“We need to find out what is wrong with you, Shana. You could have carried a virus that can wipe out our entire population on Earth,” Mikla said as she walked by her side to the hovercraft outside her housing unit.
“I don’t know, Mikla. What if I am to be put under observation. Or worse, to be put to death. Then I’ll never get to see Kai again,” Shana said as she sat in the hovercraft but didn’t close the door.
“Then there is only one way to find out. Maybe you’re pregnant,” Mikla said with a grin.
Her heart began to beat in her chest as Mikla closed the door to the hovercraft and walked over to the driver’s side, then climbed into the seat.
Two hours later and an agreement with the doctor, Shana got the results from various tests.
She was indeed pregnant.
Doctor Wortz was not the person who had told the authorities that Shana was pregnant. It was her nurse, Elizabeth Oliveraez.
The authorities were waiting for her as she and Mikla were walking out the door to the Medical Building. They handcuffed a happy Shana in shackles and took her to the holding cell that she was in at the moment. Her execution was scheduled for the following morning.
~ * ~
“I can’t just leave her in there, Gregor. It is all my fault that she’s in this predicament in the first place.”
“What are you going to do, break her out of her cell?” Gregor said with dry amusement.
“If I have to,” Mikla said with a strong and determined look in her eyes.
“No,” Gregor said as he took her shoulders in his hands and turned her to face him. “I will not allow this. Maybe she shouldn’t have returned to Earth. She would have been better off on Paradise.”
“I can’t believe you said that. I thought that you loved Shana like a sister. She is my best friend,” Mikla said with a hurt look on her face as she shook Gregor’s hands from her shoulders and took a step back from him. “How could you say such things?”
“I only have your best interest at heart, Mikla. I love you and don’t want to see you hurt like this. Ever since she left on this last mission, you have changed.”
“I never did change,” Mikla said with a wave of her hand in the air. She glanced away from him, then turned back with an even more determined look in her eyes. “I was worried about her. Can’t you understand that? I am even more worried about her now. Especially since they are planning on executing her tomorrow.” Her determined look faltered into a sad one and her eyes began to fill with tears as she turned away from Gregor once more with a shaky breath. She held back a sob with a fist in her mouth.
“Mikla,” Gregor said in a soft voice as he stepped behind her and placed a gentle hand on her back. “There is nothing that you can do. You know how tight security is concerning prisoners.”
“I can always appeal to the President.”
Seventeen
“Sir, you can’t just walk in there,” the young brunette woman said as she stood up, fast, from behind her desk. She walked in rapid steps toward Kai as he walked to the President’s door.
Kai stopped in mid-stride to face the secretary with a hard glare. “Watch me,” Kai said in an even harder voice as he turned and barged into the President’s office.
Jim Grogan looked up at the man who had dared to enter his office without being announced. “What is the meaning of this? And who the hell are you?” The President stood up and placed his hands on the edge of the desk, his finger on the button that would call security to his office.
“You know damn well who I am. I am Kai Morgan, The Guardian of Paradise,” Kai said with a snarl.
President Grogan paled and sat down in his chair, “What are you doing in here?” Jim said in an angry voice as he shook himself out his stupor and glared at Kai, who had remained standing in front of the desk with his hands braced on his hips.
“You know damn well why I’m here,” Kai said as he stepped closer to Jim’s desk.
“I’m sorry, I don’t,” the President said in a hard and amused voice.
“I am here for Shana. She is my mate and she is carrying my child,” Kai said in a lethal voice that matched the look in his eyes. “I want her back at my side right now.”
“She broke an Earth law. She knew what the consequences were for breaking that law. And she is a citizen of Earth even if she was on your planet when she became pregnant,” Jim said with another smirk on his lips.
“Maybe that law should change--it is inhumane and a stupid law that should have never been passed to begin with,” Kai said with a dry voice.
The President shrugged his shoulders. “I didn’t make the law. I only enforce it. Besides, why should you even care? I sent her to assassinate you.” Jim smirked at the look on Kai’s face, thinking that he had surprised Kai with that fact. What Grogan didn’t know was that Sonya had already told them everything that Grogan had been planning.
Kai stiffened when he heard the last part of the President’s statement. He couldn’t believe that the man would just admit it outright. He felt chills run down his spine and his face darkened with anger.
“Why?” Kai asked as he braced his hands on the desk and he placed his face within inches of the President’s.
“Because, I need your planet as a drop-off point. For years we’ve been using your planet as the stopping point and you never even knew about it. Paradise is a little planet and doesn’t have any patrols, since everyone thought Paradise was a myth. I’ve made a lot of money to buy the votes to stay in office all of these years.
