Page 100 of Command

She closed her eyes, focusing on the clock ticking ever-upward in her mind’s eye.

It was well past midnight when Alina’s door finally opened and Threxin stepped through it.

“You fucking asshole.”

He’s okay.

He stood silent in the door, looking exhausted. His spikes lay limp atop his head, his apertures open in that way of tiredness rather than arousal.

His sigh was a tired rattle. Alina’s plastic chair cracked in protest as he sank into it, kicking his feet out wide as he slumped against the backrest.

They sat there for too many minutes, looking at each other limply.

“Well?” Alina finally asked, eyes roaming his body for any sign of injury and finding none.

He’s okay.

Threxin flexed his fingers on his knees. When he spoke it was with the tone of one making a bland report as opposed togiving her the scoop on a super fucking risky ordeal. “The vessel docked at your twenty-three hundred hours. One human occupant boarded to authenticate. She was… curious. But all played their roles acceptably. Forty-eight plasma pallets, twelve vats of Nutrigel, six hundred and thirty tons of drinkable water, one hundred tons of edible seeds, and two million liters of graywater to germinate them have been delivered onto the ship over ten hours. The delivery vessel departed and no suspicious activity has been detected.”

Alina looked at him blankly. “So you’re saying it worked.”

“Yes, Alina. It worked.”

It worked!

“You fucking asshole,” she burst out, the tension of the entire day overflowing in one fell swoop as she jumped from the bed and advanced on him. Maybe not a great idea, doing that with an uhyre, but she couldn’t help it—he’d kept her locked in thereall damn day.

“You would not have heeded my command had I ordered you to stay.”

Alina fisted her hands. “Of course I wouldn’t have. I could’ve helped you!”

“I did not need help, Alina Argoud. I had video feeds transmitted at all times.”

“But you don’t know how to interpret our body language yet. You said so yourse?—”

“Nothing worth endangering you for.”

He was so damn stubborn. She’d felt useless the whole day. He hadmadeher feel useless.

“Haven’t I proven myself enough?” she asked.

For a long time Threxin’s only answer was an unblinking stare on his face, making her wonder if she hadn’t overstepped her boundaries. He was doing this forher. To meet her demands. It’s just that it could’ve all gone so wrong, and she wouldn’t even have known it. What if he’d gotten hurt? What if she never saw him again?

“Go to the bed, Alina Argoud,” he said quietly.

“That’s what you have to say? Just bossing me around some more?” She didn’t like that look in his eye. She liked it even less when veined hands went to his belt and began to slowly loosen the buckle.

“Oh yeah, okay. What are you gonna do now, spankme?” Alina rolled her eyes.

She was being sarcastic, but when his expression darkened Alina backed up a step.

“You are overstimulated. Go to the bed,” Threxin repeated, and the way his apertures narrowed made her think he wouldn’t do it a third time. Now she’d gone and done it, gotten too comfortable for her own good. What if he decided she was too much trouble? What if he canceled the Uploads? What if he left?

Keeping her eyes on him, Alina backed toward the bed in small, careful steps.

“Sit,” Threxin instructed, and she lowered herself to the edge.

He nodded, pulling his gloves off one by one, revealing long, masculine fingers. She’d long since decided his hands were dangerous. Not just by way of the sharp talons that could slice skin to ribbons—she’d seen their effects. They were dangerous in the veins trailing up the back of them, sloping into thick, muscled forearms. And the way they expertly knew just how to touch her, as if they were built to drive her crazy.

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