by V. K. Ludwig
She stroked the tablecloth flat and raised a brow at me. “Why, yes, I am.”
“Is that so?” I poked my head back into the hallway, then silently closed the door behind me. “You’ve got no idea about the stuff that happens in dark backrooms.”
At that, she straightened, each of my steps toward her letting her grin grow. I grabbed her arm and pulled her against my chest, the slam of it mixing with her gasp.
She wrapped her hands around my neck and let me taste her kiss, pleasure exploding at my core at this tangle of lips, teeth, and tongue. It weakened that tight handle I’d kept on myself for so long, making me think of all the things I wanted to do with her body.
Her hands trailed down my chest with a moan until her fingers hooked on my waistband. She slipped my pants down, her knees lowering to the ground right along with it.
I sensed a jitter in my upper lip as I asked, “What are you doing?”
She grabbed onto my briefs in response, and the moment she took my cock made me throw my head back and groan. My hips thrust forward all on their own, pumping into her fist each time she stroked her fingers down my shaft.
“Sit down,” she said and grabbed my thighs, pushing me onto the chair beside us.
Not the first time our difference in height got in the way.
The tip of her tongue trailed along my shaft, making the head bob against my shirt in eager excitement. A rush of blood pumped into my cock, and the veins protruded more as I swelled with over fifteen Earth years of unmet urges.
She twirled her tongue around the tip. Fuck, how I wanted to dig my fingers into her hair and make those lips wrap around me. When she finally took me into her mouth, I jolted on my chair, causing it to tip back slightly.
Her lips closed on me, quiet suckles coming from her mouth as they worked my engorged shaft, making my balls rise. A small amount of seed leaked from me, the way she groaned at the taste sending a shiver down my spine.
“By all the galaxies, Katie.”
I dug my fingers underneath that bun of hers, not caring a bit about how it slowly came apart. I’d gladly fix it later. Just like she’d taught me this morning.
My hand hesitated for a moment, but only until a smack sounding from how her lips tugged into a grin as they sealed around my cock. That was when I pushed her head down on me, and she moaned even as she took me with one smooth stroke, her throat vibrating against my head.
Each time a drop of seed worked itself up my shaft, she clenched her eyes shut and whimpered as if she couldn’t get enough of it. And I would have loved to fill her mouth with it, stream after stream coating her gums with the warm fluid. But not today.
“Katie, baby.” My voice came hoarse as I gave a tug on her hair. “You’re going to make me release if you keep going like this.”
“I want to taste you.”
My cock jerked at her words. I had to brace my hands against my knees to get up my legs shook that hard. “And you will. But first, I have to keep my promise.”
“Promise?”
“You already forgot?”
I grabbed her dress and shoved it up, stopping at her nipples, which I sucked into my mouth. First one, then the other, before I circled my tongue around it. They grew into hard little pebbles sinking into the pad of my tongue, and I pressed my shaft against her naked belly.
I pushed her dress over her arms and head. “I kissed the bruises on your knee away, now let’s take care of the rest.”
With my hands firm on her waist, I picked her up and sat her on the table. A shove against her sternum, and she leaned back, then sprawled out on the table in front of me. My mate’s hair opened more with every toss of her head over the tablecloth. I pulled her shoes off and let them plop to the ground.
“How about I start over here?” I lowered myself down on her and brushed my lips over her sternum, placing kiss after kiss over her broken heart. “Things will get better from here. I promise.”
Her eyes narrowed. Her stomach tensed. Another trigger.
And yet she nodded and lifted the corners of her mouth into a gentle smile, working through it together with me. Kidan might have placed his mark on her, but his would fade over time while mine would remain with her for eternity.
I kissed her entire body, from those fine hairs brushing across her forehead down to her ankles aching from hard work. Then across from one fingertip to the other. Kiss by kiss, piece by piece, I put her back together.
When I trailed my tongue over her panties, she braced her feet against the age of the table and lifted her pelvis. I slid down the fabric and let it drop to the ground. Her legs parted for me, slowly pulling her labia apart, giving me a good look at her glistening mating cleft ready to receive me.