“I’ve sent out female agents, single mothers with their children--even a few of my wives when I tired of them--into space and caused their ships to malfunction. They were then picked up in deep space from the so-called ‘rescuers’ and dropped off on your little planet. Then the buyers pick them up there.” Jim grinned up at him as his hand slowly opened a drawer and pulled out a small laser pistol, aiming it at Kai. “I figured if I got you out of the way, I could take over Paradise. There is a lot of money in smuggling ‘Love Slaves’ to other galaxies. But once you got wind of it, you were trying to stop us.” The President stood up and glared at Kai.
Kai stepped back as he felt something trying overwhelm him. He shook his head and turned away from Jim Grogan.
“What are you doing to me?” Kai asked as he turned back to face the President, trying to block out the sensations that were bombarding him. “Whatever it is, it won’t work with me.” He stared down at the President.
Sweat began to form on Jim’s face and he began to shake as Kai stared at him with determination in his eyes. Jim continued to stare at Kai.
The President broke the contact with him and sat down in the chair slowly, as the laser dropped to the floor.
“I know what you are,” Kai stated with a soft voice. “I know that you made these people on Earth vote for you when you couldn’t buy those votes at every election once you knew that you were going to lose.” Kai snorted as he glanced past Jim and out the window behind him, then nodded his head.
“You wanted to turn Shana into a slave just to get her out of the way of your plans. She was gathering information about your past and what you truly are. Am I right about that?”
Jim looked up at Kai with a surprised look on his face. “She never knew anything about me. I had already sold her into slavery; she was never supposed to have arrived on Paradise. It was a fake mission that I sent her on. A beautiful woman like her would draw a lot of money on the slavery market. Another was to take her place after the Romaini’s had picked her up in space once the virus disabled her ship.” Jim reached down and picked up the laser from the floor aiming it at Kai again as he grinned.
Kai’s spine stiffened once more. “The Romaini’s are into this slavery ring with you?” He muttered under his breath. When I get back to Paradise I’ll have to check into their resources...
“You are a clairvoyant. You have no right to make the people of Earth vote for you against their wishes,” Kai accused the Presid
ent with hard, cold eyes.
“You have no proof,” Jim said as he stood up from his chair once more and glared at Kai. “It would be your word against mine that I used my powers over the people of Earth. And I am their President. Who do you think they will believe?”
“You’re right. I don’t have any proof. But you just admitted it to the whole population yourself.” Kai tilted his head in the direction of the window behind the President.
Jim slowly turned to face the window. His face paled once more as he looked at the Media that were standing there on a large hovercraft with their cameras and microphones at an open window on the four-hundredth floor. He turned to face Kai with anger in his eyes. He made a move toward Kai that spoke his anger and need for revenge against the man who had done him wrong.
“I wouldn’t do it if I were you. Not with the whole population watching. You’ll be convicted before there’s even a trial.” Kai spoke softly, reading the President’s movements from his years of training.
“Fine. I’ll release Shana to you. But I don’t ever want to see either of you on my planet ever again.” He tucked the laser into the still opened drawer and slammed it closed.
~ * ~
Shana was released from her cell two hours later. Kai held her in his arms tightly as they stood in Mikla’s housing unit. “I never thought that I’d see you again,” she whispered in his ear as she stepped out of his arms.
Kai let her go reluctantly. He turned to face Blade behind him. “I want to thank you for getting the Media together as quickly as you did.”
“It was no problem at all. All I did was make a few calls and the word spread as quickly as laser fire,” Blade said with a sheepish grin. He reached out shook Kai’s hand.
“I am going to miss you so much,” Mikla said as she turned Shana in her direction.
“I am going to miss you, too. But you can always visit us on Paradise.” Shana tried to smile behind the tears in her eyes. “You let me know what happens to the President.”
“I will,” Mikla said on a sob as she hugged Shana one last time. “Both of you need to get off this planet before the President calls in security.”
Both Shana and Kai nodded their heads. With one last hug and a last farewell, Kai and Shana were transported back to his ship.
~ * ~
“It’s not over yet,” Shana said as she stepped out of the cleansing unit on Kai’s ship, The Challenger. “Even though you exposed him as a fraud and he will be forced to resign. It is not completely over.” She let the towel drop from her still damp body and walked into Kai’s arms.
