“What?” Shocked, I tried to straighten and pull away from him, but the arms that had been so soft and tender moments ago were like steel bands holding me to him. “What are you talking about?” Oh, I knew. I’d heard that an Atlan Warlord’s prize for surviving the war was wealth and lands and titles. The whole thing sounded like the old-fashioned romances my mother used to read where Dukes and ladies lived in grand estates with carriages and servants. I didn’t know if any of that was true, but I guess I’d find out.
“I have been fighting for a long time, Megan. My people will gift me with wealth and property. I will take care of you. I promise you that.”
I was not worried about that. Hell, I could survive with a knife in the woods if I had to. But this was Nyko’s reward. Not mine. “Why did you say I would choose your estate?”
“Our estate.” He kissed me, his arms tightening to emphasize his words. “You’re mine. I don’t care where we live. But I’ve been told that females prefer to choose the home where they will raise their children.”
“Children?” I squeaked the word. Oh holy hell. I hadn’t really thought about children more than in a completely abstract—someday—kind of way.
He was watching me closely, too closely, so I looked at his chest instead of his face. “I don’t know anything about Atlan. I’ll choose the wrong city or climate. I don’t know where your family is or where you’re from.”
Nyko lifted his hands to cup my face and angled my head up so I’d look at him. When our gazes locked and held, he spoke again. “You are my family. There is no one else.”
“No one?” Was he an orphan? “What about your friends? Or cousins? A mentor or teacher you want to be close to?”
“No.” It was his turn to look away, but my reprieve didn’t last long. And when his gaze returned to me, the emptiness I saw there made me want to take him in my arms, kiss him all over, and make him forget this entire stupid conversation. “There is no one, Megan. My friends, the brothers I care about, are almost all either dead or still fighting on this battleship. I have no family, my parents died years ago in a war. My father was older when he mated, and she was alone in the world before their match, sent to him by a matching service on Atlan. I have no one left, Megan. You are my life now. You are my family. Do you understand?”
I nodded, barely holding back tears for his pain. I never cried, not like this. I was soooo not an empathy crier. And definitely not about bullshit family. I’d had my dad, and for a while, my mom, until the bottle took her from me. My brothers were pains in the asses, and we didn’t exactly hug it out at Christmas, but I always knew, if the shit hit the fan, they’d curse and bitch and moan, but they’d kill for me, just like I would for them. But Nyko was mine, and it wasn’t until this moment that I fully understood what that meant.
Lifting up on tiptoe, I pulled his head down to me and kissed him softly, putting the love I could not yet speak in the touch, hoping he’d feel it. “All right then. If I get anything I want, I want a huge house with eight bedrooms, a cook and someone to clean, because I don’t do bathrooms. I want a courtyard full of trees so tall I can’t see the tops. I want the place to feel like a forest, with flowers and vines and so many plants I can’t see the ground. And in the center, I want a fountain, a pretty fountain surrounded by benches where we can sit in the sun and catch bugs with our children.”
“Then you shall have it, mate.” His words sounded oddly like a vow, but I wasn’t worried about it.
Releasing him, I stepped back and finished notching up my armor. “Okay. So, later, we’ll go house shopping. Right now, I want to say goodbye to my team.”
“Fine.” Nyko watched me get ready, and when I was done, he lifted me from my feet and backed me up against the wall. I put my legs around his waist, full armor and all. “But then I want you again. You are perfect, mate. Too beautiful. I find I can think of nothing but filling you with my cock, licking your sweet pussy until you scream.” He kissed me, hard and rough and deep and I was so wet and eager from that one kiss, I nearly changed my mind about going anywhere.
Tearing my mouth from his, I laughed, the sound pure joy. I wasn’t sure I’d ever heard that sound come from my throat before, at least not since I was too young to know better. “You are such a sweet talker, beast.”
“I’d rather do things other than talk.” He shifted his hips, pressed that huge, hard cock of his against the apex of my thighs and I whimpered.
God, he could reduce me to a mindless, hungry animal with just a kiss. Maybe I was turning beast.
I couldn’t help but grin, and lowered my legs from his waist. With great reluctance, and not a lot of urgency, he lowered me to the floor. “Later. I promise. But I’m going stir crazy in here. I need to move. And I want to go kick some ass one more time before I go.”
“As long as the ass kicking does not involve the Hive, my beast will remain calm. So will I.”
We grabbed our helmets and Nyko followed me through the ship to the training levels. I hadn’t paid much attention the first time around, and I’d never been in the Atlan section of Coalition-assigned living quarters before, but the hallways here were huge. Beast sized. Twice as wide as those in the human section, with ceilings several feet higher.
I felt small walking beside my mate in these huge corridors, and I never felt small. It was a novel feeling, and I wasn’t sure if I enjoyed it, or hated the feeling of weakness and doubt that came along for the ride. Not that it mattered. I was what I was. So, I ignored the whole train of thought and led Nyko to the training level. Sure enough, Seth and the entire unit were on the holographic training course. On Earth, we called a setup like this Hogan’s Alley. Bad guys popped out, along with civilians. Split-second decisions were required, when to shoot, when not to. But this included physical traps and an obstacle course meant to test soldiers in every way, with attacks coming from every direction. Of course, we turned it into a game. The challenge changed once a month and was played in teams of two, which meant we had to rely on someone else, learn to trust our fellow soldiers. Everything was tracked, scored, and added to our permanent record.
Seth Mills, captain and commanding officer of ReCon Unit 3, was my friend and usual teammate. He smiled when he saw me, but his eyes widened at the sight of the Atlan who’d come along.
“Simmons.”
“Mills.”
Seth’s eyes took in everything at once, lingering on my cuffs half hidden by the black under suit that lined my armor, but Captain Mills didn’t miss much, and I knew he saw them when
his eyebrows raised in surprise. Nyko had rolled up his sleeves so the glint of metal was prominently exhibited. He wasn’t hiding our match, but displaying it proudly for all to see. The sight cracked my heart open a little more. “…the only thing that shows the others that I belong to you.”
He was mine, and that made my chest ache. Love. It was coming at me like a freight train and I wasn’t ready. I’d felt this way in the cave, but he hadn’t really been mine then. I’d kept my feelings guarded because, at that time, I’d known he wouldn’t be mine. Ever. I’d been processed, and he hadn’t even been on the market. But now…
The rest of the unit whooped and yelled as some of the others finished a challenge. I leaned to the side, looking over Seth’s shoulder to watch the finishing time. It was good. Damn good. “Five-o-three.” Those assholes had just replaced me and Seth at the top of the all-time leader board. By four full seconds. Scowling now, I waited for the digital screen to update, clenching my jaw when I saw my name next to Seth’s bumped to second place.
Seth’s smile was a mile wide. “Want to grind their fragile little egos under your boot heel?”
“Was that really a question?” Of course I did. That top spot on the all-time leader board was mine.