"Any chance of getting shoes?" Liliat asked. "I would hate to arrive at my new home barefoot." She looked down at the donated, ill-fitting clothes she was wearing. "Clothes too. A comb. A toothbrush."
Anandur exchanged looks with Yamanu.
"Give me your sizes and I'll call my mate to arrange for clothing and footwear to be sent with the second plane, but I'm not sure she can make it in time. The aircraft should be leaving our airstrip in California soon." He glanced at his watch. "Let me check with the boss if we have time to deliver anything there."
As Yamanu pulled out his phone and started texting, Eluheed looked around the table at the familiar faces of the ladies and Tony, who'd become his friends over the months since his arrival at the harem. They were Tamira's surrogate family, and they had welcomed him as one of their own.
He'd been so fortunate in that respect.
Of course, he had not considered himself lucky when he’d been abducted by Gorchenco and sold to Navuh. In fact, Eluheed hadthought that his god had forsaken him, that Elu had punished him for failing to secure his charges. But as it had turned out, he’d been in the right place and at the right time to encounter Gorchenco. That meeting had started the unbelievable chain of events that had landed him here, at this table, sitting with the love of his life and her adopted family.
Was finding the clan Elu's goal from the start?
Was Annani's clan the answer to Eluheed's prayers?
"Thank you," he said to Anandur. "For the rescue. For taking all of us. For inviting us to join your community. I can't speak for the others, but I will do everything I can to repay your kindness."
23
ESAG
Esag tried to focus on Drova's instructions about which barracks building had been prepared for the refugees, but his attention kept drifting to the small group in front of them.
More specifically, to Tula.
She was walking beside her human partner, their hands linked in a way that made Esag's jaw ache from how tight his facial muscles were. It wasn't just irrational jealousy over a female he had no business feeling possessive of. It was also anger at himself for having those feelings.
He'd known about Tony. He'd known that Tula was carrying Tony's child. And he'd also known that she didn't like him and blamed him for treating Gulan badly, breaking her heart and insulting her to boot.
But Tula had reached out to him, and they had shared dreams and visions, and he hadn't imagined the connection.
"Are you even listening?" Drova said beside him.
"I heard you. Third building on the left."
"Mm-hmm." She shot him a sideways glance with those unsettling eyes of hers. "Stop staring at her butt. Her boyfriend might have an issue with that. Humans don't like it when other men look at their partners with covetous eyes."
"I'm not coveting."
"Maybe not, but you are staring, and he might interpret it as coveting."
"I don't care what he thinks," Esag bit out.
Drova apparently delighted in needling people, and he wasn't going to play into her hands.
He forced his attention back to the path ahead, deliberately not looking at Tula and Tony.
It lasted no more than thirty seconds.
His gaze drifted back just in time to see Tula yank her hand from Tony's grasp. The movement was sharp, angry, completely at odds with the gentle way she'd been holding his hand moments before.
Tony reached for her again, his mouth moving, saying something that Esag couldn't hear over the noise of the generator. Tula's expression softened, but she looked more resigned than happy about having him hold her hand again.
What had he said to earn her ire?
It didn't take much with Tula. He could have said that the temperature was pleasant, and she would have gotten angry because she thought it was hot and humid and that he was being stupid for thinking it was nice.
Esag wished the human was stupid, but Tony was anything but. He was a bioinformatician, and that sounded like something smart.
