by A. G. Wilde
Her face softened immediately, as if she’d been so engrossed in walking through the undergrowth that she’d forgotten that he was there.
“You’re so quiet usually, I thought it was something else.” Her eyes darted to the undergrowth again. “I’m hunting some food as we go. I’m hungry. I’m pretty sure you are too.”
Hunting?
He stared at her as she turned and continued walking again.
Everything about her made him curious. She walked through the undergrowth as if she’d been born on this planet.
The way she’d adjusted was…extraordinary, and he felt a level of respect growing within him.
“What are you hunting?”
“Jungle penguins,” she whispered.
Sohut blinked. “I do not comprehend. Jungle what?”
“They’re getting smarter and learning to hide from me now, the fat little things.”
Fat little things?
She had to be referring to the senseless mogs.
“Stop,” he said. “If it’s mogs you want, I’ll call them for you.”
Clee-yo stopped to look back at him, ducking under a hanging vine as she did.
Putting both hands to his mouth he whistled. It was a high sound the mogs were attracted to and he was sure they would come waddling through the bushes directly to where they were standing.
The fact he could do this, help her, made a feeling of unexpected pride surge through him.
No doubt, she’d find it impressive. It wasn’t a whistle many beings could do.
But when he glanced back at the female, she was looking at him weirdly, her nose scrunched up, her upper lip curled as she stared at him.
“What the hell are you doing?”
Sohut blinked, glancing away for just a second. “Whistling.”
“With no sound?”
Now it was his turn to look at her strangely. “You can’t hear it?”
It was high, but even his ears could pick it up.
“You mean you’re actually making a sound?” Her eyes bugged out a little.
Moving closer to her, he whistled again but she only blinked at him. That prompted him to lean down to look at her ears.
So different from his. Hers did not rise to a point and her pinna seemed much less pronounced than his.
He was about to reach out and touch her skin when his hand was swatted away—and not by the female, no less.
It took him a second to realize that the darn slizz had leaned across her back to attack him.
Opening his mouth to curse the thing, he stopped, his breath catching in his throat as Clee-yo’s laughter reached his ears.
“I guess he’s a bit protective of me,” he assumed she said, for he couldn’t hear her words, all he could see was her lips move and all he could remember was the fact those same lips had been on his not long ago.
A sort of mouth phekking.
They’d mouth phekked.
And it had been glorious.
Cleo cleared her throat and movement behind him caused him to glance that way.
A family of six mogs waddled from the bushes to stop in front of them. The mogs’ expectant eyes moved to their party of two—fine, three, if he was going to count the unlikable animal on Clee-yo’s shoulder.
“How did you do that?” Cleo moved to stand beside him. “They hide from me.”
“And that has nothing to do with you munching on them.”
A slap on his arm made him wince out of pure surprise and Clee-yo’s eyes grew large. “Oh my god, I’m sorry. Did I hurt you?”
Not enough, he wanted to say.
“Of course, not.”
Crouching, he beckoned to one of the little animals and whistled as he did.
The mogs obliged, moving closer. Close enough for him to grab two of the fattest ones.
“And that’s how you catch a mog,” he said, standing with two hardly-struggling mogs in his hands. Raxu knows, they should be extinct for their stupidity.
But Clee-yo didn’t move. She didn’t even say anything. She just stood looking at the four remaining mogs, bewilderment on her face.
“What is it?” he had to ask. He’d never seen anyone look at their food with such pity before.
“It’s different when you catch them. Seems more…heartless. They trust you.”
“Which is why they’re going to be eaten. Just because something is nice to you that doesn’t mean it’s your ally.”
For a second, she didn’t reply, then a look came over her face that made him instantly regret what he said.
Clee-yo’s shoulders stiffened and she adjusted her gaze toward the bushes.
He could almost see his words repeating in her head and realization came too late.
He hadn’t been referring to himself but that’s obviously where her mind was going.
“You’re absolutely right,” she finally said.
18
Cleo struggled with her spindle and fire board. Across from her, Sohut sat cross-legged beside the two mogs waiting to be prepared.
He’d attempted to eat them raw, much to her horror.
Now he sat watching her with interest.
His presence was…soothing and as she worked to get a fire going, she thought about that.
But his words from earlier kept repeating in her mind.
Just because something is nice to you that doesn’t mean it’s your ally.
He was right.
It was something she needed to remember.
A sigh made her shoulders rise and fall as her fire caught and she fed it slowly.
Here, underneath the canopy, the smoke wouldn’t rise too high.
Her gaze was focused on the fire, but her mind was on other things.
She’d kissed him and that kiss meant nothing.
She didn’t know what she’d been doing or why she’d done it in the first place and that was a shock.
Sohut had no stakes in this. Her survival depended on her.
