Not about Sir getting well—I wasn’t wrong about that at all. In fact, he was up and walking in about a week—or a wern as the Korrigons called it. Not bad for a guy who’d been stabbed in the heart. But it didn’t happen right away.
He was in the Korrigon version of surgery for a long time and pretty out of it for the first few days afterwards. Aside from the surgery—(which seemed to involve lots of Mind-controlled lasers, I know because I watched through a big glass window)—I stayed with him every waking minute.
I even slept in the healing bed with him, curled against his side, though some of the Korrigon doctors didn’t like that at all. But when the guards told them that the Sovereign herself had ordered that I should be left alone, they stopped griping and let me stay with Sir.
I was back on a diet of nutritional gel cubes, much to my dismay, until one day, about three days after the duel and the surgery, the food technician came around with the nutrition cart. Which was, as far as I could tell, just a small, portable version of the Matter Synthesizer in Sir’s spaceship.
“Well now,” she said brightly, speaking to me as though I was a young child—which was how all of them talked, since I was just a ‘pet.’ “It’s mealtime again. Can I get you some yummy gel cubes?”
She was holding the golden control circle as she spoke and was about to put it on her head.
“No,” I said bluntly.
I was getting tired of the way the staff around here treated me, although the guards the Sovereign had stationed outside Sir’s door had a healthy respect for me. They were always giving me side-eye when I went past them. But everyone else at the Healing House seemed to think I was just a cute little pet that was staying by her sick Master out of loyalty. Which I was, actually, but I was a person too and I was really over the way they all talked to me.
The food technician widened her full-black eyes at my abrupt answer.
“Excuse me?” she said, frowning down at me. Even the Korrigon women were at least eight feet tall, so she had no difficulty doing this.
“I said no, I don’t want any more of the gel cubes,” I said, frowning up at her. “But if you’ll let me use the controller, I can make what I do want for myself.”
“Let you use the controller to the nutrition cart?” She gripped the thin gold ring in her hands tightly. “I’m afraid that would be very unsafe for you! This kind of thing would hurt your little pet brain!”
“Listen,” I said, losing my patience completely. “I just won a Mental duel against Sir Gra’multh, the Overlord of the Southern Continent. So I think I can handle thinking a cheese sandwich into existence without frying my brain. Okay?”
“You…what?” She stared at me blankly, the controller still gripped in her long fingers.
“Let…her.”
The low, hoarse voice behind me startled both of us. I turned quickly and saw that Sir’s eyes were open at last.
“Excuse me, Overlord, but did you speak?” the food technician asked, leaning over him.
“I said…let her…use the…controller.” Sir coughed and winced as he put a hand to his chest, over the newly repaired secondary heart. “Little one…can handle it,” he finished at last.
“Oh, but I don’t think—” the technician began.
But I had seen my chance. While she was distracted with Sir, I simply leaned over and plucked the golden circlet out of her hands and put it on my head.
“Hey!” she exclaimed, her eyes going wide. “You’re going to hurt yourself!”
“No, I won’t. Let me concentrate,” I told her. Closing my eyes, I imagined what I wanted. I felt the familiar connection to the Matter Synthesizer and when I opened my eyes, the nutrition cart gave a soft, ding!
“Did you just…” The technician stared at me with wide eyes.
“Go on, open it,” I told her. “But be careful—it’s going to be hot.”
Carefully, she opened the cart door and looked inside.
“Oh—what’s this?” she exclaimed, taking out a full bowl of chicken noodle soup, just like my mom used to make me when I was sick.
“That’s for Sir,” I said decidedly, taking the steaming bowl from her and placing it on the tray-table which hovered about an inch off the floor beside Sir’s healing bed. “He can have solid foods now, right?”
“Well…yes, I suppose so. But what is it?” the tech demanded.
“It’s Earth medicine,” I told her. “Food that helps you heal faster when you’re sick. Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to make something for myself.”
I closed my eyes again and asked for a bowl of tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich to go with it. Yeah, it wasn’t very sophisticated, but after everything I had recently been through, I felt the need for some comfort food. I also asked for some spoons for the soup and some diet Coke for me and a Sprite for Sir, (which was the drink my mom always gave me when I was sick) and then I was done.
But the tech was staring at me with such wide, disbelieving eyes by the time I finished, I decided to make one more thing. Closing my eyes again, I wished for a big platter of hot, homemade chocolate chip cookies. The kind that are gooey on the inside and crispy on the outside and completely, utterly, sinfully delicious.
“Oh…” The tech’s nose wrinkled as she sniffed at the platter of cookies experimentally when they came out of the nutrition cart. “That smells really good!”
“Try one,” I told her, offering the platter. “Go on—they’re amazing.”
“Well…” She looked around as though to make sure no one was watching. “Actually, you know, I think I will.”
She picked up one of the cookies and bit into it. And then, she moaned in delight.
“Mmmm!” If the Korrigons had had visible eyeballs, I knew hers would have been rolling up in her head in pure bliss. Well honestly, is there anything better than a fresh, hot chocolate chip cookie straight from the oven? Or in this case, the Matter Synthesizer? If you can think of anything better, speak up. I’ll wait.
At any rate, the food tech really liked the cookie.
“This is delicious!” she raved to me. “So much better than nutritional gel cubes!”
“I know.” I grinned at her. “Here, just let me take a couple and why don’t you let the other hospital, er, Healing House staff try some? And if you run out, just come back—I can always make you some more.”
“Thank you!” She nodded and helped herself to another cookie before taking the platter from me.
“Well, little one,” Sir murmured hoarsely, when the tech left the room and I turned back to him. “Still getting your own way, I see.”
“Of course.” I smiled at him and bit down on the warm cookie in my hand. “I always get what I want. And what I want right now is for you to get better. So eat your chicken noodle soup.”
After that, Sir’s stay in the Healing House went much smoother. The guards started telling the story of what had happened in the throne room—I think they had been afraid to talk about it earlier—and the food tech passed around the cookies. And all in all, I began to get a bit more respect and fewer pats on the head like I was just a pet.
My chocolate chip cookies and other desserts became legendary and the food tech parked one of the nutritional carts in Sir’s room so that I could make them multiple times a day for the staff. Sir himself began recovering rapidly, though the head Healer in charge of his case decreed that he was not allowed to use his Sex Pet—aka me—until he was completely well again. So at night we just snuggled together and talked until Sir’s medication made him too sleepy and he passed out.
“I have never had a woman stay by my side this way when I was ill,” he told me, one night near the time when he would be discharged. “You’ve been there for me in ways no other female ever has, little one.”
“I’m just returning the favor,” I told him. “Think of the way you took care of me after O’nagga Nine! Besides, you’re my Master—of course I’m going to stay with you.”
“I’m just so glad I chose you from the Alien Mate Index,” he murmured, drawing me close to his side. “I cannot imagine my life without you now, my darling.”
“I feel the same way,” I said, snuggling up to him with a sigh. “Sir, let’s never be apart again.”
“I agree with that completely,” he said, giving me that one-sided smile of him. “And as soon as the head Healer allows it, we’re going to seal our bond.”
The thought of finally making love with him completely, of having his thick shaft all the way inside me, gave me a shiver of pure lust. I missed touching him and having his big, warm hands all over my body. I wanted nothing more than to seal our Master/pet bond and be together forever until the end of time.
But it was not to be.