CHAPTER 6
RACHEL
Rachel sighed deeply as she watched Erro sleep. She was worried enough about him to pull out her cell phone and try to call work again, but the result was just the same. No signal. There was no way she’d be giving anyone a call until the storm had passed.
Defeated, she walked up to a window, taking a peek around the curtain. All she could see outside was white and more white as the snow stormed down with a fury. It was still too early to go to bed, and with the wind blowing so fiercelyoutside, she knew she should probably stay in the living room to tend to the fire. But at the same time, she didn’t want to disturb Erro either.
His eyes were closed and his breathing came deep and even as he laid peacefully on the couch in his angelic, golden glow. She may not have all the details of how a Union pilot had managed to crash land in the middle of Northern Alaska, but after an ordeal like the one he’d just been through, he clearly needed to get some rest.
In the end, Rachel decided to curl up on the loveseat across from Erro and read a book for a while. That way, she could keep an eye on him to make sure he was okay, and enjoy the newly decorated tree at the same time.
She hadn’t quite managed to decorate it completely before being called in to work, but now, it had been almost fun doing it all by herself. Back at home, there were always numerous fingers in the ornament box, and she’d never decorated a tree quite like this before, in peace and quiet, with her own freedom to place the ornaments as she wished.
It had been fun also, watching Erro’s reactions as she pulled the different shapes out and looked for places to put them. His face was very expressive, and it was easy to read what was going on in his head even if she didn’t understand what he was saying. A smile tugged at her lips when she remembered how he had tried to pronounce the English word ‘ornament’.
The man clearly had a curious mind, despite it perhaps being addled due to the crash. And one thing that the alien had made crystal clear was the fact that he had no problems with being attracted to somebody outside his own species – whichever species he was. That was one of the many questions she couldn’t ask him since he’d apparently broken his translator and she didn’t own one herself.
But probably the biggest question she had for him involved that word – ele’a.
As in, what did it mean, and why did he keep saying it on her? She was certain by now that it was a term of endearment and each time he said it to her, she seemed to react to it quite strongly. The last time he’d said it, there was no mistaking the fact that the word was somehow able to arouse her. Were there really words that could do something like that, or was it just because Erro was the one saying it?
She tended to think it was because of him. His voice was deep and mellow, and it did fuzzy things to her insides whenever she heard it. The way he purred her name, like a caress. The whole man oozed masculinity, and his voice was no different. When he spoke, she felt entranced.
With her book in hand, Rachel laid there on the loveseat, but found herself daydreaming instead. Replaying the sound of him saying that strange word to her right before she’d made him spill tea on his lap. Right before she’d – well, before she’d touched it.
A deep blush rose onto her cheeks at the memory and she quickly shook her head, banishing the thought from her mind.
She wasn’t completely inexperienced. She’d dated a guy or two at college, although during her final year, she had sworn off them in favor of studying. That’s why it had been so long since she’d been intimate. And maybe that’s why Erro affected her so strongly.
She’d gone straight from graduation to Alaska. With only four co-workers of the male persuasion – two of whom were taken – that left slim pickings as far as she was concerned. Her boss was definitely not a man on her shopping list, and the other guy was so stupid he made the caribous seem intelligent by comparison.
So yeah, Erro was definitely easy on the eyes, and she couldn’t deny the man had a certain appeal that had her so flustered she didn’t know what to do with herself, but she wouldn’t want to take advantage of a guy while he was down. What if, while he was suffering from his crash-induced amnesia or whatever, he forgot that he was in a relationship with somebody? Wouldn’t that be just her luck?
Well, if nothing else, it would have been a fun way to spend Christmas, a naughtier portion of her brain pointed out. Giving her wayward mind a mental slap, she set the book aside and glanced at Erro again. He was still out like a light, and his look was so serene he reminded her of a sleeping child. A seven foot tall, golden child, but still.
Sleep finally crawled up on her after a while, and she felt her eyes go droopy. It really had been a long day and the exhaustion was catching up on her at last. Putting aside her book, she decided to head to bed.
With a stretch, she got up from the loveseat and walked to her front door. Despite the fact they were in the middle of nowhere, Rachel took the advice she’d been given about interstellar lowlifes seriously enough that she had installed an alarm system at her house. Now, she padded over to engage it in a bid to keep them out of her home.
Then, she stepped back to the couch and adjusted Erro’s blanket again. She put another log on the fire and gave the sleeping Union pilot a final look before heading off to her bedroom for some much needed rest.
* * *
Rachel’s heart nearly leaped out of her chest when an ear-screeching noise went off in the house. She woke up with a start, her eyes flying open and her heart pounding hard. She relaxed only slightly when she realized that the terrible noise was her door alarm. After all, waking up to the sound of the alarm system going off was probably not a good sign.
Still wearing nothing but her long, oversized t-shirt, she ran quickly into the living room to see what was going on. To her surprise, she found Erro shivering on the floor, his hands covering his ears, and a cold blast of air – fortunately devoid of snow this time – chilling the room. A shiver ran along her spine as the cold reached her.
“Well, at least the storm has ended,” she commented dryly as she stepped over to close the door. She left Erro where he was long enough to build up the fire again, since it seemed like he needed to be warm, and she didn’t think her aching muscles were up to lifting the big guy again.
“Rachel?” he asked softly as he sat up, clearly trying to make sure he remembered her name.
She looked at him, worried that he might have just fallen and hit his head again. Getting to her feet, she stepped over and ran her fingers along the back of his head, feeling for the bump she’d noticed there the night before. She quickly realized the touch might have been a mistake when he suddenly leaned forward, close enough that his face was almost touching her belly, and breathed in her scent.
“Ele’a,” he whispered with a contented sigh.
Rachel could feel her cheeks heat up again, but she quickly swatted the man away.
