Toxic Desire Read online

  And there is a resistance in me to all my thoughts of conquering her. It is a realization of horror.

  My physical Attachment to her, it has cemented in my gut like the endless sands of time. It believes she is physically a part of me that I could no more cut off than my own hand.

  But I still have my reason. I have not lost my mind or my emotions to her yet.

  I have to overcome this repulsive Attachment to her the sex created.

  I cannot be a slave to her or my physical desire.

  Chapter Nine

  Nem

  The relief from the flames sends me into a dreamful sleep—filled with visions of my gold alien god. In my dreams, he fucks me every way a woman can be fucked.

  And then when night falls, he sleeps beside me, not touching me, but he’s such a formidable presence, I can feel him as though he’s surrounding me.

  And there is a comfort there.

  His care in my pleasure was…confusing. This situation could so easily be about us using each other to get off. But my concern for his pain when he was poisoned by the water was…astonishing. Something more than mere lust is happening between us.

  This place is wreaking more havoc on us than just desire. It’s as though it’s making us care about the other’s needs. Maybe it’s just because the sex is literally so fucking otherworldly.

  I sleep, twisting with anxiety, worried for my crew, ashamed of my weakness.

  I dream of chasing Oten, intending to kill him, poised to strike, then ending up beneath him instead, his cock relentlessly pounding me full of orgasms, ceaselessly.

  I dream of kissing him, sucking on his tongue, then feeling his fangs prick my lips and tasting his syrupy sweet venom.

  But there’s another dream of horror that wakes me. A dozen Ssedez massacring my entire crew—all of my soldiers’ bloody bodies on the ground—their helms pulled off and me seeing their faces for the first time, dead.

  The morning light sprinkles through the trees, and I am alone.

  The bed he made us is empty.

  The desirous flames aren’t back yet, and I’m grateful for a break from them and him. I’ve never had so much sex at one time in my life.

  And yet, I know as surely as I need to breathe, I’ll want more.

  Even as I’m shaking from the terrible dream and what I know he and his warriors attempted against my crew, I’m still craving him.

  I feel different. My body is stronger, sturdier, my limbs more lithe. So it’s not like sex with him has been bad for me.

  But then I touch my arm, and something else is different.

  I look down at my naked form, and my heart speeds. “No!”

  I run my hands over myself, disbelieving. It can’t be real. It must be more hallucinations. I’ve started seeing things even on myself.

  But I pick up one of his knives next to me and prick my forearm.

  It leaves a scratch. But it doesn’t cut me. I slice the blade over my skin again and again, willing it to draw blood, screaming at it to harm me. But nothing happens.

  The sun lifts, the rays spreading onto my legs—that aren’t pale anymore.

  They gleam, as though turned to gold. Like his.

  He’s made me like him.

  Shock seizes me—what I’ve done, what he’s done. I never suspected… If I had known…would I have stopped him? Would I have been able to drum up the restraint to say no?

  The memory of the pain and flames raging through my blood is still vivid.

  I couldn’t have resisted him. Not when the relief he brought was so complete and ecstatic.

  He just had to be capable of transforming a human into himself. Did he know this would happen? Was using his sex and his venom on me as much a weapon as any knife or blaster?

  Is the change permanent?

  My skin has a new texture. It’s thicker, more durable. It’s still smooth, if not smoother than my own, and still soft in a different way, but now there are tiny sparkles across the surface. I glisten.

  A dull ache throbs in my upper jaw. I finger my teeth and find a new set of incisors probing my gums.

  I pull forward a piece of my hair and find it run with gold strands, though some are still brunette.

  I’ve never heard of this. Never in any of my grandmother Dr. Eda Klearuh’s research did I hear of interspecies sex causing a change of one’s cellular makeup.

  I’ve memorized her theories on the common marks of all intelligent life in the universe. I’ve been riveted by her theories. After evolution and the “big bang” theories were proved correct, she set out to prove all intelligent life in the universe stems from the same source. Her discoveries ran contrary to the Ten Systems’ credo, which is that humans are the dominant beings destined to rule all others.

  My parents died protecting her research, hiding it where only their daughter knew where to find it. The military forces the best scientists into service for their own agenda to prove one and only one thing: humans are the superior species, ordained by nature to conquer. I was raised with the knowledge that only by infiltrating the Ten Systems’ military could I learn their tactics well enough to extract key scientists, evade the authorities, and escape.

  I recruited as many as I could who believed what Dr. Klearuh’s studies, if completed, will likely prove: all intelligent life, in every galaxy, in any form, is equal.

  We escaped with the best crew we could find with the sole goal of rebellion against the Ten Systems to continue her work.

  But I failed in my mission. Dr. Klearuh’s findings, the cause my parents died for and my crew risked their lives for, is gone.

  All the files were likely destroyed along with my ship. Unless someone else in the crew managed to save it and survive.

  Oten.

  He’s the reason for all of this.

  His fluids worked a transformation on me. Whether it is from his venom or his semen, I don’t know. But I do know I can’t let him put any of his liquid in me again.

