Won by an Alien (Stolen by an Alien Book 3)

by Amanda Milo

  Instantly, I’m overtaken with a feeling of contentment so profound: I sag. I’ve enough faculties not to collapse and crush her but… the instant feeling of relaxation is unexpected.

  I’ve no grasp of how she can affect me this way, but I am grateful. This close, I sniff her and her base scent is not unlike Tara’s. It’s soothing, bringing about a sense of tranquility, just before a wave of fierce protectiveness wells up in me.

  The other dappled offshoot of Tara is still clinging to her dam’s leg, but she silently observes, eyes taking in everything. I wave my tail at her slowly, and she too smiles.

  The colorless sibling, Amy—collects a modest amount of belongings for herself. That done, I move to carry Tara’s small satchel, and as we exit the ‘dwelling,’ I mention that I can hear Amy’s brought along at least one scurrying hitchhiker. “Lem is sensitive about what is introduced to the ship,” I explain. “Could you shake it out?”

  “Shake it out!” she cries, crouching to rip open her bag on the tarmac surface that holds odd, ground-level transporters.

  She shakes not one, but three of the insects from her things, making noises of disgust. My arm is jammed up high on my chest, my forearm supporting the rump of Simone as she continues to hug my neck. When she reacts to her aunt’s distress by moaning a fearful sound, I send three flame bursts at the creatures racing around in circles attempting to find cover.

  “Whoaaa,” Simone breathes, awe in her tone.

  Instantaneously, I feel leagues stronger. I pat her tiny back. Tara sends me a soft grin that nearly has me wishing we were alone. Later, I promise with my eyes. You can bestow that same look upon me later, please.

  CHAPTER 79

  TARA

  When we get to the ship, I’m surprised to see Gracie and Dohrein’s group. They’re back way early.

  Then I see them. “What happened to you?” I exclaim.

  Roughly dragging a sanitizing rag over a lipstick-covered hob, Gracie scowls. “I thought we’d be riding herd on a bunch of horny dudes, that’s what happened.”

  “Okaaaay,” I say carefully.

  “I didn’t take into account — I mean I joked, but I didn’t really think they’d lose their damned minds.”

  “The hobs?” It’s not that I can’t imagine what would happen with a group of female-starved males set loose on a planet made up predominantly of females, it’s that this hob she’s cleaning off looks more shell shocked and scared than horny and bothered.

  “No, the freaking women!” she shouts. “They saw the cameras, heard our movie-team story, and without anyone actually ‘knowing’ us, they freaked the fuck out! They attacked the guys.”

  “Are they okay?”

  More scrubbing. “More or less. They’re kind of out of it right now.”

  Women just started kissing them…? Everywhere? Really? I mean, don’t get me wrong, these are good looking guys, but even if I thought they were celebrities it wouldn’t get me to plant my lips on what is essentially a total stranger—especially now that I see where some of the evidence trail is headed—

  “Here,” Gracie orders, slamming the cloth into his midsection. “You get the rest.” And, still acting half out of it, he begins to work on his lower abdomen right above his… unfastened pants?

  “Broken zipper,” Gracie explains when she sees where I’m staring. “They tried to rip off his pants. They tried to rip off all their pants.”

  Gracie makes an irritated sound, still not over their ordeal. “They got ahold of their wings. Yanked them open. Tiny orgy,” she holds her thumb and finger a breath apart before widening her eyes and slamming her hands away from each other like bulging bookends. “And after that, we had a whole lot of pis—not fully satisfied women.” She pauses, smiling at Megan before she searches my face. “Do you know what happens if full-on s-e-x doesn’t happen?”

  I nod. “The guys filled me in.” And they had. Tac, Brax, and Grake had warned me to stay well away from the powder. Because almost immediately after coming into contact with it, women are hit with extreme arousal. They have to have, at the very least, an orgasm—or unbelievable pain follows. If they don’t have sex? Unbelievable (frustrated) irrationality follows.

