Alien Orc’s Prize (Starlight Brides)

16. Luna

CHAPTER 16

LUNA

S ince I didn’t know exactly when “later” would be, I decided to keep myself busy. I kept coming back to my seaweed suggestion with something that felt like a little trill of hope. But I could tell that, though Galbrath was giving it due thought, he wasn’t excited about it like I was. More like resigned. I wanted to come up with some options that, if not exactly wow him, might at least make him smile.

So, I returned to the beach later that day, gathered up three giant baskets full of seaweed, and got to work.

Neena and Noona couldn’t seem to figure out why I wanted to spend so much time with the slippery ink-green and rust-red stalks, but they dutifully trundled my baskets and me into a spacious but unused kitchen. Apparently, the palace had two, but only one was used by the cooking staff on a regular basis. I was shown into the spare one where I wouldn’t be in the staff’s way.

Which turned out to be a very good thing, because trying to come up with a dish enticing enough to impress a prince – and a brutally grumpy one at that – was a messy task. Also time-consuming, but I didn’t really notice that part. Despite the chaos, I was loving every moment of it. It had been ages since I’d gotten to try to cook something from scratch, let alone come up with my own original recipes. It felt so good digging in, being creative, and working with my hands.

I steamed, sauteed, ground, dried, and chopped. I made seaweed soup with bone broth and spices, dehydrated seaweed crisps sprinkled with salt, and had even managed something close to seaweed flour. It wouldn’t make that gorgeous wheat flour bread I’d had at dinner and again at breakfast today, but I did approximate something close to a very dense scone.

None of it was perfect, but it was a pretty freaking great start in my opinion. I planned to refine the recipes, come up with a few more, and then, when I was ready, present them to Galbrath. Maybe if he could see how tasty the seaweed options could be, it might make the failing wheat a bit of an easier pill – or meal, I guessed – to swallow.

Well, that was my plan, anyway. Until my husband decided to waltz into the room mid-mess.

I didn’t hear him come in. No, I was too busy with my head halfway into a hot oven, gently singing made-up songs of encouragement to my newest batch of scones as I checked on their progress. I was pretty sure it was when I got to the, “You’re the scones we want to eat! You are awesome, who needs wheat?!” bit that Galbrath settled himself behind me, stance wide, brawny bare arms crossed over his chest.

I closed the oven, straightened, turned around, and just about jumped out of my skin at the sight of him.

“When did you get here?” I said, slamming my hand against my chest as if I could contain my leaping heart.

“I arrived around the time you were very sweetly commanding whatever is in the oven to rise through the power of song.” His gaze went to my mouth. “You have a nice voice.”

“So not only do I smell nice, but I sound nice too? Anything else?” I asked. Damn. I couldn’t even hide it. I was totally fishing for compliments.

“Look nice,” he grunted. “Especially when you’re bent over in front of me like that and I get to stare at your backside.”

Genuine laughter bubbled up and out of my throat.

Galbrath cocked his head, his eyes roaming my face. “That wasn’t a joke.”

“I know,” I said, still chuckling. “But I can’t help it. You have great delivery. Very dry.”

He made a harrumphing sort of sound in his throat before turning to cast his eye around the disaster of a kitchen.

“What are you doing in here?”

“Don’t look!” I screeched, flapping my hands at him in a vain attempt at distraction. “Nothing’s ready yet! You weren’t supposed to come so soon!”

“Soon?” His head whipped back to me, eyes probing. “It’s full dark out. I was late getting back from the last farm and dinner’s come and gone. You weren’t in the hall and you weren’t in bed. I came to find you.”

“I missed dinner?!” Luckily, I’d spent so much of the afternoon sampling my recipes that I wasn’t hungry now, but I couldn’t believe so much time had passed.

“I can have something fetched for you. Whatever you like.”

“I’m actually not hungry.” Now that I’d stopped moving for a moment, I was more tired than anything.

“You still haven’t answered my question.” His eyes were like coals, black and bright at the same time. “What are you doing down here?”

There was no point in trying to hide it anymore or lying to preserve the surprise. With my luck he’d probably be able to tell I wasn’t being honest just by sniffing me.

I dragged my hand across my forehead, only now becoming aware of how sweaty I was, and how smeared with seaweed sludge my face and hands were.

“I was…” I gestured around the room, feeling suddenly like all the things I’d created, all the things I’d gotten excited about, were useless. Like I was a silly child presenting a pie made of mud to an uncharitably discerning adult. “I was trying to come up with some interesting recipes for the seaweed. I thought it might help.”

God. I sounded lame. Here Galbrath was with potential starvation, chaos, or revolts on his doorstep and I was goofing around in the kitchen, singing songs and playing chef. As if that meant anything at all. Why did I think this was a good idea, again?

Galbrath listened to me finish speaking, then swept his demanding gaze around the room once more. He picked up one of the finished scones then held it aloft with a questioning rise of his brows.

