Page 7 of Two Aliens Are Better Than One (Bodyguards in Space #1)

Chapter 6

Vaelu

T he escape pod was too small, so small that if I stretched out my arms I could almost touch both walls. There was a tiny cockpit up front, cushioned benches that doubled as bunks along each wall, and two cabinets in the back, and that was it. I knew from the shuttle’s safety briefing that it could sustain ten people for five days, so there must have been water, rations, and a commode somewhere, perhaps folded into the cabinets or under the benches. If only there were clothes. My well-meaning rescuer hadn’t stopped to grab me a pair of pants. I leaned over and picked up my towel, wrapping it back around my waist, while I thought about how to explain the specifics of our predicament to him.

“Less than one percent of the Chokreini population are velasu, and of that one percent only one in five thousand have abilities as strong as mine. Strong telepathic abilities come with a lot of challenges, the most difficult being the way we lose ourselves in the minds of others. Crowds and strong emotions are difficult to block entirely. Back on the ship there, I was overwhelmed with the fear that surrounded us, the way other passengers were feeling, and I latched on to you. Because you seemed confident and calm, and I needed that in my head instead of the fear.”

“How do you feel now?”

I closed my eyes. “The fear I felt aboard the ship was draining, but being out in space in this pod is a respite of sorts. I only feel you. No one else is close enough. But that’s not the problem.” I sighed, rubbing my eyes. “The problem is that we’ve unintentionally triggered an ankra bond.”

“Okay…” he drawled. “I don’t know what that is. Something to do with the skin-to-skin contact?”

“Yes, skin-to-skin contact with a non-telepath. The non-telepath must have the right qualities, and the velasu must be open and connected to the telepath. We train for years to create mental walls we can put up so that we can touch people without being bonded to them. But in times of stress…”

“You didn’t have your walls up. You were using my mind to calm yourself.”

I nodded. “Yes. Usually, there’s a ceremony where the velasu opens his or her mind as they embrace, allowing their thoughts to wind together. But the fear of the situation, my need for your strength, set the process into motion.”

“What’s wrong with that? Can’t we just… unwind?” He had all four arms crossed over his chest now and looked a little intimidating, but the warmth was still there. He wasn’t angry with me.

“No. It’s a lifelong bond. A dangerous bond to break. And my powers are strong enough that it may have been initiated in that short time. I have to spend hours preparing and closing myself off before sex or a hug, and even then I can’t touch a person for long.”

“Skin-to-skin,” he murmured, shaking his head, a wry smile curling his lips. “I could sense that I’d fucked up from the start, but I didn’t know why. So we shouldn’t touch? Can you pull back out of my mind?”

“No,” I whispered, rubbing my hands over my face. “I should, but I don’t want to, and I don’t think I can. You’ll have to resist it.”

“So you find it comfortable in here?” He tapped his forehead. “Interesting.”

“You’re…” I couldn’t explain why his mind felt like home to me, why I so quickly came to understand the protection and care he offered to people who belonged to him. He met my eyes and nodded, as if I’d communicated it to him anyway. “I sometimes struggle with verbal communication.”

He chuckled softly, taking a step forward then pausing when I flinched. “Shit, it’s tough. It feels right, like you belong here, nestled in my mind where I can calm your paranoid thoughts.”

“That’s coming from me. Try to dig deeper and find something that’s true to you.”

“Nah, I know which thoughts are yours and which are mine. You’re freaking the fuck out. I’m not. Easy to differentiate.”

“Relzo, it’s dangerous for you to be bonded to me, not the least of which because velasu aren’t permitted to bond with anyone outside our race.” I tried to focus my thoughts on bonds gone wrong, on the fact that bonded pairs always died together, but it was difficult not to acknowledge the way Relzo made me feel.

I felt whole, like I was meant to be bonded to him. Which was insane. Throughout the years, when my mother had insisted that I stay away from the other children, that I avoid touching people, I hadn’t fully comprehended the risk. I’d only known the loneliness of it. Most velasu could select their bonding mate and slowly build the connection. The strength of my ability had handicapped me for as long as I could remember, and I’d never even considered that finding someone steady to bond with might change things.

“Ah.” He didn’t speak for a moment but I could feel him absorbing my thoughts, sorting them and examining them one by one. I did my best not to connect to those thoughts, but I enjoyed the way he thought the situation through without getting worked up. “So, logically, I want to stop it. I know I should stop it. I understand it’ll cause you pain, but I should put my own safety first.”

“Right,” I said, pulling back, moving as far from him as I could. My heart thundered with disappointment instead of fear and I glanced at him, afraid to meet his startling blue-green eyes. A man could become lost in those eyes, and I needed to build what walls I could. He was quiet for a while longer. It seemed to stretch on forever — minutes or hours, I wasn’t sure. It took all my strength to fight the urge to bond.

“I never was much for logic, though,” he said, and I realized he’d moved, that he was close enough to me that I could feel his heat warming my skin.

“It’s permanent, Relzo. It can’t be undone.”

