Halley #2
A small part of me is wickedly satisfied when it turns out that Keelo, despite his best efforts, ended up with the slowest of the bimors again.
His mount drags behind Eot’s and mine, so Rin leads from the back, taking her job of monitoring the tablet as seriously as she takes everything.
If we accidentally drift off course, she gives Keelo a nudge, and under her instruction, Keelo barks orders at Eot and me to straighten up.
Two or three times Eot tries speaking with me, but that’s when Keelo is most likely to issue directional orders. And to be honest, I’m too embarrassed by my own behavior to want to talk. So I wince in a pretend let’s discuss it later sort of way and keep silent.
Tension hums in the air between the three adults as the day drags on.
We eat lunch in the saddle, and I find myself hunching forward, left to my own thoughts.
My mood bounces between feeling hot, flushed, and embarrassed at the memory of how much I wanted to glue myself to Eot, to feeling confused by Keelo’s obvious disgust at seeing me panting over his partner.
I know Eot said he wasn’t romantically involved with Keelo, but maybe Keelo’s got feelings for Eot.
It would be just my luck to have accidentally become one side of a love triangle.
Of course, that train of thinking leads to thoughts of Keelo kissing Eot, and…I try pretending my panties are still damp from earlier, but the real truth is that Keelo and Eot making out is doing something for me. Doing a lot for me.
Is it creepy that I’m thinking about them when they’re both right there, within my sight? I ponder that question as I watch Eot’s broad back. He’s restless in his saddle, fiddling with his neckerchief and continually glancing back at me.
Nah, I decide. So long as Eot and Keelo don’t know that I’m thinking about them, it’s not creepy.
And it’s not like I’m going to ever admit to imagining them swapping saliva.
That fantasy is for me, and me alone. Preferably in the middle of the night when everyone else is asleep and I can secretly slip a hand into my panties.
“Halley.” My name in Keelo’s deep voice is a warning, and for a second I think Eot and I have accidentally strayed off course again, but when I glance back at Keelo he doesn’t motion for me to change direction.
In fact, Rin’s got her eyes closed, and the slow and steady rise of her chest suggests she’s fallen asleep on the job.
Keelo has a hand around her waist, keeping her from slumping too far forward and slipping out of the saddle, and his other hand is tugging at the strip of fabric tied around his neck.
His bimor’s reins are hanging loose, looped over the pommel, as though Keelo’s given up trying to persuade her to walk any faster than her slow trudge.
“What?” I ask, unable to understand his pained expression.
“Think of something else,” he says between gritted teeth, and this time his voice is more of a rumble than actual words. Rin mutters in her sleep as if she felt the vibration of his voice against her back.
“Think of...” I frown. “Er?” There’s absolutely no way he could know that I was thinking about him and Eot. Mind reading, even for aliens, is too fantastical to be real.
“Your scent is distracting Eot.”
“My scent?” I’m a parrot who can only repeat what she’s heard someone else say, but it’s not my fault Keelo’s speaking in riddles.
By “scent” does he mean that my sweat is distracting Eot?
There’s the length of two bimors between us, so Eot shouldn’t be able to smell me at all.
Besides, I already checked, and despite being self-conscious, I know my pits aren’t that bad.
Certainly not bad enough to be distracting.
Unless… Unless Keelo doesn’t mean my sweat…
I squirm in the saddle, feeling the damp gusset of my panties against my pussy. Surely Keelo doesn’t mean that scent. Surely their sense of smell isn’t so superior to my own that they can smell between my legs.
I catch Eot glancing back at me, and when our eyes meet, he gives me a sheepish wince.
Oh God. “I don’t—I’m not—” Denial sticks in my throat. Mortified, I lean toward Eot, whispering, “You can smell that?”
“We can smell everything,” Eot answers with a single-shoulder shrug, clearly trying to lessen the sting of his words.
“Everything?” I’m a bloody parrot again.
“That’s what I was trying to tell you earlier.”
Earlier, when I’d been too obsessed with sex to properly listen to anything he had to say.