“Can I kiss you down there?” I asked, throwing myself into unknown space. Pleasure droids and Jal’zar were intended for our pleasure, not the other way around.
At her nod, I leaned over and nibbled on her lower lips, sucking them farther apart before I dragged my tongue over the glistening pink skin. The scent of her lust spread across my gums. Rich and heady, with a slight sweetness to it.
Katie licked her lips nervously, staring down at me whenever she managed to lift her head, her body weak and delivered in front of me. She groaned when I penetrated her with the tip of my tongue, but she gasped the moment I drew her clit into my mouth. That hard little pearl throbbed between the clasp of my lips, and she sucked in a breath through gritted teeth.
I worked it deeper into my mouth, sucking it stronger while I let the pad of my tongue stroke over it with pressure. Katie threw her hands onto her mouth, but it did nothing to muffle her shout. When her pelvis retreated, I chased behind it, teeth raking over the hard knot of flesh before I suckled it some more.
My mate tensed underneath me, her legs stiffly by her sides as she lifted her pelvis toward me, against my mouth, riding her peak on my face, rubbing her sex over my lips.
I kept the pressure steady until her body eased, a fat smile peeking through the gaps between her fingers.
“That’s nothing my training ever taught me about your anatomy,” I said with a grin. “Should the Empire include that in our booklet about Earth females?”
She pushed herself up onto her elbows. “You have a booklet about us?”
“Maybe,” I said with a grin, taking myself in hand.
I grabbed her legs and worked my hips between them, wetting myself on her entrance. Hard flesh parted her drenched pussy, and a mix of my saliva and her climax formed a frothy white layer which collected around my corona.
I damn near whimpered when I grabbed her hips and pulled her onto my cock, then pushed deep inside to close the final distance. She pulsed so tightly around me, it cast trembles onto my body.
“Fuck,” Katie groaned. “This feels so go—”
My first thrust cut her short. Everything that escaped her mouth after that included a moan, mixing with my own and the way my thighs slapped against her ass.
“Too much?” I asked.
She answered with her legs wrapping around my back. They tugged, demanding me to go faster, deeper. “I love it.”
I sputtered a curse and drove into her, the table vibrating underneath my thrusts. “You love it when I fuck you like this?”
“Mmm, yeah.”
My balls tightened in response, ready to blast my seed inside her. I breathed it down. Detached my mind from the sensation of her walls squeezing my shaft, while I watched her breasts bounce in almost circular motions each time my legs knocked against the edge of the table.
I grabbed her leg and draped it over my shoulder. One tug on it and half of her pelvis hung over the edge, but I grabbed her other leg, keeping her sturdy. Then I rocked in even deeper, each thrust accompanied by a tug on her legs. Katie turned wild and threw her hands over her head, clasping to the tablecloth, which only slipped and gathered around her face in white dunes.
She was so wet for me, the entire room filled with the smacking sounds of it. It made th
e hairs on my arms rise. The thought that she wanted me. That she belonged to me and nobody would take her from me ever again. Not the department. Not a bounty hunter. Fuck, not even fate itself.
“I’m close,” Katie moaned.
The way she clenched around my shaft confirmed it, and I kept my pace steady no matter how much I wanted to ram deep into her pussy. Moan after moan, her pitch rose until her calf flexed against my neck, and her nipples grew even harder, surrounded by goosebumps pebbling her breasts.
And yet I didn’t let it push me over the edge. Instead, I watched her peak in front of me, taking in every wrinkle on her face, every furrow between her brows, and the way she tortured her lower lip.
And while I marvelled at my mate, my shaft suddenly turned cold.
With one quick move, Katie pulled away and pushed herself onto her knees. She squatted down on the table tight lips once more curling around my shaft.
I threw my head back and thrust my hips toward her, teasing a choking sound from her throat. “Fuck, Katie. Suck me just like that.”
