The Taming: Book 3 in the Tribe Warrior Series Imogen Keeper (story reading .TXT) 📖

“Our population evolved into segments, with a majority of the population becoming nearly infertile, both male and female. They are our fighters. With no young of their own to protect, they are free to leave the planet, wage war, do whatever they must. Then there are Primes. It’s their job to propagate.”

“And you are a Prime.”

He nodded. His fingers stroked along her hip bone.

She had to ask. She couldn’t bear not knowing. “Do you have a woman? And children? Back home?” She winced as she said it, knowing he’d make a snide remark to humiliate her. She held her breath.

Why do you care?

The unspoken question hovered in the air around them. She squeezed her eyes shut. If only words were like confetti, she’d snatch them back.

“Not yet.” His voice was soft, a bare ripple on the air.

She opened her mouth and blurted the words before she could change her mind. “And a felana?”

He sent her an amused glance. “Women who breed.”

That was something she could relate to. “Like me.”

“Yeah,” he said, voice rough in the thick night.

She stepped over a puddle, hands shaking.

Her breath was coming too fast. She was positively light-headed. “And if a Prime and an Argenti woman were together?” Her voice came out barely more than a whisper.

A dark smile curled across his cheek. “I have no idea. I don’t even know if it’s been done before.”

Her whole body felt heavy, hot. A second pulse pounded between her thighs. She rubbed them together.

He was watching her closely, his eyes burning with something that smacked of victory, and his thumb stroked a lazy path up and down her torso. Up nearly to her breast, and down to below her hipbone, so close to the rise of her pelvic bone that her breath hitched and her nipples chafed against her bra.

The streets grew crowded, and raucous laughter spilled through windows and doors with the ruddy light.

It was practically a mob. The streets teemed with dark-haired, pale-skinned people she’d always considered her enemy. They swarmed around them, loud and boisterous. The buildings were full of them. She’d never been so close to so many people before. She pressed against him.

“Are you scared?” He didn’t say it like a dare. No malice lurked in the words, and, for once, she got the impression he wouldn’t laugh at her.

“Not with you.” She squeezed her eyes shut, hoping to remember this exact moment for the rest of her days. A moment of total freedom, no rules or proprieties, no obligations, no fear. Just the safety of Tor’s warm body and the fresh night air.

Men and women alike gave him a wide berth, melting out of his path. He cut through them as easily as a wild beast loose amid the civilized.

It wasn’t just because he was Vestige. Even among his own people, he stood out. Fierce and scary and a little mean. And she walked beside him. She slept beside him.

And maybe... maybe they weren’t as different as they’d thought at first. The last of the streetlamps was behind them, so she couldn’t read his face.

The ship was close now, but she didn’t want to go there. Not anymore. Once they were there, everything would go back to the way it had been.

She slowed her pace, glaring at his ship, hulking black in the darkness. “So, this is it, then. Our last night? You’ll take me to Pax-Ahora tomorrow?” Her voice caught on the last word.

He stared back at her, the pearly orbs of his eyes locked on hers.

“And I’ll never see you again.”

His brows knitted together.

“I’ll almost miss you,” she whispered.

“Klym,” he said, turning her to face him, and he didn’t say anything else. Just walked her back so her shoulder blades pressed against the ship’s cool hull.

His boots came forward to settle on either side of her slippers, and his shoulders loomed above her. It was so much like that first day, only gone was the threat. He traced his nose along her temple, inhaling so long and slow.

The cool night air heated around them. He pressed a gentle kiss to her temple, and it made her want to cry.

Sweetness from this man, of all men. Something hard pressed against her belly, and a low, steady pulse pounded between her thighs in response.

Of course he’d decide on this night, their last night, to be sweet. “You make no sense,” she whispered as his nose trailed down her ear, his stubble bristling down her neck.

“I make perfect sense.”

“No, you don’t. You change constantly.”

He shook his head. “You’re the one who keeps changing on me.”

She rested her hands on his chest, her fingers splaying over his warm, shirt-covered chest. “I’m the same. You just didn’t see me.”

His fingers tightened on her hips. “I see you.”

Her heart skipped a beat.

“And I like what I see.”

Her heart skipped two beats.

Her hands drifted higher, sliding up around his thick shoulders. When she pressed her hips against him, he hummed a low, raspy growl that swirled in her ears.

“You blow hot and cold with the minute,” she breathed.

“I’m hot right now.” His words were nothing more than a breath as his lips trailed across her cheek, but a hard weight did press against her abdomen, and it was decidedly hot.

“I can feel that,” she blurted.

His laugh drifted over her skin. “Are you talking about my organ again, Klym? I can only assume you are interested.”

And damn him, she was curious. It was as if the thing had magnets or something. All she wanted was to press against it.

He grazed his teeth along her neck.

“Is it like that because of me?” She just had to know.

“Hard? Yeah.”

“Because you want me?” She needed to hear it. “The way a man wants a woman?”

“I want you, Klym.” His low, breathy laugh hit her low in the belly. “The way a Prime wants a woman.”

The bottom dropped out of her stomach. Just slipped right out and hit the wet ground of an alien planet. He wanted