Maruvian Bride (Alien SciFi Romance) (Celestial Mates Book 5)

by C. J. Scarlett

  And Jeanell knew her better instincts were right. Here was a man who was ready to lord over her murder just a day before. Anything like trust or affection was misplaced at the very least.

  But Jeanell couldn’t deny that she felt an undeniable attraction to him, like no man she’d ever met before. He was dangerous, he was courageous, and he was virtuous. Or he was a complete liar. But Jeanell’s time with him had included so much, actual life and death and the future of mankind passing between them, that single day felt more like six weeks.

  And in those six weeks, Jeanell had seen in Ric things she’d never seen in any other man. He was a rebel, he was ready to risk his own life for a better world. Those were things Jeanell had aspired to, had hoped for, and had to some extent succeeded even if long after her short lifetime was over.

  No, she had to remind herself. I’m not dead yet. I can still get back to my own time.

  But even if not, Jeanell knew that she had a destiny in that time, in that place, things to do that could end her life before she ever had a chance to return to her own time. They would have to take the uppermost priority, even at the expense of her life.

  Like Ric had said, she’d started a problem which she now had to solve, even if it meant using that same problem as its own solution, assassinating the most dangerous man in the world.

  And she knew Ric would help her, stand by her side and guide her, perhaps even love her.

  No, Jeanell told herself again, there’s no time for that!

  But Jeanell knew that she’d lived her whole life with that mantra. There was never time for anything, not for dating, not for love, not for family, not for fun. Hers was a life in the library, the research lab, despite all the boys’ adoring looks and stammered invitations. But she knew then that it had only been an excuse, to protect herself from men she was afraid of, from feelings she couldn’t quite understand, and from the place society put pretty blond girls like Jeanell Glenn. She wanted to be more than just a pretty face, and she knew that she was; she turned out to be a genius.

  And being alone seemed to be her life’s masterpiece.

  It took being thrown sixty years into the future, to face her own death, to finally bring love into Jeanell’s life, and the more she thought about it, the more she couldn’t deny it; the more she wanted it.

  Jeanell looked at herself in the mirror. She slipped her glasses on and wiped the mirror, taking in the full picture of herself. Mid-twenties, attractive, body in good shape, breasts still high and firm.

  Does he want me?

  She looked at her long, blond hair. She’d never understood how to use it, how men were attracted to it. But as she raised the scissors to the side of her head, she suddenly felt that she was parting with a certain symbol of her femininity. She’d never exploited it, she’d never truly understood it, but she felt that she was going to miss it.

  Snip, snip, the strands collected in the sink, dark and wet. But it was necessary to hide herself, and what little good that blond hair ever did for her, it would only prove deadly in the days to come.

  Black hair dye changed her whole look, including her eyebrows, and after an hour to let it set and then blow it dry, she barely recognized herself in the mirror. She had a more dramatic appearance, it seemed to her, more dangerous.

  She liked it.

  After her hair was dry and set, she put on the white outfit that everybody else seemed to wear. It was comfortable enough, flattering of her figure. Though she’d grown up a bookworm and a research scientist, her body was always firm, athletic. She’d been working out, always enjoyed her morning runs. Jeanell knew then that her lifestyle had helped her through the past few days, not to mention getting her past the next few.

  With the clothes and the dye, Graham had left a pair of contact lenses, turning her blue eyes green and improving her vision tenfold. She wouldn’t need her glasses, further changing her appearance and improving her chances of survival. She also felt stronger somehow, like she was an entirely different person. Instead of the timid, mousy bookworm, she felt strong, exciting, a woman of adventure and danger.

  Well, she had to ask herself, why not? How should I be the same? I’m in a different time, engaging in a suicide mission to save the human race. That’s not the life I knew, that’s not the person I was.

  But it’s the person I am now, whether I like it or not.

  And she did like it, just a little bit.

  In the living room, Graham served tea, oaky and hot and spicy, delicious with a few chocolate-coated soda crackers. “Glad to see some things just don’t change,” she said to Graham’s amused smile.

  Then she saw Ric step into the room.

  Jeanell had changed her own look, and Ric had done likewise. The most significant thing besides the change of clothes was his hair. Those long, black locks had been shorn to a tight buzz cut. But it revealed all the more his striking handsomeness—sculpted cheekbones, strong chin, striking green eyes to match the artificial color of Jeanell’s new lenses. But Ric seemed even taller in his white suit, his lean and muscular physique pushing out from beneath the slightly stretchy material.

  He walked in without a word, and that was about as much as Jeanell could manage to put together too.

  Graham pulled out a smartphone, very much like the ones popular in Jeanell’s own time. Graham said, “You’ll use this to shoot around, get the lay of the land.”

  Jeanell repeated, “Shoot around?”

  Ric said, “We can go anywhere in the world.”

  Jeanell’s mind reeled. “Anywhere at all?”

  “If you want to see Paris, we just press a few buttons on the screen and boom, we’re there.”

  Jeanell’s jaw literally dropped. “Paris. Can we?”

  Ric smiled. “We can… and we will.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  It was just a few clicks on the screen, just as Ric had said. And Paris was just as Jeanell had always imagined. No time or distance could change the ancient majesty of that timeless city. Notre Dame was untouched, grand support pillars reaching up to support that dream of man’s spiritual heart.

