Chapter 28
We did one better than a bookstore, we found an untouched library.
It was a pristine, red brick building with romantic white gabled windows.
Carn looked completely mystified when we strolled inside(apparently nobody bothered to lock up when aliens invaded) and I pulled in a deep breath of old books.
“This is heaven,” I sighed, slouching into an overstuffed loveseat. “A million books, a sturdy building, furniture...” My head lolled back and I grinned like an idiot. My confused mate was carefully picking books off a nearby shelf and staring at the pages.
“I’ll teach you to read if you want,” I offered. “We might need to actually learn each other’s languages first, though. I think the translator might just confuse things.”
He looked up at me and weighed the book cautiously. “This is what you were looking for?”
“I love it, but we don’t have to live here.”
Please let us live here, I begged silently.
He nodded and inspected the book-stuffed space.
“I can fortify it, but we will need food and water.”
“And a bed.” I lurched out of the loveseat. “I’ll make a list and we’ll get a wheelbarrow.”
Carn ducked down to press a kiss to my hair. “I do not know what that is.”
I couldn’t help but laugh at that. It was easy to forget how completely out of his element Carn was. Death, aliens and constant danger were just a regular Tuesday for a gladiator, but we were on my planet and even destroyed and mostly vacant, I had the high ground here.
Carn spent an hour inspecting the library.
Aside from the front doors, there were only a few windows, so we wouldn’t have to do much to make the building secure.
I forced myself away from the siren’s call of the shelves and wandered around making a list of things we’d need to turn the place into a decent home.
There was a small kitchen in the backroom, no power, so we couldn’t use the microwave or the stove, but it still made a decent place to store food.
When I was confident I knew what we needed, I found Carn and we set out to find all the things on my list. The library was only a few blocks from the strip mall, close enough to hear an air horn, which was at the top of my list. I planned on stocking up and giving some to the other girls so we had a long distance alert system should anyone suddenly need backup.
I was also on the lookout for walkie talkies and batteries.
Instead of a wheelbarrow, we found a home improvement store with big, flat carts and stole two.
Carn effortlessly pushed one ahead of him and pulled one behind as we slowly made our way from store to store and stocked up on everything we needed.
He grabbed heavy sheets of plywood to board up the library windows and I found a king-sized mattress in a box.
The bedframe I picked out seemed like overkill, but after living in a cell and sleeping on Carn’s tiny cot, I was craving the luxury of a real bed.
By the time we’d piled as much as we could on the carts, it was getting dark and I was over the moon.
I’d found sheets, actual sheets and a big fluffy comforter I’d probably never need. Between the lack of air conditioning and Carn’s body heat, blankets were kind of pointless, but I couldn’t help myself.
We dragged everything into the library and I busied myself clearing a shelf near an open reading nook to stock with all our goodies. With a little direction, Carn wrestled the mattress out of its box and I watched gleefully as it slowly expanded.
High on success, we worked into the night, assembling our new home.
Carn dragged several book-filled shelving units around to make walls around our ‘bedroom’ and I admired the flex of muscles in his back as he worked.
By now I’d had plenty of chances to see his inhuman strength at work but it never failed to shock me.
Even without the hundreds of books weighing it down, it would have taken at least three men to move the shelves and Carn managed it effortlessly on his own.
After a break for a quickie on the still inflating mattress, I broke out a tool set and dug the instructions out of the bed frame box.
“What is this?” Carn inspected the screwdriver, a look of fascination on his handsome face. I dug out the baggie of hardware and showed him how the screws and screwdriver worked and he looked impressed.
“Humans are more like the sytos than I realized,” he said, still lounging happily on the mattress.
“Really?” I mentally compared the mag cuffs, and the translator in my ear to the good old fashioned screwdriver in my hand.
“Turochs don’t have anything like this.” He waved a hand at the open tool box. “Our ax blades are made of bone, though some males have scavenged metal from crashed merchant ships and fashioned stronger weapons.”
“But you have hammers and stuff right?” I didn’t know why I was surprised. I’d gotten used to my primitive mate, it had been days since I even registered the fact he was still naked and completely comfortable with it despite recently meeting over a hundred strangers.
The corner of his mouth twitched, and he tucked his arm behind his head.
“I used large rocks to beat wooden stakes into the ground when we set up our tents. We rarely used knives, even to butcher our kills, it was easier just to cook the whole thing and tear pieces off.”
“Don’t you need knives to get the skin off?” I wondered.
He shook his head. “It’s easy enough just to rip it all off as one piece.”
I could absolutely picture Carn ripping a steaming haunch of meat off the fire and eating it like a savage. Pulling the skin off a kill was an image I could live without, however.
Abandoning my attempt to build the bed frame, I crawled up the mattress until I was straddling his broad chest.
“Does it bother you?” I asked, watching his face for any flicker of resentment.
As much as I loved modern convenience, Carn had been ripped from his planet and way of life.
He’d been forced into the syto’s high tech world, he would have lived happily in a world where rocks were tools.
There was a very real chance he saw all the human gadgets as reminders of his slavery.
He cocked his head to the side, ears tilting forward until I could see the dark pink skin hiding beneath his black fuzz.
“No. Your world was attacked, humans have never done anything to me. Besides,” his expression turned wry and he reached up to stroke the side of my ribs. “I even find myself growing fond of Gigi.”
I couldn’t stop the laugh that burst out of me at that.
“Watching him strip down and try to wrestle Tovis was pretty funny,” I agreed.
Gigi had thrown himself into the turoch way of life like it was all he’d ever wanted.
He’d already made friends with a few of the males and I didn’t doubt he’d be wielding an ax and going on hunting patrols by the end of the week.
I’d seen way more blue skin than I ever wanted to but I really didn’t have the moral authority since he’d walked in on Carn and I multiple times.
“He is as eager as the young males,” Carn said. “I think the band will take to him quickly.”
That sobered me.
“But not to you.”
He smiled and it was bittersweet.
“Gigi is an enemy turned ally. I am a brother turned traitor. It is not the same.”
Resentment flared in my gut. I did understand the difference, but I hated thinking about my mate being left on the fringes of his people because of something that was out of his control.
“I am content, Naomi.” Warm hands cupped my face and I leaned into his gentle touch. “The happiness I feel when I am with you, is beyond anything I dreamed possible. If my people never forgive me, I will still be at peace.”
“As long as you know I love you, big guy.” I leaned forward until my head was tucked under his chin and let my body melt over his.
It was wild how much could change in a few weeks.
Two months ago I would be coming home after a day at work, eating alone, numb to all the things I was letting pass me by.
And now I had a big, affectionate alien mate and the world was a dumpster fire.