Total pages in book: 141
Estimated words: 130947 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 655(@200wpm)___ 524(@250wpm)___ 436(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130947 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 655(@200wpm)___ 524(@250wpm)___ 436(@300wpm)
Part of her wanted to be suspicious about how good it felt to let him hold her, to wonder why she felt so inexplicably safe in his arms. But Liv didn’t want to think about those things at the moment. Didn’t want to question the warm, comforted feeling she got from being close to him. For the moment, she wanted to just let things be.
“Okay, Olivia,” he rumbled softly when her tears had tapered off to sniffles. “You wanna tell me why I came home to find you in the dark strapped in the Touch-U set on high and my best fireflower juice in a puddle all over the food-prep area floor?”
His voice was gently amused but Liv stiffened anyway. Suddenly she remembered she was supposed to be mad at him. And not only that, now that her nerves were more settled she was realizing that they were a little too close for comfort. Or maybe a lot too close was more like it. There was a gaping rip in the black silk fabric of her nighty where the massage mat had gotten frisky and her bare breasts were pressed against the material of the dark blue shirt he was wearing. Pushing away from his broad chest, she hastily pulled the ragged sides of black fabric together to cover herself and glared up at him.
“First of all you left me here in the dark and there are no freaking light switches anywhere in this damn apartment. Or suite, or whatever you call it.”
Baird frowned. “Switches? For lights?”
“Wall panels, damn it! You flip the switch and the light comes on.” Liv pointed to the perfectly smooth wall. “Where are they? How can you control the lights without them?”
“Like this. Lights off,” he said in an authoritative tone. At once the bathroom was plunged into darkness with only the faint, diffuse glow that Liv had been stumbling around in before he came back. “Lights on,” Baird said and the room was suddenly awash with warm, golden illumination. “I had them configured for your voice too, before I came to claim you,” he told Liv. “Try it.”
Scowling, Liv did as he asked. “Lights off,” she muttered and sure enough, the room was doused in darkness. “Lights on,” and the warm golden glow was back.
“See?” Baird shrugged. “That was all you had to do.”
“Well you could have told me.” Liv crossed her arms over her chest, still frowning. “Back home on Earth we still flip a switch to make the lights go off and on.”
“I’m sorry.” He spread his hands wide. “I should have thought to tell you. I guess I left in kind of a hurry and didn’t get around to it.” He cleared his throat. “But that still doesn’t explain why you had the Touch-U turned up on high like that.”
“Is that what you call that perverted thing?” Liv shivered as she gave the black massage mat a disgusted look. “It practically attacked me.”
He frowned. “It wouldn’t have if you hadn’t set it to the highest massage setting and then pressed the eroticize control. Even I would’ve been scared to get on it set to those levels.”
“Well how did I know what buttons to push? I was in the dark, remember?” Liv flared at him. And anyway, I wouldn’t have gotten on it at all if the weird teddy bear thing hadn’t been chasing me.”
Baird’s brow furrowed. “What did you say was chasing you?”
Liz sighed in frustration. Apparently the Kindred weren’t big into stuffed animals. “It was this little fuzzy blue thing that came at me when I was in the kitchen—what you called the food-prep area,” she clarified, seeing his confusion. “At first I thought it was cute and tried to pet it. But then it opened its mouth and it had these long, sharp—Omigod! There it is!” She pointed behind Baird where the bright blue teddy bear had suddenly appeared.
“Where?” He turned at once, putting himself between her and the perceived threat. Liv couldn’t help noticing he moved with incredible speed for such a large man. She waited breathlessly for the murderous teddy bear to attack but nothing happened. Then, to her dismay, Baird began to laugh. It was a deep, rumbling noise that came from the bottom of his chest and it might have been nice to hear if it wasn’t so obviously directed at her.
“What?” Liv glared at him. “Would you mind telling me what’s so damn funny?”
“I’m sorry, Olivia. It’s just…I can’t believe you were scared of Bebo.” Baird laughed again.
“Bebo? What the hell is a Bebo?” Liv demanded, still keeping her distance from the bright blue teddy bear which was eyeing her mistrustfully.
“Bebo’s his name. He’s a zicther—an animal native to my home world, Rageron.”
“Rageron?” Liv frowned, wondering why the name of his home planet evoked strange images in her head.