Alien Claw, page 10
We kept going late into the night. So late that I started yawning on Tok’s back. As soon as he noticed the way I was fading so fast, he banked to the left, heading for a small outcropping of boulders and babkit trees.
“We will set up camp here,” he said, his words muffled by the spear in his mouth. We came to a stop inside the ring of tall, dark stones.
“Sounds good,” I said. I was so exhausted that I didn’t even think about what the sleeping arrangements might be. But as Tok helped me off his back, let his spear drop to the sands, and then pulled out the packed-up tent bundle from the strap at his waist, I froze.
Is he sleeping in the tent with me...?
Why the hell had I not considered that as a possibility?! Panic surged in my chest, along with a sharpened pang of something else. Something a lot like desire.
Tok held the tent in his claws, watching me with unreadable eyes. I licked my lips, feeling splayed open by the intensity of his gaze. My legs trembled from the journey, and the place between them grew warm.
“This tent is too small for the both of us,” he said suddenly.
Oh. Well... That solves that then. I just wished I didn’t feel so disappointed.
“But will you be OK, you know, out here?” I asked, suddenly feeling bad that the tent was too small. And not just because there was an irrational part that wanted him curled against my back inside. But because... Well... “Won’t you get lonely?”
Tok tossed the tent bundle to the ground, then undid the straps at his waist. I pursed my lips, watching, almost entranced by the oddly human look of the gesture. Like a man undoing his belt.
And when he slipped the straps off of his shoulders, it was like a man shrugging out of suspenders.
And somehow, that was more bizarrely erotic than the fact that he’d been naked pretty much every time I’d encountered him so far.
He set the saddle on the ground and then closed the space between us with one large step. I gasped and stepped back instinctively, my back hitting rock.
“I miss you every moment I’m not with you,” Tok said, his voice flat and serious. “I felt grief when my parents died, and I miss them. But even after they were gone, I never truly felt lonely. But now...”
A huge golden fist came up to pound at his chest.
“But I feel it, now. Whenever I’m not with you. Like a hole, right here.” His fist pounded again.
Oh. Oh oh oh. His words were... Doing things to me. Making the desire already spinning through me feel less physical and more emotional. And it scared me.
But just as quickly as he’d advanced towards me, he drew back, letting his fist fall to his side.
“But you are not responsible for such things, Taylor. I do not tell you these things to pressure you, nor to sway you. It is honest, and it is how I feel. But it is... Not your problem, so to speak.”
I stared at him as he turned and started fiddling with the tent bundle, undoing the straps and taking out the bone poles to set it up.
OK, why was everything he said just... Spot fucking on to make a lass fall for him?! First, he breaks my heart by telling me he feels lonely for the first time because of the hold I have on him, then in the same breath, he takes full responsibility for his feelings. He wasn’t pressuring me or manipulating me by what he’d said. He was just honestly telling me how he felt.
I shook myself as Tok made an irritated sound. I stepped up to his side.
“What’s wrong?”
He’d driven one of the bone tent-poles into the sand so hard that it had cracked. My eyebrows flew upward as a huge chunk of the bone pole fell to the sand.
Tok sighed, once again seeming almost starkly human, staring down at his claws, then back at the ruined pole.
“Weak desert bones,” he grumbled.
And I fucking died laughing. He whipped his head towards me in what looked like astonishment. I laughed so hard I had to place my hands down on my knees, my curls spilling upward over my head as I shook with the laughter.
“What is so funny?” Tok asked. “Did we travel too long? Have I addled your brains with the exhausting journey?”
He was so serious that his words only made me laugh harder.
Instantly he was at my side, his hands pulling me upright by the shoulders.
“I’m fine! I’m fine!” I said, taking several deep breaths. But then my eyes caught on the broken bone pole, and Tok’s grumpy expression, and I started laughing all over again. Tok studied me silently as my laughter faded into giggles, his hands heavy on my shoulders.
