Epilogue
“Your PR teamhas been doing a fabulous job.” The actor sitting across from me beamed. For the life of me, I couldn’t remember his name. It was on the tip of my tongue, but it just wasn’t coming out. The worse part about it was I remembered a movie I’d seen him in and his character name. “That fight choreography was mesmerizing, and to release it in little clips to tease to the full release - just love the marketing. I can’t believe how you turned the whole thing around. Amazing recovery. Just look at who you got to come to this party. Quite the turnout.”
I shifted on my barstool, swiveling to turn my body out to look at the room.
This freaking gorgeous mansion my husband had bought had a party room, a massive space that in a period piece would definitely be used as a ballroom for an intense eye gazing dance sequence. Instead, it hosted a DJ playing at just the right volume for people to bob about, all looking at each other instead of sinking into the music, while I could have a conversation without yelling at the top of my lungs on the other side of the room.
I knew some people would prefer it so loud that they got ear drum damage, but that wasn’t me, and this was my party.
“Oh, I didn’t hire a PR team.” I took a sip of the iced green tea in my champagne glass. I had too much to do tonight, too many people to schmooze to be drinking. “That was all me. And my husband Aeson, of course. I couldn’t have put this on without him.”
“Of course not, look at all these hot alien males.” The actor gave me a look, his eyes slightly narrowed, his lips curled upwards in a small smile as he tilted his chin to the side and ducked it, presenting me the side of his face as he looked at me. He leaned in closer and lowered his voice. “Tell me now… why are they all male? Why didn’t you invite any smoking hot alien ladies? And why did they all come dressed like ancient roman sex slaves? They don’t dress like that in the news, that’s for sure. Is their formal wear normally so… loinclothy?”
I sighed, looking out at the aliens in question.
There were a dozen or so alien males at the party. They had a few things in common. They were all bipedal, there were no other Atisari, all of them were wearing only a loincloth over their junk, and they were all so incredibly ripped that looking at them made me wish I was drinking so I could handle the sheer fluster of being around so much raw, primal eye candy.
“I left the alien invitations up to my husband.” I took another sip of my tea. “We still have a few communication difficulties due to how different our cultures are, so I’m not actually sure he understood what kind of party this is.”
“Or he knew exactly what kind of party it should be.” The actor smirked at me.
On that note, I was done talking to this guy.
“Please enjoy yourself.” I smiled back, slipped off my chair, and walked away, looking for my husband. I hadn’t seen him since the party really had gotten started, my new home filling with celebrities and industry hot shots. I had been worried he would hover around me the whole time, making my deal-making, relationship-building conversations more difficult with his intimidating presence, but instead he just vanished.
I walked through the large room, dancing through the pulsing dance floor, moving to the deep base that thrummed and headed into one of the kitchens.
A snorting sound caught my eye and I looked over to see several people huddled around a pile of white lines on one of the marble counters. I kept my reaction to myself, instead giving them that broad, practiced smile.
“Everyone enjoying themselves?” I asked, pleased that my voice came out smooth and warm, rather than prickling with the irritation I felt inside of me. I didn’t care what they were doing to themselves as long as they didn’t hurt anyone else, but the remembrance of what the Blamex had done to my system made me feel a sadness for them.
There was a round of cheerful responses, all overlapping each other, so I nodded and kept walking, threading my way through the house until I made it to the backyard.
The backyard glittered with lights, all strung up on a three story scaffolding that Aeson had setup over the first twenty feet of the backyard. It was built with a natural looking material that suited the backyard, and there were several young plants planted along the base of it that he said were fruit producing climbers. I’d hired a human catering company and the Norratar had run background checks on all of the employees working this party, so the yard had beautifully draped standing tables where guests who didn’t like the indoor vibe of the thumping music could sit or stand outside and listen to the small strings orchestra I’d hired. I had roaming acrobats, a string of fire dancers, and a team of aerial acrobats taking turns suspending from the scaffolding over the guests as an ambient background.
“I didn’t expect there would be so many humans here,” an unfamiliar voice rumbled from behind me. I turned to see a Norratar male with fur so well groomed it gleamed under the lighting. His fur had brown roots, but the tips were colored in a way that looked eerily similar to Aeson’s hood when he was content. He towered over me, like they all did, but I didn’t have to strain my neck to look at him as he stood a reasonable distance away from me. As I looked at him, he definitely flexed, as all his muscles suddenly became very hard to look away from.
I tore my gaze back up to his face.
He was handsome, in the way that all the Norratar seemed to be. I had yet to see one I would consider ugly, but then again all the ones I’d seen took impeccable care of their bodies and it was difficult to consider a person ugly when they were so mouthwateringly fit. This particular Norratar had a large chunk cut out of one of his ears.
“Jessica, it is a pleasure to formally meet you.” The Norratar took a half step back, straightened his front leg, and bowed. As he straightened, his smile caused my breath to catch in my throat for a moment. “My name is Destarr.”
