Sylvan sighed when he saw her coming down the sidewalk to the HKR building. It was one of the women who had been with Olivia earlier at the claiming ceremony—her sibling, no doubt. The resemblance in their delicate facial features was unmistakable even though the woman coming toward him had long, silky brown hair and beautiful green eyes instead of Olivia’s blonde hair and grey eyes. Despite his vow never to take a bride himself, he couldn’t help wanting to make a good impression on her, if only because she was so close to the bride of his kin.
She had changed from the loose, shapeless clothes she’d had on earlier and was wearing a dark red top and the tight fitting dark blue pants the human women in this part of the world seemed to favor. The fabric of her outfit clung lovingly to her full hips and breasts, making the double set of fangs in Sylvan’s mouth ache and his shaft grow hard. It was a perfectly ridiculous response to a woman he had no interest in or any intention of mating and Sylvan knew it. Stop it, he scolded himself. She’s the sister of Baird’s bride and nothing more. Besides, you don’t even like human women.
It was true that he’d never had an interest in the tiny, fragile female creatures that made up half the sentient life on this planet. Mostly because they were completely unlike the glacial women of Tranq Prime with their pure white hair and eyes so pale they were almost colorless. Sylvan could still remember Feenah looking at him with those beautiful clear eyes like the finest crystal. Looking at him and saying, I’m sorry, Sylvan. It can never be…
Sylvan shook off the painful memory and turned his attention back to Olivia’s sister noting that she was nothing like the tall, pale beauties that had always drawn his eye. She was all lush curves and her rich chestnut brown hair was much darker than the hair of the Tranq Prime females. Not to mention the fact that she was so tiny the top of her head would barely come up to his chin. At the moment she was struggling to get through the glass door with an enormous brown cardboard box in her arms and the exertion had turned her cheeks a rosy pink that was most becoming with her large green eyes.
She appeared to be having trouble so Sylvan ran to help her. “Here, let me,” he said, trying to take the box from her small hands.
“Oh, thanks. I—” She looked up and her eyes hardened. “Oh, it’s you.” Wrenching the box away from him, she banged through the door herself and shoved past him to enter the building.
Wonderful—she was still mad at him. Sylvan had no idea what he had done to earn her enmity but for whatever reason it seemed like Olivia’s beautiful sister really hated him. “Yes, it’s me,” he said, following her as she marched up to the front desk. “My name is Sylvan, by the way, I’m Baird’s half brother. And Olivia mentioned your name but I seem to have forgotten it.”
“Isn’t that a shame.” She nodded at the human behind the counter as she placed the massive cardboard box on the desk. “This needs to get to my sister, Olivia Waterhouse, immediately. She was abducted, uh, claimed by a Kindred warrior earlier today.”
“Yes, Ma’am.” The human attendant nodded. “You’ll need to give it to the Kindred representative who came to pick it up.”
“Kindred representative?” Olivia’s sister frowned as Sylvan cleared his throat behind her.
“That would be me.”
“You?” She whirled to face him. “What do you have to do with it?”
Sylvan frowned. “Olivia wanted her things. I volunteered to come get them for her so Baird wouldn’t have to. They need to spend time alone together right now—every minute he has with her is precious.”
“Oh right. So he can seduce her and convince her to bond with him.” She shot him an icy glare and picked up the box again. “Fine. I guess you can take the box to her. She ought to have plenty of time to go through it since I know for a fact she has no interest in spending the rest of her life on an alien ship with a complete stranger.”
Sylvan smiled, deliberately showing her his fangs. “I think I can promise you with absolute certainty that they won’t be strangers for long.”
Her large eyes filled with doubt for a moment and then she lifted her chin. “You’re lying. Liv wouldn’t give in that easily. She knows how much I need her here.”
Sylvan frowned at her absolute certainty. “Did you ever consider the idea that maybe Baird needs her too?”
“Oh, right,” she scoffed. “He really needs her to scratch his itch. Why can’t he just find a…a hooker somewhere to take the edge off instead of bothering Liv?” Her cheeks were pink again, whether from anger or embarrassment, Sylvan couldn’t tell.