“Sorry,” I finally said, wiping tears from my eyes. “It’s just, you’re so big and so serious. Seeing you get all out of sorts over the pole breaking was really funny. It was like some old man getting mad about breaking something and getting all riled up about it. ‘Back in my day things were built to last!’ That kind of thing. Ha!”
Tok made a deep grumbling sound that had any remnants of laughter dying immediately. I was very quickly reminded that, though he definitely had a mature sort of air to him, this was no goofy old man. And the only reason the pole had broken was because his strength was so brutal.
“I will not pretend to understand a single thing you just said,” Tok said, cocking his head slightly. “But all the same, I am glad it brought you some amusement.”
He let go of my shoulders and returned to the tent. He whipped the broken pole out of the ground as easily as pulling a toothpick from a cotton ball, tossing it to the side. He replaced the broken pole with his own spear, pressing the long bone handle of it down into the sand.
“Want me to do the other?” I asked, gesturing to the other bone pole needed for the other side of the tent. But Tok jerked his tail in a movement that seemed to mean “no.”
“Now that I know how brittle and weak the desert bones are, I will not make the same mistake again,” he said.
He was right, and he made short work of setting up the rest of the tent. Normally I would have tried a little harder to get him to accept my offer to help, but now that we’d stopped, I was totally exhausted. When the tent was all set up, I was physically aching to go lie down in it.
“Thank you. Oh! But won’t you need your spear?” I asked, glancing at the makeshift tent pole he’d constructed. It was much thicker and longer than the pole on the other side, giving the tent a slightly asymmetrical appearance. The asteroid and starlight caught on the deadly scale tip that Tok had pierced through the tent hide to hold everything in place.
Once again, his answer was short and to the point.
“No,” he said. Then he added, “I am the worst thing that we could encounter in these deserts, even without a weapon.”
My breath caught as I realized he was right. Even the zeelk, the giant crab/spider alien monsters who’d killed our ship’s crew the first day we’d landed here, wouldn’t stand a chance against Tok.
I bit my lip as the strangest mix of fear and comfort washed over me. A tangy, hot pulse of fear at the reminder of just what Tok was – a predator. And a sense of safety at the fact that he was my predator.
“Sleep now, treasure,” he said softly, stepping forward and drawing a scratchy-yet-smooth knuckle across my cheekbone. “It will not be long before the sun rises once more.”
I nodded wordlessly, frozen in place at the feeling of his knuckle skimming so gently over my skin. The scales on his hands were much, much smaller than scales in other places on his body. It made the hide of his knuckles feel like scratched-up leather, rough yet oh so soft against my cheek.
“Goodnight, Tok,” I whispered, still not moving. Tok’s face tensed, a look of what seemed to be pained hunger passing through his eyes, before he pulled his hand away. As if sensing that I was still stuck in my spot, he leaned around me, opening the flap of the tent with one hand. His other hand moved behind my shoulders, flattening against my back and turning me slowly. Once I was facing forward, my back to him, he gave a soft nudge, ushering me inside the dark structure.
“Sleep,” he repeated, his tone quite firm this time, if I did say so myself. Like he was giving me an order. Normally such a thing would make me bristle and shoot back some remark. But I was just too tired, and my skin too warm and tingly from his touch, to bother.
I dumped my pack on the ground, took out my bedding hides, and crashed into them, sleeping immediately.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Tok
I’d had to physically move Taylor into her tent, practically commanding her to go. If I hadn’t done it, if I hadn’t forced myself... I might have lost my sea stone control.
When I’d touched her face, she’d seemed... Spellbound. Like my touch upon her skin was pinning her in place with some fated magic. If it had not been such a long day for my little human mate, if I did not know she was tired from the journey, I would have tightened my hold on her. I would have seen just how much my touch affected her in other places.
Did she freeze up, tense and tight, when she reached her peaks of pleasure? Or did she come undone, shaking and writhing and...
