Page 8 of Double Bind (Cosmic Mates #6)

I can’t believe we’ve been on Refuge for a week! Amity worked the loom, starting her third blanket. She’d gotten much faster and more competent, finishing her second blanket in half the time it had taken to do the first. During lunches, she’d worked on a personal project. It was coming along nicely. She smiled with satisfaction.

Life was good.

I’m glad I married you. Marshall’s whispered words when he’d thought she’d fallen asleep had relit her hope, awakening the infatuation that had only lain dormant but hadn’t been snuffed out. Heart hammering, she’d waited to hear if he’d say more, but he hadn’t. Nor had he said it since—unless she had been asleep the other times. By the end of the day, sometimes it was hard to keep her eyes open, although she tried.

While the concept of him waiting until she was asleep to confess his undying love sounded romantic, she hoped if it ever happened, he would ensure she was awake!

Wary after so many bad dates and failed relationships, she hesitated to label her emotions love, but around him, her heart went pitter-patter.

Their nightly pillow talk was the highlight of her day, although she did most of the talking. Epitomizing the strong silent type, Marshall didn’t say much, but he was a good listener, and when he did have something to say, it was all the more meaningful.

I’m glad I married you. She hugged his words to her chest as a shield against her insecurities. If he’s glad, maybe he’ll want to continue the marriage?

She told herself she needed to be patient, just take their marriage one day at a time, let the relationship develop naturally, like Darmaine had suggested. They had a whole year to decide what they wanted to do. And if they’d progressed this much in a week, imagine what might unfold twelve months from now.

As a couple, they had developed a routine—work during the day, dinner with their friends afterward, then snuggling and talking at night.

Today brought a break in their routine. Marshall had to deliver a load of tables to a neighboring village, requiring him to leave at first light. They didn’t know how far away it was, how long it would take, or if he’d be back for dinner. He could possibly be gone overnight. She wished she’d had the courage to kiss him goodbye.

She’d begun to hope they could progress from friends, to friends with benefits. He got aroused during their snuggle sessions, but he didn’t act on it, so she didn’t either, the fear of rejection holding her back. He was a man of action. If he’d wanted to kiss her, he would have.

“They’re here!” Darmaine called out. Her boss picked up an armload of blankets. “Get those bolts,” she said. Besides furniture, Artisan’s Loft would be delivering linens to Fair Shake.

Amity grabbed three rolls of horniger fabric and one of polax , a cloth woven from plant material. They didn’t use a lot of polax because turning the plant into fabric was extremely labor- intensive. After harvesting, the plant had to be retted or soaked in water until the stem rotted so the fiber could be extracted. Then it had to be dried. Next, the polax was scutched, the fibers beaten with a heavy stick and hackled with combs to remove unwanted residual plant material. Finally, the achieved hairlike strands were spun into yarn and then woven. There was one village that harvested and prepped polax. Amity was glad they hadn’t been assigned to that village. She had no desire to work as a field hand.

She went outside to find Marshall opening the rear gate on the conveyance. The wagon held five tables. It was hardly light yet.

“Hi,” she said. He hasn’t left, and already I miss him.

He smiled. “Long time no see.” It had been just a couple of hours since they’d breakfasted together. He stowed her bolts of fabric in the wagon bed and relieved Darmaine of her burden. She went inside for another load.

“Any idea how long you’ll be gone?” Amity asked.

“Barring any breakdowns, he’ll be back by dinnertime,” said a squat, bowlegged alien. His face was so wrinkled, his eyes could barely see out of the folds. A vibrant green mohawk ran down his head and nape like a mane.

“Oh, good!” she said.

“This is my foreman—Chartreuse. My wife, Amity,” Marshall introduced them.

“Nice to meet you.”

“This is the last of it!” Her boss returned with two more blankets.

“Darmaine, this is my…husband, Marshall.” It felt strange to introduce her spouse; she’d never done that before.

“Very pleased to meet you,” her boss said, her gaze shifting to Amity. “I think you should go with him to Fair Shake. He’ll need help unloading.”

