Chapter 22 Callie
twenty-two
Callie
Look, if anyone ever asked me how Rathal dressed me and himself, got me up like eight stories and in front of what passed as a wedding officiant on this station in what equated to a blink of an eye, I’d shrug my shoulders because I had no fucking clue know how he did it.
One second we’d been post sex, naked and worn out and the next we were in a plushly appointed office of sorts with the fox-like matriarch from the Assembly looking us over with a knowing expression on her furry face.
Som’ae was even shorter than I realized now that she was standing in front of me, separated from us by a small desk built to fit her stature.
Her long robes now the color of a pink washed sunset that contrasted beautifully with her maroon and black marbled fur.
The little fox-like female had huge eyes with golden tri irises which were shimmering merrily as Rathal fidgeted at his spot next to me.
“Rathal, would you quit? You are making your bride nervous,” she scolded him, her four fluffy tails rising to fan behind her as she shook out her hands over a stack of paper-thin holoscreens on her desk.
Rathal stopped shifting from foot to foot, but the fingers of his left hand started tapping at his thigh.
He was kind of making me nervous, so I smiled at her. She bowed her head slightly in my direction before picking up the first holoscreen.
“Now, for the first part of the contract we will be going over the transfer of assets to one Callisto Maria Jamal Johnson Ramirez from Ra Rathal NulKal Som’Vel Ah’Roshal as part of the first portion of obligatory courting gifts and the penalty interest for the failure to supply said obligatory courting gifts before the agreed upon civil union.
As such, the sum of 4,000 sels shall be transferred to the account of choice to Callisto Maria Jamal Johnson Ramirez by end of business rotation this Darking. Sign here and here.”
She held up the thin glass to Rathal, who bent to wave his wrist over its surface and then she shifted it to me.
“Please read over the itemized list and mark whether or not the courting gifts due to you are satisfactory. If they are not, arrangements will be made to supply you with additional gifts until you deem them fit.”
I lifted the tablet from her hands and scanned the glowing yellow lines of script. None of it was comprehensible to me. Oh, I could read the words, but I had no idea what ‘Sels’ were or what two thirds Args of Gresia were or any of the dozens of other items on the list.
I turned to Rathal and waved the tablet at him. “Uh, I have no idea what any of this stuff is.”
He opened his mouth and closed it a few times and then shook his head, reaching to pluck the tablet from my hands and sidled in closer to me. He pointed at the first line, the two third Args of Gresia.
“These are a rare mineral, used to bind nanoites to various materials. In Earth terms, I’ve given you the equivalent of say two hundred billion dollars… give or take.”
“What?” I squeaked, taking a step away from him.
Both he and Som’ae stared at me in confusion.
“Callie. To refuse this would be to say that you are not worth this gift,” Som’ae explained slowly.
“Which you most assuredly are,” Rathal declared, glaring at me as if to stop whatever argument I was going to try and start.
I closed my mouth and swallowed hard before passing my wrist over the tablet and watched as my name was etched into the appropriate sections that made me a multibillionaire in the blink of an eye and then passed the glass back to Som’ae before I put my foot in my mouth or passed out or both.
“So what was the rest of it?” I asked and then instantly regretted it. I really didn’t want to know what else I’d just been given. Lord have mercy. I was rich.
Rathal waved his hand in front of his face in a gesture of nonchalance. “Oh, just a few simple things… like property, shipping lines, credit accounts, business stakes, jewels, cloth, and a very lucrative portion of a coffee making enterprise that I’ve started.”
Som’ae chuckled gleefully as she picked up the next holoscreen. “You have just become the second largest shareholder in Erral, don’t let him fool you.”
The part of me that had always felt guilty receiving gifts shivered in revulsion, but the new and improved Callie that I was carefully cultivating clapped her hands and nodded that it was her due.
“Okay. Cool. Totally fine. Um… who’s the number one shareholder?” I was pretty sure I already knew, but I asked anyway.
“Why, me, of course,” Som’ae said, smirking briefly before growing serious again. “Now, the second contract portion includes management of personal assets and loss prevention…"
“Oh my god, that was worse than any legal proceedings on Earth,” I said, falling into one of the plush chairs in Rathal’s bedroom with a groan.
