Married to Krampus - Marina Simcoe Page 0,13

unbuttoning his uniform coat, he leaned back in his chair, gesturing to the drone for another drink. He rarely drank hard liquor on a week night, but today warranted it.

The privilege of being the first to acquire a human wife had been bestowed upon him by the Governor of Voran. Deep inside, Grevar suspected that Governor Ashir Kaeya Drustan had wished to marry him off simply to keep his attention away from his own wife, Shula. Not that there was anything to worry about. Ever since Shula had chosen Ashir over Grevar, they had been nothing more than friends.

In public opinion, as the decorated war hero and the newly promoted Colonel, he was a logical choice to be the first Voranian to marry a human. It was a great honor he could not refuse.

Not that he wanted to refuse it, of course.

Having a wife was a rare thing in Voran. Artificial insemination allowed a man to have his own family. However, many would be delighted to have a wife in addition to children if given a chance.

That said, Grevar hadn’t exactly burst with delight when he’d been informed about the honor bestowed on him. His wife would be a foreigner, an odd-looking alien from a newly discovered planet. There’d be cultural and other differences to overcome. Despite that, he had been looking forward to her arrival.

From the moment he had accepted this marriage, nothing could be changed. Instead of trying to contact his new bride, he’d chosen to wait until he saw her in person. So much could be lost in translation during communication by mail or video feed.

He had chosen Daisy from a stack of pictures dumped on his desk at work one fine morning. There was not enough time in his busy life to even try to go through all of them, not to mention to give any careful consideration to each of them.

All the women in the pictures seemed very much the same to him. Their skin shades varied from beige to dark brown, and their hair colors ranged from pale yellow to black, but those were the only differences, and they meant little to him. None of his potential brides had any horns or fur. And all had looked equally strange with their dull human eyes—alien.

He had expected some complications. Everything about tonight, however, had proven challenging and overwhelming.

Heaving a long breath, he took a big swig from his freshly refilled glass.

Unfortunately, it hadn’t been possible to tell from the picture alone how much of a chatterbox his new wife would turn out to be. His head pounded with the ache from her blabbering.

Of course, having anyone at all around here would be a challenge. The most noise he usually had to endure in his home had been the subtle dripping of the irrigation system watering the plants or the whirring of the numerous Omni devices, or the noise of the entertainment system every now and then when he watched the news. That was about it.

Having a chatty woman living under the same roof with him would be an adjustment. Though, maybe not necessarily an entirely unpleasant one.

He liked the expression of delight on her face when she had first entered his home. It reminded him of that happy smile she had in her application picture—bright and full of wonder.

Her voice, melodious and pleasant, wouldn’t be too hard to get used to, either. Even if she continued to talk as much as she did, he could see himself being able to tune her out, let her voice blend with the trickling of the irrigation system in the background. As long as she didn’t expect him to reply to her every statement, they should be fine.

Hopefully, she’d also try harder not to say the insulting things she’d said tonight. He had a thick enough skin and wasn’t easily insulted. However, criticism about his children and the way he was raising them was not something he took lightly. Thankfully, she truly seemed sorry when she realized she’d said too much.

This was a new world for her, after all. How well she’d do in it would largely depend on her ability to learn.

The image of her rose in his mind again.

Looking straight at her face had been the most difficult. The lack of horns disturbed him. Staring at her smooth forehead, he couldn’t even pretend that she’d suffered some accident resulting in the loss of her horns.

Thankfully, the rest of her didn’t seem so bad. There even were some