Page 11 of Proslo (Brides of the Mylos #5)

11

BETTY

O ur hands brushed as we walked from the elevator into the entertainment deck where an honest to God public park filled with grass, trees, bushes, and a children’s play park stood, surrounded on all sides by restaurants and cafes and shops, Proslo informed me. It felt natural to slip my hand into his, and I was determined to not overthink why that was. We’d been determined a perfect psychological and genetic match, after all, by a really advanced and sophisticated set of algorithms. It was probably just us really gelling and something to do with pheromones. Yeah, we were medical professionals, but we were both into building our relationship, not treating it like a science project.

“Oh!” I said, stopping to point at a cafe with a sign proudly proclaiming it to be ‘Quarter Bites’. “Are those beignets?” A quick glance at the menu board informed us that yes, they were indeed and also that Cafe du Monde chicory coffee was served there. “Can we eat here?”

He smiled, nodding even as his eyes looked around for an empty table. The ones outside facing the park were all full, but he quickly spotted one inside being vacated. We made a beeline for it and a waitress hurriedly came to take our order.

She left only to shortly rematerialise with our pastries and coffees and I took a sip, closing my eyes as the glorious caffeine hit my system.

“I have a confession to make,” he said.

I opened my eyes. “You don’t like the coffee?’ I asked, wondering if this was the first time he’d ever had coffee of any sort.

“No, that’s fine.” He looked decidedly nervous. “There was, ah, an incident with Pumpkin last night.”

“An incident?” What was he even talking about? Pumpkin had seemed fine when I got up, a little zoomie but that was to be expected with all the upheaval.

He swallowed. “I gave him too many cat treats,” he confessed, looking crestfallen and staring down at his beignet.

“You gave him too many - oh.” Suddenly the zoomies made even more sense. I laughed. “I bet that’s made you his new best friend.”

“I am sorry for drugging our fur young.”

Wow. He was taking this hard.

“Hey,” I said, reaching a hand across the table to cover his. “It’s okay. Thank you for telling me and I know you’ll be more careful next time. But honestly, he’s eaten all the catnip out of a stuffed mouse toy and gotten high from it more than once. It’s not dangerous or anything.”

He took a deep breath. “You are not angry?”

I shook my head. “Nah. Shit happens. You two have bonded and he got over being stressed about the move. Win-win, am I right?”

He looked thoughtful. “He did seem to recover well and was confidently moving about our quarters this morning. He seems to have staked out the sofa from my old quarters as his own.”

“Exactly.”

Damn, he was so cute. I took a bite of my beignet, falling for him a little bit harder. How could I not, after seeing how invested he was in Pumpkin? I just knew the child we’d get would be lucky to have him in their life. I certainly knew that Pumpkin and I certainly had hit the jackpot.

“So,” I said, changing the subject, “We don’t need to buy much food-wise, huh? Seeing as we’re leaving so soon for the wedding and all.”

“We should stick to shelf stable foods and those that remain in the cold stasis compartment,” he agreed. “We can replicate anything else as needed.”

My mind took a split second to translate that into canned and frozen food only.

“Any preferences?”

“I’d like to get some sporka from my homeworld,” he replied. “It is typically slow roasted in broth and I believe the thing you called a Crockpot would work wonderfully.”

“Sporka? What kind of critter is that?’

He tapped his kunnarskyn before proffering his arm for me to take a look. If the world’s ugliest chicken had a turkey fertlize an egg and the baby grew up and mated a pig, this feathered and pig snouted thing would be their offspring.

“I bet it tastes like chicken,” I joked.

“I am told it reminds humans of duck, but without being as oily.”

Okay, I could deal with that. “Sure, let’s get one. I’ll try it.” After all, he’d taken one look at the sparse amount of toppings on the frozen pizza and replicated more to add to it, then apparently asked Xeranos what kind of salad one usually ate with pizza and presented me with a gorgeous bowl filled with romaine, cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, grated mozzarella, cheddar, and gouda cheeses, along with an entire set of tiny bowls filled with different salad dressings. As if that wasn’t enough, when dessert time arrived, there were blonde and fudge brownies as well as peanut butter and chocolate ones, all of them warm and with French vanilla ice cream to scoop out onto the top. The least I could do was try this thing that tasted like duck.

He beamed and we finished our breakfast before taking a leisurely stroll through the park. His scales were more in evidence this morning, something I’d not noticed until now as he’d slept on the sofa and showered and changed in the other bathroom this morning in order to give me my space.

Tonight, I decided. Tonight, I’d make us a candlelit dinner and take him to bed. Heat pooled deep in my belly at the thought of his strong arms around me, those plush lips licking and sucking my skin, us kissing. My panties grew damp and his nostrils flared. He let out a low growl and I gave his hand a squeeze.

“Is that the supermarket?” I asked, pointing.

“If we weren’t already here and so far from our quarters, I’d take care of your need,” he rumbled.

I gave him a saucy look. “Oh, you’re on, big guy. Tonight.”

Heat flared in his eyes and he heard the promise in my voice.