Barbarian's Choice: A SciFi Alien Romance (Ice Planet Barbarians Book 12)

by Ruby Dixon

  I wiggle on top of him, because I am pleased with how this is going. I loved kissing him. It was so fun, and it has made me so aroused. I want to do it more. “I really, really am.” I lean down and lick the tip of his nose, just because I want to lick him everywhere.

  “Where did you learn to do that with your mouth?”

  “Humans taught me. It is common on their planet. Is it not on yours?”

  “No. Kef, I think I’ve only seen stuff like that in vids. Most mesakkah women aren’t quite so…open. They’re worried about disease. Mouths are so unclean.”

  “Pfft. Do you think my mouth is unclean?” I press another kiss to his lips.

  “I think your mouth is amazing,” he murmurs. His hand slides along my flank and then lightly caresses my buttock. “I’ve never met anyone like you, Farli.”

  I preen under the compliment and give another wiggle. He sucks in a breath, and I realize the hard ridge I am straddling is not his hip but his cock. Oh. My body flushes with heat, and I rock my hips over him experimentally. It drags his blanket-covered length against my folds, and the sensation is dizzying.

  Mardok groans again, and then, sky-claw fast, he wraps his arms around me and rolls until I am at his side and not straddling him. We face each other, so close the curves of our horns are practically touching and I can feel his breath on my face. “Tell me you’re real,” he says to me. “I feel like if I go to sleep, I’m going to wake up and this will all have been a dream.”

  “I am very real,” I tell him, and trace my fingers over his cheek again. “Why do you have drawings on your face?”

  “They’re tattoos. I got them when I was…” He hesitates. “When I was in the military. At war.”

  “What is military?”

  “Nothing good.” His tone has changed. It’s no longer sensual and full of pleasure, but turning cold. This is something that hurts him. I decide to change the topic, letting my fingers glide up his arching horns and along the curve. “Why are your horns shiny?”

  He gives a short, breathless laugh. “You’re very curious, aren’t you?”

  “Mm. It is because you are a very curious man.” But the darkness is creeping out of his voice, so I am happy. I want nothing but his smiles. Whatever bad things are in his past, I will make better for him with my love. “Is it a secret?”

  “No, it’s custom. People cap their horns because…well, I don’t know. It’s just what you do. I guess it’s polite. Keeps you from accidentally scratching someone if you move wrong.” I can feel him shrug. “I’ve never met anyone without capped horns except you.”

  “I am special,” I tease. “You like that.”

  “You’re very special.” The husky note is back in his voice, and I wish his eyes glowed in the dark like mine so I could see them. He is just…dark. Soon enough he will have a khui, I remind myself.

  “Can we kiss more?” I ask him, snuggling closer. My nose rubs against his. “I like kissing you.”

  “We shouldn’t. It’s against Captain’s rules to have relations with ship guests, and I’m pretty sure you qualify.” But his hand glides up and down my arm, touching my bare skin, and his tail is still twined with mine. “I’ll lose my position.”

  “What position?”

  “My job.”

  “What is job?”

  He chuckles. “Like your people have hunters. I am a mechanic. Well, that and security. I do both.”

  It makes no sense for him to lose his position in his small tribe because he touches me, but perhaps their customs are harsh…or he has a mate. I suck in a breath. What if he has a mate and that is why he has not resonated to me? I grab his horns with both of my hands and hold his face against mine, my brow pressing to his as if this will give me the answers faster. “Mardok,” I say quickly. “Do you have a mate?”

  “A what?”

  “A female? A mate? A family? Kits?”

  “What? No. I told you, I’m a soldier. Was a soldier.” I can feel his heavy sigh in the air between us. “It keffed my head up good. Can’t bring a family into that. Never wanted to.”

  I am relieved. “Good.”

  “Why good?” He sounds amused.

  “Because you are my mate and no one else’s.”

  There’s a long pause. “What?”

  I put my hand to his chest. Still covered in his silly, thin leathers. He should be naked with me. “You are my mate and I am yours. We have resonated.”

  5

  MARDOK

  Mate?

