Page 49 of Saved By the Alien Hybrid (Hybrids of Yulaira #1)

Relief sang in Rentir’s veins as he looked up at Cordelia, more beautiful than she’d ever been, with sweat plastering her fine hairs to her flushed cheeks and tracks of tears still shining on her temples. She stared down at him incredulously, her chest still heaving with wild breaths.

Her scent was everywhere now. After days of agonizing deprivation, he was covered in her, just as he should be. No one would have any doubt of who he belonged to—who belonged to him in turn.

He tamped down on that thought, shaking his head hard to clear it.

No, that wasn’t right. She was still angry with him, wasn’t she? But she’d let him…

Was it too much to hope that something had changed in her capitulation?

“Cordelia,” he rasped, leaning back and easing her legs closed. She let out a little hiss of pain, shifting to get comfortable. “Did I hurt you?”

Panic gripped his heart at the thought.

“I’m fine,” she said, her voice just as rough from screaming. “Just tender. It’ll pass.” She sat up slowly, tucking her knees beneath her chin and pulling the hem of her shirt down over them. When she shivered, looking down at the tatters of her pants, shame lashed at him.

“You’re cold. I should not have… give me one moment.

” He darted for the door, ignoring the way his spend was already cooling into an unpleasant, sticky mess in his pants.

When the door opened, Haerune was standing on the other side of the door, a hand over his eyes as he held out a bundle of clothing.

“How did you…”

“A hunch,” he replied, grimacing. “Shut the door before you kill someone for passing by. I’m leaving now.”

He turned away, and Rentir did as he asked, shutting and locking the door behind him. He returned to Cordelia, fumbling with the clothing. There was a full set for each of them. He handed the smaller pair to her with a sheepish look.

She snorted, shaking her head as she gathered the fabric of one leg up and stuck her foot through.

“That guy is so smug, but I’ll admit he’s useful,” she muttered.

He watched with rapt fascination as she arched her hips up off the table to tug the pants over them. Hurriedly, he stripped out of his own spent pants and boxers, wiping perfunctorily at the mess he’d made before tugging on the spares Haerune brought him.

“So…” She fiddled with the closure of her pants longer than necessary. “Do you feel better?”

“Much,” he said quickly. “Thank you. It was a mercy.”

He’d meant to leave it a statement, but his inflection had made it a question. She must have heard it, too. Her expression shuttered, unreadable to him.

“You’re literally addicted to me, huh?” she murmured, then huffed a disbelieving laugh. “That’s some shitty luck.”

“Why would you say that?”

She gave him a wry smile. “I’m not exactly the epitome of emotionally available, if you haven’t noticed.”

“I did,” he said. “It does not matter.”

“Doesn’t it?” Her lips thinned. “It is just sex, I guess.”

She seemed to retreat into herself, and he hated that.

“It is not,” he said. “It is everything, Cordelia. It is you. Your bravery, your beauty, your brilliance. All of it. Although… I like the sex very much.”

Her eyes drifted down to his crotch, to his still-hard cock, now covered in his drying spend. “Yeah, it’s… good. But it doesn’t change anything.”

His heart sank at the confirmation of what he had feared. His position with her was no better than it had been before.

“If this is what you need to stay sharp, I’ll help you.

” The flush on her cheeks deepened. She cleared her throat before she continued.

“But after the mission, we have some serious shit to hash out. I can’t just pretend like I don’t know what I know.

What you didn’t tell me, even after I told you about…

” She swallowed hard, looking away from him.

“I am sorry,” he said earnestly, sinking back to his knees before her.

“I know better than most how insufficient the sentiment is, but I am deeply sorry for how I have wronged you. I never set out to mislead you, I just… you looked at me for who I am, and it has been so long since anyone gave me such grace. I dreaded how that would change once you knew who I have been. I was selfish.”

Her face softened, and she met his gaze once more. “Yeah, well… don’t do it again. A lie of omission is still a lie.”

Shame flushed through him, chasing away the haze of pleasure that had settled over him for such a brief while. “You are right, of course.”

Silence stretched between them.

“Is there…” He cleared his throat. “Is there a chance for more between us? If it were possible for me to make amends for all I have done? Would you consider it?”

She chewed her bottom lip, and every second seemed to stretch into eternity. “Maybe.”

Hope leapt in his heart.

“I’m still…” She huffed, running a hand roughly through her mussed hair.

“I’m still afraid, okay? Maybe more now.

I have it in my head that anything I grow to care for is damned, and the second I opened up to you…

you let that fear come true when you hid the truth from me.

Finding out like that… you can’t imagine how I felt. ”

“I cannot.” He reached out slowly for the hand she had braced against the table. Relief sang in his veins when she didn’t immediately pull away from his touch. “But I will never give you cause to feel that way again.”

Disbelief was obvious on her face. The proclamation only seemed to urge her further away from him. Her hand slid out of his grip, tucking itself safely away in her lap.

“I should have told you myself. I’d like to rectify that mistake, if you’ll let me.

” Fear curdled in his gut at the thought of sharing the details of that day with her, but it was his fear that had led him to this situation, and this time he would not yield to it. “I’d have you hear it in my own words.”

She slowly dragged on one sock and then the other before answering. “Okay. But not here.”

He glanced around the sterile room, now thick with the smell of sex. The screen on the opposite side of the room was flashing with complaints and warnings from the abuse it had undergone during Rentir’s mindless pursuit.

“And not today,” she added. “I need to, uh, clear my head.”

There was a flush on her cheeks that softened the blow of having to wait longer still to air things out with her.

She pointed toward her boot, flung to the far side of the room, and he retrieved it for her.

He had the other in his hand before she could ask, and he was pleased when she let him slide it onto her foot and lace it up for.

It was such a small act of intimacy, but providing for her, caring for her, made him feel like he was back on solid ground. He could breathe for the first time in days, knowing he’d brought her pleasure and tended to her.

When she was dressed, his heart sang with regret that it had not taken longer. She would not want to linger in his arms as she had last time, not with so much still unsaid between them.

She slid off the table. “Well, I have some details to nail down with Eunha about the whole dropship caper,” she said, fidgeting with the cuff of her sleeve. “So… I’ll see you around. If you get the shakes again, come find me.”

He caught her arm gently as she brushed past him. “When can we speak?”

She bit her bottom lip, hesitating. “We’re going to try to coax the ship down tomorrow. We can talk after, yeah? I want my head on straight for the mission. If I’m busy chewing on whatever you have to tell me… I don’t want anything to go wrong because of me.”

So soon? He had skipped the morning meeting with the hybrids that day; he’d been so agitated he was liable to rip someone’s head off for breathing the wrong way.

“Fendar is confident he can get you access to their system, then?”

Talking business seemed to put her at ease.

She tucked her hands into her pockets and nodded, propping a hip against the console. “Yeah, he’s got it down to a science, I guess. Lidan is mostly confident we’re not going to get everyone killed trying to race the thing back to the hangar.”

“You don’t share his confidence.”

She said nothing, looking away as a muscle feathered in her jaw.

He smoothed his hand over it, feeling her muscles unclench at the touch. “You should. You are more than capable. We will seize the ship, and we will recover your friend.”

“Maybe,” she said mildly. She gently dragged his hand away, putting space between them. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” she said over her shoulder, and then she was gone.

He lingered in the medbay for hours after, desperate for every last molecule of her scent.