by Jenny Foster
The Alien
Mail-Order Bride
A SciFi Fantasy Romance
Short Story
Jenny Foster
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The characters, places, and events portrayed in this book are completely fiction and are in no way meant to represent real people or places.
Warning: Only for readers 18+
Copyright © Jenny Foster
Dear Readers,
I am so pleased that you have joined my readers’ list.
I welcome you as a reader and want to surprise you with a short story to express my thanks to you for making my dream of becoming a writer come true.
I hope you enjoy this story!
Yours truly,
Jenny Foster
About this Romance Short Story
Zavir Tharok is a man who knows only one goal.
The preservation of his race.
He is cold.
He is strong-willed.
Above all, he is determined never to give up.
To minimize his effort, he orders women from Earth, for himself and his men, instead of abducting them. These women know what awaits them and will not put up any resistance.
After all, the goal is not to woo women with sweet words, but to make them the mothers of the next generation.
But one woman on board tests his cold attitude.
Sally Smith is playing both sides of the fence, and is pushing his legendary self-control to the limit...
Chapter 1
The Arrival
Chapter 2
The Decision
Chapter 3
One Night
Chapter 4
The Betrayal
Chapter 5
The Truth
Chapter 6
The Way
The Captive - Preview
Chapter 1
The Arrival
Sally Smith had to admit that her first evening on board the Cyrac was not what she had expected. She had reckoned with anything, from a communal sleeping hall and bad food, to treatment that was reminiscent of herding livestock, rather than the arrival of 150 mail-order brides. But these strange Zevkorians, who had looked for genetically compatible women on Earth, with authorization from the highest levels, did things in style.
Every one of them had a single room with an adjoining bath, and dinner had consisted of three delicious courses. Apparently, the aliens had gathered information about the eating habits of women from Earth, ahead of time, because they didn’t serve anything that you couldn’t have found on a menu in a restaurant on Earth.
The only thing was, that the examples the chef used, were obviously continental, and a few hundred years old, at that. Snails and frog legs were probably delicacies in France in the past, but had not been on any menu in the Pan-American States for several hundred years.
When Sally looked at the creatures, she wasn’t surprised that France had gone down, so gloriously, in one of the European Wars. You just couldn’t take men, who enjoyed eating crawlers, seriously as soldiers.
Just like Sally, most of the women had politely pushed the appetizer around on their plates with their forks, and had sighed with relief when the next course was served. It was noodles with tomato sauce, and the plates had been licked clean faster than you could blink. Sally looked around and eyed her fellow travelers, whom she had met for the first time, today. Most of them seemed to be excited and not overly nervous.
Contrary to Sally, many of them were extremely skinny, bordering on malnourished, which didn’t surprise her, given the shortage of food on Earth.
Sally was definitely the exception with her curves, she thought, annoyed. This was something that neither she, nor Captain Jack, had thought of at the briefing. She could not expect a man to think of such a supposedly small thing, but she should have thought of it. Sally had gone over everything with the captain countless times: which clothing would be best for her cover identity as a typist, if she should change her name, and she had even taken a course in stenography, just in case the aliens wanted to get an idea of her skills. Her figure showed that she had held a well-paying job, in contrast, for example, to the woman sitting next to her. She was pretty and the combination of warmth, food and the drink in front of her gave her features a much needed hint of rosiness. Almost all of the women had the pale complexion humans get when they have spent the majority of their lives underground. None of them talked to the other women seated next to them. All were much too occupied with the food they were being served.
When the sound of scraping spoons finally went silent, and they had all eaten their dessert, a strange hush fell over the great hall. It felt as if they were all waking up from a dream they were dreaming together. They looked around shyly and some even started quiet conversations. The woman on her right was a very young girl, who introduced herself as Melanie and asked Sally why she had made herself available to the aliens as a mail-order bride.
“I … well, I had an affair with my boss,” Sally began.
“You don’t have to talk about it, if you don’t want to,” Melanie interrupted her, but in a nice way. “I understand.” The pretty blonde’s sad expression spoke volumes. Everyone here probably had the same story to tell, more or less; dealing with being dumped and with loneliness. Everyone, that is, except herself, whose story was nothing but a lie.
She needed to pull herself together. Doubts about her assignment were counterproductive and would only lead to failure. She had promised Captain Jack that she would return with a DNA sample from the aliens at the conclusion of her assignment. The sample would bring about the beginning of a new era for humanity.
“Have you seen any of the alien men yet?” Sally asked and looked around. “I would love to know if what they say is true.”