He held out his hand, palm up, still partially bent at the waist.
Without thinking, I put my hand in his and he drew it to his lips. He kissed my knuckles, his lips brushing over my skin. Then he licked the back of my hand, his tongue rasping as he let out a rumbling purr through his partially open mouth.
I yanked my hand back and clutched it to my chest.
“Nice to meet you, Destarr,” I replied, trying to remember some of the Norratar fancy dancy gestures to add to my interaction but drawing a blank. If I was going to interact with these guys more, I needed to learn at least a few gestures in their language to be polite. “Is that bow a normal thing for your society?”
“No.” He grinned. “Aeson sent us a list of your favorite human movies and books, and that was in one of them.”
I blinked at him.
“Why would Aeson do that?” I asked him. A few seconds later, the answer to my own question slammed into my mind with the force of a trainwreck. The half naked alien males, the fact that he had only invited males, all of the many, many times he had said he wanted a harem. I held up my hand, palm towards him. “Oh, don’t answer that. I think I know. I need to have a talk with that male.”
I turned away, looking around for Aeson yet again.
“May I cook for you?” Destarr asked.
I turned back and gave him a gentle smile.
“Destarr, I hired a caterer; cooking isn’t necessary.” I made sure my words were gentle. If I only knew some of the Norratar gestures, I could convey additional emotional context to my words, but I didn’t.
“I would love to come back on another time when you do not have a caterer and cook for you then,” Destarr continued. “I have been practicing Earth cuisine, and if you let me know your favorite dishes, I will perfect them before my demonstration.”
“I don’t need a demonstration of your cooking.” I shook my head.
“I have also begun to master the human video editing software. There are quite a few classes on your internet that offer great insight into the reasons behind different styles of editing.” His words were coming out a little quicker, like he felt he had too little time to say all he wanted to say. “I have also begun courses on set lighting, ballroom dancing, and large project organization.”
Aeson really put me in a spot on this one.
Were all the alien males here ready to give me their elevator pitch on how they could support me and my dreams? I didn’t like rejecting men. I’d spent a good amount of time perfecting my exit routine for situations like this. If a guy was too aggressive, normally I’d grab his hand and drag him over to look at something interesting before darting away.
But this alien wasn’t setting off any of my instinctual wariness that I felt around human men who were too tense in their desperate need to talk to me.
“Are you looking for a job or are you trying to pitch yourself to me as part of my harem?” I asked, planting my hands on my hips. “I can’t actually tell.”
Destarr hesitated.
“Either would be great actually.” He scratched his chin. “I don’t even know if you’ll awaken my osea yet as it hasn’t been appropriate to rub on you and I left my career behind to come to Earth, and though I have enough savings for Aeson to consider me, I have been trying to figure out what I want to do here.”
“Ok, you know what I’ll do? You can work on my next project; I’ll find a place for you. Are you willing to work as a PA? Do you have your own space transport?” I asked.
“Yes and yes!” Destarr beamed. “A production assistant is a fine job.”
“I’m going to pay you almost nothing,” I added, seeing how far I could push it.
“I will accept that on this first project.” Destarr nodded. “But after I show you my quality, if you wish me to continue with you, we will have a conversation about what that entails.”
“Plus I’m not interested in you for my harem, let’s be clear on that,” I added.
“Crystal clear is the correct idiom response for that!” Destarr nodded and gave me a relaxed smile. “Let me know what you want me to do, boss!”
He turned and trotted off.
“You don’t want to consider this one?” Aeson rumbled from behind me.
“Aeson!” I whirled. He was hanging down from the scaffolding canopy, his upper body dangling just up out of reach. I jabbed my finger up towards his chest. “I’m not adding anyone to our relationship right now!”
“Right now is good.” Aeson smiled. “It is much better than never.”
I shook my head at him and laughed.
“If you keep bringing around guys looking like that, there is a good chance you’re going to sway my opinion,” I admitted. “You did realize this party was for me to work on my industry connections and find the people I wanted to work on my next project, right?”
“Yesss.” Aeson’s tongue tasted the air. “Though it seems you appreciate my choice of guests.”
He lunged forward and snatched me, his arms wrapping around my waist as he lifted me up off the ground, drawing me back into the canopy.
“Aeson!” I wiggled in his arms. “What are you doing?”
“Do you want me to stop?” he asked as he pulled me up out of sight, behind the leafy decorations he had affixed to the top of the canopy. He held me tight against his body and let out that fully body rumble I so desperately loved.
“Yes I want you to stop,” I smiled as I ran my hand up his chest. “Then after the last guest has left, I want you to do whatever you want to me. We can use the red, yellow, green thing we talked about and a safe word.”
“Good,” he chuckled. “When the last guest has left, the safe word will be...”