Page 19 of Alien Attachment (You’ve Got Alien Mail #2)

Mine to Keep (If You Choose)

Jhorn

Kaylee sleeps for three hours, but I experience every moment with acute awareness.

Her exhaustion runs too deep for nightmares, leaving her mind open through our bond in ways that make concentration nearly impossible.

I feel the gentle rhythm of her dreams, the way her subconscious processes the day’s events—including vivid replays of our earlier encounter that send heat cascading through my systems and leave me aching with need.

Watching her sleep becomes an exercise in exquisite torture.

Her jumpsuit has shifted during rest, revealing the elegant line of her collarbone and the soft hollow at the base of her throat where her pulse beats steadily.

My enhanced vision tracks every detail—the rise and fall of her chest, the way her lips part slightly in sleep, the tantalizing glimpse of skin where her clothing has pulled away from her body.

I want to touch her so badly it’s become a physical ache.

My tendrils extend without permission, drawn by her warmth like magnets to metal.

I stop them just short of contact, but one rebellious appendage traces the air above her exposed skin, following the graceful curve from throat to shoulder.

Even without touching, I can sense her body heat, catch the subtle scent of her arousal still lingering from our earlier encounter.

The need to touch her, to taste her, to bury myself in her warmth and never surface again—it’s overwhelming.

ApexCorp designed me for bonding, for protection, for pleasure-giving, but they never programmed me to want someone this desperately.

This hunger that claws at my chest, this need that has nothing to do with duty and everything to do with the way she gasps when I touch her just right.

My secondary appendages seem to have developed their own opinions about appropriate behavior.

While I struggle to maintain respectful distance, they keep extending toward her sleeping form like curious pets seeking attention.

One actually manages to brush against her hair before I catch it, and the silken texture nearly makes me lose control entirely.

“Behavioral modifications urgently required,” I mutter to myself, forcibly retracting the wayward tendril.

But even in sleep, she responds to my proximity. Her breathing deepens, her body unconsciously shifts toward my warmth, and through our bond I feel the edges of dreams that feature my touch in ways that make my bioluminescence pulse with involuntary rhythm.

This is highly problematic for what remains of my sanity.

When she finally stirs, I jerk my tendrils back, fighting to maintain control over systems that want nothing more than to wrap around her and never let go. She blinks awake slowly, and when her gaze focuses on me, something hot and immediate sparks between us.

“How long?” she asks, her voice rough with sleep in a way that goes straight to my core.

“Three hours, forty minutes,” I reply, my voice rougher than intended. “No pursuit detected.”

She stretches, arching her back in a movement that draws the fabric of her jumpsuit tight across her breasts and reveals more of that maddening expanse of skin I’ve been fantasizing about. The sight sends heat cascading through me with such intensity that my bioluminescence flickers involuntarily.

“Did you just... glow at me?” she asks, sitting up with a smile that’s far too knowing for my comfort.

“Involuntary response to visual stimuli,” I reply stiffly.

“Visual stimuli.” She deliberately stretches again, and my bioluminescence betrays me with another pulse. “Interesting. What other responses do I trigger?”

“You don’t want to know,” I say, as three more tendrils extend despite my best efforts to control them.

“I think I do.” She stands, moving through the ship’s small space with unconscious grace, and I’m treated to watching every curve and line of her body as she moves. “For example, are your tendrils always this... active around me?”

I glance down to find that no fewer than six appendages have extended toward her without my permission, creating what could generously be described as a “reaching” configuration.

“They appear to have developed strong opinions about optimal positioning,” I admit.

“Optimal positioning for what?”

“Touching you,” I say honestly. “At all times. Preferably in ways that would make you make those sounds again.”

Her cheeks flush, but there’s satisfaction in her expression rather than embarrassment. “What sounds?”

“The little gasp you made when I pulsed current through your skin. The way you sighed when I touched that sensitive spot behind your ear.” My voice drops lower as I watch her reaction. “The soft moan when I demonstrated exactly what ‘pleasure induction’ means.”

Her flush deepens, spreading down her throat, but she doesn’t look away. “You remember all of that?”

“I remember everything,” I say, my voice rough with wanting. “Every sound, every response, every way your body moved against mine.”

