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Arcanthus reached into the lounge’s refrigeration unit, grabbed the first cold drink he saw, and chugged it down. The time away from his mate had been agony, and true to his word he’d taken his time in savoring her-– her presence, her scent, her delectable body-– upon reuniting. They’d made love late into the night until exhaustion overtook them, but old habits died hard, and within a few hours Arc awoke from his deep sleep, thirsty as hell and full of restless energy.
Samantha, however, had been adorably fast asleep, and even after showering and taking his time in redressing she hadn’t moved. Eager not to wake her, he’d made for the lounge.
The soft whirr of the door opening and closing was the only warning before his solitude was disturbed, and with a satisfied sigh he set his drink aside, swinging his tail good-naturedly.
“Surprised to see you here, sedhi,” Drakkal gruffed upon entering. He was followed by Urgand and Thargen, who sat heavily on one of the couches. Urgand flipped on the TV and began surfing through the various shows. Drakkal didn’t join them. Instead, he lingered in Arc’s peripheral vision, looming like a dark cloud that threatened his good mood. Arc’s pleasant expression fell. Seems their chat was going to happen now. He turned to face the azhera, who stood with arms crossed a few paces away. He supposed he couldn’t avoid it forever. With a roguish smile, Arc leaned against the nearby counter and swept his gaze over his friend.
“Surprised you got bored of your ball of yarn so quickly, kitty. What brings you to the lounge?”
“Cut the shit, Arc,” Drakkal grunted, and drew closer. He yanked open the refrigeration unit with more force than was necessary, and grabbed a bottle of gurosh . “I just finished helping these two unload all that shit you brought back from Earth. What the hell is all that, anyway?”
Arc’s smile warmed to something more genuine as his thoughts returned to his sleeping mate and the many bouts of lovemaking that had so tired her. “Necessities for a traditional terran wedding–-their ceremony of commitment. We may be married according to the UTF, but I intend to give Samantha a wedding to look back on fondly.”
“Wedding, huh?” Drakkal cracked open his gurosh and took a prolonged drink. “Never thought something like a commitment ceremony could be so involved. Where’d you get your facts from?”
Arc chuckled. “Don’t tell me you doubt me now! After all we’ve been through together you’d think I’ve proven myself several times over when it comes to information gathering!”
Drak scratched his furry cheek and averted his eyes. “Yeah, and you’ve also proven several times over that you’re prone to excess. Surely this is over the top.”
“Felt over the top to me,” Urgand grumbled as he finally settled on a show and reclined on the couch. Arc shook his head and brought his drink to his lips. “Not at all. As a matter of fact, I got my information directly from a terran. What I brought with me is paltry in comparison to what terrans typically do on Earth, but I was short of space.”
Drak snorted. “A terran. You mean Samantha?”
Drinking from his own bottle, Arc shook his head. Drakkal waited impatiently for him to finish, and just to get a rise out of him, Arc swallowed several mouthfuls before continuing. Finally he set the bottle aside on the counter and the corner of his mouth quirked up in a playful smirk.
“No, I mean Abella.”
“Ooooooh,” Thargen taunted from the couch. Drak’s eyes flared. “ Kraasz ka'val, Arc, are you serious?”
Arc flicked his central eye towards Thargen. “What do you mean?” he laughed as the azhera began pacing. He tracked the movement with his lower eyes.
“You’re telling me that not only did you fly halfway across the universe to kill a terran, putting your neck on the line by doing it alone , but you fucked around with her? Do you ever use your head?”
Arc held up his hands and stood up straighter. “You wound me, Drakkal. I was never in any danger, and I was not alone, or did you forget that I’d left with both Urgand and Sekkthi?”
“And you left us behind more than once without more than a vague ‘I’ll be back!’ ” Urgand interjected. Arcanthus ignored them, his attention fixed on Drakkal as he dragged both hands down his face, one flesh and blood and the other cybernetic. “You took on the terran alone, Arc. And what purpose did going back to that female who started this whole fucking headache where you never seem to think before acting anymore serve?” He hissed a string of indiscernible curses under his breath. “Tell me you kept it in your slit this time, Arc. We don’t need another murderous enemy coming for you neck.”
Arc’s eyebrows fell. “Don’t you think that is a little unfair? I haven’t yet had the chance to tell you the entirety of what happened back there!”
