by R. E. Butler
She was greeted warmly by the other seven women in the group, who ranged from as young as Kelly’s niece, who was nineteen, to as old as Mona, who was fifty-one. They were all very different women, but their love of reading brought them together.
Filling a small plate with a few pieces of cubed cheese and some crackers, Ashleigh sat down on one of the overstuffed sofas and put the plate in her lap. Taking a glass of white wine from Kelly, she took a sip and waited for someone to start things off.
The first hour of the get-together, the women discussed the book at length, asking questions of each other and exploring the serious nature of this particular story about child abuse. Because she took care of children for a living, the thought of someone hurting a child for any reason made her blood boil.
Ashleigh put her now-empty plate on the coffee table and sat back, taking another sip of her wine. “This book was so sad. To think that those parents profited off selling their children like that, it’s just so sickening.”
Mona nodded, “Makes me wonder what this world is coming to. Parents selling their sons and daughters for drug money, caring only about themselves.” She shuddered, and Ashleigh felt that same revulsion fill her. Her childhood hadn’t been perfect, but it was leaps and bounds over what the children in the story had suffered. She wanted to find those parents and wring their necks. Putting themselves above their kids like that; putting their own hopes and dreams over the welfare of their own flesh and blood.
“Can we not read something so depressing this next time around?” Colleen, a mother of two, said, putting the book down and settling back in one of the wing chairs surrounding the coffee table.
“I second that,” Ashleigh quipped.
Kelly stood up and brought a box of books out. “I knew you’d want to go lighter this month, but before I show you the new book, I wanted to tell you that Bob and I are going to donate money to the abused children’s charity set up by the author. If you want to give some money tonight, we’ll match it dollar for dollar.”
“I’m in,” Ashleigh said quickly, and the other women around her answered the same. Kelly smiled and opened the box.
She passed out a thick paperback titled “The Rake and the Rose.”
“An historical novel set in 1800s London, about a duke who falls in love with a woman betrothed to another man. It’s supposed to be lightly humorous and just a bit sexy.” Kelly winked and the women laughed. Ashleigh liked historical novels, and the premise sounded really cool.
They put the books aside and spent the next hour chatting about what was going on in their lives. Although the women kept in touch via email and phone calls during the month, getting together in person was sweet and fun. She shared her news about the necklace and flowers, and when asked, she extracted it from her purse for everyone to see. Met with jealous grins and threats to steal it away from her, she tucked it inside her new book as she walked out the door, saying goodnight to her friends until the next month.
When she walked through the front door of her two-bedroom apartment, she kicked off her sensible heels and wiggled her toes in the thick white carpeting, glad to be home. Book club night was always a late one, but she loved it.
She pulled the necklace from the book and laid it on the top of her cherry-wood dresser. She immediately wanted to put it on, to feel the slight weight of it against her skin, but she ignored the desire and left it alone. She loved the necklace, but she didn’t want to risk forgetting about it and accidentally falling asleep with it on.
She changed into a pair of lilac lounge pants and a brushed cotton short-sleeved shirt, walked into the kitchen and reached for her cell. Even though Tate’s number had long since been erased from her contact list, she thumbed through the recent calls until she found where he’d called her last and dialed his number.
“Yeah?” he answered.
“Hi, Tate, it’s Ashleigh.”
There was a pause, and then he said brightly, “Ashleigh! How are you?”
“Fine. I wanted to ask you if you sent me something at work today?”
“Excuse me?” he asked.
“I asked if you sent me something at work today, Tate.”
Tate sounded suspicious. “No, I didn’t. Must have been some other guy.”
“I guess so.” She felt stupid for calling him. She hadn’t really thought he was sweet enough to send her flowers and an expensive necklace, had she? He hadn’t been that attentive when they’d been together.
“Sorry to bother you.”
“No, wait, Ashleigh, it’s not a problem. Look, if you’re not busy, maybe I can come over and we can chat. I miss you.”
She felt a bubble of anger well inside her. “You didn’t miss me when you were having sex with my cousin behind my back. Forget I called.” She hung up and dropped her phone on the counter with a clatter. He called back immediately, but she sent the call to voicemail and then turned the phone off.
She felt like a first-class idiot for calling. Now he would call her constantly and beg her for just a few minutes to talk, which she wouldn’t give. She’d met Tate at her friend Suzanna’s birthday party in January. Tate and Suzanna’s husband were close friends, and both worked for the same mortgage company. They’d hopped into bed immediately - something that Ashleigh had never done before - and the relationship had moved fast and fizzled equally as fast. He was charming and a shameless flirt. It hadn’t really been much of a surprise when she had taken Tate to a family reunion and then found Tate and her cousin Brit in bed together a few weeks later. She'd ended what little remained of the relationship in April, and he’d been calling her off and on for the last two months, asking her to give him another chance.
She poured a bowl of cereal for herself and sat down at her laptop to check her email. Her mother had sent her several messages over the last few weeks, asking Ashleigh to call her, but she hadn’t. She’d sent standard “I’m busy” emails, but she knew that eventually she would have to speak to her mom.
