Alien Warlord's Miracle Page 7

  Regardless, Elizabeth’s heart rate never spiked with fear. It elevated, yes, but with something other than panic or apprehension.

  Attraction.

  Her pupils blew wide, and her pulse pounded in her throat. He wanted to nuzzle his nose there, feel her pulse under his tongue, and savor the heady scent of her. She was absolutely the most tempting morsel he had ever encountered, and her lack of fear made her all the more delicious.

  His cock stirred to life, but he ignored the ache. He resisted indulging his base desires. She was tempting—but forbidden. He needed to focus on repairing the ship and returning home. The female would only complicate the issue.

  Focus on the mission. He didn’t have time to spend flirting with a female.

  Reven sat in the cooling water until the fire in his blood matched the tepid temperature. Satisfied that he had his base nature under control, he dried and dressed in the armor. He suited up completely, despite the lack of an undershirt, rather than risk exposing himself to Elizabeth again. He had only intended to tease her with his nudity. Her body responded in a tantalizing rush of pheromones and attraction. He wouldn’t risk that happening a second time.

  He found her slumped over the kitchen table, head resting on folded arms. His mended shirt soaked in a basin of water and a bowl of soup waited for him.

  “Elizabeth,” he said gently.

  She murmured but did not rouse.

  The surgery caught up with her. Despite the lack of pain, her body did suffer a major trauma. She needed time and rest to heal properly. The initial flurry of excitement upon waking carried her forward, but even adrenaline wore off in time.

  He carried her upstairs to the bed that held her scent the strongest and gently laid her down. He removed her shoes and covered her with a blanket.

  Moonlight slanted across her form. He should have left straight away but his feet would not budge. His work was plentiful and time was limited to a handful of days at best to make repairs and reach the wormhole before it collapsed. If he vanished, she would wake and be forced to consider the encounter a dream. Leaving was the logical course of action.

  Only… she could have an adverse reaction in the night.

  He made himself comfortable on the floor. When she shivered, he feared a fever but determined that it was due to the dropping temperature in the room. Unwilling to leave her to investigate the heating system, he climbed into the bed. Immediately she turned to his warmth and snuggled into his side; heather and the scent of the wind surrounded him.

  Breath caught in his chest. This tiny female shook him to his core.

  Carefully, he arranged the blankets around her and positioned himself so his hardening cock would not jab into her. He might be an impatient male, but he could control his body’s reaction.

  Their shared body heat lulled her back into a deep sleep, even as he stayed awake for hours.

  Chapter Eight

  Reven

  Reven stood in front of the food preparation unit, baffled at the black metal box’s simplistic design. It was completely cold now but he had witnessed Elizabeth stoke a fire in the center of the device. Coming from a more advanced time, he should be able to master a simple technology. At least he hoped so. Elizabeth’s home was filled with deceptive items that on the surface bore enough of a resemblance to their modern descendants that it bolstered his confidence. When it came to practical application, however, he found himself on his knees, poking at cold ashes.

  The entire house was laughably unsafe. Natural gas had been piped in for lighting and the tubes were affixed to the wall, exposed and vulnerable to puncture. The flawed and highly combustible system was lauded as modern progress. Elizabeth had puffed up with pride as she ignited the gas lamps. He would rather sit in the dark and the cold than willingly ignite the gas.

  How Terrans managed to survive as a species amazed him.

  The mission had strayed so far off the original mark. He knew the words his warlord would say when—if—he returned to the lunar base. He should not have initiated the teleport drive while under fire. He should not have taken shelter in the abandoned barn. He should have done more to remain hidden and certainly should not have revealed himself to a primitive Terran.

  He felt no regret for helping Elizabeth when she fell ill. Protecting Earth and its inhabitants was his purpose. He could not let a person die when he had the ability to give them the medical treatment that needed. No one would fault him for that.

  However, he should have increased the sedative and kept her unconscious. He should have returned her to her domicile to wake in her own bed, unaware of what occurred. He should not have spoken to her, or struck a bargain for her assistance. He should certainly not have crawled into her bed last night.

  That last bit might be left out of his report, if he ever got the chance to write it.

  He could still leave and salvage what he could of his ruined mission, yet he couldn’t make himself do it. Something about her compelled him, drew him in, as a light in the dark. He could explain it away as exhaustion making him susceptible to a chemical reaction induced by pheromones. She was genetically compatible and would be a good match, that was all. Simple.

  So why was he trying to boil water on a primitive fire box and ignoring every reason to leave? She held some sort of strange power over him.

  He should probably leave that bit out of the report, too.

  Elizabeth

  She woke in her own bed. Edges of daylight peeped around the closed drapes. Her limbs felt leaden, encouraging her to fall back asleep. Extreme lethargy took her suddenly last night. All she recalled was stitching on a rough patch to Reven’s shirt before her eyes grew too heavy to stay open. She could only draw certain conclusions about how she ended up in bed.

  At least she had her clothes on and seemingly alone.

