Chapter 38

Devin had given them an answer before everyone had finished cleaning up. Two females were being held, ages unknown, but appeared to be young adults. While everyone was buzzing with excitement, Konner was worrying about how ‘young’ they were and if the lunatics that thought his kind were zoo attractions had figured out how to breed.

Nolyn and Olanna cut off his path before he could take two steps inside his house.

“We were thinking we’d get one of the houses ready, the one between our homes.” Nolyn looked at Olanna, who nodded. “They might adjust better if they’re in the same house together and not suddenly on their own.”

Konner rubbed the back of his neck. “That’s a good idea.” He looked from one to the other. “And it’s close to the lake.” If they were anything like Terah, they would spend a lot of their time in it for the first week. Freedom was an unknown thing to them, and he wanted them to know that they were. “We’ll just have to—”

“We know, keep an eye on everyone around them.” Olanna gave him a blank look. “They’ll also have Terah, who will relate the most to their situation.”

Terah. Konner glanced in the door he was holding open. “I’m sure she’ll help them.”

“Okay.” Nolyn nodded enthusiastically. “Let’s go take stock of what needs to be added.” She grinned at Olanna. “We may have a shopping list.”

Konner smirked. “Wrangle Reeves attention away from whatever his brain is stuck on to get it ordered.” He looked inside again. “I’ll pick it up when it comes in.”

“Perfect.” Nolyn inhaled a deep breath and nodded some more. Her expression said she wasn’t as thrilled as she was letting on. He wondered if she worried that one of those females would be the mate to her lover.

“Go get some rest.” Olanna used her mother’s tone on him. “You’re like talking to an empty shell tonight.”

Konner flashed her a brief grin. “Yes, ma'am.”

Rolling her eyes, she ushered Nolyn back into the community house. “I just want to check in on Rae before we start, see how she’s feeling.”

Konner didn’t wait to see if they thought of anything else, he stepped into the hall to his home and closed the door quickly. He could hear the boys in the entertainment room and started for it to ask them if they had homework, then stopped and decided he’d let them have some game time tonight. He just wasn’t in the right frame of mind to wrangle teenagers right this minute.

He had even intention of going to his room and getting some real sleep. Maybe it would help some clarity come back to him. When his feet stopped moving, he found himself standing in front of Terah’s door. She had wanted to talk to him, so he was going to pretend he meant to be here. The door was open a few inches. Holding it with one hand, he knocked on it.

“Thank you for knocking,” she called out. “Come in now.”

Opening it, he went in. She wasn’t in the main part of her room. “Terah?”

“I am in here.”

He turned to the bathroom; the door was also open. “You said you wanted to.,,”

She was in there. In the large tub, filled with water and completely naked.

“Talk.” He couldn’t remind her of the rules, as it was her own bathroom. They were going to have to discuss when to close doors though.

“Yes.” She smiled up at him.

Konner glanced at her, then to the floor, trying not to look right at her.

“Did you want to sit in here with me? It’s big enough.” She moved over to the side and leaned, her arms hanging over it.

He opened his mouth to reply and then couldn’t remember what he was going to say. Clearing his throat, he went over leaned back against the counter. He could still see in the tub from here, but the distance between them would help him focus. “I’m good now, thanks.” It was a complete lie, there was nothing good about him right now, not with the thoughts in his head.

She moved from the edge, giving him a quick flash of a smile. “I wanted to swim in the lake at night, but I don’t want to break any rules.”

He was trying to keep his eyes on her face, and it was hard, the slightest movement from her flashed a bit of skin here and there. “Once you’re—” he waved a hand around, while he tried to prompt his brain to help out “—adjusted to life here, you can swim at night. The couples tend to later in the night though, so checking for others is a good idea.” He finished as the breath rushed from his body. He felt like a teenage boy who had never seen a naked female before right now.

“I will. Thank you.” She leaned on the edge, and smiled at him, her eyes sparkling, bluer than silver right now.

With an abrupt nod, he straightened away from the counter to leave.

“Konner?”

He stopped and looked back at her.

“I still want to talk about what we stopped to go to dinner.”

His brows creased as he looked at her. “Right.” He nodded, then motioned to the tub. “I can wait out there until you’re finished soaking.”

“Oh.”

He forced himself to look at her face.

“Is it another rule I don’t know? Talking when in the tub?” A look of defeat came over her face. “I keep doing things wrong.”

“It’s not, uh, wrong.” He scowled at the floor for a second. “It’s just that most don’t have conversations while they’re in the bath. Couples do, sure, but normally you close the door or doors for privacy.” As explanations went, that one had been as clear as mud.

