Page 45 of Rescued By the Luxirian

His bark of a laugh cut me off but I couldn’t help but grin. Now I was getting excited about this. So many people were looking for safe colonies that they could call their home. Human females, for one. Females like me. Families, hybrid families, just like ours that feared discrimination on some of the smaller colonies. But if they moved to larger ones, they risked their safety. They’d have to deal with space pirates and mercenaries, traffickers, drug runners and weapon dealers, who all had a strong hold on the criminal networks in those colonies.

But Ullima…

Ullima was a paradise.

Despite the stormy season, the weather was moderate nearly all-year, at least from what Droxan had told me. There was a wide coast to the north and jungle towards the west, where we were. The soil was rich. The ground stable. The water clean.

It would be perfect.

“A small, private colony,” he told me, studying my face, seemingly relieved when he saw my excitement. “Buttev, there would be room for expansion. If we decide to do that. Together.”

“I love it,” I told him truthfully. “I love that you’re thinking of us too. And that you’re also excited about building something new here.”

“It’s all for you. It’s allbecauseof you, Lyra,” he told me. My breath caught in my throat and I felt the connection rise between us when he pressed his forehead against mine. The Luxirian version of a hug, an embrace, meant for loved ones. “You made me realize how much I’d turned my back on the universe. Cutting myself off from people, fromlife.”

“Oh, Droxan,” I whispered.

“But then you literally fell out of the sky,” he rasped, a small smile lighting up his features. “You gave me your love. You gave me renewed purpose. These last few months with you have been thebestof my life and I know we have so much more to come. But you’ve made me feelhopefulagain. You’ve made me feel optimistic about life. And I want to grasp onto that feeling with both hands and try to build this place up to something wonderful. Something for you. For our family. I promised that I would always take care of you and I meant it.”

“I love you,” I breathed, my vision going blurry with my tears even as I grinned at him. “Gods,I love you so much, Droxan.”

“And I love you,luxiva,” he murmured, leaning forward to press a kiss to my lips. “Always.”

“You’re going to accomplish so much here,” I told him. “I can feel it.”

He smiled. A slow grin that made me feel as light as air.

“Wewill,luxiva. Together.”

I kissed him again.

“Sounds like a plan,” I said, smiling, against his lips.

Bonus Epilogue

LYRA

Two years later…

It was Ullima’s first market day and our little town was buzzing with excitement.

To prepare for the event, I’d been up most of the night with Mrs. Smyth, Serena, and Ty’o baking little cakes, individually decorated, and wrapping black sugar drops in waxed paper for the children. Given, there weren’t many children on Ullima, only 12 thus far amongst our population of 77 people. But our council had just approved three new families’ residency visas and they’d be arriving within the week. One of the couples—a human and Keriv’i pairing—had three children, all of differing ages. One would be our first teenager.

We were planning to cap the population at 100 this particular year while Droxan and his team finalized a new village of homes a short, walking distance away from the town square. The village’s location was more rural, opening up to spacious land that would one day grow our crops. The soil had been tested and cultivated—it was perfect for what we envisioned. The homes my mate and his team were working on had already been claimed byprofessional farmers, our waitlist for residency growing longer by the day when people heard that the famous Luxirian builder had created a colony all his own. As such, we could afford to be picky, choosing only the farmers that had vast experience, especially working with alien soil.

Droxan’s reputation still amazed me to this day. I thought I would be used to it by now but hearing about his success on Luxiria and experiencing it everyday on Ullima were two different things.

Shortly after our son had been born, we’d broken ground on Ullima’s town, a ten minute hovercraft ride away from our home in the mountainous region. Droxan had had a goal in mind: to have five people living in the town he would create by Maxon’s first birthday.

We’d had 23 people living on our colony when we celebrated our son’s first year. Droxan’s goal had been achieved and then some. It hadn’t been easy. Of course, it hadn’t. In the beginning, there had been many nights where Droxan had worked in darkness even, connecting pipe lines or laying pavers or troubleshooting the water catch system. My mate, I’d discovered, had been so successful in his business—his passion for building and creating evident—because he threw himself into it so entirely.

But he had a family now. A mate and a young child. We began to realize he couldn’t do it alone after those first few months without sacrificing his time with us. And so he’d brought in a building crew, some of which he’d worked with on Luxiria.

After that, he was home every night. Though at times, I’d woken to an empty bed, only to find him sketching plans in the living room at midnight, our son stretched out and sleeping soundly next to him.

I would put our son back to bed those nights…and then I would entice my mate back to bed with a kiss, a caress, and atease. Those nights, he would happily leave behind his sketches and I would have to muffle my pleasured cries so our son wouldn’t wake.

Nights like those, I thought now, watching the banner in the town square lift higher and higher into place,were exactly how I ended up pregnant again.

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