Chapter Twenty-One
“Don’t get too comfortable,” Ryan said over his shoulder. “It should only take them a couple hours.”
“That’s all I need,” Jess replied.
“Them” was the Uurosolian crew unloading the cargo, and despite the fact that the Uurosolians were known to be aggressive toward females, she remained calm. Not too long ago, just looking at their translucent gray skin, pointy ears, long blond hair and blue-tinted lips would have sent her into a severe panic attack.
The days of her being afraid of every alien she came across were forever gone.
She wasn’t a slave. She wasn’t a whore. She was Jessica fucking Moore and she’d put a clean hole through anyone’s head who thought to test her.
The overhead lights flashed from red to green, indicating it was safe to unbuckle the safety harness. Not wasting any time, she unfastened hers and stood.
“Bring me back a bottle of something good,” Ryan said.
Whether at the helm of The Vengeance II or the cargo loader, Ryan was at home in the captain’s chair. The African-American was a lot shorter than she, standing only five feet nine, but his weight of two hundred and twenty pounds made him appear more like a pro wrestler.
Without Ryan she didn’t know where she would have ended up. Kane, JB, Kyle and Eli wouldn’t have been able to escape the Galontaers and she wouldn’t have stowed away on their vessel.
It had taken Ryan’s skills as an Air Force fighter pilot with two tours in Iraq and one in Afghanistan to make the escape possible.
She crossed the large space to the closet. There, she grabbed for her coat and pulled it over her head. Although it wasn’t very thick, it had technology embedded within its lining that would protect her from the extremes of the weather on Uurose.
She waited patiently at the bay doors for José, the newest member of Ryan’s all-human crew. He’d been to Uurose enough to know where the best bar was, which was a definite plus. She wanted to taste something other than Kyle’s hooch. After two months of the same shit, her mouth and stomach lining begged for something different.
José approached her and pulled a similar thermal coat over his head. She caught the face shield he threw her way. “Don’t want to forget this.”
The shield would protect her face and eyes from freezing. “Right,” she said before slipping it on.
José put his face shield on and tightened the straps. He activated the radio communication by turning a small black knob by his ear. “Ready?”
She activated her headset as well. “All set.”
José slammed the side of his fist on the red bay-door-release button. Red lights flashed and a warning bell sounded as the doors slowly opened, revealing vast whiteness as far as she could see.
“Where’s the city?” she asked, looking around.
He pointed in the distance. “About a quarter mile away. Can you see the shiny dome?”
Her eyes strained against the glare of the sun beating off the snow. Not too far away she saw a large metallic dome. It would be so much easier if the loading docks and city were closer together but she understood why the two were spaced apart. No one wanted to make their home near the shipping docks where dangerous materials were stored.
“I see it,” she replied.
José gave her a thumbs-up and began his descent down the bay ramp, with Jess following on his heels. “Hold on to the back of my coat so you won’t get lost,” his voice crackled from her headset.
She chalked the interference up to the ferocity of the wind that threatened to sweep her away with every gust. “Is that your excuse to get me to touch you?”
“Did it work?” he asked playfully.
She snorted. “Hell no.” The only person I want to touch isn’t here.
“Shucks, even if you were touching me, I wouldn’t feel it anyway. I can barely feel my own feet,” he said over the crackling speaker.
“Pick up your foot then put it down. Just put one foot in front of the other.”
He stopped and turned around to face her. “Huh?” he said, the crackling louder than before. “I can’t…keeps…in and…” He shook his head and pointed to his ear.
She shooed him. “I said keep going!”
The speaker crackled again in response.
She pointed to the dome in the distance, indicating for him to keep going. Thumbs-up again, he began leading the way. She kept at his back, pressing forward.
If she didn’t need the promise of alcohol to wash Rasha from her mind, she would’ve stayed in the vessel where it was nice and warm. But more times than not, her thoughts swayed to Rasha and the what-ifs became too much to bear.
What if she hadn’t waited so long to go to Sonis? Would Marcie still have ended up pregnant?
What if she had stopped him the first time they made love? Then the temptation of staying in his arms wouldn’t have been too much to resist.
What if she had stopped him the second time? She wouldn’t have entertained the idea of creating a life with him.
What if she hadn’t fallen in love with him? Then her heart wouldn’t hurt so badly.