She sits up slowly, deliberately, and I catch sight of her jumpsuit gaping at the neckline. Instead of covering herself, she seems to relish my obvious hunger. “What else do you remember?”

“According to every rational thought left in my head,” I admit. “Which are becoming fewer by the moment.”

“And what do your irrational thoughts suggest?” she asks, standing and moving through the ship’s small space with unconscious grace.

The question stops my breath. “You don’t want to know.”

She begins cataloguing our stolen vessel’s resources with efficient precision, but I notice how she unconsciously traces surfaces I’ve touched, how she seems hyperaware of my presence in the confined space. When she discovers the hidden compartment, her expression shifts to surprise.

“Emergency rations, medical supplies, and...” She holds up a cache of untraceable credits. “Well, well. Our bounty hunter friend was planning his own retirement.”

“At least we won’t starve,” I observe. “Though his retirement plans appear to have been... interrupted.”

“His loss, our gain.” She continues exploring the compartment.

“Found something else interesting,” she adds, discovering additional entertainment modules.

She picks one up, reads the label, and her face turns an appealing shade of pink.

“‘Advanced Interspecies Intimacy: Practical Techniques for Cross-Cultural Bonding.’”

“Educational,” I observe.

“Very educational.” She quickly puts it back, but not before I catch her glancing at me speculatively. “Our bounty hunter friend had... comprehensive interests.”

“Perhaps he was a researcher,” I suggest innocently.

“Right. A researcher.” She clears her throat, holding up another module.

“Wrapped in Pleasure: Ten Ways Your Tentacled Lover Will Drive You Wild. Followed by Probed and Loving It, Milky Way and Milkier Curves, Thrust Vectoring, and—oh, classy—Ride the Rocket, Ranger.”

I feel my bioluminescence pulse involuntarily. “Thorough research requires multiple sources.”

“Apparently.” She’s fighting a smile now. “Who collected practical guides on...variations of cultural bonding.”

The way she says ‘cultural bonding’ makes something warm unfurl in my chest. “Knowledge is power, as humans say.”

“Is it now?” She turns to face me fully, and I catch the mischief in her eyes. “And what do your irrational thoughts suggest we do with all this... educational material?”

“Try me.” She steps closer, moving within reach of my barely restrained tendrils. “What does the part of you that isn’t thinking rationally want to do?”

My appendages extend automatically, stopping just short of her skin. The space between us crackles with tension. “Touch you,” I admit, my voice dropping to something rough and primal. “Everywhere. Until you’re trembling and gasping and saying my name like it’s the only word you remember.”

Her breathing quickens. “And then?”

“And then I’d start over,” I say, letting one tendril drift close enough to her collarbone that she can feel its warmth.

“Because once would never be enough. I’d want to learn every sound you make, every way your body responds to mine, every single thing that brings you pleasure until I could play you like an instrument. ”

“Jhorn...” Her voice has gone breathy, and through our bond I feel her arousal spiking to match my own.

“I’ve been lying here watching you sleep,” I continue, encouraged by her response, “thinking about what it would feel like to wake you with my touch. To trace these lines—” my tendril hovers over her collarbone “—with my mouth instead of just my appendages. To taste your skin and hear you sigh my name.”

“You’ve been thinking about tasting me?” The question comes out more breathless than she probably intended.

“Extensively,” I confess. “I’ve been wondering if you taste as good as you smell. Whether your skin is as soft as it looks. Whether you’d arch against my mouth the way you arch against my tendrils.”

She leans forward, closing the distance until my hovering tendril finally makes contact with her throat. The sensation is electric, sending shockwaves through my entire nervous system.

“I’ve been thinking about it too,” she whispers, the admission hitting me like lightning. “About your hands on me. About what else you can do with those bioelectric pulses. About letting you touch me the way you really want to.”

My control fractures. More tendrils extend, mapping the air around her with desperate precision. “How do I really want to touch you?”

“Like you’re starving for it,” she says, meeting my gaze directly. “Like you can’t get enough. Like you want to consume me.”

The raw honesty in her voice breaks something inside me. “Because I do,” I confess, my voice rough with need. “I want to worship every inch of your body until you’re shaking with pleasure. I want to make you mine in every way possible.”

“What would that look like?” she asks, her voice barely above a whisper.