Chapter Two
Imuna Parker
It had been two months of life without my husband, and I found every day harder and harder. No matter what I did to distract myself and no matter how much I pushed myself into my work at the Intergalactic Bank, I couldn’t get over it. I was still in deep grief.
Standing on the terrace every night only made me feel worse. Every time I stood there, I looked up into the sky, the way that I used to when Sion was on a mission. Tears filled my eyes. It was always the same when I stood there, but this time something snapped inside of me. I didn’t want to be without Sion, and I felt like the moment was heavier than any other that I had been through.
I looked down over the glass wall railing. It was a long way down from the top floor of the floating building. That’s when logic left me, and I just wanted to be rid of the pain of mourning. I walked inside and pulled out a chair and set it against the glass rail. I pulled up the hem of my white dress and stepped onto the chair. I stopped crying. I felt numb. I felt nothing.
A low hum grew louder and louder. I thought my mind was playing tricks on me since I was about to end it all.
“You would destroy such a beautiful thing?” I heard a deep voice say.
It startled me, and I nearly lost my footing. I caught myself on the rail. To my right was a vehicle hovering at the end of the terrace.
Boom! The heavy sound of a large Ition alien landing on the terrace. My eyes were wide as I looked at him. Was I imagining this? He stood there with his dark blue skin, blue-black hair shaved on the right side of his head, with the rest of his long hair flipped to the left side. He had broad shoulders and was a looming figure. He wore a snug gray uniform that stopped at the elbows, revealing tattoos on one arm all the way down to his wrist in black ink. They were Ition designs that I did not understand. He had a sideways grin on his face flashing white teeth at me. He stepped towards me.
I gasped, suddenly frightened. “Who are you? What do you want? What are you doing here?”
“Get down from there, human,” he ordered.
I narrowed my eyes at him.
“You presume to order me around? How dare you.”
“Yes, I order you not to kill yourself. That would be such a waste of a sexy human female body like yours. There are so many things I could use it for,” he said still walking down the terrace toward me, putting only a couple of feet between us.
“You arrogant ass!” I said.
He laughed a boisterous laugh. “Fine, then do it. Let your body become flat on the ground. Let your memory go to disgrace for giving up,” he said putting his hands out beside him as he got very close.
I was silent. Now that I had been jolted out of my moment of despair, I felt foolish and dramatic for thinking about jumping. I looked down. I suddenly felt dizzy and swayed.
“No.,” he said as he put his arms around me and scooped me into his arms and off the chair. “I can’t let you do it, human.”
“What are you…” I whispered as I felt the heat of his strong chest against my breast. I looked up into his deep brown eyes as his hair moved in the wind. I had never been this close to an Ition. It was forbidden.
“You don’t want to kill yourself. You are just bored,” he said, and then he pressed his lips to mine. I whimpered and struggled against him. He pulled back and laughed. “Now there is your fiery spirit; just as fiery as your hair. I seem to bring it out in you,” he said as he walked toward the hovering vehicle.
“Bring it out in me? Put me down, you Ition brute!” I said balling my fist and hitting the stiff burlap-like material of the uniform.
“One minute you have tears flowing down your face ready to end it all and now you are full of life and fire,” he said as he suddenly pushed me into the flying vehicle and climbed in himself.
“What! What are you doing?! You can’t do this!” I shouted.
“I can and I will,” he said as he pushed the car away from my building and flying it into the dense traffic of the city.
“Take me back! I order you to take me back home!” I shouted, confused why this Ition was doing what he was doing. Why me?
“No.”
“Ugh! You must have lost your mind. Do you know what will happen to you if you are found out?” I shouted as I pressed against the walls of the vehicle, holding on while he flew the vehicle erratically and recklessly in the sky.
“Find out what? That I saved you from killing yourself?” he said with a grin. That grin caught me off guard for a moment. He was beautiful, even for an Ition alien. He was strong and very manly. Then I remembered what was happening.
“No! That you took a human female out for a joyride!” I said.
He laughed. “Joyride? Is that what you think this is?”
“Is it not? Then what is it?” I said getting nervous. I looked ahead and realized that we were heading for a landing port high in the sky on a platform. There was a large ship on it that was unmistakably an Ition ship. My eyes grew wide.
“Are you insane? I’m not getting on that thing,” I said struggling, but there was nowhere to go.
“You make it seem as though you have a choice. Don’t you know who I am, human? I get what I want, and what I want, for now, is you,” he said with a low growl.
“Take me home, you imbecile!” I shouted.
This only made him laugh more. It was amusing to him, and I realized the more that I struggled, the more he liked it. “What kind of sick alien are you?” I spat at him.
“The kind that likes to hunt humans,” he said looking at me. He terrified me with that look. I hated Itions just like all the other humans. They were arrogant and only wanted to take, take, take—just as he was doing now.
The vehicle landed, and my door opened. Two strong Itions stood at my door and pulled me out of the vehicle.
“Put her on the flight deck,” my abductor said.
“No! Help!” I shouted. But there was no one on the platform to hear except other Itions. My abductor smiled and turned away from me and began to see to other matters as I was pulled up the ramp of the ship and then strapped securely into a seat with an Ition soldier standing behind me, making sure that I did not move. I could not believe that this was happening to me. I had to do something to stop it, but what?