PRIYA

I was deluding myself.

For a fleeting moment, I had almost believed Allex was interested in me. But the idea was ridiculous; he was an alien prince and wouldn’t give a second thought to a woman from Earth. If he wanted anything from me, it was only a quick fuck.

Was that possible for someone from Auxem? I hadn’t read all the paperwork, but I remembered something about bonding for life. He certainly wasn’t interested in me as a bride, and I wasn’t interested in him as a husband. We barely knew each other.

I needed to get my head on straight. He was doing a good thing by offering to get me off the ship and help me get home. The alien was doing the Earth girl a favor.

Why did I feel like I didn’t want him to help me like this? I took a deep breath and examined my feelings as I searched the room for more clutter to tidy.

I didn’t want to go home because it would mean leaving him. It was a stupid idea. I couldn’t care about him so much that I’d want to remain on the ship. I barely knew him; I wouldn’t trade Earth and my family for Allex.

Would I?

* * *

A few hours later, Allex and I were sprawled out on our beds. I had drifted in and out of sleep, but it seemed as though Allex barely even rested. Every time I woke up, I saw him in the same spot, sitting up on his blankets. The last time I woke up, he was walking toward the door.

“Are you going to open it?”

“The stench should be gone by now. Hopefully, the pirates left too.”

Nothing happened when he tried to open the door. “It’s stuck.” He pulled it again, harder this time.

The door didn’t budge.

He glanced at me for a second before licking his lips and bracing his feet against the wall. He tugged on the handle with all of his strength, putting his entire body weight into it.

“The door won’t open. It’s wedged in there pretty tightly.”

I stepped closer and examined the edge of the conduit. “The seal has deteriorated. It’s fused to the door frame.”

Allex looked at the seal, standing a little closer to me than necessary. “You’re right.”

“I’ll try to breathe half as often as I normally do.” Fear suddenly pulsed through my body.

“Don’t do anything drastic yet, Priya. I’m sure we can open the door before we run out of air. Do we still have the pail we used to collect rotten fruit from the gardens?”

“Yeah, we didn’t want to leave it anywhere. It’s over here in the corner.”

He walked to the corner, peeked into the bucket, and dumped it out onto the floor, to my dismay.

“Hey, what are you doing? You’re making a total mess over there!” Allex began separating the plants from the dirt. He stopped when he found a flower with a long stem and snapped the top off. A dark liquid began to ooze out of the stem. He jumped to his feet, carefully avoiding contact with the plant’s secretion, and smeared the substance onto the parts of the door fused to the frame.

I grimaced. “That looks pretty gross.”

“It’s a pyrrhus plant. Not the most pleasant thing around, but the fluid in the stem is highly caustic and can dissolve a lot of material over time.”

“As long as we have enough time.”

Allex turned his head to look at me. “We don’t have a lot of options at this point. It has to work.”

I nodded my head, hoping he was right.

* * *

Allex had spent an hour walking around the room.

“How much air did you say we had in here?”

He looked at me quickly, eyes filled with guilt and fear. “I’m not sure. I guessed eight hours altogether, but it depends on a lot of things. We have about an hour left if that’s what you’re asking.”

“An hour?” I felt the fear I had been holding back start to rise to the surface.

“The pyrrhus will do its work. Don’t worry, Priya.” Allex came over to me and held both my hands.

“Well, you look worried.”

“Maybe it’s okay to worry a little bit. Don’t panic, then.”

“I’m not panicking.” I yanked my hands from him. “I just didn’t wake up this morning and think it was my last day alive.”

He checked the seal on the door again. “Neither of us is going to die today, Priya.”

I glanced in his direction. “Stop trying to comfort me by telling me lies. Are you always like this?”

“It’s the truth.”

“You don’t have to make me happy by telling me what I want to hear.” I was getting angry. “We don’t know what’s going to happen in the next hour.”

“That’s right.” He didn’t sound angry at all but started pacing around the room again. “I don’t want to die either. If something happens to us, it’s going to be my fault. I placed the rotten fruit. I trapped us in here. We could have done something different, like move to another level.”

I shook my head. “You shouldn’t take the blame for things out of your control.”

Allex turned his head away from me. “I do that a lot. I’ve been trying to stop, but it’s not easy.”

