incubate, hatch, and blossom into acidic green alien pus that starts eating away at my mind. Scenarios like sexy boss lunchtime, big brawny quarry worker quickies, and paying Bash ‘under the table.’ Hell, on top of the table too, why not.
His brilliant, beautiful, super sexy Gryfala.
No wonder he’s still so messed up in his headspace. She’s never left it.
“What,” Bash asks, confused, “does exown mean?”
I try to swallow past the lump in my throat. My eyes try to leak a little. “Not exown—does your ex own.”
Bash is beginning to look frustrated and exasperated. “My what?”
“Your ex—your…” my voice breaks, causing Bash to jerk back, “your ex-Gryfala, Bash!”
“My...?” He rears up, frowning mightily. He takes me by the arm—with his hand now. His tail never left me. He starts hauling us away, but to my surprise, we aren’t headed in the direction of the nearest rock pile.
“Where are we going? We aren’t working?”
“We’re going to fix this communication issue between us,” he says with finality. Like somehow, if we change the way we hear reality/each other’s words, it will make our circumstances all better.
To everyone else in the quarry, he bellows, “KEEP WORKING! And don’t go near that Counter. Isla will not be weeping because of me, and if I find my numbers gone, I will flame roast every last one of you!”
CHAPTER 41
BASH
(Crying Counter: Outstanding)
I haul Isla to the Na’riths. If anyone can fix her, this lot will have the equipment. “Switch Isla’s translator so that she speaks in Gryph to me. No more of this human-to-Gryph. She is my mate and we can barely converse; she makes no sense.”
“That’s not the fault of the tech,” the pirate says, grinning. “That’s marriage.”
“Funny,” I growl.
The Na’rith makes adjustments to my translator rather than Isla’s, on account of the process having the possibility of being painful. Thus, rather than have her speak my native tongue, I get a download of more human words and phrases and other confusing data that will hopefully sort itself out whenever I have discussions with my mate.
We return to the quarry. I watch Isla become fraught with silence. Understandably, seeing my mate upset makes me upset. Unfortunately, she says she needs time to think and she tells me that she wants to work first rather than have this issue out.
On any other day, at nearly any other time, I’d approve of her throwing herself into a task. But I want her to throw herself into fixing what feels so very, very wrong between us.
When I tug Isla aside and tell her this, she assures me we will work on it, but first I must let her think.
Think. Think? I’m losing my teveking mind! But I let her be. I stare at her, but I try my best not to crowd her, and my mate who talks nearly nonstop retreats to seek solitude in herself.
My wrath turns darker than the purple-midnight core of our planet.
I’ve heard the humans claim that their ‘feelings’ can ‘bleed out’ onto others when they’re in a mood. My emotions don’t bleed, but the humans around me nearly do.
The humans become anxious, unsure why I’m snarling more than usual, and then they’re more anxious when I begin to yell at them. “No—tevek no, don’t you dare cry I’m not angry with you CRITE I SAID I’M NOT ANGERED! STOP CRYING THIS INSTANT!”
“Bash, whoa, whoa,” Isla tries to draw me away, but she does so still looking so glum, I’m infuriated. I have a vocation that is physically demanding, one that has honed my body, built me so that there is almost nothing that I can’t lift or crush. Yet all the strength in the world cannot help me lift or haul away or fix whatever is upsetting my beloved mate. “Isla,” I growl. “I am begging you to speak to me. What is causing you to be sad?”
Isla glances around the quarry stirring with her nervous friends, or tries to. I catch her with my tail and tighten her right to my front, roping us together by wrapping it around us both.
“Let’s maybe not talk about this here,” she hedges, eyes not quite meeting mine.
“Teveking agreed,” I say, and I loosen my tail only so that I can haul her up and over my shoulder. My dorsal spines slap low against my back almost with anticipation. They aren’t filled; she’s in no danger of being stabbed by them now and thereby struck with their toxin. She even gathers one in her hand for leverage