“For Arrok, scent is a dimorphic trait that develops when we reach our maturity,” he explains.
“You mean, umm”—I attempt to remember my Biology 101 lectures—“it’s a sex trait?
Wait a second, does this have something to do with me being able to smell apples earlier?
Oh shit! You’ve got sex pheromones!” I snap my mouth shut on my shout, with a glance at Rin.
She turns her head, and for a second I think I’ve woken her, but she resettles a cheek against Keelo’s chest, her eyes closed and her breathing steady.
“Sex pheromones!” I whisper-yell, glaring at Eot. “That’s why I wanted to hump you.”
“I wouldn’t have let you without having explained the situation first.” His sheepish expression transforms into one of…longing? Desire? I can only guess, since I’m still not an expert at reading Arrok’s facial emotes. It’s another reminder of how much I don’t know about Keelo and Eot.
“Our pheromones aren’t meant to trick anyone into doing something they later regret,” he says. “They’re designed to enhance our partner’s pleasure when she’s already decided of her own free will to copulate.”
“That’s…a lot to unpack.” Starting with why he used the word copulate. “Do your pheromones work on everyone or…not everyone?”
“Not.” Keelo answers, pressing a hand over one of Rin’s ears, gentle enough not to wake her, but clearly wanting to block her from accidentally hearing anything she shouldn’t.
“Not,” Eot agrees. “They wouldn’t work on someone who isn’t biologically compatible.”
I nod. Makes sense, scientifically. The entire basis of evolution is the continuation of species. It would be a waste for an alien’s sex smell to work on a species—or an individual—with whom they couldn’t have sex.
“So we’re”—I gesture between Eot and myself—“sexually compatible?” I feel my face heat again.
I’m definitely not the full-time scientist Mom is, because my emotions are controlling about 95 percent of this conversation.
Whereas she’d be taking notes and planning her next research paper, I’m trying not to squirm in the saddle from a combination of embarrassment and curiosity.
“Yes,” says Eot simply.
Behind me, Keelo grumbles under his breath, but when I glance over my shoulder at him, he’s scowling at Eot and won’t meet my gaze.
“But let me be clear,” Eot continues. “Our pheromones are not strong enough to change how someone feels about us. They enhance what’s already present. Or else they have no effect at all.”
Meaning my reaction to Eot’s sex smell was the equivalent of me coming right out and saying I’ve got a huge crush on you. I risk another glance at Keelo, and before I can help myself, I’m wondering if I’d have reacted to his pheromones as strongly.
Which leads to a whole other series of questions. Like: What about when Keelo and Eot body meld? What do they smell like then? Would the two of them together release double the pheromones? And would double the pheromones mean double my horniness?
And do Eot’s pheromones work on Keelo? Or Keelo’s on Eot?
Maybe that’s why Keelo’s so grumpy all the time—because he’s also crushing on Eot and is suffering the consequences of being attracted to Eot’s pheromones.
Eot strikes me as being someone who’s oblivious to other people liking him until they come right out and say it—as I did by trying to slide down his chest and grind against his crotch. I’ve got a strong feeling he’s clueless about Keelo having the hots for him.
And Keelo? Undoubtedly, he’s someone who’d rather suffer in silence than admit to suffering. He avoids having a proper conversation like it’s the plague.
“You’ve got questions,” Eot predicts, studying my face.
What I don’t think he predicts is exactly how salacious my questions are, so I shut my mouth and shake my head.
“No questions? None?” And he halts his bimor’s progress so he can more effectively stare at me in disbelief.
I continue riding, my mount pulling into the lead.
As I pass him, I can’t seem to stop myself drawing a deep breath.
For science, I tell myself, pretending that’s a believable excuse.
The scent of apples is so faint as to be barely recognizable.
In fact, if I hadn’t purposefully been searching for it, I never would’ve noticed.
It’s as if what I’m smelling is the remnant of this morning’s incident…
or as if the neckerchief is somehow blocking his pheromones.
But if that’s the reason, then why is Keelo also wearing one?