Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 72065 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 360(@200wpm)___ 288(@250wpm)___ 240(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 72065 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 360(@200wpm)___ 288(@250wpm)___ 240(@300wpm)
“Oh, of course! How foolish of me.” Her cheeks flushed again with embarrassment. “Forgive me, my Bear. I was thinking only of my own pleasure in being with you.”
“It’s a pleasure to be with you, too, baby.” He stroked her cheek again. “But I have to get going. Do you have enough to keep you busy around here? You’ve got plenty of books to read—right?”
“I do but…” She nibbled her lower lip uncertainly and Bear sensed she had something she wanted to ask.
“Yes, sweetheart? What is it?” he asked.
“It’s just that…today is the day of my mother’s medical treatment. She’s very ill, you know,” Aleena said quickly. “And I know we are just now Joined and I ought to stay in the house, but I would so love to be with her in the Healing House. She is very dear to me and the treatments are so painful…”
“Of course you can go visit her,” Bear said, seeing where this was going. “But I’ll need to take the hovercoach. What if I leave you some money so you can call your own coach to take you to the Healing House?”
Her eyes went wide.
“You would give me credit of my own to spend?”
“Of course—you’re my wife, aren’t you?” Bear went to the dresser and began looking through his wallet. He pulled out some of the triangular metallic credit chips that were used for currency and showed them to her. “Will this be enough?”
Aleena’s eyes went even wider.
“More than enough!” she assured him. “Thank you, my husband! I swear I won’t waste a single credit on anything frivolous. I’ll just go straight to the Healing House and back again.”
“Don’t be silly—get yourself some lunch or a treat,” Bear told her. “I’m not demanding that you scrimp and save—there’s plenty where this came from so buy yourself whatever you want.”
Her pale purple eyes surely couldn’t get any wider.
“Oh my Bear,” she breathed. “You are so kind to me! Even kinder than my father was to my mother before he disavowed her!”
The talk of disavowing made Bear uneasy.
“I just want you to be happy, baby,” he told her. “Now, I’d better get dressed or I’m going to be late.”
“Of course! I’ll make you something quick to eat for breakfast,” she promised, hopping off the bed. “And this time, I promise not to burn it.”
“Speaking of burns, let me look at your hand,” Bear said. He should have thought of that earlier, but she’d distracted him with that sweet little mouth of hers.
Obediently, Aleena held out her palm to him. Bear took her hand and examined it before nodding in satisfaction. The quick-healing ointment he’d applied the night before had done its job nicely and soon the protective false-skin he’d sprayed on the burns would start peeling off.
“Good,” he said nodded. “You’re healing well.” Impulsively, he leaned down and placed a soft kiss in the center of her palm. When he looked up again, Aleena was staring at him with an unreadable look. “Everything okay?” he asked.
She nodded.
“Truly the Goddess of Mercy was smiling on me when she led me to be your bride,” she said softly. “I have never met a kinder man.”
“I’m just treating you the way a husband ought to treat his wife,” Bear told her. He smiled and leaned down to kiss her forehead. “Now I really do have to get dressed.”
“All right! I’ll go make you something.” Aleena flashed him a beautiful smile and scampered out of the bedroom and down the stairs. And though he knew he needed to start getting ready, Bear couldn’t help watching her go. What a beautiful, sweet, curvy little bride she was.
It made him sick to think that as soon as the negotiations were done, he would have to break her heart.
21
ALEENA
Aleena was all ready to go with a rental hovercoach waiting in the driveway of her grand new house when her personal communications device buzzed discretely.
Quickly, Aleena answered. She was thinking that it might be either Bear or her mother. Before he had left for his negotiations, her new husband had exchanged contact information with her. Of course she would never bother him in the middle of his important meeting. A wife did not interrupt her husband’s work—such a thing was unthinkable. But it was nice he cared enough to want to be able to call her if he decided to.
Her other thought was that the call might be from her mother. Sometimes her treatments were so painful and if they had started early before Aleena was there to hold her hand, she might be in distress.
“Hello?” she said, hoping everything was all right.
“Hello? Is this the daughter of the woman Leelah who was formerly the wife of Sir Greggor?” an unfamiliar male voice asked.
“Yes, this is Aleena, her daughter,” Aleena said. “Who is this?”