Page 5 of Alien Attachment
Heat floods my cheeks. “That’s not the point.”
“Is point,” he says, his voice dropping to that purr again. “You find me... appealing. I feel it through bond. Is... gratifying.”
“There are spare jumpsuits in that locker,” I say quickly, pointing across the cargo bay. “Put one on. Now.”
As he moves toward the locker with predatory purpose, his tentacle stretches but doesn’t release my wrist. I’m about to protest when Lila’s voice cuts through the cargo bay:
“Warning: Jump drive overheated. Coolant system compromised. Estimated repair time: six hours.”
Six hours. ApexCorp will find us long before then.
The alien pauses, looking back at me, and I feel a wave of determination that isn’t entirely my own—fierce, protective, and edged with something darker.
“Will protect you,” he says, his voice deeper, more resonant, promising things that make my pulse quicken. “They will not take us. Will not take you.”
The possessive way he says that last word should probably alarm me. Instead, it sends a thrill straight through my core that I’m definitely not going to examine too closely right now.
“Okay,” I say, taking a deep breath and trying to ignore the way his alien beauty makes my mouth water. “Let’s figure this out. Somehow.”
His tentacle pulses warmly against my skin, and something shifts inside me—not just the bond, but something deeper. I’ve spent years trusting nothing but my ship and my instincts, both held together with patch jobs and spite. But this connection bypasses all my defenses, lets me feel his sincerity and his desire like they’re my own emotions.
Maybe that’s what scares me most. Not ApexCorp’s hunters or even the bond itself, but the fact that for the first time in forever, I’m not facing the void alone. And the alien sharing myheadspace happens to be the most devastatingly attractive being I’ve ever encountered.
We’re so screwed. In every possible sense of the word.
But as he finally pulls on a jumpsuit—though it does absolutely nothing to diminish his appeal—and turns to face me with those impossible dark eyes full of promise and danger, I find myself thinking that maybe being screwed won’t be entirely terrible.
2
My Anchor, My Light
Jhorn
Theshipjoltsviolentlyas reality reassembles itself around us. Space folds and unfolds—concepts I somehow understand without knowing how or why. The sensation is... unpleasant. My insides feel twisted, compressed, then stretched beyond their limits like elastic being tested to its breaking point. But the discomfort is secondary, barely registering beneath my overwhelming awareness of her.
Kaylee.
My anchor.
My light.
My magnificently stubborn, gloriously alive human.
She lies sprawled across the cargo bay floor where the jump threw us, her chest rising and falling rapidly in a rhythm that mesmerizes me. I can feel her heart racing through our connection—the pulsing tentacle that links us physically and mentally. Her fear and adrenaline flow into me like electrical currents, sharp and bright and intoxicating. The ship around us hums with damage, systems straining under stress, but all I can focus on is the way her jumpsuit has ridden up slightly, exposing a tantalizing strip of pale skin at her hip.
Is she hurt? The thought sends a spike of distress through me that I don’t fully understand. I know only that her safety matters more than anything else in this universe I barely comprehend. That, and the way her scent— warm and alive and utterly compelling—fills my senses even through the ship’s recycled air.
I reach toward her with another tentacle, this one moving gently to brush a strand of hair from her face. The silken texture against my skin sends a pleasant shiver through me. She flinches, jerking away, and the rejection stings like physical pain.
“Don’t,” she gasps, scrambling backward until her spine hits the wall. The motion causes her to arch slightly, and I find myself memorizing the curve of her throat, the way her pulseflutters visibly beneath her skin. “Just... don’t touch me. Not with any more of those... things.”
Things.
She says it like my tendrils are foreign objects rather than parts of my body, extensions of my very being. I withdraw immediately, all tendrils except the one bound to her wrist curling protectively around my torso. Her revulsion crashes through our bond, making my skin tighten with shared disgust. She doesn’t want this connection.
Doesn’t want me.
The knowledge hurts in ways I cannot name, a hollow ache that settles in my chest where dual hearts beat in syncopated rhythm.
