by A. G. Wilde
“The task of creating clothing saddens you?” His silver eyes met hers then and the intensity within them almost had her looking away, except she found that she couldn’t.
“No. I—”
“Then what is it?” He closed the distance between them, his hand reaching out to touch what was left of the tear at the corner of her eye. He touched the liquid and brought his finger up to his nose and sniffed.
Not expecting his next action, Evren scrunched up her nose when he licked the tear from his finger.
Her reaction was mimicked on his face, his nose scrunching as he looked at his finger. “I can taste the minerals in it.”
Evren, nose still scrunched, gave him an incredulous look. “That was really weird.”
“What was?”
“You used your finger to taste my tears. It’s not...normal.” She gave a soft chuckle.
Funny how he managed to make her smile so easily without even intending to. Around him, she forgot she was going through mental hell.
“Should I have used my tongue instead?”
His question seemed innocent enough but the thought of him running his tongue on her cheek made her widen her eyes, memories of him in the market and the thoughts she’d had then coming back to her immediately.
Evren opened her mouth to respond but no words came out.
Why wasn’t the thought of his tongue stroking down her cheek repelling her? It should. What it shouldn’t do was turn her on.
Ohmigod...she was, wasn’t she?
She was slightly turned on.
And God help her, she couldn’t stop her next words before they spilled from her lips.
“A tongue would have felt nicer.” She gave him a small smile. “But I don’t think many humans would appreciate you doing that either.”
“Don’t worry. I never intend to repeat such action on any other human. I only wanted to taste you.”
Again, she didn’t know how to respond.
Was he...flirting with her?
Were they flirting?
She’d never been good at that sort of thing. Her idea of flirting involved text messages, where she could mull over her responses in private until she came up with the smartest thing to say.
“What has made you sad? I can fix it.” He glanced down at the skirt in her hands.
As she looked up at him studying her, in the quiet of the room, his proximity suddenly felt intimate. It was just the two of them, standing so close...if she moved just a bit closer, she’d be pressing herself against his chest.
And she wanted to.
At least, her nipples sure wanted to. They were hard and pointing right at him.
Thank goodness her unsightly dress did a good job of hiding that.
She didn’t know why but she felt...safe around him. As if she wasn’t being judged.
As if she could be open, free, and utterly and completely her true self.
She felt like she could tell him anything. Anything at all, and it would stay between them. He didn’t seem like the sort of person to go yapping to the others about her failings or the fact that such a simple event as losing the one thing that made her Evren was breaking her so much.
Mind made up, she thrust the skirt toward him.
“It’s this stupid skirt. It will never fit me. I spent all this time, had this grand image of what my clothes were going to look like, and bam! It was ripped away from me just like that. Worst part is, it was because of my own stupidity!”
She felt annoyed. Annoyed with herself and she was very aware she was possibly overreacting. But, goddammit, it’s the little things that push people over the edge, and this little thing was doing just that.
Under the light above them, she couldn’t see the color of his eyes, but she could almost feel the intensity of his gaze.
“I sense that this had nothing to do with the clothing.”
Ah, so he was intuitive too? One point for him for picking that up so quickly. The more time she spent around him, the more perfect he became.
“You’re right. This has nothing to do with the clothing. It’s everything else!” Throwing her hands into the air, she stalked over to the drink she’d poured for him earlier. “You aren’t going to drink this are you?”
When he shook his head, she plopped down into the seat and took a big gulp.
“Shit, this tastes like piss.” Her nose scrunched up again. Still, she took another gulp. “Can you imagine it, Kyro? Being taken from everything you ever knew? Being thrown into a world that you didn’t choose? Can you imagine what it feels like inside?”
“I can.” He moved so smoothly and silently, she hadn’t realized he’d left from beside the table to stand by where she sat.
Taking a seat beside her, he gazed at nothing in front of him, his pupils dilating as if he was thinking of something that happened a long, long time ago.
“What do you mean you can?”
When he turned to look at her, there was a pain in his eyes that she hadn’t seen there before.
“I can. Because I was once abducted too.”
She was looking at him in shock, so he thought it best to continue.
He shouldn’t have opened his mouth, but he’d been doing a lot of things he shouldn’t be doing lately; he’d just add this to the list.
“As a youngling, about six orbits old, I was taken from my homeworld.”
Evren’s large blue eyes widened as her mouth fell open.
Shock.
He’d shocked her.
He’d take that over pity. He never wanted to see her pity him.
“I was eventually rescued by the Restitution. I’ve been here ever since.”
A moment of silence paused as he let her soak in what he just said.
“You. An alien. You were abducted?” She blinked. “No offense. I don’t mean that in a bad way it’s just...whenever I thought about beings being abducted, I only ever imagined humans getting the short end of that stick.”
“That would be impossible.”
“Huh?”
