Page 8 of Chosen By the Alien (Halloween Temptation #11)

We get out without anyone seeing us. All the people that still remain are blacked out. Jake is nowhere to be seen. And Tahl kisses me like he doesn’t want the encounter to end.

Like he wants to burn it into me. Into us.

Our mouths crash together again in a corner of the back patio, hidden behind the tall hedge where no one from the party can see us. His hand cradles the back of my neck, firm and grounding, while mine grips the front of his shirt, knuckles brushing bare skin.

I taste him, earth and ozone and something wild I can’t name, and it fills every nerve. It’s not just lust. Not just heat. It's him.

I don’t know how long we stay like that, tangled together while the rest of the world sleeps off their booze. But eventually, he pulls back, eyes glowing faintly, lips flushed.

“I need to get you home,” he says.

I nod because I can’t speak. My throat's dry, my body still throbbing from what we just did. I feel like I’ve stepped outside of my own skin. Like I’ll never fit back in it again.

Tahl leads me by the hand down the gravel path. The dawn's not up yet, but there's a lightness in the sky, that pre-sun glow. He unlocks something that looks like a matte-black muscle car from a sci-fi movie. Sleek, alien, sexy as hell.

“Wait, this is your ride?” I blink at the thing. “You drove this to a kegger?”

“It looks like a car,” he says, grinning as he opens the passenger door for me, “but it is not.”

I lower myself into the seat, which hums slightly under me.

“It’s a ship,” I say, trying not to freak out. “You landed it?”

“Parked it,” he corrects. “Cloaking matrix. Cloaks the engine core and diffuses the mass signature. Your satellites think it is a Camaro.”

I stare at him. “You’re serious.”

“I am always serious about tech.”

The dash lights up, unfamiliar glyphs dancing across the surface like water. It feels alive under my palm, and I’m suddenly aware of how far out of my depth I am.

“Can it fly?” I ask, half-joking.

He throws me a side-eye as the windshield shifts into something more transparent, showing the stars above. “Yes.”

We’re silent for a few moments as he guides the not-Camaro down quiet back roads. The sky grows paler, the town still asleep. It feels… unreal. Like I’m caught in someone else’s dream.

Then he speaks. “You have changed.”

I glance over at him. “You noticed that too?”

“I did more than notice.” He taps the side of his neck where his mouth left that mark on me earlier. “You let me in.”

I touch mine instinctively. It still tingles, low and warm.

“It doesn’t mean I know what I’m doing.”

“I do not need you to know.” He glances at me, his expression softer now. “I just need you to feel.”

God, I do.

That’s the part that’s terrifying. I feel everything.

When we pull up outside my apartment, I almost ask him to stay. But I don’t. Instead, I let the silence stretch.

He reaches into the center console and pulls out a small object, a necklace, a shard of something iridescent, suspended on a simple leather cord. It pulses faintly, like it remembers being part of a star.

“This is for you.” He hands it to me, wrapping my fingers around it. “If you need me. If you want to… reach out. This will call me.”

I look down at it, heart thudding. “Like a space pager?”

He laughs, low and full of affection. “Something like that.”

“Will I know how to use it?”

“You will know.”

Our eyes meet again, and this time, I lean in first. One last kiss. It’s slow, full of promise, full of things we haven’t said yet.

And then he’s gone.

Just like that.

Back in my apartment, I lock the door behind me and lean against it, chest still tight, lungs working overtime.

My bed is untouched. My phone is dead. The window's open and the air smells like pine and electricity.

I walk to the mirror.

And I see someone I barely recognize.

Not just the mark at my throat, though that’s there, dark and undeniable. Not just the mussed hair or the faint scratches on my chest from where he gripped me while I came so hard I saw stars.

No, it's something deeper.

My expression is… softer. Like I’m seeing something new. Something raw. There’s confusion in my eyes, yeah. But there’s also hope.

I press my fingers to the spot he marked. The sensation rushes back, him inside me, the stretch, the fullness, the way I wanted it.

The way I came, untouched, just from feeling him.

Fuck.

I shudder and grip the edge of the sink. My cock twitches again, half-hard just from the memory. I shouldn't still want more. I shouldn't crave it.

But I do.

And it scares the hell out of me.

So I do what I always do when my thoughts spiral: I grab my journal from the bottom drawer and flip to a blank page.

Entry 1: I thought this would be a dead party. But I think I found something alive.

I write fast, scratching ink into paper like it’s the only thing tethering me to reality.

He kissed me. He didn’t stop. And I didn’t stop him. I wanted it. I want him.

He touched me like I wasn’t a mistake. Like my body was something meant to be claimed.

I pause, breath catching as the words pour out.

Is this what it means to be chosen? Not hunted. Not seduced. But… seen?

I close the notebook after a few more pages, hand cramping.

My heart is still racing. I’m naked under my shirt, half-dressed, still sticky with dried sweat. But I can’t bring myself to shower yet. Like washing it off would be erasing something holy.

Instead, I climb into bed and hold the necklace in my hand. The shard glows faintly against my palm, warm. Alive.

I stare at the ceiling.

I don’t know what any of this means. I don’t know what comes next. I don’t even know what to call what’s happening to me.

But for the first time in years… I want to find out.

And that’s something.

Morning creeps in.

I doze a little, then wake up with a start, hard and aching, the dream still vivid in my head.

Tahl behind me, whispering things in a language I don’t understand, his cock pressing into me slowly, like worship. My own breath caught between moans and gasps, the words please, please, more falling from my lips like prayer.

I wrap my hand around myself, slick already, breath trembling.

I pump slow at first, eyes closed, the memory sharp. I tilt my hips up like he had me, thighs spread wide, greedy for the ghost of him.

I imagine his tongue, hot and slow, tracing over the mark he left.

I imagine him pushing back inside me, that thick alien cock spreading me open again, deeper than anything I’ve ever known.

I come hard, shuddering, gasping his name into my pillow like it’s sacred.

Fuck.

I wipe my hand on the blanket and lie there, staring at the ceiling.

What the hell is happening to me?

But my chest isn’t tight anymore. Not like it used to be. There’s still fear, but now it’s paired with wonder. Curiosity. Something close to longing.

I reach for the notebook again.

Entry 2: I think I’ve been asleep for a long time. He woke something up. And now… I don’t know how to go back.

I don’t think I want to.

I close the journal and smile faintly to myself, thumb grazing the edge of the necklace.

The world’s bigger than I ever knew.

And maybe, I’m ready to see more of it… sooner than I thought.