He lifted her into his arms and carried her over to the bed. Kai laid her in the center of the bunk and quickly shed his clothes. Shana opened her arms for him as he slid over her. He claimed her lips with his in a deep, soul-searing kiss that made Shana’s heart beat wildly in her chest.
“I love you,” she whispered as she pulled her lips from his and he stared down into her eyes.
“I love you, too,” Kai said as he claimed her body in one hard thrust of his hips.
~ * ~
“So, I hear that you were sent to assassinate me,” Kai said as he lay behind Shana with his arms wrapped around her.
“That was the mission. Or I thought that it was.” Shana turned over to look down at Kai. “But I couldn’t do it. Not after I had regained my memory and had gotten to know you the way that I did. The file said that you were a drug runner. Even though I had never known what you actually did or why you had never taken me with you to your office, I knew deep down inside that the files were faked. In my heart, I knew that you were not the man that was written in the files,” Shana said with her heart in her eyes.
“I believe you. What I couldn’t understand was why Sonya did what she did,” Kai said as he tugged Shana down to his side.
“She was jealous and greedy. President Grogan pays well for outside help. Sonya was greedy and wanted to you. She also wanted your position to gain whatever power she could,” Shana said with a soft sigh.
“Sonya had help from Carlos. She wanted you out of the way so that she could take your place,” Kai said in an angry voice.
“That is what she had hoped to gain and she failed, because I am still by your side. By the way, we never did get to see my ship,” Shana added with a grin.
“Do you still want to see your ship?” Kai asked as he flipped her over onto her back. He rose up on his elbows and stared down at her.
“I don’t think that I need to see my ship now that I know everything that I really need to,” Shana said as she rose up and claimed his lips with hers.
Once more, Kai took her to paradise, with his body and with his heart.
Eighteen
Eight months later
“Push,” Mikla ordered a sweaty Shana.
Shana sat up on the bed, then fell back as wave after wave of pain filled her entire body. “I can’t,” she panted as her whole body tightened and another wave of pain filled her.
“You don’t have a choice, Shana. The baby has to come out,” Mikla said as she rubbed her hand over Shana’s extended stomach.
“I am so glad that you are here,” Shana said with a hard and loud moan as she rose up on the bed and pushed with all her might.
A moment later the baby was born. “It’s a girl,” Mikla said as the doctor cut the umbilical cord.
“I don’t think that I’m done yet,” Shana moaned as she began to push once more.
“Another girl.” Mikla grinned down at Shana. “Are you finished this time?” Mikla said as she turned to look at the twin girls as they were being placed in a glass bassinet.
“I’m done. I wish Kai was here to see them being born. I never did tell him that we were having twins.”
“He had pressing business with the Romaini’s. He didn’t know that it was going to take three months,” Mikla said as she bit back a groan of her own and sat down on Shana’s clean bed. “Jim Grogan resigned from his office three months after you and Kai left Earth. He is nowhere to be seen,” Mikla told her.
“And Sonya committed suicide. We won’t have to deal with her any longer,” Shana said as she glanced over at the twin babies sleeping in their bassinets.
~ * ~
“Two.” He said the single word in a soft voice as he stared at the twin bassinets next to Shana’s bed.
Shana nodded her head as she watched Kai slowly walk over to the twin girls. “They are both your daughters,” she told him with a soft smile as her heart was beating wildly in her chest.
Kai nodded his head as he turned to look at her. “Thank you.” He leaned over and kissed her lips briefly.
“Are you happy with the girls?” she asked him in a soft low voice. She could hear Mikla and Gregor talking in the background but she didn’t hear what they were saying while her heart was beating in a fast tempo in her chest.
“I am happy to have daughters, we can try for a son later on. What did you name them?”
Shana placed her head on the left bassinet, “I named her Kayla and her sister, Kaylene.” She looked over at Mikla, “Thank you for being here when my time came. I’ll be there for you when your time comes again.”
~ * ~
Three months after the birth of the twin girls. Kai and Shana walked along the ocean’s shore on Earth. “I still can’t believe that within a year, Earth finally has water in the oceans.”
“It’s amazing what technology can do when it comes to the will of the people.” Kai stopped in mid-stride and pulled Shana toward him.
“And look at all of the people that are here to see the wonder of the ocean,” Shana said as she pushed a strand of her hair behind her ear.
“I like to see the wonder in you,” Kai said before he sealed her lips with his.
Meet Tamia Dawn Osburn
I’ve always wanted to be a writer. Thanks to Wings, that dream is coming true for this California native. I have two wonderful boys, Eddie and David and a beautiful daughter, Bethany.
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