Dzar-Ghan (Alien Barbarians of Vandruk #3)

9. Chapter 9

Throughout the day, I had been distracted enough not to miss my assistant, Joe. He usually kept me out of trouble on trips like this. It’s not like I seek out problems, but my brain is always juggling nine million things at once. My first university job hired him to assist me, and I never looked back. I brought him along to all my trips as a private assistant—and sometimes guard—but the Vandruks hadn’t allowed any males on this expedition—not that I faulted them for it—but now I felt a bit lost without Joe, who would have warned me about the acid liquid or the crawling scorpion, and he would have already set up my lab by the time I reached the camp. But watching Dzar-Ghan take to my tools distracted me again, and I didn’t dwell too much on him having been forced to stay on Earth. Besides, Dzar-Ghan more than made up for not having a bodyguard around.

Soon, we had unpacked my entire lab, and he was holding each item carefully in his oversized hands. Hands I couldn’t stop thinking about on my body. I had experienced his touch a few times; it had mostly been as careful as he was handling my tools now, but a couple of times, I had felt the repressed strength in them, the power to break me in two without any effort on his part.

I’ve always been a very meticulous person, very logic-driven, but none of the emotions this man holding my plastic microscope right now aroused in me were in the slightest bit logical. Or were they?

Vandruk wasn’t just an unexplored, alien planet; from all appearances, its inhabitants were very much barbarian-like, primitive if one wanted to label it. His presence awakened a long-forgotten, long-dormant, very primal part inside me that was looking for the most suitable protector. Of course I would be sexually attracted to Dzar-Ghan; it was my body’s way of telling me that he was a prime male capable of keeping me safe. More than that, it was telling me that producing children with him would not only bind us but make my position in his life and thus my life more secure.

Absolutely logically , I told myself, happy with my rational reasoning and coming to a conclusion that made sense.

Until my stupid vagina piped up, so why then didn’t I feel anything in Dzur-Khan’s presence ? Thankfully, my mind had a very reasonable explanation for that, because he was taken, and I didn’t want to compete with Amber. So there, I couldn’t help but add triumphantly.

If a vagina had been capable of an eye roll, I was sure that would have been its response. And why the hell was I arguing with my vagina?

I risked a surreptitious glance from the corner of my eyes at Dzar-Ghan. How he was holding the test tube without breaking it between his fingers was beyond me. His dark, reddish-brown eyes were narrowed as he lifted the test tube this way and that, and my heart did a little stutter when he tried to put his finger inside. Such an innocent move, and yet my mind… drifted… oh my God, did it drift. What the fuck is wrong with me ? Did I just think fuck ? I shuddered. I never cursed, ever. There were perfectly better acceptable words to use than fuck. Fuck, I did it again. I wanted to slap my head but was afraid it would turn Dzar-Ghan’s attention to me, and I had a pretty good idea of what I looked like right then. Glassy-eyed and panting.

Shit, I really need to get it together . Shit? This time, I rolled my eyes. Apparently, my vagina wasn’t the only part of my body reverting to its baser instincts. My brain seemed to follow the same path.

All the while, my eyes were still glued to his hand, his thick fingers, long and strong and…

Dzar-Ghan’s deep voice startled me from my very inappropriate thoughts. He repeated my earlier game, pointing at me and himself, saying our names, and then holding up the test tube questioningly.

“Test tube,” I said, having to clear my throat in between words because there was a fat lump in it.

“Test tuuhb,” he repeated, his voice sending a warm shiver through me, one that made me want to contort my body to follow its flow and flutter my eyelashes at him. What the hell was wrong with me?

I noticed a small commotion at the other side of the camp, but since Dzar-Ghan didn’t react, I didn’t look over either; we were too caught up in naming things. Beaker, beehca , he repeated, Schlenk Flask, shwang flaasck, and so on. I supposed I didn’t sound much better when I tried to repeat the names he gave me of some items I had collected earlier.

The smell of roasting meat permeated the air, causing my stomach to rumble loudly. He asked me if I was hungry—at least that’s what I assumed he asked—and I committed the words to memory like all the others. I was a quick learner. I didn’t exactly have a photographic memory, but it was close. Close enough to keep picking up bits of words and connecting them. At this pace, I figured within a week, we could have small conversations. Very small. But hey.

He spread his fingers, yeah, fingers, again, to indicate how long it would take for the food to be ready. I had no idea what it meant but hoped it would be soon. To distract myself, I carefully packed all my supplies back into the backpacks. I had barely finished when Dzar-Ghan motioned for me to follow him to join the others. He took this moment to formally introduce me to all of his twenty men. I did what I always did when presented to a new large crowd: Grehn-Bzag, small scar across his left eyebrow, Dragh-Whar, crooked nose, and so on.

The food was served on wooden bowls, or the alien equivalent of wood, and delicious. The meat was more tender than anything I had ever eaten before that was actually cooked through. Dzar-Ghan sounded the words for each vegetable on my plate out for me, and I devoured all of it, even going for seconds.

After dinner, Dzar-Ghan took me to a small pond. He kneeled down to show me that this was actually water and mimicked washing. That’s when it hit me, really hit me, that he had saved me from a gruesome death earlier. Thanking him now, though, would have confused him, and I didn’t have all the words yet to explain, so instead, I sent a warm smile his way, hoping in some way he would recognize it for what it was.

