He had found that she knew how to undress him faster when he wore human clothes, but he left that out of his argument.
“Do you remember you taught me this one phrase… and you wouldn’t tell me what it meant, but you told me not to say it to anyone else?”
He looked away from the snowflake he was currently detailing with glue and glitter to look at Maggie instead. She was biting her lip, her blue eyes sparkling, and her cheeks were almost as pink as his. Ro straightened, slowly, so as not to spook her. He knew that expression. Slightly embarrassed, slightly aroused… She was feeling playful.
“Yes.”
“What did it mean?”
“Ah…” The Balin didn’t display any physical sign of embarrassment, which was good. “Nothing.”
Maggie smiled, sensing weakness. Her hands stilled on what she was doing, putting the scissors down. “Ro…”
“I don’t remember.”
“You do, it’s on your face.”
“It’s not, there’s nothing on my face.” Ro carefully schooled his scales into stiff blankness.
She poked his foot with the toe of her shoe. “Tell me.”
“It was nothing,” he insisted.
“Then maybe I’ll ask someone else.”
She clearly thought she had him, but she didn’t. There was no way. “Maggie, if you can remember it, go ahead.”
He watched her as she opened her mouth, her eyes flicking to the side as she tried to remember, then closed her mouth again.
“That’s what I thought,” he said, holding in a breath of relief.
She huffed. “I’ll get it out of you one day.”
No, she wouldn’t. He would take it to his grave that, when he was insecure and thinking he would never have her, he’d asked her to tell him anything as juvenile as “Your crest is the hottest I’ve ever seen.” He had that strange feeling of distance again. He’d said much filthier things to her now, after all.
He just rubbed the curve of his claw against her ankle and went back to his snowflake.
“You should teach me more,” she said.
“Why?” When they’d stopped needing an excuse to talk to each other, Maggie had stopped asking for Balin phrases from him. He wasn’t offended. This was her planet, it made sense for him to speak her language, and she didn’t know any Balin that she needed to talk to who didn’t speak English.
“Because I should know!”
He laughed lightly at her moral outrage on his behalf. “Why?”
“Because. It’s not fair that you have to speak English all the time when you’re Balin. It wouldn’t hurt me to learn a second language.” She shrugged. “Maybe I’d get a raise.”
“For that you’d need qualifications, and for that you’d need tests, and for those you need a class, with a real teacher.”
Maggie pouted. “You don’t want to teach me?”
Immediately, and perhaps predictably, he imagined her being taught by another Balin male, staring up at him adoringly as he wrote out the Balin alphabet, something Ro could do blindfolded with both hands tied behind his back. He imagined her coming home late, talking about how smart this other male was. He imagined making dinner for one and eating alone. He imagined her telling him she didn’t want his help, pushing him away.
No.
“I didn’t say that,” he grumbled, knowing full well he’d been played but powerless against it. It wasn’t the first time Maggie had exploited his jealousy. “Maybe you could do the tests online.”
“But you don’t think I should learn?”
He sighed and put the snowflake down, then held out his hand. He pulled her out of her chair, steering her down into his lap instead. He tucked his arms around her waist. “I don’t mind if you want to learn, but don’t do it for me. I don’t mind speaking English. Even if you could speak Balin, I don’t think I would prefer that to speaking English with you.”
“Why not?”
Ro thought about it. Why didn’t he want her learning Balin? Maybe because their language reflected the life they had led, and that life hadn’t been kind to him? Maybe because he was still afraid she would find something out about the Balin, or their life on Teiss, or what Balin society thought of Ro that would change how she felt about him? Maybe because the years he’d lived before he met her felt like his secret to keep? “I just… like it better. This is the life I have now. I want to live it, and… leave everything else behind. I don’t miss my life on Teiss, and… I don’t want it to follow me here. I escaped. I don’t want it in our home.”
Maggie lifted her hand to his cheek, her eyes soft. “Will you always feel that way though?”
