“This isn’t over, you know,” he murmured in a low voice. “We need to talk about this, Brandi. We’re bonded—you can’t just ignore it.”
“I have to go,” she muttered, looking away. “I’m going to be really late for work and my boss is awful when I come in la…”
She trailed off when he cupped her chin in his big hand and lifted her face to his so she had to look him in the eye.
“I mean it,” he growled. “I’m letting you go for now but we will have to talk.”
“I…fine, I guess.” Brandi’s voice sounded breathless in her own ears and her heart was pounding at his warm, gentle touch. His scent was suddenly all around her, breathing out of his pores in a rush of smoke and leather and deep, male spice that made her nipples instantly hard and her pussy instantly wet.
What is that smell? she wondered hazily. Like some kind of a lust drug…
“No lust drug—it’s my bonding scent,” Slade sent through their link.
“Bonding scent, what’s that?” She looked up at him, feeling confused. Suddenly she wanted desperately to kiss him—to be held in those flexible steel-cable arms again. To feel his big, hard body against hers as the two of them got lost in each other as they had yesterday…
“Maybe I’ll tell you next time we talk.”
There was a low, hungry growl in his metal voice that echoed her own need. Once more Brandi felt desire wash over her—an almost palpable hunger to touch him and be touched in turn by the big Kindred. Through the strange link they now shared, she could tell he was feeling the same way…hungry.
“You’d better go.” Slade dropped his hand and took a step back from her.
“I…I…” Brandi shook her head. What is wrong with me? One whiff of his cologne and I fall into some kind of a lust-coma? Come on, Brandi—snap out of it!
“We’ll talk later.” Slade crossed his massive arms over his broad chest and took another step away, taking his scent with him—mostly anyway. Brandi could still smell it wafting towards her on the light morning breeze and it was seriously making her want to jump his bones again.
“I don’t know that Earth idiom but if it means what I think it means, we’d better hold off until we talk some,” he sent through their link. “We already did that once and look where it got us.”
“Oh, you…” Feeling furious and embarrassed over her strange lapse of judgment, Brandi flung herself into the car and grabbed the wheel. As the ancient Chevy crunched over the loose gravel and dried leaves to the exit of the trailer park, she promised herself this would be the last time she met with the big Kindred.
But try as she might, she couldn’t get his words out of her head.
“We’re bonded, Brandi—you can’t ignore it…We’ll talk later.”
Somehow she had a feeling he meant them.
Chapter Seven
Slade sighed as he watched her drive off in the ancient, rusted Earth vehicle with its archaic combustion engine. Couldn’t she afford a better, more efficient form of transportation?
Eyeing the ramshackle aluminum construction of her domicile, he decided she probably couldn’t. The clothes she and her young one had been wearing hadn’t been of the best quality either, though they were neat and clean. Clearly Brandi was doing her best on a meager allotment. Seeing that—and watching the way she was so protective and loving with her daughter—gave him a very different picture of her.
On the way down from the Mother Ship, he had been planning to confront her. She was a little tease, he’d thought grimly. A female who had probably gone into the Puppet House on a dare or just for fun to catch some unsuspecting male unawares. He was going to give her a tongue-lashing she wouldn’t soon forget.
She hadn’t made it easy to find her—she’d given the wrong name which had led to a female relative of hers—the same one who had apparently been with her on the Mother Ship. One look at her artificially blonde hair and too-skinny body let him know it wasn’t Brandi and he didn’t even speak to the girl.
Slade had left but the bond he shared with Brandi let him know he wasn’t far off the mark. It drew him to her until he was close enough to follow his nose to her exact location.
But long before he got to her, he had begun getting her thoughts, loud and clear—as though she was broadcasting them right into his head. He listened in to her worries about him but also her feelings for her daughter, whom she loved with all her heart. Though he’d tried not to let it sway him, Slade couldn’t help softening towards her just for that.
She’s a good mother, he thought with grudging approval. And she seems to be a decent person. Maybe she didn’t have any malicious intentions when she came to the Puppet House.