Pheromone, page 24
part #1 of For the Love of Aliens Series
Abraxas’ wing-hand slides the translator off his head and puts it on mine, his fingertips tickling my hair. I shiver all over, and he grins at me. The grin fades relatively quickly as he considers how to respond.
“Tusks take your females …” He trails off, and then a word comes out of his mouth that isn’t translated. It’s just him, speaking to me the way he said those few, scant English words before. “Humans.” Another pause. Back to his language again. “They take human females to breed.” His entire face contorts. “They violate them.” He looks at me, and I swallow hard.
All along, he could’ve saved himself by mating with me. At any time, he had the power and the strength to take what he wanted and needed from me to cure himself, and he didn’t. He was willing to die because of an ironclad moral code. He didn’t want that female dragon; he wanted me. That makes me feel so guilty that I could die. What am I going to do?
I curl my knees up and wrap my arms around them.
“I am the lucky one. I have found a lovely female.” That’s what he says. Shit, shit, shit. I hug my legs even tighter as his tail drifts over, the tip of it wrapping around my ankle and giving it a comforting squeeze. “But you are right. Any female Aspis would’ve eaten you.”
I laugh at that. It’s a tad bitter, but hey, I’ve seen firsthand that he’s right.
“No, really?” I ask dryly, wondering if the tone will be lost on him or if he’ll understand. He tilts his head at me again, and I get the idea that this is some sort of pleased response. He only does it when he’s pleasantly curious.
“As far as pets … I have seen humans on jeweled leashes. You would not have liked being a pet.” He says this in such a way that I shiver. There’s subtext there that I don’t care to dig into. Also, wow. He’s well-spoken and smart. I had no idea how deep his intelligence went. My cheeks continue to burn with shame.
We trade the translator, and his long fingers brush mine. My entire body wakes up, and I make a small sound that causes him to grin at me again. I can’t decide if that’s a real expression of his or something that he picked up from watching me. I would not be surprised if it were.
“What are the weird, uh, slug things?” I gesture randomly and uselessly around my head. He seems to like that, scooting closer to me. My body burns with his nearness, but I don’t acknowledge it. But damn, I want him again. I could go all night. “When I was at the market, I saw this big, gelatinous thing eat one of the other humans whole.”
Headset swap. He blinks at me with those beautiful eyes, and I find my fingers itching to touch his horns.
“You may touch me, female.” He sounds beyond amused. Also, apparently, he can read my mind. My eyes go wide, and my skin blazes pink with embarrassment. “I see you change color when you are embarrassed. How odd.”
“I’m not embarrassed,” I scoff, knowing he can’t understand me and not caring. I sweep my hair back, breasts thrust out for his perusal. I don’t even care. Seriously. I’m a mature adult woman. Not a problem to sit here naked with his cum between my legs. Nope. “Ugh, I would kill for a hair tie.”
I snap my fingers and put the translator on his head.
“Wait right here.”
I can feel his eyes on me as I pad over to his dragon horde room, spotting a cord right away that I can use. I tie up my hair with it and then snatch a hide from the nest, coming to sit back by the fire with it wrapped around my shoulders. If I sit a little closer to him than before, so what? He said I could touch him, didn’t he?
I take the translator back.
“The slug creature,” he says finally, as if he’s been considering it while I was gone. “I do not know what they call themselves. We call them Pests. They eat everything. They eat Aspis.” He turns his bejeweled eyes from the fire to my face. “I am grateful you were not eaten.”
That makes me laugh. I clap a hand over my mouth. This time, when I need to give him the translator, I scoot even closer and slip it onto his head, my fingertips lingering on the sides of his face. I trace the spot where I know his mouth is, from one side of his head to the other. He has small holes beneath his horns that I figure must be his ears. I delicately trace my fingers around them, and he shudders, spikes raising up along the length of his neck and spine, from the crown of his head all the way down to the tip of his tail. His scales ruffle, too, a bit like a bird’s feathers.