Ro took her hand off his cheek and kissed it instead. “If one day I miss Teiss and my culture… I don’t think you speaking Balin will be the answer.” She could speak his language but it wouldn’t be the same. She wouldn’t understand his culture the way he did, and he preferred it that way. He needed her to treat him differently than a Balin would.
Maggie took a deep breath. “Would you rather I didn’t learn Balin?”
“I don’t want to make that decision for you.” He didn’t want to stifle or frustrate her.
“But if you did?”
Ro sighed. She was going to insist. “If I did… I would rather you learn a different language, yes.”
It wasn’t that he expected her to be angry, but still part of him waited for it. Instead she kissed his cheek. “Okay.”
He couldn’t help the corner of his mouth lifting in a self-deprecating smile as she did what he asked. Why? “Just like that?”
“I don’t want to make you unhappy. You have your reasons. You can teach me what you want me to know and if I want a second language for work, I’ll pick something else.” Her voice dropped to a whisper and she played with his claws, tangling their fingers together, avoiding his eyes. “I know what happened to you. I won’t push, or inflict this on you. I don’t need it to feel close to you.” She pressed her hand to his chest over his heart, dancing in a different rhythm than hers.
He was in awe of her. He didn’t deserve her. He squeezed her tighter with a low growl and pressed their lips together in a kiss. If she wanted to feel close to him – why, he had no idea – then he would make sure there wasn’t a breath between them. She opened to him as soon as their lips touched, and they spent a minute kissing in the middle of their office floor.
When they broke apart, Maggie offered him a shy smile, licking him off her lips. “Want to call it a night and go home?”
Ro grinned. It was earlier than Maggie normally quit with her decorations, but he wasn’t going to say no. They could do more over the weekend. She wanted to be alone with him, in their home.
“Let’s go.”
****
The following Friday, they had their regular double-date with Kez and Bia. The party was on Tuesday, the last day before DETI moved to holiday hours and skeleton staff, so Ro had wondered if Maggie would need the time to prepare, but it seemed she’d rather take the opportunity to try to convince Kez to attend. She’d told Ro that with him helping her, she was ahead of schedule anyway.
Unless there was something specific one of them wanted to do, they usually just went for a movie and then a late drink or snack to talk about it. It meant they saw a lot of movies, but Bia at least never got tired of it, and they didn’t want to put a dent in her enthusiasm.
In December, it was dark as they walked to the cinema. Maggie and Bia walked in front, arm in arm, while Ro and Kez followed like their personal security. It made Ro wonder just how much of this was supposed to be a date, and how much of it was an excuse to talk to other people. Maggie was always stressing the importance of his friendship with Kez, and spending time with other Balin. She said she didn’t want to limit him, whatever that meant. He wondered if she felt the same way about her friendship with Bia.
Now that none of them lived at the DETI dorms anymore, Maggie and Ro got the bus to a stop in the city where Kez could park his van. It w
as frustrating to wear his lenses at night as they made the rare patches of darkness almost impenetrable, but the artificial lights everywhere made them necessary.
Even with his colour vision muted though, when he saw Bia, he couldn’t help a “Wow.” He always thought he was used to her dress sense, but with a Balor’s natural flamboyancy and love of colour, she could still surprise him. Tonight she wore a neon yellow net dress over a cropped pink shirt and a green skirt, and woollen things on her lower legs that were covered in multi-coloured pompoms.
Kez clicked his tongue. “Don’t ‘wow’ at my mate,” he groused, batting Ro on the arm with the back of his hand before tucking it back into the sleeves of his robes. In contrast to Bia, ever since Kez had left DETI, he had taken to wearing Balor robes. He had always despised the human-styled clothes he had had to wear to the office, but traditional Balin dress was considered too indecent to wear in public. Being with Bia had made him more comfortable with his Balor heritage so, while he didn’t wear as many layers, or as many colours as the Balor, when he went outside he wore their robes.
