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“It isn’t so large that I couldn’t— If you wish for me to separate us…”
I smiled against his collarbone. “Stay,” I said because it was clear he didn’t want to leave my body yet even if he could.
He tightened his arms around me and sighed as he rested his chin on top of my head. I relaxed against him, grateful to finally get the cuddle I’d been missing since he’d left earlier. Whatever happened next, I didn’t really care because I’d just lost my virginity and was going to savor the moment with my incredible fox.
CHAPTER 5
PYSINA
Owen trusted me. I could feel it in the way he gave his weight to me, leaning hard despite being curled to keep our bodies aligned. He accepted me as well, allowing me to stay inside him even though my knot wasn’t so large that I couldn’t separate us. And Goddess, the way he’d reacted as I’d fucked him with my knot…
Gulping back the desire that would only bind us together longer, I turned my mind to a more complicated issue. Namely, the reason for how I’d behaved since waking after the attack with him in my arms. He’d distracted me from my duties all day and been too much to resist when I returned to him. I’d always thought the stories of how quickly my father and grandfather had claimed their mates was a silly joke, just a tall tale they told at gatherings. But now, I couldn’t deny that I’d been compelled to make Owen mine.
“I talked to my father’s chief of staff earlier,” Owen whispered, breaking my train of thought. “It was…bad.”
I didn’t bother telling him that I knew of everything he’d done since being confined to my quarters or that I could replay the conversation if necessary. Instead, I asked, “What did he say?” I cupped the back of Owen’s head protectively.
Disbelief, maybe some disgust, dripped from Owen’s voice as he said, “Brett’s trying to spin it like my father was a victim. Can you believe that? Like he was somehow coerced into detonating a bomb by some outside force.”
“Impossible. We invited him here because of his condemnation of us. We had hoped to enlighten him. He knew what he was doing.”
Owen sat back enough to look me in the eye. “Did you suspect he was with Humans First?”
“No.” None of the intelligence briefings I had received had ever even hinted at such a connection. “And neither are you.”
Owen made an incredulous face. “Of course not,” he said as our bodies disconnected on their own. He sighed, and to my ears it sounded disappointed.
Could he feel even a small amount of what I felt for him? The drive to remain by his side? The desperation to mark him as my own? I gently touched where his neck and shoulder met, where I’d bitten him to keep him still as I claimed him.
“Owen,” I whispered, forcing myself to say this, “I am very attached to you.”
He nodded and reached up to smooth back the short hairs at my cheek. “Yeah. Same.”
A shiver I couldn’t contain lit through me at his confirmation.
“We don’t have to tell anyone,” he said, “if you don’t want people to know. I’m not exactly a prize at the moment.”
That he could say such a thing about himself put a growl in my tone. “You are not your father, and I will shred anyone who claims you are. I may not know you well yet, but I already know you are incapable of the sort of hate and destruction that he committed.” I took a deep breath as he blinked at me before I drew a fingertip along the evidence of my bite. “Besides, anyone who looks at you will know what this means.”
He frowned for a moment before his eyes went wide and he stumbled off my lap. I stayed where I was sitting on the edge of the bed as Owen dashed into the lavatory, probably for a look in the mirror since the light went on. When it turned off again, I braced myself for his admonishment.
Owen walked back to me with his cheeks stained by a blush and a wicked little smile on his lips. He liked my mark. Goddess, but knowing that went straight to my cock.
In a small, shy voice he asked, “Will you do that and the knotting every time?” He stood in front of me looking at me through his long, dark lashes.
“Perhaps not every time.” I reached for him, drawing him between my thighs with both hands cupping his ass. “Only when I need to stake my claim.”
As sophisticated as we Norlons were, our baser instincts still managed to influence us when it came to our mates. Everything in me demanded I make absolutely certain that everyone knew he was mine. He smelled of me and my lust, but not yet strongly enough. I should take him again.
“So maybe—” He cut himself off with a gasp as I let my claws out to press into his cheeks. Between us, his cock began to stiffen.
“So maybe?” I asked, curious about what he’d been about to say before I’d distracted him. I leaned in and rubbed my cheek against his, transferring more of my scent to his skin.
He pressed his ass back into my hands and shivered as he blinked several times, looking up at the ceiling. He seemed to be trying to take deeper breaths than the panting he was doing. That I could ruin his concentration made me grin.
“So maybe,” I teased, “I should claim you again?”
“Oh. Yes, that.” He nodded fast and his hands came up to burrow into the hairs at my neck. “That’s a great idea.”
