Chapter 36
CORA
Queen of the Eissoi Coast Appears at Kon’s Concert
Cora Keaton Ahlon made an appearance with her notorious husband at Qhev’in Kon’s concert last night, stunning again in vintage Americana style.
The popularity of her signature winged eye-liner continues to grow since Kon debuted the look weeks ago, attributing the trend to a “friend” he met on BMM.
Last week he stated in an interview that he had reconnected with that friend, none other than Earth’s Cora Keaton, the woman Eissoi mobster Yiri Ahlon claims as his Ibar chosen mate.
X-tra Tea can confirm that the two are legally married and mated according to Bion and Venastean law, but who can say if the alleged fated mate status is bona fide?
It would be the first such claim of an Ibaran mating between a human woman and a daernir male not originating from the stifling Ibarutan moon.
The Ibarutan government’s claims that they have found several fated mates from Earth have never been satisfactorily proven, and we have yet to see concrete evidence or hear firsthand testimony of such a mating from any woman of Earth.
If anyone has connections with Mrs. Keaton-Ahlon, this reporter would love to sit down and discuss the topic with her.
One thing is certain. The two were not unaffected by Kon’s distinctive performance.
Seen leaving the theater with Ahlon’s longtime associate Nerus Veron and his sister, Thisa Veron, Mrs. and Mr. Ahlon were visibly flushed and exhibited several public displays of affection.
Who knows if he’s her fated mate or not, but Cora, enjoy your silver fox, girl.
He might be a deranged gangster, but damn, the man is fine.
The article was in an e-zine published by a human woman living on Venastea. X-tra Tea was geared towards other Earth women, spilling all the juicy extra terrestrial tea and putting it in a context that was more familiar to our home world cultures. Thisa sent it to me after waking me up with a call.
“This is so cool, Cora,” Thisa gushed to me over the cruiser’s large nexus frame. “I’m basically famous now, too! Thank you so much for inviting me.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Seriously,” she said. “You don’t even know. A mention in X-tra Tea next to your name right now is everything. I’ve been trying to learn the cat-eye all morning. I think I’ve almost got it down. It’s so hard to keep both sides even!”
“It takes a little practice,” I agreed. “I’ll send you the link I shared with Qhev.”
“Qhev,” she sighed with big hearts in her eyes. “You know him well enough to call him Qhev. You’re so glamorous. How did a grumpy old male like Yiri ever pull you?”
I laughed. “I guess maybe it’s an Earth girl thing, but I think it’s hot. I knew I was in trouble the first time he called me. He’s a little broody and dangerous, yeah. But don’t you feel safe when he’s around?”
“I guess,” she tapped her chin thoughtfully.
“I could feel that from across the universe.”
“But how? I mean it’s not like he could do anything to protect you from Venastea.”
I cocked my head to the side. “You don’t think so?”
She didn’t answer, tight-lipped for once.
“Maybe you’ll understand this when you’re older, and maybe not. I don’t know how it is for daernir women.” I shrugged at her through the floating frame. “I like it when he tells me what to do.”
Thisa wrinkled her nose. “That sounds awful.”
“Like I said,” I lifted a shoulder, “maybe you won’t know what I mean.
On Earth, I was completely alone. I didn’t have any family, no partner, and very few friends.
I had to make every single decision for myself, I had to work really hard to support myself, and I spent a lot of time worrying if I was going to be able to make ends meet. ”
Thisa’s face softened as she listened, her eyes rounded with surprise. “That sounds awful.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “So imagine living your whole adult life that way, and then suddenly you meet an older man who radiates security and control. Just talking to him paid my rent, and then add to that, he tells me what to do every now and then. I don’t have to decide everything all the time.
I can let him take over because he knows what he’s doing and what I need. ”
Thisa bit her lip, her light blue skin taking on a lavender hue around her cheeks and ears. “Yeah, okay,” she said slowly. “I guess that’s kind of…. No.” She screwed her eyes shut, shaking her head. “No, it’s Yiri. It isn’t attractive.”
“But if it was Qhev’in?” I suggested.
That gave her pause. “Do you think… Do you think he’s like that?”
“Maybe,” I said. “I would have said no before seeing him perform. He’s so easy-going most of the time. But if he had a woman and that’s what she wanted or needed from him, I think he could handle it.”
Thisa’s shade of lavender was edging towards magenta. “I… I have to go for now. I’ll see you tomorrow at Della’s party.”
“Bye, Thisa.”
Yiri found me making a snack of grilled eslu and zibe fruit, reading the rest of the e-zine. He pressed close to my back, caging me in against the counter.
“Where have you been?” I asked, leaning my head back against his chest.
Capturing my hand, he drew it to his mouth and stole my next piece of zibe fruit. His lips and tongue slipped around my fingertips, cleaning every drop of juice away. Yiri hummed contentedly as he ate, holding me tighter.
