Chapter 24
I woke up before sunrise, my body stretched out on top of his. He was so soft and warm. His body felt so good to touch.
I felt sticky.
I also felt panic.
Last night was so good.
It was incredible.
I'd never felt a level of connection to a partner before. I'd never felt so alive, so present in the moment, so focused on the sheer ecstasy of being with someone.
It terrified me.
I peeled myself off him, picking up his abandoned trousers from the floor and gently draping them over his lap before I abandoned him there, snoozing on the couch.
As I snuck to open the door to the bedroom I shared with Arnina, I stepped down on something strangely springy that poked my bare foot. I lifted my foot up to find a dinner plate sized hairbrush lying on the floor in front of the door.
"It's bigger than I thought it would be," I whispered to myself as I hefted it up with two hands.
The sore ache between my legs echoed that sentiment.
I grinned and pushed open the door, tossing the brush on the end of the bed. There was a soft snoring lump under the blankets in the center of the bed, and I took a shuddering breath. It was okay. That man sleeping out there treated me with every ounce of tenderness paired with feral passion.
But was one night all I was going to get?
One night was all I deserved.
My thoughts crushed down on me, and I tried to push them aside, taking another deep breath to hold them at bay and focusing on the environment around me.
The room was beginning to lighten with the first rays of sunshine.
It was a warm glow that sent a sparkle in the air.
It was impossible to tell how long the nights were here.
I had no way of telling time yet or understanding the local timekeeping, plus there was the erratic extra night cycle that happened when the planet was in between this moon and the sun, but that wasn't as long as the actual night.
I checked in with my body, focusing on how I felt physically.
I was sore, more satiated than I'd ever been in my entire life, and a bit messy.
The only thing wrong with this moment was the anxiety-inducing fear of loss.
What happened last night gave me something I was afraid of losing.
I crept into the shower room and did some serious self care, letting the hot water run over my face, washing over the surface of my skin as I sat still with the ache inside of me.
It was physical, but it was also emotional.
I had taken a step forward with a alien man, the kind of step that left me feeling vulnerable.
I felt fragile.
So I did what I always did whenever I felt this way. I went looking for armor.
My favorite kind of armor was looking absolutely fabulous, so I dug around in the closet, quickly realizing that the clothing shopping spree I'd gone on hadn't ended up here.
Where had he sent all my new clothes?
I picked out a silky jumpsuit and a nice complementary scarf I wrapped around my hips like a belt, then found another outfit that looked great for Arnina. A knock on the door had me poking my head out of the walk-in wardrobe to see the Arnina-sized lump on the bed stirring.
I chucked the silver dress at her, and it smacked her right in the face as she sat up.
I giggled and ducked back into the wardrobe.
Oh, that part of me that loved stirring up trouble was satisfied with that, even if she wouldn't react negatively to it at all.
"That's your outfit for today," I called out from inside the wardrobe.
I heard the bells of Arnina's laughter.
"Lover boy left a gift outside. I put it on the far end of the bed," I said. "Don't worry, it's not a mouse."
"How am I supposed to brush my hair with this?" she called back.
Another knock echoed on the door, but I ignored it, still digging through the wardrobe, confirming what I already knew - not a single one of the outfits was the one I bought the other day.
Where did all my clothes go?
It wasn't that I minded the other options, but there was a difference between a wardrobe that was chosen for me and one I picked out for myself. Shopping was work. Fun work, but still work, and I wanted to reap the rewards of my efforts.
Ugh, if I could just ask where they went… if I could ask anything at all, this would be easier.
Not that I really should expect anything about this entire scenario to be easy.
This was first contact on crack.
It was missing all the things it should have, mainly scientists and an entire team of linguists dedicated to bridging the communication barrier. Instead, it had shady situations like being stuck in cages and being beaten up by a bunch of slave traders.
Then, being pampered, fed, and dressed.
I really hoped they didn't work together to tear us down and then plump us up for a nefarious purpose. It would be quite clever to pair pain and suffering with luxury and kindness so that we were buttered up and supple for whatever shenanigans they had planned for us in the future.
I took another deep breath, letting the air roll down inside of me, filling me up from my base to my brim.
