Page 48 of Star-Crossed Captive
The position and the words brought back memories of her last day onElara Five, how he’d ripped her from her home and killed her people. On a scream, she threw her body backward, snapping her head, kicking where she could reach. She thought she’d gained an inch of space, when he pushed her forward until her knees hit the bed. Bent over, his groin pressed against her ass, her hands trapped against the bed frame.
“Let me go,” she spat over her shoulder and pushed against him. The part of him pressed between her thighs hardened. Every part of her went tense.
“I’d stop doing that if I were you,” he said, voice low.
The air around them crackled and shifted. She froze. A shiver tickled along her spine. Her cheeks burned at having his body pressed so intimately against hers.
The fight left her, and her body sagged. Heat settled in the pit of her stomach. She leaned forward until her forehead pressed against the bed covers. With sheer willpower she held herself still.
“Mace.” She groaned, barely resisting the urge to move suggestively against him. His hand hovered over the middle of her spine, like he was about to press her further into the mattress.
“Mace—” Nia stopped speaking. Heat settled between her legs.Oh, hell.What was going on with her body? Why wasn’t she screaming at him to stop touching her?
He shifted, releasing his hold, and freed her arms.
Nia exhaled and braced against the bed to stand on rubbery legs. By the time she’d turned around, she stared at an empty room, the smashed fruit on the deck and the thrumming of her body the only indications he’d been there.
Mace ran a shaky hand over his face, leaning against the bulkhead beside the door to his quarters. What the fuck? He had nothing in his brain except that. What. The. Fuck.
He needed to stay away from her. Nia was his responsibility in all ways. He needed to protect her, even if it was from himself. The way she’d said his name…an accented purr making every part of his body harden.
Pushing away from the bulkhead, he stalked the corridors until his brain slowed to an acceptable speed. Unfortunately, his cock remained as hard as it had been when he’d held her in his arms.
Walking and taking deep breaths for long minutes, Mace circled back to his quarters. The door opened and he found Nia sitting on the edge of the bed, her arms wrapped around her knees. He lifted his gaze above her head so he wouldn’t see her wounded expression.
“Your shift starts soon,” he said, speaking to the bulkhead.
Nia rose and walked toward him. He refused to look at her as he engaged her bonds and continued to the lift. When he finally turned, he realized she hadn’t followed. She stood by the door to his quarters, wrists clasped, and stared at him.
The sight of her bound had never hit him so wrong as it did right at that moment. An emotion akin to panic wrapped around his chest and squeezed. There was no way to fix this situation, and he’d made it worse. He stood frozen to the spot.
Finally, she walked toward him with slow steps, counted only by the stuttered breaths in his tight throat. She stopped in front of him, her gaze searching his, the color high on her cheeks.
The lift door opened, but neither of them stepped on.
“Am I safe with you?” Nia asked, chin jutting. Confusion and challenge swirled in her eyes. “On my first day here, you said you wouldn’t hurt me.”
It felt like someone’s hand punched into his chest and squeezed his heart slowly. “I won’t hurt you.”
He had to make this the truth. He couldn’t overpower her again. She was his ward, and he needed to protect her. If staying away from her was his only option, then that was what he would do.
She stared at him, eyes searching, then gave him one nod, like she believed him, before stepping onto the lift.
Nia focused on her patient, a boy with a sprained wrist, and tried to clear her head of everything else.
It wasn’t working.
She’d been angry—beyond angry—for being kept in the dark about the proximity alert. Attacking him with fruit had been juvenile and stupid, but she’d needed some sort of release.
But it had turned into something completely different.
It made her mad all over again. She shouldn’t be attracted to her warder, to a Tellusian. She shouldn’t want to get to know him better. But no matter what she should or should not be doing, she found herself craving both.
Instead of dwelling on all the confusing emotions in her head, Nia focused on work.
The day merged into the next, the one after that into another. Nia became used to the routine of family medicine, the rhythm. Ignoring the occasional snide comment wasn’t hard. Kilian was booked to see a physical therapist and discharged. The debt of the prosthetic hung over her head.
And it didn’t take long for Nia to realize Mace was avoiding her.