“Who is that moth dude?” I ask after regretfully drawing my hands back to my lap. “The one who challenged you with some spiel about imperial authority.” I swallow the strangest feeling down my throat, this odd sense of … something that happened when the moth guy and I looked at each other. It was weird. “When I first arrived on this planet, I was with five other people. Moth Guy, he came and purchased a female. And then he licked blood off of her, and took her away. I heard her screaming.”
When I take the translator back this time, Abraxas makes a chuffing sound that has my stomach twisting into a pretzel. I … oh my fucking God, I really like this guy. How? Why? The universe has never been so cruel as this.
“Ah. They call themselves the Vestalis. We call them hypocritical fools. They claim they will clean up our planet, force the monsters away. They never do.” Abraxas turns to me and huffs my hair, making it ruffle around my head with his warm breath. It’s so oddly affectionate that I don’t know what to make of it. He seems to really be taking this mate thing seriously. If he gave me … if he gave me those spirals from his penis, how is he going to get another mate? What have I done?
Saved his life, that’s what.
“Do not worry, female. If he tasted her blood, then it is because she is his mate. The Vestalis do not get to choose their mates. Blood sings. It calls them. He will not hurt her.” He waits for me to hand the translator back, but I’m … I’m fucking speechless. I yank it off my head with a strange, sick fear in my chest. He takes it gingerly and uses the adjustable headband to put it on.
“What if … so you’re saying that whoever’s blood he eats, that’s his mate?” I pile on some more questions before we trade the translator. “Like, how are they mates? What does that mean exactly?”
Abraxas is clearly picking up on my panic. He folds his wings around me, and I feel so protected and seen in that moment that I want to scream.
If I stay here, I will never see my mother again. I won’t argue over golf with my dad. I won’t have lunch with my sisters. I’ll never get to see my little brother get married. I won’t ever eat cake. I won’t see chocolate let alone eat it. No wine. No hamburgers. No once-a-year cigars on Christmas. I won’t ever see another movie. I won’t ever read another book. No more fried chicken on a Friday night. Never be a homeowner. Never have a child.
I shove all of those fears into a box and slam the lid shut.
“Once he tastes her blood, he cannot choose another mate. He will die of a broken heart.” Aha. I see. This is where we are again. I can’t help but wonder if something very, very important is getting lost in translation. “But were she to be separated from him, she will be fine. It does not work both ways as it does with the Aspis.”
I push the translator onto him, heart pounding. If that stupid moth prince … well, at least that’s a relief. I mean, for me it is. Avril got the short end of the stick, eh? She was covered in my blood, and I’d been freshly wiped down, but … oh dear.
The moth man’s black eyes. Those fucking eyes. They cut right through me.
I bite my lip hard enough to make it bleed.
Abraxas leans forward and sweeps his long tongue over my mouth, obliterating my poor brain. I give him the translator back and he takes it, somewhat reluctantly it seems.
“How will we die of broken hearts? I don’t understand that.”
Headset swap again.
“When Aspis mates are separated, they die. It is without fail. It cannot be undone.” He seems upset, so I don’t press my luck. Swap.
“Don’t look at me like you think that I think … you’re not a mistake.” I tell him that with the translator parked firmly beside his horns, and I exhale, knowing that I am digging myself into a very deep, very troubling hole. I banish thoughts of the moth. If he dies, that’s his problem. He’s the idiot that ate the wrong girl’s blood. Or … the idiot that purchased the wrong girl. Maybe the blood was right? Gah. Shit. “If I had to go back and make that decision a million times over, I would save you every time.”
I’m terrified to hear that I actually mean what I’m saying. Abraxas is noble and intelligent, beautiful and strong. I … losing a creature … a man like this, that would be a blow to the entire galaxy. Assuming we’re in the same galaxy. Wait, what even is a galaxy? Like, scientifically? I have no clue.
I clear my throat when he sits up and curls around me, gargoyle style, so that I’m essentially sitting in his lap. He slips the translator from his head and gently pushes it across the floor with his tail, so that it’s out of reach.