Stop. I was already looking hungrily towards her tent, dark need blooming in my belly. My mate needed rest, and she’d still not offered herself to me, anyway. As much as I wanted to crowd inside the tent, or drag her by the dainty ankle back out here, I could not do it.
A flash of movement nearby caught my eye, and with a hiss, I launched forward, catching a desert creature the Sea Sand men called a rakdo. I killed it quickly, urging all the unspent need of my body into my meal. My fangs gnashed, tearing flesh and snapping bone. Blood spilled down my snout to my neck. I normally did not eat with quite this ferocity. I must have looked like a terrible beast.
I wonder what Taylor would think if she saw me now?
A frisson ran through me as I swallowed the last bite, turning to stare intensely at her tent.
What would she do if I came to her, like this, right now, covered in the blood of my kill?
I already knew what she would do. She would quake.
Quake with fear. And with need.
I’d seen her do it before. I’d seen the way her prey drive thrashed and twisted inside her, turning to desire. I’d smelled it, I’d seen the frenzied throb of her heart at her throat.
My little mate wanted me. I was growing more and more certain every moment.
I just had to figure out how to get her to admit it.
Or, if she’d already admitted it to herself, I had to figure out how to get her to stop fighting it.
Fighting fate.
Fighting me.
Finished eating, I wiped the blood from my scales with a clean bit of the rakdo’s fur before burying the mess in the sand. I’d stripped all the meat from the bones, and the fur was too ruined with blood to bother keeping for any other use.
I did not worry about the fact I’d saved no meat for Taylor. I was a powerful hunter and I could kill dozens of desert creatures for her if she grew tired of the rations she had brought on our journey.
I settled myself next to Taylor’s small travel tent, curling up on the sand. I would have preferred to sleep in the shelter of a cave, as I was used to. But I would sleep anywhere near Taylor. She could ask me to sleep in a bed of hot embers, and I’d lay myself down without a second thought.
The hold this new woman has on me is dangerous...
Resting the bottom of my snout on my arm, my tail curling around my body, I stilled, listening to Taylor’s breath. It was soft and quick and shallow in her tiny lungs. I tried to picture her, wondering how she slept. Did she sleep curled into a ball, like I did? Or some other way?
Was she still dressed, or were those breaths pushing and pulling inside a bare, silken chest.
I tensed, forcing myself to relax. There was no sense in getting so worked up when I could do nothing about it. Besides, I’d spent a lot of energy today. I needed rest, too.
But rest did not come easily. Taylor’s quiet breaths became the crashing of waves inside my skull, pounding through my blood into my limbs, my groin. With a suppressed groan, I let my cock emerge, heavy with blood and seed. Shifting slightly, I worked my cock down into the cool sand, grinding into the ground the way I wanted to grind into Taylor’s cunt. The sand did not grip me in fevered wetness, did not give me what I wanted, what I needed. But the cool, grainy pressure of it did provide an oddly pleasurable sort of discomfort that soon had me snapping my hips harder against the ground.
I must be losing my mind, I thought miserably as my tail jerked behind me, my cock throbbing. For a warrior of the sea to be so out of control that he ruts the dry sands...
It was utter madness. Madness that had me straining against the grit of the ground, spilling seed into the dry depths, biting back a groan.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Taylor
After using some talka gel in the tent to clean myself off, I dressed and packed the next morning. Tok was ready for me when I emerged from the tent, and we broke down the tent unceremoniously, leaving behind the broken bone pole. After a quick bite to eat, we were off, continuing on our rapid journey. I knew Tok only had seven days’ leave from his duties at the settlement, so when he asked me if I wanted to keep going as darkness fell that night, I told him yes. It would be a huge disappointment if we didn’t even get time to explore the coast and to see the Bitter Sea records he’d told me about.
