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There’s something about our little vehicle and the urgency of our mission, as well as the fact that I was never quite certain my mom didn’t have a hidden camera trained on us at the cottage, that allows me to finally let my guard down with him. This feels intimate.

Up to now, we mostly played games and avoided talking. Now I want to know everything about him.

“There were so few women on Draal you never thought you’d marry . . . I mean mate?”

“It wasn’t an option. That was a big reason Zoriss and I went into the military. We’d have no family to interfere with our careers. Poor kids like us could excel and rise through the ranks—and we did.

“And you?” he asks. “You’re happy in the family business?”

“It provides a good living. We perform a service, helping women meet their own needs. There was never any other career that sang to me.”

“Sang?”

“Called to me. Seemed exciting.”

I doze for a while after it gets dark, but wake around two in the morning.

It’s probably a hundred degrees in here.

Poor guy has three layers on including his thick military coat.

It must be a bitch not to be able to self-regulate his temperature.

When it’s my turn to drive, I won’t be able to keep my eyes open for ten minutes with the thermostat set this high.

“I’m too tired to fly right now, Zorn, and I think you are, too. Let’s stop for a bit.”

We park off a dirt road under some trees and bed down in the back of the van.

As I push the broken bots into a corner, one of them says, “I want to taste you,” in a deep voice research indicated was exactly what women in the Andryla district want.

At the same time, another says, “I can’t get enough of you.

Just sit back and let me make you feel good. ”

Poor Zorn can’t maintain eye contact, nor can he contain his nervous grin.

“Nothing like this back on your planet?” I ask as we lay out two blankets as a bed.

“If males on Draal wanted cock, there were a million at the ready.”

“Very funny. I mean female sexbots.”

“We have similar things, perhaps not so technical. In the military, our sex toys were small and portable.”

Why did I ask? Why? Now I’m envisioning a design of a lush pussy toy to accommodate not one but two cocks. And in my mind, those cocks are patterned blue, just like the ones I saw a few hours ago on the roof. I shake my head, wishing my brain had an off switch.

We lie down next to each other, and moonlight streams through the glass top of the cargo area. Lying on my side, I examine Zorn. He’s no longer repellent. In fact, he’s the opposite of that. What word fits? Attractive , my inner voice supplies. This male is attractive , she coaches.

She’s right.

“So, you’ve never had a girlfriend?” Such a stupid question.

I know the answer. I’m such an idiot. I try to justify my ignorance.

I’ve never been this physically close to a male before, I’ve certainly never flirted.

Well, except with one of my junior high teachers when I thought I was attracted to women.

“No. And you, no boyfriends?” he asks with a smile.

How cute. Two people who’ve never been with the opposite sex trying to flirt. Lame! And adorable.

“Imaginary boyfriends,” I admit.

His gaze flicks to the damaged bots at the foot of the van. “What did you like about your imaginary boyfriends?”

Is it my imagination or did his voice just drop an octave? And is it also my imagination, or did I just feel the most arousing twitch in the territory between my legs?

He wants to play sexy, dirty-talk games? Okay. This might be fun. Even though it’s a hundred degrees in here, I’m no longer sleepy.

“They complimented me. They told me they liked me and said they missed me when we’d been separated for only a few hours.

They laughed at my jokes. They said some of the things the bots say, but made up some others that were very .

. . personal. They figured out how to kiss me in a special way that made me moan.

They never made fun of me, and always made sure I wanted to do whatever we did. ”

I never thought I’d have a male to tell these things to. And here we are, Zorn’s blue eyes are laser-focused on me. I may have pretended that was a flippant answer to his question, but he was hanging on every word.

This no-longer-repellent-now-definitely-attractive male was not only listening, but by the look on his face, he was taking mental notes.

“It’s too bad you find Draalians repulsive,” his voice is soft and serious, “because I could do those things.”

My heart seizes in my chest. Maybe it’s the sweetness of his words, or their sincerity. Maybe it’s the look of yearning on his face that can’t be imitated or faked.

“Isn’t that ironic, Zorn? Because I no longer find you repulsive. Recently I’ve been trying to determine which is more attractive, your wit or your ass.” Don’t you dare let your gaze run from his , I order myself.

I thought he’d laugh at my comment, at least a little, but he doesn’t. No, there is no amusement on his face. His eyes flared with desire when I spoke. Now they’re riveted on my lips.

“My ass?” his question is low and ripe with every sexy, unspoken question and observation and desire two words can hold.

You’ve waited your whole life for a moment like this Annora. Don’t let us down , the bleacher section of my mind cheers.

“I, um, happened to, without wanting to, mind you, catch a glimpse of your ass earlier. And maybe there was a moment when I was hefting your unconscious, torporous body onto your basking rock that I might have . . . taken a peek.”

“Really?”

