And yet, somehow, despite his worry, Asier still burned for her. Were she not halfway to hypothermic shock, he’d have her impaled on his cock right now. The mental image sent a bolt of lust through him, shaming him. He clenched his jaw, clenched his entire body, and shoved away the feeling.
He unslung his arc rifle, leaning it against the wall of the cave. He reached into his jacket and pulled out an incendiary ring. He set it on the ground in the middle of the cavern. After a second of searching, he found a flat rock that fit into his palm. He brought it down on the ring in a heavy strike. Green flame shot out from the ring immediately, making the human jump.
Asier pulled his hand away before the flames grew hot enough to burn him. He backed away until he hit a stone wall, then sank down to sit, as far from the human as possible. She shivered and trembled on the other side of the fire, staring into the green flames with eyes still dazed from his toxin.
Within minutes, the small cavern was as warm as an engine room. Asier flicked a quick glance at the human. Best not to stare too long, if he didn’t want to be sucked into her beauty again. She still shivered, but not so violently any more. The dampness of her flight suit would be an advantage now, conducting heat quickly. Eventually, it would dry. She would be safe.
For now.
“My name is Asier Mor-Talis.” He spoke once again in the traders’ language. It was the only language he knew that a human might also speak.
She lifted dazed eyes to his face. There was no comprehension in them.
But he had to try to explain things to her while she was calm. Whether she was sober enough to comprehend, to care, to remember, was not certain. Whether she even understood the language he was speaking was another question. But he had to try.
“I am a Scaeven—a race that has had contact with humankind in the ancient past, but no longer does. You were abducted by Scaeven criminals. I am not one of them. I will not hurt you. When we can return to my ship, I will transport you to safety.”
She tilted her head, staring at him dreamily. Her gaze dropped down to the flickering green flames, and an absent smile curled her lips. The color had come back to them, lush and pink once again. Her silken hair had come free of its braid. It spilled over her shoulders in soft waves, reflecting emerald as it dried before the fire.
Asier tore his gaze away. He stared down at his boots. “What is your name?” If he got her to speak, cajoled her into the analytical portions of her brain, maybe she could resist his toxin in the same way he fought against the lure of her pheromones.
She didn’t answer him. She continued to smile dreamily. He felt it like a gentle touch as her eyes drifted over the contours of his hard face.
“What are you called?” he tried again.
“Lyra Hallas,” she answered finally, distantly. Her voice was soft and light, markedly feminine. More importantly, she spoke the trader’s language. That was a good start.
“Lyra,” he repeated, testing it on his tongue.
She stirred at the sound of her name in his mouth. Her gaze traced lazily over his body. Her smile curled a little more. “You’re very big.” She shifted her weight to sit on her hip, one slender leg draped over the other, one arm braced on the ground. She toyed with her zipper, dragging it down slowly to reveal a V of creamy skin. Her eyes glittered in the firelight. “Very big.”
Asier closed his eyes against the sight of her. A hot rush ran through him. His cock stood at full attention.
He heard a small noise, and opened his eyes again. Lyra had gotten to her feet. She circled the fire, coming towards him. Asier lurched up, backing away from her.
“The feeling you have right now,” he said hoarsely, “it’s a toxin from my body. It’ll pass. If we just—”
She lunged for him.
He dodged out of her way, and she caught herself against the wall of the cavern with a giggle. The sound of it ran over his skin like fingertips. He shivered. Straining for self-control, he moved to put the fire between them again.
Lyra turned to face him, leaning insouciantly against the cavern wall. She watched him with hungry eyes. Heat suffused his entire body. His cock throbbed.
He wasn’t going to make it.
She pushed off the wall and started towards him. She took sedate, exacting steps, her eyes pinned on him. He backed away slowly. Outside the cavern opening, the storm raged. The rain had turned to hail the size of Lyra’s fists. There was nowhere for him to go.
“You don’t want this,” he rasped. The effort of making himself back away, instead of grabbing her and ripping the flight suit off her body, was going to kill him. “You’re under the influence—”
She leapt for him again.
He staggered backwards. His heel hooked against a protruding rock, and he crashed to the ground.
Asier was far from a clumsy or weak, but in the last hour, a fragile little human had knocked him on his ass more times than anyone else had done in the last ten solars combined.
Before he could rise, she was on top of him. Her small hands were braced against his chest. Her soft thighs straddled his waist, the hot core of her bearing down on his unrelieved erection.
He groaned and fell back, helpless. He was going to fail. He was going to betray his own honor, betray his principles, betray the laws he upheld. Worst of all, he was going to betray the human he’d meant to protect.
He covered his mouth and nose with his hand. It was a pitiful, last-ditch effort to block the influence of her pheromones, to prevent her from taking in more of his toxin. But the slow grind of her pelvis was a maddening, exquisite torture. The sweet friction of her body would break him. And he would enjoy every second of it.
She gazed down on him with glazed eyes and a crooked smile. He stared back at her, an addled mixture of shame and need. Green flames reflected off her her pale skin in shifting patterns, making her delicate beauty even more ethereally unreal. Their eyes met, and held for a long, taut moment.
Very slowly, the glassiness lifted from her gaze.
She stopped.
Chapter Four
Lyra remained as still as a statue, straddled across the big male. Her body pulsed with need, but the agony in his gaze cut through the intoxicating arousal. She needed him—needed to taste him, to feel him, to have him inside of her.
But she also needed her humanity. He had begged her not to do this. Even with his hand over his mouth, he pled with his eyes.
Moving stiffly, she slid off of him. She let out a pained mewl as her inflamed core slid across the stone-hard contours of his body. On the ground, she rolled away from him. She ached with unsatisfied arousal. Her flesh felt unbearably cold where only a moment ago she’d felt the hot press of his iron skin. She crawled away from him, too shaky to stand, and slumped against the cavern wall on the other side of the fire.
He remained where she’d left him, flat on his back, staring up into the dark of cavern. Lyra’s gaze roved hungrily over him. He was so very big and muscular. So intensely male.
Like the others of his kind, he had skin the color of the landed meteorite—dark gray, but faintly lustrous. His hair was silvery-white, shaved on the sides, long on the top, and braided down the back of his neck to where it reached his shoulders. His eyebrows, thick and straight, were the same color, and he had a couple inches of silver beard growth.
She touched her cheek, remembering the feel of that thick, coarse beard against her skin. His face was brutishly hard, with a hawkish nose and wide, firm lips. Behind those lips, she knew, were wickedly long, sharp canine teeth that would put a leopard to shame. Her lip still hurt where he’d pierced her, but it was a pleasant pain that only made her constantly aware of her mouth. And his.