“There would be no way to extract beings on a stick. Unless it was a very small being and they somehow clung to your very large stick. And, outside the atmosphere of their planet, they would surely die without some form of protective equipment. Unless...” He paused. “Unless you put them in protective equipment and attach your stick to your spaceship.” He paused once more as he thought about it. “I retract my statement. It is possible.”
When he finally cast his eyes on her once more, she was doing that thing where she scrunched up her nose and looked at him as if she was trying to figure him out.
With a laugh, she took another sip of her drink.
“Kyro, you are so weird, but I mean it in the nicest way... I like it.”
Never mind that she just insulted him nicely. He could take that and think about it later. But...did she say she liked him?
For a few seconds, he wondered what the strange warmness growing inside him was.
And this thing tugging at his mouth, making his lips want to stretch across his face. Dear Polvrak. He wanted to smile?
When he returned to his quarters, he had to check if he was low on vitamins. Something was wrong with him.
“So, you were abducted...as a child?” She tapped her drink receptacle. “How? By whom? For what reason? How did you escape?”
What should he tell her? He couldn’t tell her everything. He shouldn’t even be telling her anything at all.
“I...was taken by the High Tasqals.” He glanced at her. “My people were invaded...enslaved.”
“Oh my God.” She sat up straight, looking at him, her eyes wide with horror and...anger? Anger? She was angry for him?
When she reached over and placed her small hand over his, the warmth of her skin was so unexpectedly pleasurable that he froze underneath her touch.
He hadn’t been touched by anyone in so long, he had to stop the chromatophores in his skin from memorizing the imprint of her hand.
&nbs
p; With the simple contact, he could feel the remnants of the chets along his arms pulse with excitement, almost as if they wanted to regrow and extrude to show that he could be a protective mate.
Qrakking Goddard’s nest. Whatever was happening to him was making him teeter on the edge of control.
“You were a slave? Like for labor or...”
When he looked at her again, the horror in her eyes touched him deep. She cared that much about his past?
Why?
The questions were too many.
“Oh my God, Kyro,” she whispered. “Did they...did those bastards...” She gulped as contempt grew in her eyes. Contempt at his expense. “Were you a sex slave?”
The thought of being a sex slave to the horrible and utterly vile High Tasqals made the corners of his eyes twitch and pulled him from the thoughts he was mulling over. He could feel the hatred boiling within him.
His emotions were beginning to get the best of him.
This was a dangerous conversation. Too many doors closed. Too many secrets.
That was why he needed to end their little discussion.
“It’s okay,” Evren spoke. “We don’t have to talk about it.”
Then she did something he didn’t expect.
In careful movements, she closed the distance between them to nestle against his arm, bringing up her feet towards her chest as her head rested against his shoulder.
“I guess we have something in common then. Were the rest of your team, your brothers, were they also slaves?”
She spoke as if she didn’t know the effect she was having on him, being so close, touching him, sharing this moment that he’d never shared with anyone else before.
Probably she didn’t know...he hardly understood these new feelings himself.
What was this wild increase of his pulse? This urge to pull her closer? This...need?
Qrak.
He felt so needy.
“You know who I miss the most on Earth?” She continued when he didn’t answer. “My cat, Nigel. I miss Nigel.”
“Cat?”
“Y’know...well, I guess you don’t know.” She let out a small laugh. “A cat is a small animal. Most are furry. Pointy ears. They have four feet. Tail.” She stopped speaking and smiled suddenly, her eyes glassy while memories he couldn’t see played in her mind.
As Kyro looked at her, he knew he was becoming addicted. He was beginning to live for her touch and her smiles.
Her smile lit up her face so much, he could see his tomorrow in her eyes, and she was how he imagined she’d been back before all this, before she was taken and brought into this unforgiving world.
“Nigel was a calico cat. He was mostly white, but he had those orange and black patches all calico cats have. He even had this one black spot that was shaped like a heart on his side. He was a rescue. I should have been warned. That heart-shaped spot was a representation of his cold, dark heart. Nigel was a selfish asshole.” She chuckled.
“Yet, you miss him?”
“I do.”
“Even with his cold, dark heart?”
She chuckled again. “Yep.”
Her eyes were still glassy as she kept staring ahead. “That’s the thing with cats. I think we love them so much because, unlike humans, they don’t pretend to care. Cat’s don’t give a shit. I think we respect them for that.”
He waited for her to continue.
So qrakking needy.
It was not only her smiles that were killing him. He was getting addicted to the sound of her voice as well. If she allowed him to, he would gladly sit and listen to her speak for ages.
But when a sob shook her shoulders and she wiped her eyes, Kyro turned to face her, moving to the floor in front of her so he could see her face.
“You’re losing minerals from your eyes once more.”
“I just miss Nigel. He was all I had after my parents died. He is all I have and now he is out there all alone and I have nothing. Every day I am reminded I have nothing.”
