Mail Order Mom, page 19
I smiled, feeling all warm and gooey inside. “It feels so good to be back, you guys.”
“We need to have a celebration,” Illal declared.
Xavran raised an eyebrow ridge. “A celebration?”
“Ooh, yes! A party!” The boys jumped around us.
“What for?” Xavran shook his head.
“Well, we have a few reasons. We made it back from the desert in one piece.” I counted off on my fingers. “You’re coming home next week...”
“Mara is gone,” Ene added, matching my tone of voice while sticking out a finger.
“Um...” I glanced at her. “Is that really a cause for celebration?”
Ene blanched, but Illal nodded. “Yeah, I couldn’t stand her whining about how terrible Diria was.”
“Diria is nice.” Ivex shrugged. “Mara just doesn’t like the same things we do.”
The kids had been paying attention all along, it seemed.
“A party it is then,” Xavran conceded.
Ene furrowed her forehead, pressing her lips together. “Except that no one would come.”
“Oh, right.” Illal nodded. “Kessra is having a party next week too.”
“We can have ours the week after,” I suggested. “Maybe the weekend before your dad goes back to work?” I glanced at Xavran.
“I’m planning to change my schedule a bit,” he announced. “I’ve decided to share the job with another captain.”
“What does that mean?” I asked.
He grinned at me. “That means I’d work for only half a month, then be at home for the other half. That’ll give me more time to spend with the children.” He leaned my way, lowering his voice a bit. “And you.”
His face was so close to mine, it was all I could do not to steal a kiss from him. I refrained only for the sake of the children.
“That’s wonderful.” I smiled at him. “You see, guys, we can have the party the week after Kessra’s. Your father will still be home.”
The excitement appeared to have evaporated from the girls, though.
“What’s the matter?” I asked.
Illal made a long face. “Kessra’s parties are the best. No one will want to come to ours after hers.”
“Nonsense! There can never be too many parties.” I propped my hands on my hips. “Besides, who said hers are the best?”
“Everyone,” the boys drawled in unison.
I sat on the bed, getting down to their eye level. “Listen. I promise we’ll have a party like no one in Diria has ever seen before. Everyone will come because no one will want to miss it.”
“Really?”
I smiled with confidence.
“I may not have many talents. I can’t put an outfit together as brilliantly as Mara or make the cauldron dinner as delicious as your father, but there is one thing I’m really, really good at. I can throw a fantastic party. You’ll see. It’ll be truly out of this world.”
Chapter 24
SUSANNA
“Tired?” Xavran asked me when we’d finally calmed down the kids enough to put them back in their beds.
“A little.” I stifled a yawn.
I was exhausted, but not enough to fall asleep right away. A part of me—the very horny part—really wished to give Xavran the chance to get me out of my clothes as he’d wished for back in the desert.
“Let’s get you to bed then.” He wrapped an arm around my shoulders, turning left.
“My room is that way.” I pointed right.
“But your bed is this way.” He gestured to the left, in the direction of the captain’s suite. “I’m not letting you out of my sight anymore.”
“Do you have more than one bed in your bedroom?” I teased, allowing him to lead me toward his suite.
“No. But the one I have is big enough for two.”
“I’m too filthy for a bed.” I shook my skirt, sending a shower of sand to the floor.
“Then I’ll give you a bath. Though, I hope it won’t make you any less filthy in all the ways that matter.”
I couldn’t hold back a giggle as we entered his suite. “You are determined to get me out of these clothes, I see.”
“I’ve never made a secret out of that. I’ve liked you naked from the very first time I saw you without your clothes. You looked gorgeous, naked and dripping wet. I’ve been dreaming about that ever since.”
I giggled again, thinking back to me running from the fish in the tub the very first night I came to Aldrai.
In the bathroom, he unbuttoned my sundress, then slid the straps off my shoulders, taking the bra straps with them. Slowly, as if savoring the moment, he freed my breasts from the bra cups.
