Page 27 of Smart@ss Cyborg

Her chest rises and falls rapidly, her breathing increasing even faster than while we were coupling. “I thought you were Joel,” she says brokenly.

I raise up enough to see her face. “Why? He’s dead.”

Confoundingly, Becky chokes out a sob. Her hands come up to cover her eyes.

Feeling unsure and discombobulated, I bring my hand to her shoulder, and rub her muscles there like she’s done for me. I like the touches she’s given me, and I find them very relaxing, so I hope they translate the same way to her.

To my intense relief, as I stroke her, they do seem to help calm her shuddering tears.

“I was mistaken,” I admit to her. “And I apologize.”

“Mistaken about what?” she asks, breath shaky. She’s producing tears again.

I had no idea human grieving included such tear production. Humans must consume an ocean’s worth of salt to replenish what they drain from their eye ducts.

“Sex is very pleasurable, and I hope you invite me to service you again in the future. I want you to know I will no longer view it as an unsightly duty.”

“I don’t even know what to—to say to that,” she says tiredly, even though we’ve just woken up. She plants her hands on the bed and rises with some difficulty.

I move to help her until she’s sitting up. She murmurs a toneless“Thanks,”and leaves the bed, waddling oddly to the siphon room, where she shuts the door with startling finality.

I stare past the door, focusing on the activity centers in her brain, wondering if I’ve done something horribly wrong.

CHAPTER 10

My cybernetic feet set wide on the floor, elbows planted on the hard surfaces of my composite metal thighs, I stare over my clasped hands and wait for Becky. I feel a great urge to show her how deep my feelings of affection for her have become.

However, when she emerges from the siphon room, she walks right to the bedroom door—and uses it to exit.

She never even looks back at me.

In fact… it seems to me as if she deliberately avoids my gaze.

Frowning, I move my legs into position to take my weight until I can rise from our bed and follow her.

I find her in the kitchen, facing the stove, studiously at work beginning what smells like breakfast. A seafood breakfast. Probably more frozen fish, thawed and pan-heated—but not cooked—following my preference. Which she asked after one day some days ago.

It was kind of her to ask.

(And fortuitous that Joel had an appreciation for fish and thus filets were stocked in the freezer and cans of fish are in the pantry.)

For many species, the caretaking of a mate is integral to their pair bonding success. Becky has been showing me from my first night here that she is a good mate to me. As I take in the sight of her, her swells and curves that I know so intimately now, her tousled mane of hair—thatItousled—I’m struck with powerful feelings of hunger.

And not simply for the skillfully created food smells beginning to waft toward me even more strongly.

I’m attracted to Becky. Visually, olfactorily, aurally, sexually—in every and all ways one should desire their mate.

My seafood cakes spit up grease as they heat and a thick cloud of fish liver juice wafts up, permeating the air, calling to my hunger for food. Becky covers her mouth and turns away from the stove, battling with her gorge reflex.

I'm struck anew at my awe and respect of her. The scent of my breakfast offends her pregnant sensibilities and yet she is determined to prepare meals for me anyway. Her grit is so admirable that I’m made silent with astonishment. Rendered speechless. Feeling yet another swell of tender closeness paired with intense liking, I move up behind her. I have in mind to kiss the back of her neck like I’ve seen males do to the females they’ve chosen to perform servicing duties for.

But the moment I step toward her, Becky freezes.

Later I will ascertain that she was expecting me to force the issue of more sex.

I would never want my mate to feel forced. In this moment, sex isn’t even my intention. I simply want to show Becky affection. And I want… I want to receive it.

Stymied but not yet discouraged, I attempt to pet her and squeeze her like I’ve seen in sexual vids—yet distressingly she displays the same shut-down reaction.

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