Total pages in book: 41
Estimated words: 38048 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 190(@200wpm)___ 152(@250wpm)___ 127(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 38048 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 190(@200wpm)___ 152(@250wpm)___ 127(@300wpm)
She went out into the living room and saw the big Kindred sitting on the floor beside the couch. He had a brooding look on his face, which didn’t bode well for any frank and open conversation. Still, Kelli tried.
“Hey, what are you doing down there?” she asked him. “Why not sit on the couch? It would be much more comfortable.”
He glanced at the couch and made a face. There were dark circles under his eyes and it looked like he hadn’t slept a wink.
“It just now reappeared. It’s been gone all night.”
“So you’ve been sitting out here like this all night?” Kelli raised her eyebrows.
He shrugged.
“It’s fine.”
“No, it’s not!” Kelli couldn’t keep her feelings in check anymore. “What happened last night? Why did you run off like that? Was it something I said?”
He shook his head tiredly.
“No, sunshine. It’s all me.”
“But what—”
“I really don’t want to fucking talk about it, okay?” he growled. Hoisting himself to his feet, he walked over to the front windows. “Looks like we can get out of here now. If I can find any fucking clothes.”
“I think the cabin left you some, but you’re not going to like them.”
Kelli pointed to the couch, where a neatly folded Santa suit had appeared, complete with a thick black belt and big black boots.
Klaus turned to look and gave a low, frustrated groan.
“This fucking cabin! I swear to the Goddess if I could rate it I’d give it no stars!”
As if in answer to his voice, the cabin suddenly spoke.
“We notice that the two of you have not consummated your relationship, as was expected during the Maximum Romance program,” it said in its soft, feminine voice. “Could you please give an explanation for your non-consummation and subsequent distancing from each other?”
Kelli wanted an answer to those questions herself, but there didn’t seem to be any forthcoming—not from her Protector anyway.
“Shut the fuck up,” he growled at the cabin irritably as he pulled on the Santa suit. Stomping to the door, he twisted the knob, clearly meaning to yank the door open and go.
But the door didn’t budge.
“Please answer the query before you go,” the cabin said pleasantly. “We cannot allow you to exit until we find out why our experiment has failed.”
“Experiment?” Klaus demanded, looking angrier than ever. “You’ve been doing an experiment on us?”
“We have,” the cabin acknowledged coolly. “We wished to test the efficacy of using classic romantic scenarios in facilitating mating in real-life conditions.”
“Which is a fancy way of saying you wanted to know if a plot from a Hallmark Christmas movie would really make people want to jump in bed together,” Kelli snapped, frowning.
“Affirmative,” the cabin’s voice said—though Kelli was beginning to think they were no longer talking to the AI that controlled the cabin. She had a sneaking suspicion it was the Questarion scientists they were conversing with.
“We have been monitoring the broadcasts from Earth for centuries,” the voice continued. “In the past few decades, we have become especially intrigued by the genre your people call ‘romantic comedies,’ especially the subgenre of Christmas rom-coms. We wished to learn if such scenarios would lead to actual mating behaviors but it appears that they do not if the two of you are any indication. If you would please clarify why you did not engage in coitus, we will allow you to go.”
“So this whole fucking town is just a giant experiment,” Klaus growled. “You just want to see if Christmas cheer will make people fuck!”
“Essentially,” the voice acknowledged coolly. “Please answer the question—why did you not mate last night?”
Kelli looked at the big Kindred, but his jaw was set and it was clear he wasn’t going to say a thing. Well, maybe she could get some answers out of him later, when they were out of the Christmas Village. But for now, someone had to answer or the cabin would never let them out.
“You can’t make people fall in love,” she said. “It doesn’t matter how romantic a situation you put them in if there are barriers in the way—maybe something from their past that’s hurting them or stopping them from moving on…” She shot Klaus a meaningful look. “Then they’re not going to er, ‘mate’ with each other.”
“So internal stimuli plays a greater part in mating rituals than external stimuli for your species,” the voice said, sounding thoughtful.
“Exactly.” Kelli nodded. “Now could you please let us out? We need to get home.”
“Certainly. We thank you for coming to visit the Christmas Village,” the voice said as the door opened with a click. “And we are sorry that your mating was a failure.”
Kelli was sorry too and she still didn’t know what was going on with Klaus.
But as they left the cabin behind, it seemed she wasn’t going to find out.
She waited as patiently as she could, walking through the empty Christmas Village in silence. Klaus was brooding and silent as they passed by the frozen pond where they had drunk hot chocolate the night before. He kept quiet as they walked past the shops and the massage parlor where he had rescued her from the crazy massage robot too.