“Oh, I have never had that.” Her eyes flicked to him, then to the water she was in, “Closing of doors and that.”

He hadn’t wanted her to feel bad, that’s the last thing he’d want.

“I will get out.” She nodded her head. “We can talk then.”

As he started to turn to leave, she stood up and stepped out of the tub. Water cascaded off her partially changed skin. He knew it was wrong, but he could only stand there and look at her. She practically sparkled, as the water glistened off her. He swallowed as his gaze moved slowly down her, she was perfection in his eyes, nothing like the almost skeletal woman that had been rescued.

Her skin slowly changed back to regular skin but was still radiant, he knew if he reached out and touched her it would be silky smooth. He wanted to reach out and touch her and despite knowing how much he needed to back his ass out of this room his feet remained stationary.

“We can talk now?”

He jerked his head up and looked at her face. “Talk?” His voice was barely audible.

“Yes.” She moved closer, making no indication that she intended to put on a robe or towel. “Before dinner, I was telling you that I still think about kissing you.”

Konner licked his lips at the mention of kissing.

“I feel this strangeness in my stomach when I think about it.” She moved her hand to place it over the smooth skin of her abdomen.

Konner tried to swallow to create salvia so he could speak, without success. Females of his kind were without body hair, as it wasn’t their true form and below her hand was bare for him to see.

“And lower.” She moved her hand down to cover her sex. “In my vagina, that’s what it’s called, I asked the tablet. My vagina gets wet when I think about it.” She was right in front of him now. “Is that wrong?”

Konner blinked. He tried again to speak, the images in his head from her words now rendering him mute. His body was hard as he struggled to answer her.

She stood there looking up at him, waiting. Lifting her arms, she undid her hair and let it fall to drape her upper body like a picture frame.

Konner went from no clear thought to what seemed like every synapse in his brain firing at once. With something between a moan and a growl, he reached over and grasped the back of her head, pulling her closer. He crushed her soft mouth beneath his, forgetting she was essentially innocent. He needed to taste her, to feel her against him. Wrapping his free hand around her back, he bent his knees and then stood up, lifting her with him.

When she wrapped her arms around his neck and tried to keep up with his kiss, it dawned on him that he needed to slow down, for her sake. Angling his head, he reduced the pressure of his lips on hers so she could return his kiss. His knees almost buckled when she put her tongue in his mouth. It was not the reaction he anticipated from someone who knew little about kissing.

He started to move and then remembered he’d left the bedroom door wide open. Breaking the kiss, he gasped to speak. “I need to close the door.”

“So we can kiss more?” her voice rasped.

Konner nodded and stepped backward toward the bathroom door. It took every ounce of control he had to not turn around and run and slam it closed so he could get back to her.

Closing it with as much grace as he could manage, he turned to see Terah had followed him into the bedroom. She stood there, her body flushed with passion and her eyes were locked on him, devouring him. He should turn and walk away. Stop this before it went too far, but instead, he pulled his shirt over his head and dropped it on the floor beside him. It wasn’t the years he’d convinced himself that alone was okay. It wasn’t that he’d been denied physical contact for too long. It was her.

Just being near her changed everything.

“Come here.”

She came to him, without comment, stopping right in front of him. Her hands touched his chest and then moved slowly over it like she was memorizing its shape. Konner sucked in a breath when they strayed closer to his belt. He grasped her hand before she could continue her exploration. His control was already wavering.

Leaning down, he pulled her closer and kissed the side of her neck. She gasped and tipped her head back further to give him access to do it again. Tasting her skin again, he closed his eyes as he brought her flavor into his body. Of course, it was everything he’d imagined it would be. Purity, seduction, sin, and perfection all at once.

Growling, he lifted his head and kissed her mouth. It took a lot of restraint, but he managed to keep the kiss slow and gentle this time. Turning, he walked her backward toward the bed. Should he be doing this? No, but he was going to. He knew it was going to change everything and for the first time in his life, he didn’t care what anyone, but the woman in his arms thought.

Lowering her to the bed, he followed her to it and let the motion of the water inside it rock her to him. Turning to his side, he pulled her close and continued to kiss her. She clung to his head, returning his kiss with fervor.

When he lifted his mouth from hers, she clutched his head, not wanting him to stop. Reaching, he untangled her one hand from his hair and held it in his as he leaned down her body, to take one sensitive nipple into his mouth. She gasped and arched her back. The hitch in her breath told him that she’d never felt that before.

