by Marla Monroe
* * * *
Hannah lay flat on her back, panting as Porter collapsed next to her after pulling from her pussy. She’d come so hard and so long that her muscles were cramping in her ass cheeks. She moaned and tried to move to relive the tight pain.
“What is it, honey?” Edward asked, concern on his face.
“Butt cramps,” she hissed out.
He chuckled, but rolled her over and started massaging her buttocks. It hurt at first but soon smoothed out to feel much better. She sighed.
“Thanks. That’s better.”
Porter laughed next to her. “I gather that you came pretty hard.”
She giggled and smoothed her hand over his chest. While he had a smidgen of chest hair, it wasn’t enough to really dig her fingers in. Still, she managed to find enough to pull a few hairs.
“Ouch!”
Edward spanked her ass with a laugh. “You’ve got some hair we can pull, too, you know.”
“Sorry, Porter.” She instantly wanted to cover her pussy with her hands.
“You’re perfect, Hannah,” Edward suddenly said out of the blue.
She smiled. Hearing him say that sent chills down her spine. It was a start and she wanted it to grow. When she opened her mouth to tell him that he was super too, her brain short circuited and that wasn’t what came out.
“I’m hungry,” she said instead.
Both men laughed so hard the bed shook. She frowned. Where had that come from? She hadn’t meant to say that.
“Let’s go fix our woman something to eat. She’s eating for two now,” Porter said with a grin.
Hannah frowned, still unsure why she’d blurted out that she was hungry like that. Yeah, she was hungry, but not excessively so like she’d inferred. Shaking her head, she climbed out of bed behind the men and padded to the bathroom. Once she’d cleaned up some, Hannah walked downstairs to find the men busy in the kitchen putting together some of the native fruit and cheese plate.
“Juice to drink or tea?” Edward asked.
She started to say juice, but milk came out instead. She never drank milk.
“Good for you, baby girl,” Porter said. “The baby needs milk for strong bones.”
She shrugged, deciding that her body knew what she needed and she might as well accept that she wasn’t going to get what she wanted until after the baby was born. After all, that was the reason behind strange cravings. When you craved something, it was your body’s way of obtaining some vitamin or nutrient it was lacking.
By the time they’d finished eating the snack the men had put together, Hannah was wide awake again. She was glad she’d gotten her second wind. There was a pile of clothes upstairs to put away. Deciding it wouldn’t be in her best interests to advertise what she was going to do, Hannah left the men discussing the issues of pollination without bugs or birds. She’d never thought about that before. She’d just been excited to find out that there weren’t any on Alpha. Now she couldn’t help but wonder how all of the flowers and trees and weeds continued spreading.
By the time she made it to the second floor, Hannah’s second wind had petered out. She had to force herself to put away her new clothes and made a half-assed attempt at straightening the covers before she climbed back in the bed. She’d just rest her eyes for a few minutes then get up and clean up the mess in the bathroom. Somehow, she managed to scramble beneath the covers and settle down for the night so that when the men came to bed later she roused enough to realize it was late.
“What time is it?” she asked with a yawn.
“Nearly one in the morning, honey. Sorry we woke you,” Edward said brushing a light kiss across her lips. “Go on back to sleep.”
“Bathroom first,” she mumbled rolling over to crawl out on Porter’s side. He was still sitting on the side of the bed pulling off his boots.
“Careful there, baby girl. You’re not fully awake. I don’t want you to fall.”
She grumbled something about being fine and hurried to the bathroom to relieve herself. Once there, Hannah decided to wash her face and brush her teeth. She hadn’t gotten around to that earlier since she hadn’t planned on falling asleep. She sure hoped those prenatal vitamins and the extra iron would help her regain some energy. She was less than a week along in the pregnancy and already had no stamina. Weren’t pregnant women supposed to get some burst of vitality with a nesting instinct or something?
She harrumphed at that. So far the only nesting she felt like doing dealt with bed covers and a comfy mattress. On her way back to bed, she suddenly decided she needed something to drink. Was she thirsty? Yeah, she was thirsty.
The men appeared to already have fallen asleep. She slipped on her house shoes and tiptoed out the door and down the hall. By the time she’d made it downstairs to the kitchen, her mouth was dry and that drink sounded even better than it had upstairs. This time she pulled out the pitcher of juice and poured a big glassful before replacing it in the fridge.
Hannah wondered over to the window and gazed out at the two huge moons that illuminated the yard outside. She couldn’t see the garden from there, but she could see the various plants and grass just outside the window. There must have been a breeze because it all looked as if were moving. She could have sworn that she was watching it grow but couldn’t see how that would be possible. Things just didn’t grow that fast.
When she looked down at the ground to focus on one of the plants, a pair of orange eyes peered up at her from only a few inches from the edge of the porch. Hannah nearly dropped the glass she was holding and did take a step back.
“What the…”
She leaned closer to the window and studied the creature looking back at her. It didn’t look like a muskie or dorrie based on the pictures she’d seen in books. This looked more like a cross between a long, smooth pig and a platypus. Its hairless skin was the color of a yellow duckling and it stretched to be about five feet from the tip of its rounded ears to its two stubby tails, or what she assumed were tails.