I walked back over to him and looked into his tired brown eyes. “You’re not responsible for everything. We both made decisions, and we have to live with them. Blaming yourself isn’t going to help.”

Allex lifted his hand toward my face but dropped it before he touched me. “We should accept the fact we may die in fifty...” He glanced at the clock. “Fifty-five minutes. Do you think we should go through the things on our bucket lists?”

“I don’t know. I guess not. But there’s no point in holding anything back if we’re going to die, is there?”

He gazed into my eyes. I felt the intense heat of his stare. “What are you saying, Priya?”

I couldn’t bring myself to say how much I wanted him. I decided to ask him something else, something that had been on my mind since the night I followed him.

“Why didn’t you tell me about your wings?”

* * *

ALLEX

I sighed, rubbing my temples. “What else do you know?”

She took a deep breath, which drew my attention to her breasts. “It looks like they work. I saw you flying.”

“I’m not an angel, Priya.” I inched closer to her, edging into her personal space just enough to make her slightly uncomfortable.

She gazed up at me with big eyes. “What are you, then?”

“I’m from Auxem. We all have wings.”

She looked thoughtful. “It seems like they would be more useful if they didn’t hurt so much.”

I closed my eyes. “Did you see me take them out?”

“I got there right before you retracted them.” Her eyes looked sad. “Why were you in so much pain?”

I sighed and turned away from her, starting to pace again. I felt trapped in our tiny space. “It’s always a struggle when we take them out or put them away.”

“It hurts every time?” She looked horrified. “I thought you were going to pass out.”

“If I did, it wouldn’t be the first time.” I shrugged. “It’s worse for me than the others. My wing pockets became infected when I was a teenager, and I’ve had complications ever since.”

She shook her head. “I would have thought an advanced species like the Auxem would have solved this problem by now.”

“What do you mean?”

“Why would you accept something like this? Can’t you bioengineer your way out of this problem?”

I was flabbergasted by the thought. “My brother is a geneticist.”

“There you go. He probably wanted to fix you guys, just like the rest of your family intends to fix the problem with females. I bet that’s the reason he became a geneticist in the first place.”

“You’re remarkably insightful for a person who hasn’t met my family. How do you know these things?” I wanted to touch her so badly, but I wasn’t sure we were ready for where it would lead.

Priya played with her hair and thought. “I’ve always found people easy to read, I guess.”

“That’s a fantastic quality to have.” I felt myself being drawn into her dark eyes, falling into them and never wanting to come out. I had a tight feeling in my chest, and I suddenly needed her.

“Allex, how long do we have left?”

I reached up and touched her face with the back of my hand. “I don’t care.”

She smiled and looked for herself. I couldn’t take my eyes off her. “Forty-five minutes.”

“Do you really think we’re going to die?”

“If we are, it would be a shame if we didn’t find out where this is going.” Her voice became softer than before. “We’ve been dancing around our attraction since we first met.”

My gaze moved down to her breasts and up to her face. “Is it only an attraction?” I moved closer and put my hands on her hips. It felt like they belonged there. Priya reached her arms up and wrapped them around my neck.

She didn’t answer my question, or she might have answered it with her eyes. “Allex, just kiss me.”

I knew I was trying not to jump whenever someone told me to, but her command was something I wanted to obey. I bent down and gently touched my lips to hers. I loved how soft and plump they felt. She made a sound of need and opened her mouth. Our tongues twisted together, sending a shot of lust to my groin that made me hard almost instantly. Her sweet body was pressed up against mine, and I felt the desire spike inside me. From the way she responded to our kiss, I was almost sure she felt something too.

* * *

PRIYA

Allex’s kiss was driving me wild. If he hadn’t been from Auxem, we would already be naked and writhing on the bed. The thought made my hips buck involuntarily. Our touch was already heating up to the level of a supernova.

His hands moved from my hips to my waist and snuck under my shirt. He undid my bra and slipped his hand underneath it, palming my breast and sending a blast of desire through my body. I gasped, breaking the contact.

“Priya, you’re beautiful.”

“I’m just pretty.”

“Don’t sell yourself short.” He moved to the other breast and tweaked my nipple, making me want to get closer to him. “You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met.”

I was already panting, and he hadn’t even touched my pussy yet. “What you’re saying can’t be true. You’re a prince. You must have seen hundreds of gorgeous women.”

