by Rena Marks
“Are we porn?” he teased, his tone deliberately aghast.
“Baby, you’re porn no matter where you go.”
“Wait til they see the bulge in my painted-on bodyguard suit,” he warned.
“I guess it’s a good thing we have diplomatic immunity,” she said. “They can’t arrest us and impede the trial.”
“No, but everyone will know why we were nearly arrested.”
“They’re going to be so envious.”
By the time they entered the grand lobby of The Bella Suites, they’d separated. A lot of people loitered around in the lobby. Leah moseyed to the front desk and Trance stayed slightly behind her, a bodyguard paid to watch her back.
“May I help you?” The man behind the desk wore white gloves and spoke with an accent. He gave her a bored expression.
“I’m Leah Margulies. I have a reservation in the security floor.”
His face became a bit more animated. “Welcome, Ms. Margulies. My name is Lord Wilson Nolan and I’m the overseer for the Bella Suites of Iota Nine. I see you’re only booked for one room?”
His eyes barely took in Trance standing behind her in his matching suit. The clerk’s eyes fell on his black suitcase.
“That’s right. My bodyguard stays with me at all times.”
“I see,” he murmured. “Please place your hand on the screen for DNA scanning.”
They each did as he requested.
“Doors unlocked.” He smiled at them, but Leah was taken aback at how predatory he looked. “I would love if you’d enjoy dinner in our five-star dining room located in the center of the waterfalls. It’s on us as a thank you for visiting our establishment. I can enter you as guests right now if you’d care to accept?”
That was a surprise. “Thank you, we will enjoy dinner.”
“Would you like me to have an employee take your bags up to your suite?”
“My bag stays,” Trance murmured.
The clerk again let his gaze fall onto the black case. “Of course, sir. Madam?”
She shrugged. There was nothing in her bag worth anything. Just clothes and toiletries. “Sure.”
She broke the seal on her sleeve and her suitcase dropped from its three inches of hovering to the floor.
“It will be inside your room upon your arrival.”
“Thank you.”
She turned and linked her arm with Trance, his bag following them.
“Was it me or was that guy a little creepy?” he whispered.
“Just a tad. I think he’s a bit too enthralled with his Iota Nine status. Did you know Jason and Amanda are from Iota Nine? The first time I heard Amanda’s accent, I knew right off the bat. Notice how they all sound alike?”
“Jason doesn’t,” Trance said.
“No. Bet you he can turn it on if he tried, though.”
“I’ll bet I can turn it on if I try,” Trance said.
“You probably can,” she said. “You definitely have the looks for it. Only the most beautiful come from Iota Nine.”
“You think I’m beautiful, Leah? Even though I’m other?” The last part was whispered.
“Yeah. You take my breath away.”
The floor glowed with twinkling, soft lights leading a way to an empty dining table. The rest of the room was darkened. They sat at the table. Trance glanced around. “This place is beautiful,” he said. “But where are the rest of the people?”
“They’re here,” she said. “When someone walks by, everyone can watch you walk to your table. But once you sit, a darkening cloak surrounds your table. We can look out but no one can see in unless we release it. Since it’s Iota Nine, no one releases them.” She waved her hand around.
“These people are fucking weird,” he growled.
She giggled and whispered. “They can hear us though, unless we talk softly.” In a louder voice, she said, “It is beautiful. There are a lot of water dances in the cities. Because each city is domed, water doesn’t evaporate the same way it does on Earth-Ground.”
A robot rolled to their table, carrying four drinks and a card.
“What is this?” Leah asked while reaching for the card. The robot’s tray lit red. “Oh.”
“What does that mean?” Trance asked.
She giggled. “It means the robot doesn’t respond to my DNA scan. Remember when they scanned us at the front desk? Our scans will open our room. Pay for our meal, which is complimentary. But I’m not sure why the robot sits here waiting for us to take the card and drink, but he flashes red when I try to retrieve them.”
