Page 47 of Alien Jeopardy

A laugh peals out of me, and then I’m lost to it, wheezing.

A mating dance?!

A mating dance.

He thought me miming what I was saying to him, acting it out, was a mating dance. It shouldn’t be so damned cute, but he’s so earnest about the whole ridiculous thing.

I cackle, going limp with laughter.

It’s nice to feel something besides horny and scared. Rex smiles at me, then lets out a laugh of his own, joining in until we’re both breathless from laughing.

“Come on,” I tell him, wiping an errant tear from my eye. “Let’s get cleaned up and eat.”

He nods, and I take his offered hand as I get up from the weird chair, feeling lighter all over.

Maybe this whole thing isn’t as dramatic or ridiculous as I’ve worked it up to be in my head. We’re just two people, er, ahuman and a Draegon, partnered up in a reality show. And they want us to fall in love.

That’s not so different than my favorite Earth reality TV shows. It’s just like… a weird mix ofWorld’s Most Eligibleand those awful survival shows where they force contestants to eat half-gestated eggs while they get eaten alive by tropical bugs.

This isn’t so bad.

I grin as Rex opens the door to a sumptuous spa-like bathroom.

As I sink into the hot water a few moments later, alone and finally getting clean, I can’t help thinking that we got this.

It’s gonna all work out.

It only takes me about a day to regret thinking that.

Famous. Last. Words.

CHAPTER

TWENTY-TWO

Ellison

I’m clean. I smell good. I’m not sweaty, and I have clean clothes.

And in front of me? The girl dinner dreams are made of, and a date who is not only listening to me, but is also holding up his side of the conversation.

Not to mention, he’s easy to look at.

The drones buzzing around us mostly fade away to background noise as we eat, and even though I know I really have no reason to be… I’m nervous.

Nervous because I want him to like me, and this feels a lot like a high-stakes first date.

The drones aren’t helping. Every time one of them gets closer or I hear the mechanical sound of one, I remember this is being filmed and broadcasted or whatever it is that aliens do with their alien tech.

I can set up a conference call and a mean pivot table in Excel, but alien tech is a little bit above and beyond my qualifications.

So is making small talk with Rex, it turns out. We’ve mostly chatted about the moon we’re on, the game we’re playing, andwe had a good rehash of the first challenge together, and then the food arrived and that made for easy conversation.

Until now.

Now, we’re chewing as silently as we can, randomly catching the other staring and then going back to eating, pretending like this is all a very normal circumstance.

“What is your family like?” I ask him, falling back on an old favorite.