hardened flesh of his palm. She only clamped down harder.
Unmistakably, she felt something twitch against her backside in response.
He likes it, she thought, realization crashing down on her, and she immediately released her bite, stunned.
A group of males, at least five, were now walking past the trunk of the tree. Wind rustled the branches.
Again, Erin made a show of filling her lungs with air, threatening to scream. Jaxor’an rasped in her ear, “Vrax, female, he was the Prime Leader’s Ambassador. He will take her back to the Golden City.”
Was that so hard, asshole? she wondered, but profound relief made the built-up air huff from her nostrils. Crystal would be safe.
The males below were moving on. The last of their group was just on the edge of the clearing, heading in the opposite direction of where they’d initially been waiting.
Her neck felt hot where Jaxor’an had bitten her. After several moments of quiet, she finally felt his grip loosen away from her mouth and he brought his palm up to inspect the bite she’d given him.
Erin did the same, brushing her fingertips over the side of her neck. He didn’t bite hard enough to leave teeth marks—which she knew she had left on his hand—but it felt sensitive to the touch. It had been a warning.
She glared as she said, “Bite me again and I’ll bite you back.”
Erin had always prided herself on being in control of her emotions. She had also prided herself on being calm, on keeping a level head even in the most difficult of times. Like being abducted by aliens, for example.
But looking at this alien male with bright blue eyes, her chest was in turmoil. She felt like a smug, wild little beast as he inspected his palm. Her emotions felt like they possessed raw, serrated edges as they dragged through her mind and body, leaving fresh marks along the way as they passed.
His gaze leveled at her. He was handsome in a grim way. His mouth seemed perpetually downturned into a scowl. His black horns curled proudly from his head and his dark hair was loose and wild, trailing to his waist. He was half-feral…half-wild.
She remembered seeing him for the first time that morning, in the Golden City. As she and Crystal had bathed, he’d appeared in the washing room after knocking out their two guards with unfathomable ease.
Erin remembered the jolt in her body when their eyes had connected for the first time. She’d had the wild, stray thought that he was a puppeteer because that was what it felt like. It felt like he’d tugged on an imaginary thread that ran between them, that had always existed, that she hadn’t discovered until just that moment.
And he’d seemed equally stunned, unable to pull his gaze from her.
“I warn you now, female,” Jaxor’an said, his voice edging closer to a purr than a growl. It made her belly flutter anew and she hated it. “I am not like the Luxirian males you have encountered so far.”
Erin bristled at his thinly veiled threat. She’d always heard that Luxirian males would never hurt their females in any way, that they would rather die. She saw the way her friends’ Luxirian mates treated them and knew it to be undeniably true.
No, he wasn’t like any Luxirian male she’d encountered before, that much was certain. He didn’t dress like them, he didn’t act like them, he didn’t speak like them. Except for the piercings through his nipples that told her he’d completed Luxirian warrior training, he was a complete and utter mystery.
What frightened her the most, however, was that he seemed completely aware but also…unpredictable, like a feral animal. There was a quiet wildness about him that put her on edge.
“If you act out against me again,” he continued, those bright, electric eyes glinting, “I will punish you. And next time, I will bite even harder.”
Chapter Two
Once he was certain the Mevirax were far enough away, Jaxor hauled the human female over his shoulder once more, ignoring her muted sound of protest, and maneuvered her back down to the forest floor.
Once there, he gashed the trunk of the tree with a fast swipe of his claws for no other reason than that it made him feel slightly more in control. He didn’t even know why, but immediately, that turbulent beast rising within him quieted and stilled.
The female froze when she witnessed his small outburst, but Jaxor didn’t give her a chance to say anything before he was running again.