulders heaved and his fists clenched.

She took a few more steps back. It occurred to her that she was trapped inside a relatively small space with a shifter who had lost complete control of his Draqon mind and who couldn’t control his fire. He could kill her within a fraction of a second.

“Tane,” she said quietly. “You need to calm down. You can’t shift.”

“I have to get out of here.” The words were strained, hardly distinguishable from a growl.

“I don’t think that’s possible anymore.”

He whirled to face her and took a few rapid strides to close the distance between them. “Because of you. I’m stuck in here because of you.”

Kinyi fought the urge to point her gun at his chest. Would she do it? Would she pull the trigger to keep him from shifting and killing her? Or drawing soldiers to them and ruining her mission? She was so close. She was on a ship heading home. How far would she go to ensure she got back?

His eyes fell to the human killing machine in her hands.

Her finger flexed around the trigger.

When his gaze found hers again, she saw a glimmer in there. In her gut, she sensed he might actually want her to pull the trigger. He hated himself for what he’d done. He’d exiled himself from his home for it. For something a thousand other males had gone through before. But Tane was powerful enough that the consequences of his madness had been devastating.

She set the gun aside.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, holding out her hands. His chest heaved with labored breaths, and a few beads of sweat rolled down his dark, glistening skin. “I’m sorry you’re here. I’m sorry you have to go home. I know what that means for you.”

“You don’t! You have no fucking idea!”

“I can’t understand what you’re feeling, but I know Zayd and the new Queen will not hate you for what happened. That battle was a long time ago. Things have changed.”

“Not that much. Those Draqons are dead because of me. Nothing changes that.”

His violet eyes fractured around the words, and Kinyi’s heart twisted. What had she done in coming here? The legend of the White Horn wasn’t the hope they needed to save Kladuu. He was just a broken man fighting his own demons.

Seeing him that way calmed all her fears of him shifting and setting everything ablaze. She stepped into him and wrapped her arms around his waist. She buried her face against his chest. With every fiber of her being, she willed forth a sense of calm and soothing reassurance and everything she didn’t feel in that moment. But he needed it. Where her body touched his, she felt his tattered edges flapping loose in the wind, and she was the only one around to hold him together.

Even more, she wanted to. She wanted to grasp onto his torn seams and be the stitches that bound him back together. She could do that for him.

Her body relaxed into his, and she poured all the comfort she could out of her body and into his.

For a moment, he didn’t move. Then his arms came around her shoulders and his head settled on top of hers. A breath shuddered through him, and his weight settled heavily against her, but she was strong enough to hold them both up.

He pushed her hair out of the way and cupped the back of her neck with his broad, rough hand. She shivered at the contact of skin to skin. He cradled her to him, and a flicker of wonder sparked through her.

Even without shifting, they connected. If she focused hard enough, she could feel his nerves settling. His fear morphed into resolve. She sensed the strength in him picking up his pieces and pushing his fear back into the corner where it belonged.

Beneath their feet, the ship lurched.

Tane went to move away from her, his body instantly tensing, but she held him tightly, her arms like steel barriers around him.

The battleship swayed off the ground. The pressure built in the storage area as the ship picked up speed the higher it rose from the ground. Beneath the metal casing, the thrusters burned and roared, but the noise amounted to nothing more than a dull ache in the back of Kinyi’s teeth.

“Guess I won’t be making the evening’s fights.”

Kinyi lifted her head from his chest to gaze up at him. It was a good sign that he could joke, even if his voice sounded strained. “You can stay on the ship. No one has to know you’re on the planet.”

He frowned, his eyes searching hers. “But you came to Earth to bring me back.”

Her resolve was solid and unyielding. When had the line between Tane and Kladuu grown so hazy? She would have done anything for her home only days ago, but now she was willing to risk her entire planet for the man in front of her. “I know.”

“Kinyi,” Tane sighed.

He skimmed his fingers along her cheek to her bandaged face. His touch was cool and soothing, lessening the ever-present sting that plagued her skin around her missing scales. Was he doing that or was she imagining it?

