Page 76 of I Punched an Alien and Now We’re in Couples Therapy

She signed off, and the screen blinked out, leaving behind the gentle, vexing quiet we’d just started to know how to fill.

“That was…shockingly painless,” I said. I expected Lokbaatar to demand retribution against me, or absolute control of the Frittata. But simple amnesty and a clean slate?

Imagine that.

“Told you it wouldn’t be so bad.”

It was late—too late for another drink, too early for sleep. For a while, Blair and I just lay there in the rubble of ruined pillows in that honey-thick silence.

“Tomorrow’s going to be a shitshow,” she whispered.

“Not if we’re prepared,” I replied, mostly to hear something in my own voice that sounded like leadership.

“Do you think we can actually win this?” she asked, lying against my chest.

I let my hands roam the thick thighs straddling my hips as I answered, “Do you really think I’d allow myself to fail at an attempt to impress you?”

She giggled against my chest, and in that moment, it was hard to reconcile this sweet, affectionate creature with the madwoman who slaughtered giant killer birds and ran me absolutely ragged each day that I’d known her. Yet her fierceness was just as lovely as the trust she showed now, and pride filled me to have earned it. The Crucible may not have been the trial of the gods, but now the soul-deep need I had for her felt earned. Right.

I took hold of her chin, forcing her to meet my gaze. “I will deliver vengeance for you, my queen. On my armor, I swear it.”

Blair took hold of my hand and kissed my wrist; the blood beneath jumped at the call of her lips. In her eyes I saw oblivion—not as the death goddess I dreamed before, but a surrender, warm as it was endless. The dark space between stars in the night sky, and I so desperately wanted to get lost in them. She smiled softly as she asked, “Osid, can I tell you something?”

“Always.”

She considered me with a frankness that was, somehow, more intimate than her actual body pressed against my hip. “I think you’re the closest I’ve ever gotten to a romantic partner, and we’ve spent most of this time hating each other.” She blinked hard, then snorted at herself and buried her head in my shoulder. “God, that makes me sound pathetic.”

It did not. I let the admission settle into my bones, let the warmth expand along my ribs, a welcome acid against the memory of Lokbaatar’s laughter. There were so many things I wanted to say—grand declarations, ugly confessions, desperate promises that should never be made in the hour before a reckoning. But what came out of my mouth was “You know I’m in love with you, right?”

A long, raw pause. Blair went stock-still, then let out a wheeze that was half scoff, half sob. “Damn, Osid, don’t say that now. We’re about to overthrow an evil organization tomorrow, and you’re gonna spring that on me?”

“Do your people not share inconvenient truths before battle?” I asked, feigning nonchalance. “I thought the custom would be universal.”

She laughed, and it caught on something jagged inside her. She had the same look in her eyes when I had told her how much I wanted her in the Christmas challenge. Blair was never shy when it came to physical forms of affection. Ever since I’d earned her forgiveness, I’d gotten to see how eager she was to share her body, but to give a name to it, this draw we had to each other—it terrified her. I wished I had the space and time to give her the slow pace she needed. But nothing was certain when it came to battle, and selfishly, if I died tomorrow then I needed her to know that she owned all that I am. “I—”

She reached up and mashed a hand over my mouth, like she could keep the words inside me by force alone. “Save it for tomorrow, all right?” Even as she said it, her hand trembled against my lips. “Besides, I always thought the night before a big climactic battle was supposed to be full of passionate sex?”

I grinned, licking the inside of her palm until it tickled, and she snatched her hand away. “Anything for you.” I caught her hand and kissed it, then rolled us so she was beneath me on the ruined nest of goose down and blankets. A thousand jokes and barbs curled at the corner of her mouth, but then I pressed my lips to hers, and she seemed finally content to let me win a round.

The thrum of her current made every nerve in my body scream at me to ravage, to lay claim, to consume her tooth and bone. But she was mine already, from the stubborn line in her jaw to the unflinching way she held my gaze as I undressed her. Instead, I brushed my lips along a tendon on the side of her neck, letting my breath fan against her earlobe. “How does my wife like to be doted on? Should I stroke and pet you for hours? Or would you have my head between your thighs, your hands on my horns as I suck on that needy little bud you love so much?”

Without waiting for an answer, I slid down her body to delve my tongue into her cunt. She gasped, her hands flying to my horns as I lapped slow strokes against her needy folds. “Mmm, yes. Slow. Gentle. My queen needs to be savored, doesn’t she?”

The wicked thing tried to laugh it off, but her lungs stalled, and her voice cracked. “You don’t need to try and be a gentleman with all this tender stuff. I like it rough just fine.”

I didn’t doubt it. But there was an edge coiled in her body that I was determined to shave away. Whether she knew it or not, she wanted this. She needed to be treasured. Why she pretended otherwise was a mystery.

Humans were such strange creatures.

“Is that so?” I thrust my fingers inside her as I kissed her clit. Swirling my tongue around the sensitive bud as I curled my fingers, letting delicious pressure expand. The fists around my horns tightened. I smirked against her thigh. “You say you want it rough as if you’re not holding your breath right now. Or are you going to deny the way your fists are clinging to my horns as my fingers spread you? Fill you? How this flower blooms for me with the simple caress of my breath?” I skirted my lips against her core, barely allowing them to touch her before kissing her deep.

“Fuck!” she cried out, back curling off the bed.

I took my time as I feasted on her. Her hands released my horns to dig her nails into my shoulders. I felt the tension in her lower belly tighten as I worked her deeper. When she came apart beneath my mouth, I allowed her a moment to catch her breath. My fingers slipped beneath her neck, rubbing the tension from the top muscle before thrusting my fingers back inside of her. “I’m going to keep tasting and working this body until every part of you longs for me, begs for my touch so much you can’t stand it. You beautiful, wicked, venomous thing, let me worship your body the way a queen deserves.”

“Wait, let me—” She reached for my straining cock, wrapping her fingers around and stroking as she pushed against my shoulders. “Lay back,” she ordered.

I gathered her hands and pushed her on her back once more. “Not this time. Relax for once in your life and let me enjoy you.” Covering my mouth over hers, I drove my tongue in her parted lips, and she moaned at the taste of her own need.