Page 53 of An Alien for the Future

“Good sol,” he rumbles, his voice lacking the warmth I’ve come to associate with Tovan.

“Yesss,” I drag out the word, shifting a little so I can see up the road behind him. There’s a transport by my gate. Somethingthat looks like a metal balloon. But I see no one else. “Are you Arnak?”

That’s what Tovan said his friend was called, right? I put some hope in that. That this stranger is just here looking for Tovan and that he hasn’t arrived at my door for some other reason. Because the vibes I’m getting aren’t good, and they’re all I have to go on.

“I am not.” His face shifts and I figure he’s smiling? God. It doesn’t look like that when Tovan smiles and I’m immediately grateful. The alien before me looks like he’s baring his teeth over a bit of steak. “May I come in, Donna of the line Johnson?”

He knows my name. Alarms ring loud in my head.

“I…who are you?” It’s as if all my senses sharpen and my hand tightens on the doorframe. I have no weapons. Nothing to defend myself. My closest weapon is all the way in the kitchen!

“My designation is irrelevant.” He takes a step closer, and I instinctively shrink back, my other hand squeezing the doorknob. I want to slam it shut; to bolt it. Everything about this male screamsthreat.

“We’ve been waiting for you to register.” His voice is so flat, emotionless, that his words fade into the background of his looming presence.

“We?” I lift my chin.

“Many males. We wait for the result of your test. You are the only female we have to hope for.” His head tilts slightly and a cold dread tingles along my spine. “It is…disappointing…that you have chosen to delay this process.”

“The blood test,” I whisper, more to myself than to him.

He does that thing again that suggests he’s smiling. All that happens is I see more of his fangs. “Aye. Just a sample of your lifeblood is all we need.”

I try not to swallow hard. To not reveal the sudden increase in my heart rate. “That program is voluntary, and frankly, I’m abit put off by the fact you are here at my door requesting that I comply. Are you a representative of the program?”

But I know he isn’t. It isn’t run by Kari. It’s run by New Horizons.

“Not a representative.” He leans closer, slanting his frame to brace against the door jam and blocking my view of everything behind him. “A hopeful. For all I know, you could be mykahland we are ignorant of that fact because we have no sample of your lifeblood.”

So he’s here to what?Makeme comply?

The thought almost makes me want to vomit. This is leagues away from the apprehension I felt around Tovan. This…this is something dark. A violation of my very being.

“I’m not interested.” My voice is stronger now, defiance replacing fear. “I want no part in it.” I move to close the door, but it doesn’t shut. And that’s because at the last moment, the stranger blocks it with one boot.

My heart lurches and I force the lump down my throat. I’m alone out here. For all I was hoping that Tovan might have been different, that what we shared meant something and he wasn’t just spewing lies like every other hopeful in my life, I might have been wrong. Because he’s not here now. He’s gone.

I have to be smart about this. I have to be there for myself, just like I’ve always been. This…this weight of independence. Of always having to fight battles on my own. I’m tired. I’m so damn tired.

So tired of dealing with things like this. That and the fact this alien has dared to approach me in the sanctity of my own home pushes past my fear and reaches my anger instead. My brows dive. “Now listen here.” I press a fist into my hip as I glare at him. It’s the same look I used to give stubborn old patients who would have rather died than take their medicine. “I don’t know who you think you are, but you better pick on up andleave.”

“That is not your choice, human.” The stranger growls, muscles bunching as he leans even closer. He sniffs, inhales deeply, and something withers inside me. Not like Tovan. Not like Tovan at all. This is all wrong. “We have been patient, female, but your…resistance…ends now.”

He lunges then, his arm shooting out, grabbing my shoulder like a vice. Pain explodes in my flesh and I scream. Instinct takes over and I lash out, my fist connecting with his jaw. It barely sounds like a punch. Pain shoots through my fist, anyway.

The stranger roars, more surprised than hurt, and I use the momentary lapse in his grip to wrench myself free. I stumble back, adrenaline pumping through my veins, fear warring with a fierce determination to fight, to survive.

“Get out!” I scream, my voice raw with fury. “Get out of my house!”

But he’s already advancing, his eyes narrowed. I scramble back, my hand searching for a weapon, anything to defend myself. A vase? A chair?

But there’s nothing. Nothing but my own trembling hands and the frantic beat of my heart against my ribs.

He advances so fast there’s just a single moment when there’s a single terrified beat of my heart. When he grabs me again, this time by the waist, he lifts me off the ground like I’m a rag doll. I kick, I scream, I fight with everything I have, but it’s no use. He’s too strong. Too big.

This is it? This isn’t how I expected this day to go. Yesterday was so wonderful, like a new world opened up for me, and then today…

“Put me down!” I claw and scream at him, but those scales that I admired on Tovan Kamesh, their smoothness, their softness, also turn out to be impenetrable. My fingers do nothing. I’m screaming, struggling, vaguely aware that it’s having some effect. Stools topple and the stranger bangs into thedining table. I continue screaming, thrashing. I will not make this easy for him.

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