Twenty

The first day back was rough on Ghua.  He spent most of his time lying on his stomach in bed.  He didn’t complain, but when he thought I wasn’t looking, he’d move around, showing his discomfort.

The second day, he walked around the house.  Standing up straight didn’t seem to bother him at all.  However, going up and down the stairs produced a few winces.  Throughout the day, I kept him company wherever he went.  If he wanted to lay on the bed, I laid beside him.  And, we spent a lot of time talking.  I asked him questions about his first few days on the surface.  I couldn’t imagine discovering a whole new world.  He told me about the confusion he and the other men felt when seeing humans and then the curiosity once Drav discovered the first female, Mya.  Most of it was fairly amusing because of his naivety.  Some of it was sad like when they discovered what death meant here.

I snuggled close to Ghua’s side and ran my fingers through his hair.

“I don’t like this,” he said.

I immediately stopped.  “Sorry.”

“Not your touch.  I will always like that.  I do not like waiting to heal.  It takes too long.”

I grinned and went back to petting his hair.

“Cassie said that if you were human, you would need to wait almost two weeks before getting some of these stitches out.  Since you’re different, she’s not sure how long it will take.  Molev said you heal quickly.  So, be thankful it’s not two weeks of this.”

“I would not survive two weeks being unable to hold you.”

I leaned forward and kissed his cheek.

“You’re very strong.  I think you would survive.”

Smiling slightly, I closed my eyes and pretended not to hear his grumbling.  I fell asleep to the weight of his good arm over my back.

When I woke first, I slipped from bed to use the bathroom and shower.  The hot spray felt so good, I lingered.  After returning, I’d been so preoccupied with Ghua that I hadn’t really paid attention to much else.  It would take time to get used to the idea that I had easy and safe access to regular bathing and clean clothes.  Well, clean clothes if I was willing to walk around in one of his oversized shirts while mine washed.

I turned off the water and dried.  The idea of clean clothes had me ignoring the pile of dirty ones on the floor and wrapping the towel around my torso.

Ghua still breathed softly when I opened the door.  Instead of going to the dresser, which made noise when opening the drawers, I went to the other door in the room.  The door I hadn’t opened on my first night in the house.  It had to lead to a walk-in closet.  I held a tiny spark of hope that I’d find it stuffed with women’s clothes, all my size.  I was a dreamer like that.  If I couldn’t have that wish, I would settle for some board games.

As I turned the handle, I reconsidered those priorities.  Board games would probably come in handier than clothes for me.  Ghua needed something fun to do today.

I eased the door open and stepped into the large space.

Laundry baskets overflowing with a ridiculously extensive variety of dildos and vibrators filled the closet.  Baskets were stacked on baskets.  Some of them looked sorted based on the type of vibrator or dildo.  Ghua had even set some individually on the shelves meant for shoes just inside the door.  I stared at the black tinted rubber one that looked comparable in size to my forearm.

“Holy fu—”

“Eden!  Do not go in there!” Ghua’s panicked voice echoed in the room.

Reaching out an arm, I pushed the door wider so I could see him.

“I think you’re a little late with the warning, buddy.”

He started to move off the bed.

“You stay right where you are, Ghua, and start explaining why you have about a thousand fake penises in your closet.  Because this shit is freaking me out.  First porn magazines and now this?”

Not listening to me, he shifted himself off the bed.  Then he stood there, looking around the room in that distressed way he had when I’d flashed him.

“Talk, Ghua.  Why do you have all of these?  Please tell me you haven’t used them?”

“Me?  No.  They are for females.”

“You weren’t planning to use them on me, were you?  Because I’m telling you now, that shit cannot be previously owned.”

“No.  I wasn’t going to use them on anyone.  I didn’t know what they were for.  Some of them looked very different from how my brothers and I look.  I thought the human males weren’t made like us and was curious about the differences.  I thought it might help me understand why human females don’t like us, so I started bringing them back from scavenging runs to study.”

“This is not a sample.  This is a collection.”

“I will remove them.”

“You bet you will.  I can’t believe you even kept this many.  Please tell me you washed your hands after touching them.”

