Handling the Hybrid Read online

  “Come on, little girl,” he murmured. “Nothing more we can do right now. Let’s go home.”

  Fourteen

  Vrox didn’t ask if he could join her in the shower once they were back in her private bathing chamber. He just shucked out of the slave trousers and boots he’d been wearing and followed her in under the warm spray.

  The shower was a big one—a luxurious model where instead of a single showerhead, the entire ceiling rained warm water down on you. Tandy turned her face up to it gratefully, glad to have the remains of the plant liquid and the slave’s blood washed off her skin—though it was going to take some doing to get it out of her hair. She reached for a bottle of hair cleaner only to have it plucked from her fingers.

  “Here, little girl,” Vrox murmured, squirting a generous dollop of the sweet-smelling stuff into the palm of his hand. “Turn around—I’ll wash your hair for you.”

  Again, Tandy didn’t protest, just as she hadn’t protested when he came into the shower with her in the first place. She just leaned back against him and let those long, strong fingers massage her scalp and work their way carefully through her hair. Somehow, the big Kindred managed not to pull it at all and the feeling was pure bliss.

  Tandy sighed gratefully as he rinsed her long locks.

  “You’re really good at that.”

  “Didn’t I tell you? I’m a slave with many talents,” he rumbled and sighed. “Just wish one of them was getting out of this damn collar so I could have gotten to you in time.”

  “Vrox, don’t…” She turned in his arms, putting her hands on his broad, bare chest. “Don’t say that,” she told him. “You did get to me in time. It didn’t…” She swallowed hard. “Didn’t get all the way into me. It could have been so much worse. And I still can’t believe you were able to save me with your pain collar set to maximum!”

  “I thought it was set only to your touch,” he said, frowning. “How could Mistress Tillabong operate it anyway?”

  “Some kind of override is my guess.” Tandy frowned. “She said something about my aunt Deelee several times and I know they’re friends. Maybe Deelee put her up to it.”

  “Pretty sure she did.” Vrox frowned, a low growl rising in his deep chest. “That relative of yours is out to fuck you over, little girl. You’d better be careful.”

  “I will be,” Tandy said seriously. “But I don’t want to think about it right now—there’s nothing we can do until Mistress Sinda investigates.”

  “Do you think she’s on your side?” Vrox asked. “She seems to like you. Hell, she seems to like me—or she did before I ripped that fucking slave’s head off.”

  Tandy shivered, remembering the gory scene. It might have made her feel frightened of the big Kindred if she didn’t remind herself that he had done it for her. That he had fought through the agony of a pain collar set to maximum to save her from being raped—first by that shaft plant and then by the awful slave.

  How had he managed, she wondered. It was amazing that he had been able to move at all, let alone fight when such fiery pain was coursing through every nerve in his big body.

  “I don’t know if she’s on my side,” she said, trying to answer his question. “I think she’ll be as fair and impartial as she can. But the fact that you killed another slave, well…it doesn’t look good.”

  “No, I guess it fucking doesn’t,” he admitted heavily. His mismatched eyes, framed by wet black lashes, blazed. “But I’d do it again, little girl. In a heartbeat. It was the only way to keep him from hurting you.”

  “I know. You saved me—protected me. You’re amazing.” Tandy put her arms around him and they held each other, naked in the shower. “Thank you,” she whispered into his broad chest. “Thank you, Vrox.”

  “You’re welcome, little girl.” He held her tight and then bent down to kiss her slowly. Despite the pain and trauma she’d been through, Tandy felt a little spark strike in her belly. She’d never been so intimately close to a naked male before she’d met Vrox. And though it had been a bit awkward at first, now it felt right—felt natural—to press her bare breasts against his broad chest and feel his hard shaft branding her belly.

  It wouldn’t take much for him to be inside me, whispered a little voice in her head but the thought made her wince. She couldn’t forget the terrible, stretching pain of the engorged purple shaft-plant as it tried to force its way inside her. And the plant and Vrox were about the same size. There was no way he would ever fit inside her—despite all her fantasies, she knew that now. Not even with enough lubricant to fill a bathing tub and the patience of a saint would his huge shaft be able to find its way inside her pussy.

  The thought made her sad and she leaned her head against his chest, hearing the thick, steady drumming of his heart in her ear, over the constant rushing of the water.

  “Hey, little girl—it’s all right. Let’s get you all cleaned up.”

  Vrox got another handful of soap—this time a special moisturizing wash she liked—and rubbed his big hands together. Then he was caressing all over her body, soaping her shoulders and back in long strokes and then turning her and taking his time to cup her bare breasts and wash them thoroughly.

  He was careful with her nipples, not pinching or twisting them until Tandy moaned and pressed forward into his hands. Then he took them lightly between his thumbs and fingers and tugged gently—just enough to send showers of hot sparks through her body—until she was panting. Goddess, how could he make her want him again after everything that had happened to her? Tandy didn’t know—she only knew that her body seemed to crave his and that even in the shower with the flowery scent of the body wash rising around them, she could still smell his dark spicy musk—the scent of his skin and his desire for her.

  She loved the way he washed her but when his big hands moved down to her thighs, she pressed them tightly together.

  “It’s all right, little girl—just want to help get you clean. I’ll be gentle,” he promised.

  But Tandy shook her head.

  “No, Vrox, please. I…I can do it myself.”

  He stopped washing and moved his hands up to her waist instead.

  “Okay, little girl. I’ll leave it to you—for now.”

  Tandy wasn’t sure what he meant by that but she was relieved he was willing to let her be for the moment. The place between her legs still throbbed and stung and she didn’t want him to see how she’d been hurt—he would only blame himself again for not getting to her sooner.

  Vrox soaped himself up and rinsed off, then left her to herself for a while.

  Tandy felt a little better after she’d washed the slippery seed juice of the first shaft-plant out of herself, though she was still sore and shaken by her encounter with the second one. Gods, if the big Kindred hadn’t been there to save her…

  But she didn’t even want to think about it. Shaking her head, she finished rinsing herself and stepped out of the shower.

  Fifteen

  “Well, it’s not as bad as it could have been.” Tandy winced as she sat on the edge of her bed and Vrox could tell she was still sore. He wanted with all his heart to heal her with the essence from his fangs but she had to let him get to her first and she certainly hadn’t been ready in the shower. She looked beautiful, he thought—innocent and sweet in her short pink bathrobe with her long curly hair twisted up in a matching pink towel.

  Right after she’d stepped out of the shower, there had been a call for her from Mistress Sinda over the vid-screen and she’d been talking to the other woman for almost an hour. Now, apparently, she was ready to tell him their fate.

  “How do you mean?” Vrox was only wearing a towel himself. It was wrapped around his lean hips and aside from it and his ever-present pain collar and cuffs, he was naked. He supposed he could have changed back into his slave clothes but he was Goddess-damned tired of that fucking loincloth and the trousers with no crotch that left his shaft and balls hanging free made him feel more naked than just wearing a towel.