He sat on the edge of the tub, then drew me closer between his legs.
“Something I’ve been dying to do.” He dragged his tongue over my nipple, then sucked it into his mouth. A rumble resonated through his chest as he rolled the hardened bud between his teeth.
“Ohh...” I exhaled, pressing my breast into his mouth.
Desire flickered and burned, banishing the tiredness completely. Need for him flared through me anew. I slid my hand between us, finding his hardness through his clothes.
“I want you, Xavran,” I rubbed him through his pants.
With a low groan, he yanked my bra and the dress down to my waist. A shower of sand spilled to the floor from my clothes.
“Oh no!” I slapped a hand over my mouth, unsure whether to laugh or feel mortified.
“Bath,” he growled, shoving all my clothes, including the underwear, down my hips and legs.
Lifting me over the edge, he deposited me into the tub. The inside of it was laid with stone tiles, giving the tub the look and feel of the carved rock basins we had in Xavran’s home.
I lay back, stretching in the warm water.
Not taking his eyes off me, Xavran opened the closures at his shoulders, then yanked his coverall down his body and stepped out of his boots.
The pile of sand from our clothes on the floor grew bigger.
“It looks like we brought half of the desert back with us,” I chuckled.
He didn’t smile, tossing his clothes aside.
I managed to catch but a glimpse of his strong, muscled thighs, with his long, thick erection bobbing in the front, before he raised his leg and stepped into the tub with me. I sat upright, and he got down on his knees, straddling my legs.
He took a jar from the stand nearby. “I don’t have the soap that women use to wash their hair, but this should work.”
He scooped some of the pearly white paste from the jar, lathered it between his palms, then gently massaged it into my hair.
“Let’s rinse it off.” Holding my head, he lowered me backwards into the water, washing the suds out of my hair.
Only my face remained above the water, my head submerged past my ears. He lowered his head to kiss me. I gasped, afraid to go under, and hooked my arms around his neck.
He chuckled against my lips. “I won’t let you go.”
“Promise?”
“Promise.” He kissed me.
I ran my hands down his torso, feeling every hard ridge and rise of his strong body.
Sand still clung to both of us.
“Let me...” I took some of the paste from the jar, then lathered him with it, from the tips of his horns down to his waist, as the rest of him remained under the water.
I tried to rinse him off by splashing over his chest, but he just laughed.
“It’s easier this way.” Grabbing me around my waist, he flipped us over, sinking completely under, including his face.
I lay on his chest. His erection pressing against my stomach.
Taking hold of the horns on the side of his head, I lifted his face out of the water. He opened his eyes, dark as the Aldraian night in the desert. They were deep, still a bit mysterious, but the look in them wasn’t intimidating, not at all. Warm and beckoning, it drew me in.
“My turn,” I whispered, lowering my mouth to his.
The fragrance of the soap rose from the tub. Weariness drained from me as my muscles relaxed. Arousal swirled through every cell of my body.
Not breaking the kiss, Xavran leaned back against the edge of the tub. His hands traveled down my back, a finger slipping between my legs. When he moved his hands up my sides, I realized that wasn’t a finger caressing me, but his tail. The tip of it twirled around my opening, slipping in and out.
With a soft gasp, I sat back.
Xavran flashed me a cheeky smile. “Should I put it away?”
I rocked my hips against the tail. It flicked the throbbing bud above my opening, spiking my arousal.
“No...” I panted. “Keep it... Please.”
The tail wiggled its way back. Needing more contact, I pressed my core to the ridge of his erection.
“Susanna...” he groaned, arching his back to rub himself against me.
I rocked on my bent knees, water splashing around us and out of the tub. He sat up, the tip of his hard length pressing against me.
“I need you,” he rasped.
I wiggled my hips, easing his sizable girth inside me. The spongy bumps along his length tugged at my opening with a delicious sensation spreading through me.
