5. Roark

“Aye-m Nah-t Yer Peht!” Huu-goh gasped out, his face an angry red, his whole body quaking. I willed myself to comprehend his words even though I had literally no idea what he was saying. We’d had a pleasant dinner in our rooms after returning to the ship so I thought his grumpy mood had passed. I’d been wrong. Because when I entered the bedroom after showering and brushing my teeth—I had been met with…with this .

Dinner had made me naively think I’d been imagining the tension between us.

Huu-goh had seemed happy.

That had been the calm before the storm.

“Yew muhthehrfuhker,” he hissed out, stomping around the room, his tiny body stiff. I could not for the life of me understand what he was so upset about. I’d done everything the “How to care for an Earthling” pamphlet had told me to do today.

He was fed, watered, clothed.

I’d been gentle with him. Fed him treats. Petted him.

What else could he possibly need?

You’re not enough for him, a traitorous voice whispered.

That sudden sense of inadequacy threatened to bring me to my knees.

No, no. I could do this.

I could.

I needed to stop fantasizing about mating with him and move on. That was the problem. Maybe he could sense how ill at ease I’d been. Maybe he was more astute than I’d given him credit for. Maybe he’d been learning me as I’d been learning him.

I held my hands up in surrender, purring low in the back of my throat to soothe him. The sound rumbled as I edged my way toward him so I could fix the mess I’d made of this.

Slow and easy. Don’t frighten him.

“Treeteeng mee lyke uh dawg.” Huu-goh stomped around some more, his ire turning to sadness that tasted salty-sweet in the air as his eyes began to leak again. “Tuh-gg-eeng mee awround ahll dae. Aye thot yew wehr dihffehrehnt—” He pointed at me again, in accusation. His eyes were red-rimmed. Tears leaked down his cheeks. My hearts ached. “Buht aye ahm juhst un ahnimahl to yew—naht uh purrsahn—and aye—” he hiccuped. I froze, floored by his beauty and the fact that for the first time in my life I had no way of fixing this.

I’d always been a fixer.

It was in my blood.

But I didn’t know what he was saying. Didn’t know how to solve a problem I couldn’t understand.

I gazed at those stormy brown eyes as they filled to the brim over and over again. My hands shook, still raised placatingly—because I didn’t know what to do. Huu-goh rubbed his palms against his eyes, the shirt I’d procured for him hanging loose on his long, limber frame.

He looked gorgeous when he was sad. He always looked gorgeous, if I was being honest. There was something about him that was so colorful. Even without the ability to understand his words, I could see his emotions written plainly across his face.

The longer I’d spent with him, the more I’d grown to admire him. His tenacity. His intelligence. His resilience. I respected him more than I’d respected anyone I’d ever met. So to see him hurt like this pained me. Especially when I knew it was my fault.

“Wah-ter?” I offered, because it was one of the only English words I knew.

“Noh. Noh wah-ter.” Huu-goh put his hands on his hips. He stomped. Actually stomped . Then he froze, and frowned, realizing what he said. “I meen. Naht thihs sehcond. Buht yes, Aye-ll need wah-ter uh-gayen aat sum poihnt. Ore aye-ll dai.”

I didn’t understand what he was saying, but I nodded anyway. Slowly.

“Fuh-d?”

“Noh fuh-d.” To my horror Huu-goh’s eyes filled with tears again, his frustration evident. I didn’t understand. Maybe this had been a mistake. Maybe all of this had been a mistake. I was supposed to make his life better, not…not this—whatever this was.

“Aye juhst…aye juhst—” He deflated, looking lost and lonely as he crossed his arms over his chest and squeezed himself tight. “Aye-m lohn-lee.”

His eyes spoke to me—the way they always had.

I simply had needed to listen.

Oh.

My hearts thudded unsteadily as I realized what he needed.

Relieved, I took a steadying breath and raised my arms out wide. Huu-goh’s expression was wary, his brow furrowed in confusion as he bit his plush pink lip. “Wut…?” He wavered, and I held still as I waited for him to understand.

“Huu-goh,” I said as patiently as I could. My pulse thundered. “ Huu-goh, ” I repeated, plaintively. Maybe he desired to be touched as much as I ached to touch him? Maybe…intimacy is what had been missing. Maybe…maybe we were more suited than I’d thought.

Maybe by waiting for him to make the first move I’d done him a disservice.

I couldn’t be too angry at myself, even though I wanted to be. This was my first time in a relationship—if that was what we could call this. And I had…no idea what I was doing.