  The changes can’t be permanent. They’ll pass through my system like any other injections would. They have to.

  How this rapid change is scientifically possible, I don’t know.

  I read no notes on the Ssedez and their evolution in my grandmother’s research. There was so much information she’d gathered from dozens of ships and thousands of scientists, I couldn’t read it all. Those in my crew combined may have combed through it, though they wouldn’t have memorized it.

  Gone. All that precious knowledge.

  Because of him.

  Rage builds in me like a coming explosion. It ricochets inside my skull with the force of split atoms in a reactor. I can’t let him beat me.

  He will pay.

  “Oten!” Wherever the fuck he is. I’ve let my guard down with him. He’s probably still planning to kill me. I can’t let that happen. I can’t let him win.

  Chapter Ten

  Oten

  I watch her from amidst a copse of bushes.

  I am not a coward. I am shocked.

  She needs space—I need space—to comprehend what I have done to her. I predicted it would be something, before I lost my mind to the madness of this hellish planet and its damned sun.

  But I never thought it would be this.

  The dawn revealed her change. I did not know it would happen. I swear, I would have found a way to resist her had I known. To change her, to force a transformation on her, is fundamentally wrong, no matter how much I like it.

  I should feel guilt at her skin turning the tone and texture of mine. The armored quality she now has should be a bad thing. She will be harder to kill.

  Disgust at seeing her—a human—transform into a Ssedez would be a reasonable reaction.

  But I cannot think or feel any of those things.

  Instead, I feel a satisfaction as deep as the fires burning within the largest star of the brightest solar system. I know beyond doubt—

  She is mine.

  She is genetically laced with parts of me.

  I have made her stronger. I have given her protection.

  She will need exterior armor no longer.

  She now is armor. My armor.

  Pride breeds in my chest with the power of my life’s blood. To see her—the female my body has physically Attached to—turn Ssedez makes me want to boom the news of it from the treetops. I want everyone to see her this way. I want everyone—from this galaxy and beyond—to know she belongs to me.

  I want them to witness I did that to her, with my sex and my bite.

  The strength of my response is—horrifying. If I could sever this Attachment from my body, I would. If I could cut her out of me, no matter what the pain, I would carve the hole in myself with my own knives.

  I cannot be feeling this for a human. I cannot. It should be impossible.

  But no matter how unwilling my reason, I cannot control the instinct.

  My heart, my soul seethe with emptiness. I have longed for this—for my body to feel this for another Ssedez—for a hundred years. I have in vain sought a mate and never found one who called to my instincts the way this human does.

  That the Attachment should awaken in me now, for her, is painful, and a mockery of my heart’s desire.

  It is because of this place.

  I tell myself again, My feelings are not real.

  My body does not understand this truth. It only knows what it craves.

  That she is mine to the point of changing her cellular makeup affects me on an instinctual level.

  But it does not make it right.

  It is hopefully temporary and will pass from her system. If I do not give her more of me.

  The need to infect her further, to make it permanent, beats through my blood and rises through my cock. It should be aching from
overuse, but it is not.

  My body is made for the mating frenzy that comes with the completion of the Attachment. When my heart and soul join with my body’s desire, when my emotional Attachment is equal to the physical, her life will become more important than my own. When her fangs descend for me and she returns my bite, then it will be complete. Then my lust will be even more unslakable than even Fyrian has made me. I have witnessed it among my other warriors. At the onset of the Attachment, they must be excused from duty for a week or more.

  A female Ssedez is genetically able to withstand the male frenzy and return it.

  This human—I doubt could withstand it. My frenzy would likely kill her.

  But it will never happen because the rest of me will never Attach to her emotionally the way my body has physically. So I do not need to worry.

  My gums pulse where my fangs are once more dripping with my venom. The craving to bite her has not lessened since I drank the cursed water from the stream.

  I found edible fruit hanging from a tree, which I tested and found negative for toxins. I bite into one. It does not dull the ache, but it relieves some of the pressure to pour the venom into something.

  Before I go near her again, I must relieve some of this accursed lust taking over my body. She is a forsaken human! I cannot be feeling these false things for her and filling her with the sacred venom, which should be reserved for my fellow Ssedez.

  Procreation for us has been of paramount importance since the attempted genocide by the humans. We are still not returned to our former numbers. It has been the shame of my existence that I have not been able to father children yet.

  That, mixed with the pride of claiming her, is a lethal concoction of confusion, like the most potent poison. It conjures in me an outrage and a certainty that—

  I cannot give her more of myself.

  No matter the compulsion of this place, I must find another way to ease the burning pain that has increased again since dawn.

  I pull and squeeze at my cock as I watch her. I try to make it hurt. I need to teach it to not crave her like I need her to survive. She sits naked on the makeshift bed, her breasts in full view. I cannot help remembering the tight muscles of her ass and how they looked and felt from me fucking her countless times. So firm and yet her skin so soft.

  That softness is no more. Now it will feel like mine.

  It raises the pleasure in me, the orgasm building stronger.