Trance reached out—and the tray changed from red to soft white.
“Ha. The drinks are for you, Trance.”
He looked puzzled as he gathered them and placed them on the table. “But why?”
“Read the card.”
He took the card on the tray—and another popped up from a slot. He took that one and another popped.
“I noticed you walk in and thought you might enjoy a drink. Room: Star level, west side. Nine-oh-seven.”
“Sure you do,” Leah giggled, sipping one of his drinks.
“I have need of a bodyguard. Water level east. Three-forty-eight.”
Leah laughed. “Soliciting my guard? Tacky. That’s gonna cost her the entire drink.” She took another gulp.
“Call me. Wendy. Five-twelve.”
“You might be right about the kinky Iota Nine class,” she said, reaching for another drink and pushing it toward Trance.
“The last card doesn’t say anything. It just has a room number.”
She grinned. “You disappear on me, I’m gonna know where you ended up. I’ll drag you back upstairs kicking and screaming.”
He smiled as he took a drink. “I’ll make sure to bellow properly.”
The robot wheeled from their table—to be replaced with another. Its tray was also loaded with drinks.
The aghast look that washed over Trance’s face sent Leah into a fit of giggles. By the time their meal was served and they ate, robot servers continued to visit. They could hardly contain their laughter.
“Every woman in the hotel must have seen you at some point,” Leah said.
“We’re breaking the unspoken Iota Nine rule,” Trance said. “We hold hands from here on out. I don’t care about their germ fetishes with the gloves and the little face masks.”
She laughed at him. The idea of Trance being possessive with her sent a ping of excitement to the pit of her belly—though she was sure all the alcohol they consumed helped with that also.
“You ready to go upstairs and check out our room? We can change and go out if you like?”
“Sure we can stumble upstairs,” he agreed, eyeing all the empty and full glasses on the table.
She stood and pressed her palm to the center of the table. A pathway of twinkling lights lit the floor again, showing them the way out.
“Hold on, beautiful,” Trance said, getting up. His muscular arm came around her shoulders and from darkened tables around them, she heard several gasps.
Another tipsy giggle broke from her lips, making answering laughter come from him. He winked at her and leaned in to whisper. “They’d die if I popped a boner.”
Her laughter broke free, loud and clear. “Or if I grabbed your ass.” With an answering wink, she dropped her hand to caress his muscular bubble-butt. He groaned and she heard whispers break out everywhere.
“Come on,” he said, leading her down the path of lights.
A trail of gasps and several huffs followed behind them each time she caressed his fine ass, giggling together like schoolchildren.
Their drunken giggles didn’t even subside when they burst inside their breathtaking room. The entire wall side of their suite was a hologram of the setting sun on a beach, giving them the impression they were on display.
“Is that seriously our bed in the middle of the beach?” Trance said, his voice erupting with laughter. “Kinky, Iota Nine. Very kinky.”
“No one can really
see our bed,” she laughed. “The hologram is just on our side to make it appear like we’re outside.”
On their pretend “beach” a woman in a white bikini walked by.
“So they didn’t know having a watcher in the bedroom would be kinky?” Trance’s voice was droll.
He had a point but Leah wasn’t going to give him that. Instead, she leaped onto the bed, testing its buoyancy.
She bounced up in the air when Trance took a leap also, his greater body weight making her fly and triggering more giggles.
Chapter Twelve
SHE ROLLED WHEN SHE came back down to the mattress, sinking down near his spot. He captured her in his arms, rolling over to hold her in a protective cage of his arms lest she fall from the bouncy bed. She ran her fingers up his biceps as they grinned goofily at each other, chuckles still spilling from their lips before their laughter slowed.
When her face sobered, his followed, all too aware of their position. All too aware of her fingers trailing over his arms.
