CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Ash
“I told your father to bring his blue suit.” Ash’s mother threw up her arms. “What does he pack? The gray suit. I swear, I could kill him sometimes.”
Ash smiled behind her hand. “I think the gray suit looks great.”
“The blue is more slimming.”
This time, Ash let the laugh out. “Ma, who cares? You guys are up here, on an alien spacecraft for my wedding.” She fluffed her enormous, ridiculous white dress. “I mean, look at this thing you dressed me in. Who cares which suit Dad’s wearing?”
Her mother glanced around, then leaned in.
“Look at these people, Ashley. They’re all so glamorous and beautiful.
They look like they just walked off the set of a soap opera.
I don’t want anyone thinking your family isn’t sophisticated.
You know what I’m saying?” she asked in a worried whisper.
Then, with a frown, “And don’t you forget you’re having a ceremony and reception back home on Long Island.
I don’t care how fancy your husband is. I already booked the Howard Johnson. ”
“I haven’t forgotten,” Ash said with an eye roll.
Someone rapped on the door. “Are you two ready?” Her brother Owen shouted it through the door, probably because he couldn’t figure out how to open it, even though he’d been told. Several times.
“Yeah. Coming.” Ash got up, fending off her mother’s continued fussing with Ash’s hair.
As a hairdresser, her mom had insisted on doing the bridal hair and makeup.
It was a lot of makeup, but her parents and brothers had taken the trip to the Raplan-B to have a small ceremony in the Atriama.
She’d even allowed the false eyelashes. Every time her mother fiddled, Ash’s hair got bigger and higher.
She looked in the mirror and sighed. Her light brown locks were teased, curled, and pinned into a towering confection.
It was all sprayed to rock solid and studded with rhinestone hairpins.
Her mother beamed. “My finest work. You have never looked so beautiful.”
She had never looked so sparkly, and even a hurricane couldn’t budge this updo, but she smiled and air-kissed her mom, so neither of their makeup would get smudged. “Thanks, Ma.”
Her mother’s eyes brightened before she squashed the tears.
“I love you, honey girl. Now let’s go get your man.
Or alien. Whatever that gorgeous devil is.
” She hooked an arm through Ash’s and they went to the door.
Her mom lowered her voice. “Your father still doesn’t understand why he has to have so many tattoos. Thinks they’re unseemly for a doctor.”
“Oh my God, Ma, they’re not tattoos.”
She shrugged, adjusting a curl on Ash’s head. “I just told him it’s none of his business.”
On the other side of the door, Owen and Brad stood, gaping at a nearly naked Baylan female walking by in a sheer flowing caftan.
It was commonplace to see a Baylan on the Raplan-B in sheer garments, revealing everything underneath—Ash sometimes wore them these days—but it was not a sight her younger brothers were accustomed to.
“Knock it off, you two,” she snapped. The female passed by without acknowledging the young men. “That’s how people dress around here, and no, none of these females are going to sleep with you.”
“Really?” asked Owen.
Brad looked crestfallen. “Are you sure?”
Ash almost regretted having invited them. “One hundred percent sure,” she gritted out.
Their mother was not so gentle. She pinched both of their shoulders.
“Hey, both of you—stop gawking like a couple of jackasses. This isn’t the corner pub.
Have some class.” She straightened Owen’s tie, then tightened it until he winced.
“We’re on an alien spaceship, for God’s sake.
Famous actors can’t even get on these things.
Can they?” She gave Ash a probing look. “Have famous people been on here?”
“No, Ma,” said Ash. “No famous people.” She was seriously doubting the wisdom of agreeing to two ceremonies. Long Island, New York, could handle the Hill family. She wasn’t so sure about the Raplan-B.
But a half hour later, she walked through the iridescent, multicolored trees of the Atriama, past the place where she and Zade ate during their first sort-of date, past the secluded alcove where their ill-fated make-out session happened, and stepped into a clearing filled with the most beautiful flowers Ash had ever seen, to meet Zade in the center.
As always, he took her breath away. He wore a black suit which hugged his gorgeous body in fitted perfection.
