She reaches up and lays her hand flat against the center of my chest, directly over the Aethel-weave shirt, directly over the heart that is beating fast enough to kill a human.
The contact is electric.
My scales ripple under her palm, sharp edges catching on the fabric, rasping against her skin. It must hurt—the heat, the friction—but she doesn’t pull away. I hiss, trying to pull back before I damage her, but she presses harder.
“You idiot,” she breathes, stepping into my space until her body brushes mine. “You absolute, dramatic, noble idiot.”
She slides her hand up, gripping the lapel of my shirt, yanking me down until our foreheads touch. I can feel the heat transfer, seeing the sweat bead on her brow, but she doesn’t flinch. She leans into the burn.
“I didn’t call you cargo because you’re a package,” she says fiercely, her eyes locking onto mine, stripping me bare. “I called you cargo because if I told Jax who you really were... if I told him that the way you look at me makes my knees weak, or that I’d burn down the entire Fringe before I let anyone touch you... he would have known.”
I freeze. The resonance stutters in my chest. The world narrows down to her mouth, her words.
“Known what?” I rasp.
“That I’m already gone.” Her eyes search mine, brave and terrified. “That I’m not just the pilot anymore. That I’m in this. With you. The monster and the noble and all of it.”
She runs her thumb over my cheekbone, smearing the grease she put there hours ago.
“I didn’t lie to protect the job, Rynn. I lied to protect the male.”
The leash snaps.
The realization crashes into me—she sees me. She sees the beast, the heat, the danger, and she isn’t running. She’s holding on. She wants the monster. She wants me.
I don’t think. I don’t plan.
I grab her hips, fingers digging into the flight suit hard enough to bruise, and haul her up against me. She gasps, a wet, desperate sound, wrapping her legs around my waist instantly, as if her body has been waiting for this exact moment.
I slam her back against the wall, the breath leaving her lungs in a whoosh.
“Say it again,” I growl, burying my face in the curve of her neck. I inhale deep—past the grease, past the ozone—finding her scent underneath. It’s intoxicating. It hits my brain like a narcotic, quieting the rage and replacing it with pure, unadulterated need.
“Rynn—”
“Say you’re in this.” I open my mouth, dragging my fangs lightly over the sensitive cord of her throat. I feel her shiver, a full-body quake that matches my own. “Say you’re mine.”
“I’m yours,” she sobs, hands fisting in my hair, pulling me closer. “I’m yours. I’ve been yours since the first malfunction. Since before the malfunction.”
That’s it. That is the permission my beast was waiting for.
I lift my head, looking at her one last time. My vision is swimming with gold and red. I want her to see me. Not the diplomat. Not the client.
“Then I am done pretending,” I rasp against her lips. “I am done being gentle. I am going to take you, Polly. I am going to mark you so deep that if another male comes within ten feet of you, he will smell my claim on your very soul.”
Her pupils are blown wide, mirroring mine. She doesn’t look scared. She looks ravenous.
“Do it,” she challenges, breathless and wild. “Stop talking and claim me, Lord Chaos.”
I roar—a low, guttural sound that rips from my throat—and capture her mouth.
It’s not a kiss. It’s a collision. It’s teeth and tongue and thirty years of starvation meeting a feast. She tastes like fire. She tastes like home. She moans into my mouth, her tongue meeting mine, demanding as much as I’m giving.
I turn, carrying her toward the captain’s quarters, not bothering to be careful. I shoulder the door open and kick it shut, sealing us in the dark.
The time for diplomacy is over.
Now, we burn.