Huu-goh kept staring at me and his eyes were turbulent. Swirls of unease and exhaustion twisted inside their depths as he inspected me from head to toe—dressed in sleep pants as I’d been about to retire for the night—his lips wobbled and I ached for him, for his confusion, for his fear.

I wished I could soothe him.

I wished we were back on my home planet so that I could contact A&R about purchasing permanent translators. I had never had a reason to buy one in the past as I had always gotten along just fine speaking Common. However, I now had a fluffy-furred, clever reason named Huu-goh. Which meant I planned on procuring one for myself as well as for Huu-goh as soon as we arrived home. I would’ve bought them earlier, but it was copyrighted tech that wasn’t readily available anywhere else, and unfortunately, at the moment, my hands were tied.

So this was…the next best thing.

A few more seconds passed.

My purr grew deeper, rougher, trying to entice him like he was a pup in need of comfort. In a lot of ways he was. Even if he hadn’t looked so young, his behavior would make the age gap between us obvious. He was so full of life . Intrigued by anything and everything.

I had lost that spark long ago—if I’d ever had it at all.

It’d died the day my first captain had.

Until the moment I’d seen Huu-goh.

Huu-goh’s face morphed through a series of expressions too quick for me to decipher. I was still learning him, though one day I hoped to have every one of his faces and their meanings memorized, just as I hoped he’d learn my colors.

My chest vibrated as my hearts lurched. Something in Huu-goh broke then. His eyes spoke to mine.

They said, I need you.

They said, don’t leave me.

They said, please understand.

He swallowed, and I watched his throat bob, fascinated by him all over again as he took an unsteady step toward me. So brave. So goddamn brave. My hands shook, arms still outstretched as I waited for him to cross the space between us.

I could acknowledge that the distance had been there since the day he’d stepped foot on this ship. It was my fault. I knew that now. I’d done this to us. But I wanted to fix it. Wanted to hold him—even if holding him innocently was all I’d ever have. Even if he didn’t want me the way I wanted him. Even if his proposal had been false, and his interest wandered.

I still wanted to be there for him.

Even if it broke my hearts.

“That is it, little one,” I crooned in my own tongue. I ignored the ache in my groin that the sight of him obeying my command inspired. It was a new sensation. As uncomfortable as it was exciting. “Come to me. I will make it okay.” It was the second time I’d made that promise, but it felt even truer now.

He took another step.

Pleasure, unlike anything I had never known tingled at my fingertips.

So obedient, so lovely, so beautiful.

His dark eyes glimmered with determination.

Five steps. Four steps.

Three.

I could smell him. Smell my own soap in his hair as his fluffy head appeared at my ribs, his head tipping up to study me warily. He was shaking just like I was. Like his body knew the trauma he had been through even when his mind did not. Brave as ever, Huu-goh stepped inside my embrace. I tentatively hovered my arms above his shoulders, terrified to touch should I scare him off.

I did not want to frighten him.

Even if I ached fiercely to embrace him.

I had never hated my teeth, my claws, my size. Until the moment I realized how easily they could be used to scare a person as defenseless as my mate. One day, a small part of me still hoped he would realize those same things were what would keep him safe. They would be a comfort to him.

The moment Huu-goh’s cheek settled against my body I sighed. Something inside me shuddered into place as that soft skin rubbed against my own. My surface clung to him, tiny tendrils reaching out as desperately as I wanted to. Huu-goh giggled, pulling away from my torso to stare at it in wonder.

“Woah,” he said, shocked—he did not look affronted, however. Instead, my endlessly curious companion tentatively pushed a finger against my bare skin. It parted, reaching for him, sucking him inside till part of him became part of me, the tip of his finger encased beneath my surface. “Woah,” he said again. Huu-goh pulled his finger free. My arms remained aloft, but I lowered them around him the moment his cheek met my ribcage for the second time.

I was only a man, despite my inexperience and strict lifestyle.

What else was I meant to do?

He was so small, so sweet in my arms. Tiny. My cocks ached, twisting together in a way that made me weak-kneed. His close proximity did things to me that did not feel fair in the slightest. Like I was a teen just learning how his dicks worked—not living in my fourth decade.

Huu-goh had responded like this before, at the club, when he’d been frightened and I’d soothed him. He’d trusted me then as he trusted me now, curling his arms around me just as tightly as I held him.

I rumbled against his orange fur, petting down his back in slow, gentle swipes to soothe. Back and forth, back and forth. Huu-goh’s panic faded.