“Do you want me to stop it? If you ask me to, I will.” He held a hand in the air, almost touching my face but not quite. “It’ll be difficult to watch your pain, but if it’s what you want I’ll do it. If it’s not what you want, though, just say the word.”

“I don’t know what I want.”

“It feels too damn good. To have someone. Someone you can touch. Someone you can seek comfort in and confide in,” he whispered.

“Yes,” I said. He turned and stripped off his shirt, his back and arm muscles flexing. His shoulders were interesting. The way the musculature controlled all four of his arms was beautiful, but strange. Then he sat on the bench across from me.

“I’m okay with this,” he said firmly. “Would I have agreed to this if you hadn’t accidentally started it? Probably not. But I’m okay with this.” He closed his eyes, dark black lashes falling heavily against his cheeks, and I saw something. A big man who looked like Relzo, a woman with four arms, a little Zangrel girl. And an explosion, pain that knocked a seven-year-old Relzo to the ground. More things flashed in front of me, glimpses of his life, memories. And I knew what he was telling me. He had his reasons for craving the addictive connection of the ankra bond. He was lonely, too.

“Relzo,” I growled.

“We fit, don’t we?” he asked. “And neither of us has anyone.” That wasn’t quite true, was it? I still had my parents, as distant as they were. And he had a woman, though the glimpses I could see of her were small and incomplete. Laughter and flashing violet eyes. Golden hair. I glanced at him and he shrugged, knowing my thoughts well before they were verbalized. “I can’t have her.” The bond was growing, even as I tried to resist it. He was opening himself to it.

“This is very illegal. And once you open yourself up, you become mine and I become yours. We become interwoven with each other, no longer completely individuals. We won’t be able to spend time apart. Your job…”

“Fuck my job,” he said.

“Relzo…”

“Do we fuck? Not sure I’m into that.” His eyes scanned over my mostly-bare body and he tilted his head. “Maybe. Can we feel each other’s pleasure?”

I huffed out a breath. “No. Maybe. Bonded pairs often pick a partner together. My grandfather and his male pair shared a wife. This bond can only happen once and then it’s done, but the bonded pair can love another.” I could already feel his mind getting sidetracked by pornographic threesome fantasies, and I smirked at him. He wasn’t listening to my warnings, and he damn well wasn’t going to heed them. I supposed it might make sense that my match was as impulsive as I was cautious.

“Ooh, now that sounds appealing. A pretty girl pinned between us, taking both our dicks. Come, sit on my lap and tell me more.” He patted his thigh, and I couldn’t help but go to him. He tugged the towel off as I straddled him, and it wasn’t sexual. Not exactly. He just wanted every inch of my bare skin against his. Only the thin, supple fabric of his pants stood between us, and I sat with my knees on either side of his hips and pressed in close, giving in to what my mind and body had wanted all along with a happy sigh. His thoughts, his taste and smell, swirled around me as his four arms closed around my body, caging me against him. He adjusted me a little so my soft cock was resting against his bare stomach, just above the waistband of his pants. Two big hands firmly cupped my ass, while the other two embraced my torso. I couldn’t stop myself from gently rocking my hips, enjoying the pleasure of the intimate position.

“Wait until we have a woman to share,” he said, laughing. “It’s gonna be so fucking hot.”

“I’m going to regret this, aren’t I?” I muttered, nuzzling my face into the curve of his throat. I couldn’t get close enough to him. He took a shaky breath and pulled me even closer, molding our skin together, and we closed our eyes, our minds weaving a complex tapestry of memory and experience that was unbreakable. I wasn’t sure how much time passed like that, sharing every dark corner of myself with him in a silent, sweet embrace, but when I came out of the reverie, I really had to pee. And even that thought made him laugh.

And I knew something else. We had to get back to the space station, because she was there. His woman — the one he thought he couldn’t have.

“How do we hide this?” I asked as I stood and stretched, looking around the cabinets. As I moved he was still studying me, a soft smile on his face, his voice echoing in my head like a heartbeat. Mine.

“I’m an undercover operative. Surely I can hide my weird soul bond with a Chokreini elite from the world. I’ll treat this like any other assignment.”

“Shit, there was clothing in this cabinet the whole time.” I interrupted his train of thought as I yanked on a loose pair of pants.

He smirked. “You like my hands on your bare ass.”

I frowned at him, and this time tried to speak directly at him in my mind. And you like your hands on my ass, too. He laughed out loud, the warmth I’d felt in him permeating the depths of my psyche. Being his felt so damn good.

“I think this is going to go well.”

“It’s probably a huge mistake.”

“Nah. I’m quitting the job that was destroying me. You’re getting a happy place to hide when your brain goes all haywire. What could go wrong?”

“I’m living on the Chokreini Space Station right now, so we’ll be in close quarters with the other residents. We need a good excuse for you to be at my side at all times. Perhaps as my security?”

He swallowed, a rush of nerves making the entire room quiver. “Did you say the Chokreini Space Station?”