Alien Slave (36 page)

The grass green of the main cabin
deepened to emerald in this room, with accents of maroon. A huge
sleeping mat, tall enough to reach above Dani’s knees and wide
enough to accommodate the entire clan plus her, took up most of the
space. After days of sleeping on the hard ground, cushioned only by
fronds, grasses and leaves, it looked like a cloud. Dani wanted to
sink into it and sleep for weeks.

Wynhod ushered her to the large shower.
It had more than enough space to hold both of them, and Dani was
disappointed Gelan had insisted Wynhod return to the main cabin.
She could think of many enticing possibilities the shower
presented.

Wynhod showed her the temperature
controls, the cleansing agent dispenser, and how to adjust the
spray intensity. Then he left her alone to clean up.

Dani had a little bit of a hard time
washing with her non-dominant left hand, but the warmth of the
gently falling water more than made up for that difficulty. She
washed her hair, grimacing to find twigs and leaves tangled in it.
She lathered the long red

tresses twice, and then washed herself
over and over until the water sluicing off her finally ran clean.
Then she simply stood under the spray for awhile, letting it sluice
away the tension and fear and pain of the last few days.

It’s over and we’re safe. And I have
this clan for at least the next three years. Yep, life just got a
lot better for Ms. Danielle Watson. I’m not going to take it for
granted either.

Dani finally switched the water off and
engaged the drying jets. She finger-combed her hair, knowing it was
going to turn into a frizzy cloud. Oh well. At least she was clean.
A definite improvement.

She stepped out of the shower stall and
looked at that sumptuous bed again. Boy, the fun she hoped to have
on that with the three men! Grinning wickedly, she returned to the
main cabin.

The Kalquorians were clustered
together, their dark heads bent near one another as they muttered
in their staccato language. Dani stared in surprise.

“
We haven’t taken off? I
have to tell you guys, I can’t wait to be a million miles away from
this planet.”

All three men looked at her. Gelan and
Wynhod stood, their faces pleasant but sharp. Krijero looked
worried.

Now what?

Gelan said, “We’re leaving soon, Dani.
We have some business to attend to first.”

He held out his hand to her. After a
worried moment, Dani stepped forward to take it. He drew her close
to the clan and nodded to Wynhod. The Nobek held up his handheld,
letting her see what was on the screen. She stared at the document
displayed. She recognized the language written as Dantovonian, but
she’d never learned to read the language.

Dani looked from the handheld to the
men, ending with Gelan. “What’s that?”

Gelan took a moment before he answered.
“Your contract making you our slave.” He pressed a button on the
handheld, and the document disappeared.

Dani stared in confusion. “Okay. Now
it’s gone. So what?”

“
We’ve decided to void it. I
just destroyed the contract.”

Wynhod added, “You fought bravely and
even put your life at risk to defend Krijero. You’ve earned your
freedom, Danielle. You are not our slave any longer.”

Gelan’s fingers played over the collar
they’d put around her neck for an instant, and it dropped away,
thunking with a metallic clang to the floor. Dani stared at the
open ring, feeling the absence of the weight.

They’re done with me. I won’t even get
to spend the three years with them. Rejected. Thrown aside again.
Oh God no. I love them. I want to stay!

Hurt stabbed into her heart, her gut,
her head. Dani fought the tears that sprang to her eyes and the
anguished scream building in her throat. She’d let herself hope
when she knew better. She’d allowed herself to care. She should
have known better. Nobody loved her. She would be forever on her
own, with only herself to rely on.

No. A thousand times no, a small
childish voice inside her cried.

Dani tore her eyes from the collar. She
looked at the men staring at her. Even Krijero’s emotions were
hidden behind a mask of stoic patience. Of all of them, she’d
thought he might want her. But he didn’t. None of them
did.

Dani gathered her shredded pride. She’d
rebuild the wall between herself and the rest of the universe.
She’d make it thicker and higher this time, and she’d never, ever
let another soul in.