One of his browridges quirks in question. A few days ago, I thought a hairless eyebrow was an unattractive travesty. Now I think it just might be one of the sexiest things I’ve ever seen.

“Hall of Fame ass right there, Zorn. Hall. Of. Fame.” For some reason, this flirting thing is becoming easier. I smile at him, and for extra emphasis, I spear him with a shamelessly sexy look.

“Hall of Fame?”

“Best of the best,” I explain with a nod.

“Like the way your green eyes catch the sunlight and actually sparkle like gemstones? That kind of Hall of Fame?” he asks, then licks his lips with the forked tongue I’ve been fantasizing about.

“Maybe,” I tease, dying to hear more.

“Like the perfect curve of those lips, unlike anything I’ve ever seen on Draal?”

“Perhaps.” I dredge up the gumption to toss my head a bit—not easy when you’re lying down.

“Like Hall of Fame worthy . . . breasts?” that last word squeaked out, but he didn’t let that stop him, “that would seem to a novice like me to be the ideal shape and weight to fit perfectly into a Draalian male’s palm?”

He’s working as hard at this as I am, and is just as much of a natural. What might junior high have been like for both of us if it had been co-ed?

“You tell me, Zorn. Hall of Fame worthy?”

“Yes, Annora. The download they gave me on the trip here was quite extensive. I believe your attributes are A-number-one, numero uno, top of the class. But of course, that’s just my humble opinion.”

“Tell me more of your humble opinions,” I coax.

“Should I tell you that you’re good at everything you do? Well, everything I’ve seen you do. Well, except for gin rummy.” He shakes his handsome head. “You’re definitely not good at that.”

“More,” I order shamelessly. I’m firmly in the pro-flirting camp now.

“And the way you handled your mother when she pushed you through the front door. I was not happy that day, perhaps you remember, but I had to give you credit for not calling her names.”

“Yes, I guess I do deserve a medal for that.”

“And I never told you, Annora . . .” he stops cold here and touches my shoulder so lightly, so respectfully I can barely feel it, but it sends shockwaves throughout my body radiating from the point of impact to peak at my nipples then zing to my sex.

“How much I admired how you decided you weren’t going to stomp to your room, or take it out on me, but you laughed—laughed!

And then decided we should have fun. That was the moment I decided I liked you. ”

“You . . . like me?” I ask, my voice soft like a little girl’s. I know that by this moment in the conversation I should know the answer to this question, but dear God in heaven, I want to hear him say it.

His voice is so deep it rumbles as he says, “Oh yes. I like you. And I’d like to—” He stops abruptly. The sentence doesn’t just drift off, it’s as if someone threatened him with death if he spoke one more syllable.

His eyes flare open and a hundred emotions flit across his face. I can’t read most of them on his alien features, but whatever it is, it’s like a hover going a hundred miles an hour abruptly switching into reverse.

He shakes his head, his mouth still open as if it wants to keep talking. “Get some sleep,” he says with less feeling than the Jason 23 lying in the corner of the van. To make certain his meaning wasn’t lost on me, he adds, “We should . . . sleep.”

Zorn

What am I thinking? Flirting with Annora is bound to end in disaster.

Conflicting thoughts war in my head.

One side of me replays her initial statement that I’m a repulsive Draalian male and reminds me of my initial assessment that she’s a pale, bland Earth female with the bushy remnants of primitive cave-dwelling ancestors sprouting from her head. She insists we have nothing in common.

But another side of me replays the conversation I just terminated so abruptly. She was flirting with me, complimenting me. Not only does she find my ass attractive—that thought makes my already-hard cocks turn to steel—but she likes my wit.

Why did I shut things down? The answer slams through me with the power of the gale force winds I experienced on Agnon II. Fear. Zorn Krine, a captain in the Draalian planetary army, is afraid of what might happen if I express my attraction.

Might she reject me? Almost more frightening? What if she doesn’t?

She’s been helpful, which is very nice of her. But I’ll be leaving this forsaken planet the moment I find Zoriss.

I’m thinking with my cocks. Ignorant. In fact, I’m barely thinking at all. The only thought drumming through my head is that it would feel like heaven to sheathe myself in her right this moment.

We’re both starved people. Starved of sex. Starved of companionship of the other gender. We’ve been thrust together for days. Of course, we’d be interested and aroused. Under similar circumstances, the only people who wouldn’t react this way would either be comatose or dead.

She made it clear she’s not interested in me. I’m the first male she’s ever known. I wonder if she’s desperate enough to be attracted to any male.

There’s nothing substantive here. Nothing real. Nothing that could possibly last. We should sleep. The sooner I find Zoriss, the better. And then I’ll go back to Draal.

Just as I drift off to sleep, though, my mind teases at the edges of my awareness that I wish things could be different. What would it be like if the emotions we just felt were real?