Chapter Twelve
I feel like someone chewed me up and spat me out.
Nessa collapsed on her bed, glad it was so big. She sprawled like a starfish, wishing the weight in her chest would evaporate.
She peeled off her uniform—literally. She scraped it and tore it from her skin. She’d been proud to work at the MWIP—not knowing someone she trusted could manipulate her records to make it look like she was, at best, irresponsible or at worst, helping kidnappers.
Today’s calls and conferences had made yesterday’s look easy. Now that they had a suspect, she and Abigail had been asked to provide information over and over, together and separately, speaking to officials who regulated the MWIP, police on Sapien-Three, and law enforcement for different galaxy-wide and intergalactic agencies. The same things had to be said to each representative, and each time it felt worse. Heavier.
What was worse? She couldn’t say anything to clear her name. Not yet. Talking to Merton again or telling her family and friends that she knew the truth about Merton could tip him off. She had to stay “fired” for now, although the governing authorities promised her she could have her old job back—in time.
And what will that look like? All of Merton’s cronies hating on me? Or hailing me as a hero? Did Joe get a bribe for covering for me? A bottle of booze, or a day off? Or credits? He’s really going to hate my guts now if I’ve taken away his chance for easy perks.
And my dad! My dad knows... Some of the time. Jesus Christ on a comet. If he tells the wrong person what I said about being kidnapped... Merton must know I’d tell my dad.
The thoughts were getting worse.
The beeping of the intercom at her door was actually a relief, even if it made her jump and flail like a snapped piece of rubber. “Hello?”
“I have something for troubled minds, to help you sleep.”
Kamau. Of course. He’d left to cook meals, but he returned to her “interrogation” room (Talos’ office today) each time to silently stand, kneel, or sit beside her.
Truly like the knights in fairy tales, devoted to his Queen.
Yes. Damn it, yes, I do want to be his Queen, and I don’t want to give that up.
“Come in!”
Crap. Too late, she recalled that she had mauled her own clothes off and probably looked like something caught in a shuttle reentry flame.
“Nessa, my brave warrior. My Queen. You were so steadfast and brave, never showing you were overwhelmed with the endless barrage of questions! It was as if you were on trial and—” Kamau entered, talking a lightyear a minute, holding a fancy tray with a strange-looking jug on it. When he placed it on her table and turned to catch sight of her torn and disheveled appearance, he let out a startled yowl and his fur stood on end. “Oh! My love, who did this to you? Oh, Nessa, no! Did you accidentally hit the ‘fur trim’ setting in the bathroom?” he whispered, rushing to her side.
“My inspector’s uniform reminds me that someone sitting in management can mock everything I worked for—what I thought would be a job that would literally put me on top of the world. I don’t want to work there anymore. I never got to even put my tech training to use, and that was the hardest part, the thing only a handful of people ever pass the test for. It’s a mockery. A clown suit. I don’t want it.” Nessa sat up and shed her tatters.
“You are in your swimsuit again?” Kamau cocked an eyebrow as she appeared in the smooth white bra and panties.
“These are my underwear, Kamau. They always were.”
“Oh. Ooh!” Kamau turned abruptly away from her.
“You’ve literally licked my coochie. What are you coming over all bashful for?”
“I’m giving my Queen privacy. Just because you shared your body with me once doesn’t mean it is my body to admire.”
Merton hadn’t seemed to understand that. Ever since they slept together the first time, he had no qualms about giving her a leer or brushing against her. She hadn’t thought it was worth complaining about, especially since she wanted that door left open for nights when loneliness and horniness got to her.
And for what? My own hand works a damn sight better than his ever did. “Well, I invite you to turn around—and I love that you truly are a Knight. You stand by your Queen and serve her in every way. But... I want it to be mutual.”
“Ah, maybe, if I am ever allowed to court you properly in the old Servali customs, then—”
“Tell me about the old Servali customs. Tell me anything. I want to forget about today and all the questions I have.”
Kamau faced her. “A robe, perhaps?”
“A long hot bath with a glass of whatever is in that jug, perhaps?” she countered.
“Well... It would let me start off with the customary toast to the Queen I desire.”