“There will be people there to help unload,” Chartreuse said.

“Doesn’t hurt to be prepared.” Antennae twitching, Darmaine glowered at the foreman.

“I would like the help,” Marshall said.

“I’m not paying her wages out of my budget,” Chartreuse said.

“I’ll cover it,” Darmaine said.

Chartreuse shrugged. “No hair off my head, then. Go ahead.”

“Thank you!” Amity gave her boss a quick hug.

“How do I get to Fair Shake?” Marshall asked his boss.

“Well, there are two ways. You can ride out that way.” Chartreuse pointed toward the rising star. “When you no longer see Artisan’s Loft behind you, keep going for about thirty kilometers until you come to the forked tree. Veer right. If you run into the asteroid crater—and I advise you not to do that—you’ve gone too far. You missed the tree turnoff. Go back and make the turn. With the wagon loaded, you’ll have to go around the rocky hill instead of up and over, but once you’ve done that, continue on for, oh twenty kilometers. You should see Fair Shake. If you don’t, you did something wrong.” He paused. “The other way is to use the nav system in the conveyance.”

Marshall muttered a curse.

Amity smothered a laugh with her hand. A glance at Darmaine showed she was trying not to laugh, too.

“We’d better get going.” Marshall opened the passenger door to the cab, and she climbed in. He bounded around the vehicle.

“You can operate a conveyance?” she asked when he was inside.

“Yeah, Tailless explained how. Didn’t tell me about the nav system.”

“Tailless? That’s not the guy who cut off his tail…”

Marshall grinned. “Yep. Everybody calls him that now.”

“That’s mean!”

“I didn’t start it! His wife did.”

“I would never call you a mean name.”

“Asshole isn’t mean?” he reminded her.

“I don’t call you that anymore!”

Marshall laughed and patted her hand. “I’m teasing.” He peered at a small screen on the dash. “Oh hell, this is easy.” He poked the screen. It beeped as he touched it. “We’re all set.”

He fired up the vehicle, she waved goodbye to Darmaine and Chartreuse, and they drove off into the sunrise .

* * * *

In the open, outside of Artisan’s Loft, it became clear the buildings had been situated to provide a windbreak. Driving across the tundra, the vehicle rocked and shuddered as it was buffeted by the howling wind. But inside the enclosed cab, she was toasty and draft-free.

“It’s nicer riding up front. Warmer.” She recalled the chilly journey to Refuge.

“Yes.”

“Your boss is a character.”

“Yeah.”

“He looks ancient.”

“He is. His people live to be about 500 years old.”

What did people do when they lived that long? “If we were that old, we would have been born before space travel, before electronic communication—before airplanes and cars and the Industrial Revolution. I can’t imagine what it would be like to live in such a primitive time—cooking over a fire, riding horses, using outhouses, doing laundry by hand.”

He lifted an eyebrow. “You can’t? We’re heating our cabin with animal shit.”

She laughed. “Good point.”

They rode in silence. Then: “I think your boss is matchmaking,” Marshall said.

“Do you mind?” She worried now he would have preferred to travel alone.

“No, I’m glad to have the company.” He stretched his arm over the seat back and around her shoulders. “ Your company.”

She scooted closer, hugged his forearm dangling over her shoulder. Her heart raced with awareness. Didn’t this seem like a date?

“You must have told her the circumstances surrounding our marriage,” he said.

Only that it wasn’t a love match. “Just the bare bones, that we didn’t know each other well, and you married me so I could get sanctuary. Nothing about Dark Ops. Is that okay?”

After a moment of silence, he sighed. “It’s fine. There’s no reason to keep Dark Ops a secret anymore anyway. We’re safe here, and everybody has a similar story to tell; they’re all running from something.”

She nodded. “Darmaine was a political prisoner. She’s married to Lucento. He was a prison guard and helped her escape.”

“Bragg was going to end up in prison. Maybe I should have married him.” He winked.

She chuckled. “I’m glad you didn’t.”

“Me, too. You’re much prettier than him.”

