Eventually, her strength gave out.Her heart pounded a mile a minute in her chest, her body completely winded from the fight since she hadn’t exerted it enough since she’d been captured.Her muscles felt weak, underused.
And she was crying.Deep sobs racked her body as she tried to catch her breath.She was finally breaking down.This was her tipping point.Finally.
“Female,” the alien hissed.He sounded almost…tormented, which couldn’t be right.“Stop this.”
His strong grip gentled on her wrists, but he didn’t release her.It was then that Cara realized how closely they were pressed together.The entire lines of their bodies were flush with one another.
Again, despite everything, she felt that little flame of need, of desire.
Cara stilled against him.Like a bucket of ice cold water dumped over her head,thatwas enough to dry up her tears.She must really be messed up from her time at the Pit to feel that way about her newest captor, the most fucked up case of Stockholm Syndrome.
Panic made her rear back.Or at least try to.But he had a good grip on her still and what she hadn’t realized was that her previous struggle against him had loosened her hood just slightly.
And when she reared back, only to have his grasp stop her?
Her hood came tumbling off.
* * *
It happened just like in the tales he’d listened to as a youth.Stories that Devix had passed off as false, even though he’d listened with raptness, with focus.
Because the moment he saw the face of his fated mate, hisluxiva, the one female in the entire universe that the Fates had chosen for him…it was like something snapping into place.Except, instead of a gentle snap, it was a roar in his ears.It was his blood rushing beneath his veins, his Instinct wakening fully, unfurling in his chest with a rightness that shocked him.It was his cock hardening to a point of pain and a desire that made his head swim.
But more importantly, it was a calmness.It was like his mind was saying,there you are, nothing else matters now.
Except Devix knew that wasn’t true.
His female’s face looked impossibly soft.Golden hair tumbled around her shoulders, still wet from her bath.Her wide brown eyes stared up at him in shock, little hairs fanning out from her lids that he found…mesmerizing.Her nose was small, the tip upturned slightly.And her lips…they were pinkened from her exertion, her top lip slightly fuller than the bottom.
Everything about her was…perfect.Strange, but perfect.
Just as a feeling of elation, of completeness, of lust, of contentment filled him, so did dread.
He had finally found his fated mate.
And she belonged to another male.Devix would be handing her over to Sarkon, in exchange for his peace, for his freedom that he’d begun to build for so long on Rozun.
Because Devix knew that if he didn’t return with the female in his grip, Sarkon would stop at nothing to destroy him, to destroy the life he’d been building for the last six rotations.
He had finally found his mate…and he couldn’t keep her.
His Instinct roared in mourning within him.
“You should rest,” he found himself saying, releasing her immediately.His voice was unrecognizable to his ears.He realized it was also the voice of his Instinct, of the beast inside, making itself known.
The female stumbled away from him towards the sleeping platform.Already, the short distance between them made him feel…unhinged.He stopped himself from going after her and set himself up in the small chair in the corner of the room.
Her quiet voice reached his ears.He didn’t look at her, which was the most difficult thing he’d ever done.
“Where will you sleep?” she asked.
“I will not sleep this night.Now, rest,” he ordered gruffly.His hands shook when he retrieved the tin of travel rations from the floor.
Out of his peripheral vision, after a moment of stillness, she settled onto the sleeping platform.The spike of lust that raced through him almost made him groan out loud, but he clenched his jaw so tightly it ached instead.
The room was quiet as his female tried to find sleep.She struggled at first.Every now and again, he perceived her looking at him, as if wondering if he would do anything to her in such a vulnerable state.
She didn’t trust him.
