Staring out the visor, he settled back into the pilot’s chair and fantasized that it had been him and not Vadim who’d taken Anna for the first time.
He’d realized his mistake as soon as he’d seen Vadim cover Anna’s mouth with his own. Kojo had neglected to fully engage her in the process. She seemed to melt into Vadim every time he kissed her. How could Kojo have skipped that part of the mating?
He closed his eyes and imagined Anna’s lips pressed to his. He imagined the softness of her skin and the warmth of her breath, the taste of her mouth and scent of her arousal.
“Kojo?”
His eyelids popped open at the sound of her voice and the light touch of her hand on his shoulder.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you,” she apologized.
Her being there seemed like the answer to his unexpressed prayer. He grabbed her wrist and pressed a kiss to her palm.
“Oh,” she gasped softly.
His trousers tightened as he observed her responsiveness—something he hadn’t missed during her interactions with Vadim. He tugged gently on her hand until she came around to the front of the pilot’s chair. Then he pulled her down to straddle his lap, her legs just fitting under the armrests, virtually locking her in place over him.
“Kiss me.” He cradled her face between his big hands.
Her eyes widened as she leaned toward him. He met her halfway and pressed his lips to hers. He explored her fuller bottom lip with the tip of his tongue, savoring the shudders that coursed through her body at his touch.
Her hands clenched his shoulders as she drew closer to him. Her tongue slipped between his lips, and he captured her moans of pleasure with his mouth.
He ran a hand down her slender throat to her rounded breast. He rubbed her nipple through her clothes with his palm then gave her a light squeeze. She arched her back, shoving her breasts toward him.
Not letting their mouths disconnect, he plucked open her buttons with his fingers and drew her shirt over her shoulders and off her arms. Then he got rid of her bra.
He wasn’t as cold as Vadim. He wouldn’t take Anna the way the General had. Kojo wanted to feel all of her skin against his own, so he undid the buttons at his throat before reaching down to the hem of his tunic. Anna helped him remove his shirt, which finally broke their kiss.
Instead of returning to his lips, she bent her head and kissed along his neck to his shoulder. “Your skin is so beautiful,” she murmured against him as she bent further to trail kisses down his pecs. She licked one nipple. “Do you like this as much as I do?” Then she sucked his flat nipple into her hot mouth.
He wasn’t sure if she meant the nipple play or the whole mating thing, but he definitely liked it all. She was a fireball in his lap. The hesitant research scientist had been replaced by a sexy siren.
He tweaked her nipples between his thumbs and fingers, and she bit gently on his pecs. His erection pressed hard against her center, and her slightest movements had him nearly begging for more friction.
He grabbed the waistband of her trousers and tugged them down her hips. She got off his lap and reached for his waistband. He stood, and together, they dropped their trousers on the floor. Then they were standing naked before each other, his skin dark like the night sky and hers so pale like the distant moon.
Hooking his forearm under her butt, he lifted her so she wrapped her legs around his waist. She was light, and it was no struggle to hold her aloft with one arm as he used his free hand to tease her nipple.
His cock nestled in the heat of her nether lips as she rocked her hips up and down. She nuzzled his neck, whimpering softly with her need. He slipped his hand between them and found her clit. She nearly pitched herself out his hold with her response. He grabbed her more firmly with both arms and backed up to the armless chair in front of the communications console. He sat with her straddling his lap, but still, he did not enter her. He would not do it as brutishly as Vadim.
Now that he had her in a more secure position, he returned his thumb to her clit. She bucked against him, gasping his name. “Yes…please…Kojo.”
He swallowed her next gasps with his kiss as he circled the sensitive bundle of her nerves with just the right amount of pressure to send her crashing into orgasm. Her nails dug into his biceps as the muscles all over her body tensed with her climax. Her thighs squeezed his hips as he held her tightly around the waist with his arm.
