“But first,” he continues, his hands beginning to move with renewed purpose, “I need to make sure my claim is thoroughly established. Once isn’t enough for a proper bonding.”
“How many times?” I ask breathlessly as he begins to rock his hips, stirring himself inside my oversensitive body.
“As many as it takes,” he growls, lifting me slightly so he can thrust deeper. “Until you’re so full of my seed that there’s no doubt you’re carrying my mark. Until the scent of our mating is so strong that any male who comes near you knows you’re claimed.”
His words send another spike of arousal through me, and I feel my body responding despite my recent climaxes. The claiming bite throbs with each movement, sending jolts of pleasure through our shared joining that make rational thought increasingly difficult.
“Show me,” I whisper, grinding down against him in a way that makes us both groan. “Show me what it means to be thoroughly claimed.”
His response is to flip us without warning, using his enhanced strength to reverse our positions so I’m pinned beneath him on the pilot’s chair. The sudden change makes me gasp, but the sound turns into a moan as he drives into me with renewed vigor.
“This is what it means,” he snarls, his golden eyes blazing as he claims me with ruthless intensity. “To be possessed completely. To belong to someone who will kill anyone who tries to take you away.”
The new angle allows him to go even deeper, and I arch beneath him as he fills me impossibly full. His enhanced stamina means he can maintain this pace indefinitely, and I feel his determination to wring every possible sensation from my willing body.
“Mine,” he growls with each thrust, the word becoming a mantra that drives us both higher. “Mine. Mine. Mine.”
And as he claims me for the second time, driving me toward another devastating climax while space flows past our windows and our future stretches ahead of us, I realize I’ve never been happier to belong to someone completely.
We may have escaped the asteroid field, but our claiming is far from complete. And as his movements become more urgent, more demanding, I realize I wouldn’t have it any other way.
This dangerous alien warrior wants me like I’m the center of his universe, and I’m more than ready to surrender completely to whatever he wants to give me next.
11
Post-Incident Analysis
Zola
Therefresherdoorslidesshut behind me with a soft hiss, and for the first time since Crash’s fangs pierced my throat, I’m alone with the magnitude of what just happened.
I stare at my reflection in the mirror, cataloging the evidence with the same methodical precision I use for safety inspections. Two perfect crescent marks curve along my throat, golden against my skin and still tender to the touch. They’re beautiful, in an otherworldly way, but they’re also permanent. Biochemically permanent. Legally permanent. Emotionally permanent.
“Okay, Cross,” I whisper to my reflection. “Let’s analyze this situation objectively.”
My engineering training kicks in automatically. When faced with an unprecedented event, you document everything, analyze the data, and develop a comprehensive understanding of what occurred. The fact that the unprecedented event in question involves alien bite marks and permanent interspecies bonding is... well, it’s just another variable to account for.
I pull out my datapad with shaking hands and navigate to the OOPS Employee Handbook. Might as well see exactly how many regulations I’ve just obliterated.
Section 7: Fraternization and Professional Conduct.
Subsection A: Relationships with clients are strictly prohibited during active contracts.
I stare at the text. Technically, Crash wasn’t a client—he was an inspection subject. Does that count? I scroll down.
Subsection B: Romantic or sexual relationships with subjects of active investigations are grounds for immediate termination and potential criminal charges in cases of coercion.
My stomach drops. Active investigation. That’s exactly what I was conducting when we... when we...
I scroll faster, desperately looking for some loophole, some clause that might apply to “accidentally bonded to aliengladiator during asteroid navigation while fleeing vengeful warrior.”
Subsection C doesn’t exist.
I stare at the empty space where guidance should be, where someone with more foresight than me should have written protocols for exactly this kind of situation. But apparently, no one at OOPS headquarters anticipated that an inspector might accidentally create a permanent biochemical bond with her inspection subject during a firefight.
I am literally off the handbook.
“Great,” I mutter, setting down the datapad. “I’ve achieved a new category of professional misconduct. They’ll probably name the new regulation after me. ‘The Cross Clause: In which inspectors are prohibited from mating with subjects regardless of atmospheric contamination, pheromone overload, or imminent death by alien warlord.’”
