Riv's Sanctuary: A Sci-fi Alien Romance by A.G. Wilde (best books to read TXT) 📕

He wouldn’t relieve himself of the pressure, the pain.

He wouldn’t be so weak as to indulge. He’d endure it till it went away.

Hanging his head, he took a deep breath.

He was weak. Weaker than he’d realized.

All these years of telling himself he was better off alone, all of that was crumbling in just the short space of time he’d been around the sweet-smelling human.

Didn’t she understand?

She’d been thrust into his space and now she was invading his entire being.

Maybe he was overreacting. Maybe this was normal.

Maybe it would go away as soon as he got rid of her.

Or maybe he was weak.

And the last thing he wanted to do was let himself down.

Many orbits ago, he had promised himself he would never leave himself open to be used ever again.

But despite that he’d kept himself away from so many other females, he knew he was also not someone a female needed.

He was broken. Incomplete.

The stub where his tail once was served as evidence of that.

Which female would want a male like him?

He kept this in his mind as the air jet dried him and he exited the cleansing room, nude but warm.

Trust no one.

That had been his motto.

A silly one…because it seemed as if he couldn’t even trust himself.

24

A full week passed since the bathroom incident and, surprisingly, the days went more smoothly than she’d thought they would.

After that night, she was sure she’d have seen Geblit in the morning. And she’d been ready to leave with him too.

She’d had enough.

But Geblit never turned up and what’s more, Riv seemed to disappear for the most part.

So she decided to do what she could do.

Work.

Keep herself busy.

It was great, too, because, after being stuck behind a glass wall for a year, keeping herself company, she suddenly had things she could occupy her mind with.

She’d wake early, get out onto the grounds to do chores, return late, shower, eat, go to bed, repeat.

And during most of that time, she was left to her own devices.

Riv seemed more focused on securing the farm, spending most of his time by the perimeter when he wasn’t tending to the animals.

He stayed out of her way but she still found him hovering sometimes.

At certain points, she’d turn to find him watching her from a few meters off and, with his face covering and shades, she couldn’t tell if he was scowling or not.

Memory of what had happened between them that night played in her mind every single day but it was getting easier to forget as time passed by.

She wasn’t angry at him, really.

She was angry at herself.

She really should have known better.

She should have walked away before he’d told her to get out.

She knew her self-worth. She shouldn’t have stayed plastered underneath his slick, wet body as if she was a sex-starved animal.

And she shouldn’t want Riv.

What was bad was that after she’d held her head high and walked away, she could still feel her arousal dampening the mat of hair between her legs.

It was a good thing he didn’t make an effort to speak to her. She didn’t know how she’d respond.

And since he hadn’t said anything, she took that as a win. That meant her hard work was paying off.

He didn’t have a reason to confront her about anything.

So she’d been working tirelessly, not even taking breaks as she tried to complete as many jobs as she could for as long as the sun stood in the pink sky.

The animals were a great distraction from the mess that was her life.

Funny thing was, the “work” she was doing was questionable.

After the bathroom incident, when she’d thrown herself into working, she’d ignored Riv as she’d raked, shoveled, cleaned, and fed the animals.

He’d been hovering in the background, watching her, observing everything she did, but he hadn’t said a word nor had he approached her.

The following day, however, when she’d come out to do the almost-giraffe’s pen, she’d noticed about eighty percent of it had already been shoveled.

When she went to rake hay for the almost-crocs, most of that had already been done, too.

The same thing happened when she went to feed the plump woolly animals. They’d all already been fed except one enclosure.

That’s when it became pretty obvious what Riv was doing.

If he thought she didn’t realize he was making it easy for her, he must think she was dumb.

He was doing half the work but still leaving enough so she felt like she was doing something.

She didn’t know what his kindness meant.

She would ask him but every day, he woke before she did and came in after she’d fallen asleep.

Fine, she thought. That was fine with her.

At the start of the second week working on her own, Lauren rolled her shoulders as she closed the almost-giraffes’ enclosure.

She’d just finished shoveling their poop and had set the bucket down to the side. It wasn’t nearly full. She was sure the blue ninja had shoveled most of it before she’d gotten a chance to, leaving only a bit so she felt like she had something to do.

It was getting out of hand and she almost giggled, but she’d play along with his game.

She could bet he was hovering somewhere, watching her because he thought she was unaware.

Looking into the enclosure, she smiled at her handiwork. It looked much better than it did a week ago. She’d even cut some of the tall yellow-orange grass and put it in there. The animals seemed to like plopping their asses on it.

As she looked in, one of them stretched its long neck over the barrier and bumped her with its nose.

It was the animal’s way of greeting her and she rubbed its moist snout.

“See you later, little one.”

She snorted at that.

It was way bigger than her, even though it was a baby.

Smiling, she glanced up at the pink sky. It was a clear day as always. Clear, dry, and warm.

Her kind of weather.

She was dying to sunbathe but she just couldn’t afford to take a day