  “There was more grinding and humping going on than on a Chicago club dance floor on a free PCP night. I had to shout, ‘Only your fingers!’ which—thank fuc-fudge,” she amends, flashing a brief impression of teeth before continuing, “They’d ALL filed their claws down prior to disembarking, the hopeful little bast—”

  She swallows the rest of the word, then shakes her head. “Yeah, that was a good thing, but it’s also a good thing we’re leaving as soon as we can round up supplies, because otherwise we’d be sitting in a tank somewhere with some serious public indecency charges racked up.”

  Gracie grabs the hob’s sleeve as he finishes and asks, “Good?”

  When he nods mechanically, she gruffly assures, “Good man. You’ll be fine.” and she shoves his shoulder roughly to get him to turn and start walking away.

  She grabs at the back of her neck, a scowl still on her face. “These kids. I feel like they’re not ready.”

  I doubt that we’re much older than them, if we are physically older than them at all, but I don’t point that out because I see what she means. This bunch is sure looking a little vulnerable at the moment. “That must have been awkward-fun,” I say.

  “Oh you’ve no idea. Being chased by a mob of sex-starved women was not how I thought I’d be spending my Saturday. We were supposed to have waffles.”

  I laugh. Then I see how serious she looks. “Really?”

  Gracie stares at me like I’m nuts. “We finally make it home, and you don’t want to satisfy your craving for waffles?”

  “I wanted my kids!”

  She shrugs and nods. “Right, but after that… kids need to eat, waffles need to be eaten… hey, by any chance did you pack a waffle maker?”

  CHAPTER 80

  TAC’MOT

  Tara’s sister expresses how ‘Crazy!’ everything seems to her. She adjusts well enough, especially once there are a number of other humans that return to the ship.

  They seem to be quite the social species.

  So I am both gratified and humbled when Tara breaks away from the others in order to find me. Not that I was so very far away, but I kept a polite distance, respecting the females’ need to interact sans other beings.

  I also feel great nerves.

  For how the other aliens will view me, for how the humans will view me, and mostly, for what Tara’s young will think of me.

  Brax has ahold of one, and she is talking to him nonstop, either so rapidly or so garbled that my translator is unable to decipher any of her words. He appears mystified and amused at her diatribe, but he humors her with occasional noises of agreement, which seem to thrill her, making her want to squeeze his nose and call out more foreign words. Unable to communicate. This feels so familiar.

  Tara, arms laden with the other child, reaches me and manages to rise on the tips of her toes, offering her lips up for a kiss.

  I oblige her, and dare to hook my arm around her back, tugging her into me, the youngling now on the far side of her dam, my hand tucked next to her body.

  She peeks around Tara for a closer look at me, and anxiety spots race across my skin for a click before disappearing.

  “Tac?”

  I look down at Tara. “Yes?”

  Her eyes narrow just the slightest fraction, then they soften, and her bottom lip presses into her top one, her lines of eye fur scrunching close and tipping just the slightest bit up. It all happens so quickly I’m having difficulty determining what this micro expression means, but her voice comes out reassuring. “It’s alright. She likes you, you know.”

  I can barely make my eyes turn in the offspring’s direction. “You think so?” I finally manage, but I cringe at the hesitant note that the words take on.

  “Tac, she’s been asking to see the Kangaroo since we got in here.�
��

  I had heard the child’s excited voice repeating that word. My translator provided nothing to match it. “What is a Kangaroo?”

  Tara’s smile is a bit sheepish. “A super, super cute Earth animal.”

  Cute? Super cute?

  I reflexively scratch along my arm, which is essentially just brushing my fingers back and forth, now that Tara has sanded my nail tips so flat and so finely. “She is not afraid of Kangaroos then?”

  Tara looks surprised. “She’s never had a reason to be afraid of one. She’s only ever seen them at a petting zoo, and it was almost as gentle as you are.”

  “Kangaroo!” The youngling says, clearly enunciating the word, as well as clearly following along with the topic of our conversation. She points to me and claps her hands excitedly.

  Baffled, I peer at her, and I’m at least relieved to find I can meet her gaze now. Eyes as soft as her dam’s, there’s no fear, no disgust. In fact, she’s quite beside herself. And… she’s spotted.