Allex growled and walked me back toward my futon, pushing me down onto my back. He pulled up my shirt and exposed my bare breasts. My nipples were already as hard as pebbles. He appeared to be enjoying the sight.

“I’ve seen a lot of women.” He bent down and kissed one of my stiff peaks. “But none...” He kissed the other one, and I pushed my chest up toward him. “…were ever as beautiful...” He planted a kiss between my breasts, brushing his rough cheeks on either side and making me shiver. “…and sexy...” He gave me a glance, nearly setting me on fire. “...as you.”

He finally gave me what I wanted. His hot mouth closed over my nipple, and I let out a moan. After a few minutes, he slid a hand down into my pants and caressed my clit. I was so wound up already that it only took a few moments before my pussy began to pulse, my hips came up off the bed, and I came with the intensity of a thousand suns.

“Jesus, Allex.” I opened my eyes. He had a satisfied grin on his face, and I smiled back, undoing his pants.

“What are you doing?” His deep voice was starting to rasp. I didn’t bother answering. I wrapped my hands around his hot, hard cock and started pumping as I gently circled the tip with my tongue.

“Priya.” He said my name like a prayer.

I loved the feel of him in my hand and mouth. He was rock-hard and smooth, like a living fire. I could only imagine what it would be like to have him inside me. He began to thrust his hips, and I spat on his cock, firmly caressing it. When he came, his face was the sexiest thing I had ever seen.

It was a shame we were about to die.

* * *

ALLEX

I was no angel, but I was in heaven. Seeing Priya come and having her hands on me was intense and passionate — everything I could have possibly imagined.

I was grateful to have had such an amazing experience before I died.

We cleaned ourselves up and tried the door again. It hadn’t loosened at all. We attempted to open it together when Priya’s hand slipped. She crashed into the wall where a screw protruded from the metal. She groaned when the sharp point tore into her skin.

“Oh shit.” She held her hand against her outer arm to stop the bleeding.

My medical training took over automatically. I grabbed some cloth Priya had made from one of the blankets and pressed it onto her wound. It was worse than I had expected. The way she had fallen on the screw had deeply punctured her arm. I helped her to sit down on the futon and started to clean and bandage the injury.

“Thank you.” Her eyes still had pain in them that I wished I could take away.

As if by unspoken consent, we curled up together on her futon and spooned. I wrapped my arms around her and pulled her body close to me.

“That was really good. Not hurting myself, the other stuff. I liked it.”

“Me too.” When I murmured into her ear, she shivered, and I smiled.

“It’s too bad we’re going to die.”

“We’re all going to die eventually. Were you trying to say something else? What does it matter what you tell me now?”

She rolled to face me, those dark eyes looking straight into my soul. “Okay. I was going to say it was too bad we couldn’t keep kissing each other so we could see where it led.”

“Auxem can only safely mate with the woman they love and who loves them back. Sex without love can cause Bond Rejection Syndrome, which is actually quite a bit worse than it sounds.”

Her eyes got wide. “You’re saying you couldn’t fuck me.”

I knew she wasn’t just asking about sex. I reached out and tucked a strand of black hair behind her ear. I spoke before I chickened out.

“I could fuck you.”

Electricity charged the space between us as she understood the full meaning of my words. “Maybe I could fuck you first.” We stared into each other’s eyes without saying anything else. Priya lay her head on my arm. “Allex, are you feeling sleepy?”

“It’s the first symptom of asphyxiation.” I yawned.

“I guess it doesn’t matter if I tell you I love you, as crazy as it may sound.” She said it with her eyes closed as if she were mentioning the weather. “It must have been love at first sight. Well, no, I didn’t like you at first, but I do now. I don’t want to go home. I want to stay with you, and I want you to fuck me.”

“I don’t think you know what you’re saying.”

“I don’t care if you don’t feel the same way about me. I’m about to die, so what do I have to lose? I just wanted you to know. Maybe we can have sex in heaven.” She yawned and snuggled into me.

My pulse pounded in my veins. “Priya, are you passing out?”

“I...think...I am.”

“Well, before you do...” I pressed a chaste kiss to her lips. “I love you, too. I want you to stay with me, and I want to fuck you so you can have my babies.”

“Will they have wings?”

I smiled. “Wings don’t develop until the teenage years.”

She squeezed me tightly. I felt myself slipping into unconsciousness, and I knew I wouldn’t wake up.