Page 342 of Gladiators of the Vagabond Boxset

Meena

He was gone before I could say anything, leaving me with a tangled mess of feelings.

So, despite the advice, he’d still left me gifts, and he’d still followed me into the woods to rescue me.

He was doing his level best not to pressure me, even though it felt like he was completely infatuated with me.

Was he feeling some kind of mating urge toward me?

Was that what this was? I really needed to ask him.

I didn’t want to lead him on, and I really hadn’t made up my mind yet about what I wanted my future to be like.

Just probably not Rakex, that I was sure of.

I still didn’t know what to do when he came back with a leaf folded like a pouch, filled to the brim with more nuts and berries.

He was also carrying something strung from some kind of vine over one shoulder.

A closer look told me it was a small animal he had probably hunted.

Thankfully, he skinned it out on the branch, where I didn’t have to see or smell it.

For an alien from an advanced society, he had tons of survival skills for being out in the wild.

It was extremely attractive to know he could take such good care of me out here, though he cooked the meat on a little portable gadget he pulled from his bag instead of making a fire with a pair of twigs or something.

I supposed an actual fire up in a tree wasn’t the brightest idea.

When the food was ready, he sat cross-legged in the “nest” across from me while we ate.

Since it had been weighing on my mind from the moment the thought popped into my brain, I just blurted it out.

“Jakar, you don’t think I’m like your mate or anything, do you?

” I honestly didn’t know whether I wanted him to say yes or no.

I held my breath while I waited for him to answer me.

Did I want to be his mate? Did it make me feel safer, out in this alien universe, to know a man like him was a place—no, a person—to rely on?

Or was it going to make me feel trapped, feel like I had no choice?

His eyes went wide, his spots turning from yellow to orange. For a moment, I fully expected him to bolt straight from the tree, his arms shifting out, muscles going tight. Then he sighed and began to nod. “Yes, my mate. I know you are. I knew it the moment our eyes met—”

I tried to figure out how that made me feel, but I had no freaking clue at all.

Then he was rushing on, words tumbling from his mouth like a waterfall.

“I know humans don’t have mates. I know you don’t experience it the way a Pretorian like me does.

And I know you need time. I just wanted the chance to get to know you.

I wanted to stay on Rakex with you, but Ziame said I shouldn’t, that you should have time to settle here first before I courted you!

We were going to come back in a few months, but then you got stolen and, well… I’m definitely not leaving now.”

The last words were said firmly; then he shut his mouth abruptly, crossed all four of his arms over his chest, and gave me what could only be described as a defiant look. Determined, that’s what he was: to stay here on Rakex and protect me. To keep me safe, but give me space.

“I don’t want to stay on Rakex,” I said to him, because that was the one thing I did know for sure right now.

I shuddered just thinking about it. I didn’t think I’d ever feel completely safe again in a big city or crowd, where I could be snatched up at any moment.

Living on a ship seemed like a much safer bet right now.

His shoulders dropped. “You mean that? Does that mean staying on the Vagabond with me?” he uttered his question with such a hopeful, puppy-dog look that I found myself grinning and nodding.

How could anyone say no to this man—with his huge eyes, that sexy dimple, and rakish look?

It still seemed a little overwhelming to realize that this four-armed dude wanted to be my alien forever-boyfriend, but I was already not hating the idea.

Okay, that was good. I wasn’t freaking out about it.

It wasn’t making me feel trapped right now; it actually sounded like safety.

But was that the right kind of motivation to date him?

Didn’t he deserve better than that? Didn’t I?

Too many thoughts, too big to grapple with at this moment.

I was going to push it all aside and just spend time with him.

I wanted to do the things I’d been dying to do since he’d wrapped me up in that sexy body.

“Come here, Jakar, I think we should get to know each other better,” I said.

It wasn’t my best pickup line by far, but that didn’t seem to bother him at all.

He was on his hands and knees, crawling over to me in a flash, sitting down at my side where I patted the soft blankets I was sitting on.