The fire caught and she cooked the meat with motions that were more ingrained than conscious.
As they ate in silence, she could feel Sohut’s eyes on her, but she kept her gaze averted as she considered things.
How did she even know he was taking her somewhere safe?
She didn’t. She was just blindly following him along.
Her instincts told her she could trust him, but logic told her to be cautious.
As they finished the meal, stood, and headed to the water hole, she led the way.
She couldn’t hear him behind her.
She was sure he was still there though; he just walked through the jungle as if he was a black panther.
He was silent.
Gorgeous.
Deadly.
And that’s why she should get her mind centered and control herself.
He wasn’t human.
He wasn’t her friend.
She had no friends.
She only had Cleo.
Pushing the thoughts back, she sighed as she reached the clearing for the water hole.
“I’ll leave you here,” Sohut suddenly spoke behind her.
“Leave?” Why did that make her panicky?
“I’m going to scout the perimeter,” he said.
Wawa lifted his head on her shoulder.
Nodding, she put down her makeshift bag on some dry vines running along the floor.
Sohut paused for a second and then he disappeared into the brush.
Glancing at Wawa, she smiled at the animal.
“Just me and you again,” she murmured. But Wawa hopped from her shoulder, gave her a glance, and went in the opposite direction to the alien.
Now that she knew what he went off to do, she wondered if he sensed danger close.
She’d had no idea her little innocent pet had been working so hard to keep them both safe.
She was indebted to him.
Dropping against the rock wall, Cleo looked around the small clearing.
She coul
dn’t believe she was going to leave this place.
It had become her home—the only place she knew on this god-forsaken planet.
She’d always known the day would come. Still, she wasn’t prepared for it.
Another sigh lifted her shoulders, as she turned to the rock pool.
Sohut said he knew how to get them from the jungle and to the Torian camp. From there, they’d travel to his brother’s location—a sanctuary of some sort. She could only hope he wasn’t about to bring her right to the aliens she was running away from.
Stripping off her clothing, Cleo stood naked in front of the rock pool, looking down into the clear water.
It was so pristine, she could see right to the bottom of it.
It would be the last time she took a bath in this water—the very last time she’d sink beneath its cool surface.
For that reason, she moved slower, intent on soaking up every bit of the experience.
The sun’s rays hit the yellow-orange leaves around her in such a way that the entire little clearing looked like a scene she’d expect to see on a map of a fairy kingdom.
Not only that, but the air was so fresh, so clear, so unpolluted, that each deep breath she took felt like she was purifying herself from within.
It really was the perfect spot she’d found and as she stepped into the pool, her body going below the surface, she allowed her shoulders to sag with relief.
It was perfect for the time she’d spent in the area, but her leaving was inevitable.
She had to go.
There was no way, realistically, for her to live out in the jungle indefinitely.
The change was one she was going to take in stride and try as much as she could to embrace.
And Sohut…
Something inside her fluttered at the thought of him.
As her head broke the surface and she gasped for breath, Cleo blinked, treading the water as she wiped it from her eyes.
There was no soap so she had to make do.
She’d found some berries in the jungle that made her smell good and she’d always left a few close to the water’s edge so she could retrieve them while washing herself.
The animals didn’t seem to trouble them so that was good.
Reaching for a few now, she crushed them between her fingers and began lathering her hair and sensitive areas.
As soon as she dipped beneath the water again to wash the residue of the berries out, she already felt clean.
She didn’t know where it came from, but a smile graced her lips then.
She was about to leave and it wasn’t going to be so bad. She could feel it in her heart that everything was going to be okay.
Zimsu berries…
The smell was faint but he caught it in the air anyway.
Sohut paused at the edge of the clearing and his life-organ in his chest ceased beating.
Clee-yo was like a piece of life he didn’t know he’d been missing till now.
Her head broke the water’s surface, and the star’s rays played on her tresses making their hue seem even richer.
Small rivulets of water were running down her pale skin and for the first time, he was jealous of something so simple.
The urge to follow the path of the water droplets down her skin was so strong, it’s almost as if it pulled him from the cover of the bushes into the clearing.
She looked up then, alarm making her features a little larger.
And then, as if she realized the water was no cover at all, she moved toward the edge, pressing the front of her body against the rock and essentially blocking his view as a curious hue colored her cheeks.
“You’re back,” she breathed, her cheeks were still that warm color and he realized she was looking everywhere except for at him.
“Did you find anything?”
He didn’t trust himself to answer.
He didn’t know if he was capable of speech.
It felt as if he would groan if he opened his mouth.
Clee-yo looked like a trimslar gem on display and all he wanted to do was to touch her.
“Nothing,” he managed to croak.
The urge to touch her was one problem. The other was already stretching the crotch of his trousers.
