Page 84 of Tempting Cargo
HOW DARETOKORAN suggest I stoop to blackmail?
I let my rage carry me, let the heat of it fire up my veins, even though his words echoed.
Why did you bother investigating it?
Because I’d hoped there was another way the information could be useful?
The truth settled in my gut like a stone. I should use my strengths. Be ruthless.Like she is.
I didn’t want to be like my skykking mother, didn’t want to have to become like her to be free from her. How could I force another to my will when the weight of that had crushed my spines for so many years?
I’ll go to any lengths to free my brother.That was what I’d told my crew two weeks ago. I’d been angry, zealous, without any hope of it becoming a reality.
And now the myriad threads twisted and tangled, weighing my head down inside and out. Was I a coward, or was I principled?
I can’t do this any more.
Garrison found me slumped against the training room wall. He sat close enough I could feel the warmth radiating from him but not close enough to touch.
Everything else fell away, the strength of mywantingfor this man burning away all other concerns as though they were nothing. That was… worrying.
Dangerous.
The need to have him, to claim him as mine, to explore what we could be together, blazed as brightly as the desire to rescue my brother. The paths to each were just as tangled. Tangled on their own, tangled together.
“Is there anything I can do?” His low, husky tone sang of sex, but his words offered care. Care I needed. Care I craved.
“I just need time.” My words could have been a reply to any of it, to all of it. But, as theDorimisahurtled towards Orith, time was the one thing running out.
“Take all the time you need, Sho.” His emotions bled through despite his carefully constructed calm.
If his words had meant to be a comfort, they didn’t wrap me in warmth—just further chilled the void inside me. Where was the male who’d shoved me against the wall and thrust his fingers into my cunt as he growled what he wanted to do to me?
Where was the male who let me lead him by the cock a few minutes later? The male who eagerly helped me with anything? Who laughed with me? Called me sweetheart?
I risked a glance, but his impassive face told me nothing.
Sharp pain knifed through my chest. He was gone. Locked away, because I’d asked him to.
All I wanted was his arms around me. But I’d told him I couldn’t risk a mate bond, not yet, and so he held himself back—taking away everything that made himhim.
I hated it.
I stared at the mats on the floor, my eyes out of focus. This was where we’d first kissed. Where I’d first had him inside me.
The memories rose up in my throat and threatened to choke me.
For the second time, I dashed from the training room, leaving Garrison behind. This time I couldn’t even find it in me to apologise.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Hydouis
Garrison
LAST NIGHT, despiteShohari’s flight from the training room, we’d cuddled more than we had in days. It wasn’t much, but it was something. Hell, after the last week, it was everything.
I sat at the nav station on the bridge as Hydouis came into view. I shouldn’t have expected it to be blue, but the cracked, burnt red of its arid surface momentarily stalled my mind.