Getting lost in a twisted creation of my own mind wouldn't serve me.
I needed to focus on the present moment.
I let the breath go and walked out of the wardrobe to see Arnina standing by the open door.
Standing before it was that smaller cat elf that had brought over the clothing to the zoo office a few days back.
Her ears flattened backwards on her head for a brief moment before they wrenched back forward, held stiffly in place.
"Hey, it's that one that looks like him," I said. "Sister? Mother? You've seen more of them than me, so how old does she look?"
Arnina looked back over at me with a confused expression on her face.
"Do you think they're like that society in The Giver ?" she asked. "I haven't seen any that look old."
Whoa, dark. I grinned at her at the morbid words.
She seemed so sweet all the time, and then every once in a while, she let something slip out that was positively hellish. My smile faltered for a moment. What if their society was actually like that?
We didn't know anything about their society other than they were confused about whether or not we belonged in a zoo or in the bedroom.
The Boy Toy lady look-a-like, waved her hands in a gesture I recognized.
Finally! My body language lessons were paying off.
"She wants us to follow her." I rushed past Arnina, dragging her in my wake.
I understood something!
"Wait!" Arnina turned around and grabbed the keys and her ladder thing.
We followed the wardrobe lady to the climbing shaft. Zale was still asleep on the couch. I hesitated for a moment and thought about waking him.
I turned back to see that the wardrobe lady had left us behind, springing straight up the shaft.
Arnina carefully set up the ladder and began to climb. I waited until she was at the top, then looked back at Zale one last time. Then, I started up the ladder.
"I don't know about this," Arnina said as I made it to the top of the ladder. "She seems annoyed waiting for us. I think we should check in with Makrus."
"It will be fine," I replied, still excited from understanding the communication. "This is one of his employees. He has to have sent her."
We reached the top of the building to see the woman standing next to the open door of a car.
Arnina sang something in their cat elf song.
She was getting really good at that.
The woman didn't respond.
I didn't feel like waiting around. A sense of anxious urgency welled up in me and I grabbed Arnina's hand and dragged her to the open door of the car.
Wherever we were going, this was going to be an adventure!
I heard a small growl behind me.
I looked back to see Zale spring out of the top of the shaft.
He hurtled towards us like a panther rushing its prey, sending a small shiver of excitement through me. It was a heady dose of adrenaline as my body recognized a predator in motion.
A predator that was coming for me.
"Adventure!" I belted out as I dragged Arnina into the car.
"I'm not sure about this," she said.
"A kidnapper wouldn't walk right in the house and nicely ask us to follow," I said. "She would break in and put bags over our head or-"
"Knock us out and scoop us off a beach?" Arnina interrupted.
I felt a flash of fear rush through me. I could smell the salt and feel the sensation of my leg sinking into the sand as I tried to carry Arnina's weight away. I felt the hard metal floor of the spaceship and flashes of the pain as they beat me.
For a moment, all that existed was that fear and that rage.
Zale's fingers brushed my hand, and I looked up to see his face.
He'd caught up with us already.
The man on the screen.
The man who was here.
The man who would murder my enemies for me.
He was here.
I took a deep, shuddering breath and let the memory go.
Next time I would wake him up before I left.
"Arnina!" Arnina's Boy Toy howled as he tore out the front door, his eyes locking onto the vehicle as the wardrobe woman shut the door.
The woman sang something to the driver, and the car lurched forward as its speed rapidly increased, and we shot up into the air, merging into a lane of flying traffic.
I met Arnina's eyes.
"This is my bad," I admitted. "She is totally kidnapping us."
I grabbed her hand and squeezed it.
I wasn't that worried about her Boy Toy being so upset because Zale was with us.
He wouldn't let anything bad happen to me.
I remained silent as the car lowered out of the flying traffic, and we approached the large wall of a building shaped like an oversized stadium. We tucked into a line of traffic going through a tunnel underneath it.
After longer than I could hold my breath, we emerged on the other side.
We separated off from the line of cars, pulling through another much shorter tunnel before we emerged into an open air space, a small artificial valley that held one large, sleek-looking hulking vehicle perched in the middle of it.