“I won’t stay on the ship,” he murmured.

She nodded into his touch. “I’m sorry. This is all my fault.”

“We’ll figure it out. I just can’t shift.” His gaze burned with intensity. “No matter what, okay? I can’t. My fire … I can’t hurt anyone else.”

She spread her fingers above his heart. She thought she felt it—not just his heartbeat, but his actual heart. The scars on it. The ache in it. The way it couldn’t beat without the echo of pain and guilt and horror. She pressed her fingertips into his flesh.

Slowly, she lifted her eyes back to his. “I won’t ask you to. I promise.”

He dipped his chin. Carefully, like it was their first time, he brought his lips to hers. He kissed her lips slowly, with a tenderness she hadn’t realized he possessed. When she opened her lips to him, he tipped her head back and took her mouth fully.

The ship had risen high enough that the auto-stabilizers kicked in. The only sign that they were moving came from the slight vibrations in the floor. The pressure in Kinyi’s chest had nothing to do with the atmosphere they were flying through as the ship maintained breathable air pressure.

It was just Tane.

She wrapped an arm around his neck to pull herself farther up his body and stood on her tiptoes to reach him better. His hand skimmed down her ribs to her hip and around to her lower back. He pressed her hips against his, his cock hard and ready for her. Her breath hitched in her throat.

She moaned against his mouth. Her core ached with need. She was already dripping wet for him, her body trembling with desire. No other male had made her so desperate with desire before. Not like this. She’d never ached for anyone as much as she ached for Tane.

A powerful scent swept from Tane’s pores, one Kinyi had never smelled before. His kisses turned feverish. He grabbed her waist and lifted her so she could hook her legs around his hips.

Wrapped around him, she felt every inch of his massive cock. She ground against him, pulling louder growls from his mouth as he carried her to the nearest box. He’d barely set her on top of it before he reached for the hem of her shirt.

She lifted her arms so he could tug it over her head, the tight material peeling off her skin. Her breasts tumbled free, her nipples painfully hard. Tane dropped her shirt and cupped her breasts, his hands so large on her body. She arched into his touch, keeping her legs wrapped around him.

He lowered his mouth to her skin, tonguing the point of each nipple until she was panting. She raked a hand through her hair and watched as his attentive mouth explored her breasts.

“More,” she hissed, reaching down to unbutton her pants and then his.

He jerked his shirt over his head, material tearing, and tossed it aside. When he stepped back and dropped his pants, Kinyi sat up, her eyes stretching wide at the sight of his erect cock. It was velvety and dark, veins pulsing to the head, which already glistened with a delicious bead of pre-cum. Her pussy clenched with a vicious desire to have him inside her, stretching every inch of her tight body, and pumping her full of his seed.

She jerked her pants down. When they were around her knees, Tane stepped in, one hand on her bare hip, the other on her pants. His violet eyes met hers as he pulled her legs free.

Kinyi couldn’t look away from him if her life depended on it. He let her pants fall to the ground before dragging his hand back up her legs, fingers skimming along her calf to the inside of her knee, and then to her thighs. He pushed her legs apart with his hand, and she spread herself for him as he looked down at her core.

She leaned back on her elbows and shamelessly let her knees fall farther open, baring herself to him. With a cocked eyebrow, he met her eyes.

“You smell delicious,” he said, his voice a low rumble in the back of her throat.

She smirked. “I know.”

When he finally touched her, her head fell back and she gasped. Her pussy lit up with fiery desire beneath his fingers as he spread her lips and circled her clit with his thumb. He pushed one finger and then two inside her. Her hips bucked against the sudden sensation, her core clamping down on his fingers as he moved inside her, gliding in and out.

“Fuck, Kinyi.” He watched as he finger-fucked her, her hips rolling to match his ministrations.

Drawing his attention, she cupped her breast and rolled her nipple between her fingers, squeezing until she made herself gasp from the pain that shot straight to her pussy.

He growled with approval.

Sliding his fingers free, he brought them to his mouth and sucked off her wetness. His eyes went completely black, and a tingle swept down her spine, making her shiver. She tasted his partial shift in the air, along with the undercurrent of madness as he licked his fingers clean.