Ro was more used to the robes than to Bia’s eclectic style, but he imagined to the humans they made quite an eye-catching pair.
Ro rolled his eyes, but Maggie jumped in before he could reply. “It’s a lovely outfit Bia.”
“Do you think so?” Bia said, grinning and tugging at the hem of the dress, twisting as if to show it off.
“I wish I could wear something like that.”
“Why can’t you?” Bia asked, frowning, her purple scales creasing between her blue eyes.
“Oh…” Maggie glanced at Ro and he couldn’t help a crooked smile. “I… don’t think I have the… colouring for it.”
Bia cocked her head, considering, but then she just hummed and snatched Maggie’s arm into hers so they could start walking. “You could always dye your hair. Lots of humans do that. I wish I could dye my hair but I don’t have any. You could get tattoos…”
Ro didn’t hear the rest, falling into step behind them with Kez a familiar presence beside him. “Are you coming to the office party?” he asked in Balin, keeping his voice low and private.
Kez sighed, almost a hiss, and rolled his eyes as if the topic was a great inconvenience to him. “Bia wants me to.”
“Maggie wants you to.”
Kez snorted. “Why does your mate care?”
“She wants you to socialise more, I think. She believes your colleagues want to see you again.”
“Doubtful.”
“Still. She wants you to be happy.”
“I am happy,” Kez said, and Ro caught how his eyes fell on Bia’s back.
“So will you go?”
Kez groaned and rolled his neck, as if the pressure was a physical thing.
“If Bia wants you to, I think we both know you will end up doing it, so you might as well give up now,” Ro teased, enjoying this after all the shit Kez had given him over Maggie.
“Can’t we pretend I am still in charge of my own fate?” he grumbled. “Besides, you just want to tell your mate you changed my mind and take the credit so she will be pleased with you.”
Ro laughed. Kez might have had a point. “So what? Why be difficult if you can make all three of us happy?”
“It won’t make me happy,” he complained, but Ro knew Kez knew he had lost. Kez stretched his neck again, as if he was uncomfortable in his scales or trying to escape. “The truth is…” he murmured. “We’re scheduled for a heat soon. I don’t want Bia to be disappointed if she can’t go. I don’t want her to get so attached to the idea that she tries to go when it’s not safe. I hate the thought of her at that party and- Well. You know how it is. She’s asking me to tolerate all those males around her when- when she should be at home. But you know what she’s like. She tries to be so human sometimes. She doesn’t want her heat to stop her from going.”
Ro grunted in acknowledgement, glancing over at Bia. That did change things. If Bia’s heat came before the party… It was understandable that Kez was trying to keep her from getting her hopes up. It was natural that he would be possessive of her so close to their heat.
“I understand. That’s a shame, but it can’t be helped.” He elbowed Kez to lighten the mood. “You’ll just have to make sure she has a better time with you.”
Kez tried to scowl in disapproval, but it didn’t work, his face splitting in a wolfish grin. “Of course,” he replied, and Ro returned his cocky grin. For a moment, it felt something like a promise between them, a deal made and sealed. Unlike a year ago, they both knew now what it was to share a heat with a mate, and have her moaning and satisfied under them. It was a very male and very Teissian feeling. Maybe Maggie was right about him spending time with his own kind, or maybe he and Kez were better friends that he thought.
Kez looked away, checking on Bia ahead of them, and a softer look came into his eyes. “How did this happen?” he mused, and Ro knew what he meant. A little more than a year ago, they had both been certain they would never have mates. Ro had yearned for one, but he had been sure he would be rejected. Kez, on the other hand, had vowed he neither needed nor wanted a female in his life. He had been too afraid of fathering a child whose life would be no better than his. Ro assumed, since Bia was not pregnant after almost a year together, that they weren’t in any hurry, but he’d never asked. Maybe he would one day, if he got Kez alone.
