Page 48 of My Human Wife

l.I’m floored. Gael pulls me into his strong embrace and begins stroking my hair.

g.“Good,” I say again. I’m relieved to know that she wasn’t raped. I still carry the guilt of knowing how I was conceived. And it’s awkward thinking about her and my father together and that I put her in that situation. “I’m sure it wasn’t amazing all the time though. You did come back to me.”

l.“Do you think that’s why Coco stayed to be with your father?”

g.“I don’t know.”

l.“Well you would be right. She told me she loved your father and that she also wanted to be a mother even if the time spent with her child would be fleeting. I’m guessing you didn’t want that?”

g.“We never talked about it. But I couldn’t offer her anything luxurious.” I gesture around to my quarters. “I thought thatmight get you too. All those fine material things. I know things weren’t easy for you at first on theSisu.”

l.I look away. I’m ashamed that I enjoyed being pampered in the harem. Humiliated that I enjoyed my golden cage and that I even contemplated that life wasn’t that bad being owned by Kamos. I’m uncomfortable that I had sex and became pregnant with his father’s child. I never wanted that, but I never said ‘no’ either. “Gael had I known he was your father…”

g.“You would have never gone and you would have never been able to steal the teleportation suit. It’s the only one of its kind and it’ll allow us to get in and out of places to help without anyone knowing we have it.”

l.“Kamos knows.”

g.“True but he’s not going to tell the authorities it exists explicitly. You did a great job. We’ll record this in the Terra Ka legacy along with the note that your actions have put pressure on the IGC to ensure humans’ rights by being the first human to be recognized as a free citizen. Buyers at Gala will be more concerned now because they’re thinking, ‘If Kamos can be caught then what about me?’”

l.I didn’t expect those words to mean so much to me but suddenly they do. “You’re going to record my actions?”

g.“Yes. For what our group is worth we record what we’ve done and what works so that others can learn and feel inspired.”

l.“Can you write it as, ‘Lara from Earth, Wife of Gael?’”

g.“I can, but…”

l.“I want to choose freedom wherever I can. I don’t want anyone who owned me to tarnish the good I have done today.” I touchmy abdomen. “I don’t want her to see my name as being owned by anyone in the Terra Ka records. Every place I went in the galaxy I had to name my owners and where I was sold. She’ll be able to find that information anywhere. I want a record of me somewhere where I’m not owned.”

g.“So does this mean you stillchooseme, Lara?”

l.I answer him in Uru which he can understand with his translator. “Ichooseyou, Gael the Returner.” Although I learned those words when I was owned by Lord Juo, they seem very fitting and authentic now. “I’m free and I choose you.” Gael’s lips touch mine. And it’s as if he’s kissing me for the first time again. I tremble. His lips send electricity through me and I put my hands in his long black hair to pull him closer.

g.“I’m grateful, Lara,” I say as I hold her tightly against me. I want her in ways I’ve never wanted any other woman. Nothing matters to me but Lara. I run my hands down her body. This body that I’ve thought about every day since I met her but haven’t touched since that first day.

l.I’ve fantasized about being back with Gael ever since I left him. I want this more than ever now. But I’ve changed. When he first touched me he was the first man with hands like mine to do so.Now how many grey hands have touched me?

g.I pull back my kiss and search her green eyes for answers. When I don’t find them I say, “I’ve thought about you every day since you left,” and then add, “And even before that.” I worry that she doesn’t find me attractive anymore. That I don’t add up to my father.

l.“Why do you want me now?”

g.“You’re my wife.” I run my hands up and down her small torso. “I’ve missed you. But you don’t have to…” I move my hands back into my own space.

l.“I don’t want you to think you have to.”

g.I’m confused.Why wouldn’t she want me to touch her?I stay silent while I try to figure this out. Our eyes never break contact. “Does my touch repel you because of my father?”

l.“No. No! How can you even suggest that?” I feel sick that that’s where his mind went, but at least it gives me an opportunity to say how I feel which is less incestuous. “So many grey hands have touched me now. Pleasured me….” I trail off.How can I continue?“Am I still attractive to you?”

g.I take her into my arms and kiss the top of her head, then I rest my head on hers reveling in her being in my arms. “Lara, I sent you to Kamos’s palace. I always wanted you back. I will always want you and you will always be mine, unless you don’t want me. And if I’m being pedantic, I was your first man and that was also the day we married and you became mine forever.”

l.I wrap my arms around his strong body and hold him close. How could I have ever thought that he wouldn’t have wanted me? It’s becauseIfeel used. “It was all work for me in the palace. This isn’t work. You are my pleasure, Gael.” He squeezes me so tightly I feel like I might not be able to breathe.

g.“And you are mine, always.” I kiss the top of her head, her forehead, her nose, her lips. My tongue enters her small mouth. “All of you is mine,” I say in-between kisses. My mind is telling me not to say these things, but I’m on autopilot now and my emotions are running this show. There’s no logic in what I want from her. No galactic manners or customs, just my primalinstincts as a man. I begin kissing her neck as I run my hands through her long blonde hair. “And I willnevershare you again.”

l.His touch is igniting a fire within my body I’ve not felt since I was last here. All my fears about only being attracted to Gael because he was the first humanoid man I’d ever been with melt away. “I never feel like this with anyone else. Only you. Your touch is the only man’s that reaches my soul.”

g.“So, not my father?” I had to ask. I have to get this out of my system so that I can move on too.

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