“Ooh. No one has ever made a toast to me. Or desired me,” Nessa shrugged as the realization hit her again.
“I’m sure hundreds did—but they were selfish or cowardly and wouldn’t risk their hearts. I have decided that you are my miracle, and I am willing,” Kamau took two small red glasses and tipped the jug to fill each one. “ Borde . It’s a traditional Servali liquor. Only one glass is necessary to relax you. I wouldn’t want you to have too many, or then you might not enjoy the rest of the ritual.”
“Ritual? What ritual?”
KAMAU PERCHED ON THE edge of the tub, trying not to peep below the bubbles as his large paws dangled in the water up to his ankles. Meanwhile, Nessa was submerged up to her neck, grinning at him as he cleared his throat for the tenth time.
“He must sing a song to prove he truly knows her and is worthy of being her King.”
“Oh.” Her face fell.
His faltered.
How can I sing to my sweet Nessa, only having known her for a pawful of days?
Well. Faint heart never won fair Queen.
Words tumbled free, jaunty and purring—happy. His father’s song to his mother had been one of such longing and so sonorous. And his was...
Happy.
Simply happy.
“My Nessa, she is brave and bold,
And soft and sweet, a joy to hold!
Hold you do, a piece of my heart,
A piece of my soul, from the very start.
Smart and sharp, a blade you are,
My heart you pierce, my shining star.
Every moment spent with you
Opens my eyes to something new.
I could go merrily through this life
If Nessa was my Queen and wife.
No longer would I be her Knight, but King
If Nessa would but wear my ring.
I’d take her to Leonid moons and Servali sands
If she’d take my paws in her hands.
And tell me that landing here was meant to be...”
Kamau stopped and swallowed, his jaunty tune suddenly thick and slowed with the tears gathering in his throat.
“And tell me that landing here was meant to be...
Her brave actions brought her to be loved by me.”
Nessa stared up at him, her mouth open.
“Was that... a proposal?” she asked.
His head dipped once, a silent, singular nod.
“You can’t ask someone to marry you so soon after you meet—”
“I know. But if my Queen is so brave to charge into the unknown, what kind of King would I be if I could not at least try to keep up with her? Just know that you have my offer, whenever, if ever, you would like to use it.”
“Um. Um, I think... I think that I would like to try building a new life here. In this galaxy—if my father can come and if my contract will still be accepted by anyone. Who knows what the hell it will look like when this is all over,” Nessa’s eyes skirted from his. “And if I knew I wouldn’t be a burden to you, then... Then.”
“A burden?” Kamau looked at her in shock. “Bastet’s whiskers! Is that how humans see one another? As burdens?”
“Well, yeah , if they come into a relationship with pretty much nothing. I can’t even get my stuff back if I’m not there in a few days—and I won’t be. I’ll literally have nothing but whatever credits I had in my account.” Nessa rubbed her temples. “Not a lot. I wouldn’t be able to rent a place on any of the Felid planets, not with the crappy Sapien System exchange rate. I’m a tiny little person compared to all the big Felids, and I don’t know Felid customs.” Nessa’s long curls were bound up in a silken scarf, and she began to pluck at the curls that had escaped onto her forehead with anxious fingers. “I don’t know if anyone would take my contract, but I don’t think I can bear to go back to Sapien-Three. I have friends here that I trust more than the people I lived and worked with there.”
Kamau groaned and shucked off his trousers, hopping into the water and joining Nessa. “You bring you ! You are a gift. You have skills. You have kindness and strength and beauty! You have all I want, and I know for a fact that you will bring more as time goes on. If you are this wonderful when you are weak and recovering, this wonderful in just a few days—then how much more wonderful will you be in a few cycles? Years?” he challenged.
She crossed her arms, even as she scooted into his open embrace. “I could get worse.”
“And I could, too.”
“I... Stop. That’s not going to happen. You don’t have a bad bone in your body.” Nessa looked up at him, eyes softening. She stroked his face, pulling his muzzle toward hers.
“How can you tell? I am a stranger.”
“Some things you know in your heart.” She kissed his lips, then his nose.