  She touched her abdomen, finding the skin smooth and whole, and nearly able to believe that yesterday was a figment of a fevered imagination. Aliens. Cities on the moon. Honestly. She fell ill. Her mind produced an elaborate delusion, nothing more. Extraordinary, yes, but false.

  Disappointment sat heavy in her chest. She wanted to believe in the extraordinary. The world was dull and gray. She needed her box of crayon pastels and paper—lots of paper—to capture her dream before it vanished.

  Her feet hit the plush carpet at the side of the bed, and she reached for her dressing gown.

  The door opened. Reven entered, head ducking to avoid hitting the lintel, and very much not the delusion of a fever. He wore the patched undershirt, the faded rust of blood staining the shoulder. She bit her lower lip, wondering where she could find a clean shirt for him. David’s old wardrobe would never fit. Mr. Baldry was broad enough in the shoulders, if not nearly tall enough, but she didn’t want to rummage through the groundskeeper’s wardrobe without permission.

  “You are awake. Excellent. You require sustenance,” he said as he shoved something square and brown at her. It smelled meaty but did not look like the preserved beef or even the dried sausages favored by hikers. Her stomach did not care. It rumbled.

  She nibbled on the corner and decided the texture to be like an oatcake—if oatcakes were made of smoked meat. The strong salty taste made her wrinkle her nose, but she chewed nonetheless, too hungry to be picky. Reven produced a cup of tea, and she drained it, foregoing propriety to wash the taste away.

  “Where did you find that? It’s revolting,” she said, handing him the empty cup.

  “It contains all the nutrients and energy required for one solar cycle,” he replied, sidestepping the issue of taste entirely.

  “Is that your extravagant moon city way of saying one day?”

  The corner of his lips twitched.

  “What is the time?” she asked, already picturing the day’s tasks.

  “Mid-morning,” he said.

  She slept half the day away. “Let me wash up and dress. Please compile a list of the materials you will need to repair your ship.”

  She
went to her ablutions, washing away the dust of multiple days. Three days, if she counted correctly. Gilbert walked her home on Wednesday. Thursday night, the lights from the barn drew her out of the house and she fell ill. Friday, she discovered an alien. This had to be Saturday, which meant in three days she’d have Christmas dinner with the Stearnes. She dreaded the notion but could see no way out of it.

  Elizabeth elected to wash her hair in the evening when she could let it dry by the fire. For the day, she arranged it in a tidy plait.

  Her muscles ached for a good long soak but wouldn’t entertain the notion with Reven in the house. Not that she failed to trust him. She did, without reservations. She suspected that she should be more reserved with her regard for him and not admit that she found him intriguing beyond compare. Her regard felt like a betrayal to David, even though David would have been just as interested in Reven as she.

  She recalled the broad expanse of his chest covered in swirling black ink and his thick, firm legs.

  Interested for different reasons, perhaps. She could appreciate a fine masculine specimen. She was a widow, not dead, after all.

  As different as he was, with his dark plum complexion, horns, and all those tattoos, she never doubted his intelligence or his masculinity. Of course, she did witness his stark masculinity for herself the other night in that very room.

  Elizabeth blushed, being neither dead nor blind. Reven was generously proportioned, and she could find no fault with his making.

  Once clean to her satisfaction, she chose a simple blue day dress, one suitable for work.

  She found Reven in the studio. He uncovered David’s last painting, still on the easel. The drop cloth lay in a heap on the floor.

  “My late husband was a painter,” she said, joining him in front of the canvas. The landscape was the view of Exmoor directly out the window, with light streaming through a dramatic break in the clouds.

  “That explains the male scent I detect. A mate, but fading.”

  Such an apt description of David.

  “The colors convey a great deal of emotion. The light appears to move,” he said, studying the image. His fingers moved above the canvas as if tracing the brush strokes.

  “David was the best painter I ever knew,” she said honestly.

  “How long have you been a widow?”

  “Two years.”

  “Do you miss him?”

  She let her fingers trail over the abandoned brushes with dried paint caking the bristles. “He had an artist’s temperament. Passionate. Obsessive. Self-indulgent. He was a great painter but a terrible husband.”

  When David focused on her, Elizabeth felt like the bright, burning center of his world, but that focus only came in brief bursts. When he worked, it consumed him, and he neglected all else in his life, even her. Perhaps had he lived longer, that behavior might have soured their marriage. Knowing now how few days he had on Earth, Elizabeth didn’t begrudge him the time he spent chasing his muse.

  Reven hummed a response but said nothing. He moved from the landscape to other paintings, asking keen questions about technique. When he viewed all the canvases, she gathered her paint box and instructed him to carry the drop cloths. They would block light from escaping the barn.

  She wasn’t sure why she shared the true nature of David’s temperament with Reven. Perhaps because he had no expectations of her and knew nothing of David. In the village, well-meaning people shared condolences for the passing of the master of the house. They only spoke of him in the most idealized terms, as if his faults vanished on his deathbed.

  Perhaps they did. Elizabeth only spoke of his virtues, his creativity and imagination, and never uttered a word about his vices. Who would she speak to? No one wanted to hear how David squandered his inheritance renovating the lodge and fitting it with the most modern of conveniences. No one cared to know that his complete lack of interest in marital congress left her feeling as sexless as a child. No one needed to know that she sacrificed her art to care for David, to play at being the housewife, and her resentment grew each day as he painted and she mended torn clothing.

