“I will fix a plate for him to eat while the others have their pie,” he added, taking a minute to do so. “Well, Cassie, that cream is perfect.”
I looked down, seeing the white topping was thick and stiff. I’d been staring out the back window, lost in my fervent thoughts and hadn’t even realized it. As I helped Mr. Anderson plate several slices of pie with a dollop of the cream on top, I thought more about him. His pale blue shirt fit him snugly. His pants rode low on his narrow hips and could not disguise solid thighs. The dream—no, dreams, for they’d happened four nights in a row—came to me then, the feel of the man on top of me. I envisioned this stranger touching me, nudging his knee between my thighs, sliding in deep, tilting my head for a kiss.
And now I knew his face.
“Does he—” I licked my dry lips, tried to keep the curiosity from my voice, “—have a name, our newcomer?”
Mr. Anderson placed the readied pie plates on a tray. “Mr. Maddox.”
He lifted the tray and walked to the door, nudged it open with his hip and entered the dining room.
Mr. Maddox.
I put my hand on my stomach. It felt like butterflies, bees—no, hornets were swarming inside. I’d only caught a glimpse of him for a few seconds and was able to absorb so many details of him. My hand went to the back of a chair, tucked neatly beneath the table, as I tried to imagine what he’d thought of me. He’d taken in the room at large, the boarders, then me. He’d focused on me, pale eyes assessing and observant. Oh, dear Lord.
My hair was a mess and I’d been working in the kitchens all day. My brow was covered with beads of moisture as my body tried to survive the heat of the burning wood stove in July. Worst of all, Mr. Maddox hadn’t really been looking at me. He’d been observing Mr. Bernot’s hand on my bottom.
The man must think me a harlot, allowing one of the boarders to touch me, let alone put their hand on me in such an inappropriate way. The very idea that he would think thusly of me brought instant tears to my eyes. Devastation coursed through me. Why? I had no idea. I’d only been in the man’s presence for less than a minute, seconds really. I should be embarrassed at being caught in such a way, but it was an inappropriate act of Mr. Bernot’s, not mine. Shame still filled me, for the same reason I had not told Mr. Anderson of the man’s advances.
While Mr. Anderson would believe me, he couldn’t confront Mr. Bernot, for it was a woman’s word against a man’s. Mr. Bernot would likely say I had been trying to entice him, a widow seeking temporary comfort from a man passing through. What could Mr. Anderson do then? Lose the man’s business? These things had happened before and I’d just smiled and pushed through, accepting my plight as a woman in the West. But this time, Mr. Maddox had witnessed the intrusion and for some reason what he thought of me was extremely important.
Mr. Anderson returned to the kitchen, mumbling quietly as he set the empty tray on the table, then stopped and looked at me. “What’s wrong?” he asked, concern making him frown.
I sniffed, not prepared to tell him the truth, for I did not understand it myself. Besides, he was a man and would not understand feminine whims and romantic fantasies. I couldn’t tell him that Mr. Maddox made me feel things, want things I’d never imagined before. I would never be able to explain the strangeness of the scar on my palm tingling with heat, or the unfamiliar desire making the place between my thighs wet. He wouldn’t understand that.
I was an emotional mess. Exhaustion, perhaps? I’d been awoken by the dreams these four nights past. There was no tangible explanation for my tears, but I knew, deep down, that my upset centered around Mr. Maddox.
“I… I burned my hand.” I waved it in the air, but quickly so he wouldn’t see the lack of redness. It was as close to the truth as I could muster, for that wretched birthmark did practically burn.
Arching one brow, he eyed me, then tilted his head to the back door. “Go outside and cool off. It’ll be time to do the dishes soon enough.”
I didn’t reply, just nodded my head and fled. While the evening chore would not complete itself, the dishes could wait.
I walked around behind the chicken coop and used the small pile of cut wood to climb up onto the roof. There I sat, my head forward on my bent knees. It was the only solitary spot on the boarding house property. I looked out over the miles and miles of prairie, the grass blowing in the summer breeze, rippling like gold in the sunshine.
