I pulled the harness around him and me. It was designed to have significant stretch, but considering his muscles and my breasts, this was a reach. By the time the clasp pulled together, I was pinned against Zyair’s hard body. But I couldn’t hope to reach the controls…
“Put your hands on my arms.” The powerful muscles there flexed. “When you sense something coming, squeeze, and I will follow?—”
I yanked on his left arm and pushed down at the same time. He dove and went left in an instant.
Thiswasfaster. I lost myself in a talent I didn’t know I’d possessed, while Zyair reacted instantly to my arm pressure and translated it to theStardrifter. He left the larger asteroid, and as we ducked and dove, something even stranger happened.
With his body wrapped around mine, I felt not only every twitch of his muscles as he piloted the ship, but also every beat of his heart, every breath. I swear that my own heartbeat synced with his, and when he exhaled, so did I. My pulse might be racing, but it was also curiously alight. As if having him wrapped around me fulfilled it…
He’s a fucking Drake, Jaz.As I fought to keep my focus, my signals about the asteroids became increasingly refined, almost as though he sensed what I was experiencing.
I breathed, he breathed. My fingers tightened on the arms that partly encased me. It was like we were becoming one entity…
But we were an entity in peril. As we moved deeper into theasteroid belt, the rocks came closer and closer. Even the pursuing Nirzk ships had enough and headed out of the belt.
“They are outta here,” announced Xandros.
“We should be too.” Rhodes sounded tense.
“They will have us, if we do.” Zyair ground his teeth. “They know that we will have to emerge. Stay alert, next—they will use drones.”
Right on cue, small red dots appeared on the navcube, and a second later, blue fire erupted across our bow. Zyair banked hard, leaving the drone stranded—a moment later, it exploded when an asteroid bounced directly into it. By the bolts shooting around us, there were more. I counted five red dots swirling around on the hologram.
“I had hoped for less of a determined pursuit,” Zyair growled. “I do not think we can stay here much longer.”
Brentoq clearly wanted Zyair more than a hedgegopher wanted snickerdoodles. I was beginning to relate… my breathing had accelerated, and so had his. The fact he was a Drake no longer had the bite that it should have…
TheStardrifterwas taking damage now. She jolted with the impact of smaller rocks I couldn’t react fast enough for us to dodge. A red light appeared, and an alarm sounded.
My focus was split between the oncoming rocks and the hard warmth wrapped around me—it was as though I heard it from a distance. “We’re losing shields,” I murmured.
“We will be—good,” he whispered back, his arms tightening around me. I was enveloped in his scent—musky with his beast, and sexy as hell. Heat suffused me, and I had to restrain myself from rubbing up against him.
Holy crap.We were about to be either crushed by ricocheting asteroids or zapped by enemy drones and my girlie bits were getting hopeful—my priorities were seriously screwed. What was wrong with me?
I had never experienced anything like this before. Zyair’s scentpermeated my soul, sending a desperate kind of heat flooding through me. It wasn’t sweat soaking my panties. Despite the alarm shrieking at us, I breathed deep and pressed back against him.
My world narrowed to a combination of crashing asteroids and rock-hard muscles. For his part, Zyair managed to keep the ship ducking and dodging, but his heart hammered against my shoulders, and by the feel of what jutted against my buttocks, I wasn’t the only one with questionable priorities. And his preferences for piloting unencumbered by coveralls had permitted that particular beast to be released.
Meanwhile, theStardrifterwas getting hammered.
“Destroy those drones,” Zyair ordered into the comm.
“Oh, that is what I am supposed to be doing? I was busy polishing my talons,” Xandros muttered.
Apparently, sarcasm wasn’t a lost Drake trait.
I forced my gaze to the navcube. “There’s only two left.”
There was a shudder of firing phasers, and Rhodes corrected, “One, now. Other is on your side, Xandros.”
“Not for long.” More shaking, and then the light winked out on the navcube.
“Good shooting, Xandros,” Zyair praised.
“Of course,” he replied.
“They will send more,” Rhodes cautioned.