  “She has spots too?” I say, shocked.

  Tara looks down at her as if equally surprised to see them there. “Well, yeah. You think I could be covered like this and my kids wouldn’t get at least a couple?”

  “She is wearing more than a couple,” I say seriously, admiring how much this female looks like her dam in this way. It is quite heartwarming. “Is it normal for your kind to display them so early?”

  “Not really,” Tara says, her tone thoughtful. “Genetics play a big role I guess, because most kids don’t get freckles like this until they’ve had a few years in the sun. Sure, my girls love to play outside, but they look like they’ve seen more sun than all of Arizona.”

  At that moment, she wriggles out of her dam’s arms and races around to hold her arms out to… me.

  “It’s okay,” Tara whispers. “Really. She likes you already. You can even pick her up if you feel comfortable.”

  It’s not that I’m afraid to pick her up, it’s only that I’m shocked this female would want me to. Tentatively, I move to reach down, and end up having to catch her as she launches herself as high off the floor as she can.

  ‘As high as she can’ is only about the width of a human hand, and this was so much shorter than her goal that she would have crashed to the floor if I hadn’t been here. As she pats my arms, and pets my knees, then squirms down to race around me to lift, then drop and experimentally poke at my tail, I ask, “Which one is she?”

  Tara covers her face. “I’m so sorry!” She drops her hands. “My brain is fried. “Megan, come here please.”

  Reluctantly, Megan does as she is bid. Tara takes her hand, then finds my hand and meets our palms. “Megan, this is Tac. Tac, meet Megan.”

  I let my back arch over, feeling brave enough to set one hand on the floor for balance, because I know Tara isn’t disgusted, and this tiny female proves my unusual form of mobility is merely more for her to be thrilled over.

  “HI TAC!” she shouts with exuberance and a great volume of enthusiasm.

  I’m about to respond at a more restrained decibel, though I’m so heartened at her welcoming demeanor that my own enthusiasm is overwhelming me, when a weight lands heavily on my back. Cold pinches grip my sides.

  Afraid for Megan who has no immunity to me, I move to hop back, but I see that my skin isn’t spotting up with color. I’m twisting my torso to see what grabbed ahold of me when I hear Brax’s growl.

  “I said, ‘wait’.”

  There is a human on my back.

  She is grimacing and cringing under Brax’s mildly gruff rebuke—that is, until she sees that I’m looking at her.

  Then she forgets about Brax’s existence entirely.

  The pinch over my ribs eases the moment she lifts a hand to pat me on my ears. I twitch with every tiny contact.

  “Simone.”

  This is the voice of her dam. Her tone is also mildly rebuking, and Simone bites her lips, shrinking against my back, her chilly hands once again pinching my skin as she holds on to me.

  Tara explains, “You don’t jump on people, you know better than that.”

  She goes through introductions, but I’m marveling over the fact that Tara considers me ‘people’. Her offspring—sort of—consider me a person.

  And an animal. But at least they don’t look at me as if I am a bringer of disease. I can handle being thought of as super cute animal-person. “It’s very nice to meet you, Simone. Your hands are as cold as you dam’s feet.”

  “And backside,” Brax mutters before he calls, “Here,” and he brings his cupped hands to his mouth, breathing fire on them. Then he takes Simone’s tiny ones between his, and she makes a startled moan and bounces in place.

  Bounces! She bounces!

  I turn a disbelieving gaze on Tara, and find she’s already watching me, her smile broad, and her eyes shining bright with happiness.

  CHAPTER 81

  BRAX

  “Did you know Dohrein is desperate to figure out why you’re doing so well with Tac?”

  I grunt, drawing the backs of my fingers down her side. We are watching the girls play, their exuberant noises barely echoing off anything for as full as the hold is. They race among the crates of cocoa and coffee beans, chasing each other and occasionally requiring us to chase them. This provides us enough moments of alone-time to wish we had alone-time.

  “Want to hear my theory?”

