Page 16 of Taken
“While you may have failed in your mission as a participant in the Sucere Project, it is imperative you do not doom the entire mission more than you have thus far.”
“What?” My voice cuts off as Lacchus changes position, pulling me deeper into the cavern of his chest. He’s dead fucking asleep, his elbow locked at an angle now and shoved under my head, the not-so-soft pillow beneath my ear. He licks his bottom lip, against which a faint reddish shimmer gleams.My blood. I should be concerned about how much of my blood he drank but instead, I open my mouth and yawn, feeling sleepy and sated.
“You don’t have to worry about me and the mission, Pam. I’m out. I wasn’t exactly helpful to the mission, anyway. The humans can just stay asleep and it’ll be like I never existed.”
Pam says, “While that is not within protocol, I have no physical body and cannot stop you from leaving the Chamber permanently.”
“Good.”
“However, it is my obligation to inform you that without having properly sealed the Chamber behind you when you left, there is a one in four trillion chance of the Chamber remaining functional for the next two thousand years, and a less than one in five trillion chance of the Chamber continuing to function until its target survival date.”
“Properly…properly sealed? What?” I huff, panting, trying to understand Pam while sleep and warmth and too many orgasms make it hard for me not to tell her to go fuck herself.
“The door…Rhen.”
“What? What door?”
“The door to the Sucere Chamber. You need to go back and close it.”
ChapterNine
Lacchus
Iwake to the feeling of my cock being carefully unsheathed from the wet heat that had, however many moments ago, and also just now in my dreams, so sweetly surrounded it. I panic and grab her, halting her retreat. I realize that my latch has released at the same time I blink my eyes open and see her face. Her perfect face.
Her skin is brown, a slightly lighter shade than mine, and covered in small darker brown points. I thought at first, she may have been a new form of experiment, ready to shift colors at the very least, but she never did, not even when shifting into any other form might have spared her from the pain she endured last night.
In the light of day, I can see that her brown skin is now tinged red, smears of her blood and my venom covering her skin. I wonder how long she’s been crying and in pain. She looks away from me, gaze flicking all around as she moves her body away from mine across the bed. I let her go this time even though it hurts me. I have heard that newly mated males can be extreme in their possessiveness, but I feel crazed. The only thing that keeps me from hauling her body once more beneath mine, pinning her down and using her however I like for however long, is the pain that flicks across her expression.
She tries to smile. It’s all for show. I know this. She might be a demon, but I know she now thinks me a monster, even if she didn’t before. And now she’s also my mate.
I hiss and push away from her, feeling frustrated and ashamed. She has blood on her neck and though the wounds there were treated in part by my venom, I should have still bandaged them. Instead, I passed out, leaving them entirely untreated. I will need to take her to the healer today, but first, procure her garments to wear. I will do terrible things to anyone who dares see her naked.
I roll off the bed, surprised to find my legs are shaky. I shift slightly into my Mpo form, scales hardening across the tops of my thighs and bones beneath my flesh elongating. I grow taller and more stable as I pace around my room, first heading toward the small chest I use to store the few items I own. Made of slacktarine marble, it glistens dark blue and indigo depending on the light, but when I flip the heavy lid open and look down at its contents, I frown.
Three pants, all suited to fit my size in this form, one other suited to fit my larger one. There is one light robe I took as a prize when we raided another tribe, but I have never worn it. It is also see-through, and I will take the eyes of any Vironai to look upon what is mine.
A strange sound has me glancing over my shoulder. My mate has stepped back into her odd gray costume and zipped it back up to her throat, barring me from seeing her body.It is mine and I will see it when I like,I think hungrily, ravenously. But when I take an abrupt step toward her and she looks up at my face with a smile, I stop.
She speaks. She speaks long and slowly, making extravagant hand gestures that I do not understand. I turn three fingers down and she repeats the gesture with a confused expression of her own. We’re getting nowhere, especially when all I can think to do is taste her again. I take a step…
No.No.She needs treatment for her wounds, a bath—an exquisite luxury that I will provide for her, though it may cost me all the frex-frex teeth I took. I frown, regretting now not having hoarded more of the bones offered to me—not just yesterday, but over the years.
As it stands, I do not know if I will have enough to trade for her bath and for the quality of clothing she deserves today and for the rest of the days. I will need to make more kills to provide for her and for…My gaze drops suddenly to her belly, and my mind races with wild imaginings.
Her belly is full of my seed. Swollen with my child. The Vironai tribes have taken flesh prizes from lesser tribes before and all of them have resulted in successful breedings. I have no reason to think that my seed will not take in her core. I do not care if our offspring are blessed with her beauty or ruined with my genetics. I will adore them as deeply as I already do my mate and defend them all with my life.
Her head tilts to the side and I growl, taking in the battered way she appears. Blood smears cover her. Cum probably drips down both of her legs.
I close the distance between us, reach out and snatch her throat, drag her close. She speaks up against my chest, for her head does not come higher than that. She is asking me something—I can tell that much by her inflection, but nothing more.
I want more.
I deserve nothing at all, but I didn’t last night either, and that didn’t stop me then. It doesn’t stop me now. I duck my head and hesitate, giving her the chance to withdraw. She doesn’t. Instead, she makes the fatal mistake of tilting her chin up, just a little, but it’s enough. I breach the gap between us and press my mouth to hers. Her terribly sweet, viciously soft lips mold to mine like she was bred by some higher power specifically to do so.
I want to test that and feel her lips elsewhere.
I growl into her taste, and she arches into my body. Her hands are liberal in their ministrations, confident, like she knows something I don’t. I again worry that she may be demonic. Or that she’s a fool. If that is the case, however, then I know that makes two of us.
