Total pages in book: 159
Estimated words: 144433 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 722(@200wpm)___ 578(@250wpm)___ 481(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 144433 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 722(@200wpm)___ 578(@250wpm)___ 481(@300wpm)
And I start to cut.
He's a terrible person to work on—Zhur twitches and moves impatiently as I try to snip his long coat into a reasonably even length. His leg bounces as I work, and as it does, his towel slides to the floor. He doesn't even notice.
I do, though.
Since I'm leaning over him, I get a bird's eye view of, well, the twig and berries. Or in his case, the tree trunk and bushes. Because lord, the man is packing some heat. I've seen him naked before, but this is an entirely different angle, and, well...damn. His length hangs between his legs and jiggles every time his leg bounces. He's not hard, thank goodness, but it's still an impressive sight.
I should tell him to cover up. I should, but I like looking.
He's also made it clear that he's not shy, so I tell myself it doesn't matter if I keep on looking.
I trim his mane back as best I can while being distracted. I'm not trying to shave him into looking human, but rather cutting away the thickest parts and the biggest clumps so he doesn't have such a mess every time he bathes. "I feel sorry for your servants back home," I grumble as I hack at a thick tuft at the base of his neck that is nothing but knots. "It must have taken hours a day to go through all this shit."
Zhur grunts agreement. "That is why I had six body servants."
"Six?!"
"To divide the work amongst themselves, yes. Otherwise it would take many hours."
Well no wonder he's one big snarl of kitty fur. I can't do the jobs of six people. I imagine him with his arms out, fully naked, while people groom and comb him. The idea of someone being the "Left Armpit Body Servant" strikes me as hilarious but I don't think he'll share my amusement. "If anyone gives you shit when you get home, you can tell them I held you down and shaved you against your will."
"Yes, because the thought of a grown praxiian being held down by a human female won't be shameful at all," he retorts, voice dripping with sarcasm.
"Be nice or I'm going to cut a bald spot back here."
He growls, but he also falls silent.
I finish the worst of the cutting and work on shaping his hair a bit. When I'm done, I step back and eye my handiwork. It's not bad. He has a bit of a mohawk between his tufted ears, but the mats are cut away and the rest of the thick mane that's left is easily manageable. His neck is more or less revealed now, and I'm surprised at how thick it is, and at the knots of muscle across his shoulders. "Did you work out back home or something?"
"I sparred regularly. It would not do good for the—" He pauses, and then says, "It would not do good for me to be slovenly."
Because I can't help it, I reach out and pinch a thick bit of the trapezius at the base of his neck. Hard as a rock. I shiver, because muscles on a cat alien shouldn't matter.
They don't matter. They don't.
...right?
CHAPTER
THIRTY-SEVEN
MAEVE
Dyeing Zhur's hair ends up taking most of the day. I have to mix up multiple batches of the spice-dye and plaster it all over his head, his face, his arms, his chest, his back, and I make him do everything below the waist. We dye him in sections, letting each plaster sit for a good hour before he washes it off.
At the end, Zhur is a buff color all over, and he's incredibly pleased. Not just at the color—which he hates—but at how soft his remaining fur is.
"Feel this!" he insists, holding out one corded arm. "Feel how soft my fur is! This is how it should be after I bathe. My skin no longer feels like the desert!"
"I get it," I say, but he shakes his head.
"Feel," he says again, all but shoving his arm under my nose.
So I feel his bicep. And sure, I'm supposed to be feeling his fur, but all I see are hard muscles underneath, and all I feel are impossibly strong arms, and I can't stop thinking about the length of dick he had laying against his thigh and the way he moaned when I put the oil-and-dye mixture on his scalp and worked it in.
Man, it has been a long time since I got laid. What, five, six years? There's bound to be cobwebs in my lady parts. Surely that's why I'm obsessing over the muscles of a spoiled brat who is now dyed the palest of orange colors.
I pat his arm and can't help but notice he still has nothing on but a towel. "We'll probably have to refresh your color regularly for a bit. Maybe I can whip together some sort of body wash you can use every time you shower."