Scaled Heart: A SciFi Alien Romance (Project: F5 Book 2) Jade Waltz (good books for high schoolers .txt) 📖

Had she dismissed what I had to say?

Sighing, I stepped away, cursing my failures. Just as I rounded the corner, a hissing noise filled the air.

“Chyox! Wait!”

Gasping, I struggled to breathe through the flood of relief coursing through me.

Were my ears deceiving me?

Hands gripped my arm, jerking me to a halt with nails digging into my skin.

“If you have something to say, Chyox, tell me now. Running away won’t solve anything.” She released her hold on me, but one of my tentacles involuntarily wrapped around her hand, refusing to let her go. “What do you want from me?”

Nine

KAICA

My heart ached from the betrayal, and here I was, begging him to fix it.

Every time I thought he might ask me to be his nestqueen, he backed off or did something stupid, making me question his character and my attraction to him.

Suddenly, Chyox whirled and scooped me off the ground, pinning me against the wall with his body. His tentacles unraveled and secured my legs in their grasp.

His violet eyes were hard with determination as they bored into mine.

Yet somehow, my instincts weren’t telling me to claw and fight—to escape from his sudden embrace. My hands had found his shoulders, gripping the strong muscles that held me in place.

“Kaica, I am nowhere near perfect and often fail to read females, especially those outside my own species. Ever since I first met you, when you volunteered to aid our research during your downtime, I was intrigued by your mind. Why would a member of the Fab Five want to work alongside a team of healers and scientists? Why would she abandon her elite position and move from exciting battles to a dull routine at a research station? The more I learned about you, the more I hoped that one day, you might come to be interested in me—a boring Senior Healer.

“I know I’ve erred once again, but as soon as you left, I realized my mistake. I promise you, from now on, I will work harder to make the infirmary a safe work environment for you. All I ask is for you to forgive me and never hesitate to correct me.”

His words struck me to my core.

The Circuli males in Xylo’s research team tried to explain to me it was up to the female—the nestqueen—to make the first move engaging a courting bond. While the nestqueens tended to determine a male’s worth by his appearance or profession, males were the opposite; they were attracted to the mind, both in strength and beauty.

I was accustomed to males at the bars and clubs my sisters loved to frequent spewing lines about how exotic, hot, or fuckable we were.

Were the notes that they took during my lesson on how to attract a female for me?

Had I missed his attempts to flirt with me this whole time?

In the last few days, he had mentioned multiple times the beauty of my mind and character—only once had he given me a compliment about a physical attribute, my hair.

Which made sense; Ulax were empaths. Their skin changed color in response to extreme emotion and they could read another’s feelings through their auras.

To him, my hair was the most relatable feature he could compliment, not knowing how odd he sounded. At least, he was doing a better job than Selena’s nestmates, who I’d heard compliment her glowing, color-changing spots. Out of all of my siblings, I could now understand her frustration best.

“Have I said something wrong?” Chyox asked, worry lacing his deep voice as a tentacle brushed my hair behind my ears. “Please let me know what you’re thinking. Unlike the Wudox, I can’t pick up your stray thoughts, just emotions.”

Biting my lip, I hesitated, unsure how I should move the conversation forward.

“I’m going to be straightforward with you since we both appreciate bluntness. I’ve been trying to figure out what is going on between us.”

“We are coworkers.” He frowned in confusion. “What else would we be?”

Rolling my eyes, I shook my head as I smiled at his ridiculous question.

“Would a coworker hold me up against the wall, pin me in place with his body, and use his appendages to prevent me from struggling?” Panic flashed in his violet eyes, so I tapped his nose to grab his attention before he put me down. “Chyox, you know what I’ve been studying, and you understand the fertility problem my sisters and I face. Unlike the other demihumans, who may be able to have children with others of the same species they were spliced with, my siblings and I don’t have that opportunity. Our bodies reject anything foreign within it, including attacking any sperm that we may come across by joining with another. I haven’t been able to come up with a solution to change that and don’t know if I ever will, so it is your turn to tell me something. Do you want offspring? Will you be driven insane with the need to father little Chyoxes, like Odelm was?”

“I have no drive to be a father.” He jerked his head away to allow a tentacle marked with silver crescents along its edges to slither between us. “Look what Selena’s cubs did to my precious tentacles. Why would I want to have to deal with more children when Selena’s are enough to keep me busy? I naturally want to join a nestqueen’s clan and earn a rank. Anything else should be considered an unexpected blessing.”

“Didn’t Selena’s mates warn you about the cubs?” I chuckled. “You were supposed to play games with them, maybe teach them to swim, not allow them to treat you like a chew toy.”

He looked away, clearly embarrassed he hadn’t heeded their warning.

“I didn’t think they would use me as their next target for their hunting games,” he muttered as his shoulders slumped under my hold.

I placed one hand on his cheek and directed his gaze back to mine, resting my hand