He sighed in pleasure when her breasts brushed his chest and her hands found his spine, stroking down it, igniting nerve endings with every touch. “Some things I know, too. But I’m not rushing you to action, my Nessa. Just letting you know that I stand ready to be yours, if you’ll have me.”
Nessa leaned her head on his chest, letting him sway with her in the warm water. “The borde works. I’m relaxed enough to think about saying yes—but I won’t. Not yet.”
“Because you can’t see yourself loving me?” Kamau asked. He had to know.
“Oh, no, baby. That’s not it. It’s because—”
“No, no. I don’t care about any other reasons, my Queen. All other challenges we can conquer, but if there is no hope of you loving me—”
Nessa silenced him with another kiss, this one accompanied by her hands finding his semi-erect cock. “There is plenty of hope for that.”
THIRTY-FIVE YEARS ON Sapien-Three. No proposal. A week with Kamau? Proposal with serenade in a romantic bubble bath.
Thirty-five years on Sapien-Three. No one ever gave me an orgasm but me. Four days with Kamau being my... whatever we are? We’re in the double digits.
“You’ve had an ordeal, Nessa. You must rest.”
“I’m beginning to think you don’t want me to explore this fine piece of Servali hardware,” Nessa teased, running her fingers up and down his length, exploring him properly for the first time.
Long. Thick. Bright pastel pink with a diameter that she could just close her fingers around. Fingers tightly locked over him, she slid up and down the first half, realizing with a fresh jolt of arousal and a twinge of worry that his “half” was bigger than most human males in their entirety.
Kamau moaned and hissed as she rocked her clamped fist up and down his length, churning the water at his waist. Once he was squirming and her palm was slippery with his pre-cum, she explored further, taking in the second half that led to heavy, fur-covered ovals, satiny and wet, inviting her to fondle him there and see his reaction.
The purr he made as she gently explored his tip with one hand and his balls with the other made her walls ache, looking to be filled. “Are you going to fuck me tonight?” she whispered.
“I... You should rest.”
“How big is this part? About five inches? Six? Are you telling me I have to get at least seven or eight inches of your big Servali cock in me to activate these little nubs?” Her hand started stoking purposefully up and down the lower half of his cock, feeling the soft spines against her palm. It made her giddy, the way the texture and his slickness felt against her skin—and she wondered what it would feel like to have them buried inside. Swelling.
“Humans are naturally smaller. I would understand if you didn’t want to—”
“Shh. All I’ve ever had are thin little cocks, and trust me—I knew they were below average. I’m not saying all men are like that, but the ones I ended up with? Size small. This is a size double-extra-large, and I want to work up to every inch. I want to be filled and stretched with you—and I want to feel you coming inside of me. I want that meshing thing to happen, where I get to wrap my pussy around your meat and come again and again.”
“Bastet have mercy. Nessa...” Kamau moaned as she laced her fingers together and captured the base of his cock, squeezing his sensitive spines until his eyes rolled back.
“If I ask nicely, will you fuck me tonight?” she purred, pumping her interlocked digits up and down, squeezing on each pass. “Do you want to?” she asked, proud of her own boldness.
Why shouldn’t I be bold? He loves me. He really does. He thinks the world of me—and I would have to be an idiot not to think the same of him.
She moved up suddenly, straddling his lap and releasing her grip. He hissed in surprise at the loss but nuzzled her neck happily as she clambered up on him.
“If you’re worried I’ll only love you because you make me scream and come and have turned me into a total Felid fancier, don’t. I want to be with you tomorrow, no matter what we do tonight.”
“Then I want to dry you off and rub balm all over you to protect your skin—see, I learn about human customs—and then I want to watch that perfect little pussy stretch around my cock,” Kamau grunted, standing and lifting them both of the water.
THE APPLICATION OF lotion turned into a massage, which quickly turned into something else.
“Ohhh. Ohh, God. What the hell, Bastet, too,” Naessa cried, eyes rolling back as Kamau applied a special sort of balm to her pussy, sliding inside and massaging it into her walls. His thick, fluffy digit seemed to have a magnetic pull that allowed him to latch onto her sometimes elusive G-spot.