Chest to chest, he was never more aware of how thin the material of his travel suit—and her suit—was. He stared into her eyes and time stopped as he focused on the thundering of a heartbeat, wondering if it was his or hers. He almost groaned when he realized he felt the press of her erect nipples against his chest. He was never more aware of his harsh breathing, of her panting. Very slowly, she opened her legs, wrapping him into a lower leg hug. He could feel the heat of her center pulsing against his stomach, and her scent surrounded him in a drugging cloud of arousal.
Trance couldn’t quite decide if he was glad she was so much smaller than him, because it meant his swollen bulge of his groin was pressed against the bed where she couldn’t feel it. What he did know was that the desire to curl his hips forward and nudge her with it was stronger than his restraint. Was she ready for this step? To go beyond friendship and to leave her dreams for reality? He pressed a bit. Her husky moan forced an answering groan from deep in his throat.
As close as he was, he watched her pupils swell until only a thin rim of cinnamon brown remained. The ex was right. Gray did make her brown eyes pop. She exhaled a shuddering breath, slowly wrapped her arms around his back, and lifted her head off the bed. Keeping her gaze glued to his, rendering him motionless, she pressed a soft, lingering kiss to his lips. He caught her to him by wrapping his arms around her back so she couldn’t lie back down.
“Do you want this?” he rasped.
“So bad.”
Joy and lust flooded him with such force his mind went blank. Only one thought remained.
She wants to be my mate. She wishes to be with me in all ways.
Reacting instantly, he moved on instinct and kissed her with a ferocity that should have scared her, but instead made her greedy. Her hands roved over his shoulders, his chest, his neck. Tangled in his hair. Never in his life had he felt such sharp, urgent need. He wanted to be gentle, to deliver their first lovemaking with all the tenderness and reverence he felt, but he couldn’t. He was in raw animal lust.
Growling low in his throat, he pried her mouth open to taste her. He felt her fingers dig into his back and her legs clamped like an iron vise around his waist, pulling him tighter against her, as she returned his kiss with equal fervor. She rubbed herself against him, mewling when she didn’t get the pressure she needed. He’d take care of her. He would give her everything she needed.
He reached out to fist her hair—and then remembered.
Instead he smoothed it back from her forehead. Tenderly. So unlike her ex-husband. Because he wanted her to know he loved her. He’d cherish her, forevermore.
He crawled down her body and yanked the seams of the travel suit up along her side. She reached out and released his, sitting up slightly. Between the two of them, they managed to shrug out of the skin-like material, kicking them to the floor.
She was so beautiful naked. He dove at her breasts as she fell backward onto the bed. He lashed her hard, pink nipples with his tongue then sucked them into his mouth one at a time, relishing the sound of her whimpers. Her legs were open around him and she rubbed herself onto him, smearing her liquid center as if marking him, whispering feverish words of encouragement in a throaty tone and then switching to pleading.
Trance wanted to slow down, to take his time and explore every inch of her, but the need to taste her was clawing at him.
“I have you, my Leah,” he rasped. “Let me give you this. Make the need go away.” He slid downward and spread her legs wide.
Settling between them, he stared at the delicate pink sex for the first time. It was going to feel so good when he covered her with his constantly shifting, always erupting cock. But not yet. Even if he came into the mattress, he had to make sure he gave her a release. Had to make sure she came on his tongue.
The first gentle swipe over her center nearly drove him mad with lust and she bowed her back off the bed.
“Trance,” she cried out.
He pressed his lips to her clit and sucked. Leah tangled her hands in his hair then writhed against his mouth as he lost himself, licking and sucking at the tender flesh between her legs.
He used his middle finger to rub inside her as he teased her little nub. Grinning predatorily when she cried out, he leaned down and pushed his tongue, slick with her sweet honey, over the bundle of nerves, never ceasing the movement of his finger curled in her passage. Within moments he felt her walls squeeze and flutter as she orgasmed.
Her screams made his cock twitch against the bed. He wanted to be inside her more than he wanted his next breath. But was she ready for someone who looked human on the outside—but wasn’t from the waist-down? Sure, dreams had prepared her…but this was reality. He didn’t want to fuck it up and scare her.