Melanie blushed. She had also heard the rumors. “They are supposed to be good-looking,” she whispered dreamily. “But the thing that scares me a little is the other thing. You know. The thing about how they change into animals when they are having sex with a woman …”
Sally briefly wondered if she could confide the truth about the supposed animals to Melanie, or was this the kind of knowledge that she, an alleged secretary, would definitely not be privy to. However, her thoughts were interrupted, when the doors suddenly opened and the sound of marching boots filled the room. The women who were sitting with their backs to the door turned around. They all, Sally included, took in a sharp breath and froze.
The alien men marched into the hall at a brisk pace, and in tight formation. Sally’s first thought was a breathless “Wow,” closely followed by panic. How could she have ever thought that it would be child’s play to deceive these men? Not only did they look breathtaking, but they also looked alert and clever, all at once. Her heart began to race when her gaze fell on the man who was leading the alien men. He towered head and shoulders over even the other aliens, but it wasn’t his height that took her breath away. He had presence, Sally thought and realized that she couldn’t take her eyes off of him. He dominated his men, the women, the room – just everything. The lump in her throat got bigger. Hopefully, he wouldn’t notice her. She might be able to wrap one of his men around her finger. They certainly instilled awe in her. Under his watchful gaze, however, she doubted she would have a chance to gather the DNA without being noticed, and then to make her way back to Earth in a rescue pod.
Sally only had a few seconds to think about this, because he was coming closer.
And closer.
She hardly noticed that his men had each started taking
up positions behind a single woman’s chair. Now that he was approaching her, quickly, Sally noticed further details of his appearance, and she started to get a funny feeling in the pit of her stomach. His green and slightly slanted eyes looked for hers and found them. The rush of adrenaline that coursed through her body almost made her jump up from her chair. His face had many sharp angles, but they all combined to make the most handsome face Sally had ever seen. His wide mouth with its sensual lips seemed to be the only soft thing, and she wondered how those lips would feel on hers.
He closed the distance to her chair in two strides, and if she didn’t want to dislocate her neck, like a schoolgirl in love, she would have to stop staring at him, RIGHT NOW, and not wait until he was right behind her.
Why would he not take his eyes off hers? She thought she could read a silent challenge in those green eyes, and suddenly, Sally was sure that he knew. She grew hot, and then ice cold. She needed to escape, right now, and not wait until he … and then everyone around her stopped moving. Sally looked carefully to her left and right, out of the corners of her eyes, but he wasn’t there. That could only mean one thing. The man who was the leader of these troops was standing directly behind her.
She felt the heat rising off his body, behind her, and tried desperately to still her racing heart. His hands were resting on the back of her chair, and she scooted up to avoid his touch.
“Welcome aboard the Cyrac, ladies.”
His voice gave her goosebumps up and down her arms. The combination of the deep, silky-smooth voice and the harshness, with which he rolled his Rs, burned itself into her memory. He looked exactly as his voice sounded: tough, dominant, but with a hidden soft side. Any woman would have sold her soul just to have the chance to coax it to light.
“My name is Captain Zavir Tharok, and I am here to ensure that your three-month journey to Zevkoria is a safe one.”
What did he mean by that? Sally had no time to think about it, because he was already continuing. “The man who is standing behind you, now, is the companion who has been assigned to you. He will be at your side for the next three months, until we reach our destination.”
It took a few seconds for his words to sink in and for her to understand what she had gotten herself into, with this assignment. Now she had two possibilities: give up and return to Earth as a failure, or follow through with the assignment until the bitter end, and go home with the DNA in her luggage.
Giving up was out of the question. Even if it meant that she would have to fight off the alien man’s advances with violence.
Chapter 2
The Decision
At first, a tense silence prevailed in the hall. It felt like Sally wasn’t the only one who was irritated by the direct and seemingly almost brutal approach of the Zevkorians. She exchanged a look with Melanie, who looked even more scared than Sally felt. She leaned forward, took the other woman’s hand and squeezed.
“They do not mate in their dragon state,” she whispered. “I heard this from a reliable source. You don’t need to be afraid.”
The last few words got stuck in her throat. What was meant to be a small comfort, obviously had the opposite effect. The young woman paled, her eyes rolled back in her head, and her head fell forward. Sally pulled her plate to the side, but the alien who had been assigned to her was faster. He leaned forward, grabbed Melanie by the waist from behind and picked her up as if she weighed nothing. Sally wanted to push her chair back so she could stand up, but two hands landed promptly on her shoulders, keeping her in place. Before Sally could say anything, the young warrior had buried the unconscious Melanie in his chest, and after exchanging a look with his boss, carried her out.
Zavir Tharok’s grip loosened and Sally took the opportunity to wriggle out from behind the table so she could stand next to him.
“Where is he taking her?” she asked the captain and tried to return his hot-cold look without blinking. He really was tall, she thought.
“To their joint quarters, of course,” he answered.
His voice no longer had a smooth undertone. The silk was gone, replaced by harshness. He crossed his arms in front of his broad chest, a move that made her notice his well-defined muscles.
