by Cara Bristol
“I mean Earth.”
“Earth? As in go back to Dakon? Why?”
“I may not have a choice.”
“What are you talking about?” I frowned, confused.
“Would you care for a drink?” A waiter peered at us. “Champagne?”
I looked at Darak. “Have you had champagne before? Do you want to try it?”
“Sure. All right,” he said without much enthusiasm.
“Two, please.”
The waiter handed us two goblets. Darak took a sip. His eyes widened, and then his face broke into a genuine smile. “It’s bubbly. I like it.”
“Wait until you try it with chocolate.” The world was such a big, amazing diverse place. There were so many things I wanted to introduce him to, and now he was talking about going back to Dakon? Why? Last night, we’d taken our relationship to the next level. I’d thought things were going so well. Had I read too much into it? Maybe it had been amazing only for me—he could have been thinking, oh crap, what did I get myself into? His behavior seemed aloof, distracted. After witnessing my sister jilting Phillip at the altar, he probably realized what a dysfunctional wreck my family and I were. Who could blame him for getting out while the gettin’ was good?
But…wait. Hold the crazy train. Hadn’t he asked if I would go with him if he left? That didn’t sound like he was leaving me…
Darak clasped my hand in his. His warm touch calmed my jangling nerves. “I need to ask you something. It’s not my intention to rush you, but I may not have much time.” He peered into my eyes. “Lexi, will you be my mat—”
The guests whistled and clapped as my sister breezed into the tent. The fact that so many people cheered caused me to wonder how many of them had liked Phillip. Did they see the situation like I did—she’d escaped a fate worse than death?
She’d changed from her wedding gown into a floral turquoise sundress she’d planned to wear when she left on her honeymoon. She and Phillip had rented a private Caribbean island. I’m guessing the honeymoon was off, too. Or maybe Phillip had gone there alone. He’d cleared out after the heave-ho. Or maybe he’d scheduled a business meeting for the afternoon. I couldn’t believe his nerve—talking on the phone right up until Toni had started down the aisle. Yeah, she’d had a close call all right.
Toni grinned and curtsied then strode to the stage and took the mike. “Well. Perhaps the only thing more awkward than jilting your fiancé at the altar is showing up to work with him on Monday morning.”
The audience laughed; I winced. Working with Phillip would be hard.
My mother and father entered the tent and took their seats at our table. Dad winked at me and Darak, but Mother had apparently been stricken blind since leaving my sister because she acted as if she didn’t even see us. Fine. With the silent treatment, you got to skip being sliced and diced by her sharp tongue.
Darak released my hand to frown at a waiter in an ill-fitting uniform bent over a butler’s tray.
“I feel like I owe you an explanation for why I did what I did,” my sister said, capturing my full attention. The question had been burning in my mind. I’d intended to ask her when I’d gone to see her, but then Mamazilla had descended and ended any chance for a heart-to-heart. “As I told Phillip, I came to the realization we were marrying for the wrong reasons.
“I care for Phillip, but I don’t love him—and he doesn’t love me. When I joined the firm, he and I developed a cordial, smooth, functional professional relationship, which became a cordial, smooth, functional personal relationship. Pleasant but unemotional. I desire more out of marriage than a cordial, smooth, functional merger.” She gestured at me. “I want what my sister has.”
Every head turned.
My face burned under the spotlight. Throughout childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood, my sister and I had lived parallel lives. She had done her thing; I had done mine. Now, she chose to envy and emulate me?
“You want an alien?” someone piped up, and everyone laughed.
“Maybe,” she said when the laughter subsided. My mother was making choking noises. On the positive side, my presence probably wouldn’t be required at any more family events.
“I want a man who will inspire me to howl at the moon, to laugh with, dance naked with, sing with…”
Oh, sugar factory, she’d seen us. Or heard us. How many others had? If I’d been closer to the pool now, I would have thrown myself into it.
