Chapter Twelve

 

Jerik gathered all the papers in the morning just as he had done every morning since meeting Medora. Every tidbit, any snippet that mentioned her, he devoured. He refused to apologize for his interest. It was a passing fancy, nothing more. He just needed one, delicious, taste of her. That kiss.

The morning after visiting Callie, one tabloid had a blurry photo of her outside the hospital with her hand to her lips. The tactless headline read: Heiress Fighting Digestive Disease in Losing Battle. It was ridiculous. They’d manufactured the story, obviously.

On this morning, the morning after the charity ball, he was curious what he would find.

Heiress Falls for Alien Sex Club Owner

Bigoted Socialite Slums with Alien Sex God

Alien Sex in the City?

Chicago’s Angel Falls for Alien Bad Boy

Krinar Sex God Seduces Virgin Heiress

Fuck.

Each article had at least one or more photo of them at the ball. When he caught her, when he helped her off the dais, when they danced. There was one photograph in the Sun-Times that disturbed him more than any other. It was a single shot of him, imposing in his expensive suit, with a decidedly predatory look in his eyes. The photographer had managed to capture his wolfish nature. He pushed it aside and flipped it over.

He yanked his phone from the charger and dialed Medora’s number. It went to voicemail.

Damn it. He’d done this. From what he’d gathered when he first started—stalking her—for lack of a better phrase, she’d managed to keep a low profile. He paced.

He sat at his expansive dining room table, the table that he’d once used for passionate sex with two women, but never ate at, and buried his face in his hands. Medora was not going to be happy about this.

Maybe it would help her organization. He tried to call her again. No answer.

Resorted to a text.

Call me.

If you don’t call me, I’m coming over

He decided he wouldn’t wait.

He pulled on a celery green Henley and jeans. He almost called his driver, then realized the press could be camping out in front of her building even now. The vultures.

He knew she was going to rip his head off for this, but he slid the smooth metal device into his palm and created a portal gate to her living room. He stepped in, surprised at its tidiness. Perhaps she didn’t come home last night? Perhaps she went home with someone else? He made such a convincing argument she followed his advice. And chose a human man. His gut roiled. But no. She’d texted him. Right? Damn his insecurity.

He stepped further into the room, taking a moment to appreciate her style. One wall had a collage of photos of presumably family: a smiling beautiful woman who could only be her mother. He saw at once where Medora received her grace and poise. The photos traced an arc of family life and togetherness for a period of time, and then they stopped. There were no more photos of Medora after about the age of nine or ten. Or of the mother. That reflected what he’d learned in his obsessive research of her life.

He scanned the surfaces of her tables, noticing trinkets that seemed to be out of place in a penthouse. Folded paper birds, framed crayon drawings, plastic rings and junky toys. His brows furrowed in confusion. He bent to pick up a folded card with a crude figure drawn on it—perhaps it was a pink ball with two sticks protruding from the bottom? And a dated electrical outlet drawn in the center of the ball? He turned the card this way and that, mystified. He looked inside the fold. “How does a sick pig get to the hospital? In a HAMbulance!”

He stared a moment longer. A childish scrawl filled the bottom half of the paper. Your friend, Tim

He set it gently back on the glass tabletop, the mystery solved. She surrounded herself with the memories of the patients her foundation had served. Jerik felt a lump forming in his throat.

The headlines—his sex clubs.

Her acquaintance with him could jeopardize her foundation. He’d been on Earth for years now. He knew how things worked. The board of directors could ask her to step down as Executive Director. The families of the children might think she was “guilty by association” and request she stay away. He shoved his hands in his pockets and stared at the ceiling. Medora would be devastated.

Her scent stirred his senses, and he looked toward the hall. She still slept. She hadn’t seen the news bots then. His mind scrambled to come up with something, anything, to prevent her from the pain that would surely come with the aftereffects of his impetuosity last night.

He replayed their conversations. His gut clenched. His heart raced. He was no hero, but he might have the solution. To both problems. He couldn’t help the wicked smile that played across his lips.

He pulled his nano-device out of his pocket and ran a sub-program.

He walked down the hall, letting her lily fragrance guide him. He found her, obscured by gray satin sheets, sprawled in bed. She snored softly and had a sleeping mask over her eyes. Her hair was a riotous mass of spun white-gold. A bare shoulder, a naked foot, the hollow of her throat—each part seemed to sing to him and only for him. No one had touched her yet.

His arousal answered back with ferocious undertones. He took a predatory step toward her bed, but then remembered why he was here.

With resignation, he turned his back to her and cleared his throat. “Medora, you need to wake up. We have important business to discuss.” His hearing picked up the swish of satin against skin and the quick inhalation that signaled her awakening. He smiled lazily, imagining the look on her face. She would be furious with him. He liked it.

Her husky voice caressed his ears. “What business could possibly be important enough to wake Cinderella after her night at the ball?” She yawned. “This is beyond the pale, Jerik.”

“It seems I made a critical error last night when I prevented your fall.” He dipped his head. “Ah, and when I made that rather large bid for an evening with you probably didn’t help matters, either.”

He heard her gasp. How he would love to see her now. He envisioned the sheet slipping below her shoulders as she sat up in a huff. Blood rushed below his belt. Jerik couldn’t believe he was counting by days instead of hours now. Damn Medora the minx.

He heard rustling fabric, a drawer slide open and shut.

“You may as well turn around, Jerik, although I don’t understand why you’re being all gentlemanly when you have broken into my apartment for a second time while I’m not dressed.”

He turned to see she was wearing a Chicago Cubs T-shirt. And nothing else. Suddenly America’s ancient pastime seemed like a very appealing sport.

She folded her arms and tapped her bare foot on the gray carpet. She had a silver toe ring and red-painted toenails. Why did such details fascinate him?

