Viper (Naga Brides Book 1) Read online

  “Mates fuck,” I snarl, jerking my hand back. Her eyes widen. “They fuck,” I say again, feeling my member pulse under my scales. “You understand this.”

  “Vruksha is it?” Her voice is hesitant, low. I nod. “Just because you say we’re mates doesn’t mean it’s true. Let me go, and you will never have to see me again.”

  “Never.”

  “I will never fuck you. We are not even the same species.”

  “You will.”

  “Humans don’t have mates!” her voice gains steam.

  “They do now.”

  My agitation cannot be controlled. Finding the handle of an old door behind me, I jerk it open, snapping the vines on the other side. I slide through the shelter and out, uncaring of my female within, and grab my spear. If I stay, I will hurt her. I will bring the shelter down upon us both and bury us within it.

  I am a Viper. A dangerous foe. A red devil. She should be begging for my protection and all I have to give her. If I were taken to the stars and placed in her world, I would seek a master—a mate—for guidance so I may rule my enemies, but she doesn’t even look at me as her savior—she doesn’t want me at all!

  “Vruksha,” she says softly.

  My scales straighten and stretch.

  I can’t look at her without mounting frustration. Instead, I swing my tail and lash the plants around me to shreds, expelling my fury like she just expelled her tears.

  Tears. I spit.

  I pivot to her. “You will come to realize your situation and the generosity I provide. I will let you fight it now because I do not think I can take you gently in my current state. But you will join with me. You will come to understand that Earth, this Earth, is nothing what it used to be, and that ssstarts with me.”

  I slip into the shadows of the forest nearby before she can respond. Her wary eyes find mine in the darkness.

  If she does not want me, then she will have to watch me in my madness. She will witness what she does to me by her mere presence alone. She will see what she is missing, and I will show her that coming to me is the only way. Because the only protectors of this world are brutal and territorial, and I am kind in comparison to them.

  But my kindness has limits.

  “What is your name?” I command from my place in the trees. I know it, but I want to hear her say it. I want to hear it aloud. I want to see if she’ll listen and give me what I want. It would go a long way in soothing my agitation.

  A prize, I convince myself, calming. Her name is a boon.

  She doesn’t answer me at first, and despite what she said earlier, I assume she is considering running now that I have allowed space between us.

  “Gemma,” she says after a minute, loud enough for me to hear.

  “Gemma,” I repeat, my voice raspy. “This is what you do to me.”

  I slide out from the shadows and into a beam of moonlight. The scales at my groin pull back. With my spear gripped in my free hand, the other cups my hefty member, revealing it to her. It’s heavy, engorged with seed, and painful; it’s what she’s done to me.

  It’s what I suffer for her. Females do not suffer in the ways that males do, so we make them suffer by stoking their arousal, only to deny them. I have seen it.

  Her gaze slides down to my middle, where my pelvis becomes my tail—where my shaft usually hides beneath. But it’s not hiding now, and her lips part as she takes it in.

  “I am in pain,” I hiss. “So much pain. For you.”

  Six

  A Gamble of Want

  Gemma

  I can’t help but stare.

  An alien male is pumping his cock mere yards from where I’m sitting. Heat surges to my face. Uncivilized, quick to anger, but intelligent, Vruksha’s nothing like the serpentine beast I believed he was.

  And yet, he very much still is.

  I catch a glimpse of his tongue when he hisses low and deep.

  There’s a small fork in it, and it vibrates on every S sound.

  But it’s his intelligence and uncanny knowledge of my culture that confounds me. It doesn’t make sense, but I don’t care, not really. I knew these locals spoke the common tongue, how could they not, having bartered for me? He can be reasoned with, that is all that matters.

  His hips snap forward.

  I grip the vines inside my shelter as he releases his cock to my full view.

  Dark red scales glisten in the moonlight, gleaming across his frame. Large arms, abs, and sharp muscles make up this strange, angry male before me. But I barely take in his strangeness or otherworldly beauty because of the dick being presented to me.

