“Tiffani is my mate,” I ground out through clenched teeth.
Seranda slowly shook her head and pointed to the cuffs that were on the floor by the grav-wall. “No, she’s not. Who do you think let me in? She left you, Commander.”
Crossing to them, I picked them up, stunned.
The cuffs were cool to the touch. Empty. “Fuck.”
Spinning on my heel, I faced the Atlan female. Her name was already forgotten. If she left the cell, her face, her body, would be forgotten. My beast wanted Tiffani and no other. She was my mate. I knew it. My beast knew it.
But I still was afflicted with the fever. It made no sense to me. To my beast, it was simple. It wanted Tiffani.
“Get out,” I growled.
“I am here to soothe you.”
“I do not want to be soothed. I want Tiffani.”
“I could be your mate,” she countered.
My beast snarled and snapped at the idea.
“No.”
“You will die,” she said again. “You should at least try, Commander. Touch me. Let me touch you. Give me a chance to save you.”
She took one step toward me, but I held up my hand.
“No.”
“She took the cuffs off to save you.”
I looked at her then to see if she was lying. “What?”
“She doesn’t want you to die. For an alien, she is… nice. She took the cuffs off so that you could fuck me. To see if your beast would be soothed, your mating fever gone.”
“She wanted me to fuck you?”
For the first time, the Atlan female looked less than confident. “No, I think she wanted to tear my eyes out. But she knew she wasn’t your mate, that she couldn’t save you, couldn’t control your beast. She was crying, Commander, but very brave. She left to save your life. Don’t let her sacrifice be in vain.”
I wasn’t sure if I wanted to take Tiffani over my knee and spank her until her ass was too red and sore to sit for a week or pull her into my arms and kiss her senseless for being so selfless, so brave, so damn stubborn.
Either way, it didn’t matter. She was gone and I was stuck with an Atlan female who wanted to fuck my beast. My cock was flaccid in my pants. Neither man nor beast was interested.
Fuck. I was going to die.
***
Tiffani
Sarah and Dax were kind enough to allow me back in their home. I had nowhere else to go on Atlan. Deek’s house was no longer mine. While I was told I was quite famous for bravely entering Deek’s jail cell and saving him by mating with him, I was now infamous for the entire thing failing miserably.
I had no idea how to turn on the Atlan version of a TV, but I didn’t want to. Whatever was being said about me was nothing I wanted to hear.
With no friends and no prospects, I had to wonder what would happen to me. Per the Bride’s Program rules, if a match didn’t work for whatever reason, I could find another. I couldn’t leave Atlan and return to Earth per Bride Program rules, but I could accept the next mate that was an acceptable match. But the match wouldn’t be as strong, it wouldn’t be the same. It wouldn’t be Deek.
But it looked as if I had no other choice. While Deek would be fucking every willing Atlan female to find a mate and save his life, I would have to be matched to someone new. I’d either have to live nearby and watch him with some other female, or worse, live knowing Deek had been executed.
I hated the thought of him touching someone else, loving someone else. But I loved him too much to let him die. Either way, I lost. I cried myself to slee