Total pages in book: 24
Estimated words: 22109 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 111(@200wpm)___ 88(@250wpm)___ 74(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 22109 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 111(@200wpm)___ 88(@250wpm)___ 74(@300wpm)
The alien male sizes me up, gaze moving over my body before fixing on my face. “I do not know what ‘noodling’ is.”
“Trying to catch fish with your hands.” I move along the bank, keeping clear of the muddy edges. “If you are, I’ll go downstream so I don’t interrupt.”
To my surprise, he looks down at the water with a hint of unease. “There are fish in here? Live fish?”
“Well, the dead ones tend to float to the top,” I drawl, teasing. “They’re not great swimmers.”
He snorts with amusement and one big, clawed hand scratches at a thick pectoral. He’s not wearing a shirt or a tunic, I’m realizing. It must be on the banks somewhere. “I am not trying to catch a fish, alive or dead. I’m looking for my ident badge.”
“Your ident badge?” My eyebrows go up. “What’s it doing here?”
His whiskers twitch, which I find hilariously adorable, and he looks grouchy as hell. “It is a long story.”
“I bet it is.” And I wait.
He scratches at his chest again, looking annoyed. “My brother drank too much at the cantina last night and stole our sled rental. He only vaguely remembers driving away, finding a stream and dropping my card into it.” One wet hand gestures at the stream. “The tracking logs on the sled show that it must be this stream, but I can’t find the card.”
“And you were being still so the water would clear?” I wonder, and when he nods, I beam. “I figured it was either that or noodling.”
“I should be doing neither,” he growls, swatting at the surface of the water as if it offends him.
Well now, he’s going to scare away the fish if this continues. That is, if there are any left in the vicinity. So much for my fishing this morning. Not that I need the food. Fish is tasty, but I have plenty of supplies. I just like fishing. Reminds me of home. A big grumpy stranger splashing around is twice as amusing as fishing, though. “You’re never going to find it at this rate,” I agree. “I have a net back at my homestead. You want me to grab it and maybe that will help you find your card?”
He pauses, eyeing me skeptically, and I notice one of his big, triangular kitty-cat ears has a small gold hoop in it. How freaking cute. “That would be…helpful, yes.”
I wink at him. “Be right back. Don’t go anywhere, grumpy.”
“I cannot go anywhere if I don’t get my ident card back,” he calls after me. “I’ll be stranded here.”
Two
HRRRUSEK
I’d bet ten credits that the female isn’t coming back.
If she was smart, she’d race back home and call the port authorities on me. I know I’m not supposed to be on private land. That was one thing that was made very clear to the contractors that set foot in tiny Port on equally tiny Risda III—it’s a human reserve and we’re to leave them alone at all costs, or the contract could be revoked. And if my keffing brother hadn’t gotten wasted on ooli brew and gone joyriding with an air-sled rental, I wouldn’t have left Port.
But he did, and tossed everything in the cab out into the water in a drunken spree, and now I’m standing waist-deep in water that smells like a fish tank and hoping that a curvy human female takes leave of her senses and returns.
Most of the humans are terrified of us. I don’t blame them. I’ve seen some of the terrible shit that goes down in the slave rings. I’ve never had a slave of my own because the thought is distasteful, but I know lots of praxiians that keep them. Never gave it much thought until now. Now, I’m picturing the smiling female with the ample cleavage in a slave collar and wearing a chain, dragged around behind some unfeeling master, and I’m glad she’s here and not elsewhere in the universe.
Even if she doesn’t come back.
I run my claws through the murky water again and peer down into it. She mentioned there were fish in this stream, and the thought is vaguely alarming. Do fish bite, I wonder? My tail goes still and presses against my leg.
“I’m back,” a voice calls cheerfully. Sure enough, the female returned. She must have more guts than sense, but I’m glad for it. I’m trapped here if I lose my ident card. Not that this is the worst place to be trapped, but they’re protective of the humans here and won’t look kindly on me if I cause problems.
I don’t blame them for being protective of the humans. If they’re anything like the sweet creature that climbs down the bank, her teats bouncing as she slides into the water, they’d be wise to be protective. Most of the locals are tiny things, built like twigs and look as if they’d snap under a praxiian’s paws. Not this one. She’s an average height, I think, but her curves are bountiful, her thighs thick, and her ass as abundant as her magnificent teats.