“It’s a neutral plant-based oil. It’s very healing, and I read that it can be used to protect Queens from infections—and can also be used if a Queen is small and her lover is big.”
“Which Queen told you this? Jade, Wendy, or Layla?” Nessa laughed as his paw stroked faster.
“Jade.”
“The sexpert. Whatever she told you, I approve.”
“Well, she didn’t tell me because of this matter, but she asked me to supply the ship with some before we left Lynx-Nineteen and told me why,” her sometimes bashful lover explained.
“I don’t care about the reason. I care about getting slippery enough that you pop in and keep going.” Nessa reached down and to the side, fist closing over the slippery pink head of his erection, stroking thick, pearly pre-cum over his surface. In answer, his paw pounded steadily inside her pussy, all pretense of massage gone.
“Then come up here, my love,” Kamau invited, rolling on his back.
“Come up?”
“Mmhm.” He held out his arms and pulled Nessa to his chest, her leg swinging over his waist. “If we do mesh, you’ll like this position. You can sit on top without my weight crushing you.”
“But I want to feel you crushing me,” she pouted. On the other hand— She looked back over her shoulder at Kamau’s straining thickness, pointing up between his thighs. With a little imagination, she could picture herself bracing her palms on his knees and riding him, sinking that long, thick beauty into her until there was no more space—or until she had him balls deep.
Goals, Nessa. Goals.
With a scoot of her spine, she lined her hips up with his. They moaned together as her pussy pressed his wide head, the moaning turning into a harsh pant from him as her wetness surrounded just the tip of his cock.
Oh.
Oh, shit, that feels much bigger than it looks.
Nessa gasped as Kamau’s tongue invaded her mouth as her hips swiveled on his cock. One of his paws teased her hard nipple, pulling on it with just the pressure she liked, making her pussy leak.
“Did you really want my cum in you?” Kamau asked, looking up at her.
She sat back, hoping gravity might help.
“Mmhmm. I want to feel you coming inside of me. Why? Is that wrong?” Nessa asked, knowing by the hungry look on his face that it wasn’t.
“You are a temptress.”
Kamau reached out, his paw going between her thighs as she rubbed the tip of his crown against her entrance. Even with the slippery oil, his head wedged against her and didn’t want to move freely.
“It’s fine, my Queen. My beautiful Nessa. I could be happy just knowing you want me inside. Watching you stretch around me might make me burst on the spot,” Kamau said in a low, throaty voice, one of his paws moving to brace the base of his cock while the other stroked circles around her clit.
“Oh, we are not quitters, baby,” Nessa hissed, ignoring the sharp sting of pain as she pushed down hard, forcing the tip to push inside and lodge.
The world shorted out around the hard stretch that her body didn’t appreciate, but gravity and the gush of Kamau’s pre-cum coating her insides erased the discomfort.
So big. So thick. So full. “God, yes,” Nessa whispered as the pleasure came in determined throbs. Her body learned the new game fast, a sharp pulse of discomfort followed by prolonged muscle flutters that spread heat and pleasure through her whole pelvic region.
Kamau snarled and showed her gritted teeth as he continued to massage her hard pink pearl. She sank down farther, muscles heaving in protest, only to snap back against his girth and send responding waves of bliss through her.
“Lean back, lean back,” Kamau urged, eyes wide, focused on her slick tunnel swallowing him.
She did as he urged and felt herself sliding, catching herself as she fell forward on her knees, several inches buried in her.
For a moment, neither of them moved, getting used to the sensation. “Too much?” Kamau asked.
“Not enough,” Nessa whispered.
HIS NESSA WAS INSATIABLE . Her hot, smooth walls gripped him and dragged him in, a millimeter at a time, gravity and her full, round hips conspiring together to ensnare him deeper.
“More. More, I want to feel you pounding into me until there’s no more room,” Nessa urged.
And although he wanted to watch her bounce on top of him, savoring the look of her riding him, he couldn’t very well ask her to do all the work. With a happy snarl that spoke of lust rather than aggression, he pulled Nessa under him, delighting in the breathy moan and the sparkle in her eyes. He sat back on his knees, her soft, divinely squishy thighs on his. “Oooh. If I thought the view was good before, my love, this is even better.”
