CHAPTER 63

 

TARA

 

It is stalking me.

Brax couldn’t join in this expedition, not even cuffed to me because if he feels he has to defend me, this mission will become moot.  Brax didn’t exactly agree to this plan, but on some level, he knows the Culc has to be recaptured.

And guess who is the best bait around?

That’s right.  Lucky, lucky me.  “It likes the way you taste,” Tac had told me.  It grew double its size since it fed off of my face the day I got here.

Bully for the Culc.

At least its owner can be excited about that.

He will not be excited to know that his exotic ‘little’ pet is injured.  Tac says he found some blood, but after the initial trail, it seems it’s been cleaning up its own tracks.

I am super creeped out at how intelligent this thing sounds.

Especially when I’m the one it will come out for.  Because it’s hunting me.

“It can’t kill you,” Tac tries to reassure me.

FAIL.

“And I’ll be with you, so it won’t get the chance,” he finishes quickly when he sees that, surprisingly, his words do not have the effect he was aiming for.

We’re alone together, back in the giant wide open area that Tac calls the main cargo bay, which is where the livestock chute actually feeds into.  And in here, it may be kept neat and tidy, but there are many odd places for a flexible, deviously intelligent creature to hide.  Too many.

So we’re waiting.

And we’re… baiting.

This consists of me trying to look tasty.  Not hard; we can hear it scuff along the floor occasionally, and one time, when Tac took off to follow the sound of what turned out to be a pebble clattering to the floor.  Tac’s answer to this: “It must have thrown it to distract and misdirect me.”

But before he’d returned, I’d heard a soft squish, squish, squish.

Cue mental screaming.

I’d whirled around, and yes, there it was.

I’d screamed.  Out loud.  And in my head too, but out loud, like I wasn’t supposed to.

From waaay on the other side of the ship, Brax had roared, and the Culc, an arm poised above my head, had scrambled off.

“Tevek!”  Tac curses when it stays hidden.  “Tara…”  He sighs.  “You can’t scream.  Brax is going to warn it off every time.  He can’t help it.”

I gape at him.  “I can’t help from screaming!”

Tac does the thing that hot guys do on Earth, where his bottom teeth catch his top lip as he considers something with a sexy face.

Unfortunately, the thing he’s considering is gagging me.

“No!”  I argue.  “No way!  You cannot gag me!”

Tac’s eyes are playful as he brings his hand over my mouth.  “Is this an order or simply an incorrect statement?”

My muffled growl makes green spots break out across his skin.

Seeing them, knowing what they mean…  I feel a pleasurable heat starting low in my belly.

And Tac can smell it.

“Tara?” he inquires softly. 

My voice comes out stupidly breathy on account of being muffled by his hand.  “Yeah?”

“Would it offend you if I suggested an alternative, radical method of gagging you?  Radical, but just as effective.”  He’s studying me intently.  As if he’s being serious and is waiting on a serious answer.

My jaw only closes so that I can use the bottom half to form words.  “So this is like, ‘for science’, is that what you’re trying to sell me?  Won't it be kind of hard for you to catch a killer Culc if you’re in the middle of having sex?!”

“‘Kind of hard’ is not a problem at this moment.”

“Tac!”

Tac’s not even blinking he’s staring at me so intensely.  “I’ll keep him off of you until we finish.”

“JUST UNTIL?”

He darts his head down, and his lips are on mine, and I’d have been flattered he is so hot for me—if I wasn’t in danger of a multi-armed, sucker-biting space octopus.

When Tac’s hands glide around my hips, he encounters my stuffed skirt pocket.  He pulls back, and peers down at what he’s tugged out.

He looks back up at me in complete shock.

Clearly he’s ready, eager, and was thinking we’d have a repeat of earlier, when I’d interrupted him while he was in the room with all the gauges and dials and lines and important looking things.

“Are you busy?”

He’d smiled at me so sweet.  “Not too busy for you.”

Good answer.  “Did I hear right?  Is this called the Service Room?”  I’d dropped to my knees in front of him.  “What kind of service?”

I’d given him a handie.  And because I couldn’t track down Lem and his bath time spray goodness, I had to have my bathtime via sink in the bathroom Tac and I used to share, before I made my way back to Brax.

Unfortunately, his nose is CRAZY scary good, and not only did he know, but he found a spot on my shirt where Tac had splooged me.  I was in the middle of kicking myself for missing that one when Brax had—snarling all the while—bent over me and licked it off.

I’d just lain there, my eyes caught on his, thinking, Whaaaaat just happened?

I was ready for sex with Brax that time.  He’s intense, but he’s careful.  And… having him clean another male off of me had been…

I blow out a breath at the memory and refocus on the present.  With Tac.  With Tac, the other alien man in my life.

I’ve actually been keeping these in my pocket in case the opportunity arose for Tac and I to have some lengthy alone time.  This isn’t exactly what I had in mind.  I was envisioning the bed.  Not that I need a bed just… nowhere in my lurid fantasies were we out in the open in huge as crap room with a carnivorous monster hankering for another taste of my flesh.

