Alien Scrooge - Zara Zenia Page 0,55

the daydreams for long. I reserved those times mainly for sleep or when Darla was yelling at me and everyone else in her tornadic path.

Sometimes, when I was there well before dawn, baking pastries for his breakfast in the dark, warm kitchens, I’d imagine him coming in, taking the rolling pin out of my hands, and carrying me to his private chamber. Maybe we’d curl up together and talk for hours or maybe we’d sleep. Maybe we would do a combination of both. I yearned for the touch of another. I craved conversation and someone who would be interested in me and would want to get to know me.

Was it sad that my fantasies with a gorgeous alien prince involved sleep? Definitely, but when you only get an average of four to five hours of sleep a night, that deprivation seeps into everything. Of course, there were plenty of daydreams where we did more than sleep.

Whatever we did, it was far, far away from this awful, crowded, heated room. I’d never seen the private wing of his ship, if ‘ship’ was even the right term for it, but anything had to be better than the sweltering kitchens. It was like a sweat lodge in here, and I was layered in chef’s clothing that didn’t do my perspiration any favors. I wanted to sweat in other ways. Other ways that involved Gardax.

Cloaked as the structure was with stealth technology, all but the main hull was invisible from the exterior. From the ground, it was almost imperceptible, just a small aircraft among the clouds. But if the chatter among the staff was to be believed, there was much, much more to it. The shuttle that carried us to work dropped us at the service port and we exchanged stories of the glimpses we caught.

Few knew how large the place really was, and I certainly was never given leave to go exploring, but it sounded massive, a maze of finely furnished chambers and passages that I would have loved to wander. In my deepest fantasies, I’d be waltzing through those doors with elegance and grace, adorned with the finest jewelry that money could buy. I wasn’t materialistic in reality, but like I said before, a girl can dream.

I’d only seen the prince a few times. There was my first day, when I came to work with a group of new recruits aboard his vessel, two months prior. It was brief, and I was so nervous I’m not sure I remembered to breathe. That whole time was a bit of a fuzzy blur in my mind. I naturally blocked out trauma in my life.

He was the first alien I’d ever seen. Before the Trilyns arrived seeking a treaty, the only other alien life-forms humans had encountered were little more than single-celled organisms on one of Jupiter’s moons. It was utterly shocking to discover that there was a sentient, intelligent, and frankly, gorgeous race out there. I wasn’t ever afraid of them, especially if they were here seeking peace and unity. I was more infatuated and curious of them than anything.

Aside from being incredibly tall, with muscles carved so finely he might have been a statue and eyes the exact shade of the freshly ripened corn that covered the plains of the home I was forced to flee, he looked like any other inordinately stunning human. I’d heard whispers that they were trained warriors as well, despite their royal upbringing, and it didn’t surprise me. The way he moved was so controlled, so powerful. His physique was mesmerizing, intoxicating.

There had been a handful of times I’d passed him in the main hall, but he hadn’t seen me. He was always speaking to someone or occupied in some way, always distracted, always serious. I had imagined royalty—alien or otherwise—led lives of luxury and relaxation, but I had yet to see Prince Gardax in any state of ease. I wondered if he took his own mental vacations, if he checked out and ran away to some happy place in his mind . . . and if he did, what sort of things he daydreamed about. I knew that he had to keep his air of confidence and leadership. He had a lot on his plate, as I could imagine.

Then there was the day he gathered the human staff aboard the ship to inform us of the impending party. His piercing yellow eyes had passed over me as he spoke, surveying the crew. It was completely idiotic, but