“Not that it’s any of your business, woman,” he said and tilted his head, as if she were an interesting research subject. “She belongs to him and he will take care of her.”
Sally gulped dryly.
This was not a very good start, but she would not let herself be intimidated. Once the Zevkorians had become used to the fact that they could order the women from Earth around - something that was probably customary in their culture - it would be too late to do anything about it. It would be better if she earned the necessary respect right away and made it clear to him that she would never be his damned property. So, she did the same thing he had done, and crossed her arms in front of her chest. His eyes traced her every move and rested for a moment on her ample bosom.
“She is young and probably terrified,” she said and puffed her chest up, a move that was not meant to be a provocative display of her feminine charms, but to make herself feel more confident. “When she wakes up and finds herself alone with this …,” she bit her tongue. She had almost said “barbarian.” “… heavily muscled guy, she will be scared. He will be nice to her, won’t he?” She looked at him, with equal measures of defiance and pleading.
“You don’t need to worry about her.” Zavir’s eyes changed while he was talking. His round pupils grew longer until they were just black slits in the middle of his dark green eyes. His close relation to a reptile was further emphasized by the fact that his eyes were darting about much faster than any human’s eyes could. He seemed to be able to see everything that was going on around her, without actually taking his eyes off her for a second.
His expression told her that any objection was useless.
It probably didn’t make any sense right now to harp on about cultural differences and to introduce the topic of equality. But, he wasn’t done yet. “Maybe you should have thought it through before you confronted her with the truth about our race.” So, Zavir also had acute hearing, in addition his impressive body. His senses were probably a hundred times better than hers were. No wonder the scientists on Earth were so determined to get their hands on the alien-dragon shifters’ genes.
“I don’t understand why you Zevkorians didn’t put all the cards on the table. The more the women you bought know about you, the faster they will get used to you. I was just trying to ease her fear, that’s all.” She shrugged, trying to look relaxed.
Zavir turned until he was not standing next to her anymore, but was right in front of her, instead. Only a few inches separated Sally from this mountain of flesh and blood. God only knew what color his blood was. “Did you ever consider that the women might have come with you of their own free will if you …”
“Enough, woman,” the captain snarled and looked down at her with narrowed eyes. “You will come with me now, so we can have a little chat.”
Her heart skipped a beat. Zavir smiled, showing two rows of bright white teeth. Could he hear how loudly her heart was beating right now, or was her fear making her imagine it? “Resistance is futile. Unless you want to put the fear of God into the rest of the women, Sally Smith.” The smile disappeared from his features when he growled her name, rather than said it.
She glanced at her fellow travelers, or should she call the women her fellow sufferers? Some had stood up and were walking through the room, on the arm of their dragon man. Others were enjoying the view of the universe through the picture window, and some couples were already leaning over their leftover dessert, heads close to each other in intimate togetherness. Unbelievable! Didn’t these women have any self-respect? They were throwing themselves into the arms of the first mountain of muscles who signaled that he wanted to be intimate. The only reason any of them were on board the spaceship, was because they had been bought in order to produce offspring. They were nothing but c
atalog brides!
She must have been thinking for too much too long, or hesitated half a second too long, because the next thing she knew, two strong hands were grabbing her and pulling her towards him. With one smart move, he threw her over his broad shoulders. Her protests went unheard, and he didn’t even seem to notice her kicking legs. That, or he was just ignoring them. All of the other women either weren’t paying any attention to her, or they were looking at her with mild astonishment.
Sally heard the doors open automatically. Zavir picked up the pace and fell into a slight jog, which made her head bang against his muscle-packed, hard back. “Put me down right now! This is humiliating!” She started using her fists, drumming them against his backside, which was … no. She would not admire the view of the firm ass of the man who was carrying her off, like captured prey.
He stopped abruptly, and her nose banged painfully against his muscles one last time. Slowly, Zavir put her down. Her painful nose came to a stop right at the point where his tight shirt revealed some naked skin. Sally closed her eyes and forgot for a moment who was holding her against him and whose scent she was breathing in with pleasure. When her feet finally met the floor, she reminded herself of her mission and the captain’s arrogance, but especially that she wanted to go back to Earth as soon as possible.
Zavir’s hands were still on her waist. Then his hands wandered down to her hips, inch by inch, cupping her curves and pulling her even closer to him. The words “stop that” died on Sally’s lips, and before she could pull herself together to put an end to his fondling, Zavir stepped back and put his thumb on the door scanner.
Sally moaned to herself. The scanner was yet another obstacle that she would have to overcome. Surely, the area with the escape pods was secured against unauthorized entry in the same way. Well, she would find a way to make her escape. After all, Sally hadn’t been recruited into the secret service for no reason. She still had many tricks up her sleeve.