  It’s a different color than the rest of him, darker, tumescent, and bulky. The shadows cast upon it hint of ridges and a large thickness in the middle of his length. He’s long, longer than any human male should ever be, but only truly engorged at the center. Despite its shape, Vruksha’s cock is ramrod straight and pointing up, bouncing a little when his tail shifts. The eye of its tip glistens with cum.

  A drop slips out and falls to the forest floor.

  I press my thighs together, nervous that his cum would somehow find its way between us, and if I don’t stop it now, Vruksha’s threats would come true. I don’t want them to be true. I need to hold onto hope for as long as I can, and fight. Stay vigilant.

  But a man has never presented his dick to me before. I lean back into my shelter as my muscles tighten, but I’m watching closely all the same.

  Because despite everything, he’s physically alluring, and his smell is intoxicating. Sniffing, I can almost scent him.

  He grabs his member, squeezing the thickness in the middle. His palm presses into it, and his fingers wrap tightly, massaging it. His gaze hoods, staring at me.

  Staring at me and touching himself. Heat rises to my cheeks.

  “Ssso much pain,” he groans, rolling his S. The hiss rumbles through the air and tickles my ears.

  Shock hits. I know what this is because I’m not averting my eyes and throwing things at him. My breaths shallow and as much as I don’t want to, I stare. Hard.

  I want to be that person who’s righteous and virtuous, but I’m not. I never have been.

  He’s an intelligent, sentient alien… But my original, brief assumption is now mired in confusion.

  Vruksha loosens his grip on his bulge and pumps his length instead. His tapering tip, where his cum drips, is pointed and slightly curved, and could be a weapon in itself.

  “Gemma,” he rasps my name, and my skin prickles. “Gemma,” he mutters again when he slides his hand back down.

  My heart riots. I turn away, but the motion is harder than I expected.

  “Gemma, Gemma, Gemma,” he continues. What he’s doing goes against human decency, but he doesn’t know or even care. “Gemma.” He says my name with each thrust of his hand, his hips. “Gemma.”

  I listen, his pace increasing. I steal another glance, practically mesmerized.

  Primitive darkness glints his black eyes, bursting with fervor. His angular face tilts downward, arching, ribbed brows lower to show menace or… or want? I don’t know, and I tremble. He looks at me like he really is in pain, and that the only thing in all the world that could relieve him is me.

  I face him and the virility he’s displaying. As I swallow, I find that my throat is tight. My mouth is dry, like I had been gaping.

  His arm jerks, tempo building. The sounds of my name become nothing more than a guttural, animalistic gasp on his lips. The rasps he releases roughens.

  He’s showing me what he intends to do with me, and what’s in store if I can’t find my way home. Will it be bad? I hug my legs to my chest, making sure my ripped shirt covers me entirely.

  “Gemma!” he shouts my name one final time, bowing over as his hips thrust outward. His tail slams against the ground. The leaves above shake, some fall.

  I jump, startling as he crumples onto the forest floor, thrusting still. I’m still watching this male jacking off, and I lean out to see if he’s
okay.

  Something wraps around my ankle. “What are you doing?!” I shout as he drags me out of the shelter and toward his pumping hips.

  I kick once, trying to dislodge his tail, but he lifts and grabs me, pulling me under his body.

  He pushes his hips between my legs, spreading them. I press my hands to his chest. His cock slaps against my stomach. I suck in.

  He pins me with his eyes as I feel my clothes dampen with his cum.

  “Do you sssee now what you do to me? What I need from you, Gemma?”

  I swallow, holding still.

  All I can think about is that my legs are open and his body is between them. I try not to press them closed but I’m clenching, straining, uncertain.

  “Why me?” I gasp, pushing at his chest.

  “Because, my sweet little human, you are mine.” His eyes twinkle. His tongue comes out and slides up my cheek.

  My whole body shivers.

  “And soon, you’ll be licking me like how I’m licking you.”