“Well? Spit it out, Jerik.”

He sighed. Presented one of the newspapers he’d folded and stuck into the back of his pants. She read the headline, straight white teeth pinning her bottom lip. He could do that for her…

“Well damn,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

Jerik frowned. “You’re sorry?”

“Yes. How long have you been playboying around town and not been in the newspapers? I mean, I know you were on GQ, but this?” She flicked the newspaper with a French-manicured nail. “This is just nuts.”

Jerik glanced to his left and spied a gray club chair with a white diamond pattern. Her white stole from last night was draped across it. He nudged it aside and sat, placing his hands upon his knees.

“Your position as Executive Director of Humans with Heart is in jeopardy.”

She made a rude noise with her lips and batted a hand toward him. “Ridiculous. These things blow over all the time.” She gave him a smile. “But thank you for worrying about me.”

He frowned again, unsure how to make her believe him. Her phone began buzzing, and she reached down to her night table. “Excuse me, it’s Daddy.”

She took the call, and Jerik watched her face as it went from polite contentment to flabbergasted to horror. She squeaked a thank you and turned off the phone. Her face went white.

“The Board wants to speak with me,” she whispered. “In an hour. About you.”

Jerik curled his fingers into fists. This was entirely his fault. The look of abject terror and dejection on her face was all on him. To think he’d set out a few days ago, intent on despoiling a beautiful woman for his pleasure—it had turned into this—he didn’t know what to call it. But he could fix it. His plan, admittedly somewhat self-serving, would help her. It had to. He knew the sub-program would be finished running now.

He stood up and walked to her, grasping her elbows with both hands, and looked down into her watering deep brown eyes. “I’m sorry for everything, Medora,” he said. “But I can make it up to you.”

He saw a flicker of hope.

He dropped to one knee in front of her and pulled out the item he’d made just minutes ago in the other room.

It was an odd, glimmering ring.

He watched her face. Confusion gave birth to surprise. Consternation. Disbelief. This was not boding well. He sallied forth.

“Ariella Medora Rothchild, daughter of Alina Smirnov Rothchild and Douglas J. Rothchild, will you do me the honor of accepting me, Jerik Jerononikalos Malopkovic Krinadopoulos, son of Jerononikala and Malopko of Lendarka Krinadopoulos Krina, as your husband on Earth and in Krina settlements and territories?”

She looked from his face to the ring and back again. Thrice. Opened her mouth twice but closed it. Held her hand out to hold the ring in her palm.

“What is this material?” She asked reverently.

She didn’t reject him immediately. He let out a breath. “I admit it is unusual. I understand the Earth custom demands a ring of diamond and gold.” He refused to explain where it came from. “Do you accept?”

She looked back up at him. Her mouth twisted. “I don’t understand. How is this the solution?”

“Your Board of Directors is reacting to rumors of an illicit sexual relationship, a casual fling, with an Alien, no less, that could reflect poorly on your organization.”

She nodded, eyes watering again. He stood up.

“But if it were revealed that we were, in fact, engaged to be married, then it puts the relationship into a different light.”

She cocked her head and frowned.

She was being difficult. Anger began to simmer, but he tamped it down.

“Imagine the headlines when you announce your engagement to me, Medora.” He touched her shoulder and waited until she looked into his eyes again. “Chicago’s Princess to Reform Alien Rake”,” he suggested. “Or perhaps, “Heiress Promises Life of Philanthropy with Alien Companion”.” He took both shoulders, feeling a shimmer of want mixed with earnest intent. “Krinar Covenants Fidelity to Earth Woman”.

She pursed her mouth. “But you…”

He couldn’t accept her doubt any longer. He lowered his mouth to hers and kissed her. Jerik couldn’t say with words what he was feeling. It was something like, I want, and I need, swirled together with I hope, and fascination, and endless questions about the future. It was not the heady passion of unsated lust, but a kiss that married concern with companionship. Basically, it was unlike any kiss he had ever shared with any other person in thousands of years. He released her lips and his breath and stepped back, unbalanced.

She licked her lips and blinked several times. “I can’t think when you kiss me.”

He didn’t respond but walked over to her bedroom windows and pulled the curtains to the side. “Look down there, Medora.”

She padded over to the windows and gasped. Far below, news vans from several agencies were parked up and down the street.

“They’re waiting to ask you questions about me,” he said. “What will you tell them?”

A tear fell from her eye as she stared down through the glass.

“Isn’t there any other solution?”

Jerik gritted his teeth. “It doesn’t have to be a permanent engagement,” he growled. “If the thought is so repugnant to you, call it off in three months when the press has died down. Your position should be safe by then.”

He left her room and stalked into the living area. He wanted to leave. But she would be assaulted by the press as soon as she walked out the door, and he knew she would go speak to the Board. Which left him bisected between escaping the strange feelings erupting inside him and a sense of obligation to the woman in the other room. He stared morosely out the window for long minutes.

“Jerik?”

He turned. She wore a yellow dress and a bawdy robin’s egg blue necklace and bracelet. She wore the matching color of velvety high heels. With shoes together and her hands clutching a blue bag she faced him.

“Will you do you your little magic thing with the portal and take me directly to the boardroom?” She took a dainty step forward. “And will you stay with me while I announce our engagement?”

Jerik wanted to make her suffer for these last minutes of his agony, but the beseeching look she gave him prevented him from doing so. He nodded. Approached her and took her arm, looking down at her upturned face.

“What is the shape of this neckline called?” He asked about the dress. Traced the edge of it, allowing his finger to glance over her pearlescent skin.

“Um. It’s a, a, sweetheart neckline,” she whispered.

“Let’s go,” he said, and fingered the nano-device. “Hold your breath.”

“I have been for days, to be honest.”