as dark as a thundercloud.
“Because bonding is death to us. Enough cuddling.”
He stepped out of the pool suddenly and set her down on her own two feet. Brusquely, he handed her a towel.
“Dry off,” he growled. “Your first lesson is over…for now.”
Then he left her there, shivering and uncertain, wondering what in the world would happen to her in the future if this was only her first lesson with the big Kru’ell One.
Eleven
Kane cursed to himself as he made his way to his private rooms. Why had he given the curvy little female his seed? He hadn’t been lying when he’d told her he had never done such a thing before. Despite the many concubines he had taken, he had never given a single one of them his seed—had never come inside a single one of them.
Nor had he cuddled any of them. It was better to keep a cool, disinterested head when feeding from a concubine’s emotions. Usually Kane could fulfill a female’s desires enough to make her produce nourishment for him without getting involved himself. But somehow, he couldn’t resist the curvy little redhead he’d taken from the other Earth.
He was in dangerous territory and he knew it. As he had filled Allisandra with his seed, he’d had the almost overwhelming impulse to lean forward and sting the side of her neck at the same time, injecting his lust-honey and bonding her to him.
But he must not do that, Kane reminded himself—he must never bond! It was death to his kind—it would be the end of him. And yet he’d had the girl less than a day and had almost done exactly that.
What was wrong with him—giving her his seed like that and nearly bonding her? Was he simply reacting to her desire—so deeply hidden she barely knew it herself—that she might one day have a child of her own to love and care for? That she might feel her belly swell with life and nurse a baby at her breast?
Kane didn’t know but he did know he needed to stop being soft with her. From now on, he vowed to himself, she would get no special treatment. Allisandra was nothing more than another concubine—albeit, an extremely beautiful and beguiling one. He would treat her like all the others—he would not allow himself to be soft.
He would feed from her for a time and then take her back where she belonged and then he would never think of her again.
Kane swore it to himself. And he never broke his word.
Twelve
Alli stood there where he had left her, wrapped in a towel and shivering in the middle of the huge bathroom. What had just happened? Why had he gotten so angry with her after all that?
And had he made her pregnant?
Fear and trepidation overwhelmed her. She ought to go to the shower or get back in the pool and try to wash his seed out of her!
But Alli found she didn’t want to.
I’m just tired, she told herself. What a crazy night! I just need to lie down and rest for a while. Then I’ll do it.
She made her way to the bedroom and got to the bed. Her nightshirt was lying discarded on the ground but Alli was too tired to pick it up and put it on. The intense encounter with the big Kru’ell One seemed to have completely drained her strength.
She climbed under the covers naked and cuddled into herself, wrapping her arms around her legs and trying to keep warm. Between her thighs, she could still feel the warm seed Kane had shot in her filling her pussy. Again the thought that she ought to clean up came, but again she rejected it. She was too tired to do anything tonight—she would just have to sleep with his seed still inside her.
Tomorrow, she told herself. Tomorrow I’ll clean up and find a way out of here. Maybe I’ll steal a ship and try my luck with the wormhole generator after all. But not now—tomorrow.
So thinking, she closed her eyes and drifted into an exhausted slumber.
Thirteen
Alli was woken by a tinkling sound that made her think of little silver bells. Her first thought was, That’s not the sound of my alarm. And her next, when she opened her eyes was, Where am I?
Looking around the opulent bedroom, she had a moment of disorientation. This wasn’t her bedroom in the townhouse she shared with Douglas, or her suite aboard the Mother Ship. This was someplace completely different.