  I wonder if this is one of the language gaps and I’m not hearing her right. Or maybe it’s hard to concentrate when her gorgeous, supple body is pressing up against mine and she’s completely naked, her skin scorchingly hot and slightly damp. It makes me picture what she looks like in the light, all blue curves, skin gleaming, her thick hair wild over her shoulders, those bare horns…I have to suppress a shudder or I’m going to take myself in hand, right here. I need to focus on what she’s saying. “You say resonance. What does that mean?”

  Her nose brushes against mine, and I think she’s going to put her lips on me again. I’ve never experienced anything like her mouth-on-mouth kiss before. I’ve seen it in the kind of vids that no decent woman ever watches. And I’ve read about it, but I’ve never actually done it. All of the women I’ve had relationships with in the past have been brought up by modern society, concerned more with hygiene and disease control than the intimacy of putting her mouth on me. I’ve rarely even touched bare skin. But Farli? She is unafraid and unashamed of who she is, and she revels in caresses and the touches that everyone else I know would eschew.

  It makes touching her have a forbidden feel to it, even moreso given the captain’s longstanding ship orders. I know if we’re caught together, I’ll be dumped at the nearest port and given severance. That doesn’t mean I can stop stroking her soft skin or that I can push her away when she rubs up against me like a nilu cat seeking attention.

  “Resonance?” she murmurs, her voice sweet and soft. Her hand glides over my arm and down my chest, and she presses her palm against the cartilage plates there. “It begins here. The khui sings a song to let me know when I have met my mate.”

  “Singing?” I press my hand between her breasts, to the same place she’s touching me. “Here? When you purr?” Even now, I can feel the vibrations in her chest. It doesn’t sound like a song to me, more of a low-pitched, steady thrumming. It does sound a little musical, now that I think about it. “So what do you mean by mated?”

  She chuckles, and I feel her tongue flick along my jaw, tracing the lines of it. Gods above, but she’s sensual. “What do you think it means?”

  “Sex,” I say bluntly, and the stub of my tail tightens its obsessive grip around hers. “Lots and lots of sex. But I’m guessing there is more than that.”

  “I will tell you if we can kiss again,” she teases, and nuzzles my nose again. Her hand moves up my shirt, fingers sneaking into my collar so she can touch my skin. I don’t think she can figure out the fastenings, because she tugs at the front of my clothing and then gives up. I should push her away, but everything in me wants more of her innocent touches, more exploring and caressing. I pull my shirt open, and she responds with a happy sigh, her hands moving over my chest, exploring me.

  “You want kisses?” I ask, brushing my hand over her hair. I move my body slightly, until she’s under me and I’m over her, leaning on an elbow. The primal male in me wants her under me. Doesn’t matter how wrong it is. I want to claim her innocence, even if only for a moment. I take the lead on the kiss this time, tasting her luscious mouth, and when she opens for me, I drag my tongue against hers. She makes a soft mewling noise of pleasure, and I feel it all the way down to my cock.

  Mine. She’s mine.

  I can fight it all I want, but I know that she belongs to me. My kiss grows more possessive, my mouth more aggressive as she responds under me. She arches, pressing her breasts to my chest, and her hard little nipples scrape against my shirt.
I nearly come at that smallest of touches. I keep my hands respectfully on her arm and in her hair, though I want nothing more than to slide my fingers over her pussy and see if it’s soaking wet for me. I bet it is.

  I abandon her mouth with one final, suggestive lick, and she pants, dazed. “You are very good at that, Mardok.”

  “I had a good teacher.”

  “Who?”

  I nip at her lower lip, drawing another shudder from her. “You.”

  “Oh,” she says, shy. “Am I your first, too?”

  My first? “First what?”

  “First mating?”

  Does she mean having sex? “I’ve had sex before. Uh, fornicated.” Damn, even the word sounds too filthy to use when it comes to her. Farli would never fornicate. She would make love. Hell, and now I sound like a lovesick poet. “Not in a long time, though. Haven’t wanted anyone to touch me.”

  I feel her fingertips dance over my chest. “Is it all right if I touch you?”