Because we moved so quickly and didn’t stop at sunset, we reached Gahn Taliok’s mountains that night. The desert sand became harder, more densely packed, and much darker red, like blackened blood in the darkness. The mountains were an astonishing formation. Even having lived at Fallo’s cliffs when we’d first arrived on this planet, and then the Cliffs of Uruzai, I was not prepared for the harsh, sharp beauty of the mountain range. The star and asteroid light spilled down the dark red peaks, turning each mountain into a glowing fang that pierced up into the sky.
We tracked around the edge of the mountain range, rather than going right through the middle. Even though we had permission to leave the settlement and to travel this way, Tok didn’t want to disturb the camp of the guard party Gahn Taliok had left behind. So instead of riding through the middle, we picked our way through a rocky valley nearer the edge, the largest of the peaks rising up on our left, smaller rock formations on our right.
Well, I say we picked through the valley, but in reality, it was all Tok. while I just held on tight. Despite his size and the fact that he didn’t hail from these mountains, he moved through the stone formation with graceful ease, shocking me. His claws traversed each boulder and valley like he’d come this way a hundred times before, even though I knew he’d only travelled through the Sea Sands once – to get to the settlement.
As the night dragged on, the stars and asteroids trekking across the sky just as we trekked through the mountains, we found a place to sleep. It was a smooth, low spot with lots of cover from a slab of rock that leaned against the larger wall of the mountain beside us, creating a sort of stone cave.
“You must like that,” I said as Tok knelt so I could slip out of the saddle. “It’s like a cave.”
Tok removed the saddle, once again reminding me of a man undressing, making my cheeks heat, as he surveyed the spot.
“I do like it,” he said. He turned to me, the discs of his eyes like liquid metal. “Do you like it?”
“Yeah, it looks good,” I answered. I liked the way the stone slab provided so much protection. It almost felt cozy.
“Oh! But can we set up a tent here? I don’t want to break all the other bone poles we brought.”
The floor of this area was solid rock – impossible to drive a bone pole down into the ground to hold up a tent here.
Tok undid the tent bundle, holding the hides in his hands and looking at the camp spot appraisingly. Shifting all the hides to his left hand, he rubbed at the bottom of his snout with his right, as if pondering what I’d said.
“Here,” he said, suddenly moving. He struck forward, tucking the edge of the tent hides into the crack where the slab of rock met the mountainside. After a few adjustments, he released his hold on the hides, letting them swish down into place. The hides created a perfect curtain across the opening into the sheltered space.
“It is not a tent,” Tok admitted. “But will this work for you?”
I glanced at the curtain, then back at him.
“Yes, I think so.”
Tok gave a satisfied sort of grunting sound, staring at me. Weirdly, even though it had been another long day, and it was really late, I suddenly didn’t feel tired at all. I felt... Abuzz. Energized. Almost giddy.
And it was because of Tok’s gaze on me.
My heart pounded in my chest, my throat. Its rapid rhythm increased when Tok’s hungry eyes fell to my neck.
“You know,” I said. I paused.
Tok cocked his head, waiting for me to continue.
I cleared my throat, flapping an awkward hand back at the shelter.
“You know, you could fit in there. With me.”
The words came out in a chaotic tumble. Because, once again, they were falling out of my mouth without the go-ahead of my brain. Meanwhile, my brain was just catching up and absolutely screaming bloody murder at me. Did you just invite the giant lizard alien who’s obsessed with you to sleep with you?!
“Sleep! Just sleep!” I said quickly, speaking more to my own mad brain than to Tok. If Tok was disappointed by that addition to the conversation, he didn’t show it. He strode forward, lifting the curtain he’d created and fixing his stark yellow eyes on me.
“After you.”
I stiffened, not able to make my feet go forward. God, I must have been crazy. Why was I inviting him in there! Now that I knew he’d be following me in there, it was impossible to make myself go inside.
Tok must have caught my hesitation, because he said, “I do not have to share this space with you. I will be plenty comfortable out -”
