Page 34 of Xara and the Xenobeast

With a frustrated growl, he dove back under the water. This time when he surfaced, he forced himself to focus on the hunt. They needed food. The pups were growing rapidly, their appetites increasing daily. Xara needed protein to maintain her strength.

Xara. Even her name sent a pulse of heat through him.

He snarled and launched himself out of the river, water cascading from his body as he scanned the shoreline for tracks. There—the distinctive three-toed print of a dunar, a herbivore with tender meat that she seemed to enjoy. He set off in pursuit, grateful for the distraction.

The hunt was quick and efficient. He cornered the dunar in a small clearing, dispatched it with a single strike, and hoisted the carcass onto his shoulders. As he made his way back towards the cave, his thoughts inevitably returned to her.

He couldn’t keep running. Sooner or later, he would have to face what was happening between them. The way his body responded to her presence. The way his chest tightened when she laughed. The way his instincts screamed to claim her, protect her, keep her.

But what if he lost control? What if the beast they’d engineered into his DNA broke free and hurt her? The thought made him physically ill.

As he approached the cave, he heard the excited squeaks of their pups—no longer frightened orphans but confident little creatures with personalities all their own. They must have sensed his return, because they came tumbling out of the cave entrance, rolling and chirping in greeting.

Trouble reached him first, scrambling up his leg to perch on his shoulder. The others followed, sniffing curiously at the bundle in his hand and the dunar carcass he’d retrieved.

Soldier had something shiny clutched in his tiny mouth. The pup dropped it into his palm with a proud chirp.

A shard of a medical scanner—standard Kaisarian technology, broken but potentially still functional. It must have come from the wreckage of Xara’s shuttle.

He pocketed it without comment. Later, when he was alone, he would see if it could be salvaged. Such technology could be useful, especially for monitoring her health.

As if his thoughts had conjured her up, she appeared in the cave entrance, silhouetted against the firelight behind her. Her hair was tousled, her clothes rumpled from sleep. She looked soft, warm, inviting, and his body immediately responded, the cold river bath rendered useless by a single glimpse of her.

“You’ve been gone a while,” she said, her voice carefully neutral. “I was getting worried.”

He held up the dunar carcass as explanation, then approached cautiously, unsure of his welcome after his abrupt departure.

She stepped aside to let him pass, and he caught a whiff of her scent—skin still warm from sleep. His sensory tendrils reached for her automatically before he forced them back.

Inside the cave, he busied himself with preparing the meat, skinning and portioning the carcass with methodical precision. It gave him something to focus on besides her presence, though he remained acutely aware of her every movement.

She approached slowly, as if afraid of startling him, but when she reached out and placed her hand on his arm, he didn’t pull away. Her touch was light, warm, grounding.

“About this morning...” she began.

He tensed, his sensory tendrils coiling tightly against his skull.

“We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to,” she continued, her voice gentle. “But I want you to know that I’m not afraid of you.”

He looked at her then, really looked at her. She met his gaze steadily, her hazel eyes clear and unafraid.

She wasn’t lying. She wasn’t afraid.

She should be.

He turned away, resuming his work on the dunar meat. Behind him, he heard her sigh softly before she turned to the pups.

Domestic. That was the word for this scene. It felt dangerously, temptingly domestic.

As he worked, he stole glances at her—the curve of her neck as she bent over the pups, the gentle way she stroked Dot’s head, the smile that lit her face when one of the pups did something particularly endearing.

Heat clawed at his skin every time she smiled. His instincts roared beneath the surface, urging him to claim, to touch, to taste.

But he held back, focusing on the task at hand. He wasn’t built for this—for tenderness, for connection, for whatever was growing between them—but he couldn’t deny the truth any longer.

He wanted her. Not just physically, though that hunger was undeniable. He wanted everything—her smile, her laughter, her fearless spirit. He wanted to wake up beside her every morning. He wanted to hunt for her, provide for her, protect her.

He wanted to be worthy of her—and that was the most terrifying realization of all.

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