“Voyeur,” Nessa teased, her hands coming up to cup her own breasts.
“Watching you? Absolutely. Watching you with someone else?” He plunged into her fiercely, loving the sound of pleasure that burst from her. “I would only see red, my Queen.”
Kamau raked his eyes from her open mouth, pretty tongue licking her upper lip before her biting down on her lower lip, to the way the flesh padded out around her fingers as she squeezed and groped her heavy breasts, to his favorite site—her pussy, fucked to a froth of juices and pre-cum as he began to pound into her steadily.
Everything in him cried out to push another inch or two in, mesh with her, lock her body around his until only time and release could separate them.
But the sight of her slick tunnel stretching around him was too tempting. He loved watching her lips part and cling to him as his girth filled her, gave her a slight relief, and then surged back to fill her more. “I could do this forever.”
“Good.”
FOREVER, HE SAID.
He damn near meant it.
Nessa felt the prickling sensation of his spines entering her after he’d teased and thrust his way to giving her one orgasm, the first she’d ever had with a man’s cock inside of her. Now she understood what that elusive pleasure was, to squeeze and squeeze against something that wouldn’t yield, milking all the hidden pleasure centers she’d never had a chance to find.
But when she felt Kamau squeeze in an extra inch, and then everything began to swell inside of her, putting pressure on the back of her clitoris, smushing the spongy erectile tissue that connected to her bead—
“Oh! Ohhhh, what is— what is that?” It felt like the strong orgasms she’d had from frantically rubbing her clit combined with the slower, deeper G-spot orgasms Kamau had only recently introduced her to.
“Good, my Queen?” Kamau’s voice was a tight wheeze. His eyes were unfocused, and his muscles were taut. Pinpricks of claws dotted her hips, the slight scratch pairing perfectly with the deep pleasure.
“I don’t know what’s...”
“Oooh. Is my Queen going to bless me?” Kamau’s eyes focused now, and he licked his lips.
“What do you—ooh. Oooh!” Nessa’s confused, breathless questions turned into long moans as Kamau’s paws moved to her mound and then above it. With his knot of swollen spines swelling inside of her, he pressed hard just at her public bone, and she felt her orgasm take shape, a physical shape.
Like a fountain. A sudden, shocking geyser of cloudy-clear juice that shot from her pussy as she screeched and bathed his lower abdomen as he smirked.
“Blessed me.” He gestured to the beads of dew on his fur. “Don’t worry. I’ll return the favor.”
She didn’t care if he returned the favor or not. She was high. As someone who had never used drugs (that shit could kill you, especially on Sapien-Three), she finally understood what “mind-altering” experience meant.
It only got better as Kamau tensed, head back, and roared.
Hot fluid filled her where there was no more room, forcing her to gush again, a weak jet in answer to the flood of cum that was trapped inside of her. When her brain could finally send commands, Nessa looked down and saw her stomach was bloated-looking.
“Is that all you?” she demanded.
“Mmhmm.”
“That’s gotta be an actual cup of cum, Kamau,” Nessa said, eyes wide.
“Oh, at least.” He smiled. “But I’ve heard that creates a delectable fullness.”
Nessa clamped her walls down experimentally. Ripples of pleasure danced inside, her overstimulated body on the edge of an orgasm, set to go off from the slightest pressure.
And all of me is pressured.
“Now we have about an hour to cuddle and come and chat,” Kamau sighed contentedly, picking up her hand and kissing it.
She knew she shouldn’t compare, but she did. When Merton, her only lover in the last two years, had finished, he had fallen asleep. The second time, he had hurriedly left, claiming he had some last-minute reports he’d just recalled.
Kamau had flaws, sure, like moving too fast or being too clingy—but she liked them, and she wasn’t sure they were truly flaws, after all.
“That sounds wonderful. Chat about what?” Nessa whispered.
“Hmmm. What’s your favorite thing in the world to eat?”
“Cheesy potato pie that my mom used to make. Yours?”
Kamau licked his paw slowly, tongue showing off his skill as he made it circle one padded digit. “You.”