Page 7 of The Cyborg Way
Her cheeks turned an enchanting shade of pink, but he also saw the trace of guilt on her face.
“That wasn’t… I mean, it kind of was, but I’ve also been thinking about kissing you for a long time.”
He wanted to believe her, but he knew better.
“It was unnecessary.”
“I’m sorry if you didn’t like it,” she said softly, biting her lower lip, still swollen from their kiss.
In spite of everything, he wanted to smooth away that disappointed expression and assure her that he had liked it very much.Too much.He reminded himself again that it was his duty to protect her, not to seduce her.
He looked back over at the creature, debating the best course of action, and as he did, small translucent wings flared out from its sides as it hopped into the air, gliding towards Ellie. He would have intercepted it, but she stepped in front of him with a pleading look as she held out her hand and it landed in her palm.
“This is Henry.” She raised her hand as if introducing him. “Henry, this is Levi. He won’t let anything happen to you, will you?”
He looked from her anxious face to the dark gaze studying him curiously.
“I will have to consider the matter. I will let you know what I decide.”
He turned and strode towards the airlock before he could give into temptation, draw her back into his arms, and promise to do anything she wanted.
CHAPTER FOUR
Ellie stared after Levi, her mind a troubled swirl of emotions. She was still worried about Henry, of course, but the fact that Levi hadn’t immediately insisted on taking him away gave her hope. And despite her lingering concerns, she found herself thinking about their kiss. He hadn’t been entirely wrong—when she’d seen him getting closer to the bed, she’d assumed that Henry was there and she panicked. Putting her arms around his neck had been intended to distract him, but she’d also told the truth when she told him that she’d been thinking about kissing him for a long time.
And what a kiss. She had no idea that such an explosion of passion existed behind that stern facade. He’d always seem so rigid, so in control. He’d certainly taken control of the kiss, but with a passionate intensity she hadn’t expected, and the only thing rigid about it had been the iron bar of his erection against her stomach. A very large bar.
Not that she had much experience with erections—any experience really—but it had seemed unusually large to her. Was that because he was large all over? Or had becoming a cyborgenhanced all parts of his physique? Although such actions would not have been permitted on Earth, she knew that several female settlers had taken cyborg husbands. If they were all as well-endowed as Levi, she could certainly see the attraction.
Levi.
The fact that he had told her his name felt almost as intimate as their kiss.
“Levi,” she repeated softly. Henry chirped, and she smiled down at him. “Do you approve of him, Henry? I think he’s on our side—or at least I hope he is. I wonder how long it will take him to ‘consider the matter.’”
He hadn’t meant another two weeks, had he? No, she didn’t think he would leave her hanging that long. She ran her finger across her lips, still tender from the intensity of his kiss, and found herself smiling. When he returned, she had every intention of showing him that it hadn’t just been a distraction.
“In the meantime, I suppose I’d better get back to work. Do you want to come outside with me now?”
It was a rhetorical question, of course, but Henry scrambled up her arm to his usual place on her shoulder as she went to get her breathing mask.
The pale Martian sunlight was unusually warm for this late in the year, and Henry stretched out a small boulder, soaking up the rays. She noticed again how easily he blended in with his environment. As far as she could tell, he wasn’t a chameleon. He didn’t change color completely to match his surroundings, but the mottled shades of his scales varied from time to time, at least enough to help him blend into a surprising variety of backgrounds.
“Are you really a Martian, Henry?”
Levi seemed convinced that his species wouldn’t have been able to evade detection, but there still so much about Mars that was unknown and unexplored.
Species.The word suddenly made her hesitate as she looked over at her small companion. Was she being selfish by keeping him here? Did he have a family—a mother? Her throat threatened to close again, but she pushed the sadness away.My mother would have liked Henry, she thought, and the thought gave her comfort.
Besides, it wasn’t as if she were holding Henry prisoner. Although he couldn’t operate the airlock, she never tried to restrain him when they were outside. In fact, the first time she brought him back outside, she’d half-expected him to scurry away. Instead he’d settled down, just as he had now, watching as she went about her tasks. If he did have a family, he showed no sign of anxiety about returning to them. Hoping she wasn’t just trying to convince herself, she set to work.
Work occupied her as it always did throughout the long day, but whether she was planting lichen or feeding the chickens or gathering greens, her thoughts kept returning to Levi and to their kiss. It wasn’t the first time she’d been kissed but it was certainly the best, and the feelings he’d aroused in her body were definitely new.
Her mother had been obsessed with migrating to Mars, and from the time Ellie was a little girl she had shared that enthusiasm with her. Perhaps as a result of that, she’d never really been interested in pursuing a relationship with anyone back on Earth, convinced that she would be leaving the planet behind. In addition, her mother hadn’t encouraged her to date.Although she hadn’t exactly forbidden it, she’d always made it seem… unnecessary.
Instead, Ellie had spent her life working and studying and planning for their eventual future. She couldn’t regret that even now, but it had certainly left her with a lack of experience when it came to the opposite sex.
When she went to bed that night, she found herself unusually restless, despite her usual exhaustion at the end of the day. Her nipples felt swollen and sensitive, and there was a low, throbbing ache between her thighs. She slowly brushed a hand across her aching nipples and shuddered at the resulting spike of pleasure. Her other hand slipped lower, delving between her thighs.
