Page 9 of Alien Wants A Wife

Voices drift downstairs. One is Sorin’s. I cannot imagine him accepting orders lightly. His scales will turn blue with indignation and embarrassment. He is not much of a talker at the best of times. John Smith is hardly going to get the response from Sorin he will expect.

I look to my eldest brother, but Killan has his upper arms crossed over his chest and is drumming the fingers of his free hand on the table’s surface, his eyes narrowed as he watches the stairs as if he can see through the wall to glare at the Drah’os Male.

He is as angry as I have ever seen him, annoyed by the disruption to his day and the inconvenience of having to wait in the kitchen when he could be by the lakes, working.

Why cannot he see that the Females are worth any number of disruptions? I decide to ignore him and his bad temper, turning my attention to Harlee and Lydia, displaying my teeth to them to show my accommodating nature.

“Ahh…” Harlee glances between me and Lydia, shuffling on her chair, suddenly uncomfortable. I half rise, intending to fetch something soft to sit on, but I can think of nothing which matches this description, and so I sit back down again.

The silence is eating into my ears, slowly turning my excitement to nervousness.

“I am Roan,” I begin, immediately recognizing that I have told them this already.

“And how old are you?” Harlee asks, locking her hands together and resting them before her on the table.

“Thirty Common years. I was born here, on Ril II.” I lean forward a fraction, inching my own hands closer to Harlee’s. Her skin, I muse, would be soft to touch, like water. Soft and slippery and hard to keep a hold of.

“Ril II. That’s the name of your farm?” Lydia asks this question.

“The name of our planet.”

“Of fucking course it is.” She laughs, but it sounds strained. Rasping.

“Not officially.” I glance between the Females. Were they not told about Ril II when their ship landed yesterday? “Ril II is the name my family calls it.”

“You’re good at role playing,” Harlee says right as a thump from above echoes down the staircase, followed by Sorin’s cursing.

“Cut!” John Smith screams. “Again. From the top!”

“I’m afraid I don’t have any improv experience.” Harlee resolutely continues talking through the sounds from upstairs, casting the camera clipped to the kitchen counter a glance. “So, are you guys, like, D&D fans or… what’s that live role-playing game called?”

“LARP,” Lydia answers, sinking lower in her chair and crossing her arms over her chest.

“You and my brother would make good Mates for each other,” I say and nod between them. Despite their many physical differences, they are as sullen as each other.

“Roan.” Killan growls his warning, but I take no heed.

“Your temperaments suit well.” I return my gaze to Harlee. Would we suit? I slide my hand a little farther across the table, inching closer to her clasped hands.

Two hands. Two arms.

Not four.

“Your scales look crazily real,” she tells me with another glance at Lydia.

Mayhaps they are telepathic and are saying many things that Killan and I cannot hear. Their continued shared looks certainly hold a lot of weight, but I cannot read enough of their facial expressions to know what they are thinking or feeling.

I straighten to my full height, demonstrating how good of a Mate I could be. Capable. Competent. Able to care for a family of my own.

“And your arms,” she says, studying me closely. “How are you able to move all four independently? I don’t get it.”

“Akh…” I do not understand the question. “I… do.” I have never given much thought to how I move my arms. “How do you move yours?” Is there a different way to move arms that I do not know about?

“Incredible,” she muses. “Your horns. And your eyes. I mean, you’re obviously wearing contact lenses. But I can’t work outhow the scales were made. Surely you’ve not got prosthetics over your entire body. That would have taken fucking—” She clears her throat. “I mean, that would’ve taken ages and an entire makeup team of specialists.”

“While we were left to do our own makeup,” Lydia huffs.

“You made up what?” I ask, but they must not hear, because Lydia says: “Wouldn’t it be funny if they really were aliens.” And she snorts.

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