He cupped her right hand in his and he smiled. “Not broken, just bruised. Do you always turn this colour?”
“When I have impacted something with unsupported flesh, yes.” She wrinkled her nose.
She held her breath as his fingers slowly stroked her skin and the colour shifted until it was healthy once again. “That wasn’t too bad.”
He grinned and moved his chair around to the other side of the exam bed. “This will be more of a challenge. What cut you?”
Rowen sighed. “In all honesty, the gouge was caused by the tree with the yellow pods. It was so thirsty for minerals that when my arm came into contact with it, it ripped through my skin. I watered it with my blood for a bit, and when the Guardians arrived, the tree tried to apologize by pulling me up and out of harm’s way.”
He was stroking the skin of her inner arm slowly, and each stroke removed another layer of blistering and scarring.
“I was fading in and out when Walking Darkness scooped me out of the tree and Fire Fall cauterized the wound. After that, I passed out. I must have hit my right hand somewhere in between.”
It took twenty minutes to fix her arm, and after ten, she was having a problem. Every soft stroke of his fingers sent spasms through her sex. She wrinkled her nose and squirmed.
He threw her a wink. “Half of one percent of patients have that reaction.”
“It is just the matter of being touched, I think. My body takes everything as foreplay.”
Walking Darkness shifted forward but Fire Fall pulled him back.
The moment that the arm was healed, he began a slow pass over her body, his palms half an inch from her. He found something on her knee and he flipped the gown panel aside to heal the bruise and abrasion she didn’t know she had.
When her front was checked out, he asked her to turn over and he opened the panel of her gown. He hesitated. “Has someone removed your family markings?”
“My what?”
“When you marry here, there is usually a ceremony where you get markings from your husband’s family. You are saying that that didn’t happen?”
“Um, no. My people don’t mark themselves when they marry. They wear a band and that is sufficient.”
The healer nodded. “Right. I just rarely see a woman with skin so smooth and unmarred, and never do I see it in a married woman.”
“Consider today an education, Healer Wyfin.”
“I am doing so, Lady Nakkua.” His voice indicated his smile.
He healed a patch on her backside where she had struck the tree and then she was done.
“You are finished, Lady Nakkua. Feel free to resume your clothing.”
She pushed herself back to her feet and zipped back around the screen. She was out of the gown and back in her gardening suit in seconds. The boots took a few moments longer, but when she was out, she flexed her hands and smiled.
“Right, so we can be on our way?” She smiled at Wyfin.
“Just pay at the front desk and you are good. Come back if you need anything, Lady Nakkua.”
He took her hand and raised it to his lips.
A flash of shadow parted their skin and pushed them away from each other.
Healer Wyfin blushed a deep olive. “Apologies. That was beyond the scope of treatment.”
Walking Darkness took her gently by the shoulders and headed for the door.
She didn’t have a chance to say goodbye. She was marched to the lobby and she paid her bill with a thumbprint and ocular scan.
After that, they were on the way to the private pods.
Fire Fall smiled, “You have a lovely spine, Lady Nakkua. Is it true that you haven’t been touched?”
“Not in the last few years. Amongst my own kind, I am too tall and too obsessed with plants. A bit of experimenting just after puberty was the extent of it.”
Walking Darkness paused and turned his hood toward her. “You are very forthright about these matters.”
“Why not? They don’t matter. I can be aroused with a touch. So can most folk that I know.”
Fire Fall paused and laughed. “Valid point.”
They were in the pod when she finally asked Fire Fall, “Do the ladies really have tattoos covering their backs?”
He nodded. “It shows the change in allegiance from birth family to husband. The artists come along to the wedding and the bride is marked in front of witnesses.”
“Ouch.”
Walking Darkness spoke. “It doesn’t hurt an Irudan woman. Our skin is thicker than yours.”
She turned toward him. “Your body language said you wanted to hit the healer. Why?”
He looked at her with eyes lost in shadows, and he slowly pulled up the cuff of his suit up to expose an intricate band on his forearm.