In a whisper, my father was asking my mother if she was all right. I exhaled through my mouth.
“And, who will do those things with me. I want to be crazy in love the way my sister and Darak are.” My sister snagged a glass of champagne from a passing waiter and raised it. “I would like to toast my sister, Lexi, for living life on her terms and inspiring me to do the same.”
Yep, I had a lifetime exemption from any and all future get-togethers.
“To Lexi!”
“Here, here!”
Glasses clinked.
Growling, Darak sprang out of his seat and tackled the waiter in the ill-fitting uniform who’d been handed a tray of champagne to pass around.
Guests screamed. Toni screamed. I screamed. There wasn’t any ice cream, only broken glass, spilled champagne, and Darak grabbing the gasping waiter in a headlock. “Darak! Stop! What are you doing?” I cried.
“Security! Security!” my mother yelled. Rent-a-cops in waiter uniforms were already rushing over. It took three men to pull Darak off the server, more disheveled after he’d been wrestled to the ground. He rubbed at his neck, his fingers moving over a dragon tattoo!
“That’s him! That’s Hoodie!” I cried. “That’s the man who mugged us. He stole my wallet!”
“He robbed Lexi!” Darak growled and tried to lunge at him again, but the men held on.
“I don’t know what she’s talking about.” Hoodie flexed his shoulders. “I’ve never seen either of them before—before tonight, I mean.”
The three security guys looked at each other.
“Let Darak go!” I ordered them.
“Absolutely not.” My mother stepped forward. “Remove the alien from the premises.” She looked at me. “I’ve had enough of this nonsense, Alexandra. I’ll be contacting Immigration and the Intergalactic Dating Agency to have him deported to his home planet.”
“No, you can’t do that!”
“Mother, no!” Toni cried, lending her support.
Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted Hoodie backing away, trying to melt into the crowd, but I had bigger problems to focus on.
Mother flicked her wrist. “Take him away.”
I leaped in front of Security, barring the path. “If Darak goes, I go, too. If he’s ejected from the house, I’m leaving with him.” I glared at my mother. “If you send him back to Dakon, that’s where I’ll be.”
The relief in Darak’s eyes melted my heart. “I didn’t know if you’d go with me,” he said.
“Of course, I’ll go with you.”
“Nobody’s going anywhere,” my father said. He motioned Security, calling their attention to a retreating Hoodie. “Except him. You’d better grab him quick.”
Two other security dudes in waiter outfits nabbed Hoodie. The mugger, security—was anybody here actually a waiter?
“Release Darak,” my father said.
“Blake, you have no right to countermand my order,” my mother said.
“Yes, I do.” He fixed a commanding stare on the men holding Darak. “Let him go,” Dad said in a quiet voice. Did I mention my father had been a full-bird colonel in the military?
They released him, and I ran to Darak’s side and wrapped my arms around his waist. We clung to each other. “Thank you, Dad,” I said.
“You will not contact Immigration or the dating agency,” my father told my mother. “You’re going to leave Darak and Lexi alone to live their lives together if that’s what they choose.”
“You can
’t stop me,” she replied, but her voice faltered.
“I can.” My sister stepped forward. “I’ll file an injunction on Darak’s behalf. Do you really want the negative publicity when your attorney daughter goes against you in court?”
My mother stiffened her spine, lifted her chin, donned her mask, and left the tent.
My father motioned to the rent-a-cops. “Call the police and have them take that man into custody.”
“Ask for Sgt. Jenkins,” I said. “She’s familiar with our case.”
He addressed Darak. “I apologize for my wife’s actions. I promise you there won’t be any more incidents.”
“You don’t need to worry about being deported,” my sister added.
“No, you don’t,” Dad said.
“Thank you,” I said.
My father wagged his finger at me. “And you, Alexandra—”
I braced for a scolding. He never called me Alexandra unless he was going to lecture me.