“I don’t know…” Ro replied, his eyes naturally falling on Maggie. “It’s a new world, things are different here.” Love had taken them both by surprise.
“That they are.”
They let a comfortable silence fall for a moment as they both got lost in thought, reminded of everything they had left behind, and everything they had gained.
Kez roused himself with another roll of his shoulders. “So what movie are we seeing this time?”
“Maggie said it was romantic?”
Kez groaned, but then he added, “Bia will enjoy it at least.”
Ahead of them, Maggie and Bia stopped walking and looked back at their mates, waiting for the males to catch up.
“Did I hear my name?” Maggie said, reaching for Ro’s hand.
“And mine?” Bia added.
“No,” Kez said, just as Ro said “Yes.”
Maggie raised an eyebrow, and Ro pulled her into his side. Beside him, Kez sighed.
“We were just talking about the movie. I said you said it was romantic-”
“And I said you would enjoy it,” Kez said to Bia. “That’s all.”
“Then why did you lie?” Bia pressed.
Kez shrugged. “It wasn’t important.”
“You’re so naughty!” Bia chastened, giving Kez a poke in the chest with a painted claw. She wasn’t really angry, because her other hand smoothed up the back of Kez’s neck to scratch at the base of his crest, making his eyes droop and a lazy smile come to his face.
Ro looked away from the intimate moment, decidedly averse to seeing his best friend like that, and he caught Maggie’s eye. They exchanged a look, and fought back laughs.
“Come on. I want to get popcorn,” she said, offering Ro an escape and pulling him ahead, leaving Kez and Bia to it.
As Ro pulled her back against him, she giggled, and he murmured “Thank you,” into her hair.
“No problem,” she whispered, rubbing his chest with the back of her hand, content to walk the rest of the way under his arm.
3
On the day of the party, Ro had to dig to the bottom of his clothes to find the Christmas sweater Maggie gave him the year before, but he was glad he did. He wanted to dress for the occasion. The wool caught on his claws, and it was too short in the sleeves and waist, but it went a small way to making him feel like he belonged. He pushed the sleeves up to his elbows as he had the year before, and checked how it looked in the mirror. The black was a perfect match for his scales, and the printed “Ho Ho Ho” was subtle, but it rhymed with his name and he liked that.
When he came out
of the basement, Maggie leant backwards to see him through the kitchen doorway, crooning appreciatively. She was dressed normally, but she was wearing more make-up than usual and her hair was styled and pinned up. She had her red dress, shoes, and hat in a bag by the door.
“Did I ever tell you how much I like that sweater on you?” she purred as he walked over to wrap his arms around her.
“You can tell me again,” he said, dropping his voice as he spoke into her ear and watching goosebumps ripple over the back of her neck.
Her hands were wet with bubbles from washing up the pan he had left for her today, and she shook them off before running the tips of her fingers along his shoulder. “It does wonders for your shoulders, and I’ve always been a sucker for a good pair of forearms.”
Ro rested his chin on the top of her head, careful not to disturb the clip. “Humans are so strange.”
“Whatever, buddy. Don’t knock it when you’re the one benefitting from it.”
“I’m not.” He bent to press a kiss to her neck so as not to smudge her make-up and went to find his wallet and Gadjit. She joined him by the front door, checking they had everything they needed, then headed out together. He took her hand as they walked to the bus stop.
Maggie, and Ro as her helper, were allowed to stop working at four to go and set up the party. She went to change in the bathrooms while Ro went to find the Estates team to get the catering tables and step-ladder. Maggie had done this so many times that the two of them together made short work of it, and they had everything in place and the music playing softly ten minutes before people were due to start arriving.
It felt like a rare stolen moment alone for them, and Ro caught Maggie by the hand as she crossed the dance floor to pull her against him.
“I love this dress,” he murmured into her hair. It was the same one she’d worn the year before. It had been their first kiss. “You’re so beautiful.”
An Office Alien Christmas Collection (Office Aliens Book 5) Page 3