Every molecule in my body reacts to his presence.
Thank God that Zero is blind. I can feel her cursor blinking aggressively at my back.
She’s going to know after this conversation that I’m full of shit.
“Female.” He snarls this in my ear, and it’s a word I can understand coming directly from his lips. His tail wraps my waist, and he lifts me up, hovering my naked body over his hard cock. His entire body pulses and glows from behind me, those beautiful shadows shimmering and dancing against my skin.
He slides me onto him, all the way down until my ass meets his pelvis.
Holy crap. I’m in big trouble. I am in so much trouble.
Because, suddenly, weirdly, the last thing in the world that I want to do is leave.
Yep. It’s the sex thing. And I have just walked myself right into an intergalactic thirst trap.
When I crack my sex-hooded eyelids open, I see that Abraxas is in the doorway with a cloth sack in hand. He drops it on the floor and then snatches me up with his tail, bringing me right up to his face.
“You’ve got to stop doing that,” I grumble, sleep-choked and disoriented. He licks my face and neck, nuzzling me and waking my body up with a bright, hot burst of arousal. “I’m not a doll.”
He’s not wearing the translator and neither am I.
He doesn’t take it with him either when he turns and stands up in human form, strapping me to his back. I ignore Zero’s glare (however imaginary it might be) as we move past her screen, and then Abraxas is leaping off the ship and into the grass. He lands with a crouch and then rumbles with pleasure at the surprised sound I make.
I’m so fucking embarassed to be naked out here, even if I know that nobody’s going to come up on us. Or … if they do, it’s Bad News Bears for them, isn’t it? My new fuckbuddy is a powerhouse predator. A weird sense of pride fills my chest, but I bat it away. I told myself that I’d use today to really sit and think, try to parse my thoughts and figure out what to do next.
Doesn’t seem to be the case.
We’re going on a field trip.
“Where are we going?” I ask, throwing my arms over his shoulders. He pauses where he is, and the spikes on his spine raise up, poking me in the chest and belly. He scoots me to the side of his back, but I have to say, they didn’t hurt. I actually liked the feel of them. Yep. I have officially lost my fucking mind. This is what I get for mocking Jane’s alien romance novels. This is the universe’s true irony.
I am the last person in the world that should be here. I have a large, loving family. I own a business. I love my life. I have the bestest best friend that ever lived. So what the fuck is all this? I’m sure there are women who would love to be where I am. I just so happen to be somebody that was happy on Earth, and I have a hell of a lot to lose if I never go back there.
I wrap my hands together around Abraxas’ neck, and I can tell that he’s pleased. He keeps trying to get me to touch him more, to explore his body, to cuddle and pet and rub and … I don’t know what to make of it. I am not someone that ever would’ve used the word ‘commitment’ on myself. One word that I would use on myself is TSTL—too stupid to live. That’s what I’m like sometimes. I once jumped off a dam into shallow water for a five dollar bet. Broke my clavicle.
I rub absently at the old wound as we continue walking.
I’m extremely exposed, all sexed up and naked with no less than four of Abraxas’ orgasms between my legs. It’s all over the furs, too, and after he put in so much work for laundry day.
He growls at me, and I know that he’s responding to my question in his own language. Whether or not he’s picking up on my words, I don’t know. But being here with him without the translator makes me remember how foreign and strange he seemed to me during those first few days.
Abraxas strolls the woods like they belong to him. I suppose, all things considered, they do. Who the fuck would mess with this guy? He even killed that aggressive female. He saved me from being eaten. From being kidnapped. Thrice.
Somehow, my rebellious arms squeeze a little tighter around his neck, and he chuffs at me again. My nipples turn to rocks against his back, and I wish that we’d brought the translator so I could, um, explain some of my anatomy to him—and vice versa.