“I had to—”
“If you say work,” I warned him, trailing off without a threat.
“Then you’ll do what, Aneah?”
I rolled my lip out. “I’ll have to misbehave, won’t I? I have to keep your attention somehow.”
“Would it help if I said I missed you every minute I was gone?” he asked.
“No,” I lied.
“What if I said I have a surprise for you this afternoon?” he hedged. “Would you be a good little wife for me then?”
I perked up, turning in his arms. “A surprise?”
“A few of them,” he said.
I tapped my chin, pretending to think it over. He hadn’t really been gone that long, and I got to sleep in. And he let Mr. Darcy out in his little float. It made me nervous, but Mr. Darcy loved it.
“If it’s a good surprise, I might be able to behave,” I relented.
“Good,” he said. “Now finish eating, and I’ll let you fly us there.”
“Me?”
He kissed the tip of my nose and stepped away. “Yes, Aneah. You.”
Operating a flying saucer was not like driving a car, riding a bike, or—I suspected—like flying a plane.
I imagined it was more along the lines of riding a unicycle across a tightrope while juggling balls that might burst into flames at any second.
There was an air current to monitor, other crafts to avoid, elevation to maintain, signals to indicate my path to other crafts, and a speed limit of all things.
Although Yiri didn’t seem overly concerned about that last one.
He said it didn’t apply to us, but we shouldn’t go too slow, so we didn’t cause traffic to stall.
On my own, I’d have been too scared to move the cruiser at all. What if I crashed it? Yiri loved the thing. It was his home. But I wasn’t on my own. Sitting on Yiri’s knee with his hands on my hips as he gave me calm, measured reminders, I felt more confident than I had any right to.
Until it was time to land.
“What do you mean, lower it to the dock?” I froze, forgetting everything he had taught me in an instant.
“You’ll do fine, Aneah,” he said, putting my hand on the elevation control. “Just take it slow.”
“That dock is tiny!”
“Aneah.”
His tone made the affectionate name a command that had me letting loose a tightly held breath and tentatively, carefully easing the control down. The cruiser inched down so slowly that it probably looked like it was barely moving.
Yiri chuckled, but said, “You’re doing great, Cora.”
His thumb traced reassuringly over my hip, up and down as I eased the cruiser closer and closer to the slim metal gangplank of a dock. I was almost there when something on the platform it connected to caught my eye. Something big and dusky rose pink.
“My couch!”
I bumped the dock.
Yiri’s hand covered mine and steadied the cruiser as it fitted into place.
“Shit, did I hurt the cruiser?”
“No,” Yiri said, squeezing me as he pointed out the buttons to push to open the cargo door. “The dock might be a little off center, though. Let me test it before you go out.”
“You’re out of your mind if you think I’m walking across that tiny little rope bridge,” I snorted.
He patted my thigh, telling me wordlessly to get up.
“It suits me fine if you stay inside,” he said. “But it’s up to you.”
He led me to the cargo hold where a small crew of daernir men were already carrying in boxes with mine and Andy’s handwriting on the sides.
“We need the old couch taken out before you bring anything else in,” Yiri told them.
“What do you want us to do with it?” one of the men asked.
“Burn it,” I muttered.
I was joking, but the man nodded like that was a perfectly reasonable request, and went to get the thing out of the living quarters. I wasn’t sad to see it go.
“I don’t know why I hate that couch so much,” I said as they lugged it across the precarious dock.
Yiri eyed me for a beat and then said, “Promise you won’t be mad at me if I tell you why?”
I squinted back at him. “No. But you have to tell me now, or I’ll definitely be mad.”
He sighed and pulled me close so he could speak quietly. “I’ve had other females on that couch. You’re my Aneah, so your instincts are telling you it’s abhorrent.”
My stomach flip-flopped, and my skin heated. “Had?”
“Did you think I was a virgin, Aneah?” He held onto me like he was afraid I’d try to run away.
“No,” I pouted. “But we don’t have to talk about it.” But then I had a thought. “I don’t hate the bed, though. Why is that?”
He seemed to pale a shade or two. “I replaced the beds.”
I stared up at him. “Beds. Plural.”
His throat bobbed, but he didn’t look away. “Aneah.”
Yeah, no. I was uninterested in continuing that line of thought.
“I packed some snacks,” I said. “You wanna try some chocolate?”
“Yes.” He glanced at the platform where several boxes that were not mine still waited to be carried over. “And I have some other things for you, too.”
“My stuff wasn’t the surprise?”
He scoffed. “What kind of mate surprises his Aneah with her own property?”
“The surprise is that it’s here.”
“I’m not spoiling you right,” he muttered to himself. “I’ll do better.”