Forms of Love

by Rita Clay Estrada

  Her answer was a chuckle. It was a wonderful, emotional sound that vibrated into the very center of him.

  Dan opened his eyes and Earth rushed back with a snap. “Did you talk to me?”

  Kendra nodded, her face a wreath of a smile.

  “Did I do it or did you draw it from me?”

  “You did it.”

  He sat up, a grin pulling at his mouth and a glint in his blue eyes. “I really did?”

  “Yes, but you have a long way to go, Dan. This was just an experiment to prove you have the capability. I’m willing to be read and therefore am an easy channel for connection. Most of your kind are not that way. You have a lot more practice to do.”

  He still wanted confirmation. “But I did do it, didn’t I?”

  “You did.”

  “Teach me more,” he demanded.

  “Not now.” Her smile waned and her gaze darted toward the river. “We have to go.”

  Dan followed her gaze but saw nothing. “Is he here?”

  “I think so.” She looked at the remains of their picnic and pretended she needed to clean up. “I thought I felt him earlier.”

  “Then he is following?”

  “I think so,” Kendra finally acknowledged, twirling the trash sack and tying it with a twist tie. “Let’s get going.”

  “Are you afraid?”

  “A little. He was very angry last night when he knew I might have broken a few rules.”

  Dan raised a brow. “Might have?”

  “All right. Did,” she corrected. “But I don’t want to talk about it.”

  Dan stood, too keyed up to sit. He began pacing. “I don’t care about the bastard, but if he wants to harm you in any way, he’ll have to deal with me, first.”

  “This is not your problem, Dan.”

  “But—”

  “No buts. Promise me.”

  “I won’t.” He sat back down, his face a grim mask. “If I see the bas—”

  “No more.” She held up her hand to stop his words. “He is a Guardian. He has the authority to check on me. He will not hurt me.”

  It wouldn’t do any good arguing with her. Her mind was made up.

  It took five minutes to reload and shove off. And, for Dan, each of those minutes was charged with reluctance. Every wave they took, every turn of the oar, brought him closer to his separation from Kendra. They wouldn’t have one more night together, after all. Today was the day they would part, and he would be alone again—without either of the two women he had loved.

  He knew the feelings he had for this Kendra were love, but he didn’t want to feel this way. Love was the name for something that he didn’t want to feel, hear about or experience again. It was too painful. Besides, the emotions he felt for this Kendra and his wife mixed so completely together, that sometimes he couldn’t tell the two women apart. They were entwined like several strands of a thread—so tightly that they couldn’t be separated into single filaments. Perhaps in time it might change, but right now he was so connected to this woman, he couldn’t remember her differences from the other. He was sure he knew the distinction; he just chose not to think about it.

  And now he was losing both women. It didn’t matter why; either way, he was going to hurt. Unless he could put the necessary words together to convince her to stay with him.

  “Pull up here.” She motioned toward a shallow harbor in the next bend in the river.

  Dan did as he was told, paddling over to the American side of the river. Ducking under several willow trees, he anchored to one. After Kendra jumped ashore, Dan followed, then pulled the raft up on the dry, slab-stone bank, shielding it from prying river eyes.

  A rat scurried through the underbrush, but Kendra ignored it as she stared up at the face of the mountain. All her attention was focused on the jagged rocks above them. Dan couldn’t see a thing. Like all the other high cliffs, it was pitted with holes and shallow caves; nothing appeared different.

  Then she brought her attention back to Dan, and her luminous eyes stared at him with as much sadness as he felt in his own heart. “I will miss you, Dan Lovejoy,” she stated softly. “I will miss you so very much.”

  “Stay,” he whispered around the tears caught in his throat. He’d promised himself he wouldn’t beg, but he did. “Stay with me.”

  “I can’t. I have broken so many rules already, I must do this. Please leave, now,” she said.

  Dan felt defeat like he’d never felt it before. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.”

  But he couldn’t let go that easily. “I’ll wait here for a little while, just in case you change your mind. If you don’t come back down in the next ten minutes, then I’ll leave.”