  I nod as I walk my fingers under the hem of her blouse and seek out her breast compressor. This one is lacy. She obtained several decorative ones so that she doesn’t have to nanocleanse the same one every rotation. I am enamored with their different colors, and some of them have a satin sheen, and this one has lace.

  I still want to take it off of her. Unlike her panties. I bite back a groan. I’ve never wanted her to keep on her panties before but these… I groan as I picture them. Satin, lace-edged, and ruffled. When she slid them up her legs this rotation, I wanted to grab her and mount her then and there, and would have, if there hadn’t been a tiny hand pounding the door.

  “I think you’re doing well with Tac because you love him.”

  I rear back from her. “What?”

  Tara laughs uproariously at whatever she sees in my expression.

  Stiffly, I reply, “I’m willing to agree to claim him as a friend now. But let us not go overboard.”

  Even her eyes are grinning. “Let us not do that.”

  I snort smoke in her face.

  “I think you mean ‘admit.’”

  I give her a quizzical look.

  “You said you’d claim him as a friend, but he’s always been your friend. You just needed to admit it. Come on, you know it’s true,” she teases. “Don’t try to argue.”

  If she’s going to spout nonsense I’m not to argue with, then I’ll find other ways to use my mouth. “Grake!”

  His time has been freed up extensively thanks to us being able to afford to replace an engine and fully repair the others. But he’s been spending his free time wooing the colorless sibling. Unlike other hobs, he hasn’t been saving up a collection of gems, because he believed he’d never have the chance to attract a female no matter what bauble he could tempt one’s eye with.

  Tac generously offered his room of branches, but Amy was no more interested in them than Tara was.

  The princesses though… “Take them to the room of sticks.”

  Tiny twin voices instantly admonish me. “You have to say please!”

  Grake crosses his arms, smiling.

  I smile back. With teeth. “Please.”

  I feel the tickle of soft touches along my arms. Feathers. The twins each hold dust collection tools that their dam provided them with when she realized how much fun they could all have.

  Tara turns to offspring. “I could have used you here from the beginning! You two are doing such a good job training him!”

  CHAPTER 82

  TARA

  Any fear Megan had for Brax is long gone. As I watch him playing
with the girls, I think about what he said after he found a nice way to shut me up.

  He can shut me up like that annnnytime.

  I shake myself, grinning like an idiot.

  ‘The pups help too,’ he’d said, his voice gruff. ‘When you’re with Tac, I stay with them.’

  He means he lets them climb on him like he’s a Newfoundland.

  ‘And I don’t obsess then. With the spray, I didn’t feel ill, but it still drove me…’ he’d shaken his head. ‘Now with them to look after, they provide the ample distraction I need, and rearing them takes all my focus.’

  Right now, Megan’s sitting on a pillow, which has been belted down, the buckle of it positioned at his side, like a horse’s saddle cinch. He’s down on his hands and knees, and his head is pulled up, the outward curving ends of his horns grasped firmly in her hands.

  Handlebars. She’s using him like he’s got built-in handlebars.

  When she yanks her left arm down, his head turns hard to the left, and he obligingly crawls in the direction she’s just demanded.

  Meanwhile, Simone is sitting behind her, holding a leather bag on her lap.

  I peer closer, and see it’s his tail. He’s wrapped the bladed end of his tail in a leather bag, and Simone is… she’s holding it like it’s her pet.

  Oh, this guy is so owned.

  I muffle a snicker.

  “Offspring occupy them,” Dohrein breathes. “It’s the offspring!”

  Not realizing he’d snuck up on me, I jump a good foot in the air. Teeth set, I turn to him. “What are the offspring?”

  “Rakhii! It is normal for them to have several fledgling charges to rear in their lifespan: Rakhii are used as nannies and are excellent with children. They’re essentially a protector, playmate, and teething toy for sharp toothed Gryfala & hoblings until it’s time for them to leave the rookery.”

  Teething toy? “Brax said they ‘take his focus’.”

  Dohrein looks thunderstruck. “It can’t be this simple. If they have offspring to raise, they don’t bond.”