Close Obsession by Anna Zaires

keep my word?”
    Mia took a deep breath, trying to control herself. It probably wasn’t the wisest move on her part, arguing with him like that in her circumstances, but she couldn’t help it. Some reckless demon inside her had awoken and wouldn’t be denied. “You’ve lied to me before,” she said, unable to hide the resentment in her voice.
    “Oh really?” he said, his words practically dripping with sarcasm. “ I lied to you?”
    Mia swallowed again. “You manipulated me into doing exactly what you wanted,” she said stubbornly. “I didn’t want any part of it – all I wanted was to be left alone . . .”
    He regarded her with an inscrutable expression on his face. “And do you still?” he asked softly. “Want to be left alone?”
    Mia stared at him, caught completely by surprise. Her mouth opened, but no words came out.
    “And don’t lie to me, Mia,” he added quietly. “I always know when you’re lying.”
    Mia blinked furiously, trying to hold back a sudden rush of tears. With that one simple question, he had stripped her bare, laid out all of her vulnerabilities for him to exploit. She didn’t want him to know the depth of her feelings for him, didn’t want her emotions exposed for him to toy with. What kind of an idiot was she, to want to be with someone like him? To hate and love him so intensely at the same time?
    His lips curved into a half-smile. “I see.” Leaning toward her, he kissed her on the mouth softly, his lips strangely gentle on hers.
    “I’ll see what I can do about getting you an internship,” he said, pulling away from her and getting up. “And I’ll introduce you to some other human girls in this Center – maybe you’ll meet some new friends.”
    And as Mia looked at him in shock, he smiled at her again and went into his office, leaving her to digest everything that had just happened.
     

Chapter 7
     
    Three hours later, Mia was lying on the bed, completely absorbed in the story of the early evolution of the Krinar, when Korum walked into the bedroom.
    “We’re going to dinner in twenty minutes,” he told her, “so you might want to get ready.”
    Startled, Mia looked up at him. “To dinner where?”
    “Arman is an acquaintance of mine,” Korum explained, sitting down on the bed next to her and placing his hand on her leg. “He invited us over to his house when I told him about you. He also has a charl, a Costa Rican girl who’s been with him for a couple of years now. She’s very eager to meet you.”
    Mia grinned, suddenly very excited. “Oh, I’d love to meet her as well!” She couldn’t wait to talk to another girl in her situation and learn about Ks from the perspective of a human who also knew them intimately – and much longer.
    Korum smiled back. “I figured you would. How’s your reading going so far?”
    “It’s fascinating,” she told him earnestly. “I had no idea you had also evolved from an ape-like species.”
    He nodded. “We did. There were many parallels in our evolution and yours, except there ultimately ended up being two different species on Krina: us and the lonar – that’s the primates I told you about before. We were bigger, stronger, faster, longer-lived, and much more intelligent than the lonar, but we were tied to them because we needed their blood to survive.”
    Mia stared at him. She’d just learned all that as well, and she couldn’t get the images of the early Krinar out of her head. The book had gone into some very vivid descriptions of how the ancient Ks had hunted their prey, with each male Krinar staking out his territory around a small group of the lonar and fighting off the other Ks to preserve the blood supply for himself and his mate. Once inside a K’s “territory,” the lonar had very little chance of survival, as they would be constantly weakened by material blood loss and traumatized by the experience of being preyed upon. Ultimately, their numbers had dwindled, and the Krinar were forced