“Why?”

“Because by touching them, you’ve touched a thousand vaginas!”

He smiled slightly.

“I like vagina.”

“What?”

“It is a good word.  Mya doesn’t like us to use the word pussy.  I will use vagina now.”

“No you will not.  Pussy and vagina aren’t words used in normal conversation.”

“We’re using them now.”

“This is not a normal conversation.”

He sighed heavily.  “Why do you and Mya not want to talk about the things we find most interesting?”

For a moment, I could only stare at him, dumbfounded.

“You need a hobby.  Something to get your mind off of constantly thinking about sex.”

“I do not think about sex all the time.  But I do think about pussy and boobs a lot.”

I covered my face with my hands, unable to believe Ghua’s single track mind.

“Are you angry, Eden?” he asked softly.

I looked up at him and shook my head.

“Angry?  No.  Worried?  Yes.  I’m just not sure yet who I should be worried about more.  You or me?”

“You do not need to worry about either of us.”

“You know what?  I’m going to put a shirt on and go wash my clothes.  Let’s pretend that I am mad at you, and you’re smart enough to give me some space to cool off.”

“You’re angry and too warm?”

“You’re making my brain hurt.”

I closed the door on the freak fest in his closet and grabbed my clothes from the bathroom.  Ghua was smart enough to stay in the bedroom and not try to follow me downstairs.

It gave me time to sort through what I was feeling.  I wasn’t angry.  Not really.  Weirded out a bit, definitely.  But I couldn’t really say his fascination with porn and sex toys was so unusual.  Just about every boy I’d known had gone through that stage.  Heck, some probably never left that phase of their life.  Ghua was very much like a boy learning things about girls.  It was all new and fascinating.

Feeling better about the situation, I left the laundry room and went back upstairs for a shirt.

Ghua was still by the bed.  When he saw me, he scowled.  The fierce expression stopped me in my tracks.

“Now you look like you’re mad at me,” I said.

“I am.”

Surprisingly, that didn’t worry me in the least.

“What did I do?”

He stalked across the room toward me.

“Did you mean what you said?”

“I said a lot already this morning.  You’re going to need to be more specific.”

“Not this morning.  When the hound was trying to get you, you said you would stay with me if I promised to stay with you.”  He reached out and hooked a finger in the front of my towel and tugged me close.  “And, I stayed,” he said.  “I promise to always stay.”

I stared up into his serious eyes.

“I don’t understand why that is making you frown at me.  I thought you wanted me to stay with you.”

“I do.”

“Then why are you mad?”

“Because you yelled at me and left.  Because I’m tired of waiting for you to say you will stay.  Because I want to touch you and hold you so much it hurts me here.”  He laid his free hand over his heart.  “And it hurts more when you walk away.”

I reached up and cupped his face.

“I will stay with you.  If I get mad and need some space, it doesn’t mean I’ve changed my mind, it just means I need some time to think things through.”

He frowned again, and I pressed up on my tiptoes to kiss him lightly.  When I pulled back, he studied me intently.

“Why don’t you take a shower, and I’ll make us some breakfast,” I said.  “Remember not to get the stitches wet.”

“Will you help me?”

“I don’t think that would be a smart choice this time.”

“I think it would be.”

“You’d end up hurting yourself, and it will take even longer to heal.  Go.  Shower.  I’ll be downstairs.”

He grumped and stalked off to the bathroom.  The water turned on as I changed into a clean shirt.  Since he’d left the door open, I went in and hung my towel on a peg in the bathroom.  Ghua looked at me through the glass half-wall.  The heat in his gaze was unmistakable.  He certainly did have one thing on his mind, and his injuries wouldn’t hold him back forever.

“Remember not to let your stitches get wet.”

He grunted.

I rolled my eyes and left the room.

I wished we had the ability to make a big breakfast.  Waffles, pancakes, eggs and bacon, omelets…any of it would have been good.  I settled for a bowl of cereal for me and a can of Spam for Ghua.

He came downstairs dressed in a pair of athletic shorts and ate his Spam in silence.

“Want to watch a movie or something today?” I asked.  “I can angle the couch a little so you can see the TV while you’re lying down.”