  “Dan,” she began.

  He kissed her lips. “Shh. I’m going to wait for ten minutes, that’s all. If I didn’t, I would never know that I’d given you one last chance to change your mind, and I would always wonder. This way, I’ll know you chose it.”

  She hesitated, then nodded. “All right. But I will not return.”

  She tilted her head and placed a kiss in the palm of his hand. Tears sheened her gaze as she stared up at him. Cradling it against her cheek, she silently implored him to let her go.

  Dan had no choice. His hands reluctantly dropped to his sides. “Goodbye, Kendra Lovejoy. I’ll never forget you.”

  “You will never speak of me to anyone?”

  He shook his head. A small sad smile tugged at his full mouth. “No. Besides, who would believe?”

  “Who would believe?” she repeated softly. “Goodbye.” With a gentle touch on his cheek, she turned and began the climb up the slope. Her footing was sure and secure as she twisted and turned on a path he would have sworn wasn’t there.

  She sidled sideways in spots and Dan thought that she would fall. Stop it! he told himself. This was her territory, not his. He wasn’t a white knight or a heroic savior of some kind. In fact, she was the one in charge, not the other way around.

  When he lost sight of her, a sense of panic tore at his chest. He knew what he’d promised, he knew she didn’t want him with her anymore. Just the same, he couldn’t remain here and not know that she was safe. Instead, he started to follow close behind. She was too preoccupied with her quest to realize he was in back of her, and she continued on her chosen path. They were heading for a shallow shelf about three-quarters up the side of the mountain. He looked down once and realized that the only way to see the path would have been from the top; the shrubs at the bottom made it invisible.

  When she stopped and faced a shallow opening, he wasn’t far behind her. He halted, holding his breath as he watched her turn into the opening. He hoped she couldn’t hear his heavy breathing. When she’d disappeared, he climbed the rest of the way to reach the narrowest part of the ledge.

  The sight in front of him made his breath quicken even more, then threatened to clog his throat. Nestled in the shallow dirt hollow, like a newborn baby cuddled in its mother’s arms, was a cigar-shaped ship. It was the size of a small blimp or submarine, without visible rudder, deck, wings or windows.

  “Holy hell,” he muttered under his breath. He was paralyzed by the fact that the object in front of him was real. But so was everything—everything that had happened to him in the past three days.

  Kendra had walked past the rear and along the broad side until she reached the front. The outer skin of the capsule wasn’t bright and shiny or metallic as he’d expected. It was a dull blue-gray color with a slightly dimpled texture that didn’t reflect light. Dan reached out and felt the podlike ship. Even though it was in a cool place and the sun wasn’t shining on it, the outside, calluslike skin was warm to the touch.

  Kendra stood in front of the conelike capsule, gazing upward as she placed her hands, palms up, on the underskin. After a few seconds, a whine—more like a wind sigh—began, strengthening in volume the longer it went on.

  Dan wanted to leave. Hell, he wanted to disappear! Every instinct for survival told him to g
et out of there and run for his life. But he couldn’t move.

  He saw Kendra go to the front side closest to the stone wall, so he followed a short distance behind. He was amazed to see that the whining sound, which had now stopped, must have been the ramp he now saw folded out from the ship. He watched as Kendra stepped on a circular black disk at the base, and it lifted, taking her to the entrance. She disappeared and Dan waited for something to happen. Nothing did. But the disk reappeared, and he stepped on it, hoping to hell there were no more surprises inside. He didn’t want to fight a Herfronite or see Cowboy anytime soon. He just wanted to make sure that Kendra was all right.

  When Dan walked inside, a cool moistness enveloped him. It was similar to the feeling of a greenhouse; damp, cool air filled with the scents of earth and growing things. He looked around but there were no plants, no soil, no air-conditioning ducts that he could see. Instead, with the exception of the one wall of buttons, lights and screens, it looked like the bare lobby of any navy ship.

  With her back to him, Kendra dropped her hand from a spot next to the far door, waited for a panel to open, then stepped over the threshold into what looked like a laboratory.