“So good,” I moaned, gripping the horns on his shoulders.
Tossing his head back, he groaned, sliding deeper. Eased by the slick liquid produced by the bumps, his thick shaft stretched me in a most delightful way. I rose, then sank back down on my knees, enjoying the tight slide of him inside me.
His tail slipped further back, caressing up and down between my butt cheeks.
“More?” he asked, with that crooked half-smile of his.
“What do you mean by more?” I exhaled, still waiting for my body to fully adjust around the massive dick buried inside me. I couldn’t possibly take anything bigger than that.
He twirled the tip of his tail around my back opening.
“Ooh,” I murmured in understanding.
The images from the sex video I’d watched rose in my mind. Aldraian tails made double-play possible with just one man for a partner.
I moved my hips from side to side, shifting back a little to meet his tail.
“Well, come in then.” I bit my lip, trying not to squirm too much as the tip inched inside me through the orifice I’d only ever used once or twice during sex before.
“How does it feel?” Xavran asked, stalling the progress of his tail. He appeared to hold his breath.
“How sensitive are Aldraian tails?” I asked in turn.
He blew out a breath, only to still his breathing again. “Very... Very sensitive.”
“Good.” I smiled, rocking my hips into him again, to shove both of his appendages deeper inside me.
I felt so incredibly full. Excitement coursed through me, heating my blood with desire. This was like fulfilling a fantasy I never knew I had.
“Susanna,” he roared, gripping my sides. “I...”
I couldn’t reply. Pleasure spread through me, hot and thick, robbing me of words and thoughts as he pumped into me from both ends. I arched my back, making our bodies connect at just the right angle for me.
Pressure built between my legs until it exploded into the blinding fireworks of an orgasm. It rocked through me with an intensity I’d never experienced before.
I pressed my forehead to his, riding the waves of my climax. With another hard thrust, he came, too, pumping his release into me.
Draped over him, I was catching my breath as he leaned back into the water again. A wide, satisfied smile spread across his face—an expression of utter bliss.
“Was this the best sex you’ve had in the past decade?” I teased.
“It was the best in my life, my heart,” he replied. “The best in my entire life.”
Chapter 25
SUSANNA
Two weeks later.
“Ready?” Xavran poked his head into our bedroom in his home in Diria.
“Yes.” I smoothed my hands down my paisley-print maxi dress.
Its loose fit not only kept me cool in the warm weather on Aldrai, it also hadn’t required any alteration when I bought it. All tight-fitting clothes for women on Aldrai had three pairs of darts, tailored to accommodate six pairs of breasts, which left me with four useless bumps in the front. When buying ready-to-wear clothing, I always looked for something loose and flowy for that reason.
“Come.” Xavran took my hand. “Arkrel and Yurie are here with their children already.”
Arkrel and Yurie were the mothers of some of the kid’s friends from school. I got along really well with both women. The three of us had recently gone on a shopping trip to Arqa, and I’d been to Arkrel’s home for a “girls’ night in” when their husbands and Xavran took all our children on a fishing trip one afternoon.
“All right, let’s do it.” I smiled, letting him lead me down the pathway from our bedroom to the common area of our garden-home.
Xavran had expanded this space by merging it with Gelnall’s old room. The children and I had helped him with moving the hedges, rearranging the paths, and seeding the grass. It looked large and airy now, though still a bit short on flowers.
Garlands of hand-painted paper flowers decorated the hedges, instead. The kids had been working on those for days. Their schoolmates had helped them too.
All the extra space allowed us to set up almost every possible yard game I could remember from Earth. From the horseshoe pitching, to ladder toss, to beanbags—they all were here, mixed in with the Aldraian games for the kids to play.
Xilvo and Ivex were running around, explaining the game rules to anyone who cared to listen.
Poles decorated with flowers held up strings with kids’ drawings. Almost every person in the kid’s school had contributed their art for our decoration.
Arkrel beelined to Xavran and me. “So, what are we celebrating?”
