Page 45 of Needed in the Night
He bent and withdrew a blade of his own from his right boot. A Hardanian scythe-knife, in fact, gorgeous and deadly. And all the gods above and below, the sight of it gripped in his hand and the way he showed his fangs made me quiver where his tongue had been only minutes ago.
“I will watch our backs,” he said.
CHAPTER 16
MIKAS
I followedIsla into the narrow corridor. The hidden door slid soundlessly closed and sealed behind us.
My shoulders nearly brushed the walls and the top of my head was only a few centimeters shy of the ceiling. Still, wherever Isla went, I would go—whether it be a secret escape from an Engareni perfume shop or a planet far from here.
My sharp ears caught a low hum from the room we had just left. I frowned and tilted my head to listen.
“The room’s air and surfaces are purified between guests,” Isla explained. “It’s a necessary step to ensure each customer gets exactly the scent they want.”
“And it is quite handy for removing traces of anyone who has passed through,” I observed. “An ideal setup.”
Despite the danger of our situation, she smiled. “Yes, it is.”
I took advantage of our closeness and ran my nose over her hair. To think I might be able to do so whenever I wanted and no longer had to hide either my feelings or desires…what bliss.
I wanted to know what she planned for us to do, but hermost personal scents and tastes remained on my fingers and tongue, a decadent reminder of the intimacy we had just shared—and that our time had been interrupted. I also could not forget that her torn underwear was in my pocket, or that beneath her dress her sweet, bare pussy dripped for me.
“Isla,” I ground out, pressing my hand to the wall beside her head. The cold metal helped me focus on our need to get away instead of my need for her. “Where will we go now?”
“We have to choose.” Her expression turned grim. “I know I asked if you had anything you can’t leave behind, but it’s not fair for me to decide for you.”
“You are not deciding for me.” I cupped her face with my hand. “All my instincts tell me we cannot go back and we must avoid Nubo and his people. To do that, we must leave Onat’ras at least. To be safe, we should leave Fortusia. I do not believe Nubo’s reach extends beyond this planet.”
She rested her forehead on my chest. “I know,” she said, her voice muffled by my shirt. “I knew it couldn’t last. I wanted to believe I could live in this beautiful city, on this beautiful world, but in my heart I knew this would be a stop, not a destination.”
My hearts ached once again. I had already accepted Isla as my home, but she could not be expected to feel the same. Certainly not until—orunless—she truly accepted me as her mate, and perhaps not even then. Human physiology was not the same as Fortusian. We might share much of our DNA, but her body did not respond to mine the way mine did to hers. More than anything, I wanted to find a way to give her the same peace and contentment her presence gave me.
I knelt in front of her again, this time for a very different reason. She let out a little sound of surprise, tinged with dismay.
“I do not wish to cause you pain or regret,” I said, and kissed her hand. “I am sorry I have upended the life you built here.”
Isla startled me by kneeling too. Thecorridor was barely wide enough to accommodate us, so I sat back on my heels and pulled her onto my lap once more, her knees astride my thighs.
“You don’t need to apologize.” She cupped my face with both of her hands and stared directly into my eyes. “Ichoseto accept you and your feelings for me knowing full well that meant we had to get as far from Nubo as we could. It wasn’t something I said in the heat of the moment.”
“But if you like your life here—” I began.
She quieted me by resting her index finger on my lips.
“Do you think I’d trade how I feel about you—how I feelwithyou—for a gig as a singer in a bar?” she asked. “Because I wouldn’t. I can feel sad about having to leave Fortusiaandbe happy to be your…mate. I’m working on that last part,” she added with a wry smile. “Give me time.”
“You may have all the time you need.” I kissed her forehead. “There is no rush.” I glanced at the doorway we had come through, then down the long corridor to where it turned and continued out of sight. “Where shall we go, Isla?”
She kissed my jaw, making my chest rumble. “If we want to leave Onat’ras, we need to go now,” she said. “If we can make it to the Delta spaceport, Ycari has a contact there who can get us on an offworld transport using pseudonyms.”
“Then we will get to the spaceport.” I rose and lifted her to her feet.
“This hallway leads to a hidden exit on the side of a shop much closer to the market’s exit.” She slipped her hand into mine and tugged. “This way. We’ll blend into the crowd and head for the port.”
Knife at the ready, I followed, all my senses alert to any hint of danger. The silence and Isla’s trust in Madame Ycari and her contact at the port did little to diminish my tension or my rage at the threat Nubo posed to not only our newfound happiness and Isla’s safety.
But as we made our way quietly down the corridor, Irecalled Isla’s skill with her dagger and the fearless way she looked at the Hardanian. That did not banish my anger or trepidation, but my boots returned to solid ground.