Most of all, she wouldn’t show them it
hurt. “You don’t want me.” She cringed inside as her voice betrayed
her pain after all.

Krijero’s hands captured the one Gelan
wasn’t holding. His expression gently beseeched her. “We don’t want
you as a slave. We want you as an equal. As our Matara.”

Gelan added, “It’s your choice, little
fighter. Will you join my clan?”

She stared. Tried to make sense of what
they were saying. They weren’t getting rid of her? They were – they
were—

They were asking her to stay.
Forever.

She lost her fight to keep from crying,
but Dani didn’t care. These were happy tears, tears stolen from
devastating desolation. “You really want me?”

Three pairs of arms circled around her,
brought her into the center of the clan. Her clan.

Gelan smiled down at her, his face full
of warmth and caring. “Absolutely, and if it takes forever, we’ll
convince you of that. We love you.”

She cried and laughed, her heart so
full she thought she might burst. “Thank you. Thank you. Oh! Yes, I
will join your clan. And I love you too.”

They laughed at her delayed acceptance,
and Dani shook her head at herself. She was awkward and goofy at
times. She was a big, galumphing clod who screwed up royally on a
regular basis.

She was also wanted and
loved.

The men held her until she was cried
out, Krijero awkwardly because he was sitting. Once she’d gotten
control over herself, Dani asked, “So if I understand your clanning
practices correctly, simply saying yes does the deed?”

The three men nodded. “You are our
Matara now,” Wynhod said, and a huge grin broke over his strong
features as he said it. He went from ferocious to stunning in an
instant. “You do understand clanning is for life?”

Dani nodded, pretending concern. “Yeah.
Looks like you’ve sentenced yourselves pretty harshly. Don’t think
you’re getting out of it, Nobek.”

He was smiling so hard she thought his
face might break with the force of his gladness. “I wouldn’t dream
of it,” he affirmed, and her heart grew brighter at the conviction
in his voice.

They really wanted her.

Krijero stroked her back, his face
shining with delight as he looked up at her. “I think we should
make love to seal the deal, but I stink of Tragoom.”

Gelan chuckled. “We’ll help you,
Krijero.”

Cradling the Imdiko’s body between
them, Gelan and Wynhod carried Krijero into the bedroom cabin and
readied the shower for him. At a command, a seat slid out of the
shower stall wall for Krijero to sit on. Gelan and Wynhod stripped
themselves and their injured clanmate. The sight of all that
muscular man flesh gave Dani the shivers, and she sank onto the bed
to watch them tend Krijero.

The bed was as soft as a dream, and she
looked forward to wallowing on it with her clanmates. She
luxuriated in the downy linens as Gelan and Wynhod gently shampooed
Krijero’s hair and bathed him.

He fussed at the two. “My hands are
perfectly fine. I can wash myself. Besides, Earthers are weird
about men touching other men.”

Gelan gave Dani a wink. “We’re
preparing you for your Matara. Besides, she doesn’t look upset in
the least. Are we bothering you, my love?”

Dani had seen too much on Dantovon to
mind the intimacy with which Wynhod and Gelan washed Krijero. In
fact, it was kind of hot watching the three men, in all their nude,
wet glory. And seeing the Imdiko being cleansed for her, as if he
was the sex slave being readied for his mistress … well, that was
pretty damned titillating.

“
Not one trace of Tragoom
left on him,” she said in her most demanding tone. “I want every
inch of him scrubbed.”

Her command was greeted by shouts of
laughter from Gelan and Wynhod, and they obeyed her with delight.
Krijero’s yelps of dissent went unheeded, though they were very
careful to not jar his injured ankle.

“
I’m clean, damn it!” he
shouted when his clanmates went over him a very thorough second
time. “Call them off, Dani!”

She giggled. “Okay. You can bring me my
Imdiko now.”

As Wynhod got to work taking his own
shower, Gelan helped Krijero hop to the bed. Once the Imdiko was
settled next to Dani, Gelan eyed him severely. “You will not strain
yourself, Krijero.”

