She gasps, arms locking around my neck, and the small surrender of her body against mine goes straight to the oldest part of me. I carry her through the connecting door to my private quarters, space I have never shared, never needed or wanted to share. It’s furnished with the spare efficiency of someone who has treated Earth as assignment rather than a home. The outer room opens in quiet layers: low seating, dark wood, a narrow kitchen I barely use, a staircase leading to the sleeping level above. I take her up because instinct demands height, privacy, defensible ground, and most importantly her comfort. The door seals behind us with a soft hiss, and I set her on the edge of my bed.
The ring on my hand pulses once with a flash warning. I deactivate it before a hologram appears. I put it in a drawer. No brothers. No work. No interruptions. For the first time since arriving on this planet, I become entirely unreachable.
Beatrice sits with her hands braced behind her, blouse half-unbuttoned from our collision against the desk, copper-brown skin gleaming as she pants. She does not look fragile. She looks curious, aroused, and alive in a way that makes the room irrelevant. Her gaze tracks me as I drink her in. Withoutthe blue-tinted shield of my glasses, the vision becomes more intimate, her dark skin softens with a peachy undertone. I lick my lips. I have never drooled a day in my life, but I’m afraid that today will be the first of many firsts with her.
Her breath catches.
No fear enters her scent.
Only want.
"Your ears," she says, voice lower now. "They're moving faster."
"They respond to you." I say and begin on my buttons, methodical despite the tremor in my fingers. "Every sound you make. Every shift in your breathing. Your pulse beating against the thin skin of your throat." My shirt falls open, then down my arms, and her gaze moves over the blue-violet flush deepening across my chest. "I am exquisitely sensitive in this state. You could destroy me with a whisper."
She laughs, sharp and surprised. "You? Destroyed?"
"Watch."
I take her hand, and guide it to my ear, to the delicate outer ridge already rotating toward her touch. Her fingers brush me, barely more than curiosity, and pleasure arcs through my nervous system with the force of a blow. My breath breaks. My cock strains painfully against my trousers.
"Oh." Wonder enters the word. Wonder and power. "That's—"
"Again." Diplomacy abandons me. "Harder."
She grips the ridge between thumb and forefinger, and the sensation detonates a response that predates speech. I sway toward her, catching myself with one hand on the mattress, the other closing on her hip with force I immediately check.
“Sorry—"
"Don't apologize." Her grip tightens. My groan leaves me raw. "I want to see you like this. Uncontrolled. Real."
I am real. With her, more real than I have been in any boardroom, any council chamber, any royal transmission where duty required a carved face and bloodless decisions. At this moment, I’m not a CEO, diplomat, or prince. I’m just Skylor. Male. Mate-sick and desperate, offering the one thing I have denied every being on this planet: access to what lives beneath the blue skin.
The remaining buttons of her blouse open beneath my fingers. Lace appears. The swell of her breasts. The dark berry peaks of her nipples visible through the thin fabric. Her scent intensifies, omega sweetness cutting through the coffee and musk of my own arousal, and I lower my mouth to the skin of her collarbone, the hollow of her throat, the racing pulse that begs for teeth.
"Skylor." My name breaks in her mouth. "I need—"
"What?" I pull back enough to hold her gaze. "Tell me. Demand it. I am yours to command in this."
The battle in her eyes scars something in me. Desire against shame. Want against long practice in denial. The woman who has learned to suppress every hunger warring with her omega side which will not be denied.
"Touch me," she whispers. Then, stronger, "Please. I ache. I've never—no one's ever made me—"
The pieces align before she finishes.
I still force my hands to gentleness while my body screams claim, mark, possess. "Beatrice."
Her gaze flicks away.
"No." She hinted at this, but it’s not possible. My hand cups her cheek, guiding her back. "Stay with me. Has anyone touched you? Anyone at all?"
The shake of her head is almost small enough to miss. "I dated. I tried. But when it came to—" She gestures, helpless and angry at the same time. "They didn't want me. Not really. Not enough to—" Her jaw tightens. "I was chubby growing up. The bullyingwas exactly what you'd expect from creative little monsters with internet access and no home training. You don't need my trauma narrative. The point is, no one chose me. No one ever chose me."
How could that fucking be?
Her aura has always burned clean, gold, stubborn, and bright, but now its shape makes cruel sense. The sharp tongue. The competence polished into armor. The professional distance. The refusal to be ornamental in any room. All of it protecting a girl taught that her body was wrong, her desires unwelcome, her presence something to justify and defend.
"Earth men are blind." No other answer makes sense. "Weak, stupid, and blind."
