Page 6

CHAPTER SIX

GYRIK

My thoughts immediately shifted to what I’d learned from my brothers, but Angel’s warnings stopped me from telling Ava I could release inside of her repeatedly without going soft like a human male.

“I can jump higher than a human can.”

“Really? How high?”

“I could jump from the ground to your cabin’s roof without strain. Higher, too.”

“Higher than your brothers?”

Ava wanted to know more about me . She was interested . I tried to hide my excitement, but Repeat lifted his head to stare at me when my cock twitched under him again. I petted him and silently begged him not to move.

Ava had looked so lost and afraid when she’d asked if she would be hurt if she left with us. I didn’t want her to think I had only asked her to return with us so we could have sex.

“Most of them. I can also hear better. When Pete and Repeat aren’t purring so loudly, I can hear your heartbeat.”

“Wow. So…faster, stronger, better hearing, and immune to getting sick?”

“Yes.”

“I can see why some humans don’t like you,” she said.

My hope shriveled inside of me.

“Especially human men. Based on my experience, most of them can’t handle being shown up by someone—male or female. It’s sad, really. I think of all the female friends I’ve had who’ve cheered me on to do more and be more, and I can’t imagine living a life where I didn’t have that support. A life filled with thinking I’m competing against everyone or everyone’s competing against me just sounds exhausting.”

She flashed me a smile that melted my insides.

“Don’t get me wrong. I can be competitive, too. But it’s not all the time. I don’t feel an ever-present need to prove myself.”

“You think human males do?” I asked.

“Oh yeah. Definitely.

“There was this dick at work who liked putting me down. That’s why I was at the cabin. To prove that I was better than him.”

A male had pushed Ava down with his dick? I remained very still so she wouldn’t know how angry that made me. Pete and Repeat knew. Their ears flicked in my direction even when they didn’t look at me.

If Ava had a bad experience with dicks, would she become sad like May? I didn’t want her to be afraid of them. Of me.

“He won’t ever hurt you again,” I said when I could speak without sounding angry.

“Oh, I never let him hurt me. He was just an annoying ass.”

Could a male’s ass be annoying? I frowned, wondering if this was one of those miscommunication moments that Angel often mentioned to us.

“How long ago were the cities bombed?” she asked.

“Almost five months now.”

She sighed as she followed the truck in front of us around the bend in her road.

“I can’t believe I didn’t notice something like that. Is there any chance my family is still alive?”

She wasn’t the first survivor who’d asked that question this trip. So I gave her the answer I heard Bram give the others.

“It’s impossible to say right now with our limited ability to communicate over any significant distance, but it’s part of why we’re out here. We’re noting the names of the people we find and marking our maps. We won’t give locations away, but if someone in the future asks about a certain name in a certain area, maybe we’ll have an answer.”

“Wow. That’s really…nice.”

I nodded. “I am not the kind of male who will push you down with my dick.”

She made a little sound and glanced at me with visible surprise.

“I won’t push you down with any part of me. Ever,” I promised.

“Um. Okay. Thanks, I guess? What cities have you been through? My sister’s name is Kylie. She was living with my mom, Stacy, and helping care for our grandpa, Charlie, in the Shakopee area, southwest of Minneapolis, a big city south of here.”

“We’ve avoided all the big cities. The bombing makes them hard to navigate with the trucks, and the remaining infected make them unsafe to travel without the trucks. But your family was probably evacuated with everyone else.”

“Yeah, I guessed that already, but I was still kind of hoping you’ve heard of them.”

I hated seeing her sadness, so I said, “There is a woman named Stacy at Tenacity. But Bram said it’s common for humans to have the same name.”

“So don’t get my hopes up, right?”

“Angel says that hope keeps people alive.”

“Angel sounds pretty smart.”

“She is. She just had a baby. Daisy is perfect. She’s smaller than Pete and lies still like Repeat when she’s held.”

Ava glanced at Pete in my arms, then at me.

“You like kids?”

“Yes. My brothers and I never saw any before coming to the surface.”

“Never? Didn’t you say you were reborn in your world whenever you removed heads?”

“Yes. We were reborn in the waters but exactly as we are. Only, without any hair.” I reached up and rubbed my hand over my shorter hair.

“You know, the more I learn, the weirder this all sounds,” she said.

“Mya didn’t believe many things at first either. When you meet her, you should ask her about watching our rebirth.”

“I think I might have to do that.”

Ava’s questions didn’t end there. She asked about the world I’d known before coming to the surface. She seemed very interested in the animals who had lived in the caves with us and was sad to learn that many of the animals on the surface had run away and were hard to find now.

I carefully asked questions of my own, avoiding the ones I knew I shouldn’t ask—like asking what her pussy tasted like or if she had a boyfriend or husband. Instead, I asked about where she grew up and what work she did before she went to the cabin. Emily, another woman in Tolerance who was helping my brothers and me find females of our own, said those were safe questions. Ava responded well to both.

My fascination with her grew the longer we talked. She was funny and smart and interesting. I learned she’d been living independently for years. She hadn’t dated seriously, which meant she had no boyfriend or husband. I tried to think of a question that would lead her to admit the flavor of her pussy.

The radio crackled.

