Liar. You know exactly what it is.
No, it can’t be. It’s too soon.
I kiss him harder and try to ignore the jumbled thoughts in my head. He can’t lo— I mean, we just met.
But I felt that too—how when he first saw me in the coffee shop, first touched me, something clicked for him like a puzzle piece locking into place. He thinks I’m what he’s been missing his whole life. It was as if he could smell it…as part of my scent. Like a chemical reaction.
Is that all this is? Some crazy interspecies biological chemistry?
I’d love to write it off as that. I’d love to write him off.
Because if he is what he appears to be? An actually good guy? Honorable, loyal, and kind? Then I’m bound to fuck this up.
And there’s too much at stake already. I have to be able to walk away. I always need an exit strategy. Now more than ever. This is too much and I was never the strong girl. Look at how long I stayed with Robbie. The few times I’ve tried being strong in the past, I only made things worse. So much worse.
But does that stop me from kissing Shak or pulling him as close into my body as I can get him?
No.
Because I’m a horrible person. And he feels so good. Like the last time we had sex, I’m caught up in his frenzy.
He’s on the edge but holding back. Wanting to prolong the aching beauty of his unreached climax and our shared connection.
But right now all I want is to barrel over that cliff. I want him as lost and out of control as I feel.
So I clench around him and feel the pleasure from both sides, his and mine. Oh God. I fuck him from underneath, shifting my hips back and forwards so that I slide against not only the shaft inside me, but against his long, ridged length that is squeezed between us. It scrapes so perfectly back and forth against my clitoris.
“Oh fuck yes,” I hiss. My legs quake with my coming orgasm. Layered on top of that is Shak’s pleasure, and oh, oh— My spine lights up with a pressure at my base, different from the swooping in my belly.
I can’t—
How am I supposed to—?
“Juliet,” Shak gasps. “My Juliet.”
The way he says my name. It’s worshipful. It sends me over.
I spasm around him and bow my head to his chest as I hold on for dear life.
Then everything fractures. I’m split wide open. All is white, bright, and there is only me and Shak and please God, can I just stay here forever?
We hold on for one moment, two, three—
And then it begins to dissipate. The real world comes back in the ever-present hum of the ship around us, the smooth chrome of the walls as my eyes crack open, the roughness of Shak’s linens beneath us.
But what doesn’t change?
Shak’s arms are still around me. He hasn’t gone anywhere. And if everything I felt while we were connected was true, he won’t be anytime soon.
You don’t have to be alone anymore.
I press the side of my face into his chest so he won’t see my tears. I don’t know what the hell I’m doing or what I want.
Because even though I know I shouldn’t, a big fucking part of me wants to stay exactly where I am. I wrap my arms more tightly around his middle and squeeze him close.
Then all of the sudden, the doors to his small cabin open.
It’s the purple guy who kidnapped me. I yelp and scramble back even as Shak moves to block me.
“What do you want, First?” Shak asks, his voice far calmer than I expect. I yank his shirt back on over my head.
First? Is that the purple guy’s name?
“Father wants to see you.” There’s a pause as if First is perusing the scene he’s found before him. “Both of you.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Shak
I hold Juliet’s hand as we are taken to the Great Hall. The throne room. I’ve only been there once before, when the ship was being built. I’ve never been called before Father. In truth, I’ve only met the man a handful of times.
I am not sure why I am surprised. It was not as if Juliet and I could hide away in my barracks forever. I suppose I was hoping for just a little bit longer with my mate before having to expose her to the court. Because where the King is, there also is the Queen.
I have never met her, but I know enough to know she is a snake. Conniving and backhanded. She wanted my father and the power of the Thraxian throne even though he was betrothed to another—my mother.
So she seduced him away. To this day I do not know how she did it. But my mother was made to flee or else the new Queen would have killed her and the babe inside her. Me.