She nodded, her cheek against his warm, hard chest.
“Okay. So, right now you can’t tell what I am thinking?” she asked one more time.
He shook his head, planting a kiss on the top of hers. “I can feel your feelings, but the bond is still too new.”
Her stomach growled. “Are you hungry?” She couldn’t remember the last time she’d actually eaten. Her girlish figure would not keep itself up. She laughed to herself at that ridiculous thought. She also felt her face flush as she reveled in the fact that even though she wasn’t the skinniest Deo found her sexy and that made her love her body.
Lifting her leg over him, she climbed off of him. He grabbed at her. “I did not tell you to leave, mate,” he said, with a teasing tone.
She slapped at his hand. “No. I need some food. Aren’t you hungry?”
“Would this make you happy? If I ate?”
She nodded.
“Then I am as well. Shall I help you get food?”
Aisha felt her face heat as she moved off of him. Her legs a bit wobbly.
“No. I’d like to go get it and bring it back to you. Maybe you could put some pants on while I’m gone?”
He smirked. “And why would I do that?”
Shrugging, she took her own advice and grabbed a t-shirt out of a draw. “Because if you stay like that, I don’t think we are getting much eating done.”
Deo looked around the room. “I can put that odd small blanket on. I did not bring pants when I brought you home in your haste to leave.”
Blowing out a breath, she cocked her head. “Fine. Towel it is. Not that it’s going to hide much.”
She squealed as he reached for her again.
“Nope.” And she ran for the door. A manly chuckle, the only thing she heard as she finally got to the hall.
As she walked down the stairs to the kitchen, her previous worries and needs surfaced. She needed to bring up the chip thing, or rather the future of her work. Maybe it wasn’t her sole drive anymore, but what if she could still give back to humanity? Someday?
A lightness in her chest gave way to new clarity. She did need to clear up a few things before she packed up her house, because that almost seemed inevitable.
The creepy guy from her office filtered past her contentment. She really needed to talk to Deo about him. Was that chip his? Did Deo really steal it from a creepy guy who gave off some dangerous vibes?
Aisha hit the last step and suddenly felt woozy. That was strange. Gripping the banister, she held herself up.
A booming voice from her room called out. “Aisha?”
Her lips moved as she meant to say something, but they seemed numb as her legs crumpled under her.
“Aisha?” called the voice. Deo. It was Deo.
His shadow eclipsed the sun streaming into the hall from her door. She needed to answer. Something was wrong, and she didn’t know what.
Was she having a heart attack? That would be just fitting. Find your soulmate and then die. No, that wasn’t it though.
Another shadow loomed over her and all she heard was a growl coming from above her. Her head swam, the sounds filtering in but as if they were miles away rather than in the same room as her.
Leaning her head against the banister, Aisha struggled to keep it up. A shadow on the floor stretched out as a figure came closer from behind. It was too tall and skeletal to be Deo and should have made her squirm, move away, only her limbs wouldn’t respond. After a lot of effort, she could get her head to loll back to see what was happening, until it became too heavy and fell back.
The figure stepped back as something large flew by her. A growl that should have been deafening echoed through the house, but she was too tired. Her head too heavy to see what or who it was.
“Dragon shifter, you are much stronger than we thought. Always stronger. But this time I didn’t underestimate you.”
She couldn’t close her eyes, if she did, she knew that it would all be over and not in a good way. Rolling her head against the wood, she finally saw him. The shadowy figure. It was the creepy man from earlier.
Her eyes began to blur, and she blinked several times. The shadow guy moved further and further away until he was hard to make out. A larger blur, one that she was sure was Deo before he came into focus, stopped next to her. She wanted to cheer him on, only either he was going slower and slower or the world was moving in slow motion.
“I suggest you give into the sleep demons before they overtake your girlfriend here. Would be a pity to waste such a brilliant mind.”
Aisha listened again as her body slumped further to the floor.
“No,” growled Deo as she watched his form strain. A knee hitting the floor.
“Yes, perhaps she will be of use later. It is a pity she seems to be attached to you, alien.”
That voice was creepy man’s and it sent chills up her spine, even weak and nearly out of it.
Aisha tried to raise her lead weight of an arm and scratch at him, or at least point a very strategic finger to tell him to fuck off. Neither happened, though.
“Yes. Too bad. Perhaps she will see reason, though. Dragon shifter, we’ve offered her a very handsome sum for you.”
This voice wasn’t one she knew though, and it had the power to make her want to run. She wouldn’t have, even if she could though. Not while Deo was in danger.
Deo might have said something, she wasn’t sure. A static grew around her. Her eyes were so heavy.
She wanted to tell Deo to run, to get away from them. She wanted to tell him that they had offered her money for him, but she’d never have sold him out. But the conversation was in her head. She