“You can eat it,” I confirmed, my cheeks feeling very hot. I twisted the hem of my shirt between my fingers, anxiety piling into me like a starship at full speed. “But, just know the recipes aren’t perfected yet! I was planning to keep developing that one. And a bunch of others!” I added in a hurry as he sniffed the scone. Then, with nary a nibble to even see if he liked it first, he opened his big mouth wide and shoved the entire thing inside.

I stared, jaw slack, as he chewed. It seemed to take a very, very long time, during which I asked myself a thousand questions about whether the scone was too dense, too dry, and whether he’d try to divorce me now or not.

But I guessed I was worrying for nothing. Because when he finally swallowed, he looked at me as if with new eyes and said, “Good.”

Then he went to the soup. After lifting the pot and drinking a bunch of it, he set it down, swiped his hand across his wet mouth, turned to me and said, “ Very good.”

“I should hope so!” I said, shaking my head and glancing into the large pot to see it nearly empty now, “considering how much you’re having!”

He gave a gristly sort of grunt.

“Didn’t eat dinner. Like I said, I was late. And I wanted to find you first.”

My belly warmed at the idea that the first thing he’d wanted to do when he’d returned was find me. Not rest, not have a bath, not eat. Find me

“Well, they do say that hunger is the best seasoning,” I joked, squirming a little bit under the twin black spears of his eyes.

“It’s not just that, though,” he said sternly, sifting his fingers through flour nearly as green as his skin before turning back to me. “It’s good. Good all on its own.”

He stepped closer, backing me up until my spine hit a nearby countertop. His hands went to the counter on either side, his broad torso caging me in.

“Why did you do all this?”

“I’ve always liked cooking,” I stammered, finding it just a little hard to speak now that his nose was pressed up against my jaw, huffing in my scent like it was shuttle fumes to get him high, “and I wanted to… be useful. To help.”

“To help me?”

“Yes!” I squeaked as two big hands suddenly cupped my breasts, kneading the way I’d been kneading dough not long ago. “Help you. And your people. Just… everyone.”

Galbrath didn’t remove his hands, but he did stop the massaging motion. He pulled back, just a little, just enough to look down into my face. The expression there took my breath away. It was one I hadn’t seen from him before. The broad plains of his cheekbones were tight, his eyes penetrating like always but shaped with something between pain and longing. It made me want to blink and turn away, as if I were staring directly into the sun.

Instead, I threw my arms around his neck and kissed him.

He stiffened as my mouth went to the surprisingly soft place between his tusks.

“What are you doing?” he murmured against my lips. I drew back, embarrassment simmering my blood.

“I’m kissing you. Sorry. Is that not a thing here?”

“I don’t…” He exhaled swiftly. “I don’t understand what to do with my tusks when you do that.”

“You seemed to figure it out just fine when you were kissing me somewhere else,” I reminded him.

“That’s because I was mostly using my tongue.”

“Here… just… let me,” I whispered. I approached his mouth slowly this time, as if he might get spooked and bolt. But I should have known that would never happen. I doubted Galbrath was truly scared of anything.

He remained utterly motionless as I gently kissed his lips. His mouth was wide enough that my own could fit easily between his tusks. I buried my fingers in his hair and sighed against his lips, pressing and prodding gently, running my tongue along his skin, until I felt him shudder violently. He seized my waist and lifted me until I was seated on the counter. I gasped as he crowded himself in between my legs, then moaned when he began furiously rubbing the bulge of his hard cock against my pelvis.

“I want to knot you,” he groaned, thrusting against me almost as if he were thrusting into me. “Want it so bad. Want to try tonight.”

“Not in the food prep area!” I squawked as I felt his hands fumbling between us at his belt.

Galbrath froze, then gave a shaky inhale, as if to steady himself against his own impatience. I felt that impatience, too. The place between my legs was swollen and throbbing, just from him rubbing himself against me. But I could not imagine how unsanitary fucking on this countertop would be. I’d seen how much fluid that male produced. Someone (me) would be cleaning it up for days.

But Galbrath was giving me that look again. That raw, achy, unexpectedly tender sort of look that made my throat clench.

“You’re right,” he said gruffly. “You deserve better.” His gaze glinted with sudden wickedness. “At least for the first time. After that, I reserve the right to rut you anywhere.”

“Anywhere?” I breathed.

“Anywhere,” he repeated firmly, nearly majestically, as if giving out some important royal edict. “In bed. On the floor. Outside. Inside. Anywhere .”

Then he picked me up, cradling me easily against his chest as if I weighed nothing at all. And I knew, in that moment, I was already lost to him. I hugged his neck, pressing my cheek to his skin, feeling the thunder of his heart.

Anywhere.

I’d let him take me anywhere.

Luckily, he took me straight to bed.