Cerebus || Book 2

Chapter 5: Stress

Iris heard nothing but her own frantic breaths, her racing heartbeat and the crunching of leaves and forest duff beneath her feet.

Her brain knew that she wasn't capable of outrunning this alien, but her body refused to listen.

It was uncontrollable—a complete adrenaline response. And yet it drove her forward, kept her blood pumping and her muscles contracting with each elongated stride she took.

The girl didn't even know where she was going; the only thing she knew was that she couldn't stop. No, otherwise the very attractive, very naked man she left in the water would get her and she didn't know what would happen if he did.

"Iris, stop running."

The sudden intrusive baritone of the male's voice had her stumbling, her balance wavering as she braced against a tree momentarily. She'd forgotten that he could enter her mind like that, but she couldn't hide the fact that the feeling—the breath bating grip of his tone—didn't leave her legs shaky and her center moist with want and need.

"Get out of my head!" She yelled in no particular direction. She refused to be distracted from her one, and only mission.

In determination she pushed on; with wide-eyes and nearly laboured breathing, she continued moving blindly through the forest.

Although sheer-will wasn't enough to inhibit epinephrine from coursing through her veins and latching onto the delicate sinews of her muscles and pulling hard, causing them to contract and forcing her to lose her footing as she tripped over a hidden branch.

Her heart skipped a beat as déjà vu flashed across her mind; it reminded her that not too long ago she had found herself in this situation.

But this time, it was a different kind of beast that was after her.

"Just leave me alone!" Iris exclaimed, as she shakily tried to get back to her feet.

However, that process included being momentarily positioned on her hands and knees, and that drew a low guttural sound that seemed to come from right behind her.

"You say to leave you be, yet you offer yourself to me like this?"

Iris didn't even have time to react before a large, rough palm was on her bare back and slowly running along the curve of her spine. His touch seemed to act as a paralytic, preventing her from moving from her current position on the forest floor.

"Why do you taunt me?"

The girl's skin heated, both from her current position but also at the fact that she felt her body reacting to his words, proximity and touch.

Each syllable that passed his lips seemed to serve as an audible aphrodisiac and coaxed what she could only describe as a primal response from her erogenous zones:

Her nipples were as hard as stone, her pulse ran hot and thready and the sweet center at the apex of her thighs...

She didn't even want to think about the mess that was collecting down there.

Iris withheld a moan as his fingers ghosted over the dimples of her spine; they lingered there, almost as if he was admiring the feature, transfixed by the simplest details of the human anatomy.

"I-I'm not offering myself, now let me go! Why can't I move?"

The alien hesitated, but soon after lifted his fingers from her skin, causing the girl to collapse onto her stomach, not having realized that it wasn't her own strength that was supporting her weight.

"Your body is inviting me in, but your words say otherwise—why?"

While Niklaus seemed to hold himself together with an impressive amount of restraint, Iris' chest heaved up and down, dirt and grass tickling her nostrils from the violence of her breathing.