I often thought of myself as a girl in one of Grimm’s fairytales, especially the one about the poor girl forced to work and work, sleeping near the fireplace and waking covered in ash. Aschenputtel, she was called. She lived a wretched life, much worse than mine. I had a decent job and a good employer, a God-fearing man who offered me a fair wage and a roof over my head for an honest day’s work. He was, upon occasion, very kind. I was no slave with evil stepsisters or a vile stepmother who would be happy to see me dead. There was no magical tree, birds for friends, magical golden slipper, and no prince in a faraway castle chasing me home from the ball, begging me to be his bride.
There was simply me, the orphan girl turned widow who was settled into a life of serving others, people who lived out far-reaching adventures.
Now, here I was, dreaming these stupid, ridiculous, obscene dreams every night about a man I did not know and could never have. But, God help me, I wanted him. I wanted to feel the way I did when he touched me as I dreamed. When I was in his arms I felt important, cherished. I felt loved, and that was something I had never known, for even with Charles I had been convenient but never desired.
Crying would do no good, would offer me no solace, no reprieve from my lonely life. But I thought of the stranger in the dining room and did it anyway.
Maddox
* * *
I chose a seat opposite the idiot who had dared touch my mate and ate the simple fare without tasting it. My mate had fled; I’d heard the older gentleman, Mr. Anderson, tell her to go outside for a rest. Which, in my current state of mind, had probably saved Mr. Bernot’s life. If I’d been forced to witness his unwanted advances on my mate again, I wasn’t sure I would be able to control the animal instinct streaking through my body like a comet of ice and fury.
The ass actually attempted to make conversation.
“So, Mr. Maddox, where did you say you’re from?”
“I didn’t.”
“Ah… one of those types, eh?” He wiped cream from the ridiculously curled facial hair above his lip and nodded as if he were a learned sage and me his current course of study. “Not to worry, you don’t need to share if you don’t feel up to it.”
“I don’t.”
Mr. Bernot lifted his coffee cup, waving it at our host. “Is Miss Cassie around? Tell that girl I need more coffee.”
Rising to my feet, I wrapped my hand around the much smaller man’s wrist, forcing him to lower the cup back to its saucer, the dark liquid spilling onto the linen cloth. Leaning close, I whispered, “If you ever touch Cassie again, I’ll remove the offending hand from your body. Do you understand?”
He stared, the lump in his throat bobbing up and down as if he couldn’t stop swallowing his own spit. When he didn’t answer, I simply let go, nodded to Mr. Anderson, who was grinning, and walked out through the front door into the quiet of the wind rattling the trees, the buzz of bees and chirping birds.
Cassie. The name rolled through me and I repeated it, pleased with the sound. It suited her, feminine and sensual.
Mine.
My mark blazed with renewed fire. Cassie was close, very close, and I longed to touch her skin, to discover if she was as soft as she’d been in my dreams. Would her scent be the same? Would she make the same sweet sounds in reality as I pleasured her?
My cock rock hard, I ignored it and walked around the periphery of the large home, my senses on high alert. When I reached the back of the house, I grinned at the strange creatures I discovered walking about the yard, fat waddling birds that approached me like pets eager for a treat. The apparent lead
er, a speckled white-and-brown creature with big brown eyes and a yellow beak, actually nipped at my pants.
Soft, feminine laughter floated down from somewhere above me and I turned, lifting my head to spy my mate seated atop the roof. Her smile was genuine, the sight making my heart lurch.
Mine.
“Better be careful or Miss Wallace will follow you home.”
“Miss Wallace?” What was she talking about? I spun in a circle. There were no other women nearby. My senses would have alerted me to—
“The chicken.” Cassie sat with her head resting on top of a bent knee, looking down on me like a queen. Even in her simple blue dress, she was lovely. Regal, even. “I’ve named them all.”
I did not care about her names for these birds, but she was talking to me and I did not wish her to stop. “May I join you?”
