ARMOR [New World Book 2] (8 page)

Since Cobra’s reinstatement
to power, the planet Dargon had been revamped with more extraordinary holograms
until they could harvest any of Earth’s creatures. Dasks was so enthusiastic
and genuine. Amy had never met anyone like him and found herself growing fond
of him. Amy could tell him after they mated that she was dying and the healing
waters wouldn’t heal her breast cancer. The tumor had shrunk a tiny bit more
today. She felt bad about the ruse of not telling him right away but after so
long, she was actually feeling happy. Why not give herself a chance at fleeting
love, or even fondness? What could it hurt?

“You can’t wander because all
of the females onboard have the males feeling a bit too full of themselves with
female scents. It’s more than we can take and hard for us to concentrate if we
enter into must every other moment. It’s a bit volatile and Cobra wants the
women to be safe. We have unfortunately only found forty females so far, of
which ten are too young to mate. There are two hundred warriors aboard and many
more on Dargon and my home planet. Like you had been, many women are hiding in
terror.”

“Are you saying I’ll be raped
if you let me out?” Amy asked, appalled.

“What is rape?”

Amy blinked. He looked
sincere enough. “When a man or male forces a woman to accept him inside her.”

“Cobra has only explained to
his warriors who have found women to mate with what goes where. And has demanded
the women must be willing.”

“Huh? You mean to tell me
these men have no idea how to have sex with a woman? They haven’t seen anything
have sex before? Haven’t you?”

“Females have been gone from
our planet for centuries. Most Castians aboard this vessel are the same age as
me and only just hit their sexual prowess. There are no females of
any
kind on our home planet where I grew up,” he stressed.

“Not even animals?”

“Nothing. The poisoned water
killed anything female.”

“Then why can’t I wander if
the others don’t know what goes where?”

“You wouldn’t be harmed on
purpose. Castian males are a great deal heavier than human females. Your smell
is like an aphrodisiac to us. You could be pinned and while a male desperately
tries to figure out what goes where, you would be bitten into submission.
Perhaps by more than one male.”

“Bitten?” Her voice came out
in a squeak.

“It’s how we prepare our
females to mate.”

“I don’t understand. You mean
you bite us until we hold still? That’s so cruel.”

“A bite will make you more
compliant for our mating ritual. There is a hormone our teeth secrete when
aroused to make us acceptable to you. It calms women so they feel no pain.
During our mating you will be marked as mine.”

“Now wait a minute. You mean
like a brand of ownership?”

“It’s more than that. The
mark connects us.”

“Connects us how?”

“When a Castian mates, it is for
life.”

Amy winced. “But you’re four
hundred years old. I’ll be dead soon enough from old age or, uh, other stuff.”

“If you allow me to mark you
I will give you my gift—humans would call it a groom’s wedding present to his
bride. As long as I live, you will live. Castians can live to be thousands of
years old.”

“But what if I die?”

“Then I will die,” he said
simply and smiled.

Amy could feel the blood
drain from her face.
Dasks would die if we mated
. Thank God she hadn’t
let him mate with her before she found this out. She would have given him a
death sentence as her ‘gift.’ Now she realized she could never mate with him.
It wasn’t fair; she had been so close to a modicum of happiness only to have it
stolen. She wanted to cry at the unfairness. Dasks had already come to mean a
great deal to her. She liked being with him.

Dasks held her hand. As
always when she felt worried or afraid, his touch calmed her. That he just
seemed to know she needed comfort was sometimes unnerving. Secretions from his
skin absorbed into her own with the slightest touch. Amy groaned wanting
desperately to be in his arms.

“Don’t you want to mate with
me?” he asked.

He seemed so young for
someone so old. Yet he had explained that he had only recently reached his
prime. Only when a Castian could mate was he considered an adult.

“I need time to think about
it,” she said evasively. “Can a Castian have sex with a female without mating
with her forever? Without marking her as his?”

“Yes, it’s been done,” he
said. “I have learned our own women would allow a male to release his seed, but
if she felt he wasn’t ready for her, she would fight him off and the mating
wouldn’t take place. Cobra is three thousand years old. He has a son, Rask.
Cobra and Rask’s mother never mated.”

Amy’s heart fell. “I can’t
fight you off. You would hurt me.”

“Never. A Castian warrior
would never harm a female on purpose. You give us life. If our armor feels it would
be dangereous to a female, it will not go up. That is when we are most
vulnerable. You struck me once, remember? You were hurt. The second time you
struck my armor, it only had to be reminded how vulnerable you are.”

“Will you give me time?” Amy
asked. “Will you promise not to mark me, not to mate with me?”

“This is important to you?”
Dasks said.

“It’s very important to me.”

“I sense you like me,” Dasks
said, his face was full of confusion. “But there is something else.”

“Do you want to have sex or
not?” Amy countered.

“Well sure,” he replied.

Amy thought a blunt approach
would work. Taking his hand she led him to a low bed. She had marveled at the
size of the bed and its sturdiness. She marveled more when the bed made itself
every day, the sheets rolling back and new ones replicated. Amy stretched out
on the cool, clean soft sheets and lay back and waited. She looked over at
Dasks who also lay back and waited.

Moments turned into longer
moments. Amy could hear his expelled breath. Dasks looked over at her. Amy
frowned.

“Um, Dasks? Normally a guy
starts by touching a woman.”

“Okay…where?”

Amy sat up and looked down at
him.

Dasks lay prone with his
hands balled by his sides, breathing rapidly.