“That looks like…that is just like…” She extended her own and matched the pattern. She stared into his hood and then punched him in the shoulder. “You jackass!”
Fire Fall chuckled. “Lady Nakkua, you really have to stop hitting him.”
She learned that. Tendrils of shadow that managed to have the compression of a gravity field bound her.
“I am requesting your discretion on this, Rowen.”
She narrowed her eyes at him and struggled against him. “Bite me.”
Back at the manor, Fire Fall suddenly decided he needed to get something to eat while Walking Darkness escorted her to the depths of the maze.
He flipped back his cowl the moment they were alone and pulled down the fabric that covered him from cheekbones to neckline. “Lady Nakkua.”
She scowled and fought against the bands still around her. “Lord Nakkua.”
He sighed. “Please, you are still fighting. If you relax and promise not to hit me again, I will release you.”
Rowen grumped but finally nodded. “I won’t hit you.”
He let the shadows slip from her, but there was a lot more contact against her than she was expecting.
She took a cautious step back. “So, why did you need a fake wife?”
He stepped forward. “You are not a fake wife, you are a real one; this was just supposed to be a cold bed so I could concentrate on being a Guardian. That fell flat the moment that you set foot on this world.”
Rowen pursed her lips. “What do you want from me?”
“An opportunity to court you. If you don’t wish to share a bed with me, I will understand, but I would like the chance to earn your trust and your affection.”
She held up her palms. “Wait. Are you saying what I think you are saying?”
“I would like the opportunity to seduce my wife. Yes.”
Rowen was stunned. This was not what she had signed up for.
He grabbed her wrist and he brought her right palm to his lips.
A shiver ran up her arm, across her breast and below her navel.
She cleared her throat. “Uh, seduce me?”
“Indeed. I would like to call on you during my free time and yours. I would accompany you to the events my mother plans and stand at your side. Perhaps we could even dance.”
His eyes still held shadows in them, and he trailed his lips down her inner wrist. The shivering became more intense as he went.
“I don’t know how to dance. I had to turn away all requests…was it only last night?” Her voice was throaty and breathless.
“I can teach you. It is a simple matter when there is trust. Shall I show you?”
She swallowed. He had spoken with his mouth against her skin. She could feel the words and they echoed in her body.
“I think you are pretty good at the seduction thing.”
She felt him smile against her skin and shadows spun around them to ensure privacy.
He caught her in his arms and pulled her body flush with his. To her surprise, he began to murmur instructions in low tones for how easy it was to dance on Irudan.
Her mind was spinning with the feel of him. He was solidly built and smelled of soap and midnight when everything was cool and dark.
“You are giving away your identity and your courtship, Skorin, if I may call you that?”
“I do not care. You are here, we are married, you have met local society and it is acceptable that they now know who and what I am, and who you are by default.”
He moved with her in elaborate patterns that left her dizzy and clinging to him. She held tight, and when he stopped, she was breathless, disoriented and clutching his chest. He kissed her, holding the back of her head where the braid began.
She parted her lips and invited him inside, moaning when the hot slide of his tongue entered her. His other hand pressed her hips into the obvious erection below his waist and she rocked against him.
He lifted her and held her tight until there was only fabric between them as he rocked her harder and faster.
The friction and heat built to an insurmountable wave, and then, she felt a cool entry to her body that thickened suddenly and she groaned in his arms, clinging to him while her body shook.
She moaned as he helped her lower her leg and his kisses became soothing instead of savage.
His hand still supported her and she was glad. She needed it.
Rowen pressed her forehead to his chest with her cheeks scarlet. “Dance instruction?”
“I am a multi-tasker when it comes to dealing with a woman I want. That woman now and forever is you. You are the one I need to convince.”
“This isn’t what I signed up for when I came to Irudan. I just wanted to spend time in the gardens.”