He could live with oral for the rest of his life. Hers. He’d just make her come with his tongue, over and over, while he masturbated afterward. There. That was the plan.
When her release passed she collapsed, panting, back against the pillow she’d risen from.
“I still need you, Trance.” She still burned for him, but Leah had seen the hesitation in his eyes. He’d never hesitated in her dreams.
Not that she’d thought about it… too much… but sex with Trance was more natural than she could have imagined. The differences between them were more than intriguing, they were fascinating. Though, she wondered if she’d be as intrigued if he had the same part she instantly equated to pain. It didn’t help that he was so gorgeous and sexy and completely turned her on. That he was protective and patient and obviously as aroused by her as she was him, made any shyness she’d felt nonexistent. Touching him, exploring his body, him touching and tasting her, was both exhilarating and effortless.
But so far, he was keeping himself hidden from her.
“Trance?” she prodded.
His face showed his vulnerability. “I—”
She traced the defined groove of his iliac furrow, following it to his groin, then stared him in the eyes as she ran it along the swollen, sensitive veins that were racing across his heated skin. Skin so soft, but hard underneath. Just like a cock—one she knew would emerge. Form. Whatever. It was alien enough to make her pause, but not so much so as to be something she’d have to stop and run screaming like a maiden into the night. Surely her dreams had figured it out for her? His groan was harsh and she wished he’d have removed the contacts so she could see his gorgeous eyes fully instead of the human mask.
She continued to palpate him, the familiar bulge taking shape under her prod. The skin darkening to a pink that almost appeared purple. The testicles that emerged, slippery and delicate, taking shape with their odd-little ring of suction.
He grasped her hand, pulling it away from his groin and bringing it up to his mouth to kiss. “Can’t,” he gasped. “Need you too much.”
“Then stop thinking about it and come to me, Trance.”
The smile he gave her bordered on sweet. “Are you ready for this?”
“Hell, yes,�
�� she breathed. “I can’t wait.”
She searched his face, but for what exactly she didn’t know. His dark brown eyes were alight with a mix of lust and urgency, but seemed oddly alien in his face. She’d gotten used to his natural look. The glorious gold of his pupil surrounded by mysterious purple irises.
His harsh face was taut with need but his lips were curled, just at the corners, in a smile. He looked ravenous all at once.
He butted his squirming, swollen groin up against her center, like a furnace waiting to ignite them. His breath exploded out of him and he went perfectly still. His eyes studied her face, her hair, her lips. It was like he wanted to witness everything, like he was committing this to memory and didn’t want to miss a single detail. His intensity heightened her arousal until she was so wet she couldn’t tell where she ended and he began.
And then she felt it.
Sucking in a sharp breath, she felt his flesh conform to her. Something—no, not something. His sucker-mouth, what should have been his testicles, clamped onto her clit after what felt like fingers—but couldn’t be since his hands were up on either side of her face—tenderly parted her labia.
She rocked her hips in a tentative circle, and the suction grew stronger, as if telling her it wasn’t going to let her go. Wanton need exploded. She had an uncontrollable urge to grind herself on him. His abs tensed, and they both moaned as he entered her. The thick mass at his groin stretched her slowly, parting her entrance and filling her, rolling through her, adapting to every ridge, every crevice, rubbing against every single nerve ending, setting her on fire as he filled her, conforming to her unique shape.
“Oh, my god,” she breathed, because it was so good, so very, very good as he continued to spread.
He grunted, literally grunted, and she knew he was beyond words.
Leah curled her fingers against his chest, preparing for what she knew was going to happen from her dreams.
Just guessing that much gave her warning flutters of an orgasm that were daring to pulse through her. He felt heavy between her legs, but the sense of fullness was good. Better than good. Leaning forward, she slowly lifted herself up to press her chest against his. Her eyes rolled back and her lips parted on a throaty moan.