Turning from her, he dropped his satchel beside her pack that she’d set to the side and began sliding out of his trousers. He was sure he heard a sharp exhale behind him.
“Wh-what are you doing?”
Sohut turned, his cock bobbing slightly as he did. “I will wash with you.”
For a second she said nothing. Her mouth was the shape of a circle as she stared at him, or rather his cock, and that hue in her cheeks took on such ferocious intensity, he worried slightly that she was becoming ill.
“Clee-yo?”
Clee-yo’s mouth opened and closed like a kuruga’s and she blinked a few times before she sputtered, “You can’t bring that in here!” The color of her cheeks deepened further, if that was even possible.
“I—I mean, you can’t come in here. It’s hardly enough space for the two of us.”
She swallowed hard and tore her gaze away, choosing to focus somewhere on his chest instead.
Sohut looked down at himself.
Was his member not impressive?
He blinked at it, a new feeling he’d never experienced before reaching him.
What if she didn’t like what she saw?
“Is there something wrong with my cock?”
“Oh God…” she groaned in a low voice, sinking a little in the water. “What’s not right with it?”
His cock throbbed, jerking a little.
“What’s that?” He’d heard her fine, but he wanted to hear her say it again.
“I said ‘I’ll come out so you can have a bath.’ Turn around.”
That made him want to chuckle.
Stepping forward, he slid into the pool in one smooth movement causing water to slosh over the edge and onto the surrounding rock.
Wide pale eyes stared at him in shock but she had nowhere to go. And, unlike the first time they’d been in the pool together, this time was different.
This time it felt as if the pool had shrunk by epic proportions. There was hardly any room.
“I should get out. The pool is too small.” She wasn’t looking at him now and her tiny hands gripped the edge of the pool as if she was ready to hoist herself out.
“Stay. There’s not another one of these pools until we get to the Torian camp. Enjoy it.”
She muttered something underneath her breath before the color in her cheeks grew warm again and he felt his lips twitch into a smile.
He didn’t need to know what she’d just said; whatever it was, it must have been delicious.
Dipping his head underneath the water, he let the fluid flow through his hair and gave it a wash. The knot he’d put the tendrils in on top of his head came loose as he did and when he resurfaced his hair hung over his shoulders and down his back.
Pale eyes were staring at him again and she muttered something else underneath her breath, squeezing her eyes and shaking her head.
“What is it, Clee-yo?”
She glanced at him. “When did I stop being Cluu to you?”
To be honest, she’d never been Cluu. He’d just been saying it to spite her.
“I don’t know,” he said instead, his eyes taking her in.
Such a pale, beautiful creature.
How could he have even thought she was a feral thing the first time he’d seen her?
“Sohut?” She gulped and he realized he’d treaded the water in the little space between them. He was now so close she was face-to-face with him.
His gaze fell to her lips, and he watched them quiver a little.
When their eyes met again, there was only one thing to do.
The touch of her lips against his sent a jolt of pleasure through him.
How? How had he lived all his life without experiencing something like this?
Whoever
invented mouth phekking in her culture was an icon that should be celebrated.
Clee-yo groaned into him, her arms moving to circle his neck as their bodies pressed together and he suddenly knew for a fact there was no way he was in the position to let her out of his presence. Not now…or ever again.
Clee-yo,” he moaned her name as they broke for air. Hands circling her hips he lifted her in the water so she was straddling him.
The mounds on her chest popped free of the water to press against him and a groan rumbled in his chest.
She was so soft all over.
Feeling her like this against him.
He couldn’t let her go.
And maybe she was feeling the same?
As his chest heaved, he searched her eyes.
It was suddenly important to him, that one question.
And though he didn’t ask it, he knew he needed her to feel the same.
“Sohut,” his name was almost a whimper on her lips and he realized her chest was heaving just as much as his was.
For a few moments, she said nothing. She just looked at him and if time stood still, he’d be lost in those pale eyes of hers.
He could hardly breathe but he could feel.
He could feel every bit of her body against him and he didn’t want this moment to end.
“I need you to do something for me,” she said.
“Anything.”
“Fuck me.”
19
He took them from the water and she didn’t even know how he managed to do it with one hand for his other hand held her firmly in place against him.
“Clee-yo,” he breathed, his green eyes holding hers with such intensity that every nerve ending within her felt charged with electricity.
Every movement, every touch of his body against hers as he walked across the clearing, sent tingles straight down to her toes.
He came to a stop and set her down gently against some vines on the ground.
There was a set of thick hanging vines that cascaded down the edge of the clearing and he moved to those.
With strong hands, his muscles bunched as he pulled them upward and set them horizontally and she realized he was making a place for them to rest.
A place for them to rest…
For she’d just asked him to fuck her!