“Believe it or not,” I say against his mouth before I return his kiss, “this scenario isn’t how I imagined this happening.”

“I’m sorry that your imagination is limited.”  He draws the tip of his nose up the side of my face.  “What say you we expand the scope of your fantasies?”

I nip his lip and Tac gives a high tree-frog croak.  It sounds happy.  And weird too, but by now, my brain has wired itself to find it totally cute.  “I’m not an exhibitionist,” I warn him.

“Grake’s busy in the engine room.  I’d hear his steps long before he reached us even if he were headed in our direction.”

“I’m not a thrill seeker.”

“You are free to return to your ascetic ways right afterward.”

I laugh.  “You’re crazy!”

More like horny. And since I hadn’t enjoyed any since before I gave birth to a set of twin social-life-abolishers, I can sympathize.  And his grin, which I feel against my neck, does things to me.  This uncharacteristic cajoling, his playful teasing, his stroking hands; it all has me softening.  In all the right places.

“Okay, one death-defying quickie, why not?”

“Yay,” Tac says—and I hear me.  He just mimicked my mini ‘Yay!’ cheer.  In my voice.

I laugh harder.

Returning to a serious tone, his voice takes on a flavor of sheepishness when he admits, “I’ve never done this before.”

I don’t let my eyes widen at his admission.  I wondered, but I didn’t know.  And really… I don’t mind this at all.  Realizing this, I’m able to give him a genuinely relaxed shrug.  “Then watch and learn, boy.”

While I’m at not letting my eyes widen for things, I don’t let the realization that Tac’s not going to fit the same as Brax play out on my face.

This is something I can never voice aloud.  Unspoken rule: thou shalt not audibly compare penis sizes, shapes or ‘features’ between the alien men in your life.

I simply tear open the packet, kneel, and lick over each one of his heads.  I try to project confidence when I struggle to dig the latex ring out from behind each shroom rim where it wants to stay squeezed, and when I finally manage to get the condom fitted all the way on, I think Tac’s about done.

His teeth-gritted exhales, his low grunts as I licked—and squeezed, and tugged and half-pumped him—have gotten me ready to go though, so no matter how long this will or won’t last, I’m game for real now.

When I stand, Tac grabs me by the hips and lifts me, and I obligingly wrap my legs around him, giving his neck a hug, and this is where I cling.  It’s been nice to feel like someone’s got me.  Being a single parent is one long, solitary road, with struggles so hard I’ve been scared they’d break me.  It can get lonely, and oh, what I would have done to have someone half as good as Tac put their arms around me and tell me, ‘It’s going to be okay: I’ve got you.’  So yeah, I’ve been soaking this up just about every chance that I can.  I sigh and squeeze his neck a little tighter.

“This is good,” he lips say against my ear, and his voice has gone guttural.

I take the opportunity to tease him now that we can understand each other.  “I can’t help but notice that this doesn’t seem a whole lot different from how you carry me lately.”

“Unlike you, my fantasies involving the two of us took place in every bay on every level of this ship, including this one, including this position.”

Really!  “Oh yeah?  What’s your favorite one?”

His smile shows a little strain, but it’s tender.  “Holding you, almost like this.”

I frown.  “Almost?”

Tac’s fishy brows pop up.  “May I?”

I give him a stately nod.

He slides his arms under my legs until my knees are locked over his elbows.  I’m spread wide, and the stretch of my muscles is as exciting as the not-so-tiny thrill of fear that zips up my back.  It’s a lot like the zip you get when you turn away from a dark closet in a dark room and you just know the monster is going to reach out and grab you.  Or like when you’re glad you’re alone because you’re a darn adult but you’re still going to pull an Olympic qualifier of a long jump to make it onto your bed without getting your feet near enough to the bottom of it to get dragged under it.

You know.  Like that.

But I do trust that Tac won’t let the monster kill me.  And I trust that he’ll do his best not to let it eat me.

But I’m also prepared to take one for the team.

I shiver.

“I’ve got you,” Tac whispers, and his eyes hypnotize me.

I believe him.

With a deep breath, I reach between us, where his cock is pulsing against me, hot, and so hard.  And I squeeze my legs so that I rise up enough to line up with his tip.

And then I sink down.

I hope Brax doesn’t hear the sounds we’re making now.  Tac must be thinking the same thing, because he “Vssshps” me softly.

And then he raises his arms.  This pulls me up and almost off of his cock… before he drops his arms and gravity brings me banging down on him.

I sink my teeth into his shoulder and use it as a sound muffler.  I think Tac finds the hollow of my neck for the same reason, but he jerks his head up and stills so that I’m left to set our pace.  Such a gentleman.  I experiment, rising and falling and panting and gasping—so good.

And I learn something new.  I’ve never had a lover hold me up during sex to know this, but my leg muscles are tightening and releasing in a workout that heightens everything. PLEASURE explodes inside me as an orgasm sneaks up and slams into me out of nowhere.

Just like the Culc when it leaps on my back.