“Tane,” she warned.

He ignored her and took his cock in one hand. He brought the head to her wet folds and slid himself along her, slicking himself with her desire.

Kinyi threw back her head with a hiss. She needed him inside her. Her pussy hurt with the desperation.

“Tane,” she begged, not caring about the madness circling like electricity that tasted like fire on her tongue.

She wanted him to burn her. She wanted his fire. She wanted his everything.

“Fuck me.” She reached up and raked her nails down his chest.

The head of his cock pushed at her opening, and he slid a fraction inside her. Just enough that she stretched painfully wide before he pulled back. White stars burst across her vision. He brought himself back and pushed inside a little deeper with the roll of his hips.

Kinyi’s mouth fell open as she looked between her legs, watching just an inch of his huge cock push inside her. He pulled out, the head gleaming from her pussy. She had at least nine more inches of his cock to go, and she already felt stretched.

Her eyes met his.

Whatever he saw in her expression made him grin wickedly.

He jerked her hips closer with one easy pull so she teetered at the edge of the box. She slid off her elbows, her head falling back against the box’s wooden slats. Tane loomed over her, between her legs, his cock right at her entrance.

He raked his hand up the center of her body, between her breasts and to her throat, pressing down only slightly before he reached her mouth. He pushed two fingers between her lips, and she sucked on them, pulling them deep into her mouth and tasting herself on his skin.

“No screaming,” he commanded.

Her mouth was too full to respond.

He thrust inside her.

Kinyi’s vision went black. She threw back her head, and Tane’s fingers pulled free from her mouth. He began to move at a feverish speed, stroking in and out, sending her into a free-fall of sensations.

She had never felt so full in her life. He stretched her around his massive cock and hit places inside her she didn’t even know existed. Her back arched off the box, and a long, slow moan rolled up from her throat.

She focused her eyes on Tane. His abs flexed with every thrust, and a bead of sweat rolled down the valley between his powerful chest muscles. When his eyes met hers, he clenched his jaw, his nostrils flaring around the scent their bodies created together.

Kinyi lifted her hips to match Tane’s thrusts. His hands went to her waist to guide her movements. With each stroke deep inside her, he picked up speed until their bodies slammed together, and a scream built at the back of Kinyi’s throat.

Tane adjusted his angle and struck a place inside her that had her pussy clamping around his cock as waves of pleasure rocketed up from her core. He hissed, and the smell of madness spiked in the air around them.

Kinyi felt their connection then. As he rocked inside her, she sensed his desperation: the wild urge to shift, at least partially, and fuck her as his Draqon despite his terror of doing just that and burning her alive. He wanted to go slow and savor the feeling of her, but the need to take her, to claim her, to mark her was too strong.

It was a tangled disaster inside his brain, but one thought resonated loudest. He wanted to know what it felt like to have her on his back, riding him through the skies.

Pressure built at the base of Kinyi’s spine, pulling her from Tane’s head. It ignited her bones and stole her breath. Her orgasm built from the deepest place inside her. She had just enough time to clamp her hand over her mouth before it took her, and she screamed into her palm, her eyes clenched shut, her body at Tane’s mercy as he pounded into her.

When she came, she felt like she was flying. Like she’d shifted forms and taken to the skies.

Tane slammed once more inside her before he came too, his cum shooting deeply into her. When he was finished, he bent over her, panting. He rested his hands on the box beside her hips while she fought to get her breathing back to normal.

“Put your hands up!” someone shouted from behind Tane.

Tane jerked out of her and spun around. Kinyi scrambled off the box. Before she could step around Tane to see what was going on, his arm went out to hold her behind him.

“Put your hands up. Slowly.”

She peeked around Tane’s shoulder and saw a line of soldiers staring at them with their guns pointed right at Tane’s chest. There were too many to fight. Even if Tane could shift, they would shoot them almost instantly.

She’d been so lost in Tane that she hadn’t scented the humans.

With no other option, Kinyi raised her hands.