There were several large windows in here, but metal shutters were drawn shut to block out the Light, to which I was thankful because exhaustion pulled at me like a persistent child.
The contracts had seemed unending, new ones seemingly appearing on Som’ae’s desk out of thin air.
Just when I thought we’d reached the bottom of one stack, another appeared.
We’d been stuck in that office for hours.
It was Light now and my body was reminding me I’d gotten my back blown out recently and I needed my beauty rest. And a shower.
And a drink. And a brace for my wrist from holding it out over so many goddamned tablets.
“What, did you think we’d just sign on the dotted line, say ‘I do’ and be done with it?”
I shot him a bleary eyed glare. “Yes?”
Rathal snorted, taking the seat across from me and kicking off his boots to wriggle his toes in the fur rug covering his fancy pink floors.
“The lines at the processing stations should have disabused you of that notion early on. Here on Erral, we have a form for everything and everything is in writing. We’re criminals, darling. Not a very trusting lot.”
I groaned again and let my head fall back against the back of the chair, closing my eyes against the headache that had formed somewhere between forms 8 and 447.
It was quiet for a long, blessed moment and then Rathal’s soft voice slipped through the shadows of his room.
“You do realise we are married now, yes? You had a very dissociated look towards the end there, and I worry that you missed the part where your name became my own.”
The humor in his voice was edged with legitimate concern and that, more than being married now, had my eyes flying open and my back straightening.
I chose my words carefully. “Yes. I am very aware we are married.” I stood, closing the distance between us to straddle his lap and wrap my arms around his neck.
“There are no regrets, second guessing, or doubts. I fully consented to becoming yours, Rathal.” I smiled as his face softened.
“I’m just tired. That was ridiculous. You should think about shortening that whole process. ”
Rathal’s hands smoothed up my thighs to settle on my ass and he cleared his throat before giving each cheek a good squeeze.
“Yes, well that has been the topic of several Assemblies. And—strictly legally speaking—you didn’t so much as become mine as I became yours.
I am now Ra Rathal NulKal Som’Val Ra’Roshal Johnson Ramirez. ”
I mouthed ‘wow’ and pursed my lips. “What if I want your last name? Or surname—uh family name? Whatever you aliens call it.”
“Family name works. Clan name is closer to correct,” he explained, smiling.
“Alright,” I said, shrugging. “What’s your clan name then?”
His hands drifted around my hips and shifted me ever so slightly back and forth over his growing erection while he pressed upwards. His gaze dropped to where we touched and grew heavy.
“Ra’Roshal is my grandmother’s mother’s name,” he murmured distractedly.
I, myself, was growing distracted too, especially as he grew harder and harder beneath me.
I was wearing the same soft, thin cloth pants that had become a regular part of my wardrobe and since he’d donned the soft ‘tactical’ pants instead of his usual leather attire I could feel every inch of him through our clothes.
I was reaching for the hem of my shirt when his hands left my hips and grabbed my wrists, stopping me. I gave him a questioning look and he shook his head, a crooked smile forming.
“Would you like to finish what we started earlier?”
I wrinkled my brows. “ Uh, did we not already do that?”
I mean the sex had been pretty vigorous, so I’m not sure how he’d forgotten about it already.
Rathal laughed, his teeth flashing bright in the low lighting of his room. “No, not that part, glorious as it was. I’m talking about our chase and catch game. I interrupted it.”
Oh. A sharp spear of heat hit me low in my belly and my pussy took that moment to clench against my will. Rathal’s nostrils flared and his grin widened.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” he purred and stood abruptly, taking me with him.
I didn’t even flinch this time, becoming used to him picking me up whenever he felt like it. “Where are we going?”
He chuckled, his ears curling. “Oh, you’ll see.”
His continued laughter was making me nervous.
But when I thought for sure we were going to head out the door and to wherever it was that this game was going to take place, he instead pivoted and walked us to his truly obscenely large bathroom.
He sat me down on the gleaming gold countertop, right next to a pink jeweled sink in the shape of some type of leaf.
When I gave him a questioning look he tapped his finger on my nose twice.