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When I have all I need, I turn around to find Danielle. What I find, instead, is Volethos standing across the room, a silky dress in his hands, but his eyes are on me. He’s wearing that stern mask again, which is at odds with the lovely gold and turquoise dress he’s holding. His thumb sweeps back and forth across the silky fabric.
When he catches me watching him, Volethos blatantly drapes the dress over the pile of clothes he took from me earlier. My mouth opens to protest, but then he’s striding toward me, and the words dry up on my tongue.
“Is this everything you need?” His eyes flick to the small mound of clothes I’m holding, although it comes out as more of a demand.
When I nod, he scoops the pile out of my arms and turns on his heel, striding to the front of the store where Danielle and Zell are waiting. Her pile is easily twice the size of mine.
Danielle and I exchange looks. Her expression is happy. Excited. Appreciative. But I can’t help feeling panicky. I hate that I don’t have any way to help pay for any of this. I hate being in debt to people. Maybe it’s because everyone in my family is successful, everyone but me, and so I’ve always hated needing help or having anyone pick up a tab for me because it makes me feel like I’m lacking. This feels even worse. It makes me wonder how we might be expected to repay these males we hardly know.
“Wait,” I hear myself saying as I reach out, trying to take back the clothes Volethos is holding. “I changed my mind. I don’t need all of that.”Or any of that.
Volethos frowns and twists away, holding them out of my reach. “I told you it’s fine.”
“No, it’s really not; I—”
“Shae,stop.” His voice is deep and low. It’s also stern enough to make me obey. “I have more than enough credits. Let me do this for you.”
I rock back on my heels with my lip pinched between my teeth. “But… why?” The question is out of my mouth before I can stop it.
Without taking his eyes from mine, he says simply, “Because I want to.”
Without another word, he drops the pile on the counter, where the blue shop woman begins to tally everything up. A younger female—this one pink with elfin ears and large, wide-set eyes—begins wrapping them into parcels.
“How long have you been mated?” the pink female asks me with a wink.
“Wha—mated?” I stammer. “We—we’re n—” Suddenly Volethos’s arm drops around my shoulders, and he pulls me into his side.
“Newly mated,” he tells the shop girl in a gruff voice that makes me want to slap him. When his eyes drop to find mine, I’m sure I must imagine the way they flicker, and the dull yellow brightens. The corner of his lip curls slightly, and he adds, “Right, lovely?”
My stomach drops, and my mouth goes suddenly dry.
“R-right,dear.”God, can I sound any more like an idiot?
The pink shop woman smiles at us before going back to what she was doing. I expect Volethos to step back as soon as her attention is off us, but he doesn’t. So, I try stepping out of his embrace, only to have his arm wrapped possessively around my shoulders tighten, holding me in place.
And I let him.
* * *
We stopat several stores where Zell and Volethos have us stock up on anything they think we might need. When Volethos tries pulling me into a lingerie store filled with delicate, sexy things. I pump the brakes. We’ve gone this long without any kind of underwear, but I draw the line at letting a male I hardly know choose my intimates.
“You’ve been beyond helpful, and weappreciate that,” Danielle says, stepping between us. “But this is something us girls need to do.Alone.”
I don’t miss the matching disappointed looks on both males’ faces as Danielle and I leave them behind to breeze into the store arm in arm.
I have my doubts about finding something functional in an alien lingerie store, but, to my surprise, there is a very large, and surprisingly diverse, selection. In no time, we have what we need and make our way to the front where the guys are waiting to pay.
Now we’re sitting at a table in an alien food court with several dishes spread out between us to try. The mood has lightened with our bellies full, and I catch myself smiling and laughing more easily than I have in a long time.
“… So, Volethos is hanging by his claws from the tree branch with his trousers full of shit,” Zell laughs as he retells a story from their youth. Turns out, these two have quite a history.
“I was dangling over a razor-tooth infested river,” Volethos grumbles. “You would have been shitting yourself too.”
We all laugh at that. Well, all of us but Volethos, who is glowering down at his half-eaten meal.
“Yes, but we’re not all as agile as you are. There was never a doubt that you’d figure out a way to climb back up the tree,” Zell sighs.
A shadow out of the corner of my eye draws my attention, and I turn just as a hooded figure steps up to our table. “Pardon me,” a deep voice begins. “Please forgive my intrusion, but I couldn’t help noticing your… rather diverse group. And I thought you might be interested in an… upcoming gathering.”