It had been bad enough when Brit and Tate had betrayed her. But then her mother had sided with Tate and suggested that Ashleigh should forgive him and take him back. She said that everyone made mistakes, and it wasn’t very kind of Ashleigh to hold his one indiscretion against him. Ashleigh and her mother had not always seen eye to eye on things, and Ashleigh’s insistence that she couldn’t just “get over” Tate’s cheating had been a thorn in their relationship ever since.
Ashleigh knew that her mother’s concern came from a loving place, even though it hadn’t felt like it at first. When Ashleigh’s father had died of a heart attack when she was seventeen, leaving her mother with a mountain of bills and not enough insurance, she’d had to return to work after being a stay-at-home mom for all of Ashleigh’s life. It had been hard for her mother, and she’d worried ever since, insisting that Ashleigh find a man who could provide for her. Her mother wanted to know that Ashleigh was taken care of, and Tate, who came from money and had a steady job, represented the fulfillment of that goal. Unfortunately, Ashleigh didn’t trust him, and if she couldn’t trust him, she couldn’t love him.
She glanced at the clock on the TV and saw that it was too late to call her mother. I’ll call her tomorrow, after work, she decided with a yawn, closing her laptop and heading to bed.
As she passed by the necklace, she touched it, the blue stone winking at her as if lit from within. It was an oval cabochon, in the deepest, truest blue color she’d ever seen. She slipped into bed and turned off the small lamp on her side table as she settled under the covers. The light from the streetlamp outside her window cast an amber glow over the bedroom. Ashleigh couldn’t take her eyes off the necklace until exhaustion tugged at them. She drifted off to sleep, the gorgeous necklace the last thing on her mind.
Chapter 2
Gwen was waiting expectantly when Ashleigh walked into the daycare. “So?”
“It wasn’t Tate.” Ashleigh paused at the front desk. She’d had a long debate with herself that morning about we
aring the necklace, but in the end she knew it was safer at home.
“Well, that’s probably a good thing, right?”
“Yeah, but he left me a half-dozen messages last night and sent me a couple of texts this morning. He wants to know who my secret admirer is, and what he has to do to compete with him so he can get me back.” Ashleigh rolled her hazel eyes.
Gwen gave her a sympathetic look. “If he had cared this much the first time, he wouldn’t have slept with Brit.”
True.
Her body demanded sugar and caffeine, so Ashleigh said goodbye to Gwen and headed to the kitchen, grabbing a lemon-filled donut and a cup of coffee in a lidded mug before heading to her room. The three and four year-olds were going on a field trip to a local fire station to meet with the firefighters and see their equipment, so the day was incredibly busy from start to finish.
All Ashleigh had been thinking of on her drive home was the necklace. Even though she felt silly, she wanted to wear it. And she really, really wished she knew who it came from. Hopefully her mystery man would reveal himself soon. She dropped her purse on the counter and went into the bedroom, picking up the necklace and slipping it on. When the cool, slight weight of the stone rested against her skin, she smiled.
Turning back to the kitchen, she dug her cell out of her purse. She didn’t want another day to get away from her without setting things right with her mom. Just as she was about to call, there was a knock on her door.
She looked through the peep-hole and saw the same young man who had brought the flowers and necklace to her the day before, holding a long black box with a red ribbon on it.
“Yes?” she said, loudly enough to carry her voice through the door.
“I have another delivery for Ashleigh Turner.”
Her thumb ran a small circle around the ‘call’ button of her phone as she opened the front door slowly.
“Ashleigh Turner?” the delivery man said with a tight smile.
“Sure. I remember you from yesterday.” She opened the door further and reached for the box, but he lifted the lid and a cloud of dark blue gas burst in her face, making her head spin.
“Wh-what’s happening?” she mumbled through thick lips. Her knees went weak and her vision tunneled as arms grabbed her and kept her from falling to the ground when her legs went out completely. Her fingers lost their hold on the phone and it clattered to the tiled floor.
She heard several different masculine voices, but they spoke in a language she didn’t understand. She opened her mouth to speak, to call out for help, but nothing came from her lips, and she drifted away into the darkness.
* * * * *
“Psst! Psst!” A voice hissed in Ashleigh’s ear as someone shook her shoulder. Ashleigh groaned and tried to roll over and go back to sleep. It was then that she realized she wasn’t in her comfortable pillow-top bed, but on a hard, metal floor.
Her eyes popped open and she sat up straight, making her head spin violently. “Ow, crap,” she breathed, pressing her fingers to her temples as she tried not to vomit.
“Careful, it seems to take a while for the drugs to wear off,” the same female voice said.
Ashleigh blinked her eyes a few times and found herself staring into the face of a woman who looked to be about her own age, wearing a simple white shift. Ashleigh looked down at herself and saw she was wearing the same thing. She touched the material; it felt soft, like brushed cotton.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“My name is Kate. We’re on some kind of alien ship.” Kate gestured around her, and Ashleigh saw a lot of women. Some were huddled fearfully together in small groups. Some were lying on the floor like her, waking up slowly.
“Did you say ‘alien ship’?” Ashleigh asked incredulously.
“I think so. What’s the last thing you remember?”