  His mouth moves over my ear and I turn away, and then it’s upon my throat. It’s warm and wet and demanding. I hate that I clench again, that I grit my teeth because it tickles.

  This isn’t happening, I tell myself. Darkness or not, protection or not. Heat running through my veins or not.

  His lips caress my throat. They’re warm, soft...

  I have a plan. He’s just a means to an end.

  Daisy.

  The second Daisy comes rushing back to my head, I push at Vruksha, fighting to get out from under him. “Stop!” I yell, breaking through my shock. He rises, and I scoot back until I’m pressed up against the shelter.

  Darkness clouds his eyes. The twinkle, gone.

  How could I forget about Daisy? I have no idea what happened to her or where she is. What she must be going through… If it’s anything like this?

  I pray she’s okay.

  Vruksha pushes his cock into the confines of his tail, the bulge in the middle of it now gone, and it disappears behind a slit of scales. I finally manage to turn away, shame rising to my cheeks. I rub the feel of him off my neck.

  “Now that you know what you are in for, I suggest you get some sleep,” he says. “Tomorrow, we will reach my den, and you will become mine. Sleep is of the essence.”

  I hear him slip away and I close my eyes.

  I’ll never be yours, I vow. Never. My time on this planet will be short.

  I’ll never become an animal like you.

  Yet that heat… It remains.

  Seven

  The Airfield

  Gemma

  I barely slept, and I feel it. The little I got the night before hasn’t helped at all. And I’m hungry. As dawn breaks through the trees, my stomach grumbles. I push onward.

  My feet drag through the damp overgrowth.

  I can’t stop thinking about what happened between Vruksha and me last night.

  “How much farther?” I ask, hating that it’s me breaking the silence. Again.

  We haven’t spoken more than a few words since we left the largely-broken shelter hours ago. When he tried to lift me in his arms and carry me the rest of the way to his den, I held him off. It made him furious.

  I might be tired, but I’ve been carried enough by these aliens to last me a lifetime.

  Besides, I don’t trust him to not carry me up into the trees.

  A sigh escapes my lips. I rub my eyes with the back of my hand, wishing I hadn’t lost my hair tie in the fight yesterday.

  Massaging my neck, I still feel Vruksha’s tongue. It’s elsewhere too, or at least I’m imagining it elsewhere. Warm, wet, and mobile. Ticklish at the fork. It’s a sensation hard to describe. I shake my head. His tongue tickles.

  A blush rises to my cheeks.

  If I were to be asked if these Earth aliens were voyeurs yesterday, I would’ve gifted a response of utter confusion. Today, I just want to laugh. Laughing is easy. The incredulous giggle tickling the back of my throat is all that keeps me walking forward, the only thing stopping my thoughts from drifting to darker subjects.

  If I’m laughing then I’m not screaming or crying.

  Vruksha threatened me with all of himself, showed me what he had to offer. No human man would’ve considered doing the same. They’re all words, easy flirtations, and gifts. There’s protocol in wooing a lover within the field—on a spaceship—and jacking off in front of them isn’t part of it.

  Perhaps it should be.

  I rub my brow.

  I’ve been asked out on dates and have gone out for a drink with men in the past. Sometimes I even enjoyed the flirty messages sent back and forth, but never has a man showed me his skill and stamina, or what he has hanging between his legs before a physical agreement, a contract.

  I can’t get the scene of Vruksha thrusting out of my head.

  My face scrunches.

  “Through the trees,” he answers, not even glancing at me. He’s focused on the forest around us, checking the sky and trees constantly. I’m glad he is. At least one of us is. I hear animals but do not want to meet them. I’m not an idiot. If I do choose to run again, I know I’ll have to contend with these ‘monsters’ Vruksha mentioned. If I run, it would be away from the one being who keeps me safe from them.

  I eye his spear.

  I want it.

  I’m going to need it when the time comes. Bringing back a weapon like his—obviously Lurker-made—would be leverage.