Her fingers worked up and down my shaft while her mouth clamped around the head. The juice of our lovemaking rimmed around her mouth whenever she swallowed me, then glistened along my shaft as she pulled back up.
I wasn’t inexperienced and certainly not innocent, and yet the moment I released my semen into her mouth turned everything before Katie into a weak imitation. My legs turned frail underneath me as she drew every drop of seed into her mouth, groaning deep like she had before whenever she got a taste. She swallowed my entire load, the way she kissed me right after giving me a sample of what she and I tasted like together.
I wrapped my arms around her and hugged her tight in that dark backroom of a brothel. A place that sold the kind of illusions I had chased all my life. But this right here wasn’t an illusion. This was real.
Twenty-One
Katie
* * *
I turned around and wiggled my ass in front of the mirror. The fake tail Adora had attached to my pants swayed from left to right, brushing against my ankles.
“What if it falls off?”
“Nonsense,” Adora snarled. “I might not be a Toroxian, but eight Kokkonian hands can surely manage to sew a tail on properly.”
“I like it,” Melek said with a grin, his face covered in a gray mix of ash and oil. “It’s kind of kinky. I’m almost tempted to pull it.”
Adora snorted and flicked her eyes up. “You should know better than to tug on the tail of a Jal’zar.”
“Got the scar to prove it.”
I rubbed my hands over the fake bumpy horns protruding from his head and placed a kiss onto his ash-caked lips. Melek’s smile reached all the way to his eyes, the contacts he wore gleaming back at me in an intense yellow. Seeing him with solid irises seemed almost strange to me. As much as he hated his natural eyes, I lost myself in their beauty every morning when I woke up in his arms.
“We’ll be fine,” he said and took my hands into his. “Just a Jal’zar mating pair enjoying the Son’idar. Everyone will be drunk. Nobody will notice it’s a costume.” He turned his attention to Adora. “Remember the rules.”
“Yes, yes, I check on them every quarter argos. Once the movie is over, he leaves.”
Melek let his gray fingers intertwine with mine and pulled me into motion. “Now let this Vetusian show you how the rest of the universe parties.”
We left the kitchen, resonating the hallway with our laughs before we stepped out the backdoor. There, Melek turned me around and pushed me against the wall, his kiss ravenous. He moaned into my mouth as he raked his teeth over my lips.
“Careful.” I trailed my thumb over his mouth, spreading the gray paste where our kiss had smudged it. “You’re barely back on your feet.”
His answer came deep and uncontrolled. “Are you teasing me? Because I’ve got no problem showing you how well recovered I am.”
I shuddered, my pelvis jolting when he cupped between my legs. “Look what I got myself into. A hungry twenty-something mate who can’t keep his hands to himself anymore.”
“Says the female who needed my cock so badly this morning, she interrupted my peaceful shower.” He jutted his head toward the street. “Come on. I want us to have a good time together. Just once.”
We left Brot Adnak behind and made our way toward the festival. Odheim buzzed underneath the excited footsteps of tourists and the music booming from all directions, and something inside me hummed along right with it.
This was the closest I’d come to life before the invasion ever since the Vetusians arrived. With each step, the breeze pushed through my hair, the excitement seeped into my veins, and my lungs breathed deeper.
The market square exploded with colors and foreign scents. Merchants still lined the streets, selling snacks, alcoholic beverages, and what Melek pointed out as counterfeit tickets to those unknowing souls who weren’t from around here.
At the gate to the park, he handed our tickets over to a young Vetusian who waved us through. Above us, thousands of red lanterns illuminated the festival grounds.
Melek wrapped his arm around my middle. “Excited?”
“It’s stunning,” I said and leaned my head against his chest. “I can’t wait for the sun to power down.”
“That won’t happen for a while, but I got us tickets for the Nebula.”
“What’s that?”
The answer waited around the corner, where a ramp led up to a white cube with flashes of blue lightning behind. Two massive Kokkonians stood posted to the left and the right of a door, which they opened for us once Melek handed them two circular chips.