“Yes.”

He watched me nudge the couch into position then laid down with a sigh that said “my life sucks” while I put in a movie.

I’d barely settled in the recliner when he spoke up.

“My back itches.”

“I think that’s a good thing.  It means it’s healing.”

“No, it means it itches.  Can you scratch it?”

I went over by him and looked at the stitches and butterfly taped areas.  The scabs over the wounds looked dark and thick but the skin around them completely normal.  I gently scratched the non-broken areas as close to the injuries as I could.

He made an appreciative sound then lifted his head.

“I can’t see.  Sit here.  You can scratch, and we can watch the movie.”

“You’re getting pretty bossy,” I said, sliding in under him.

He set his head on my lap with another sigh.  His exhales warmed the skin of my exposed thigh, reminding me I was only wearing a long t-shirt.  The rest of my clothes continued to quietly swish in the washer down the hall.  I really needed to figure out how to expand my wardrobe.

Ghua stretched his arm up, hooking it over my legs.  I looked at the stitches and immediately felt bad.  I was sitting there thinking about finding more underwear while he was trying to recover from helping save people.

He sighed again and rubbed his cheek against my lap as if he couldn’t get comfortable.  I continued to lightly scratch his skin.

“Do you want me to get you a pillow?”

His other arm snaked up behind me, cupping my hip.

“No.  Don’t leave.”

I smiled slightly and focused on the movie.

We hadn’t made it more than a few minutes in when I noticed Ghua breathing funny.  His inhales were big and slow.  His exhales were more shallow and quick.

“You okay?”

He turned his head slightly, as if rubbing an itch on his nose, then faced the TV again.

“I am okay.”

“All right.”  I said it, but I didn’t believe it because he shifted on the couch as if uncomfortable then made the same movement.  This time, I noticed his chest expanding as he did it.

“Ghua, are you sniffing me?”

He stopped inhaling deeply.

“No.”

“Are you having breathing problems, then?”

“No.”

I stopped scratching his back and lightly played with his hair.  My hand brushed his ear, and he groaned.  His fingers dug into my thigh and hip, and he pulled me a little further under him.  This time when he turned his head, there was no mistaking what he was doing.

“Ghua, it’s not polite to sniff—”

He lifted his head and repositioned me before I knew what he intended.  He had one of my legs wedged between his side and the back cushions, and the other leg dangled off the couch.

He laid his head on my lower stomach.

He could pretend to watch the movie all he wanted, but I wasn’t stupid.  I knew what he was up to.  And against all common sense, I tingled with anticipation, and my pulse picked up speed.

His fingers stroked my backside through the shirt.  Inch by inch, he worked the bottom of the shirt up my thigh, moving occasionally to free it from his weight.

The room grew warmer.  Or maybe I did.

Struggling to keep my breathing even, I continued to play with his hair and stare at the screen.  When he shifted again and his bare chest touched my pubic bone, I knew I was a goner.

“Ghua, I don’t think this is a good idea.”

He lifted his head to meet my gaze, then blatantly looked down at my exposed girl parts.  I swallowed hard and forced myself to stay still.  The last thing I wanted to do was rip a stitch while trying to wrestle my legs closed.

He lowered his head and inhaled deeply, proving that he had been sniffing me, then placed a kiss just inside my thigh.

“Do you trust me?”

“Yes.”

He kissed the other thigh, his tongue flicking out to taste where his lips had been.

My hands forgot their purpose and idly stroked his ears instead of his hair.  His breath escaped in a whoosh, heating my core.  My chest tightened, and I played with his ears some more.

He groaned and looked up at me, his eyes full of intense emotion.

“Do you love me?”

There was no use trying to deny it anymore.

“Yes.  I love you, Ghua.”

He growled and ducked his head to nip at my thigh.  Nibble by nibble, he worked his way to my center.  He breathed deeply then his tongue swept over me in a long stroke.  I gasped and involuntarily bucked my hips.  His hands gripped my ass, and he pulled me closer.  With his face pressed between my legs, he slowly explored each crease and swell.  I panted and made noise each time he found a sweet spot.

