His mouth straightened. “I am so sorry, Princess Jazmin. I had no right to proceed… I thought youknew.” The last was said with undercurrents of something I couldn’t quite define. “I should have confirmed it.”
Frankly, “do you want to give birth to my dragonlings” would have been quite the buzz kill. I met his gaze. “Then why didn’t you?”
“I asked you if you wanted it. You agreed. I trusted you knew what it meant…” He dropped his gaze from mine.
I… had wanted him. Very badly, more than I’d ever wanted anything in my life. But I couldn’t tell him that. Because I needed to be free, and this was the very last thing from it.
He’d thought I’d been told the score… something twisted inside me, ever so slightly. But dammit, he shouldn’t have pushed under those circumstances. This was a life-altering decision, and I’d had zero idea.
His mouth straightened. “Your scent—and fleeing from the battleship—such things always make me…” He gritted his teeth. “Iwantedyou.” He said it almost on a groan.
And there was the truth of it. Surrounded by my aroma, and with adrenaline flowing, he had asked. And if I had said no, I didn’t think he would have forced me.
But he hadn’t really made sure that I understood what it all meant. Was it deliberate? I believed he hadn’t known I was oblivious to what was really going on. But the outcome of his decision to go ahead affected both of us.
These Drakes wanted me to have theirchildren…
The entire Fated thing was a component I couldn’t even begin to get my mind around. I violently squelched the flutter within me, and straightened. “‘Do you want to screw’ is not the same thing as ‘I’mgoing to lock my cock inside you and claim you for life so that you can spawn baby dragons.’”
He looked right at me. “I am sorry, Princess Jazmin.”
The thing inside my chest—be it organ or muscle—constricted. But there was no easy way out of this mess. “Drop the Princess. I told you to just call me Jaz.” I pulled myself up straight. “Now get out of my way.”
My voice shook, and I almost quailed when I saw my words hit home. Hard. But then he moved aside.
I gathered every ounce of my failing resolve. “When we get out of here, I want you to drop Yani and I off once we are away from Nirzk territory.”
The skin around his mouth spasmed, but he nodded.
“Very well,” he said.
I ignored my aching heart and swept past him and out the door.
I stroked Sookie as Yani lay half hidden beneath the power core containment system and told her that we would be free of the Drakes once we shook loose from Nirzk territory.
There was a thump, as though she’d raised her head too fast and too far. And then silence, before she said, “You want them to drop us off?”
“That was the plan, wasn’t it?” The tone of her voice confused me.
“Originally, yes. But?—”
“But what?”
I was pretty sure I heard a sigh. “That was before you matebonded one of them.”
The word pierced my heart, but I gritted my teeth and said, “He told me it likely wouldn’t cause issues, because it was only once. And apparently it hinges on me also, um, having sex with his brothers. Which I haven’t done.”
“Yet,” she stated. Rather surprisingly.
The pulse of raw heat through me made it hard to breathe. “I don’t want to screw his brothers!” I protested in a squeak.
Her stubby fingered hand emerged and waved. “Spanner,” she requested, with an odd note in her voice.
I handed it to her and it vanished again. But apparently our less than comfortable conversation wasn’t done.
“Are you sure about this?” she asked.
“About what?” I hedged.