He knew that feeling all too well.
He, too, lived it every day.
Watching her cry was tearing at him.
“Nigel has a cold, dark heart. That means he is a fighter. He will survive,” he finally said.
Evren wiped her eyes, her gaze focusing on his and as suddenly as her tears had come, she let out a soft laugh.
“You...” She breathed. “Do you really think so?”
No, he did not think so.
Her cat animal would most likely have to find a way to support itself or it would not survive. But he’d already started the lie and it seemed to have stopped her eyes from wasting her body’s minerals.
He wouldn’t point out this Nigel’s peril. He had a feeling she already knew her cat animal was in serious jeopardy unless it was taken hostage by another human.
“I think so.”
She stared at him for a few moments before she wiped her eyes again.
“Thank you, Kyro.”
He nodded, deciding it was time for him to rise from his position on the floor, but her gaze held his. For what felt like the longest of moments, she just looked back at him, her eyes connecting with his in a way that made his chets pulse along his arm.
She began moving forward slowly, and it took Kyro a few seconds to realize what she was doing.
When her gaze fell to his lips, he froze.
Don’t be needy. You should move away.
She paused just an inch away from his face. So close, he could feel the breath from her nose against his skin.
He didn’t know what pushed him. If he imagined a hand behind his head easing him forward, it would have made sense. For he did move forward, on his own accord, despite the voices screaming in his head that what he was doing was dangerous.
He closed the distance between them and pressed his lips against hers.
…
Sweet.
Nest of.
Polvrak.
When he’d read about this human custom, he’d never imagined it would feel this good. It was no wonder humans loved joining mouths.
Her lips were soft, softer than he’d thought they would be, and that softness caught him by surprise, making him want to close his eyes but he dared not do so. He didn’t want to lose one moment of this, lest it be a figment of his imagination.
Before he could stop himself, he was pressing farther into her and she opened up to him, her lips parting with a soft moan.
Maybe time stopped.
He wasn’t sure.
It was just him, her, and this warmth within him that was burning through his veins, culminating right in his shaft.
This close, her scent was intoxicating, like freshly washed kusco berries, and every breath he took was filled with her. For once in his life, he dared imagine he could have more. More of this, more of life—to exist without the secrets that were holding him down, the same secrets that dictated why this kiss was a bad, bad idea.
Her eyes were slightly open, gazing at him with growing lust as her mouth moved against his and he knew it even before her hands curled around his neck, pulling him farther into her...
He’d passed a barrier he shouldn’t cross, and he wasn’t sure he had the strength to go back.
11
She’d kissed him.
No, he’d kissed her.
As Evren awoke, her fingers moved to her mouth, tracing her lips.
Like a ghost of a kiss, she could still feel his lips against hers, still feel how his hand had risen to caress her cheek as their kiss had deepened, still remember how soft and smooth his skin had felt.
She could still smell him too. That close, her nose brushing against his, she’d picked up the scent of whatever he’d washed with.
Pine.
He’d smelled like pine. It made her think of walking barefoot in a forest surrounded by a cool summer breeze.
Sitting up in the bed, she ran her hand over her face.
The memory of the kiss replayed over and
over in her mind and so did the events that happened next.
Kyro had released her lips, easing away from her with a look of such torment, she was briefly rendered speechless.
He’d mumbled that the drink must have gotten to her more than she’d realized and that she would probably regret their kiss when she recovered from her “intoxication.”
He’d brought her to her room, lifting her in his arms effortlessly, and then he’d left. Just like that.
He’d left.
And in her stunned silence, she hadn’t been able to say one thing to stop him.
The kiss had surprised her more than she’d realized.
As she stared at the empty wall in front of her, she forced herself to come to terms with it.
Had she kissed him because she’d been drunk?
No.
She knew she hadn’t.
She’d been perfectly in control of her body, her mind, her actions.
She’d chosen to do it.
She’d wanted to.
And she’d loved every second of it.
There’d been nothing stopping her but her own inhibitions, and in that moment, she’d had none.
Slipping from the bed, she walked from the bedroom to the bathing area. The place was so quiet; it seemed even quieter than it had been the day before.
With Kyro there, even though he hadn’t been talking, she hadn’t felt the silence.
She’d forgotten about this quiet that came when she was alone. His presence had been comforting.
As she stripped and began cleaning herself underneath the spray, she bit her bottom lip with a slow smile.
They’d kissed.
Weeks ago, she wouldn’t have imagined such a thing happening and, under different circumstances, she wondered what would have happened if they hadn’t stopped.
How far would they have gone?
It had been a while for her. Her life had been dedicated to her work. There hadn’t been time for romantic relationships. And friends...well, she didn’t have many of those. Her cat, Nigel, had been her only company.
The feel of Kyro’s lips had made an ache go right down to her center, one she hadn’t felt in so long it had made her instantly wet.