“Why didn’t you tell me you’d been mugged?”
“It happened last week. And with the wedding and all…” I screwed up my face. “Sorry.”
My sister engaged the gawking guests. “Is this the most fun you’ve had at a wedding or what?” she said.
They laughed and applauded. Damn, she was good.
I flung my arms around her. “I love you so much.”
“I love you, too, sis.”
I hugged my father. “Love you, Dad.”
“Love you, too, sweetheart.”
I returned to Darak, and hugged him. Peering up at him, I sought his gaze and hoped he could read the promise in my eyes. I had words to say to him, too, but I wanted it to be personal, and private, and not entertainment for the un-wedding guests.
My mother never came back to the reception. Sgt. Jenkins and Studmore arrived and arrested Hoodie, who’d confessed he’d found the folded wedding invitation in my wallet, recognized the address as a swanky one, and decided to crash the wedding to see what he could steal. After they carted him away, dinner was served. It turned out there were some real waiters. After my sister cut her unwedding cake, the band began to play, I put in a request, and Darak and I waltzed to “Moon River.”
Chapter Ten
Darak
We’d no sooner entered the green bedroom than Lexi jabbed me hard in the shoulder. “How could you doubt I would go with you to Dakon?”
I rubbed my shoulder. “We’d never discussed that scenario.” Until Mrs. Sutterman’s threat, the possibility of having to leave Earth had never occurred to me. “You would have had to give up everything: your family, your friends, your bakery, your planet.”
“I’d have you.”
Her vehement words and soft expression reassured me, but I was still nervous. I tugged at the constricting collar of my tunic.
“Here, take that off.” Lexi untied the sash and pulled it off then undid the top two fastenings of the tunic. I shouldn’t be nervous. Just say it!
“That’s better. Thank you,” I said.
She undid the next fastening. “Let’s remove the rest.” Her suggestive smile caused my horns to throb, but I couldn’t allow distractions. I had things I needed to say. The Intergalactic Dating Agency assimilation class had advised us to “go slow,” and “give it time.” However, they hadn’t spelled out how slow or how much time.
She had my tunic unfastened to my waist. I grabbed her hands, and grappled for the right words.
“What’s wrong?” She peered up at me.
My heart thudded. “Will you be my mate?”
“Yes.”
“You will?”
“I will. That’s what you were going to ask me at the reception before you tackled Hoodie, wasn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“I’d hoped that’s what it was.” Her grin filled me with light and made my head reel.
When I counted the days since we’d met, it did not add up to much time, but when I consulted my heart, I felt like I’d been with her forever. One more important question remained. I’d sought advice from her brother and sister. He said to “wait a while.” She had suggested I “go for it.”
Lexi and I came from different planets, two diverse cultures with unique ways.
“Will you marry me?” I asked.
“Yes! Yes!” She flung herself into my arms and pressed her lips to mine. I held her against me, breathing in her scent, relaxing into trust, the last vestiges of tension and uncertainty dissipating. I had claimed my mate, and we would be together until the end of our days.
Lexi pulled some metal pins from her hair and shook her head until the strands cascaded over her shoulders and flew wild around her face. My horns throbbed, transmitting tingles clear down to my loins. I cupped her cheeks and leaned in for another deep kiss.
She pulled my tunic from my leggings and splayed her palms on my chest. I captured her hand and placed it over my heart so she could feel it beating for her. Ardor and happiness gleamed in her eyes, an emotion probably radiating from my own as well.
Without speaking, we began to disrobe. I had to help her out of her dress, which fastened up the back with a slider similar to the one on the front of my leggings. Once naked, we tumbled onto the bed, not bothering to kick off the coverings.
Now that she was mine, I wanted to know her again, to recommit to memory the tactile sensation of her flesh, her whimpers of pleasure, the scent of her desire. I stroked her smooth skin, kissing her throat and shoulders before anointing the hard tips of her breasts by sucking on the buds.