It had a very flat and long nose and mouth combination that was almost like a duck’s bill, but it wasn’t hard, and it moved more like a mouth than a beak. The thing stared up at her with what looked like curiosity to her. The shiny orange glow of its eyes was unnerving but it didn’t show her any teeth. She wondered if it had teeth or not.
Just as it turned and waddled off, she realized that she should have gotten the camera they had and taken a picture. Had she seen something no one else had ever seen before? The idea excited her. She wanted to go wake up the men and tell them about her discovery but figured it could wait until morning. They were tired and the strange creature had already been swallowed up in the dark shadows of the yard. Oddly enough, having two moons seemed to increase the number and depth of the shadows. If something was tall, they illuminated it much better, but close to the ground or near an object that cast a shadow and there seemed to be even less light than normal.
Hannah was convinced that she’d made a unique discovery and decided to write down a description of it while her memory was fresh. The sighting had given her a spurt of energy she hadn’t had earlier. Setting the glass down, she hurried to the office and located a pencil and paper. For the next twenty minutes or so, she recorded her memory of the creature then attempted to draw parts of it for good measure. When she had finished, the drawing looked comical, but fairly accurate. She couldn’t wait for the guys to wake up so she could tell them about the weird animal.
I wonder if they’ll let me name it. Even if they don’t, I can call it what I want to, anyway.
With that defiant thought, Hannah put everything away except her notes and drawings and turned off the lights. Then she climbed the stairs to ease back into the bedroom, careful not to wake up the guys. She thought she’d succeeded until Edward softly patted her bare ass as she settled under the covers between him and Porter.
“Where have you been, honey?” he asked in a sleepy voice.
“I was thirsty. I’ll tell you in the morn
ing.” She snuggled with her ass against him and wrapped one arm over Porter’s broad shoulder.
“Um, hm,” was all he said before a soft snore let her know he’d fallen back asleep.
Hannah smiled and closed her eyes. Everything was really going to be okay. She had two men who obviously cared about her and she had no trouble falling asleep with that thought firmly in her thoughts with that thought firmly in her thoughts.
Chapter Twelve
“I’ve never seen anything like this before,” Porter said, staring at the drawing Hannah had created. He read back over her description then shook his head.
“We need to see if anyone else has seen something like it before. Maybe since she saw it in the middle of the night, it’s nocturnal, so it just hasn’t been seen yet. This planet is huge, there’s no way we’ve seen even a tenth of the animal life here,” Edward said.
“We can take the drawing with us tomorrow when we start work. Today we need to be sure everything is ready for her to be on her own for the day,” Porter said, setting the papers on the cabinet.
“We’ll start out with learning how to use the radio then move on to gun safety,” Edward said with a nod. “Let’s go, honey. I’m anxious to get to the gun part.”
Hannah felt the tension in the air the moment she’d shown them the drawing and told them about the strange-looking creature she’d seen. Both men had instantly gone into protect mode. While cute and comforting, it was also a bit suffocating. Both men had closed in on her and kept them between her while she’d been washing and putting away the breakfast dishes. She was sure it was subconscious on their part. Who needed to be protected in the house while washing dishes?
She let them usher her back to the office where the radio base was located. There were three handheld radios as well. She knew she would be keeping one near her while the guys had the other two.
A thought bothered her though. How far would they reach? She picked one of them up and turned to Edward.
“How far will these reach? I mean if I need you, will you be close enough to hear me?” she asked.
“Sometimes we won’t be within reach on the mobiles but if you use the base station, you will almost always be able to reach us. Even if you can’t get us, you can reach someone with the base station. We’re going to show you all the frequencies and how to set them. The list is right here for you to follow,” Porter said pointing to a list of numbers with names out by them.
Hannah frowned. It all looked much too complicated to her. How would she ever remember everything?
“Hey, baby girl. Don’t look so worried. You’ll get it. Just relax and watch.” Porter squeezed her shoulder and sat her down in the chair in front of the base unit.
Over the next hour, they taught her how to change channels and dial different frequencies to reach different places like the clinic at the space station and their individual hand units. She put a star out beside them as well as Lacy’s so she could call the other woman to ask questions. All of a sudden, she didn’t feel quite so lonely now that she understood how to use the radio.
“Now for gun safety lessons,” Edward said.
Hannah wasn’t too thrilled about this next part. She didn’t like guns, never had. They frightened much more than she’d ever admitted to anyone. Maybe if she told them they wouldn’t make her touch one, but one look at Porter and she knew they would still insist. The determination to make sure she was safe was etched in stone across his brow.
They had her look at the rifles and the two handguns that they had and explained the differences in them. Then Edward picked up one of the rifles and showed her all of the features before having her hold it. The entire time she had to keep from screaming that she didn’t want to touch it. She knew on a gut level that it was for her safety, and now her unborn child’s safety, that she learn how to handle one. Still, it didn’t make it easy.