Ashleigh told her about the flower delivery guy opening a box and the puff of blue smoke, and then passing out.
“I had a similar experience,” Kate said. Ashleigh noticed that each woman in the room had on a necklace that was similar to hers. The pendants were a rainbow of colors, though, and whether that was significant or not, she didn’t know. The room looked like it was made entirely of smooth, nickel-colored metal, save for the ceiling of frosted glass, which let in soft white light. There appeared to be no doors, windows, or furniture.
Aliens. Her mind raced. “What would aliens want with us?” She felt panic rise in her, and she fought it down. It wouldn’t do any good to lose it.
“I don’t know.” Kate fiddled with the necklace. “I think they put some kind of tracker in the necklace. Otherwise, how would they know where we lived?”
“Surely this is a trick,” Ashleigh said. “The delivery guy looked entirely human to me. And besides, there isn’t life anywhere but Earth; everyone knows that.” Even as she spoke the words, her mind reminded her that no one could really know everything. What if there were aliens on other planets? Why would they abduct women?
One of the women, red-faced from crying, twisted her long blonde hair around her fingers. “They’re going to experiment on us or make us sex slaves, I just know it!” Her voice took on a hysterical edge and the other women near her tried to calm her down, but it was clear that all of them were equally worried.
Ashleigh’s mouth went dry. Sex slave or experiment. Those weren’t very good options.
Kate shushed the women. Ashleigh closed her eyes and shook her head. Please be a dream, she chanted in her head. She was disappointed, but not all that surprised, when she opened her eyes and found herself still in the room with the other captured women.
There was a crackle that sounded like a speaker, and a large opening revealed a flat screen about the size of a large TV in one wall. The screen flickered for a moment before the face of a woman appeared. She was sitting on a small stool in front of a glass wall that looked out into space. She appeared to be human, with long brown hair and eyes.
“Welcome, women of Earth. My name is Shreva, and I am a medical officer on board the freighter ship H’lio. You are being taken to the planet Norlan, several galaxies away from your former home.”
There was a pause, and several of the women gasped in disbelief. Ashleigh knew the phrase they were focusing on because it was rattling around in her brain: 'former home'.
The screen split, and a picture of a city appeared. Sleek, egg-shaped cars hovered off the ground, moving through streets lined with non-descript dome buildings. The sky was purple, dotted with silvery clouds.
Shreva smiled brightly. "This is Kyvern City, the capital of our world. The ship will land here, and you will all be taken to your new homes."
The image shimmered, and a slideshow began. She ticked off the descriptions of the images as they were scrolling by: the green-tinted ocean, the farming areas outside the city, a city park with tropical-like plants, the night sky with twin moons, and smiling families of one man and one woman, a child in their arms.
"First let me assure you that you will not be harmed. When you were taken, you were put into a light sleep and transported into our ship far above your planet. While you were unconscious, female medics such as myself examined you for any maladies that our advanced medical knowledge could heal, and then bathed and dressed you."
Ashleigh felt a little sick to her stomach, glancing down at her body and wondering just how many had seen her naked and vulnerable.
"In a few moments, guards will be coming into the room. Do not fight them or try to escape. They will not harm you, but they will restrain you if they have to. They will identify you by the necklaces you wear. Please do not try to remove them. The necklaces were locked during your exam and cannot be broken or taken off. You will be taken, one by one, and delivered safely into the hands of the male that chose you as his bride. Once in his safe-keeping, all your questions will be answered. Rest assured, Earth females, you will not be harmed in any way. Welcome to Norlan." She smiled again, and the screen went blank as the covering slid bac
k over it.
There were a few shocked moments of silence and then...chaos. Some of the women fainted, many of them cried, and a few - like Kate - tried to rally everyone to fight.
"We're stronger together!" Kate said loudly.
Ashleigh stood up slowly from the floor and grabbed Kate's arm. "You can't incite them to fight, Kate. You don't know what will happen to us if you fight."
"Did you hear her? She called Earth our 'former home'! That’s bullshit. I want to go home, now!" Kate raised her voice and wrenched herself from Ashleigh's grip.
Ashleigh put as much authority into her voice as she could. "The woman in the video said we wouldn't be harmed and that we shouldn't fight back or try to escape." She implored the women to calm down, knowing that a few panicked people could cause all of them harm.
Kate stomped her foot. "The only choice we have here is to go like lambs to the slaughter or fight. I'm not a lamb!"
Her brave words were cut off as a door slid open in one wall, and two men with bright blue hair came inside.
Kate and two other women threw themselves at the men, and a few others tried to escape, but more guards appeared, blocking the exit. Some of the guards had bright blue hair and some had dark brown hair, but they all looked human.
Ashleigh backed away from the fray slowly, not wanting to get caught up in the melee. She took a few breaths and tried to assess the situation logically and calmly. While the other women around her were either trembling in terror or fighting against the large men, she tried her best to keep a cool head. If she'd learned anything from her job, it was that adding your own panic to a bad situation wasn’t going to do anyone any good.
Her back pressed against the smooth wall opposite where the men entered. Some of them stood in the entrance to block the women from escaping. The women who were fighting didn't seem to be having any effect on the men as they kicked and hit.