Gradually, the tension in her body eased, and her breathing slowed. He trailed kisses over her jaw and down the soft skin of her neck to her shoulder. She was warm and pliable under his touch. He rubbed her back in soothing circles, enjoying the feel of her over him.
“Are you…?” She started to say, but didn’t finish her question.
He waited, but she pressed her lips to his neck instead of continuing. “What, Anna?” He lifted her chin with his hand and looked at her flushed face, her eyes remaining downcast.
Finally, when she must have realized he wasn’t letting her off the hook, she spoke. “Are you…” her words were barely louder than the sound of the transporter’s engines, “going to join with me?”
Her vulnerability in that moment nearly made him roar with masculine need to beat the shiitake out of Vadim. Had her coupling with that frozen iceman made her so timid of this moment with Kojo? He’d stood by helplessly as the General had roughly taken Anna for her first time, and now, Kojo raged with the need to brutalize the other man as he’d brutalized Anna.
Drawing in a deep breath, he stroked Anna’s hair. “I will be joining with you, but it will not be in the same manner as your first time. I promise.”
She raised her eyes to gaze on Kojo’s face. “Did I do something wrong the first time?”
“Oh, hellitude. No, dear Anna, but some might argue that Vadim did not do right by you for your first time.”
Her brow creased with her puzzlement, and he was obliged to explain.
“He could have entered you in a manner that would not have caused as much unnecessary pain.”
“But the first time is always painful, I was taught. And it did not hurt for very long.” Her eyes flicked away. “In fact, it felt most pleasurable.”
Kojo’s balls ached with his need to finish this mating—their first mating—and his cock twitched against the wet heat between her legs. But it was more than a physical need at this point. This extraordinary woman had tapped a hidden spring inside him. He felt like he was awash in warm waves of sentiment for her.
She ran the tip of her finger over his pecs, tickled down his abs and ended her exploration between their lower bodies. Raising herself slightly off his lap, she dragged her finger down the length of his erection. His breath released with a hiss.
She stroked him again and smiled when he twitched at her touch. “You like to be touched here,” she said.
He nodded, finding it too hard to unclench his jaw to speak. He was barely restraining his need to take her, to spill inside her, to mark her as his.
She lifted herself higher and held his cock at her opening. She met his gaze. “Are you ready?”
He nodded again then groaned loudly as she sheathed him with her hot, wet, tight core. He bit the inside of his cheek to keep himself from grabbing her hips and ramming himself into her, a lot like Vadim had done.
She rocked up and down on him as he struggled to stay still under her. “This feels so nice,” she murmured.
Nice?
Nice?
He was on the verge of exploding, and she felt merely nice?
His masculine pride made him do it. He grabbed her by the waist and pounded into her. Clutching his shoulders, she bucked over him. His abs contracted tightly as he thrust in and out of her clenching channel. She tossed her head back and let out a keening wail as her orgasm seized her, setting off Kojo’s climax. He rammed into her a few more times as he released his seed in her, making her his mate.
As if she’d lost all muscle strength, she collapsed over him with her forehead resting on his shoulder, and he held her compact body close to his. Their pounding hearts beat nearly in unison. Finally, their breathing returned to normal, and Anna regained some of her strength as she leaned back and looked at Kojo.
“I don’t suppose we’ll be taking a bath together on this ship?” she asked softly.
Regretfully, he shook his head. “No bathing tubs, but the captain’s quarters has a fairly decent spray shower.”
“Big enough for two?”
“Big enough for us.” Kojo stood with her legs hugging tightly around his waist and carried her down the short hall to the captain’s quarters.
With one hand, he adjusted the dials for the water and checked the temp before getting under the spray with Anna still wrapped around him. Slowly, he let her slide down the length of his body until her feet rested securely on the floor of the stall. With closed eyes, she raised her face to the hot water flowing down from the fixture in the ceiling. An expression of pure joy covered her features.