“Arc?” Sam’s trembling voice was like a plasma bolt, silencing their banter entirely, and piercing straight through Arcanthus’ heart. He spun around to find his mate standing in the doorway, eyes wide and full of hurt. When had she arrived? His instinct was to run to her, to take her up in his arms and carry her back to their bedroom to continue making love to her. He hadn’t nearly had his fill of her yet. But she glanced between him and Drakkal, and suddenly he was aware of what she had just walked into. He tore his eyes from her and glared at Drakkal.
The Azhera’s green eyes filled with more regret than Arc had ever seen. For a beat, it was silent. Painfully tense. Then, “Everybody out,” Drakkal barked, though Arc didn’t miss the hint of shame in his voice. He doubted the others would notice. “You all got sludge in your ears? I said out!” In a hurry the lounge was emptied, leaving Arc and Samantha alone, with her much too far away from him to wrap in his arms as he so desperately wanted to.
He took a step toward her but she retreated, and the action shattered his heart.
“Tell me it isn’t true,” she said hoarsely. “Tell me you didn’t go to Earth to cheat on me with another woman.”
Arc’s eyes flew open wide. “Of course not, my flower!” He spread his arms out as if to show that he was unarmed, as if the gesture would convey that he meant her no harm. He never meant her any harm. “You are my mate! I’ve asked you to be my wife! I would never–” but he stopped himself short. James had been her mate, her fiancé , and at his hands she’d experienced the worst kind of torture. What did words matter when all she’d known had been pain and betrayal? He dropped his arms with a heavy exhale.
“Samantha, I could never betray you, my precious one.”
Her lower lip trembled, yet she held him with a look of such suspicion that made his entire chest ache.
“Tell me what you were doing on Earth,” she demanded, and for a moment his heart swelled with pride. The Samantha he’d met on the street could never have spoken to him with such conviction, but her distrust was directed at him.
He pressed his lips together. This was hardly the place to have this conversation. “Perhaps we should take this somewhere more private? Come with me to our bedchamber, and then I will tell you every–”
“No. Tell me now, Arc. I need to know the truth.” A single tear slipped past her lashes, and he was desperate to gather her in his arms and wipe it away. He swallowed hard.
“Very well. Then shall we sit?” He gestured to a nearby table.
“Stop stalling!” Sam cried, and her hands reflexively lifted as if to protect her face. Not him. Not him, she reminded herself. She took a shaking breath. “Please, Arc, just tell me? Please?”
Arc made to comfort her but she retreated yet again. Defeated and at a loss, he stood there dumbly as his mate sobbed, as if he’d hurt her.
As if he was James. This couldn’t wait another moment.
“Some months ago I caught wind of plot that didn’t sit right with me. A job from Earth looking for hunters to abduct a human female to be brought back to Earth.” This wasn’t how he wanted to be doing this. He wet his lips and continued. “I decided to investigate it. I met with a would-be hunter, and confirmed what I’d feared.” His yellow eyes bore into Sam’s as he spoke his next words. “You were the target, my flower.”
Sam’s breath hitched and her hands curled around her mouth. It took everything within him not to take a step closer.
“I began snuffing out the threats one by one until I confirmed what I already knew. The name of the contact.”
Sam’s face went pale, and she made several attempts to take a breath. “J-James?” She whispered. Arc nodded once. “Oh god.”
“I went to Earth to put a stop to it, and I did, Samantha. It’s over. He cannot harm you ever again.” This time when he approached Sam didn’t back away. Instead she was frozen, on the verge of another attack like the night he’d first brought her to the compound. He took her face in his hands and gazed into her eyes.
“Breathe, Samantha,” he murmured, and touched the tip of his nose to hers. She took a shallow breath and then another, each deeper than the last until she sagged in his hold. Wrapping her in his arms, he pressed her against his chest and threaded his fingers through her hair, grateful she allowed this contact.
“He’s…” her voice trailed away, small and fragile. Arc tightened his hold on her.
“Yes,” he whispered. She clutched him with claw-like fingers. He swayed her lightly side to side. “I will not go into details, but it is over.”
“Oh god, Arc, I don’t know what to think!” she sniffed against his chest. “I had no idea. I had no idea…”
“And that was on purpose, little terran,” he said with a kiss to her crown. “You’ve been through so much…I could not bear to add to your pain.”
Sam squeezed her eyes closed, tried to imagine what might have happened the moment her current fiance met her former. What if something terrible had happened to him? She’d never have known where he was, or what had happened to him.
“And you almost left without saying goodbye,” she choked out as a fresh wave of tears washed over his chest. He hesitated, then buried his face in her hair.
