Chapter 4
four
. . .
Emily
Cindy was going to be so freaking delighted when I told her the alien romance books hadn’t lied.
At least I hoped they hadn’t.
The gloopy guys had been less than ideal, but Kex?
Kex was everything a monsterfucker girly could dream of.
Not that I’d ever contemplated fucking a monster, or that I was thinking of fucking Kex—I mean he was an alien and for all I knew was taking me somewhere to eat me for dinner.
I shivered and shot another quick glance at the stunning alien.
Yeah, that might be the way to go. I hadn’t even hesitated to follow him.
He was hot and had water? I had this survival thing down.
Kex was big, maybe seven feet tall, and built.
His wide chest was packed with muscles, and his arms were thicker than my thighs.
And his thighs? I wouldn’t mind being crushed between them.
He was big, and wide, and strong, and when he picked me up in his arms like I was nothing more than a toy poodle, I nearly melted.
I was a big girl, but next to him I felt like a delicate little flower, and I couldn’t wait for him to pluck me.
I paused and shook my head. Down girl, I told myself.
I had never been particularly thirsty for a man before.
Sure, I had a few boyfriends, and the sex had been fine, but I’d never lusted after someone before, and that was exactly what it felt like I was doing with Kex.
I mean, the giant beefcake of a man wasn’t wearing anything but a few vines crossing his chest to carry supplies and a skimpy little leaf diaper covering up what I was trying hard not to notice: a sizable bulge.
That left miles and miles of delectable alien flesh stretched tight across bulging muscles.
Okay, so the flesh in question was a deep blue-green color, and felt soft, as if covered in a fine layer of fur, but if anything that just made him prettier.
His face was wide and flat, the proportions just off enough to keep me from thinking he was anything close to human, and his eyes were a shimmering silver ring of fire around a deep indigo pupil.
His ears were adorably pointed, and yes, I’d read enough smutty monster books to wonder if they would be sensitive if I licked them.
His hair was short and dark. I’d thought it black at first, but when the light caught it just right, it had a blue hue to it.
Then there were his teeth. He had scared me when I first opened my eyes to look up into his strangely handsome face and he smiled down at me, revealing sharp pointed fangs, but after spending even a moment with him, and seeing a few more grins, they were starting to come off as a little roguish and sexy.
His hands had also given me a fright when he first reached for me.
Sharp black nails tipped each finger, and later I noticed his toes as well.
But after the initial shock, they were no longer scary.
Already I was trusting his intentions and his ability to be gentle.
Even now, following him deeper into the forest, it was easy not to worry about our destination or where dinner was coming from.
Instead, I just followed him, trying my hardest to ignore the pains and aches from the last few hours, and focused instead on his butt.
It was a pretty spectacular ass, and watching it flex under the leaf covering was enough of a distraction that I barely noticed the sharp pain in my side, the throbbing in my shoulder, or the pounding in my head.
I mean, there was a reasonably good chance the monster bird had done a bit of damage when it bit down, but so much of me hurt in one place or another I wasn’t going to worry about it.
Nothing was oozing blood, and without soap and water, it wasn’t like I could really care for any of my wounds.
As we walked, Kex checked on me often, offering his weird squash-shaped water bottle, and each time I made sure to brighten my expression and smile, and only take a small sip even though I wanted to chug it.
He didn’t need to know how totally exhausted I was.
If I was going to survive this, he’d have to provide food and water and everything else I needed.
The least I could do was keep up and pretend I wasn’t going to be the biggest burden in the world.
I could daydream about his ass all day, and think about taking a bite out of it, but really, what did I have to offer him except an inch of goo and a drain on his resources?
He’d been kind so far, but I couldn’t imagine what I looked like as my goo picked up every leaf and twig I passed, sticking to me in a thick layer of muck.
Then as we walked, my goo began to dry out forming a coating that reminded me of hardened glue.
I tried to peel a bit of it off and grimaced in satisfaction as I got a long strip in one go from the inside of my elbow.