  At least, he thought it was a laboratory. It didn’t have the usual trays and utensils he was familiar with, but it did hold a few large pieces of equipment that resembled body scanners or New Age X-ray machines.

  Kendra stood in front of one such machine that resembled a freestanding shower. She emitted a series of strange mouselike sounds. It must have been another identifying device, for the whirring began again; then a large panel opened to expose the lab instruments he’d expected to see earlier.

  After she’d punched a few buttons on a side panel, the large glass “shower” door opened and she quickly stripped off her clothing, then stepped inside. The door closed and Kendra stood still, her arms at her sides, her body straight. Her head tilted toward the top corner of the cubicle, where numbers and symbols began to spew across a screen.

  Dan couldn’t move, couldn’t yell, couldn’t do anything but watch in fascination as Kendra was scanned—naked, head to toe—by a giant camera and three free-moving pads that touched her body in key spots. It was over in two or three minutes. The noise stopped, leaving the normal, dull sounds of the ship to fill the space. The door snapped open and she stepped out, her expression quizzical and wondrous at the same time.

  He stepped forward. “Kendra.”

  She froze, then slowly turned around and faced him, her head tilted in that disarming way she had. The look in her eyes was as surprised and shocked as he felt. “You shouldn’t be here.”

  “I needed to be sure you made it safely,” he said simply.

  She seemed distracted. “Did anyone follow you?”

  “No one’s out there,” he assured her. Before she could protest, he wrapped his arms around her slim form. She wasn’t cold, but her stiffness surprised him. “Tell me what’s wrong. You look like somebody socked you in the stomach.”

  “Try to read me,” she replied, finally reaching up and wrapping her arms around him.

  He tried but images blended together, not making any sense. “I can’t,” he finally said.

  She must have understood why. She looked disbelieving and yet like she’d seen a miracle. “I’m carrying a child.”

  Heat swept through him and he felt an overwhelming protectiveness. “It’s my child, too.”

  “Of course. You’re the only man I’ve been with.” She smiled.

  He placed a gentle kiss on her slightly parted lips, then held her close to him, hoping she could read his jumbled emotions and know how wonderful the news was. “We have to leave.”

  “Leave?” she repeated slowly. “I can’t. I must go back to my people. I have so much to learn. And so much to teach. Oh, Dan.” She grinned as if the sun was in her smile. “Isn’t it wonderful? We made a child! I never thought I would be able to fulfill that role. At my home, I wasn’t chosen for that field, but now I’m going to do it!”

  She obviously didn’t understand the problem. Dan would explain it as calmly as he could. “You can’t go back now. That’s my child you’re carrying!”

  “You helped, but it’s really my child now.” She touched his cheek to help fend off some of his anger. “I will take good care of her. I promise.”

  Her words finally got through the mass of emotions spilling everywhere. “A girl? You already know it’s a girl?”

  She nodded, her smile so large it warmed everything in the room—everything except his heart. “A girl. She’ll be so pretty, Dan. I’m sure our genes are good. But we don’t have any choice, do we? The genes were produced at random, by our bodies, instead of being selected correctly, in a laboratory.”

  “I want her, Kendra.” He spoke slowly and distinctly, as if his message wasn’t being heard correctly. “This child is mine and she belongs here on Earth, not with your people.”

  “She is Herfronite, and she will remain with me,” Kendra argued. “I am the mother, and have the right. We will adopt a father to share the responsibility of raising the child until she goes to learning.”

  “You don’t have to adopt a father,” he retorted angrily. “I’m already here. I’ll be part of her raising. The child is mine. She will learn about being a human. After all, she’ll be even more human than you are.”

  Kendra pulled out of his arms and reached for her clothes, slipping them on quickly to hide her beautiful body from his possessive eyes. When she was through, she faced him with straightforward dignity and a firmness that told him just how stubborn she was. “There is no argument here. Since she is a part of me, the baby must remain with me. End of the discussion.”