“I want you to do that as well. There will be nothing changed except my attentions during your free time and at the events you are required to attend. Even as a full husband, I respect your occupation, and in fact, I still have one of my own that will require odd hours and late nights. Neither of us can give up what we are for the other and the courtship will simply get us moving in the odd rhythm together.”
The idea of moving in rhythm with his was tempting. That brought a thought to bear. “Did you uncover that portrait?”
His cheeks darkened. “I did. Rhoda of Yacaro does excellent work. She is one of your kind with a talent for seeing a person’s perfect match or destiny. She puts a higher priority on working with your species to get you settled in the Imperium. It is a dangerous place for a woman alone. I believe that she is seeking out likely matches for you.”
“So, your back really has all that stuff on it?”
“It does indeed. That is a Nakkua family mark. I got it when I was seventeen.” His hands were now cradling her with care.
She shivered in his grip and slowly eased away. “That was interesting and all, but when and where I do have to give a deposition for what happened last night?”
He caressed her cheek and sighed. “Fire Fall will take it. So, what is your answer?”
“Answer?”
“Will you let me seduce you?”
She gathered her self-control and she heard herself saying, “I will let you try.”
His smile was slow and wicked. “That is all I desire, well, not all, but it is a start.”
The shadows retracted and he pulled the covering over his face and raised his hood.
“When are you going to come out as Skorin?”
“When I am ready. I have been in this cowl for several years. It is my safety net.”
Rowen blinked when he was back as Walking Darkness. “I think I get it. All I know is that I have a greenhouse full of plants that need my attention and you have to do whatever it is that you Guardians do.”
His eyes wrinkled as he smiled. “I have never been dismissed before. It is an interesting feeling.”
“You are not being dismissed, you are being postponed. Last night, a bunch of drugged-out young adults hauled me along, and I came in contact with their tree. That tree was never supposed to exist and it knows it. I need to be around other plain old plants that just want to grow and fruit.”
“The tree will be returned to the medical researchers if it hasn’t been already. It was supposed to be an oral sedative, but it altered itself into a hallucinogen. It will be taken care of by the best of gardeners.” He turned and put his arm around her, walking her out of the maze.
“I am beginning to guess that I am the best of gardeners. There doesn’t seem to be another horticultural talent on Irudan.”
“Talents are fairly sparse in our population. I only know of twelve and four of us are Guardians.”
“So my being here is unusual?”
“Very. You are the only talented alien who has ever applied for a place on Irudan. They jumped at the chance and quickly scrambled to find someone to be your husband. I was lucky that my rank was higher than that of the next applicant.”
She paused and looked at him. “There was more than one?”
“Twenty-seven. There were twenty-seven men lined up if I didn’t speak up, so I did.”
Her mind spun. “Why?”
“What do you mean?”
She shook her head and continued walking, following the path of dented grasses that had led her in.
He grabbed her arm and stopped her. “What did you mean, why?”
“I am nothing extraordinary. I mean, I am tall for my species but nothing special. At home, I couldn’t find one male to be interested, let alone twenty-seven.”
He tapped her nose with his finger. “Twenty-eight. You are lovely, soft, with bright eyes and a passion for your work. That denotes a possible passion elsewhere if a man can gain your attention.”
“That is stupid logic.”
“Masculine logic. It doesn’t have to make sense to you.” She could tell he was smiling again.
He escorted her out and to the greenhouse. When the warmth and scents of green and growing things wrapped around her, she relaxed.
“Have a good day, Rowen Nakkua. Fire Fall will be here later to take your deposition.” He bowed and left her.
After staring at the space where he had been, she headed in, grabbed her apron and data pad, working her way through the list of plants on the sick and dying roster. It was a good way to spend her day.
Fire Fall was brought out to her by a fawning intern. Rowen gave her an amused look, and the girl shrugged and walked away, swaying her hips in blatant invitation as she went.
Rowen wiped her hands clean and grinned. “Where did you want to do this?”
“You mean the deposition, right? Because I think Walking Darkness would have something to say otherwise.”