Page 17 of Silver Slayer

QUIN

Ifelt the heat of him before he touched me. Vennox eased into my personal space, crowding me as the moment stretched between us, thick and heady. His thumb brushed my cheek before his hand cupped my face, cradling me as if I were precious. That molten gaze seared into me, prickling my skin with sensual awareness.

"What are you staring at?" My lungs were tight as if all the air had been sucked out of the room.

"The twin moons of Valose," he murmured. "When they rise together after the suns-fall, they cast a light unlike anything else in the sky. Quiet. Steady. Something a warrior learns to navigate by when all other light fails him. That is what your eyes remind me of."

For a moment, I just let them land, his poetic words settling over me like a warm blanket I hadn’t known I was cold without. Then my brain caught up. I looked at him, really looked: the silver eyes still trained on me, patient and deliberate, and I felt the flushclimbing my neck with a sudden, embarrassing clarity. He was good. I’d give him that.

Apparently, the universe was big enough to contain males from other planets who’d figured out that pretty words were the fastest way past a woman’s better judgment.

"Pickup lines, Valosian style,” I smirked. “You sure do have a way with words, making boring gray sound amazing."

“Grraay,” he repeated slowly, as if he was hearing the word for the first time. I leaned out of reach, his thumb grazing my cheekbone one last time before dropping his hand. “There is nothing boring them. You are... remarkably lovely, Quin?—”

Panic fluttered low in my belly, and I didn't let him finish. This warrior of Valose was dangerous to my sensibilities. I needed distance. Needed to shut this down right now and get back to reality.

Before I could think too hard about why my pulse had suddenly kicked into overdrive, I jerked the bio-spectral analyzer up between us like a shield. The device vibrated alive in my hand, its screen flooding with scrolling data as I tapped through the incoming readings with far more focus than the situation warranted.

"Your bioluminescence," I said quickly, latching onto the first coherent thought in my head. "And these scales — the camouflage.” Another series of readings flashed across the display. “How does it work? Is it involuntary, or can you control it?”

The analyzer hummed softly as I forced myself to focus on the familiar stream of data instead of the male kneeling between my legs.

This attraction to him wasn't normal. It was too fast, too intense, like my body had skipped several steps my mind refused to take. I had never reacted to any man like this, and that alone made it feel dangerous.

Surprise flickered briefly across his face before his expression shuttered behind a careful, unreadable mask. "Our scales respond to the environment," he answered evenly. "Light, shadow, movement... even the bioluminescence of the flora. In the jungle of Huren, the plants glow during suns-fall, and our scales and bioluminescent markings shift to mirror the surrounding foliage. It helps conceal us from predators."

I was still watching the analyzer screen when something at the edge of my vision made me look up. His ears had shifted. Those elegant, pointed ears had caught my attention in the first few seconds of meeting him. Both had swiveled simultaneously toward the far end of the ship, cupping forward, like a satellite dish orienting toward a signal, precise and involuntary.

"Did you just—" I leaned forward. "Your ears. They moved on their own."

He blinked, as if he hadn't noticed. "They respond to sound."

"Can you control it?"

“Yes.”

I couldn't help it. "Can I—" I reached out slowly, giving him time to pull back, and touched the pointed tip of one ear with a single fingertip.

It twitched under my touch immediately, a quick, involuntary flinch, and he went very still. His expression shifted, as he quickly masked it with indifference.

"Sorry," I said, lowering my hand. "Occupational hazard. I document things."

"I noticed," he said with a tinge of annoyance.

"How far away can you hear?" I asked, pulling the analyzer back up as cover for the sudden heat flushing my face.

“About half a milose.”

The translator behind my ear said that was the Valosian term for a mile. I thought about that. The way his ears had swiveled toward the back of the ship, while I heard nothing.

"Like a cat," I said.

He tilted his head. "I do not know what a cat is."

"A small domesticated animal from Earth. Furry. Four legs, retractable claws." I gestured vaguely at his ears. "Pointed ears that rotate independently to track sound. Extremely sensitive hearing. Very difficult to sneak up on."

He considered that with a careful neutrality. "And this is a compliment?"