He lifted his head, and I blinked down at him, dazed and aching for more.

“You are beautiful, my Eden.  Your cheeks are pink and your lips wet.  You love me and trust me.  Will you allow me the rest?”

“Yes.”  The desperate answer escaped me before I could think of all the reasons why we shouldn’t.

The moment he got off the couch and scooped me up into his arms brought clarity.

“Ghua, stop.  You’re going to hurt yourself.”

He looked down at me and smiled.

“You shot me, and I still carried you.  This is no different.”

He started toward the stairs.  Too afraid of hurting him, I didn’t struggle in his arms.

“First, I’m really sorry I shot you.  Second, you scolded me and said it hurt.  So, I know this has to hurt, too.”

“I hurt, but not because of the hound’s scratches.”  He reached the top of the stairs and strode to the bedroom.

My pulse pounded as he placed me on the bed.

“Will you take your shirt off again?” he asked, hopeful.

Exhaling steadily, I reached down and pulled the shirt up and over my head.  I tossed it aside and scooted further back to give him room.  The king-sized bed gave plenty of that.

His gaze swept over me, then he grabbed the waistline of his shorts.  I’d tried to ignore his erection until that point.  However, once he freed it, I couldn’t look away.  Kicking the material to the side, he put a knee on the mattress.

“Please be careful,” I said softly.

“I won’t hurt either of us,” he said crawling toward me.

I wasn’t so sure about that.

When he reached me, he kissed my neck, nipping a trail down to my breast.  He didn’t need to coax me much to get me to lay back.  While his tongue traced a slow circle around my nipple, his knee wedged between my legs.  I arched up, wanting more.

“Please, Ghua.”

His mouth closed over my tight bud, and I moaned at the hot, wet suction.  The feel of his fingers, smoothing down the column of my throat, over my sternum, and down between my legs made me shiver with need.  He stroked my folds, then shifted his attention to my mouth.

He kissed me reverently, pouring his tenderness into each touch of his tongue.  He pulled back to look at me.

“I love you, Eden.  You are brave and smart.  You’re patient and sometimes kind.  I like that you’re soft here,” he traced his fingers over my breast, “and here,” he slipped a finger inside of me.

The sweet man was trying to seduce me when he already had my legs spread wide.

I smiled at him and gently cupped his face.

“And I like that you’re persistent and so very loyal.”

He kissed me softly again and lifted himself.  The head of his cock bumped my entrance.  I tilted my hips and reached between us.  My hand closed over him, and I wondered again if I was insane to say yes to this man.

He pushed forward, easing himself into my opening.  Stretching me and pressing forward before withdrawing a bit.  Inch by inch, he worked his way in, the advance and retreat slicking the way.  Sweat beaded his brow by the time he was fully seated.  I ached and burned but in a desperate, hot way that made it impossible for me to hold still.  I arched up and swiveled my hips, grinding against him.

He growled and withdrew halfway.  I groaned when he slowly pushed all the way in again with a single, slow stroke.

“More,” I panted.

He withdrew and returned faster this time.  Forgetting myself, I hooked my heel around the back of his leg.  He reached back and gently removed it.

“Sorry,” I whispered.

He kissed me hard then set a grueling pace that made me cry out and beg.  He grunted in time with his thrusts, too.  I’d never felt anything so amazing before in my life.  As my insides tightened, I was already thinking of doing this again and again.

My climax exploded through me.  I tensed and let out a low wail as Ghua kept thrusting.  His rhythm faltered.  He jerked inside of me twice, then roared.  I could feel each pulse of his release.

He partially collapsed on top of me, his weight a comfort rather than a bother.  His lips pressed against my forehead.

“That was amazing,” I said.

He grunted and slipped to the side to lay on his stomach.

“Are you okay?  Did I hurt you?”

“I have never felt better, my Eden.  You’ve filled my heart so it will never ache again.”

I smiled and rolled on my side.  The heavy stickiness between my legs distracted me from what I’d been about to say.

“I think I need to shower,” I said.

He immediately lifted his head.

“Can I help you?”

“Always.”