After a few seconds of standing there, smiling idiotically at him, the muscles in my face began to hurt, and still, he made no move to leave me to bathe by myself. I made a shooing motion with my hands, and he shook his head.

I repeated the movement. He shook his head again.

“I’m not gonna strip in front of you and bathe,” I said, pushing my fists into my hips, elbows out, shaking my head.

His eyes narrowed at me, and he made a shooing motion for me to get in the water.

“Nope, not with you watching.” Another head shake, this time accentuated by a frown.

With an exasperated sigh and an even more exasperated movement, he turned his back on me, saying something I interpreted as, “Happy?”

“Some.”

I still didn’t feel like stripping out here, but the pond beckoned. The long march had made me sweaty, and my hands were dirty from all the digging and prying. It wasn’t hot on Vandruk, but the air was slightly sticky, so a good soak in the pond sounded enticing enough for me to finally give in.

“No peeking,” I warned, and he promptly turned just as I pulled my shirt over my head.

His eyes darkened as he took in my half-naked torso. Thank God for bras, especially sensitive black ones that covered well and weren’t made from this lacy stuff some women preferred, the ones that felt so itchy on my skin that I had ripped off my first and only one after an hour into it. I preferred natural, organic materials.

I turned, yelling at him to do the same.

His chuckle reached my ears and made me narrow my eyes in irritation. But, to his credit, when I peeked over my shoulder, he had turned his back to me once again. That’s when I decided to keep my underwear on. It could use a washing too, and I was certain it would dry overnight. If not, it would during the day tomorrow.

The water felt strange, thicker and oilier, but still refreshing, and the pond was large enough for me to do a few strokes one way and then the other. I forced myself not to think about any kind of inhabitants like snakes or water bugs, trusting Dzar-Ghan wouldn’t have brought me here if it wasn’t safe.

Speaking of. A loud splash announced his arrival.

Why had I ever thought he would be like a hero of old and stay out of the water, guarding me? He was a barbarian through and through. And judging by his discarded clothing by the shore, a naked barbarian at that.

Gah!

What was a girl to do with that?

Had I said the pond was large enough to swim a few strokes? Apparently, it wasn’t large enough for the two of us not to be in close proximity. Thankfully, the water was murky, perfectly hiding him and me from the waterline on down. It was disturbing enough to see his face with his now plastered back, nearly black hair accentuating his chiseled features and burning eyes. With their brownish-red coloring, they really did look as if they were burning. Add the slant of his pupils, and he was a girl’s downfall.

His shoulders poked out of the water, incredibly wide and hard-muscled. With the sun shining on him, his skin tone appeared to be a deep dark copper, enticing in its otherness.

And then there were the scars. So many. They puzzled me with their evenness as if they’d been carved, but that couldn’t be, could it? Who would sit still this long to have a pattern like this carved all over their back, most of their front, and down their arm?

Dzur-Khan’s scars had not just been similar but exactly the same. It had to be some kind of mark calling out their ranks as khadahrs, but for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out how it had been done.

My hand itched to trace the pattern again, but thankfully, just then, he took a deep breath and dove underwater.

When he came back up, he held a few leaves out to me. They felt oily and lathery. He used them to scrub over his skin, and when I imitated him, I realized they were like soap, which explained the oily water. I sniffed them, but there was no scent; still, it felt good rubbing myself down with them, leaving my skin feeling as if I had used actual soap but without the drying effect.

When we were done, I made him get out first and turn his back. It was impossible not to sneak a peek at his formidable all-male body. His back was just as muscled as his front and his butt… that’s when I turned, but not before he began shaking himself to get rid of most of the excess water. Following his example, I shook like a dog and wrung out my hair, which had also been scrubbed with the plant, and yes, I had a few samples with me to analyze later. IC would make a fortune just on these. My skin and hair felt incredible.

By then, the sun had sunk so low it was barely a speck on the horizon, and I wondered if that was west here, too. Deciding it wouldn’t matter as long as I stayed consistent, I marked the spot in my mind.

With the sun lowering, the temperatures also dropped a good twenty degrees. I hated putting my dusty clothes back on over my wet body and underwear, but there was no choice other than to wander back into camp half-naked and shivering.

Dzar-Ghan pointed at a tent when we returned, and thankful, I made a beeline for it. Somebody had already put my backpacks in here, and I hurried out of my damp clothing and donned my pajamas. They were red-and-white-striped, my favorites, washed so many times, they were beyond comfortable and one of the very few articles I brought everywhere with me, even to an alien world.

The flap flapped as Dzar-Ghan entered, filling the large tent with his presence and making it suddenly seem so much smaller. That’s when I noticed another bag. His bag.

“Oh no,” I stated flatly. “No sex, no sleeping with you here. In the same tent”—my eyes moved to the before so inviting-looking nest of furs—“in the same bed.” For emphasis, I turned my head from side to side. No way .

Ignoring me, he shrugged out of his pants. Leaving me speechless and momentarily frozen. Unable to stop myself, my gaze moved over his massive body. And when I say massive, I mean. Every. Single. Part of him. I hoped his penis was semi-stiff because that thing wasn’t a penis; that was a weapon, one that would spear me, split me… sweat broke out over me. Fuck ! That word again, mentally, I rolled my eyes, but fuck !

Unintentionally, I licked my lips, his eyes drew to the movement, and mine stayed glued to his penis, dick, cock—damn it!—as it hardened, thickened. Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me!

An ache spread through my loins. He took a step toward me, and I raised my hands, palms up, shaking my head. No!