“Are there any homes Ava wants us to check before we leave Silver Bay?” Will asked.

“I didn’t really know anyone from around here.”

I relayed that to Will then leaned forward to look up at the sky before speaking on the radio again.

“It looks like it will snow soon.”

“We’ll let you know when we need you in front,” he responded.

“What did he mean by needing you in front?”

“New snow will make it harder to see where the road is. I’ll run ahead of the truck to ensure Will doesn’t drive off the road.”

“Why you?”

“I don’t get cold like humans do.”

She glanced at my shirt. “I guess not. What did you do before coming here? Not to this area but here on the surface?”

I talked about the fields, the things we made like the pants and boots I wore, and how we’d honed our fighting skills to defend ourselves against the hounds.

“I think I’d like to see a challenge,” she said. “It sounds interesting.”

The idea of Ava wanting to watch me spar with one of my brothers sent a thrill through me. Repeat lifted his head to look at me, and I tried to will my throbbing cock into a relaxed state—an impossibility with Ava’s sweet scent filling the cab.

“If we’re worried about losing the road, why aren’t we taking the main highway?” Ava asked after it started snowing.

“This way will take us around Duluth,” I said. “The highway would take us directly into it.”

“Gotcha.” She sucked her lower lip into her mouth, and Repeat got off my lap to lie next to me. I quickly set Pete there to cover my reaction to what she was doing to her mouth.

“Is there any chance we can check my family’s house?” she asked after a moment. “I just need to know if they left a message for me like the people did in that house in Silver Bay. If you have a map, I can show you where it is.”

I was willing to search any home she wanted, but I knew better than to promise to check her home, especially if it was still in the city.

“When we stop, I’ll ask Bram to show you the maps we have.”

“Thank you, Gyrik. So much. I know that’s not a ‘yes,’ but it wasn’t a ‘no’ either, and I appreciate that.”

Thank you, Gyrik.

I grinned as her pretty words of thanks repeated in my mind.

The snow was getting deeper as it fell thickly from the sky, and I could no longer see our tracks from the day before, but that didn’t matter. The dips on the side of the road made it easy enough to find the center.

I knew Bram was having difficulty navigating, though, despite my presence a hundred feet ahead of him, when he flashed his lights.

Pivoting, I ran backward to wave for him to stop then sprinted past their truck to check on Ava and Zach. I hadn’t liked leaving Zach with her, but I hadn’t wanted her to drive alone, either.

Since Zach had promised me weeks ago that he had no interest in women older than himself, I knew he was the safest of the three to put with Ava.

Ava rolled down the window when she saw me approach.

“Something wrong?” she asked.

“It’s getting too hard to see, and I don’t think the snow will stop soon. I’ll find a house for us and take you there. Stay inside with Zach until I come back.”

I glanced at Zach, not liking that he needed to stay despite his promise.

He grinned at me. “Don’t worry. I’m being helpful and telling Ava all about you and your brothers.”

That didn’t reassure me. Zach thought everything was funny, and I wasn’t sure what stories he was telling. He wouldn’t tell her about our desperation for women, would he?

“That’s the blink I was talking about,” Zach said. “It means he’s either confused or not sure how to answer. You can ask what’s wrong or just offer more of an explanation to see if that clears things up. It usually does.” He looked at me. “See? I’m helpful.”

I grunted, and as I turned away, I heard him say, “That’s like an agree to disagree in most cases.”

When I glanced back, her window was up, and they were still talking. Perhaps Zach was being helpful, but I still didn’t want to give up any more time with her than necessary. So I sprinted away from the vehicles and watched for an opening off the road that might indicate a driveway.

I found a home several minutes later.

The locked door was a good sign. I walked through the cold rooms and noted the undisturbed state of everything as I checked all the usual hiding places. Since the smart ones had died a few weeks ago, the infected didn’t hide anymore. They still responded to sound, though, and sometimes light. So, I didn’t move quietly.

As soon as I verified the house was safe, I returned to lead the vehicles back to it. While they parked, I watched Ava, anticipating spending the rest of the day with her.

She was looking at the house as she turned off the engine and gathered Pete in her arms. I jogged over and tapped on her window.

“It is safe to go inside,” I said when she looked at me.

She nodded, and Zach gave me a thumbs-up before motioning that I should leave.

Don’t let your desperation show.

Rather than stay with her like I wanted, I jogged to the main truck and helped Will dig out our overnight supplies.

“Here,” he said, handing over the first tote.

Ava and Zach were a few steps behind me with her cats as I went inside with it.

“Is this what you normally do?” Ava asked. “Break into vacant houses?”

“Pretty much,” Zach said. “It’s warmer than sleeping outside, but if we have to, we have the gear to do that too. We did last night.”

She glanced from me to the tote I carried. “Do you need help with anything?”

“Yeah,” Zach said as I set the tote on the kitchen table. “You can help me see if we can get the heat and water going. Let’s check the basement.”

“Wait,” I said.

Although I’d already walked through it, I didn’t want Ava down there with only Zach. He could defend himself, but what about her?

“Actually, why don’t you help her, Gyrik?” Zach asked, reading the situation well. “I’ll carry in supplies.”

He walked out without waiting for an answer from either of us.