  “How can you tell where we are?” I ask, wanting to learn about the world I’m facing. Something hoots in the branches above, and I flinch.

  “The land is flattening.”

  “Oh.” Has it been? I hadn’t noticed. All there’s been is trees, trees, and more trees. And the occasional oddly-shaped structure overgrown with vines and leaves. It’s not like the trees are strange to me. Most habitable planets I’ve seen or visited have trees like the ones on Earth.

  “We are close, very close,” he adds. Vruksha cants his head in my direction but doesn’t say anything more. He’s been quiet since his show last night, and though it didn’t bother me at first, it is beginning to now. Questions, so many questions are at the tip of my tongue, waiting to be asked, needing answers.

  I want to ask so many things but don’t. Each time I’m about to, I look at the alien male who’s captured me, his tail, muscles, and blatant, in-your-face strength and then intimidation thwarts me.

  Nighttime didn’t do Vruksha justice. The moonlight on his scales was beautiful, but it’s nothing like seeing him in full light, in full view. I’ve gotten to watch him for hours, he’s the only thing I’ve watched for hours.

  And my observations prove that this male is nothing like the men I grew up with. Vruksha intimidates me. Not even the captain of The Dreadnaut intimidates me. But this half-man, half-serpent does.

  All my questions die on my tongue.

  He’s powerfully built, lean and long, and his tail seems to go on forever, flicking, wrapping, and testing the forest with it. He uses it like a third arm, a third leg, whichever he needs at the moment, and it’s mesmerizing. I recall the sensation of his tail on my skin, his scales, sleek and soft but hard when pressed against. They’re armor, and considering all the scratches on my arms, I envy him for that. My fingers twitch, hungry to explore his scales more thoroughly. To discover how strong they really are.

  Can they be pierced with a blade?

  His scales shift as well, rising from his skin ever so slightly when a strange noise comes from the forest. Among them are ridges. Ridges that appear as inflexible as his scales.

  And oh, is this male flexible.

  Like an acrobat, Vruksha uses the world around him as a playing field. Using his tail and hands, he swings up into trees, slipping up to the very tops to peer out over the landscape at a moment’s notice.

  Yesterday, he carried me like I weighed nothing, and he carried me for hours.

  It was probably easy too, I grump. With the length and size of his tail
, that alone probably weighs three times what I do. He’d have to be mighty to climb with that weight hanging off him.

  I’m not heavy, but I am tall, and I do have some curves. My weight should have hindered him somewhat, but recalling back, I don’t think it did.

  “We’re here,” Vruksha says, pulling me from my thoughts.

  I see nothing but more trees around us.

  I hug my middle. “Here? Please don’t tell me you live in a treehouse.”

  “Treehouse? No, human, I don’t reside in such an easily accessible place. I am not Azsote.” Vruksha swings his spear out and moves the heavy branches in front of him. There’s a clearing on the other side, a field almost. He moves aside and nods for me to pass through.

  I hug myself tighter and walk past him, trying to avoid touching him. His tailtip brushes my leg.

  A shiver goes through me, but I quiet it as fast as it rises.

  Sunlight hits me, and the clearing widens as I move forward. Vruksha follows behind. He doesn’t stop me, so I keep going until there’s a field of intermittent trees extending beyond my sight. There are no bushes here, nor overgrowth.

  It’s like an orchard, but not entirely, instead there’s just dirt and long fields of grass between the trees, and old, dead leaves covering the ground. And the ground? It’s mostly level.

  “What is this place?” I ask.

  He slides past me and deeper into the field, toward a worn path on the ground where he’s clearly moved many times.

  “I think this used to be an airfield.”

  “An airfield? Like a landing port?”

  “A landing area for planesss.”

  “You mean ships,” I correct.

  He shakes his head. “Planes. This was built for planes.”

  No one uses the term plane anymore. To know that at one point, humans were all stuck on Earth, without any access to space, unsettles me. The lack of freedom would have driven me mad.

  I follow Vruksha deeper into the place. “How can you be so sure?”