Right then, Kex turned to check in on me, and I dropped the skin-like flap in embarrassment.
Kex gave me a kind smile and offered me the water again.
I shook my head and gestured for him to continue.
My deep burning lust for him began to dim in the midst of embarrassment. It was probably for the best. Maybe it was the life-and-death of the situation throwing my hormones into overdrive.
We walked on. Where to? I had no freaking idea, but his destination had to be better than anything I could come up with.
I had no idea what direction the monster bird had flown from, except that it was another ridge perhaps hundreds of miles away.
Maybe whenever we got to wherever we were going, I could figure out a way to ask Kex if he had some kind of tech in his leaf diaper that could detect a crash zone on his world.
After what had to be a few hours, I started to worry. Yeah, I had stamina, I could walk as far as I needed and as long as I didn’t try to talk or go up a hill; my breathing stayed level. But after the last few days, this hike through the woods was going to be the end of me.
I lagged a little further behind Kex. I think he’d been slowing his pace to accommodate me already, but after I tripped over the third root that I should have seen, he took my arm and led me to a fallen log to sit.
I sighed. I didn’t want to rest. I wanted to get to wherever we were going because once I stopped I didn’t want to start again, but there wasn’t any way to explain that to Kex when we didn’t speak the same language, so I sat and tried not to whimper as the flesh on my side throbbed.
Kex handed me his water bottle, but I shook my head.
He pushed it into my hand. I lifted it up, shook it, then handed it back to him.
It was almost empty and I wasn’t going to finish it off when we didn’t have any other water source in sight.
He sighed, opened the bottle, then pressed it to my lips, lifting the end and forcing me to drink.
I glared at him, pulled it from his hands, and took a small sip.
I held the water in my mouth for a long moment before swallowing and handing it back to him.
The water wasn’t cool, but it was refreshing.
There was a slight botanical flavor to the liquid that I couldn’t place.
I wondered if it came from the plant the bottle was made from, or if that was just the normal flavor of water on this planet, but I didn’t have the words to ask.
Kex grinned and gestured at me expectantly, as if asking me something, but I just gave him a weak smile, not understanding. His grin faded, and I felt bad. I couldn’t even keep up the pretense of pleasantness anymore, and Kex was being so accommodating.
I just wanted to lie down among the leaves and twigs and bugs, and cry for a little while.
Kex adjusted some of his supplies, moving his spear and a few other items from his back to his front. He crouched and turned his back to me, and patted his shoulder. He said something. I frowned at him, but didn’t reply. Was he saying what I thought he was saying?
He reached back and grabbed my hand and pulled it over his shoulder.
Was he offering to carry me? I reached forward with my other hand, and sure enough, he snatched it and pulled it over his other shoulder until I was pressed against him.
He pressed my hands to his chest, then reached for my legs and hiked me up on his back as he stood effortlessly.
I squeaked and held on tight with my arms and my thighs, wrapping them as best I could around his thick waist. The muscles of his back would have felt delicious pressed against me if my clothes weren’t shellacked to my body with the now crusty goo, but I tried not to think about that as I rested my head against his back and breathed.
A slurry of emotions ran through me as he set a much faster pace through the forest. No one had given me a piggyback ride since I was in single digits, and as the fat girl in the group, it was one of those subtle things that had always made me feel left out when guys threw around the “regular sized” girls in their brash attempts at flirting and proving their masculinity.
I’d found happiness and peace with who I was and how I looked, but being carried by this gorgeous man as if it was nothing threatened to make me feel safe and cherished.
I was just a crusty little alien who couldn’t even walk on her own, and here Kex was willing to carry the slack.
I closed my eyes and let a few tears fall as the overwhelming emotions of being kidnapped and crash-landing, then nearly being eaten by a monster, threatened to consume me.
Five or six, that was all I let fall before I forced myself to suck it up and just focus on what I could control.
And at the moment, that didn’t feel like much.