Page 118 of Command

That thought was just for her—she didn’t mean to transmit it. But Threxin’s brow relaxed, rising in a gesture that hinted at curiosity, and then she felt him coming forward to meet her offering.

I love you.The admission she had so fiercely guarded surged forward unfiltered and found its mark. The raw sensation flooding the link between their minds wasn’t fondness. It wasn’t even desire. It was a violent crash of souls—their minds building tethers that knotted and cinched as if by primal recognition.

A blush warmed Alina’s cheeks. She hadn’t intended to reveal so much, but stemming the flow wasn’t even an option now. Complete candor was inevitable. And that was the point, wasn’t it?

His eyes opened and the blue fire within his gaze was blinding in its intensity. The physical sensation of it was quickly dwarfed by the onslaught of thoughts and emotes that hit her all at once.

None of it was discernible exactly—the constructs coming at her now were distinctly alien. Threxin didn’t feel the way she did. His emotive thoughts were sharp, slicing, desperate shards. They were aggressive. Pointed and hungry, painful and yearning. It took her a few ticks to sit back and let herself take them in wholly—to stop trying to parse them and just be a vessel for the onslaught. Only then did the full picture of him grow into something discernible, and Alina realized she’d been crying.

She felt his impulse and mirrored it, vaulting it back over their link. There were so many things they both longed forand so many that they now knew. They needed to get it all out in something physical—something touchable.

Alina was floating, her pain and weakness all but forgotten in the parallel universe of their link. In the back of her mind she knew this was dangerous—she felt the wetness trickling down her thighs, covering her abdomen. But it was just so easy to ignore, especially when Threxin’s hands were on her waist. When he sprawled them both on the bed, lifting her with one seamless motion to set her atop his hips. When he was shoving one hand into his medbay trousers, yanking down the waistband, the heat of his erection springing free to press against her thigh.

Her leggings were soon shredded to scraps and hanging from her thighs.

When he tore away her shirt it tore a scream from her throat as the fabric peeled all at once from congealing blood, ripping open whatever spots had begun to dry. And though his eyes flashed in that hungry way she’d seen behind the leash of his limiter, not a moment later Threxin drew back, staring as he processed the painful emote she’d let slip through their link. Then his palm was on the side of her neck, his forehead leaning into hers as he flooded her NS with whispers of a soothing presence.

Alina stared as her blood splattered across his chest. Logically, she knew that this was bad… she was still bleeding, a lot. But every other shred of her, body and mind, wanted only to ignore it and be there with him, doing this.

Her brow creased in a pained wince when he rolled them over, placing her on her back. When he brought his mouth to the wound on her stomach, she sucked in a sharp breath, anticipating pain.

Therewaspain, followed by the gentle wrapping of his mind around her own. She threw her head back into the bed and yanked at the spikes on his scalp as he worked his lips along the gashes he had created, but soon the burn began tofade. She chanced a look down, gasping when she saw the bleeding had all but stopped. Instead, a thick layer of exorin covered each wide gash, seeping into puckered broken skin.

Threxin left a trail of black as he kissed up her ribs and toward the matching wound on her chest. His mouth left trails of fire as he oozed exorin into each clawmark there, lapping it meticulously into the length of each wound with his rough, spiked tongue. Again, the bleeding had stopped, the layer of black coalescing into something almost gel-like as it settled.

I had no idea exorin could do this,she subvocalized without thinking, finding immediate joy in the fact thatshe could.

Horizontal lines puckered his forehead as he looked up at her, his eyes momentarily so fucking clear in a way she’d never seen them before and his mouth still pressed firmly to her skin.

Me neither.

That clarity burned up in an instant, his expression darkening into something that made her core tighten instinctively. When he entered her with a swift roll of the hips it was unexpected, but her body immediately sparked with the sudden fullness, tightening possessively around him despite the pang of pain as it was forced to stretch. Her mind was ready for it, his intentions clear in the melt with his own. They were already fucking in their souls long before she felt him nudge at her insides, a twitch of the shaft buried inside her sending a lightning spike of pleasure to her brain that was immediately transmitted back to him.

Threxin had lifted his face to her and they watched each other this time, not their bodies, as she took him in spike by bulging spike. She began to move, rolling her hips back at him along his bulging texture. A groan caught first in her throat and cracked out of his, his hips rising to meet her.

She knew he’d feel her now—every move that hurt and every one that felt good, or a combination of both. He feltwhat he was doing to her, just as she felt his as she squeezed around him. Technicolor bursts of a carnal high colored her thoughts, setting her alight as he burrowed into her pores. Each little hair stood at attention as it was stimulated by his touch and their link.

She sensed his attention wander and only then felt his hand at her chest, pressing firmly to stymie a fresh trickle of blood through the barrier of exorin. She barely even felt it anymore, so impotent was the pain compared to the rest of it all. They were close. She didn’t even need to feel or see the exorin leaking between her thighs, sucked by her out of his spikes, to know it.

She took his hand in both of hers and pressed it more tightly against herself, digging her nails into hard planes. Their movements grew haphazard and jerky. She pulled his hand with her as she unfurled beneath him, back arching as pins and needles sprouted along her skin.

Alina only vaguely registered their sounds in the heady pool of their link. The others must be hearing them, but neither of them gave a damn. The bed beneath them had been banging loudly against the wall, and a growl was continuous and escalating in Threxin’s chest, punctured only by increasingly desperate cries torn from her own throat with each thrust of his hips.

That last one hit just right, and then she was falling, the orgasm hitting her like a punch in the gut that doubled her over, her cheek coming up to slam into the hard plane of his chest. His hand came up to cup the back of her head, squeezing her against him.

His brain assaulted her with the crazed frenzy of his own impending orgasm as he swelled inside her, stretching her to and past her limits. And then he exploded, heat flooding her insides.

I want to see.

He dug his talons into her roots and peeled her face away from him, tilting her head down.

Watch, female. Watch me claim you.

Alina stared down and saw the outline of him within her abdomen, shifting as he filled her until cum and exorin leaked in rivulets between her legs and melted between them.

“Fuck,” she gasped as the fullness of it all drove her over the edge once more, her pussy contracting around him in another set of spasms as her hips ground desperately into his, drinking everything he had to give.

When finally they were spent, Threxin gently peeled himself up and off of her, revealing a giant red bloom on his chest.

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