Page 53 of Fated to the Hunter
I leaned in, letting my nose brush hers, our breaths mingling in the charged space between us. Her sweet scent wrapped around me like a cage I didn’t want to escape from.
“You’re injured,” I growled, voice low and rough. “You shouldn’t be teasing me.”
Her lips parted, eyes locked on mine. “I’m not teasing,” she whispered. “I’m inviting. That’s different.”
My blood roared through my veins. It didn’t matter if we were officially mates or not. She was mine.All mine.And nothing would change that.
I cupped her face with reverence, careful not to jostle her injuries. Her skin was soft beneath my palm, her gaze fierce and full of need. I kissed her, devouring her mouth. This human ritual of mouth mating was addictive, and I was already hooked.
She kissed me back, her good arm clawing into my bicep like she needed to anchor herself to me. Her moan was soft, but it hit me like a punch to the gut. My cock hardened instantly, straining against my pants, demanding I take her.Now.
The healing device slipped from her shoulder and smacked against the wall. I barely noticed until she gasped my name.
I forced myself to pull back, grabbing the device and gently placing it back where it belonged. My fingers lingered on her skin, reluctant to leave.
“Perhaps when you’re fully healed, Fire of my Heart,” I said, voice tight with restraint I barely had.
She raised her brow at the new name but didn’t let go. Her fingers curled around my arm, her eyes pleading. “But I want it now. Ineedit now. I need to touch you. I need to feel somethingreal. I need to feelalive.Let’s celebrate surviving. Just you and me.”
I brushed a curl from her forehead, heart pounding. She was irresistible. Brave. Beautiful. Mine.
Perhaps that mate bond would form once I was buried to the hilt inside her. Yes. That must be it. I couldn’t wait.
“Then let me take care of you,” I murmured. “I’ll do all the work.”
She giggled, breath catching, her smile pure temptation. “Sounds perfect.”
***
The door to the vault containing our treasure stood in front of us, carved into the very rock of the mountain. Am’r, a hunter I’d worked with here in the mountains, had found it just off one of our regular patrol paths after I’d sent him a copy of Kiera’s map.
He’d been the one trying to contact me when we’d gotten out of the Dead Zone.
I couldn’t believe it had been there the whole time, right under our noses.
It was almost too easy after what we’d been through.
After celebrating our victory of finding the code and surviving, I’d held my beautiful female in my arms the entire day and night, right through to the next morning, only releasing her for natural functions and to feed us.
But nothing had changed. My arms had released her without hesitation each and every time.
We’d spent two days recovering with the Mountains group.
After a thorough investigation, the Tech Wizards had come to the conclusion that my shuttle hadn’t been a PIP model at all, but rather another iteration the Xarc’n military had tested and decommissioned. It was militant to a fault and followed its directive sometimes to the detriment of its pilot.
As long as I’d stayed on my path, fighting the scourge, I would’ve never had a problem. But meeting Kiera had changed everything.
The Tech Wizards weren’t able to ascertain whether it had been sentient, mostly because they hadn’t been able to agree on the exact definition of shuttle sentience.
Was it the drive for self-preservation? But even single-cell organisms moved away from danger. Was it self-awareness? All our shuttles were self-aware. Was it the presence of a soul? Or the ability to believe in souls?
They’d all agreed without a doubt that all the Pips and Pippas that had come out of the woodwork were sentient. But they were split when it came to my shuttle.
But I didn’t care either way. It had tried to hurt Kiera. It was dangerous, and it needed to be decommissioned.
They’d matched my shuttle up with a computer who’d lost its hunter and shuttle, and this one held no animosity toward humans at all. It was just happy to be able to fly and fight again.
The new protocol the humans had developed against scourge toxin was revolutionary. And while Kiera had lost some feeling in the tips of her fingers in that arm and at the site of the cut, it would return in time. And what would have taken months to heal would only take weeks now.
