Love is Always Write Anthology Volume 5

he finally tensed again, staring at his human companion.
    Deshi pressed his fingers to his lips again. "Kiss."
    "Kiss." He knew that caress of lips to lips. He'd had female mates in the past. There had even been two males in his long history of protecting this forest. None of them, though, had been part of a poacher's party. Deshi had come with the humans who had intended to take the skins of his brethren. He shifted, frowning. "Killer. Came with killers of the cat," he said. "Kill the beautiful."
    Horror filled the boy's face. "No!" Deshi shook his head. "Killers bought me."
    He frowned, growled. Bought? What did bought mean? "Tell Kaanan."
    Deshi huffed. "Mother, Father, owed coin. They had no coin. They had me. Sold me to killers."
    Bartering he could understand. Debt owed and coin scarce. He remembered a distant winter when he'd gone into a village for supplies he'd been desperate for. He'd needed to give something in order to receive the supplies. What Deshi was saying, though, meant that the boy's own parents had used Deshi as the coin to fulfill the debt owed. What debt was so great that parents would barter their own child to killers? "What debt?"
    "Food."
    A child for food? "Food?"
    "Food. Village starving. Needed food. Traded food for me." Deshi tossed a stick into the fire. "Village had food then."
    Food for child. Probably with a promise that the child would be well taken care of. He growled. "Deshi worth more than food."
    Deshi flushed. "I am?"
    He nodded. "Yes. Deshi smart. Quick." He looked Deshi over, trying to see him with an eye for pleasure. "Pretty."
    "Pretty?" Deshi laughed, the sound pleased, amused. "Kaanan beautiful, Deshi pretty."
    "Yes," he declared.
    Deshi scooted closer to him again. "Kiss?"
    He held Deshi's gaze, considering. Kiss often led to mating. Did Deshi want to mate? Was that what this was? "Kiss. Rut?"
    "Rut?"
    Ah, a new word. He sought a different word, but he knew no other, and so he drew in the dirt by the fire. It was a crude, simple image, but to the point. "Rut."
    Deshi looked as if he'd spent too much time in the sun, his face was so red. The boy stared at picture, and then nodded once. "Kiss. Rut."
    He purred. It wouldn't be terrible, and he was fond of Deshi. The boy was important to him now. He nodded. "Yes."
    This time, when Deshi leaned close and sealed their lips together, he was prepared. It had been a very long time since he last kissed and rutted as a human, and even longer since he'd mated with another male, but he remembered well enough. Cupping Deshi's face with both hands, he pulled the boy closer and deepened the kiss, tasting the musky spice of him mixed with the jungle fruits that had been their morning meal. The flavor was a little strange, but appealing, and he purred when Deshi emitted a sound halfway between surprise and outright encouragement.
    What he had said before about Deshi had been true. Deshi was pretty for a human, and the sounds that kept coming from the boy as they continued to kiss were also pretty, not feminine by any means, but still submissive enough to send a distinct tingle through his body. He let one hand wander down Deshi's body, and when he encountered the cloth covering Deshi's groin, he tugged at it until it gave way. Deshi wasn't very large in his palm, but he was hard, and that was more than enough for Kaanan.
    With a needy growl, he picked Deshi up and, despite much unnecessary wiggling on Deshi's part, deposited him onto their makeshift bed. Deshi stared up at him with wide eyes, and he scented the slightest hint of fear amidst the human's potent arousal. He frowned. Why was there fear? He wasn't biting or clawing. To his mind, he was on his best behavior, so why did Deshi stare up at him like that? He chuffed when a thought occurred to him.
    "Wait," he told Deshi before grabbing one of the packs they had looted off the dead poachers. It took a little rummaging, but he purred triumphantly when he found the flask of oil he had remembered seeing. The humans used it to clean their weapons, but it didn't smell bad, so it would do.
    The boy was staring up at him with wide eyes, and lust mingled with fear in the air. Both made his body hungry for Deshi's, and he knelt between Deshi's legs once more. It was awkward, kissing while he oiled his fingers, but it seemed to ease the sense of worry in Deshi. If face to face and kissing were what the boy needed, he wasn't going to deny him. Within moments, he had wormed a finger inside