Dani traced soft fingertips over the
injured man’s chest. “You mean I get to be on top for a
change?”

Krijero gave her a leer. “Enjoy it
while you can, my Matara. I fully intend on having you my way as
soon as I’m able.”

Gelan withdrew with a grin, leaning
against the wall as Dani straddled the lanky Imdiko.

“
Watch that arm,” Krijero
warned. He supported her with hands around her waist as she leaned
over to kiss him.

“
I think you should worry
about other body parts,” she giggled before her lips brushed over
his. He growled as his tongue invaded her mouth.

He tasted her for a long time, and Dani
reveled in the feel of him beneath her. He lowered her so that she
lay on him, chest to chest, belly to belly. His cocks curved
beneath her sex, hot and hard and wet. She added her own moisture
to them as she caught fire.

One of his hands tangled in her hair,
holding her head so that he could plunder her mouth thoroughly. The
other hand roamed up and down her spine for awhile before cupping
one buttock. Long fingers probed and wet themselves in her font.
His thumb pressed into her anus and two fingers reached into her
pussy.

Dani moaned as he worked in and out of
her, finding all the most sensitive places. The man described
himself as awkward, but his fingers proved to be amazingly
dexterous. Even as he thrust into her with three digits, the other
two stroked her clit. Dani cried out into his mouth more than once
as he played with her nether parts.

At last Krijero released the kiss. Lost
in the rapture of what he did to her down below, Dani was unable to
do anything but gasp as she lay heavily on him. Some small part of
her mind thought perhaps she should be returning the favor of such
pleasure, but she couldn’t make herself move. Bliss rumbled through
her, sapping all her strength as well as her ability to think
clearly.

“
I bet I could make you
climax like this,” Krijero whispered.

“
Uh huh.” Her agreement came
out in a sob. Waves of warmth lapped through her belly.

“
Do you love me,
Dani?”

“
I do … I love … you.”
Something inside seized for an instant, a brightened spot of
delight that made her whole body tremble.

“
I love you too.”

Despite the riot her body was in, Dani
had the presence of mind to look at Krijero’s face. He smiled at
her, really smiled for perhaps the first time, all tension missing
from his expression. Like her, he felt safe to love now.

“
Thank you,
Krijero.”

“
Thank you,
Dani.”

His magical fingers left her, and she
felt the loss keenly, wanted to wail with the absence of him. Only
the knowledge that better things would happen kept her voice
still.

“
Up you go,” he said,
boosting her so she sat upright on his well-muscled abdomen. Then,
as if she weighed no more than a feather, he lifted her so that her
sex hovered over his.

One handed, she tried to get both cocks
in position, but Dani was nowhere near as adroit as Krijero. She
fumbled around, getting one sex in place only to have the second
one off target. Within moments, both of them were laughing
uproariously at her clumsy attempts.

“
Some help here, please?”
Dani snorted at Wynhod, who had handed over the shower to Gelan and
watched their efforts to couple with a big grin.

“
My pleasure,” he snickered,
coming over. He reached beneath Dani and put Krijero where he
needed to be.

The next instant, the Imdiko’s strong
grip pulled her down, sheathing his cocks in one merciless yank.
Dani shrieked, all humor gone as catastrophic orgasm burst through
her in mind-numbing abruptness. She’d been aroused, but the sudden
climax caught her by surprise.

Sonic booms of elation reverberated
throughout her being. Pleasure suffused everything, sending
electric shocks to her fingers and toes, seeming to stream right
through the top of her head, making her hair stand on end. She knew
nothing but the crash and roll of ecstasy as it tore through her,
making her mindless.

When Dani came back to herself,
aftershocks still tingling through her extremities, she heard her
last scream echoing in the room. Wynhod was holding her, one arm
wrapped about her waist, the other pinning her injured arm just
below her breasts. Krijero lay still beneath her,
panting.