A Son for the Alien Warrior (Treasured By The Alien #2)
Honey Phillips & Bex McLynn
Chapter One
Mariah pulled her beat-up old Camaro into the parking lot for the city park and let it shudder to a halt. She clenched the steering wheel in an attempt to keep her hands from trembling. Too much caffeine, she tried to tell herself. But even though she’d been guzzling coffee all night, she knew that wasn’t the reason she was shaking.
Forcing her hands to release the wheel, she reached for the small bouquet of flowers sitting on the passenger seat. They weren’t much—just a cheap bouquet from the last gas station—but she had wanted to bring something, some token to acknowledge that this was the last place where her sister Judith and her nephew Charlie had been seen.
As she climbed out of her car, her collection of bracelets jingled, the sound startling in the still morning air. With a muttered curse, she pulled off all but the frayed friendship bracelet her sister had tied around her wrist not five days before she disappeared. Judith had laughed and tugged one of the braids scattered throughout Mariah’s long blond hair as she displayed her own bracelet.
“There. Is that hippie enough for you?”
Mariah’s eyes filled with tears as she remembered that morning in her sister’s small townhouse, as neat and organized as her sister. Why hadn’t she stayed with her for just a few more days? But she had already been restless, the same restlessness that had kept her on the road for more than fifteen years pulling at her. Despite the joy of spending time with her sister and her new nephew, she’d left that day for a gig in Detroit. The police had contacted her a week later.
Now she took a deep breath, wiped her eyes, and turned towards the park. Even though the summer sun hadn’t yet crept above the horizon, the parking lot wasn’t entirely deserted. A big black Escalade stood guard at one end and two mom vans were parked by the walking trail. Mariah gave them a wistful glance as she passed by, noting the car seats and the colorful assortment of toys. Judith had a similar model, still sitting in her townhouse driveway. Mariah hadn’t been able to bring herself to sell it.
The path led into the woods, still cool and dim in the dawn light. Her sandals made no sound on the asphalt and nothing disturbed the hush that lay over the park. She started to hum, but the sound was so unnerving that she stopped and focused on reaching her destination instead. Around the next curve, a meadow opened up, leading down to a small lake with a bandstand perched on the shore. That was where the police had found the jogging stroller.
As she emerged into the meadow, she paused. Mist drifted up from the water, obscuring most of the open area, and the same unnatural quiet persisted. A breeze whispered past, like cool fingers against her skin, and she shivered. The mist cleared for a fraction of a second and… what was that? Her heart started to pound.
All her life, she had been addicted to stories of the supernatural, of the unusual, and that included UFOs. She had no doubt about what she had seen in that quick glimpse. A huge spaceship, gleaming in dark metal, hovered over one end of the meadow with a ramp descending to the ground. No wonder the police had never found any trace of Judith or Charlie.
Straining to see through the mist, she moved closer. Her heart was pounding so hard she felt sick but a spaceship here in the same place, exactly one year later? It had to be the same aliens. And maybe, just maybe, there was a chance that her sister and her nephew weren’t lost to her forever.
A slight rustle penetrated the fog-muffled air and she dropped down into the long grass lining the shore, not caring that the wet grass instantly dampened her long skirt and peasant blouse. A man appeared, dressed in a severe black suit and facing away from her. She started to call out, to warn him, but then he raised his hand and her mouth went dry. It was not a human hand. Six long fingers, impossibly smooth and white, manipulated something that looked oddly like a radar detector.
He scanned the area but just as he turned in her direction, a low call sounded from behind him. A second man—no, a second alien—appeared and they had a brief conversation in a clicking language. Her pulse racing, she automatically reached for her phone, but it was completely dead, not even a flicker of light appearing despite what she knew had been a full charge.
While she was trying to decide what to do, two more aliens came down the ramp. Three of them disappeared off into the mist, while the fourth one stayed behind, examining a tablet-like screen with a disinterested air.
Probably checking alien Facebook, she thought half-hysterically. If he would just move a little farther away, she might be able to sneak onto the ramp behind him. Wait a minute. Was she seriously going to try and sneak aboard? Even as she wondered, she knew the answer was yes. She twisted her bracelet ruefully. Her sister would have been the first one to tell her she was being impulsive and reckless, but Judith and Charlie were her only family. If there was even a small chance that she could find them, she was going to take that chance.
The alien wandered a little farther away, still focused on his screen, and she crouched on the balls of her feet, ready to make a dash for it. A startled cry came from the far end of the meadow and then the unmistakable sound of a gunshot. The alien took off at a run in that direction.
Mariah paused for just a second to make sure no one else was coming, then took a deep breath and darted up the long metal ramp, her heart thudding against her ribs.
Inside, she found a dim, cavernous space more than half-filled with a wide variety of containers, some of them resembling huge packing crates much taller than her, while others were stacks of what looked like Tupperware boxes. All of them were strapped into place in some complicated arrangement that she didn’t quite understand. Based on every science fiction movie she had ever watched, this must be the cargo hold.