I scented salt in the air.

He was crying again. I did not interrupt. Beings both large and small needed time to process their emotions. Some hit things, like me and Mala. Some, like Ushuu, worked through them silently. And some…were like Huu-goh.

Their emotions fled from them on trails of salt.

It was a beautiful thing, a huu-man’s tears.

I felt honored to behold them. I wished I’d appreciated them more the first time around. That I had asked him more questions. That I had been able to learn him through words as well as actions. That I had told him how brilliant I found him—how strong.

He was small.

So small .

Delicate.

And yet he had survived so much .

Huu-goh still found joy in things, despite the bad that had happened to him. Despite how defenseless he was. He never appeared frightened. Not like I was—frightened all the time, every day. Frightened of losing the people and things I loved most. Frightened of losing control, because without it I had nothing left.

I traced his spine from top to bottom, reveling in the way he trembled and quaked in response. His tears had stopped falling, the scent of salt growing stale. Tighter, his arms twisted around my middle. “That is it, sweet creature,” I murmured in my own tongue against his fluffy head, rubbing my cheeks against it to scent him.

It was the first time I’d allowed myself to do so.

I ached.

Huu-goh—thank god—seemed to appreciate the touch. He made a pleased little sound. It was a noise that I’d only ever heard him make when I fed him something particularly sugary—or when he’d seen the gemstones at the cave on our first field trip from the ship. I purred my amusement, stroking down his spine again in the hopes of causing another sound.

It was lovely.

He was lovely.

My cocks ached.

God, did they ache.

“ Roark —” Huu-goh whined my name. The sound of it on his tongue like that cut through me, trembling through my body as the sweet man in my arms grew even more pliant. I should stop this. Except that it was so close to what I wanted—I just…I couldn’t bring myself to do it.

“Roark,” Huu-goh repeated, breathless and confused but no less pleased. My hand slipped lower and he gasped, stilling completely as I smoothed my palm over his rump for the first time. “Yehs.”

Did he like that?

My cocks writhed together.

I squeezed.

Huu-goh’s breath hitched and his hips stuttered against my body. “Yehr tehn-tah-cles ahr?—”

I didn’t understand what he was saying, too enthralled by the swivel of his pelvis and the way his dick was pushing against my thigh. When I glanced down, I realized why exactly he had become so breathless.

My body apparently had a mind of its own.

I hadn’t meant to but…

Hundreds of tiny tentacles had sprouted from my elbow, slinking down his arms, sucking and pulling at him as they slipped beneath his shirt. Everywhere we touched they tickled across his skin, toying with the nubs of his nipples. It was a tantalizing sight, all that pink twisting and writhing across pale supple flesh.

Wasn’t this the sign I’d been waiting for?

Something awoke inside me as I stared and stared and stared, drunk on the sight of him.

Huu-goh’s cock was hard, just as mine were.

I could feel it. So much smaller, but no less masculine. Singular, but just as greedy as mine put together. I groaned, suddenly hungry for more. Hungry to see him in an entirely new way. To taste him.

His length pushed against the fabric of his own sleep pants, thickening with every second. My tendrils grew bolder, pulling at his nipples till they pushed against the fabric. For a creature of his stature Huu-goh’s dick was impressive . Longer than I would’ve expected, and listing to the left as it pulsed against the thin fabric.

There was a wet spot forming beneath the crown, see-through enough I could see the pink head pushing against it. I confess, I couldn’t bring myself to stop even if I wanted to. This was everything I’d wanted—and I just…I had to see what he looked like when he gave in.

Had to see him come.

Had to touch him—the way I’d never wanted to touch another person.

Growling, I buried my face in Huu-goh’s neck, ignoring the voice in my head that whispered what I was doing was wrong. That I should wait. That he had asked for comfort, not this?—

But he didn’t seem to mind as he pushed his hips against my leg and began to hump me in earnest. My eyes flooded black with lust and I released a groan of my own, consciously tugging harder at his nipples now as my hand gripped his rump tight. He rutted harder against me, fucking my thigh like the little beast he was.

Ah.

Yes.

That’s what he was?—

Yes, yes.

“That’s it, little beast,” I purred in my own language. I shuddered when I felt him clutch hard at my shoulders, his fingers sinking in as he fucked and fucked and fucked. Tight snaps of those tiny hips, hungry and primal.

I urged him on, drinking him in greedily. My fingers rubbed at his ass cheeks, then between them, and lower still. With every touch his hips grew needier, grinding harder and harder. When I could feel where his balls were pulled tight, I paused. Huu-goh, because he was perfect, spread his legs wider to give me room.