Melek led me inside with a wink, the base of the music lodging itself between my ribs. It vibrated there in my chest, and I stumbled over my own feet more than once as I trailed behind him, my attention on the acrobats swinging through a holographic nebula above our heads.
“Is this like… a club?”
Melek stopped, turned, placed a hand to his ear, and mouthed, “What?”
I leaned in; the scent of my mate undeniable even under the gray paint. “Is this is a club?”
I expected a scream over the blasting music, but Melek nodded instead and jutted toward a glass wall across. Our fingers interlocked, knuckle against knuckle, his grip certain where my confidence faltered. How long had it been since I’d enjoyed a place like this?
We maneuvered around groups of Vetusians and passed tall cylinders with electric currents running up and down behind it. Once behind the glass wall, the music muffled into something that allowed an actual conversation.
“Better?”
I nodded and gazed around for some orientation. This part of the club must have been some sort of lounge, with sets of tables and cushions here and there. Opposite the glass wall was the bar, and Melek headed straight for it.
“Two Dakonian Striders, please,” he ordered across, then he quirked a smile at me. “Before you try to come up with excuses, let me tell you that the two of us are going to dance tonight no matter what.”
A blink through the glass had my knees lock in place. On the other side, feet moved in all sorts of sequences, but none of them anything I’d recognize. Big surprise there.
With a tumbler in each hand, he pointed toward a set of loungers. He placed our drinks on the round table between them as we sat down.
“Did you ever do this kind of stuff on Earth?” he asked. “Go out to clubs?”
“Not since my mom died. Simply couldn’t afford a sitter. And once I could have, I felt kinda too old for it.”
He handed me a tumbler and kept the other. “Human females are odd when it comes to age. Most Vetusians don’t even know their exact age.”
“You never thought I might be too old for you? I’m almost a decade older.”
He choked on his drink, hammering his chest before he found his voice again. “Katie, it’s literally five Earth years. By the Three Suns, I hope your math skills were in better shape when you stil
l worked as an accountant. Last time I checked a decade was double that.”
Between my giggles and the overfull drink, taking a sip resulted in most of it running down my chin.
“This is the first time I see you with a drink,” I said.
He changed for my lounger and placed a hand onto my knee, his brow furrowed. “Addiction is a lifelong condition, Katie. We never get rid of the urge of the drug. All we can do is keep a tight handle on it, and alcohol tends to bust it loose.”
“But not today?”
“I’m addicted to this reality with you now,” he said, his fingers gently stroking my cheek as not to smudge the gray paste. “Good moments. Bad moments. Sign me up for it, because I’m all in.”
I closed my eyes and chased the warmth of his hand, the familiarity of his touch. There had been so many good times in the past nobody shared with me. The fact that Melek was committed to sticking around for the bad ones made it clearer how precious he was. Not just as my fated mate, but as a male.
A loud howl made me peek over at a group of Vetusians who sat on loungers at the end of the wall. Warriors. Easily recognized by their black uniforms. They drummed their fingers on the glass table in front of them, making silver spheres roll around, traces of blue dust scattered cross.
I looked at Melek, the way his gaze dropped to the ground confirmation enough. Souldust.
“It’s an epidemic,” he said, a certain emptiness settling onto his voice as if he detached himself from his words. “You touch it once, and you’re hooked, although I told myself for the first couple of lunar cycles that I had it all under control.” His hand held my knee a bit tighter now, as if he had every intention of never letting it go again. “Until you wake up one day shaking so much you can’t even piss straight because your body needs that next line to function.”
“Why did you start?”
He gave a slow shrug. “Not sure. Perhaps I’m more sensitive than others? I was born from a machine, raised by a machine. I didn’t realize the female who pretended to be something like a mother was a droid until her heat sensor malfunctioned, and she melted half her face off standing too close to a fusion panel. Then I got sent to my stratum. And it just continued from there. Get up. Do your duty. Bring pride to the Empire. Hooray!”
