His tail tightened around her waist, pulling her flush against him while his hands explored the curves of her back, the dip of her waist, the generous swell of her hips. She was all softness where he was hard, yielding where he was unyielding, and the contrast made him growl low in his throat.
She gasped against his mouth and he swallowed the sound, taking it into himself like a gift. Her fingers stroked over the ridges covering his skull and sent pleasure sparking down his spine.
Careful.He needed to be careful. She was human and fragile and he could hurt her if he lost control. But control was becoming harder to maintain with every second that passed, with every soft sound she made, with every place their bodies touched.
He walked her backward toward the wall, needing something to support them both because his legs felt unsteady. Her back hit the padded surface and she arched into him, eliminating the last centimeters of space between them. He could feel the rapidbeat of her heart, the heat of her through the thin fabric of her clothing.
His hands slid under her shirt, finding warm skin, and she shivered. He froze, pulling back to check her expression.
“Too much?” he managed.
“Not enough.” Her voice was breathless, her eyes heavy-lidded with desire. “I haven’t felt this way in so long and I want?—”
He kissed her again, swallowing whatever she’d been about to say, because if she kept talking in that voice he was going to lose what little control he had left. His hands explored the soft skin of her back, tracing the delicate curve of her spine, the vulnerable dip at the small of her back.
She made a sound that went straight through him, half-moan, half-plea, and he felt his restraint starting to crack. His tail slid higher, curling around the lush curve of her breasts, and she gasped into his mouth.
“Selik—”
The door hissed open behind them.
They sprang apart like guilty adolescents caught by parental figures. Her face flushed scarlet while he fought to regulate his breathing and force his body back under control.
Anya stood in the doorway, eyes wide. “Oh shit, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to— But Mikoz is sick and I don’t know what to do and he’s burning up and making these awful sounds?—”
The rest of her words became irrelevant noise as instinct took over. Corinne was already moving towards the door, all traces of desire replaced by concern.
“Show me,” she said, voice steady despite the lingering flush in her cheeks.
He followed them both, his military training kicking in to assess and respond to the new crisis. But part of his mind remained back in that training room, remembering the taste of her and the feel of her and the promise of what had almost happened.
Later. They would finish this later.
Right now, an infant needed them.
They ran.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
As soon as she opened the door to their quarters, Mikoz’s whimper cut through the air like a blade through silk. The sound was wrong—high and reedy and so different from his usual healthy cries that Corinne’s stomach dropped before her conscious mind could even process why.
“He just kept getting fussier and fussier after I brought him back,” Anya said, words tumbling over each other. “He won’t stop crying and he’s so hot. I tried everything but he just keeps getting worse and his breathing sounds weird and?—”
She crossed the room in three strides and scooped him out of the crib Selik had built. Heat radiated from the small body in waves. His skin felt furnace-hot beneath her palm and his eyes had a glassy, unfocused quality that made her heart clench.
“Shh, sweetie, I’m here.” She pressed her lips to his forehead and confirmed what her hands already knew. Fever. High enough to make her own childhood memories surface—thermometers and cool baths and worried late-night calls to the pediatrician. “You’re okay, baby. We’re going to make you feel better.”
But they weren’t on Earth with easy access to children’s acetaminophen and urgent care clinics. They were on a Patrol ship in the middle of space and she had no idea what medical supplies they carried or if any of them would be safe for a human infant.
No. Not human. Cire.Mikoz was Cire, even if she kept forgetting that detail in the day-to-day routine of caring for him.
“We need to get him to the med bay.” Selik’s voice cut through her spiraling thoughts, calm and authoritative. “Bombaya can help.”
“What if he can’t? What if they don’t have the right equipment or medications or?—”
“Then we will find another solution.” He put his arm around her, his presence solid and reassuring even as worry tightened the corners of his eyes. “But panicking will not help him. We will move quickly, and we will trust our medic to do his job.”
He was right. She knew he was right. But knowing and feeling were two different things and right now all she felt was the terrifying weight of responsibility pressing down on her chest.
