the bathing pool and the adjoining shower. He went to start the shower, and when he turned around, his shirt was on the floor. Hanna stood there naked, her slender body glowing and her cheeks flushed pink. As he stared at her, too awestruck by her beauty to speak, the pink spread down her neck and reached her luscious little breasts. Her lashes dropped to cover her eyes, and he recognized the gesture as one she made when she was nervous. Before he could reassure her, she took another step toward him.
“Will you shower with me?”
Chapter Eighteen
Hanna’s voice was soft, almost hesitant, as she lifted her eyes and looked at him. He could see the uncertainty in her eyes, and he knew how much courage it had taken for her to ask him. How could he, even for a moment, let her doubt his commitment to her?
He knew their time together couldn’t last. He couldn’t subject her to either the dangers of the jungle or the different but equally vicious dangers of his profession. He had to take her to where she would be safe even though it would kill him to do so. But for right now, she was here, and she needed him, and he could have no more prevented himself from going to her than he could have prevented his heart from beating.
He crossed the distance between them in two strides and lifted her up into his arms, groaning as the sweet, damp heat of her naked cunt settled against his stomach. Her legs went around his waist as she reached up and put her arms around his neck, giving him a shy smile.
“You don’t mind showering together?”
“I can think of nothing I would enjoy more,” he said sincerely as he carried her over to the water now streaming from the overhead showerhead.
For a moment, he was content just to hold her, to feel their bodies pressed together as the water poured down over them.
“Mmm, this is nice. Like being under a waterfall. Do you have waterfalls?” she asked, her voice dreamy. Then she peeped up at him. “I mean ones that aren’t out to kill you?”
He laughed. “Perhaps I have been a little insistent on that point. But Pardor is a dangerous place, and I couldn’t stand it if you got hurt.”
Her eyes darkened to deep-blue pools, and her little pink lips parted. Half afraid of what she was going to say, he hurried on. “There is a waterfall not far from here. The path is dangerous—”
“Of course,” she snorted.
“—but the waterfall itself is safe enough. I could take you if you would like to go.”
She tilted her head to one side. “Does anyone else go there?”
“Occasionally, perhaps. But we are a long way from the village, and I wouldn’t expect company. Why?”
“Because if other people were going to show up, we couldn’t do this.” She slid her hand down his damp stomach and beneath his loincloth, firmly grasping his cock. Her eyes sparkled, delighted with her own daring, and he thrust involuntarily into her hand.
“You have a very talented touch, saachi.”
She blushed but nodded, then wiggled impatiently to get down. He reluctantly let her slide free, but to his shock, she kept going, dropping to her knees and removing his loincloth on the way.
“Hanna…” Whatever he was about to say vanished as she took his cockhead in the tight warmth of her mouth. Just as when she had done this at the party, she hummed appreciatively, sending ripples of sensation up his cock and vibrating through his body.
When she pulled back, he almost demanded that she return. But she didn’t move away. Instead, she looked up at him, her eyes wide and blue.
“Will you…change back? Back to your true self?”
“You don’t like the public form?” he asked, shocked. His skin color might be different, but in this form, he more closely resembled what he assumed a human male would look like.
“No, no,” she said hastily. “You’re just as handsome like this, but…” She ducked her head. “I like you best the other way. The way you were on the ship when it was just the two of us.”
His chest ached. Other than when he was alone on Pardor, he never assumed his true appearance. Somehow, he had come to think of it as lesser, yet here was his woman, his mate, and she was not only accepting but encouraging the side of him that he had tried so hard to banish. Unable to speak, he