I shrugged. “Do we need a reason?”
Yurie came by, chewing on my version of pigs-in-a-blanket that I’d managed to re-create with local sausage and some modifications to Xavran’s bread dough. “These are so good! You’ve got to give me the recipe.”
“Of course we need a reason for the party,” Arkrel insisted.
“A spring party?” I suggested uncertainly. Without any clearly defined seasons on Aldrai, it was hard to celebrate any of them.
“What holidays do you have back on Earth at this time of the year?” Xavran prompted. “Maybe we could celebrate one of them?”
“Right, well... I need to see. Do you have your communications device on you?”
He produced the small disk from his pants pocket, and I verified the calendar from back home. It didn’t perfectly align with the Aldraian, but the two were close enough.
“Well, the closest holiday is Mother’s Day. It’s celebrated this week in North America,” I said.
Ene and Illal were running by. Both stopped at my words abruptly.
“Mother’s Day?” Ene tilted her head.
“How do you celebrate that?” Illal wondered.
“Usually, by getting together for brunch or dinner. But a party like this would be very appropriate, too,” I assured them. “People hug their mothers and wish them a happy Mother’s Day. When I was little, I remember I also made a necklace from painted macaroni for my mother once.”
My nanny Marissa and I had spent a whole day first painting the dry macaroni, then waiting for them to dry. I was so excited to give it to my mother during the formal Mother’s Day brunch she was hosting. After the brunch, however, I found the necklace in the garbage bin in the kitchen.
I was too little to realize that painted macaroni wouldn’t go well with my mother’s designer clothes and fine jewelry. I cried that day and never made her anything ever again. But as I got older, I realized that the best part of that day had been painting the macaroni with Marissa, no matter what my mother did with the necklace afterwards.
“Well, that’s what we’re celebrating, then.” Ene shrugged, then hugged me unexpectedly. “Happy Mother’s Day, Susanna.”
“Happy Mother’s Day!” Illal joined her.
“Oh!” I gasped, momentarily lost for words.
Xavran leaned to my ear. “Ene told me you spoke to her about choosing your own family. I guess they’ve made their choice.”
“Hey!” Illal ran to a group of children by the snack table. “It’s a Mother’s Day party. You're supposed to hug your mothers and wish them a happy Mother’s Day!”
Arkrel laughed as all eleven of her children rushed to hug her. “Well... If that’s how traditions are shared between the worlds, I don’t mind it one bit.”
Soft humming of the engines of landing aircraft announced the arrival of more guests. I spotted Inie, Xavran’s ex-mother-in-law. Xilvo ran to me with a hug, then turned to see his grandmother enter the room.
“Ene invited her,” he said. “We decided to give her another chance to be our grandma. But only if she doesn’t yell at our dad.”
“Hey, Susanna, Xavran!” Stefan waved to us from the entrance. He walked toward us, supporting his wife Esstal under her elbow. A giant two-tier baby stroller hovered next to them.
“Thank you for inviting us,” Esstal said after our greetings.
Dressed in a long, loose dress, she had it tied with bright belts around her torso three times, under each pair of breasts.
“How are the babies?” I cooed, leaning over the stroller where their two-week old infants lay in two rows. A tube tipped with a nipple descended from a large bottle on top of the stroller, allowing each baby to feed whenever they wished. “They’re so precious.”
“They’ve been pretty good. Calm and happy.” Esstal arched her back, rubbing her side. “But they eat all the time.” She laughed. “I’m either nursing or pumping all day.”
A woman walked in at that moment, accompanied by at least a dozen little boys and one girl who held a square of paper in her hands. I recognized Kessra and her mother from the meeting at the principal’s office.
“Kessra is here,” Illal whispered under her breath.
Ene squared her shoulders.
I took her hand. “This is our home and our party, Ene,” I reminded her. “We are nice to our guests, and we expect them to treat us the same. Right?”