“Okay, I really want to know what this ele’a thing you keep talking about is,” Rachel complained, knowing he couldn’t understand what she was saying anyway. “What is it, some kind of an alien sex thing?”
Without meaning to, she surreptitiously glanced down at the area between his legs. Her cheeks burned hot as she realized that the distinct bulge was still there, and she wondered if he’d ever managed to calm down. If he had though, it hadn’t lasted, because right now, he was in full-on bulge mode again. Or maybe the thing never gave it a rest at all? The possibility left her face crimson as she moved away, intent on making them some breakfast.
Glancing at the coffee table where Erro had left his sandwich the previous evening, she saw that he’d eaten it sometime during the night. Good, at least she knew that he was able to consume the ingredients she had on hand. That was a start.
Walking into the kitchen, she took some eggs out of her fridge and started to prepare them breakfast. While she was cooking, Erro got up and followed her into the room, curiously looking at the stovetop. She smiled at him as he entered, but quickly caught his hand when he would have touched the burner.
The sudden skin-on-skin contact ignited an odd heat inside her, like a small electric spark coursing between them, and she blushed. Erro seemed to have felt it too. His eyes darkened momentarily, and he was suddenly standing a lot closer than before. So close, that she could feel the warmth of his body against hers.
Rachel dropped his hand like it burned even hotter than the stove and turned to stir the hash browns.
Erro sighed beside her, catching her chin in his hand so she would look at him. His golden eyes swirled with an intensity she hadn’t seen before, and he pointed at the front door insistently.
Rachel understood that he wanted to go outside – although why, she didn’t know. Perhaps back to his spaceship? But she didn’t want him to get so cold she had to drag him back in again. She thought about this dilemma as she set the hash browns and scrambled eggs onto two plates and brought them over to the small kitchen table, motioning for Erro to join her there.
They ate mostly in silence, with Erro trying to make conversation a few times, maybe just for the sake of saying something – just as she had spoken English to him the night before – and in the meanwhile, Rachel considered what to do with him and his insistence to venture outside.
The storm had ended, so that much was good. She also knew that she had a very oversized coat hanging in the closet which, with any luck, might actually fit over Erro’s shoulders, but she doubted it would be large enough to fully close. No, it seemed more likely that they were going to need to cover him with a sweater or two first.
And his legs? Well, maybe some leg warmers would help? They were pink, but it wasn’t likely he would know that the color was usually meant for girls anyway, right? Who knew, maybe pink was even the most masculine color there was on his planet? She could only hope so.
Or maybe Erro didn’t even see colors. Rachel frowned at the thought. The man before her looked so eerily human at times – although an unusually attractive one – that if someone saw them eating like this, they wouldn’t think anything was amiss. But no matter how human he looked, he wasn’t one. So who knew, maybe he saw colors completely differently as well?
Either way, Rachel was glad to discover that Erro had found his appetite at last. He seemed to be happily gorging down the breakfast, eating like a starved man and even asking for more – to which Rachel happily complied.
While he continued to eat, Rachel hunted down warm clothes he might be able to wear and brought them all out to sit on the loveseat. His eyes followed her movements curiously, and when she began pulling on sweaters and socks, he looked as though he understood. Good thing, too. She didn’t know the Union words for ‘put these on’.
Since she was pulling on some leggings at the time, when Erro stepped over, he started with those. Next, he tried to pull on a sweater, which was slightly too tight, and ripped at the shoulders as he attempted to work it over his bulging biceps. With a shrug, he simply ripped off the sleeves completely and tossed them aside, easily getting into the shell before reaching for the jacket. Thankfully, that one didn’t rip as well, though just as she’d suspected, he was too bulky to pull the thing closed.
After he tried unsuccessfully to pull the jacket around himself, Erro surprised Rachel when he picked up the sleeves he’d just discarded, tied them together, and then tugged and stretched at them, testing to see if he could cinch them around his waist to close the gap instead.
“Erro!” Rachel gasped, chuckling as she watched him.
She really couldn’t help herself when she started to laugh. The puffy winter coat – which was a deep orange color – almost made him look like a giant pumpkin. Worse, the sleeves he was attempting to work around it were a shade of green.
“You look like you’re working on the wrong holiday,” she told him between chuckles.
Erro dropped the sleeves and watched her with a bemused expression on his face. The look in his eyes seemed almost predatory as he suddenly shoved her against the wall, making her gasp. Her laughter abruptly died as he pinned her there, caging her with his body, and her heartbeat sped up until she felt it in her throat.
Before she could say or do anything to protest, Erro’s lips crushed down onto hers, hot and insistent. Stunned, Rachel forgot to breathe for a moment as a wave of desire unlike anything she’d ever felt before washed over her. Her whole body felt heated, and to her surprise, she found herself kissing him back. His tongue slipped into her mouth, and hers answered in kind, begging for more. When she finally came up for air, his lips didn’t fully leave hers.
“Ele’a,” he whispered against her mouth, making her breath catch.
Somehow, Erro saying that word right against her flesh made her melt even more. Definitely a sex thing. Her natural instinct to throw her arms around his neck kicked in, but with all the stuffing between them, there was no way her padded arms were going anywhere close to that direction.
Instead, she used them to push him away from her, certain that now would not be the best time to encourage anything more. She reached into the pile of clothes and grabbed some mittens, taking hold of one of his hands, and then the other, to slip them on. Once his hands were protected, she turned and strode to the door, properly turning off the alarm system before she opened it this time.
Erro was still standing near the wall, watching her. His breaths came out quite heavily, and his fists were clenched at his sides. Rachel sucked in a deep breath of her own as she motioned for him to follow her. She didn’t need to see the evidence between his thighs to know that kiss must have rocked his world just as much as it had rocked her own.