  I think I’d die if she stopped. I swallow hard. “Yeah.”

  “You will be my first,” she tells me. “I have waited for my mate.”

  Just like that, my heart stutters. “Your first…mate?” Is she a virgin? When she nods, I groan and press my forehead to hers. She’s more innocent than I thought, and I wonder if she’s going to regret being here with me, touching me. Doing lascivious things with her mouth. I’m craving her like Trakan craves his carcinogels, but I’m not an asshole. Very slowly, I detangle my tail from hers and pull her hands away from my chest. I press my mouth to one palm. “Maybe you should go back home and wait to resonate to another nice guy, the one you want to marry.”

  She’s quiet, and then she gives another light giggle. “You only resonate to one person ever, silly.”

  What? “Are we talking about the same thing? I’m talking about sex.”

  “I am talking about resonating. When your khui chooses someone for you.”

  Farli’s throwing me mixed signals here. “If it chooses for you, I don’t understand what you mean by ‘you waited.’”

  “Mating with someone is nothing,” Her tail flicks on the blankets, and I wonder if she’s growing frustrated with me. “People take pleasure-mates all the time. It is like…scratching an itch. But you only resonate to your true mate.” Her fingers touch my chin again, as if she is trying to force me to concentrate. “Like I said, the khui chooses. It selects the male and the female that will be best together so it can bring about the strongest kits.”

  Whoa, whoa, whoa. Everything inside me screeches to a halt. I swallow hard. “Kits?”

  “Yes. The khui chooses the perfect person to father my young. It always chooses, and it chooses well.” I can practically hear her smiling in the dark. All the while, her chest is doing that thrumming, purring thing. “I have waited for resonance, because I have waited for my mate. I have had offers to share my furs, but it has never interested me…until now.”

  Because she wants to make babies? Somehow, I don’t think that’s it. She really believes that if she purrs to me that we’re somehow destined to be together and I’m going to make her pregnant? That’s the craziest thing. I don’t know what to make of it.

  I also don’t know what to make of the jealous surge that rises in me at the thought of her getting all kinds of offers to ‘share her furs.’ I shouldn’t be this possessive of her, this fast. Maybe she’s right about the ‘resonance’ thing, but I’m not sure I’m grasping all of it. “But I’m not resonating, Farli.”

  “Not yet.” She pats my chest as if to soothe me. “You do not have a khui yet.”

  Her parasite? “I don’t think I want one.”

  “But…you have to.” A note of panic enters her voice. “You cannot live if you do not have a khui. Those without one will sicken and die. You cannot stay here with me without one.”

  I remain silent. Stay…here?

  On this iceball of a planet? The familiar terror lodges in my chest.

  Left behind.

  It won’t happen. Ever. I pat Farli’s shoulder awkwardly in the dark, not wanting to tell her my thoughts. I don’t want to hurt her feelings. “You should get some sleep.”

  She doesn’t fall for it. Her arms go around my neck and she presses quick, frantic kisses to my face, as if terrified. “Mardok,” she breathes. “Tell me you will stay here with me. Please. I just found you. I cannot bear to have you leave me.”

  I stroke her back, and lust rises inside me again. She’s naked and pressing herself against me, I tell myself. Any man would feel hunger in this situation. But it feels different with Farli. In the past, when I was freshly discharged from the military, I’d get approached by women in spaceport bars looking for a quick, rough hookup. Some of them were far more forward than Farli is, and yet I felt…nothing for them.

  I’m afraid I’m feeling too much for Farli.

  At the same time, I can’t imagine living in this frigid, desolate place. Being stranded here, forever. I close my eyes, pushing past the memories that threaten to rise. “I haven’t seen much of your planet,” I hedge. “You could come with me.”

  “No, I cannot. You cannot remove a khui once it has become part of you. The humans say that there is no leaving once you are here.”

  That sounds like even more of a death sentence. “We’ll talk about it in the morning.”

  I expect her to protest again, but she only presses another kiss to my mouth. “Yes, in the morning I will show you my world. You will love it.”

