Page 14 of Married to the Alien Mountain Man

“Oh.” Green guy looked at the ring, then back at me. “I have had this ready for some time. In anticipation of receiving my human bride.”

“Receiving your human bride,” I repeated in disbelief. “What, do human women just fall out of the sky here every day? And then you guys coerce them into marrying you because no one else will come to this ass-backwards planet and do it willingly?!”

“That’s enough,” came a warning growl from the warden.

“Is it?” I squawked. “This guy had a ring for mein his pocket! Before I even arrived!”

Did they see me on some scanners before I landed? Were they preparing for this?

How the hell was I going to get out of here?

“The ring was not specifically intended for you,” green guy said, his smile finally beginning to falter. “But I know it is an integral part of marriage proposals in many human cultures. So I merely wanted to be prepared for whenever the chance might have arisen to…”

“To propose to some desperate, trapped human? You think just because my ship is down that I’m going to give up on my life and marry someone I just met?! A convicted murderer, no less!”

Apparently deciding that being down on one knee wasn’t serving him any longer, Greenie slowly rose. He cast a helpless look at the warden and muttered, “This is not going as well as I had hoped.”

“Interactions with human females rarely do,” Warden Tenn replied grimly. Then, the warden turned his attention back to me. “I realize this seems an odd request for Oaken to make of you. But he’s doing it to help you. As I mentioned before, the only people allowed to stay here apart from the convicts or those under Zabrian employ are the human brides. If you want time to stay here and fix your ship, you must be married.”

He gave me a gravely sympathetic look, but his stern voice offered no hope of arguing when he added with damning finality, “Or you must leave.”

6

OAKEN

The lovely human did not look very happy about the solution I had come up with to her problem. I supposed I could not blame her. Unlike Cherry and the others, she had not come here looking to get married. She had come here because she’d had no other choice.

“I already said I’m not leaving my ship.” She countered Warden Tenn’s words sharply, her eyes sparking as she stared him down. Not only lovely, but courageous, too.

It was so easy to admire her.

“Then you know what you have to do,” Warden Tenn said with an impatient flick of his tail.

“Yeah, I get it,” she bit out. “If I want to save my ship – the only home I’ve ever known – I have to become a housewife to some alien mountain man murderer. Great.”

“It would not be a permanent situation,” I rushed to explain. “Every human woman who comes here for marriage is free to leave after a two-week trial period. This would give you enough time to fix your ship. And, if it is at all helpful, I am not actually a murderer.”

“But you were convicted?”

“I was in the room when the crime happened, and I refused to assist the authorities.”

“Accessory to murder, then. Lovely.” The pretty pilot sighed harshly, reaching up to rub her eyes the way I’d seen her do before, when I’d been down on one knee.

“Is the dust bothering you?” I asked, my voice tight and low with concern. I leaned towards her. But as if sensing my increased proximity, she snapped open her eyes and took a step backwards.

I ignored the sting of that. Because it was likely a sting I deserved.

Of course, she would not want to be near me. Of course, she would not want to accept me as a husband. She was beautiful and capable and had likely seen more worlds in the span of one cycle than I could dream up over my entire lifetime. I had little to offer her but the weight of the metal ring in my hand.

But I held it up anyway, no matter how inadequate.

“My name is Oaken,” I told her in gentle tones. “I may be a prisoner of this world, but every day I try my best to be a decent sort of man. I may not have many credits to my name. I may not have parts for your ship. But I have walls to put around you. Food on my table to share with you. I can’t give you much. But I can give you a place here. And I can give you time. The time you need.”

I aimed my tail at her ship to emphasize my point. Her eyes ran along the green line of it, following my pointing gesture until her eyes came to rest upon her vessel. Her face, which up until now had mostly shown me flashes of anger, surprise, and confusion, transformed. Wistfully, she stared at her ship. I could practically feel the raw ache that emanated from her dark, expressive eyes. The love that went so deep it felt like pain to pull it out.

I looked at her, and I felt longing.

Herlonging, of course. I was only having a sympathetic sort of reaction to her inner turmoil. I certainly wasn’t holding my breath so that my impolite exhalations would not shift a single strand of her hair because I hated to change even a tiny thing about her. I certainly was not staring at her with hungry fascination as if she were the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen – even though she was. And I certainly wasn’t hoping she might say yes so hard that it made my heart feel like a clenched fist in my chest.

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