Five
“Whoa. Whoa.” Pace drew away. What the…? His cock instantly grew hard, imagining her naked. Well, hell.
The minute his eyes had latched onto Lola, he knew he wanted her. There was no doubt in his mind that physically, she was his type. With squared shoulders, sturdy legs and a well-muscled, robust constitution, her exotic coloring and exquisite features only sealed the attraction. His fingers had instantly twitched to run through her short platinum hair while smothering those peachy lips under his own. But fucking immediately? Not something he’d considered.
“Uh, don’t you think we should get to know each other first?” he asked, injecting what he hoped was good humor into his tone. “There’s no need to hurry things.”
She looked pointedly at the front of his pants and shrugged. “Your pike is hard, so you’re obviously interested. Why deny yourself?” She stood still, looking up at him with deep black eyes.
Pike, huh? He liked that. Pace paused and took a long look at his potential wife. God, she’s beautiful. He tried to lighten things up.
“You’ll have to excuse the little guy.” Pace glanced down at the significant bulge in his pants. “Sometimes he has a mind of his own.”
Her eyes grew wide as she stared at his crotch. “Human pikes h…have their own…brain?” she stammered. “I’ve never heard of such a thing.” Her voice rose and a bluish flush came to her cheeks. “How do the two of you communicate? Do you speak to each other telepathically, or does he have his own voice?”
Pace’s mouth dropped open, horrified and amused at the same time. “No, Lola. You’ve—”
“Wow! Now I’m more interested than ever to see you naked…and to meet him. Does he have a name?”
It was Pace’s turn to blush, although as it worked its way up the back of his neck, his coloration would be bright red. Yes, his penis had a name. Most guys, at some point in their lives, had a girlfriend who insisted on tagging it. He was no exception. But he wasn’t about to reveal that to Lola.
“Listen, I think you’ve misunderstood—”
Lola interrupted with a whoop of laughter that lit up her beautiful face and turned her from merely beautiful to stunning. “Of course. I knew there would be many misunderstandings, as well as questions and stimulating differences between us. But won’t it be fun to discover all those things?”
“Yes, it will.” Pace blew out a breath, jumping at the chance to get the conversation off his prick. “Though I clearly find you incredibly attractive, as evidenced by the state of my, uh, pike, I’d prefer we explore those cultural and personal differences before we fuck.” He used her word because she clearly didn’t have a problem with it, then did nothing to hide his smoldering gaze as he ran it up and down her body.
She tilted her head, exposing a long, smooth expanse of lavender skin he yearned to lick. His cock twitched in response. “If that’s how you want to proceed…” She smirked, “I’m willing. But the little man in your pants may have different ideas.”
Pace grinned like a fool. “I’m sure he does, but don’t worry. I’m in charge, and I’ll keep him under control.”
She licked her peachy lips, which made him want to groan. “Okay,” she agreed. “But not for too long. I find myself intrigued to see your naked body.”
Damned if she hadn’t just knocked him off his pins again. “I, uh, feel the same way, but humans have a saying. ‘If something’s worth having, it’s worth waiting for.’”
She nodded sagely. “We have one, too. ‘Crush the ore without care and lose the value of what’s hidden inside.’”
“That’s nice.” Pace moved closer and took her hand in his. Her fingers were warm and slightly callused. He tugged her toward a doorway. “Why don’t we find our lodging and drop our gear.” He had a backpack, and she had something similar. “Then we can explore the marketplace, eat and get to know each other better.”
He picked up his pace, purposely testing her energy level. Just because she had a body built for action didn’t mean she had the stamina. He’d had enough “slow walker” dates in the past, and those women were of little interest to him.
“A good plan,” she told him, squeezing his hand and following his lead effortlessly. No mincing steps for Lola. She kept up and could easily have taken the lead. Strength and endurance. Femininity with a hint of testosterone.
Pace’s head spun with happiness. Had Gerri Wilder actually found him the woman of his dreams? Or at least a woman who’d keep him from lamenting his decision to give up men? Time would tell.
****
Lola knew the planet, so Pace yielded to her, trusting she’d find their hotel. Once outside, breathing air permeated by the smell of food and filled with a cacophony of voices, she let go of his fingers and punched something into a bulky, peculiar band that wrapped her left wrist. She paused to look at its series of lights, then held her right hand two inches above it.
“This way,” she told him, pointing her chin toward a busy expanse filled with foot traffic.
He looked up. It seemed that all vehicular travel was accomplished approximately thirty feet above street level.
Pace followed Lola. “What’s that thing on your wrist?” he asked, curious as to what she was doing waving her hand above it every now and then.
“Oh. I’m sorry. We should have picked up one for you before we left the spaceport. It’s a planetrome. It allows you to understand all the languages around you, find out about the planet you’re on, also allowing this via feature.”
“Via feature?” Pace was clueless.
Lola furrowed her brows. “Umm… What do you call the thing we’re walking on, the thing they’re flying on?” She pointed at the hovering cars that had stopped at what he deemed a traffic signal.
“We call them roads.”
“Okay. With this ‘road’ feature, you enter your destination, then hover your hand above the bandlette. A pulse is emitted, pointing in the direction you need to go. Here.” She grasped his hand and placed it over her wrist. Pace felt a rhythmic wave that pointed directly ahead. “Do you feel it?” she asked with a grin.
“Yup,” he acknowledged, effecting an interested tilt of his head.
“Okay. Come with me.” She took him by the hand again and led him forward.
Just as she was about to enter an intersection, the device gave a single chime.
“What’s it saying?” Pace smiled happily.
“Put your hand over it and see.”
He did as he was told. This time, the pulse pointed to the right. “It wants us to go right.”