His breath came out in desperate little bursts, and with each puff against my body, I felt like I was soaring.

You’re doing this to him.

You’re making him feel good.

My cocks jerked, slip-sliding in the mess they were making in my own sleep pants.

“Oh fuck,” Huu-goh mewled, snap, snap, snapping against my leg.

I glanced down at his face, away from the insistent little cock fucking my leg, only to immediately regret not looking at his expression sooner.

His eyes were as black with lust as mine were and he was flushed from head to toe. Huu-goh’s tongue was out as he panted, those sweet useless flat teeth flashing as he bore them, and his nails dug into my forearms tight enough to sink inside my flesh. “Oh fuhk,” he repeated. It must be a curse of some sort, or a deity, for how reverently he said it. “Gahd yew feel soh goohd.”

I clutched his ass harder, and pulled at his balls, my cocks throbbing as I watched his eyes cross and drool dripped down his chin. The wet spot on his pants was growing bigger and bigger as Huu-goh rubbed against me, that thick long dick leaving a mess all over both of us.

“Fuck me, little beast,” I cooed against his ear in my language. I did my best to ignore the voice in the back of my mind that whispered I was doing this wrong. “Give me your cum.”

A few more stuttered thrusts later and I got what I wanted.

Huu-goh made the prettiest , most wonderful noise I’d ever heard as he spilled between us. Like a wounded animal his head tossed back, the cords in his throat bared as he rutted one last time against my leg. My tendrils pulled at his nipples again, milking every last drop of his pleasure from him before they slipped away and retreated inside my body.

His expression was dazed and foggy as he came down from his high, that pert little ass clenching beneath my fingers as I rubbed between his cheeks from top to bottom just to make him gasp again.

“Enuff,” he whimpered in human-speak, pushing at my chest weakly, his face flushed and his hair sweaty. “Sensihtihve.”

“I do not understand you,” I purred against his ear, “but you are delicious all the same. What a gift you have given me.”

“ Fuhk ,” Huu-goh whined, “whai yew gahtta sownd like that? All growlee and shiht. Jee-suhs.” He nuzzled against me, his earlier ire forgotten. His legs buckled a little when I released his ass. An easy enough fix. I picked him up off the ground. He barely protested as I carried him into the bathroom and helped him get clean.

He’d made a point to get angry when I tried to accompany him to the bathroom before, but there were no protests this time. At least at first. When I reached for his soiled clothing, Huu-goh pushed my hands away and pointed at the door with an angry furrow to his brow.

I took the hint and left.

Twenty minutes later Huu-goh rejoined me in the bedroom, looking fresh-faced and relaxed in a way he hadn’t before. He sleepily wandered to his bed in the corner of the room, curling in a ball on top of it, and snuggling in before he turned to look at me, his blue eyes wicked with intelligence.

“I thihnk…” he swallowed, speaking to me even though he knew I had no way of understanding. “I dohn’t mayend bee-eeng a peht if it meens yew tuch me like that ahll the tayem.”

He smiled, a sweet grin that made him look prettier than ever. My hearts pounded as I offered him a smile of my own, my cocks still pulsing with need inside my sleep pants. They hadn’t stopped aching the entire time I’d been waiting for his return. Now that I was whole again, the memories my tendrils had made while wrapping around him teased the back of my subconscious.

His nipples had been so soft but hard, desperate to be twisted and plucked.

His skin was so warm .

No wonder why everyone was so obsessed with sex.

When Huu-goh was asleep I waited all of thirty seconds before I made my way to the bathroom. My hands shook as I pulled my toy from beneath the sink. I hadn’t done this in years, not since I’d been young and virile, and thought I owned the world. I slicked the opening of the mount with lube, listening toward our room to make sure Huu-goh was still asleep before I pulled my cocks out of my trousers and pushed them into the device.

It sucked and slurped around me and I growled, ducking my head toward my chest to hide the sound as I tore my claws into the toy and pounded into it. My cocks twitched and writhed, twisting together as they sought the friction they’d been aching for.

And when they came my eyes rolled back, memories of Huu-goh’s blissed-out expression playing in the back of my mind as I scraped my fingers through the remnants of Huu-goh’s cum on my thigh and brought them to my snout to sniff.

Hope was a trembling, newborn thing.

And when I climbed into bed, satisfied and aching to hold Huu-goh close, for the first time in months, I knew I wouldn’t dream of death.