Page 29 of The Alien Minotaur's Bride

He laid me down on the pallet, the same place we'd spent the first heat. But this time he didn't hover over me, didn't position himself above. He knelt beside me instead, his hands resting on his thighs, waiting.

"What do you want?" he asked.

Everything. Nothing. The heat was burning through my blood, making it hard to think, but underneath it I knew exactly what I wanted. Not just relief. Not just the biological imperative demanding satisfaction.

Him. The way he looked at me. The careful tenderness in his enormous hands. The three rotations he'd spent finding me, keeping me, building me a nest in the warmest corner of his home.

"Your hands," I said. "On me. Everywhere."

His eyes went dark.

He touched me as if I were made of glass. Stripped away my coveralls with careful fingers, exposed my skin to the warm air inch by inch. When he reached my breasts – full and aching, swollen with milk that needed release – he cupped them gently, testing their weight.

"Here too?"

"Yes. Stars, yes."

He lowered his head.

The first touch of his mouth sent a jolt through me – that rough tongue dragging across my nipple, drawing out sensation in waves. I arched into him, my hands finding his shoulders, fingers digging into fur. He made that sound again, the contented rumble, and sucked harder.

Milk flowed.

The relief was immediate and overwhelming, the pressure releasing in a warm rush. But it was more than physical this time – it was him, his mouth on me, the reverence in every pull. He drank from me as if I were offering him something precious, and my body answered with a flood of warmth that had nothing to do with the serum.

"More," I gasped. "Keth, I need–"

He shifted to my other breast. Drew out the milk there too, slow and thorough, while his hand slid down my stomach, between my thighs. His fingers found me wet and ready, and I heard his breath catch.

"You're–" His voice broke on it. "You're so–"

"I know. Please."

His fingers pressed inside me. One, then two, working me open with the same patient care he brought to everything. I moved against his hand, chasing the sensation, the heat building towards a peak I couldn't name.

"I want all of it," I said. "All of you. Now."

He pulled back. His eyes met mine, and I saw the question there – the need for confirmation, even now, even with my scent flooding the room and my body slick with wanting.

"I'm sure," I said. "Keth. I'm choosing this."

He positioned himself over me.

He entered me slowly.

The stretch was familiar now – my body remembered him, opened for him, took his size without resistance. I wrapped my legs around his hips and pulled, urging him deeper, and he groaned against my throat.

"Mara – "

"Move."

He moved.

The rhythm built between us – his thrusts slow and deep, my hips rising to meet each one. The heat crested and broke, crested and broke, pleasure rolling through me in waves that seemed to have no end. I came once, twice, three times, my body clenching around him while he held me through it.

And then, without thinking, I reached up.

My hands found his horns.