Page 41 of Claimed By the Vykan
She knew who it was before her mind caught up.
He had not knocked. He had not announced himself. One moment the room had been empty, the next she was gathered against a solid mass of armor and heat.
Her vision cleared enough for her to see the lines of his chestplate close up, the dark metal etched with patterns that glowed faintly at the edges. Her cheek rested against the cool, smooth surface. Beneath it, she felt a subdued hum, like the muted thrum of distant machinery wrapped in muscle and bone.
“You should not stand yet,” he said.
Of course he was back.
Her fingers flexed reflexively, catching at the edge of his armor as he lifted her. He carried her as though she weighed almost nothing, crossing the short distance to the bed and lowering himself with her still in his arms until he sat backagainst the headboard, drawing her with him as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
She ended up half curled against his front, enclosed by hard lines and impenetrable plates.
Her breathing began to even out almost immediately.
The spinning slowed, the crushing tightness in her chest eased, and the chaotic rush of heat cooled into a deep, steady warmth that spread from where her body pressed against his.
Her mind, which had been flailing like a trapped bird, began to settle.
You have got to be kidding me.
She recognized the stabilizing effect even as it infuriated her. His presence grounded her more efficiently than anything she had ever experienced. Where other people’s comfort had always felt conditional and fragile, his was enormous and absolute, as if the very structure of the world reasserted itself around him.
This is the venom, she told herself.It’s the bond and the pheromones… and whatever else these aliens have engineered. This is not real comfort. This is chemistry and proximity and psychological manipulation.
Also known as a very fancy form of Stockholm syndrome.
“How dare you,” she muttered under her breath.
He looked down at her, helm tilting slightly. “Explain.”
“You do this to me,” she snapped, her voice raw. “You take me, you drug me with your… whatever that was, you throw my body completely out of control, and then you come back and hold me like you are doing me a favor.”
His arms did not tighten. They did not loosen either.
“I did not intend for the disruption to be so immediate,” he said. “The distance between us destabilized you more quickly than I anticipated.”
“So I’m supposed to stay near you?” The words came out on a half-breathless laugh. “Is that the idea?”
“For now,” he answered. “Until the bond settles.”
Her anger flared again. “You keep calling it a bond, like this is some kind of mutual agreement. I did not sign anything. I did not choose?—”
Her voice faltered as another wave of relief washed through her. It rose from the contact itself—where her body met his, where the chaotic buzzing in her nerves dulled into something very close to calm.
He was hard everywhere she touched him: armor, muscle, and just his sheer size—all of it unyielding. Yet warmth radiated through the metal, turning the unyielding surface into something she could lean against. The hum under his chestplate synchronized slowly with her pulse.
She wanted to pull away on principle. Her body refused to move.
“You should rest,” he said quietly. “Your system is recalibrating.”
“You are unbearable,” she said, without much force.
“Yes.”
The translator rendered the word without nuance, but somehow she could hear the faint note of acceptance.
She stared up at his mask. At the smooth, lethal lines of it, the narrow crimson slits that watched her with an intensity that never seemed to waver. There was no face to read, no expression to gauge, only that unbroken surface and the certainty of the thing underneath it.