Is he flirting with me? They were sitting close together like an ordinary couple out for a Sunday drive across the tundra on a faraway alien planet. “You’re not so bad yourself. Handsome, I mean.”

“For a clone. A replica.”

“For you.” She turned slightly, the better to see his face. He kept his profile to her, his eyes focused on the landscape through the windscreen. “I didn’t think it bothered you that you’re a clone,” she said.

He dropped his gaze to the nav screen. A moving dot approached a blinking dot. “It hasn’t before. I’ve never known anything different. I hope it doesn’t bother you.”

“It doesn’t. I’ve already said that.”

“I’m not a normal human. I was produced in a lab. I didn’t live a conventional life. My experiences are different from most humans’.”

“All of which has made you the man you are today. And I like that man.”

He looked at her then. “I’m glad I married you. That we’re on this adventure together.”

He said it out loud! Her stomach fluttered, and her mouth dried. He likes me! She felt like a teenager with her first crush. “I’m glad I married you, too.”

His gaze turned smoldering, and the comfortable, toasty conveyance seemed way too warm, but the heat fired up her courage. “Maybe…maybe then we ought to seal our wedding vows with a kiss. We didn’t do that at the ceremony.”

The conveyance stopped so suddenly, she was almost thrown into the dash.

He turned then, and his hand slid under her hair to cup her nape. His head descended, and his mouth covered hers. Soft lips coaxed a response, but she didn’t need coaxing. She parted her lips eagerly, and his tongue slipped inside. He kissed her with a thoroughness that had her sighing with satisfaction.

He growled in his throat and pulled her closer.

She stroked his nape, her fingers toying with crisp hair. His clean, masculine scent infused her senses, and she tingled from the touch of his lips, the stroke of his tongue, and the caress of his hands over her spine. She pressed herself against him as desire quaked through her body.

This was no perfunctory, ceremonial kiss.

He made the ground move.

No, they were moving. The vehicle was rolling. She tore her mouth away, in time to see a tree rapidly approaching the vehicle.

“Tree!” she shouted.

“Shit!” He slammed on the brakes, stopping the vehicle just before impact. Grayish-green leaves and spindly branches splayed over the glass windscreen.

Her heart thudding, she let out a nervous giggle. “Barring any breakdowns, we’ll be home by dinner…” she recalled his boss’s words.

“Sorry.” He winced. “I didn’t set the brake.” He reversed the conveyance.

The tree, its stout trunk midway splitting into two heavy branches, came into view. “Could this be the forked tree we were supposed to watch for?” There were no other trees around. So enrapt, they almost managed to crash into the sole tree for dozens of square kilometers.

She followed his gaze to the nav screen where a blinking arrow showed they were supposed to turn right. “Right on the mark,” he said. “Are you okay?”

Because of the kiss or because of the near-collision? She rode an adrenalin rush caused by both. The kiss had rattled her, but in a topsy-turvy, I-love-roller-coasters way. “Yes.” She wet her tingling lips with her tongue.

Heat flashed in his eyes. Hot desire rolled through her, and she felt like she would melt into a puddle of libidinous goo.

His nostrils flared. “If you keep looking at me like that, we’ll never get to Fair Shake.”

Would that be so bad?

What exactly would happen? How far was Marshall willing to go? Did she want her first time with him to be in the cramped cab of a beater conveyance in the middle of the frozen tundra?

She sighed. “I guess we shouldn’t shirk our responsibility. Somebody probably desperately needs a table.” She desperately needed to have sex with her husband. She hoped they were thinking the same thing.

“The sooner we get there, the sooner we can leave.”

“How fast can this conveyance go?”

“Not fast enough to suit me.” He grasped her hand and brought it to his mouth. His lips were soft and warm as he kissed her knuckles. “Hold those thoughts,” he said.

Her face heated at how transparent she was, but she’d always worn her heart on her sleeve. Perhaps that’s what had scared off other men—she cared too much too soon. But why hide the fact she wanted to get horizontal and naked? Her husband seemed to want the same.

“I will, if you will,” she said.

“I’ll think of nothing else.”