Amy realized he really had no
idea what to do. The explanation he had received about what went where had
apparently fallen short of anything else. The powerhouse was helpless.
This
could be interesting.
Amy touched his chest. Her hand slid down and over
his broad shoulders. Dasks’ body was void of hair and nipples. His muscles felt
like steel. He was smooth and silky and oh so hard. It felt like touching a
pristine race car with all the horses revving under the hood waiting to be
unleashed. Her tongue tingled wanting to lick him. Amy bent down and kissed his
throat.

Dasks jumped.

“Are you tasting me?” he
whispered.

“Yes.” His body was sweet and
he felt so good. Her mouth filled with the bouquet of an intoxicating banquet.
What
a delicacy.

“Do I taste good?”

“Yes.” His scent was
exhilarating. The absolute maleness of him was arousing and the urge to sink
her teeth into him was startling.

“Can I taste you?”

Amy’s teeth nipped at him and
he jumped again before settling. Her forehead pressed against his warmth. The
tip of her nose was cold and she rubbed it across his skin.

“Sure.” Amy looked up at his
face and gasped in surprise. She scooted back in a hasty retreat almost falling
off the bed.

“What?”

Dasks sat up fast and reached
for her. Amy scrambled further away from him.

“Your teeth, your fangs are
showing,” she stammered. She hadn’t seen him with fangs unless he was armored.

Dasks lifted his finger and
traced his ivory fangs. “I think they’re supposed to be out.”

“Well put ’em back,” she
demanded.

Dasks frowned and
concentrated. His face screwed into an even deeper concentration. “They won’t
budge.”

“I told you I don’t want to
mate yet.”

“Well don’t panic. I promise
not to bite you.”

“Maybe we shouldn’t do this,”
Amy said.

“Yes we should,” Dasks almost
yelped.

His hand slid over her bare
arm.

“I can smell your pheromones
and they’re driving me nuts.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

Dasks held still. “You’re not
afraid of having sex with me. I can scent your arousal all over your body.
You’re afraid I’ll mate with you. Am I that unacceptable as a mate? I swear I
would never hurt you. I’ll take care of you and any of our offspring. Amy, you
are a gift. I had never thought to mate; now I have you and a family so close
within my reach. Please want me.”

Amy slumped. He looked
crestfallen at her snubbing him. This wasn’t fair to Dasks. She was better than
this—to hurt him for her own purpose. It was cruel. After everything he had
done for her and she teased him. Dasks deserved the truth. Amy cast a glance at
the window. Once again the planet was being bombarded with flames of destructive
fire. She was terrified to be sent back out into the hell before her. She saw
it every day from the window, taunting her with her deceit. Nothingness was
outside, emptiness. If she mated with Dasks and sentenced him to death, she
would be as nothing as the Earth and she would feel as empty.

I won’t take your life.

“I can’t have sex with you,
Dasks. And I can never mate with you. Or any other Castian.”

“But why?”

“Your healing water can’t
cure what I have. I hoped it would, I almost thought it had. But I can’t
pretend at your expense. I have cancer in my breast, Dasks. I’m dying. If you
mate with me, I’ll kill you.”

Chapter 5

Dasks looked at Amy stunned.
He knew she was telling the truth, because the scent was overwhelming. The
moment she told him, the smell of deceit and lies slipped away from her like a
dirty cast-off blanket. All week he had smelled those awful scents on her. It
was the one thing keeping him from claiming her. That and she kept pushing him
away. Something awful had been warring within her until today. Today for some
reason, she had decided she wanted to mate with him—until she found out she
would kill him.

With those scents gone, the
others were more prominent. Loss, she felt loss. Amy had wanted to mate with
him and fully become his female. She had been eager and even happy. Her change
had lessened the harsher emotions until his desire had built. But she refused
to hurt him. Dasks could smell her arousal, her fear and her anger at the
unfairness. Amy was thinking other thoughts that had her emotions in turmoil.
She was afraid he would do something to her—something awful—and she felt she
deserved it.

“I won’t hurt you, Amy,” he
said in confusion.

When she looked up, he saw a
tear trace its way down her pale cheek. It was a rarity that she let her eyes
leak in front of him. When his finger scooped up the tear the moisture seeped
into his skin, jolting him.
Such sadness.

“I know you would never
physically hurt me, Dasks. You have no use for me now. I can’t mate with you or
any other Castian. I’m useless. I would rather be dead than dumped back onto
Earth all alone. It had been so nice to think my last days would be spent being
in your arms.”

That was what he had sensed.
He had won her over. She had let him in and now closed the door. Dasks pulled
her into his embrace. “I won’t abandon you. You are still coming to Dargon with
me.”

“But we can never mate,” she
argued.

Amy didn’t even try to pull
away from him. Dasks’ skin was reacting to her emotions. Secretions flowed from
his body into hers trying to calm her. Her cheek was pressed tight to his
chest. His hand soothed up and down her bare skin and Dasks still wanted her no
matter what. She gripped him tighter and the most wonderful feeling of being
needed bombarded him.

“What is this cancer?” he
asked.

Amy took his hand and pulled
it to her left breast. She was soft and felt so good. She moved his fingers
back and over one spot in particular until Dasks felt a lump. The second his
fingers touched it his armor raised a warning. This was a definite threat to
her life. Dasks could feel his armor straining to do something. He knew it
wouldn’t close while he was this close even if it sensed the threat. Instinct
not to harm a female was too strong. Dasks pulled back a small way and immediately
smelled her hurt.

“Dasks? Don’t be afraid. It
isn’t contagious; I promise you. It’s a malignant tumor. Unless we mate, you
are safe from the disease. You are so amazing and I want you so much. The more
secretions you release into me, the more I want you. I know the more upset I am
the more you respond. It’s like a war of battling emotions.