Total pages in book: 44
Estimated words: 40168 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 201(@200wpm)___ 161(@250wpm)___ 134(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 40168 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 201(@200wpm)___ 161(@250wpm)___ 134(@300wpm)
He clenched his jaw. “What relation is he to you?”
She closed her eyes, rubbed her forehead, and exhaled, resting back against the wall again. “What difference does anything make anymore?”
He didn’t respond, just watched as her resistance left, her strength fading, and he knew this woman, drugged or not, wouldn’t fight him. She’d lost her hope, which was clear to him. He sensed it, smelled it come from her in waves of sadness, and knew that his people had done this to her.
“What is your age, female? Your name?”
She dropped her hand to her lap and blinked a few times, maybe trying to clear her head. “I think twenty-one, although I don’t know for sure as I’ve been hiding, from your kind, since I was born.” She looked at him, maybe hesitant to answer the rest. “God, what does it even matter?” she said to herself. “My name is Greta.”
He wasn’t going to argue with her on the politics of it all. Decades had passed, and he couldn’t control what happened in the past. But she was young, so much younger than he was. At twenty-one she was a mere child compared to him and his species.
“Sleep, female,” he said, and watched as she closed her eyes, the Posh too strong for her to fight anymore. He left her in the guest pod and went into the living area. Sitting down on the bench, he breathed out and scrubbed a hand over his face. She’d sleep for the next few hours at least, and then he’d have to deal with explaining he had no intentions of letting her go, and that if she were breeding with anyone it would only be him.
5
“What are you planning on doing with her, Tolcan?” Stellan asked, this concentration and almost … worry on his face. They were at his pod, Stellan having shown up after he clearly heard the news Tolcan had put in a request to keep the female as a concubine, because wanting her, requesting her as a mate, was forbidden.
“What does it look like?” he said, angry that one of his warriors was questioning him. But Stellan wasn’t just under Tolcan’s command, but also a male he’d known since he was a boy. They’d been together when they landed on Earth, fought side-by-side, and had watched over the other. This was his friend, and it was clear Stellan was confused, too, about why Tolcan was suddenly taking on a female for his own when he’d never shown interest before.
Greta had been sleeping for the last three hours, and like a male infatuated with the female he’d gone in and checked on her several times. But this obsession he had, springing up from the moment he’d taken her to his pod, wasn’t going to lessen. He knew that, knew himself well enough to understand when something like this had his attention it wouldn’t go away.
War, fighting, defending his kind, those all had attention in him, concentration, obsession. Greta was the same way. It was instant, consuming, and he wasn’t going to ignore it even if he’d told himself he would.
“It looks like you’re taking on a human female as a concubine? A wife? A mate? What, Tolcan?”
Tolcan stared at Stellan, looked at the male’s arms, and stared at those black lines covering his flesh. He didn’t have as many as Tolcan, but unless a warrior had the highest Enforcer status, their black stripes of pride, or war and death, defending his people, didn’t cover them from wrist to shoulder. “I want her, and that’s all there is to it. What I choose to do with her is my business.” He stood, done with this conversation. Greta would be waking soon, and he had enough shit to deal with when she fully realized after sleeping, eating, and the drug wearing off that she was his irrevocably.
Stellan nodded, a sharp, almost angry tilt of his head. “I don’t know what you’re doing, but I can see, can tell, that she means something to you, and I don’t understand why. But I do know I’ve never seen you care about a woman for more than a couple of hours, not Rogue or human.” Stellan looked at him for a long moment. “Be careful, Tolcan. If you want her as more than a female to fuck, then you’re screwed.” He walked toward the front doors. “You know the Royal council would never let you take a human as a mate, not even if you’re one of their highest Enforcers, Tolcan.” Then Stellan left, the doors sliding into the wall before closing once more.
Tolcan stood there, his anger seething that one of his soldiers called it out like that. Told him exactly what had been playing in his mind. He turned and went into the guest bedroom, knowing he shouldn’t be seeing her, speaking to her when he was in this volatile mood.