  “Stay.” He had to get through to her. Her stubbornness couldn’t be as strong as his need to keep her with him. “Stay. Don’t take my child back to your planet. What if she’s an outcast? What if she...” He swallowed. A child.

  Kendra’s gaze darted to the door of the ship, then back again. “Go...now, Dan. Before another comes here. Once someone sees you, I will be forced to erase your memory.”

  “Kendra...” he began.

  “No. Don’t you see? I don’t have a choice. I have to stay here. It’s my job. What I was trained for. I need to complete my mission. And you need to return to your life and begin again.” It sounded more like an order than a consolation. As if to prove her point, she turned her back to him.

  Then, reaching into her oversize bag, Kendra pulled out a small box, took it to the counter and opened it up to display several slides filed inside. She went directly to work, pulling them out and sliding them into a slot on the console. Dan stood near the center of the room, unsure what to do but knowing he wasn’t leaving without a fight. She was the woman he loved, and the child she was carrying was his. What choice did he have? If he left, he would never see her again. Even if she wanted to return to him, Herfronites like Cowboy would stop her. Of that much he was positive.

  One by one, each of Kendra’s slides was analyzed and readings were sent to a screen in a code that Dan could only guess at. To him, it looked like a breakdown of the slide’s chemistry. But just in case, he wanted to know for certain.

  Dan went to her side and watched the screen closely. “What’s that?”

  Kendra was studying the results, occasionally flipping switches back and forth.

  “Go away, Dan.”

  “Tell me.”

  She shrugged her shoulders as if what she was doing didn’t matter. “DNA.”

  He was still reacting to the news that he would be a father, and it took a moment for her words to connect. When they did, Dan froze. “Whose DNA? Human?”

  “Of course. I’m checking to ensure that I processed it correctly and the bulk of it is still usable.” She flipped another switch.

  He felt anger grow in the pit of his stomach. It was bad enough that she wanted to leave with his child, but to steal other human genetic material was too much to bear. “You damn well better be kidding.”
<
br />   She looked up, surprised at his tone. “Why would I joke about my work?”

  “Your work?”

  “Of course. This is the reason I was sent here.”

  He didn’t want to know, but he had to. Whatever was happening had to be stopped. “Is this to make more Herfronites?”

  “Yes. Or at least to take some of the more desirable traits and blend them with ours.” She made some adjustments in her calculations.

  “Destroy it,” he ordered. “You have no right to take DNA from us without our permission. It’s wrong.”

  “It’s too late.” She spoke calmly, continuing her work without looking at him.

  “Destroy it. Now.” His voice growled out the last word. His hands at his sides clenched into fists.

  She didn’t answer. Instead, she flipped a switch and a slide popped out.

  Dan’s hands reached for her shoulders again, but this time it wasn’t because he was worried for her safety or concerned about her health. He was angry. “Dammit! Listen to me! You have to destroy it!”

  Kendra’s body went stiff. “Don’t touch me.” Her tone was so low and cold that he felt the icy chill of it through his anger. He didn’t need to see her face.

  “Give it back,” Dan stated doggedly. But he forced himself to release his grip on her.

  Kendra slowly faced him, her expression deceptively bland. But the words that formed in his mind were definitely hers: Don’t ever hold me in anger again.

  He glared back, thinking his own answer. Or what?

  “Or you will not be allowed to remain conscious.” She spoke the words aloud, and they echoed through the chamber like a giant rumble of thunder.

  His palms still burned with the message. So many emotions flooded his system, he felt as if he was on overload.

  Kendra gave a deep sigh. “Look, boyo,” she began in a placating voice.

  “Don’t patronize me! I want what belongs to my race and I am the only one here who has the right to it!”

  Kendra cocked her head and stared at him. “I don’t understand, Dan. Men spill their seed from the time they are capable of manufacturing it. You don’t seem to care where it goes or how it is destroyed. But, I didn’t take semen. I took minute plugs of skin. My job is to make my people stronger so they can work more efficiently. This DNA might make that possible. It didn’t hurt anyone I took it from. Why would you mind that I took it?”