“Now. Show me where the safety is,” Porter said. When she pointed it out, he nodded. “Good. Now show me how to take the safety off.”
For the next thirty minutes, she located the safety and flicked it on and off on each of the guns. Then they moved on to show her how to safely carry each of them. Porter told her that having respect for them was paramount. If she remembered that they could kill at all times, she’d be more likely to remain safe.
“Remember. Even if you just unloaded them yourself, you always treat a gun like it’s loaded,” Edward added. “Accidents can happen. You could leave one bullet in without realizing it. Never point it at anything you don’t intend to pull the trigger on.”
“I think we’re ready for target practice now,” Porter said with a wink.
“Um, can we wait until after lunch? I’m hungry and my arms are tired from picking them up and down,” she hedged.
They didn’t seem to realize it was more a ploy to put off the inevitable since they quickly nodded and steered her toward the kitchen.
“Sorry, baby girl. I didn’t think about how heavy they would feel to you. We’ll make something for lunch. You sit down and rest your arms. We don’t want to wear you out.” Porter shoved her into a chair before kissing her loudly on the lips.
“I can fix sandwiches, guys. I’m not that tired,” she said with a chuckle.
“We can throw something together, Hannah. Just rest.” Edward and Porter converged at the fridge and mumbled to each other as she sat watching in amusement.
Throw something together? Right. This was going to be interesting.
She had no doubt that both men could take care of themselves if they had to, but with the limited possibilities on Alpha, whatever they came up with was bound to be interesting. She just hoped she was able to eat it. She didn’t want to hurt their feelings when they were being so nice.
She was pleasantly surprised though when they made sandwiches from the leftover roast she’d cooked the day before. It meant she would need to make more bread though. They were running low. Actually, she was looking forward to that. Making bread was a relaxing activity to her. Kneading the dough and shaping it into a perfect loaf always made her feel as if she’d accomplished something.
“What are you thinking about, Hannah? You’ve got a dreamy expression on your face,” Edward said.
“She’s thinking about me,” Porter said with a wide grin.
“She’d look like she was in pain if she was thinking about you,” Edward said.
“Actually, I was thinking about making bread. I’ll need to make two or three loafs each time I make it with the way you two eat,” she teased.
Edward shook his head. “I’ll never understand women.”
“You’re not supposed to understand them, Ed. You’re just supposed to accept them and keep them happy,” Porter said.
“I like that idea,” she said with a laugh.
“Okay, time for target practice.” Edward stood up and pulled her to her feet.
“Let me clean up the dishes first,” she protested.
“They’ll keep. There’s just a few plates and knives. Won’t hurt them to sit here till we get through,” Porter pointed out. “You’re stalling.”
“I don’t like guns.”
“You’ve told us that several times already, honey. I think we get the picture. The thing is, you have to be able to shoot one to protect yourself. What if we’re not around?” Edward asked with a frown.
She just sighed and followed the two men out the back door. Learning how to shoot wasn’t something she’d ever aspired to learning when she was growing up, but she understood that in her present situation, it was a necessary evil. So be it. She’d learn to shoot and pray she never had to actually shoot at anything.
To her astonishment and that of her two men, Hannah was a natural at it. After a stumbling start with remembering how to flip off the safety and aim, she grazed or hit pretty much all of the targets the men had set up for her.
“Well, well,” Edward crooned. “We’ve got ourselves a little Annie Oakley in the making.”
“Ca
n we stop now?” was all she asked.
They both chuckled and together, they gathered up the assorted weapons and ammunition to carry it inside.
“Remember. A rifle will always be by the back door and you keep one of the pistols with you at all times,” Porter said. “We’ll keep one of our rifles at the front door when we’re home.”
“I’ve got it. What are we going to do when we run out of bullets?” she asked as they put everything away.
“They’re working on modifying our weapons to handle something they’ve found here on Alpha. Don’t know anything about it yet, but they’re working on it at the space station.” Porter ruffled her hair.
“I’m about ready for a nap. What about you, precious?” Edward asked.
She looked over at the odd clock designed to keep time on Alpha. It was close to two in the afternoon and it wouldn’t get dark until close to eight. They weren’t even in the longer days that marked summer yet, but with the extra hour, it tended to stay light longer here.
“I could probably use a nap,” she admitted. “Or is that code for having sex with you guys?” she asked with a smile.
“Oh, our Hannah is getting a little frisky on us, Ed.” Porter dove for her and wrapped his arms around her before she could move away.
“Hey, put me down.” She tried for indignant, but the giggle at the end sort of ruined it.
“Hold on, baby girl. We’re going for a ride.” Porter carted her out of the office and up the stairs with Edward following close behind them. He winked at her as Porter carried her into the bedroom.
When the big man gently laid her on the bed, she started to scoot over to the center of the bed, but Edward stopped her, wrapping his hands around her ankles and holding her still. She frowned and looked down her body at where he knelt at the foot of the bed and stared up at her.
“What are you doing?” she asked.