  Somehow I doubt that. But I hold her close and stroke her as she settles in to sleep. I tell myself that a planet with someone like Farli on it can’t be that bad…but then I keep thinking of the bitter blast of the wind striking my face the moment I opened the door. The desolate, white landscape that seemed to be nothing but shrubs and rocks and snow.

  A planet I can never leave again. And I’ve been restless ever since I left the military. Traveling to new worlds and systems sometimes quiets my head. Sometimes. With a job as a mechanic on a long-haul space-freighter, I’ve seen a lot of places. Nothing has felt even close to home…not even the ship I’m on now. Sometimes I don’t feel as if I have a place anywhere.

  One thing’s for sure, though—if I had to pick a new homeworld, this sure as shit wouldn’t be it.

  Farli snuggles closer to me, tucking her head against my neck and sighing happily. And I feel like an ass for my dark thoughts.

  “You need to get this thing out of my med bay,” Niri says, her voice pleasant despite her words. “It shit all over the floor twice this morning.” She’s speaking our native language so Farli can’t understand her, pretending to be busy on her med pad. “Not sure why you tried to save it anyhow. Do you know how much I spent on clinic supplies for this thing overnight?”

  “Don’t care. Take it out of my check. And speak Farli’s language so she can understand us.” I keep my arms crossed over my chest, trying to look as menacing as possible to shut her up. It’s not that I dislike Niri—she’s the closest thing I have to a friend on The Tranquil Lady. But I remember dinner yesterday vividly, and while she didn’t exactly mock Farli…she didn’t defend her, either.

  Farli. I look over at her. She’s wearing Niri’s jumper again today, her own furry boots covering her feet. Her hair is loose around her shoulders, and her face is wreathed in smiles as her ugly, smelly pet licks her face happily. She’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen, and as I watch her hungrily, she glances over at me. Most women would blush or play coy. Farli simply gives me an equally heated look that tells me she’s still thinking about last night.

  And I’m the one that blushes, my ears growing hot.

  “You’re grumpy this morning,” Niri comments. It’s in Farli’s language, so at least I don’t have to growl at her over that. “Not sleep well?”

  “Slept fine.”

  “Then it must be something else.” She gives me a meaningful look and then turns her head, exaggeratingly peering over at Farli. “Something l
ike that?”

  “Leave it alone, Niri.” The old woman doesn’t have family to fuss over, so I’m her project. Usually I don’t mind, but today it irks me. Maybe because I’m still thinking about last night and the conversation about khuis and mating and being stuck here on this planet forever. I can’t imagine. Every time my brain starts to go in that direction, I think of the ship taking off and leaving me behind on the surface…and my brain goes to another time, on a jungle planet, when I was left behind with my unit in hostile territory… I shudder, then fling myself off the wall, trying to shake off the memories.

  Farli turns back to her pet and leans in, hugging his neck. “Are you hungry, Chahm-pee?” She pulls a root out of her bag and waves it under his nose. “I saved this for you.”

  The thing takes a shit even as its little tail flips back and forth happily, and Niri makes a strangled noise.

  “Can’t do anything about it,” I tell Niri, biting back the laugh that rises in my throat. “Captain wants Farli to stick around until he has time to chat with her. That means her pet stays, too.” I woke up to a message on my com from the captain, and I’d expected it to be an ass-reaming about fraternization. It wasn’t, though—just a command not to let our ‘guest’ go until he’d had a chance to quiz her further.

  I should be annoyed that he thinks I’m her keeper—I’m not one for being social, after all. But it seems right that I be the one to stay at Farli’s side. I sure don’t want Trakan hovering around her, and it’s clear that Niri’s short allotment of patience has already been exhausted. And…Farli’s mine. The thought of anyone else even touching a hair on her head fills me with wordless rage.

  I didn’t resonate to you.

  Not yet.

  I watch Farli and her pet for a moment, thinking. “The creature’s healthy?” I ask Niri.

  “As if he’d never been wounded,” she says grumpily. “Minus some singed hair on his flank and a stink that’s going to take forever to get out of med bay.”