Not that … not that it really matters. Because I cannot fucking stay here. I grit my teeth, and he pauses, like he can sense the sudden shift in my mood. I stroke my fingers down the, for lack of a better word, mane on his head. It looks a bit like hair from afar, but up close like this, it’s easy to see that it’s made up of tiny spikes, like the ones on his back. It falls from his head to his shoulder blades.
Just petting him is enough.
He takes me off his back with his tail and puts me on the ground in front of him. We face each other, and I have to crane my neck up, up, up to his face. He puts both of his massive hands on my head, and my heart leaps. Oh God, no. He’s going to kiss me again.
His tongue sweeps my mouth before prying my lips apart, stroking my own tongue with long, velvety sweeps. Ah, and the way he grips my head, I just … I can’t with this guy. I push back against his chest, but he doesn’t let me get very far. His eyes peer so deeply into mine that I feel like he can see all the lies and the bullshit that I’m carrying around. Guilt swamps me, and I feel like such a stupid asshole that I don’t know what to do.
I mean, I often feel like a stupid asshole—I am sort of an asshole all the time—but this is on a whole new level for me. It’s like I’m stringing this guy along.
“Where are we going?” I repeat, trying to gesture the sentence out with body language that he still doesn’t understand because he’s not a human fucking being. He’s an alien. He doesn’t even share universal things like crying or laughing.
Seems like he has no trouble smirking though. Because I swear to God that’s exactly what he’s doing when he sweeps past me, snatching me up by the tail again and putting me on his back. We walk through the massive trees in silence, snippets of sunshine kissing the forest floor. I see birds in colors I didn’t even know existed, snails that glow as Abraxas steps over them, and even another kiyo that takes off like a deer when we startle it.
My stomach rumbles and Abraxas pauses. He growls something out that might mean hey, don’t worry about breakfast, I got this. Or maybe that’s just what I want him to say. He starts walking again. After a while, he drops down to all fours, extending his front claws, and continues on like that. His anatomy is honestly incredible—not just his dicks though—and I find myself surprised that he can so easily transition between walking on two legs and four legs, like both things are equally natural.
I try to look over the side of him so that I can study his back legs. Something about the way they bend makes it possible. My eyes drift up to his ass, visible when he thrashes his tail to one side or the other. Shit. This is what Jane would say: “This alien has award-winning man cheeks, my friend.” She’d be right.
“I am capable of walking, you know,” I tell him, but he ignores me. When I lean forward and grab onto his horns, he snarls at me with such ferocity that I almost come. I swear. Right on his back with no stimulation at all. I can’t resist running my palms up and down the curved lengths, collecting that sweet stickiness on my skin. It hits me like a drug, making me wonder in the back of my mind how much of my attraction comes from within, and how much is because of these pheromones.
The next time he takes me off his back with his tail, I’m put flat on my back and mounted. I use the stickiness on my hands to touch my breasts, and he pauses long enough to watch, to observe the way I pull and twist my own nipples. My wrists are grabbed with his wing-hands and slammed into the ground. He uses the other set of hands to cup the heavy weights of my tits, growling things under his breath that I somehow recognize as separate, individual words even if I don’t know what they mean.
I arch my hips against him, shameless. We’re just randomly on the ground in the middle of the woods, but … who’s going to care? There’s nobody here. A rush of wild freedom flickers through me. What must it be like to live here? I could do anything. Be anybody. Abraxas would take care of me, and I wouldn’t want for a goddamn thing.
Except my family. Except stadium concerts (just not Tabbi’s) with a lightstick in hand. Except the croissants that I only bake for people I love because they’re too good to share with snooty rich clients. Except for binge-watching good TV.
Ugh.
I shut those thoughts down for a final time.
I won’t worry about any of that crap until … tomorrow. Tomorrow is when I’ll deal with reality. For now, I’m somehow part of a mated pair with an alien dragon who knows how to fuck and isn’t ashamed to just do it. I take a note from his book, and I go wild. I push and grind against him, and he loves it. Oh, the sounds he makes are so much better without the translator getting in my way. I don’t even need to know what any of it means because I understand this part of him like I’ve known him forever.