She studied me for a long moment, her blue eyes inspecting me from the boots on my feet to the base of my neck where I’d pulled back my long hair and tied it with a strap of leather. I wondered what she saw, if the desire that invaded me at first sight of her affected her as well. She rubbed her palm up and down the rough boards on the roof as if her mating mark were simply an itch to be scratched, a nuisance. She did not appear to recognize me at all, to recognize our connection. She spoke of chickens, not touching. Kissing. Claiming.
Strange. Had I made a mistake? Why did she not acknowledge the pull between us? Why did she pretend not to know who I was? I had touched her wet heat, stroked her body to release with my cock buried deep in her pussy, stifled the sound of her cries in my kiss. I belonged to her, would die to protect her, beg for permission to touch her once more, and she didn’t remember me?
Chapter 4
Maddox
* * *
Perhaps the dream was different for her. Perhaps she truly did not know who I was.
By the time she answered me I’d nearly forgotten the question.
“All right.”
All right. She was inviting me to sit beside her.
Eager as an untried youth, I leapt on top of the strange wood hut and jumped up to sit beside her. Careful, so very careful not to touch. Touching would awaken the fire in my body, and I didn’t want to scare her, or take her on the roof of a house built for walking birds. I crossed my arms over my chest to remove the temptation to reach for her and looked down upon the odd animals. “There are too many of the creatures. I do not believe you gave each of them a name.”
A sparkle came to her eye and I knew I had won, even before her full, pink lips formed her next words.
“We have a dozen. There’s Annabelle, Alice and Annie, they’re sisters from the same clutch and named for their father, a rooster we used to call Alexander the Great.”
I had no idea what she was talking about, but I listened, wanting to know everything about her and how her mind worked. She pointed at the various birds, but I had no hope of keeping them straight as the scent of her skin taunted me along with the fragrance of the red flowers crawling along a trellis on the side of the house. I’d asked a traveler the name of the flower on my way to this place, as I recognized the sweet smell. Roses. They were called roses, their petals as soft as I dreamed her flesh to be. “Used to?”
“Mr. Anderson grew tired of his morning litany and I baked him into a rather delicious pie.”
I shook my head. “Poor Alexander. Always the males who suffer the worst of fates.”
She raised her eyebrow at that, but didn’t take the bait. Instead, she returned her attention to the animals. “There’s Maude, Charlotte and Mary, they’ve got the orange feathers. They strut around like they’re royalty, so I named them after the new little princess born a few years ago in London.” Cassie’s laughter was contagious and I chuckled as the three birds strutted and clucked as if they knew they were the center of their lady’s attentions.
“Sunflower, Daisy, Rose, and Tulip were such lovely, happy little chicks that I named them after flowers.”
I counted. “That’s only eleven.”
I was damned. I realized that now. I’d hunted dozens of men, killers and thieves, and never been this unsettled. I was a hunter, and yet, sitting next to my mate in the fading light of early evening, I was unsure. Awkward. My nerves strung so tight I counted her every breath, knew the pace of her heart as it beat inside her chest. Her scent wrapped around me until I felt like I was drowning in it, like her very essence squeezed my cock and made it weep.
Her gaze grew distant and a bit sad and I felt my own smile fade. I’d never felt like this before, as if another’s happiness was the source of my own. I lowered my hands to my sides and settled my palms on the warm wood slat roof, so close to hers. An alien. An intruder in her innocent, childlike world of princesses and flowers.
“The last will be hiding in the coop. She’s terrified of her own shadow, really, and extremely unhappy unless she’s sitting on her nest.” Cassie turned away from me to look down at the odd construct of wood that had been built to house the strange birds. “Her name is Claudia.”
“And did you name her after someone as well?”
“Yes.” Her gaze snapped back to mine, a mask I did not care to see hiding her true feelings from me. “I named her after my mother.”
I did not know what to say and tried for something that surely would offer no offense. “It is a beautiful name. I would like to meet your mother.”