He squirted some soap from the wall dispenser into his palms. Standing behind her, he rubbed his hands over her shoulders and down her back. The slippery feel of her smooth skin sent his blood shooting south.
“Mmmm,” she purred under his touch.
His hand traveled down to her ass, and he squeezed her round cheeks gently. She wiggled back against him and giggled. He pressed his hard-again cock against her and slipped his hands around her waist to the vee between her legs.
Sliding a finger through her curls, he lightly touched her clit. “Are you ready for me so soon?”
She turned in his arms to look up at him. “Is it too soon?”
He drew her hand to his cock. “No, dear Anna. I’m ready for you too.”
She grinned up at him. “I’m one of the lucky ones, aren’t I?”
“Lucky ones?” He wasn’t sure where her mind was going this time. Her thoughts seemed to fly faster than the speed of light.
“My poor friend Bella isn’t sexually compatible with her mates, but we are, aren’t we?” The look of vulnerability was back in her eyes.
“Stars, yes,” he agreed. Then he lifted her again and positioned her opening over his erection.
She wrapped her arms around his shoulders and her legs around his waist as he jutted into her slick channel. He pressed her against the wall of the shower stall as he pumped his hips, taking them both to another orgasm, and securing a place for her in his life as his mate.
After they came down from their high, he finished soaping them both. He held her close as they rinsed off under the hot spray. Her tight, little body snuggled into his, and her eyes remained closed even after he’d turned off the water.
Keeping an arm around her for support, he reached for the towels. He rubbed her dry and wrapped her tightly in a clean towel. Then he sat her on the closed lid of the commode. Her head drooped down to her chest with her exhaustion as she held the towel securely at her breasts. The poor woman was probably not used to being awake this long, into the beginning ticks of a new day.
Kojo dried himself swiftly then scooped her up and carried her into the captain’s quarters. The berth wasn’t nearly as wide as the one in Marco’s quarters back in sector ten, but that was the way of all ships’ quarters—small, due to space restrictions. He flipped back the covers and settled Anna on the mattress. Her eyes never opened as her head settled on the pillow, and he adjusted the covers over her.
Feeling uncharacteristically sentimental, he bent and placed a gentle kiss on her temple. “Sleep well, dear Anna.”
He returned reluctantly to the bridge and reached the captain’s chair just as Vadim hailed him from the observation deck.
“It’s about time you returned to your command, Kojo,” Vadim’s voice over the comm speaker clearly indicated his contempt.
Kojo took a moment to check the monitors before he replied. “Everything’s under control here, General. I was only a few steps from the bridge. If anything came up, I could have been here in seconds.” He resented the fact that he felt like he had to explain himself, but his years of military training were hard to ignore.
Vadim was Kojo’s superior and due the respect of his higher status. As a fellow mate, Kojo wished they were on more equal footing, but Vadim had secured his position as first mate by taking control of the situation in Marco’s quarters. At least Kojo had managed to get himself rated as second mate. His conscience tingled slightly at the fact that Marco hadn’t had the opportunity to assert his claim for second mate. When the other Lieutenant General joined them again, Kojo hoped Marco wouldn’t be too incensed that Kojo hadn’t waited for him.
“I’ve been in contact with Councilman Troy in Second Quadrant,” Vadim interrupted Kojo’s thoughts. “He assured me that no terrorist activity has been detected in the Quadrant.”
“Roger that,” Kojo replied. “We’ll be in sector twenty in another thirty minutes.” He wanted to add “Sit back, relax and enjoy the ride, General,” but he didn’t think the other man had any sense of humor to appreciate the quip.
“You’ve been authorized to use your CO’s landing code to keep our mission covert,” Vadim added.
Right, no need to advertise that the new mates of the renowned bio-researcher Doctor Anna were docking in Second Quadrant. “Roger that,” Kojo answered. Then he turned his focus on the pre-docking checklist. He had precious cargo, and nothing was going to get in his way of keeping her safe.