Her heart hardened to a lump, weighing her down as if it were a heavy stone.
She resisted the urge to cry again. Doing so wouldn’t rewrite the past and would probably cause the tears to freeze on her cheeks. Instead she trampled through the snow, each step harder than the last.
Without warning, the wind whipped at her and pushed her over. As her knees and hands hit the ground, snow swirled and temporarily blinded her.
Shit.
She rose and used the coverings on her hands to wipe the snow and ice away from her face shield.
Maybe I will take him up on that offer.
Jess reached out only to find nothing but empty air. Shit, had he walked too far ahead of her?
“José,” she called. “Slow down. I can’t find you.”
Her headset crackled and popped. Her heart sped up as well as her footsteps. She turned in a tight circle, whiteness surrounding her. Which direction was the dome? She couldn’t see the metallic glint on the landscape anymore.
Wait. Is that him?
Relief coursed through her veins as she made out a hazy form about ten feet in front of her. Not wasting any time, she jogged in his direction. Her breathing came out in hard pants.
Mere feet behind him, she reached out for the back of his coat. As she stretched her arm, her foot slipped from under her. Unsteady, she felt the crack of her ankle. Intense pain shot up her leg, causing her to scream out. As she fell, the hands she held out did nothing to brace her. Her head hit the ground with a thump. Pain erupted in her skull, then blackness.
“What do you mean, you lost her?” Rasha said, every word louder than the last.
He had gone to Laconia only to find he had just missed her. From there she had boarded three different vessels until she finally caught up with The Vengeance II.
It would have been easier for him to meet up with The Vengeance II and wait for her but the thought of her being on one alien vessel after another had worried him. Jess couldn’t stand for other species to look at her for extended periods of time, how would she fare being on their vessels?
The human known as Ryan fidgeted. “She was with a member of my crew. They were going to the dome entrance. It was safe.”
Rasha slammed his fist on the vessel wall. “Safe!”
Only fools would leave the safety of a vessel on Uurose. This planet was far from a tourist attraction. Any time spent outside a vessel or the protective living domes was suicidal.
Ryan jumped from his seat and stood behind it as if a piece of metal would protect him. “She’s not far. As soon as the storm dies down we can send out a search party.”
“This is Uurose!” he yelled. His eyes widened with fury. “It’s been storming for ages!” He took two slow steps closer to Ryan, trying to control his anger. “You will send a search party for her now.” He was tired of talking to this human. He flexed his hands, ready to wrap them around Ryan’s neck.
“The storm…” Ryan shook his head vigorously. “We tried but we couldn’t even see past our faces. As soon as José told us she wasn’t behind him we went out to look for her.”
His rage boiled over. “I will kill him for leaving her alone,” he seethed.
Ryan gripped the seat. “José thought she was behind him, I swear. It’s not his fault.”
Rasha stared hard at Ryan. “So then you are to blame?” he said in a low and raspy voice. Rasha cracked his knuckles. Someone would pay for putting Jess in danger. He didn’t care who.
Ryan flailed his hands in front of his face. “No, no, not me, but I’ll find her.”
“Now!” Rasha bellowed.
“All right, we’ll go now.”
These humans were idiotic to think it would be safe to venture out into a Uurose snowstorm. Even on a good, clear day, Uurose’s climate was unstable and treacherous. Because of Ryan, Jess was wandering the landscape, lost, frozen and now possibly…
Rasha pushed the thought from his mind. Finding Jess was his only priority.
“Get your gear on,” Ryan said, addressing the crew. They had all been staying out of the way, pretending not to listen to the exchange.
The seven male crew members scattered and retrieved their coats and face shields. No one said anything to Rasha as he fixed his shield in place. Working in unison, the crew assembled the tethering rope to the wall fixtures.
The lights flashed after someone initiated the doors.
Rasha hooked one of the ropes to his waist and set out down the ramp. He waited for the others to descend.
“You two go that way.” He indicated to the right. “Stay in a straight line. Don’t veer off course. Take slow, small steps. Check the ground for everything.”
“We know what to do,” a voice said over the speaker.
“If you knew what to do Jess wouldn’t have gotten lost on this forsaken planet in the first place!”
Everyone remained silent and it was a good thing. One more smart remark and he was going to kill the speaker.
Rasha tried to put a tamper on his temper as he made his own straight path.