“Exactly.” She beamed like he was the smartest two-year-old in the class.
“It wasn’t difficult to figure out,” he gruffed, not wanting her to give him props for something any dummy could have ascertained.
“Of course it wasn’t. But the minute you caught on, your face was positively merry.”
“Merry, huh?” Pace couldn’t keep his mouth from twitching upward. “The only time we ever use that word on earth is for a particular winter holiday…”
While they walked, Lola making him decode where her planetrome pointed, they discussed holidays, food, music and…food. Suddenly, Pace realized he was ravenous. With the delicious smells permeating the air from all the vendors, his taste buds had started taking notice.
Pace interrupted a lively discussion of seafood, which she called washfood. “Does this thing tell you how much farther we have to go?”
She wrinkled her cute little nose. “Do you want a measurement of distance or time?”
He smiled. “Time would be fine.”
Lola pushed a button and words appeared on the screen. She held it up for him to read.
“Okaaay,” he drawled. “Five slices…” He turned to her and raised his brows. “What’s a slice?”
“Oh.” She bit her lush, lower lip, making his dick twinge.
Down boy, he thought, then choked back a bubble of laughter. Now he was talking to his junk as if it were sentient.
Luckily, Lola didn’t pick up on his discomfort. “What measurement of time do you use?” she asked. Before he could say a word, she continued. “We divide a round, which is what you call a year, into four hundred and twelve TOS’s, or turns of the star. A TOS is made up of fifteen kelsugs, and a kelsug is comprised of ninety-five slices.” She looked to him for understanding.
“I leave the math to Calamity, so I don’t know how that equivocates with earth’s system. Our year is made up of three hundred and sixty-five days, a day encompasses twenty-four hours, and an hour is divided into sixty minutes.”
She clapped her hands gleefully. “Our year is quite different.” The corners of her mouth twitched upward. “On my planet, I’m twenty-seven rounds old, but if I lived on earth, I’d be...thirty and a half.” She gazed up at him.
“And I’m thirty-five years old, which makes me…”
“Thirty-one rounds,” she completed. “A perfect age for fathering.” She certainly didn’t beat around the bush.
“It is, isn’t it?” He suddenly pictured her belly swollen with his child, and his knees wavered.
A lovely blue tinge crept up her cheeks again. That blend of lavender and cerulean was fast becoming his favorite color combination.
She changed the subject. “Three point one six minutes.”
He shook his head to clear it. He couldn’t figure out what she was saying. “Three point one six minutes what?”
“The time it will take to reach our lodgings.” She gave an impish smirk. “Although my math has taken so much time, it has brought us to our door.”
“Good. Because I’m so hungry I could eat a… What did you call the thing in your Anduvian Wash that has twelve eye stalks?”
“A gruggle. And yes!” She clapped her hands together. “That’s a perfect choice for mid-TOS consumption. There’s a vendor here who wraps it in blarfronds and steams it in washwater with a secret mixture of spices. I’m all for that.”
Pace simply nodded, pushing his way into the hotel. He’d hold back his enthusiasm for something cooked in washwater.
“Oh, look,” Lola exclaimed as they walked into the empty lobby. She headed straight for a small kiosk. “We can get you your own planetrome, here.”
He followed, looking at the pile of wristbands like the one she wore. He wondered why she paused beside it instead of handing a unit to him.
She saw his confusion and explained. “You’re only allowed one per person,” she said. “Besides being good for the things I told you, the Lords of this planet also use it to track those who visit. If I tried to reach for another, I’d get a nasty shock.”
Pace didn’t like the idea of being tracked, but what the hell? As much as he didn’t like being monitored, he was only here to meet Lola. It wasn’t as if he had cargo to unload or merchants to meet. He reached in and took a purple one from the pile.
Yup. My new favorite color.
Immediately, the thing chimed and words came up on the tiny screen. Check in to your hotel.
Huh. It’s giving me orders?
He turned his wrist to Lola. “What will it do if we don’t?” He scowled.
Hers had made a noise, too. “It would wait a reasonable amount of time before delivering a shock. It’s to discourage loiterers in the lobby.”
It seemed the invasive unit discouraged a lot of things. He had second thoughts about keeping it on and gave it a tug to unlatch it, but it wouldn’t budge. “Hey. It won’t come off.”
Lola didn’t look the least bit perturbed. “Don’t worry. You’ll be able to remove it when you re-enter the spaceport.”
Pace nodded, but inwardly frowned. He didn’t like being tagged by “big brother”, no matter that he was only here for pleasure. A thought occurred to him. “What would have happened if I never put one on in the first place?”
She shrugged. “I’m surprised we weren’t stopped already. The minute the Sweepers noticed, they would have made sure you were banded.” Lola looked at him, clearly puzzled over his blank expression. “Don’t you have Sweepers on your planet? A group that enforces protocol?”
“We do, I guess,” he acknowledged. “We call them police.” But they weren’t the minions of the government, keeping tabs on all its citizenry for God knew what purpose.
He thought of his friend, Marek, and wondered what the cop would say about all this. Probably, “Stay vigilant, bro. Sounds like bullshit to me.”
“You seem uncomfortable.” Lola perused his face with something akin to worry. “This is just how things are done in our galaxy. I hope it doesn’t upset you.”
He attempted to put her at ease. “I’m just a free spirit.” He forced the corners of his mouth to turn up. “I’ll be okay.”
But would he? Here was the first glitch in their possible future together. He’d kind of figured they could split their time between G-Hydrox and earth, but no way would he live on a planet where they kept tabs on his every move―he glanced suspiciously at his wristband―and probably monitored every word that came out of his mouth.