He smiled at her, and tears pricked her eyes.
They were tears of happiness, for a new love she never thought she’d find.
A few Baylans watched the spectacle with curiosity, as mating ceremonies were not a thing here. Beside Zade stood the Saar-king himself, Drace, and his mate, Rachel Harkett. The Yana-queen beamed a smile and gave her a little, excited wave.
Ash was just getting to know the other human women on the ship, as she and Zade had barely come up for air in the past four months since her recovery.
With her parents by her side, and her brothers—mostly—behaving themselves behind them, Ash said vows that made her mother cry and her father’s lower lip quiver.
Part of her was in awe of the fact that she was a bride again.
It was not the wedding that she had ever thought she’d have.
It was better. Ash had set the past aside long ago, but finally, she was ready to embrace a future filled with love.
When Zade swept her into his arms and whispered into her ear exactly how much their bond meant to him, her heart melted all over again.
Her brilliant, beautiful Baylan male may have saved her life and leg, but maybe he was the one who needed saving, too.
THE END
Hello reader! I hope you enjoyed Zade and Ash’s story!
Oh man, I had fun with these two. You, the reader, allow authors like me to keep publishing new books and imagining new worlds (and hunky aliens), so thank you for reading this book!
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Sooo, are you ready for a new series? If you read book four, you've already met Trak, the Virilian alien who helps Harc out of a jam.
I love me some humor and swagger, so I gave this guy his own story and paired him with a fiercely independent woman who really doesn't need saving.
Check out the first chapter of TRAK: Virilian Mail Order Mates:
Chapter 1
There were hundreds of women, all lined up in two long rows like cattle.
The one thing they had in common was they were all fertile and healthy.
About a million tests and exams had confirmed that.
Anna Baker stood there, shivering in a short white robe bearing the logo of a company being paid well to organize this process.
She hugged herself as she waited to be judged and measured and, perhaps, chosen.
They stood inside a huge aircraft hangar in an undisclosed location, everyone having been blindfolded when transported here.
They’d been told to be silent, or they would be ejected.
A few had been, after getting cold feet and panicking.
Anna couldn’t blame them. After all, the women who stood here were being given a chance to be matched with a Virilian male.
An alien. In return, they would get a one-time payment of five million dollars.
What made it appealing was that the match wasn’t permanent.
The Virilians badly needed offspring after some virus had killed most of their females.
Human women were biologically compatible.
It was a simple transaction. Anna looked around at her fellow hopefuls—maybe that wasn’t the right word—applicants.
Everyone looked at least a little nervous.
Anna didn’t know what motivated the other shivering women to enter this insane contest, but she surely wasn’t the only one suddenly thinking that maybe five million wasn’t worth it.
Whoever was chosen was expected to conceive, carry and deliver an alien’s baby.
The application had made it clear that there’d be no test tubes involved, and to not apply if they had any objections to a sexual relationship with a Virilian male.
Virilians were absurdly attractive, and when Anna had filled out the form, all those months ago, her focus had been on how desperately she needed the money to continue her brother’s medical treatments, not the rest of it.
There were so many women here—more beautiful, with bigger boobs and better hair—Anna figured her chances of being picked were slim to none. This was just a pilot program.
Only ten women were being chosen to be matched with Virilian males. If it was successful, they’d consider expanding the program.
A voice boomed over the loudspeaker. In at least ten languages, a male voice repeated an order for them to remove their robes.
Anna felt sick as she watched a few more women dart from the line and be escorted to waiting vans.
She swallowed back a roll of nausea and considered running, too.
But if she did, she wouldn’t get the five thousand dollars offered for standing through the process.
She needed that five grand, so with shaking hands, she reached for the tie at her waist, pulled it open and shrugged the robe to the ground.
In one of her many, many jobs, she’d done a stint as a topless dancer, so she tried to think of it as that—just a performance.
“Arms to your sides,” ordered the disembodied voice through the hangar. “Face the center aisle.”
They did as told. Anna faced the row on the other side. The women stood shoulder to trembling shoulder.