“I’m not buying it. Maybe it’s part of the truth, but it’s not the whole truth. Tell me why you’re here, Davix. Now.” His hands move so quickly that it takes me a moment to figure out what he’s saying. “What?” I ask. He repeats the motion. “Yeah, I get it,” I say with a wave of my hands. “What do you want me todo?” He slashes his hand across his chest in a sign I have come to learn is his emphatic no. “Now you don’t want me to do something? I don’t understand what you are saying. You want me? To what?” I stare at him expectantly as he signs the words slower this time, but it still doesn’t make sense. I’m about to tell him so, when I am suddenly swept up in his arms with his face pressed against the hollow at the base of my throat and his arms wrapped tightly around me. Any words I might say die in my throat as his warm, wet tongue extends to lick a line from the base of my neck to my chin.
Chapter Thirty-Nine: Davix
There are no words in my hand language for what I want, what I need, to tell Corrina. I am not sure I could explain it even with the voice I lost years ago, because I am not sure I fully understand it myself. The sound of her laughter brings joy to my heart, her smile warms me from within, her voice soothes and comforts me like the feeling of being curled into the nest with my brood brothers. The smallest touch of her bare skin to mine thrills me, and those rare occasions when I have held her in my arms before stirs up a desperate desire to never let her go. I crave her physically in a way I have never craved another even in the throes of breeding. And the sight of Slade with his hands and lips on Corrina drives me to madness. It should be my hands against her skin, my mouth on hers, my name on her lips, and my arms clutching her tightly. I run my tongue along her neck again, and the taste of her sends a shiver down my spine and a jolt to my cock sheath.
I back her against a tree, bracing her against it so that my hands can slide to her legs and wrap them around my waist. I bury my face in her neck, breathing in her scent as I bring one hand up topull her hair free from its restraint. As the long black and silver strands cascade over my hand, I tangle my fingers through her hair and tilt her head back to expose more of her neck to my exploring tongue. She lets out a shuddering sigh, but then she is pushing my shoulders back.
“Put me down,” she demands. I lower her gently to the ground, and she shoves me backwards. “You can’t, you can’t just do that,” she sputters. “You can’t just pick me up and, and lick me. What are you even doing? What is that supposed to mean?”
“I want you, Corrina,” I sign. “I care for you, and I want you.” I will her to see the truth in my eyes, in my body.
“No,” Corrina protests. “No, you’re not interested in sex with humans. You’re not interested in sex at all.”
“I am interested in you,” I agree. “Not others. Just you, Corrina.”
“No,” she says again weakly. I go to reach for her, and she jerks away from me. Seeing her flinch from my touch is like ikis venom straight into my chest. “Davix, I, I can’t talk to you right now. I need time. I need to think.” She turns abruptly and hurries down the path. She is in such a rush that she doesn’t even notice Krish or Zann watching her from the branches overhead on either side of the path. I am not the only one who did not like the thought of her alone with Slade, though neither of them got as close as I did.
“Why is Corrina upset?” Krish asks, dropping from a tree a moment later. I know he would have watched her until she was in sight of the base.
“Did Slade upset her?” Zann asks. “I watched him leave, but he was alone and seemed distracted.”
I shake my head, angry at myself for upsetting Corrina and even more angry that I now have to explain my actions to my brood brothers. “I held Corrina in my arms,” I begin. “I tried to tell her how I feel.”
Zann’s eyes widen. “What do you mean?”
“That I care about her. That I desire her,” I sign quickly.
“And this upset her?” Krish asks. I nod. “But I do not understand. She knows that you, that we all, care for her.”
“I do not know,” I sign and then I suddenly remember something that she said to Slade. I frown and struggle to remember precisely what she said. “Corrina said something about not wanting someone who could breed another without emotion. That is why she sent Slade away.”
“You think Corrina thinks we could not be suitable partners because we bred females in the past without being close to them?” Zann asks incredulously. “But she has never expressed any disgust with our culture or our ways before. She has asked many questions.”
“Perhaps it is different for her,” Krish offers. “Perhaps it is different for one who would want to be with her.”
“I do not know,” I sign. The taste of her skin still sings in my mouth, but her anger and frustration are like a rock in mystomach. “I should not have tried to tell her,” I sign angrily. “I am a fool.”
“You are not a fool,” Zann says, pulling me closer to him. He wraps his arms around me and then pulls Krish closer as well. “Krish or I will speak to her. We will find out what is wrong, and we will fix it.”
“What if she doesn’t want us?” Krish asks softly. “What if we disgust her?”
Zann sighs heavily. “I do not know,” he says softly.
Chapter Forty: Corrina
I barely see where I am going or who I am passing as I hurry through the base towards my quarters. I’m fairly certain that I ignore some people greeting me, but I desperately need to be alone. As I close the door to my quarters, I begin to pace. I rub my hands along my arms. It is like I can almost still feel Davix’s hands on me, feel the wet warmth of his tongue on my skin. I close my eyes as a shiver passes through me. He said that he wants me. Just as I was starting to make peace with the idea that while my feelings might seem reciprocated at some level that there was no chance of a sexual relationship, Davix announces that he wants me. I rub my face with my hands. I don’t think I mistook his words or his actions. The way he wrapped my legs around him. I close my eyes and shudder again at the memory of his hard frame pressed against me, at even the tiniest friction against my core as I tightened my legs around him. I want him so badly that it hurts, and yet I don’t know if I could handle if sex were just an itch for Davix to scratch once. It would be easier to never be with him physically at all than to have that and then lose it. Not to mention how to deal with Krish and Zann. If it’s possible that either of them feel the same way as Davix, I don’t know how I could possibly choose between them.
The console in my room chirps and I answer it. “Hey, Commander. Krish is at the gate asking to come see you,” says a voice through the speaker. “Want me to let him through?”
“No,” I answer immediately.
“Say again?” the voice asks. I can hear the uncertainty in the speaker’s voice. The haleens don’t have a blanket pass to access the base, but I’ve never denied them entry before.
“I’ve got other commitments at the moment, so it’s not a great time,” I lie. “Access temporarily denied.”
“Yes, ma’am,” the voice replies and then the connection goes dead.
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