I wasn’t expecting him to be so eagerly obedient, but I kind of liked it.

Once he was sitting, I got to my knees and eyed his big frame contemplatively.

I’d been pressed up against that agile, muscled body for most of the day, but I hadn’t really had the chance to appreciate it yet.

Would he let me touch him without touching me back?

I didn’t think I could handle that part yet. Only one way to find out.

I swung my leg over his thighs, straddling his lap, and then I smiled when he sucked in a surprised breath.

His spots were going pink immediately, but he kept his hands at his sides—all four of them—while he watched what I was doing.

“Don’t touch,” I said anyway. “Just sit still. Can you do that for me?”

He shook his head up and down eagerly, curls bouncing around his face, the spots glowing even brighter against his deep red skin.

Raising a hand, I curiously touched a finger along the bridge of his nose, stroking it along his cheek.

The spots glowed like little hot spots on his skin, pulsing against my fingertip.

When I stroked it up along his cheek to his ear shell, I discovered that his ear was shaped much like mine, but small v-notches were missing from the edge.

Dropping my hands to his shoulders, I stroked them along his skin, down to his wrists, then back up to touch the pectoral muscles at the top.

It was odd to stroke down to find a second set, but then his chest tapered into the deeply ridged abdominal muscles, a washboard of at least eight of those sexy squares.

His skin was delightfully soft beneath my fingers, but the muscles were hard as steel.

When my hand reached the lower edge of his abs, he groaned, his hips shifting restlessly beneath mine.

Heat was starting to pump off him—especially from between his legs—his cock hardening until I could feel the thick ridge of it press against my ass.

And still, he didn’t reach out to touch me.

His hands were planted firmly in the blankets.

They were clenched into tight fists, but he was definitely obeying.

“Meena,” he said, his voice half an octave lower than usual, a mixture of a complaint and a plea. I felt a surge of power. He was under my control, and he was letting me set the pace and decide on the rules. I could do this; I really wanted to do this.

“Yeah, I know. Don’t worry,” I told him, promising I wouldn’t leave him hanging. Would his parts be the same as a human’s? I was dying to find out—to replace terrible memories with new, bright ones that I could cherish.

Keeping one hand on his shoulder for balance, I shifted on my knees so I could open the tab at the top of his pants and undo the metal belt buckle.

It was a bit of a struggle—the closure unfamiliar to me—and my fingers kept brushing over his thick erection through the fabric of his pants.

“Let me help, please!” Jakar said through gritted teeth.

I looked up at his face to see that his colorful freckles were such a dark pink that they were almost bordering on purple.

Purple meant aggression, and I could see why the two feelings were so closely related that they could mesh when they were this intense.

I still didn’t feel afraid. If Jakar had wanted to take instead of woo, he’d had plenty of opportunity to do so a long time ago.

He made quick work of the fastenings, yanking his pants open to free his trapped member.

Thick and red, the tip was so flushed it pulsed, with white precum beading from the slit.

The head of his cock wasn’t mushroom-shaped; rather, it was a bit narrower and more pointed.

From the small slit along the top, a dozen little ridges added texture.

Then there was his girth—like two of my fists stacked together—thick, but not crazily long.

It would stretch me, but he’d fit, and those ridges would probably feel really good.

I hadn’t touched him yet, just sat there on his knees, staring. Honestly, that cock looked better than anything I could have imagined, and it also looked like nothing I’d seen before, alien or human. That helped, too.

Beneath my ass, I felt him shift his weight a little on his knees, making his cock sway from side to side as it tried to reach up toward his belly button. He didn’t say anything, just kept on watching me watch him.

I looked up at his face, meeting his yellow-gold eyes and noting the patience in them, a calmness that was actually quite unlike his usual boundless energy.

“I want you, Jakar,” I said to him, the truth rolling from my lips and freeing me.

My cheeks ached a little when I smiled. “I’m not ready for anything but this physical part. Are you okay with that?”