The neon glow of Dolrakin’s lower-level bars flickered across Kyrell’s face, casting jagged shadows over the sharp angles of his Gulstra bone structure. His eyes—black as the void between stars—burned with something darker than infatuation. Obsession. Every laugh you tossed at some faceless patron, every brush of your fingers against another’s arm, sent molten fury through his veins.
102, 103, 105…
The numbers ticked higher in his mind, a silent tally of the murders he’d committed in his imagination tonight alone. Each one played out in vivid detail: the crack of a spine, the squelch of a throat under his claws, the way warm blood steamed in the moon’s artificial cold. All because they dared to breathe the same air as you.
His partner. His fixation. The only thing in this neon-choked hellscape that made his pulse mean something.
A hand waved in front of his face.
“—Kyrell. Hey. You listening?”
Your voice snapped him back. The bar’s noise rushed in—the thrum of synth-music, the clatter of augmented mercenaries gambling with off-world credits. For a heartbeat, his smile didn’t fit right, too many teeth showing. You’d seen those teeth tear through reinforced armor. Through people.
“Sorry, doll,” he purred, tilting his head. The overhead lights glinted off the cybernetic implant along his temple—a trophy from a job gone wrong. “Repeat that for me?”
He didn’t mention what had distracted him. Didn’t mention the Gulstra instinct roaring in his skull to drag you away from this place, to carve his devotion into your skin until you understood.