  I clamp down on the fruit in my mouth and stifle a climactic groan so she cannot hear. I watch the silver semen pump from my cock—the ridges pulled back to reveal the vulnerable tip.

  But as though she can hear me, though I know I was soundless, she calls my name.

  “Oten!” The anger in her tone is like a demanding beast—one that hardens my cock again, despite my orgasm. If the evidence of it were not in a shining silver puddle on the ground, I would think it never happened.

  I groan, not attempting to hide it this time.

  Her gaze whips to mine, and I move through the bushes.

  “You’re watching me?” she seethes, her mouth twisting in revulsion.

  She hates me. As well she should.

  I stop, away from her. I don’t want to get close to her. To tempt me into touching her. To tempt her into attempting to kill me again.

  Though I hope she does. I want her to attack me. To see her unleash all the anger screaming at me from her eyes, hot and murderous. I would enjoy crossing blades with her.

  And then fucking her when we’re done.

  Which I cannot do, so fighting is not an option.

  “Answer me, you fucker!” she yells, and stands. “How do you explain thisss?” Her tongue has changed. She hisses like a newly born Ssedez.

  She gestures to her naked body of shimmering gold. My skin tone is a richer gold, while hers is lighter, as though younger and touched by the sun.

  She is sensational to look upon. I peel my eyes away from the chiseled form of her warrior’s body, combined with the new gleam of her—to look away is impossible. I cannot not stare at her.

  I try to speak evenly, as much as I can with my cock pulsing and fangs aching. “I did not know the effect I would have on you.”

  “Bullshit!”

  “There is no precedent for the Ssedez having relations with a human. I swear, I did not know.”

  “You knew it would affect me sssomehow,” she hisses.

  I see her tongue lick out, the twin tips snaking over her lips.

  It makes me harder, to think of that tongue licking over my skin, of sucking it into my mouth, of her wrapping it around my cock.

  I will not point it out. “I did know I would have some effect. I did not know it would change you.”

  She stalks toward me. “You could have warned me.”

  “I was not in my right mind.”

  “What does the venom do to the Sssssedez?” Her tongue lingers over the first part of our name, the correct way to say it. I have to suppress a groan. I like it.

  “For the Ssedez, the venom increases sexual pleasure. Brings greater heights of ecstasy.” I don’t add that it is considered a great honor, a special treasure, when it does happen, since it flows only during the physical part of the Attachment. “I had no reason to believe it would cause a change in you.”

  “You could’ve ssspeculated. You should’ve known.”

  “You, who demanded I bite you.”

  Her nostrils flare, but she does not deny it. She remembers it was the first thing she wanted when we got off the escape pod. The sight of my fangs extended made her desire it.

  “I would not have bitten you otherwise.” I would have found a way to resist. Some way. Any way.

  “If I had known, I never would’ve succumbed.” Her voice is tight with aggression, her body tense and coiling to spring. She is as vicious as a viper.

  Her upper lip pulls back in a snarl, revealing the points of fangs poking through her upper gums. I have to close my eyes and look away. The sight of them sends a bolt of lust searing through my veins. To have her bite me…

  To see her mouth overtaken with fangs, to have her spill her own venom into me, would make me. For her to return the venom would mean the ultimate completion of the physical Attachment.

  A longing, thick and fierce, rises behind my lust. For her to feel the Attachment for me that I have begun to feel for her…

  I want it with a ferocity that could shake the ground we stand on.

  I turn away from her and let out a vicious yell. This cannot be happening to me!

  These feelings are contrary to every longing that lives in my soul.

  But it does not stop the desire from implanting itself in me.

  The centuries of my loneliness compound within me. In the absence of a mate, I have consumed myself with the training of my warriors, with the protection of the Ssedez.

  It does not mean the desire for a mate, the need for someone who pulls from my body the animal instinct to join for life, has ever died. Though I despaired of finding the one, I have never been able to give up hope.

  And here she is. A human who, with her consent and more of my venom, I could turn into a Ssedez.

  This place, this planet, taunts me with a hope I have clung to for too many decades.

  The bitterness I feel is fiercer than even the lust the water induced yesterday.

  “The affects might wear off,” I say with a sneer. “I will not bite you again. And you may return to your former, vulnerable mortal self.”

  “Vulnerable?” she snaps.

  “While you are Ssedez, you will not have to worry about the plants cutting you.” I motion at the leaves that yesterday infected her with more lust than even the atmosphere.

  “I don’t need your venom to protect me!” The brutality in her tone is like a slicing knife. Her shoulders bunch, and her body vibrates with restrained violence.

  She is a breath away from attacking me.

  I want her to. The craving to touch her defies even my revulsion at her kind. And so, I am willing to say words that are not true. “You will never be as strong as I am.”

  A battle hiss, the precursor to a strike, bursts from her mouth, and she lunges for me.

  She double kicks me, a one-two in the gut and the chin—too fast for me to block.

  I stumble back but see her next swing. I catch her fist, flying straight at my eye. But she expects it, and her other fist slams me in the chest like a hammer.