Page 39 of Alien Rescue

He grunted and motioned to her hair. “I will do your hair.” He’d made it into one of his intricate basket weaves overnight. She’d been tempted to choke him when she saw what he’d done while she slept. She had no problem with him doing all the work undoing it now.

“Make a French braid, like you did yesterday. That works well when we are working.” If she couldn’t stop him messing her hair, she’d give him some directions. Lots of directions.

He helped her to sit on the bench and then went to work on her hair. “I am working; you are merely accompanying me.”

“Whatever.” If it made him feel better to think that, she wasn’t going to argue. It felt like hours later when he finished with her hair, at last. But she had no complaints; it was soothing having him work on her hair.

He grunted and the door opened, and Rose instinctively stepped back at the sound of the wind howling around the shuttle.

“Are we walking again?” she asked dubiously. The weather was even more unpleasant. Rose looked up at him and then stumbled back. He showed even more teeth than usual, and even in his disguise, it wasn’t a good look. “I have transport. We will cloak and use it.”

“Transport?”

He grunted something and the shuttle shimmered. She saw a faint shadow that grew as it moved toward them. Rose looked up. A large, silver thing, that vaguely reminded her of a hoverbike, came toward them at high speed. It was going to squash them like bugs. She opened her mouth to scream, but not a sound emerged; her blood literally froze in her veins while she waited for the heavy machine to crush them.

“Move,” she screamed at her feet, but they stood as if planted into the cement. The vehicle landed in front of them without so much as a squeak, and Rose almost sagged in relief. She wanted to scream in his ear, again. She pushed his shoulder instead, and of course, he didn’t budge. “Would it kill you to warn me?”

He picked her up and placed her on the seat, and got on behind her. His heat surrounded her and his breath warmed the back of her head. Her skin tingled where he touched her through her clothes, causing a delicious hollow feeling low in her stomach. “No, but it would be less fun.”

“Everyone will see us. We can’t afford to attract the wrong attention.” Fading into the background was crucial for someone with her job.

“We will be shielded,” he said close against her ear, and she shivered when his warm breath wafted over her ear.

“We’ll be invisible?”

“Yes.”

It was odd, riding at exhilarating speeds through the streets of New York with no one turning to look at them. Zanr drove above the cars, dangerously close to pedestrians sometimes. Rose lifted her face and enjoyed the freedom, the speed, and the open spaces around her.

At the bar he parked the hoverbike out of the way in an alley. She jumped off and looked around dubiously. “What if someone accidentally bumps into your machine? If they figure out there is something here, they might steal it.”

He grunted and it became invisible again. “I will be alerted if anyone attempts that.”

“Handy,” she muttered, but again some idea she couldn’t quite grasp tugged at her.

“I like these cloaking devices of yours. When this is over, I wouldn’t mind taking one with me.” It would come in handy when she went undercover to catch whoever was producing superman crack—a particularly nasty drug that gave the user super-human strength. For a while. She’d seen horrific images of the bodies of their victims and of the addicts. They died within days after causing unbelievable devastation. She’d read about one addict who’d murdered his own children, only to realize what he’d done in his last agonising moments when his brain cleared.

Something scurried out of the alley, red, beady eyes glowing in the weak light, and she squealed and jumped away. “I’ve heard the rats here were enormous, and it’s true. That rat was three times the size of that old oil drum.” Rats were a problem everywhere, but these looked like large cats.

“We do not have rats on Zyrgin,” he sneered.

“Yeah, yeah I know, everything is perfect on Zyrgin. That’s why you go out and live on other planets.” People who abandoned their babies in the desert weren’t all that superior in her eyes.

He turned to her, stepped right into her space. “You will speak of Zyrgin with respect.” He was really scary when he became all intense like this.

“Yeah, whatever,” she said, trying to sound casual but tough. Her heart was beating so fast, she was afraid it would jump out of her mouth. Hopefully he didn’t see how she trembled.

He stared at her with narrowed eyes for a long time and then turned back toward the door leading into the bar.

“Enter before me. Do not make conversation with males.”

Rose shook her head, but she didn’t argue. He had this weird but flattering idea that any man who saw her would instantly want her. She rubbed her chest. Every now and then it hit her. Her duty was—she would do what had to be done—to kill him and take as many of his gadgets she could get her greedy hands on. But she couldn’t imagine him dead. The energy and drive that made him stilled forever? By her hand? Maybe she’d just grab his gadgets and disappear.

He stepped in front of her when a group of rowdy men walked into the bar ahead of them. When he was sure they were inside and focused on their drinks, he motioned Rose inside.

She headed to the bar and went through the whole ritual of ordering a drink she didn’t want. She felt hungry, and the peanuts, that had seen better days, almost looked appetising. Again, Morgan didn’t show.

Hours later they returned to the shuttle. He drove the motorcycle thing right to the door of the shuttle. She got off and put her hands on her hips and tapped her toe. It only struck her now how unnecessary that death-defying run down the building yesterday had been.

---