  Perhaps Reven’s lack of expectation in her made it easy to confide to him.

  Curious.

  She set up in a corner of the ship’s interior and sketched. Her hand flew across the page, hoping to capture everything in their limited time.

  “I designed this,” Reven announced, showing off his machine. While it looked like nothing more than a pile of gears and cogs, his obvious enthusiasm for his creation was evident. She didn’t grasp the technical details but understood that Reven had made something new. She admired a man who felt the urge to bring to life what dwelled in his imagination.

  He happily explained the tools he used, the individual components of the ship, and the other masterpieces within the larger masterpiece. No question she posed left him irritated, and he always had an answer, even if it was a vague promise to do research to find the correct answer.

  “How do you know so much?” she finally asked.

  “I’m an engineer. I need to have a basic understanding of how the entire ship functions. A ship is an ecosystem. Each part must function properly, or the entire system collapses.”

  “But how do you know so much? Surely you’ve run out of space between those horns of yours.” A man as handsome and appealing as he surely didn’t spend his nights poring over books and schematics.

  He huffed with amusement.

  ***

  One day flowed into the next. Reven worked on the external repairs during the daylight and switching to the interior when the light vanished. He answered her questions with unerring patience.

  “What is your moon city like? Does it have canals like Venice?”

  “No, the canals are on Mars,” he replied.

  “Canals on Mars?” Her pencil stilled over the page.

  “No. I am being humorous.”

  She frowned, but her pencil resumed moving.

  “I do not like being teased in such a manner,” she said at length. She was hardly an astronomy expert but had seen lunar map in her father’s library. Her father fancied himself a scholar and would have pursued academia if circumstances allowed. Financial success allowed him the luxury of pursuing whatever interests caught his eye. Curiosity and a love of discovery ran deep in the Josephson household. “You could very well tell me that the moon is covered in a great lake of ice and I would have no cause to doubt you.”

  “It is a city like any other. People live and work under the domes.”

  “Domes?” Her pencil paused again.

  Reven scratched at the base of his horn. “The moon has no atmosphere. The base was originally a military installation, so the older structures are very functional and not aesthetically pleasing. As it expanded, the domes became necessary. Terrans felt trapped in the massive buildings. They prefer smaller structures with green spaces.”

  “Are you claiming that there are gardens on the moon?”

  “Yes. The base is a series of connected domes. Each has a controlled environment. Some domes are practical: housing, medical, commands, and so on. Other domes produce food and others are greenhouses to provide fresh oxygen. It is a very complex system.” His voice took on a wistful tone. Obviously, he admired complexity. “The domes are constructed from a durable material, so there is no risk of failure, but they are transparent. The Earth hangs above the base. It is quite remarkable.”

  “I’d like to see that.” Imagine, viewing the Earth from such a vantage. How extraordinary. Then, “If your moon city is so complex, why is it that no one has detected it? Can we not see it with a telescope, such as the one in Greenwich?”

  His body tensed, as if she finally stumbled on a question he did not want to answer. “It’s not visible now.”

  “Was it destroyed? You were under attack when you arrived.” Perhaps his hesitation sprang from not knowing the fate of his friends and colleagues.

  “I shouldn’t tell you.”

  “W
hyever not? Is it a secret of the utmost importance? Do you have some phantom technology to make it undetectable? How exciting.” Anything seemed possible as she sat in his ship, surrounded by wonders. It flew, which seemed to be the most commonplace activity, given tedious Reven made it sound. Of course, she hadn’t actually seen it fly. She took him at his word.

  “Yes. Let us go with that explanation.” He focused on his task and avoided looking in her direction. For the first time, she felt he did not tell her the entire truth.

  This would not do.

  “When your ship is repaired, can you take me to your city on the moon?”

  “No.”

  “Would you be able to return to visit?”

  “Unlikely.”

  Hmm. Perhaps a different tactic. “Why are your people on the moon? Doesn’t your planet have its own moon?”

  His lips pressed together. “I can’t tell you, Elizabeth.”

  “Whyever not?”

  “Paradox!” He slammed his tool to the ground and stood quickly. Body tense with stress, his fingers flexed and curled into a fist. For a moment, he looked as though he wanted to slam his fist into a wall. Instead, he ran a hand through his hair, making it messier than before. “It could create a paradox and unravel the fabric of reality.”

  She blinked, taking in his words, tone, and posture. A laugh bubbled up within her. No matter how she tried to keep a straight face, she just couldn’t. Her body shook with laughter. “Paradox?” Her eyes watered. “I’ve swallowed your story whole so far, but there’s some dark secret about the moon that will, what, have me run off to the Royal Astronomy Society? Write to the Evening Mail?”

  “Do not mock. A paradox is a serious consideration when time is involved.”

  “How is time involved?”

  He knelt at her feet. “May I?” he asked, gesturing to the hem of her skirt.