She combed her fingers through my hair, teasing my horns with the lightest touch. They throbbed and swelled. When she rubbed her palms against them, a groan of pleasure erupted from my throat.
“You have the cutest damn horns,” she said. “I love how you growl.”
If she kept playing with them, she’d get more than a growl. I pressed a hard kiss to her mouth before breaking away to continue my exploratory caresses. She moaned when I laved her breasts, giggled when I brushed my lips over her tummy, and sucked in a deep breath when I pleasured her between her legs. I wanted to bring her to the peak, but she twisted away and then took my manhood into her wet mouth.
Obah. I fisted the bed covers, the ache of desire spiking to a sharp need. My hips bucked, my body seeking surcease. I grabbed her head, tangled my hands in her hair. My breath came in harsh gasps as hot satisfaction coiled and tightened in my loins. Did she feel this way when I teased her?
She peered at me, the mischief in her gaze revealing her awareness—and enjoyment—of my torment. The lascivious glint in her eyes, the sight of her fondling my manhood threatened to undermine my control. I wanted her body clasping mine when I attained the ultimate ecstasy.
“Now,” I said. “I need you now.”
She scooted toward the pillows, but I flipped her around and lifted her legs onto my shoulders. I paused for an intimate caress to reignite her desire, nudge her closer to the brink of ecstasy. Her back arched, and whimpers tumbled from her lips.
Urgency pounding within me, I guided my erection to her entrance. I hissed as our bodies joined, the clasp of her wet silken channel so much better than I imagined. She matched my swivel and plunge with a thrust and grind. Together, we moved in an intimate dance guided by the music of our moans and whispers. Our bodies recognized what our hearts had decided: we were mates. Husband and wife. The name, the ceremony didn’t matter. Wherever we would go, wherever we would live, we would be together.
Neck arching, her channel contracting around my member, Lexi found completion with a piercing cry. Then I surrendered to my needs, allowing oblivion to claim me in an intense rush of sensation. I thrust into her as if uniting with her were the only thing that mattered. In that moment, it was.
The peaks of physical pleasure satisfied my body, but the intimacy of the aftermath gratified my spirit. Her sigh of contentment resonated deep within my chest.
I smoothed th
e damp hair off her face and stroked her cheek with the back of my finger. “I never believed I would be this happy.”
“Me, either.” She kissed my shoulder. “I joined the Intergalactic Dating Agency for all the wrong reasons, but I got the best results.”
“The Fates see what we cannot.”
“And a seventy-two-point personality assessment doesn’t hurt, either,” she said.
I didn’t argue. Over time, she would come to recognize the effects of the Fates swirling around us. For now, I had more immediate matters to discuss. “Will you want a mating ceremony like your sister had?”
“Well, not just like hers. I intend the ending to be different.” She laughed.
“Toni and Phillip were not true mates. He would not have walked away if they were.”
“And she would not have left him at the altar.” She thumped my arm. “You’re stuck with me, buddy.”
“I desire very much to be stuck with you.” I kissed her.
She settled back against my shoulder and sighed. “Getting back to your question, I’m not interested in a big fancy wedding like Toni’s. I darn sure don’t want to have it here. I envision a simple, memorable ceremony. A few family and friends. How we get married isn’t as important as being married, being mates.”
She raised up on an elbow and sought my gaze. “The wedding will require a little bit of planning, which will also allow a respectful amount of time to pass after my sister’s nuptial washout. Is that okay?”
I wound a strand of her hair around my finger. “We’re already mates, so waiting to solemnize our togetherness in accordance with the customs on your planet isn’t a problem.”
“I’ll have to invite my mother. I can’t not invite her. Maybe in a few months she’ll be more accepting.” Her grimace confirmed my own hunch: the ice on Dakon would melt before that happened. Some relationships were complicated.
Her expression brightened. “Maybe she’ll boycott the wedding on principle.”