Cassie made a strange sound I did not recognize and lifted her shoulders in an odd shrug. “Me, too. But she’s dead.”
I heard pain in her voice and my hand moved closer to hers, close enough that I felt her heat. “I’m sorry, Cassie. I didn’t know.”
“How do you know my name? And why did you follow me out here?” She rose to her feet, brushing off her skirt with unnecessary vigor and I cursed myself a fool for ruining our time together. I was supposed to seduce her as quickly as possible, throw her over my shoulder and carry her off to bed. She wouldn’t be safe from Neron until she was mine and safely aboard my ship. That sounded more of duty, of protection, than courtship, but right now all that was pushed from my mind. I simply wanted her. My mate. But now, facing her, I realized Earth was truly an alien place, and she rubbed the mark on her own palm not as a welcome heat, but as if it actually pained her.
“Mr. Anderson speaks highly of you. That is how I know your name. Please sit again before you fall.”
“And the other question?” Her eyes darted around as if she were looking for an escape, but chose to sit as I asked. Torn, I wasn’t sure what to do. If she were an Everian woman, I would simply lift my hand and show her my mark. No words would be needed. But Cassie was not from my world, and I suspected that she had absolutely no idea about the marks or what they meant.
But the dreams! I refused to believe I’d experienced them alone.
“What is wrong with your hand?” Her answer would be telling.
She’d been rubbing it vigorously up and down her skirt, but stilled at my question. “Nothing. I have a birthmark there and it’s been itching.” She stood once again, completely unsettled, hopping easily onto the pile of wood resting against one wall of the structure. She was too quick, for I stood to offer her assistance, but she’d already nimbly returned to the ground. I had hoped she would pause and look back, perhaps ask me to join her, but she didn’t even glance over her shoulder as she walked away.
“Yes, it is a birthmark, but it isn’t nothing. It’s a mark that has awakened by my presence,” I called from my high spot on the chicken house. My voice was nearly a shout, but my ire rose as she walked away from me as if I were nothing and no one.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She didn’t turn around, but I could hear her clearly.
Oh, but that was a lie. I knew in the way her shoulders tensed and the back of her neck turned a slight shade of pink. I hurried off the roof, chasing after her like a fool as she marched toward the side of the house. “I never answered your question, Cassie. Don’t you want to know why
I’m here?”
That stopped her, and she turned on the heels of her odd black boots that were lined with small round buttons. Our women looked very much the same, but Earth clothing was very different from that on Everis. Our women wore long, flowing pants that whirled and swayed as they walked, their tops fitted to show off their curved waistlines and heavy breasts. In the cold seasons, their bare shoulders would be covered with the softest furs, their sandaled feet covered in smooth, self-fitting boots. Most wore long chains of gold that varied in length, some dangling from neck to breast, some to their waists, or down their long spines to the small of their backs where the swaying jewelry would draw attention to their curves. Women braided gold into their hair and wore circles of gold around their necks, ankles and wrists. The adornment was beauty personified, temptation and sensuality, and also a way for their mates to secure them during sex.
If a woman on Everis offered her gold to a man, she offered him everything.
I very much wanted to see gold adorning Cassie’s body as I fucked her.
My woman stared at me now, and I asked my question once more, my voice softer this time in an effort to tempt her. “Do you want to know why I’m here, Cassie?”
“No. I’ve changed my mind.” Five words and she whirled away, changed direction and walked past the coop and toward the open field. Her blue dress, the same soft color as her eyes, flared around her ankles as she fled, ignoring the fire of our marks and the pull between mates.
In two strides I had her, my hands at her waist as I pushed her back flat to the side of the chicken house, pressed my body close. We were sheltered here, hidden from the view of the house, nothing but the vast prairie behind us. Everywhere our bodies touched, chest, hips, thighs, ached with the need to get closer to her, to rip the dress from her body and mold her naked flesh to my own, to slide my cock deep into the hot, wet glove of her pussy and claim her.
The Alien's Mate Page 3
