Total pages in book: 119
Estimated words: 110600 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 553(@200wpm)___ 442(@250wpm)___ 369(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 110600 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 553(@200wpm)___ 442(@250wpm)___ 369(@300wpm)
Nassakth, I remind myself.
Even though it’s been less than a day, I need to think of him as a person. As a friend. As someone to trust.
The thought’s a little terrifying. It’s been so long since I’ve trusted anyone.
So far, though, Nassakth has been more than fair. He’s been nice. Courteous. I remember him opening my door. I remember him quietly correcting the clerk who married us when the man didn’t see the point of our mating. He gave me half his property.
He stayed in stun-cuffs all night when he could have snapped them and wrung my neck.
And he never touched me, even when out of his head with the noli.
I rub my hand, thinking about how he licked at my palm as if his life depended on it. As if, well, it were other parts of my anatomy and he was trying desperately to make me come.
I squeeze my thighs tightly together at that thought.
18
NASSAKTH
There is no pleasure quite like the knowledge that one’s mate is sleeping in one’s bed. It does not matter to me that she isn’t ready to share it just yet. She knows my intentions. She knows I plan on keeping her.
And she said she would like a baby.
I would like nothing more than to give her one.
I rake my hand over my face, messing fur tufts, and try to clear my head of the thought of Kim underneath me, looking up at me with anticipation. That is a dream right now, and until she learns to trust me, it will remain a dream.
So…I must make her feel safe and secure in this new life we are starting together. I want to learn about her, to decipher her past so I can determine the best way for us to move forward. It is clear she has experienced bad things that have made her wary despite her generally innocent, trusting nature. I decide I must be honest with her at all times, and show her that I am not to fear.
The brutal Nassakth, Arena Scourge of Askorthi Prime, is not the same Nassakth that she married. I am different now. I am retired. I have no desire to rip anyone’s throat out…unless they threaten my mate. But she does not need to see that side of me. I will show her kind, wealthy Nassakth who merely wishes a pretty human companion to spend his days with…and to spend his nights impregnating.
The thought makes me sweat. Perhaps I have not worked all of the noli out of my system yet, because I need a few moments to calm down. I move to the window and gaze out at the fields, at the rolling land and the large trees I had imported from a distant world and transplanted here because Risda III does not have many forests. I have done much to make this quiet place my home, and I have wanted for nothing, desired nothing beyond what I have…until I saw her.
Now I must win her.
Winning Kim’s heart is not like winning an arena battle. Violence and brute force will not help my cause. Cunning, though…I can be cunning.
I must show her what a good mate I can be.
Rubbing my hands, I race to the kitchen to see what I can cook my pretty mate for an evening meal. Fresh meat, I decide, with veg from the gardens. A nice Kessian wine.
I will be charming and smooth and I will brush my tail for her again…and she will be unable to resist.
I prepare a spicy, herbed roast to perfection, so juicy and tender that my mouth waters. I am not a fan of veg—most praxiians eat nothing but meat—but I cook a little up for my pretty human companion, toasting some roots and tossing them in yet more herbs. I select a fine wine, set the table, and wait.
Kim still has not yet emerged from the bedroom, so I put the food in a warming oven and tend to my plants to pass the time. There are automated bots that can ensure the plants are all watered and fertilized properly, but I like to tend to them myself. It gives me great pleasure to check on each plant, to touch the green leaves and turn it toward the sunlight streaming through the windows. Plants are such a simple pleasure that I do not deny myself any of them, and it takes me a long time to work from room to room, watering and nipping at dead leaves, adding nutrient tabs when necessary, and losing myself in the pleasure of my greenery.
One of the plants has a leaf peppered with holes, and I find the culprit after searching through the arching fronds—a caterpillar has somehow gotten inside and began feasting. With a careful touch, I ease it onto my finger. No sense in killing something that is only doing what it must to stay alive. I eye the small green worm as it crawls across my claws, trying to go back to my plant. “I am afraid you cannot stay,” I murmur to it. “These plants are not yours to eat. Outside, though, there is a feast for you, my friend.”