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“No. I have retrieved anything. Unless there is anything else specific you will need to travel.”

“No, I’m good,” she replied. “Darcy already gave me a few supplies.”

“Then, if you are ready?”

“I am.”

“This way.”

I hoisted the large pack onto my shoulder, retrieved the smaller travel pack and Tasha’s bag from the shuldu stall, and led her around the other side of the building to the open-walled garage. My hands full of bags, I used my tail to grasp the large tarp and rip it off the slicer. Dust exploded into the air. Tasha covered her mouth and coughed.

I placed our bags in the storage compartment at the back of the slicer. Once the dust had mostly settled, Tasha came closer to inspect the vehicle.

“What’s this called again?”

“A slicer,” I explained. “You’ll ride behind me.” I indicated the padded seat in the centre of the long, narrow vehicle. “It’s solar-powered with hover capabilities. It’s much faster than travelling by shuldu. It will be a few days of travel to Warden Hallum’s province at most.”

“Wow,” she said softly, walking slowly around the slicer. Her fingertips brushed one of the handlebars, then curled experimentally around it. My cock gave a hot leap in my pants at the sight.

This was going to be a very long month, if I was going to get hard every time I noticed her bare neck or she deigned to touch something even remotely phallic in shape with those pretty fingers.

I was sensing a rather pathetic amount of masturbation in my future.

Maybe I could make her a big scarf. And some very thick mittens.

Yes, Tenn. Because that makes sense in the dead heat of summer.

Masturbation. That is truly how I would have to survive.

Masturbation and suffering.

My suffering only increased when Tasha hopped up, hitching one thigh over the seat until she was straddling it. She placed her palms flat between her spread thighs for balance, her back arching.

I’d never been envious of an inanimate object, like a slicer’s seat, before.

I was now.

As Tasha wiggled her delightful backside and got into a more comfortable position, I occupied myself with fantasies about what it might be like if she were straddling me that way. My lap. My cock.

My face.

“What should I do with my hat?” she asked. “Will it go flying off?”

“It would, if you were wearing it,” I answered belatedly. “You’ll be wearing my helmet.”

I detached said helmet from the side of the slicer.

“Your helmet? What will you wear?” she asked as she removed her hat so I could put it in the storage compartment. I placed the helmet on her head and got to work adjusting it so it would fit.

“I’ve got a hard head,” I murmured, giving the chin strap a final tug. Tasha’s face looked very small beneath the round, black case of the helmet.

“So I’ve noticed,” she replied. As far as I could recall, she hadn’t actually touched my head, but she seemed very certain. An observant female, to be sure, if she could tell such a thing just by looking at me.

Feeling rather exposed, I snapped down the helmet’s protective face visor before getting into the seat ahead of her. It had been many cycles since I’d had someone on the slicer, and even then it had only occasionally been one of the convicts.

Never a female.

“You’ll have to hold on to me,” I told her, my voice roughening. I distracted myself from her proximity by pulling two lengths of hide from inside my hat and securing them beneath my chin so I wouldn’t lose it on the ride.