“I am here now, my precious flower,” he rumbled against her temple. “And I will never leave your side like that again.”
She sniffed loudly, and for a few moments she allowed herself to bask in his warmth, his safety, his scent. But it wasn’t long before Drakkal’s words began nagging at her from the back of her mind. That didn’t explain the other woman, a voice whispered to her, or what he meant by ‘the one who started it all.’ Carefully she disentangled herself from Arc’s embrace and put some distance between them. He regarded her questioningly.
“But that doesn’t explain what Drakkal said,” she said while wiping her eyes, and crossed her arms. “What woman were you with?”
Arc smiled sheepishly and rubbed the back of his head. “I’m going to have a word with Drakkal later,” he muttered to himself. “The woman is Abella, and she is mated to a zenturi called Tenthil.” He reached out to toy with a piece of her hair. Thankfully, she allowed it. “He was an assassin. A killer. They came to me some time ago for help and I, uh, did not make the finest impression with him.”
Sam’s eyes widened but he continued before she had a chance to speak. “I needed his help this time, and I went to their residence to ask for it. He ultimately agreed, and before I took my leave I spoke with Abella about terran traditions, namely weddings. That is all, my flower.”
Sam’s brows fell, but Arc had a feeling the suspicion she carried wasn’t nearly as deep as it had been before. “Didn’t make the best impression?”
Arc averted his lower eyes, keeping the center one on his mate. “Indeed.”
“Do I want to know?” she sighed and dropped her hands to her hips. Arc clenched his teeth and shifted awkwardly on his feet. How was it this female always shattered his carefully constructed guard?
“It was a while ago, my flower, before I ever met you–”
“You said you’d been looking through terran immigrants in the Consortium database,” Sam interrupted, and her eyes widened. “You have a thing for terrans!”
“I have a theory, if you’d afford me the time to explain myself,” he answered with a lopsided grin, and taking her hands he pulled her closer. She placed her palms flush against his chest as soon as he released them, and settled his own on her hips. “When I met Tenthil and Abella she elicited a strong reaction from me, a fascination that lingered far longer than any I’d entertained before.” Sam’s expression fell, but Arc continued.
“And if you asked Drakkal, he’ll say I obsessed. I prefer to think that it was the first spark of my connection to you. Through that fascination I looked for you in every terran face in the database until I found you, and the moment I did…” he brushed her hair behind one ear and took her jaw in one hand. “The moment I saw those eyes, your lips,” he brushed his thumb along her plump bottom lip, “and the moment I read your name I knew you were mine. I disagree with you, Samantha. I do not have a thing for terrans. I simply was looking for you all along.”
Sam threw her arms around his waist without warning. This time there were no tears. This time she held nothing back. She held him fiercely, and the moment she placed a searing kiss to the center of his chest he felt as if he might shatter on the spot.
“Thank you,” she whispered after a while, and lifted her head to gaze at him. “For everything.”
“You need not thank me, my flower,” he answered, and placed a tiny kiss to her lips. “I’d traverse the universe over and over again if it meant keeping you safe.”
“Before I left Earth I felt like no one believed me, or maybe they just didn’t want to acknowledge what was happening.” She glanced away. “It made me feel so alone, so small and stupid. No one else was making a big deal of anything, so why was I? But then it got so bad that I couldn’t ignore it and still…”
Arc’s mind flashed back to what he’d seen in that monster’s home. The holograms, the vile words and actions he’d committed against her, the place he’d meant to chain her…He closed his eyes and resisted the fury that threatened to overtake him.
“But you’ve given me justice,” Sam continued, and her voice broke through the darkness in his mind. He opened his eyes to find hers– bright and warm and wonderful– focused solely on him. He smoothed her hair back.
“It was the least I could do,” he insisted. “And someday when you are ready, I will tell you of the legacy I left for him.” Sam’s eyes widened with surprise, and he couldn’t help but smile. “For you, and for others who have been in your position.”
“Now you’ve made me curious,” she smiled. “But, later. I think I’ve heard enough for today.”
“I think you have,” Arc said with a kiss to her forehead. “If it’s alright with you, flower, I’d like to return to our bedchamber, if only to hold you.”
Sam’s smile was brilliant, and she didn’t offer so much as a word of protest when he gathered her in his arms and carried her toward the door.
“Though, I wouldn’t mind if we did more than cuddle,” she said shyly. Arc’s central eye dipped to meet hers.
“I’d hoped you would say that, Samantha,” he purred. “I hope you are rested. I’m nowhere near finished making up for my absence.”