Letting go of her hand, he shifted so he could hold one breast in his hand when he moved his mouth to the other. She cried out when he swirled his tongue around her other tight nipple. Both of her hands gripped his hair so tight it stung, but he didn’t care. This was for her right now, not him. She’d been forced to have sex to breed and had been denied how good it should feel. He meant to correct that for her.

Terah sucked in another breath and then moaned. “I didn’t know they could be kissed,” she gasped.

Lifting his head, he grinned, his mouth against her ribcage. “All of you is for kissing.”

To that, she opened her eyes and looked at him, the confusion plain in her eyes.

“Let me show you.” He stretched up and kissed her mouth softly. “Let me make you feel good.”

“I do feel good.” She sounded breathless. “But there is something…”

"Shh.” He placed a feather-soft kiss along her jaw, then moved his mouth down to her throat. With each placement of his lips against her, he was rewarded with a breathless gasp.

He wanted to tell her that it was more intense in the water, with their real skin, but now was not the time for words. Their skin may appear like scales, but not in the way that a fish would be. There was a thermal layer against the cold waters but was so soft it felt like it was covered in fine hairs.

Opening her legs, he moved down to taste her. He loved that in this form, a female’s body was easily accessible, not hidden as it would be for protection in the water. With her taste taunting him, his tongue inside her, he decided that no other male would ever taste her. Ever.

As she moaned and called his name in a rasping breathless way, he decided no male of their kind would ever swim with her. She was the one thing in his long life that he wasn’t going to be able to let go of.

Arms shaking, he raised over her and was about to ask her if she was all right when her eyes popped open and silver eyes looked up at him. She grabbed his face and pulled him down for a kiss. Not a satisfied, easy kiss, but one filled with so much passion he thought he would explode from how hard it made him.

Her skin literally glowed, and he knew if he looked at his own, it would be close to it as well if he could focus to look. It was what happened when their kind was consumed with passion, it was also why they couldn’t ever be with anyone that wasn’t their kind or didn’t know what they were. With Terah, it made her even sexier than she already was.

He flipped onto his back and brought her to sit on top of him. He needed her to be in control, for this to be on her terms. He wasn’t sure if he would be able to control himself if she needed slow or gentle. After what she’d been made to do when she was being held by those lunatics, he wanted her to experience what this should be like between two consenting adults.

She looked down at him, an unsure look on her face. Grasping her hips lightly, he lifted her and aligned their bodies. He guided her to lower onto him slowly, watching her face the entire time. The expression on her face showed her every response, it was the most erotic thing he’d ever seen.

When he filled her, she stopped and sat there, looking down at him. He really wanted her to set the pace and had intentions to do just that, but his restraint was at its end, gripping her hips tight, he lifted her up and thrust as he lowered her again.

One gasp left her mouth and then she began to move on her own. Konner forgot all his plans to allow her to set the pace, his needs took over, and nothing registered outside their bodies connecting, the way her muscles squeezed him with each movement of her body. He watched her, fighting to keep his eyes open when all he wasn’t to do was close them and let the feelings take over him.

A few minutes later, he couldn’t separate who was moving or controlling this, they were both frantic and reaching for completion. He heard a loud groan and couldn’t tell if it came from his throat or hers, then they both crashed over the edge together.

Trying to breathe burned as he fought to bring air into his body. The silence in the room was filled with gasping, as both struggled to catch their breath.

She smiled down at him and then collapsed on top of him. He didn’t have the energy or desire to move from this position. Wrapping his arm around her, he pulled the long hair away from her face. She looked happy and content and it was suddenly the most rewarding feeling in his life to know that he’d done that for her. He ran his hand down her back, they were both covered in a sheen of sweat now. He paused, reality crashing through the euphoria. Sweating was bad for someone so young and still recovering.

He patted her hip lightly. “We have to get you in some water.”

“I don’t want water right now,” she sighed contently.

“I know, but you need it, you are sweating.”

She lifted her head and smiled at him. “It is a good sweat.”

Konner grinned. “Yes, the reason is good, but with your age and health, it’s not.”

Her expression sobered. “Oh, I can go back to the tub.”

Konner shifted and lifted her into his lap, “No, the lake is better.” Setting her on the bed, he stood up and looked for his pants. “Just grab your robe.” She sat there for a moment, he hoped it was just the drugged feeling after sex that had her foggy.

Pulling his pants on, he rushed into the bathroom and found her robe lying on the counter. Grabbing it, he went back out. She was standing now, that was a good sign. Leaning down, he looked to see her skin wasn’t looking translucent yet. He held the robe so she could put her arms through it. Before she could tie it together, he scooped her up into his arms and headed for the door.

Hopefully, none of the other adults were in the lake— the last thing he needed was to be seen carrying her out of the house.