“You ‘figured’ right,” Chain said, smiling at her. His heart was pounding at the thought of being naked with his beautiful Victoria but he told himself that she had specified there would be no sex. He would be careful and respect her boundaries. Still, at least he would be allowed to see her beautiful body again.
“Okay, good then.” Victoria smiled at him. “Let’s get in then, I guess.”
Chain nodded. “Yes, let’s.”
She turned her back modestly and began to undress and after a moment, Chain did the same. Boundaries, he reminded himself as he did so. No matter how much you want her, you must respect her boundaries.
But Gods, it was going to be really hard to look at her beautiful naked body without touching her!
* * * * *
God, I can’t believe I asked him to take a bath with me! What happened to doing the sensible thing? Vicky asked herself as she pulled off her clothes with shaky hands. She’d only had on an old pair of jeans and a t-shirt so there wasn’t much to take off. She made a face of disgust as she saw the splatter of green alien goo on the back of the jeans. She was definitely going to have to wash those before she could put them on again.
As soon as she was naked, she turned quickly for the pool, hoping to get in first before Chain could see her. Of course, he’d seen her completely naked that night on Priima Belle—seen her and done a whole lot more. But she had been really tipsy at the time and she was much more shy and retiring about her body when she was sober.
Thank goodness the float dots are still in place, she thought as she looked down at her breasts, which were still riding high and proud. These things are great—I’m never taking them off! They—
Her thoughts cut off abruptly when she turned and saw that Chain was already in the pool, waiting for her.
“Oh, uh…” She laughed nervously and attempted to cover herself with her arms.
“Are you shy to let me see you, beautiful Victoria?” he murmured, smiling up at her. “Don’t be—I love your luscious curves, my little Elite.”
Oh, that’s right—he’s into plus-sized women, Vicky reminded herself. Still, she couldn’t help blushing as she lowered herself into the warm water and settled across the bathing pool from Chain.
But once she was submerged to her chin in the steaming water, she found she couldn’t stay tense. The water felt silky against her body—as though it had some kind of skin conditioning treatment in it. Vicky found it incredibly relaxing and her muscles began to unknot for the first time in hours.
“Mmm,” she moaned leaning her head against the side of the pool and not caring if the bottom of her hair was getting wet. “This feels so good.”
“It’s very relaxing after a night of doing battle,” Chain agreed.
Vicky laughed quietly.
“Yes, I guess so. Though I wasn’t expecting to be fighting for my life on family movie night.”
“I’m so sorry about what happened with the Varians.” Chain looked at her seriously. “I feel like it’s all my fault. And your domicile—”
“Is a complete and total wreck,” Vicky said calmly. “But I’ll tell you what I told Kat—my girls are all right and that’s all that matters.” Summoning her courage, she crossed the bathing pool to stand in front of him. “You saved us tonight, Chain. Thank you for coming for me—thank you for saving me. You must have come the minute Kat’s message got to you.”
He frowned. “No, actually—her message that you didn’t hate me for being an M-Switch didn’t come until I was already down on Earth. Vorn and Liosh followed me there and told me just as I was about to go get you.”
“Really?” Vicky was confused. “But then, why did you come to me in the first place? Did you just…decide you wanted to see me again?”
Chain shook his head.
“Of course I did want to see you again—only I thought you had no wish to see me. I came because the Goddess told me to—told me through the T’lix-Kruthe.”
“What? How?” Vicky looked at him with wide eyes—could he be serious?
“Well, I was presenting it to the Kindred High Council…” Chain went on to tell her of how when he joined the two halves a bright light and loud music played. “And then the Goddess herself told me to get down to Earth and save you because the female she had given me was in grave danger,” he finished. He cupped her cheek in his big hand. “Victoria, I was so afraid I’d be too late,” he murmured. “Thank the Goddess I got to you in time.”
“Well I’m pretty grateful too. Grateful the, uh, Goddess was thinking of me.”
Vicky felt dazed as she said it. She wasn’t an atheist but after Kevin had left her, she had definitely questioned if there was a God. And if so, why had he let such an awful thing happen to her? Being abandoned and left alone after so many years of faithful marriage—it didn’t seem fair or right.
But if Kevin hadn’t left me, I’d still be living in a miserable loveless marriage, she thought. And I never would have met Chain. So maybe everything really does happen for a reason.
“The Goddess wasn’t the only one thinking of you,” Chain murmured. “I haven’t been able to get you out of my head since the moment we parted.”
“I’ve been…thinking of
