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It splatters beneath the heavy footsteps of the brutish creature hulking toward us. His fingers are just long enough to curl menacingly as he stoops into a prowling stance.
He will not touch her.
I can feel her trembling touch, and I push her behind me, the leather gloves falling to the fetid floor. My claws are bared. My wrath is unmatched. He will not threaten what is mine.
When his next step lands, I launch.
Martial arts training from a life forgotten flows through my limbs as muscle memory moves my body in a whirlwind. Sidestepping and deflecting his slow blows, my claws rip into his muscles, slashing across his stomach and opening his bowels to join the crust at our feet. He stumbles forward, his gnarled palms sliding to the floor.
I leap onto his back, my clawed toes gaining purchase in the thick skin of his flanks. One swipe under his throat and he collapses below me, blood surging in a wave, a bubbling carpet spreading toward my trembling mate.
Rage erupts from me, roaring into his lifeless ears, to the huddling throngs of panicked dogs that scurry to flee my sight. It draws into a howl that echoes from the concrete walls and ricochets into the streets. I hear the joined cries of my loyal subjects mimicking my call, their voices carrying across the city beyond the reach of my sensitive ears.
I am in charge. I will not be threatened.
Nor will she.
Jumping from the broad back of the carcass, I signal to my next in command to remove the body. Within seconds, the massive shape is being dragged into the streets by half a dozen snarling beasts where it’s quickly encapsulated by a mass of writhing fur and limbs.
The crunching of bones and wet sounds of tearing flesh cloak me with their comforting sounds as I step down the hall back to her.
She huddles near her door. With wild rolling eyes, she reaches for my arm as I draw close.
Seeking safety with me is a welcome change from her previously fearful and disdainful attitude. A shift I hope she continues after today.
As she’s hiding behind me from the frenzied dogs, I can smell the cloying scent of fear nearly covering her estrus. The combination sends a riotous surge of blood to my loins, nearly causing me to relent to the torrent of adrenaline still coursing through my veins and take her right here in the hall.
My nostrils flare, gulping her intoxicating smell. I can taste her in the air, heavy, alluring. The stifling weight has me gasping in the heady perfume of her.
Corralling her with my arms, I carry her lightly to her room as I did that first day I found her. Her lithe body pressing against mine, the soft golden sheen of her hair skimming against my cheek causes my cock to kiss the air as it pushes free of its sheath.
“You have to, don’t you.” It isn’t a question that she whispers against my neck.
Today is not the first day I have fought to protect her. My queen has seen the carnage that ensues over an unclaimed female, how their refusal can be lethal. She has also bore witness to the claimed ones, safely strutting through the fray of posturing males, their scent saturated with the smell of their mate.
When I drop her to her feet, I simply nod. Squatting, I pull my knees to my chest to cover my erection thrumming against my stomach.
Why I care what she feels baffles me sometimes. I never once stopped to consider my prize’s perceptions of me before. Now, I covet every soft look she slips my way, every momentary lapse in her hatred.
Digging through the pile of retrieved items within my reach, I find the chocolate I could smell hidden, and offer it to her. A consolation in its most rudimentary form.
The quivering of her bottom lip betrays the inner struggle she is fighting. A glistening of tears bead against her big blue eyes, but no drop breaks free. Instead, they gather into a frail ribbon upon her lower lids.
With a resolute tightening of her brows she reaches for the chocolate, admitting her acquiescence. Turning on her heel, she walks stiffly to the side of the bed. It’s adorned with a fluffy pink comforter I had selected just for her.
She had cried then as well. And angrily screamed “Why?” repeatedly at my kind gestures.
I cannot explain why something shifted within me. The obsession to keep her to myself, at all costs, burns in my chest with such a fierce intensity I suffer to breathe. I wonder if she knows I have long abandoned sleeping in my trophy room, instead choosing to prostrate myself outside her door, guarding her slumber from the lurking dogs who may be tempted to test my command.
She tosses the chocolate bar onto the nightstand and begins undressing herself, folding the clothes neatly and placing them next to the chocolate.
Her heart races, a mix of fear and arousal seeps from her pores. I have been dedicated to bringing only pleasure the last few times, and her mixed reaction is a testament to the lure of my tongue.
The perfect skin of her body reveals itself as each layer is removed. Smooth curves and lean lines prickle in gooseflesh in the cool air. I catch a silhouette of her rose colored nipples tightening when they pull free of her snug shirt.
Cascading blond tendrils shimmer across her shoulders sending a shiver of anticipation through me. My hips try to jerk of their own volition at the thought of burying my face against her golden locks while I’m seated deep within her virginal body.
My cock leaks against my belly. Her shivering naked form is too inviting to ignore any longer. The musk of her scent invades me until I’m drowning in it, saturated in the essence of her filling this room, digging into my skull and dragging me to her.