“Vorgshit.” Though one couldn’t characterize an entire race as one thing or another, most Xaal were proud by nature. Many would freeze to death before asking for another to warm them. If they were weak enough to die by the cold, they didn’t deserve to be saved—that was how they would see it. “And we aren’t comrades.”
He shifted, and she felt every solid curve of muscle flex beneath her. “It would have been a poor death,” he said after a time. “The High Huntress of the Minad, the greatest warrior of her faction, defeated by poor swimming skills.”
“I know how to fucking swim.” He knew that better than anyone. He’d gone dive-fishing with her in oceans across the galaxy. “The water was freezing and my body wouldn’tlisten. Did you save me just so you could trap me here and badger me to death?”
“No.”
“Then why? I’d rather be dead than deal with you.”
“I saved you,” he rumbled, “because only I have the honor of killing you.”
It sounded like a vow. A shiver moved down her spine. “You’re really set on dying by my hand, aren’t you?”
He made a noncommittal noise. “Perhaps if this Corros Xaal of yours had trained harder with you, you would have been able to survive the cold water.”
“Are you calling me weak?” The conversation was so at odds with the way they were pressed to each other. The way heheldher.
“If that is how you take it.”
Vessa cursed. Her brain was not at full capacity, she told herself. That was why she was having such trouble finding her usual wit. “How often have you dreamed of this, then?” she asked, more to have something to say so he didn’t have the last word than anything else.
“What?”
“Me naked on top of you, at your mercy?”
He stilled beneath her before his voice came out in a dark purr. “Do you really want the answer to that?”
Oh.
She was suddenly too aware of it all. His warmth flooding into her, life-sustaining yet intimate, their hearts synced in a triune choir declaring they lived. Out of the five years they’d practically spent all their time together, she had pinned him or been pinned by him countless times. This wascloser. The mixed coloring of their skin was a complex abstract. Art. His dark blue against her brown was more beautiful than it should be. But she supposed all dark oceans must meet earth somewhere. His warm, rough hand squeezed the back of her naked thigh. He was so close to the curves of her ass, and his long fingers were nearly between her legs.
Vessa gritted her teeth. There was a time she had yearned to be this close to him. That it was happening now, after everything...
This had to be some cruel cosmic joke. Nothing could ever be simple with Kedar. Not even a gods damn blood challenge.
“That’s it,” she grumbled, and, sitting up with her arm banded across her chest, she pulled her leg from over him. And her foot brushed against—
His cock. His very hard, very large cock.
He had on some thinner underlayer that left nothing to the imagination. The sheer size of him seemed to be too much for her brain to process, and she sat frozen for a second too long.
“It’s natural,” he rumbled. “It means nothing.”
“Natural,” Vessa echoed. She almost told him nothing that big belonging to a male was natural, but thought better of it. No need to stroke his ego—thatwas big enough.
She settled beside him with her back against his side. It was, admittedly, not as warm, but it was far better than being pressed against him like a lover exhausted from a tryst. Especially now that she knew he was hard.
She’d only ever known he was aroused once before. After the war with the Zaram and before the Elders decreed their separation, her faction held a celebration and invited his clan. The Night of Strength honored Luron, the goddess of battle, and the faction’s might. There had been music, dancing, and games. One such game was played in which partners must finish an entire tankard of the heady and potent enna liquor by drinking at the same time. If one stopped, they both lost. She’d partnered with Kedar, but since Xaal required special cups that allowed them to drink while being masked, she’d been forced to sit in his lap—straddling him while facing him so she could use her makeshift straw.
When they finished—having won, of course—she’d thrown her arms around his neck and cheered. Except the momenthad turned into something else. She could feel his hard length straining beneath her. It was the spirits that had caused her to grind against him; the spirits, certainly, that had caused him to let out a hungry growl only she could hear. In that heated moment, as they stared at each other, the world had disappeared around them. But then he’d grabbed her hips and stood up with her, setting her down on her feet as if she were a fire about to consume him.
It was a mistake.
Whatever interest had been there hadonlybeen because of the enna liquor. He hadn’twantedher. Not truly. Not like she had wanted him.
This moment was nothing, too. That she knew for certain. He probably had a mate waiting for his return, and she wanted nothing more than to be rid of him.
“So, if you survive me, are you going to tell your mate about this?” she asked to sate her curiosity. “Holding another woman naked in an ice cavern, even for survival, sounds a littletooromantic.” Her teeth were already beginning to chatter.