  They strolled through The Louvre, the statue of the Greek goddess Athena looking down on them in her stone majesty. The goddess of war, she was calm and beautiful with perfect features, sending them messages of love and confidence and mutual indulgence. She may as well have been Bacchus, the Greek god of pleasure, indulgence, and wine.

  The Mona Lisa smiled at Jeanell as the world was flooded behind her, a serine mistress in the midst of tumult and impending doom. And she was smiling.

  Jeanell knew exactly how she felt.

  Walking with Ric, Jeanell felt somehow complete, whole, as if her travel had been to some greater purpose. But whatever that purpose, traveling from masterpiece to masterpiece, Jeanell found it harder and harder to take her eyes off Ric, tall and perfectly built behind that stretchy white fabric, his body as graceful and elegant as any of those timeless works of art.

  Just an hour later, they ate escargot, chewy and drenched in garlic butter, sumptuous and savory, and washed it down with champagne directly from the region for which it is named.

  Jeanell said, “So, I don’t get it. If I can travel anywhere, why don’t we just hide out here? Why doesn’t everyone just, y’know, go to Paris or Hawaii or wherever? It’s easy enough… thanks to me.”

  “Also thanks to you, the chancellor can also reach out anywhere in the world. Nowhere is safe. Your only sanctuary is time… any time other than this one.”

  “Mine… alone?” Ric smiled but didn’t answer. Jeanell asked, “How long do I have?”

  “Hard to say. But as long as we’re traveling like this, I think we’re okay. They’re going to come after you, let’s not make any mistake about that. But they’ll have to track you down, and the more we travel, the harder that’ll be. We’re a step ahead of them as it is, probably more than one. So that gives us some breathing room.”

  “I
see.” Jeanell tried to hide her little smile. “Then… what shall we do next?”

  Ric smiled too. “Anything you like, I suppose.”

  Rome was amazing; the ruins lit up, spanning the ages. What Jeanell noticed most was the lack of the big clear capsule buildings that dominated Colorado. “Things weren’t as bad here in Europe,” Ric explained. “For better or worse.”

  “Better,” Jeanell said, “definitely better.” After a thoughtful pause, she asked, “So, I don’t know anything about you, really. How did you and Graham get to know each other?”

  “He’s…” Ric looked Jeanell over, the last vestige of suspicion leaking away. “He’s my father, actually. But he’s known by the chancellor, respected; he’s one of the reasons I went underground, to protect him.”

  “Because you had to rebel, and that would endanger him.”

  “Yes. I don’t blame my father for laying low, of course. We both agreed that was the best way for him to serve the resistance.”

  “Then why didn’t you follow suit? You didn’t have to live underground, obviously. You might have found a place in the government.”

  Ric said, “I never could have played their game, I wouldn’t if I could.”

  “But you could change things from within. Isn’t that a better strategy?”

  “I suppose it’s one way of looking at things. But I just couldn’t play along to stay along. Some things, you just have to stand against.”

  And Jeanell knew he was right, and that her time to stand against evil had finally come, sixty years after her own lifetime. But this wasn’t a night to reflect on her grim future or her sad and strange past. And it wasn’t a night to worry about the future, so much in doubt. This was a night to travel the world in the company of a beautiful and mysterious man.

  A swipe of the screen put them in a flash in a disco in Prague. Lights pulsed and music thumped, loud and droning and constant, matching the pace of her heart. The synthetic music had a hypnotic quality, flashed of spoken-word vocals or drum kicks to interrupt the grinding rhythm. It jolted up from the dance floor, driving up her legs and into her swaying hips. Jeanell couldn’t resist the primal temptation of that pounding beat. Though her life had been turned upside down, though everything she’d ever known had been ripped from her and replaced with things she may never understand or even survive, a girl still existed in her who hungered to live, to love, to dance.

  And in a lot of ways, Jeanell had already given herself up for dead, so she wasn’t above indulging in the pool of life, even if just for one or two days more. She’d tried to resist it, but the wonders of Paris, the power of instantaneous travel, which she herself had created, was a heady combination that she simply couldn’t resist.

  And there was Ric, a man like she’d never known and would never know again. He danced before her, graceful and sexy, eyes locked on hers as their hips ground together. His powerful hands found her hips, resting gently and subtly guiding them. Without his long hair, he looked like an entirely different man—a bit more menacing, less primal. But Jeanell knew that he was no threat to her; he could have killed her ten times if he’d wanted to, or turn her over to whomever was willing to pay the most.

  But that time had gone. He’d won her trust, and now she wanted nothing more than to give it to him, and not only that.

  His crotch was bulging with his increasing lust for Jeanell, and she couldn’t help but notice it. A long, thick shape pushed out from behind the stretchy white material, and it was all Jeanell could do to keep from reaching out and grabbing it right there and then. She could imagine how hard it was, how good it was going to feel once it was inside her. But there was still the music, the lights, the scent of perfume and sweat intermingling as lovers swayed and danced around them. Jeanell felt as if she was surrounded by a kind of faux orgy, simulated sex acts happening all around her, a mass of lovers in perverse public displays.

  And Jeanell felt good to be one of them, and it felt even better to know that some things never really changed, though Jeanell knew that she wasn’t one of them.

  She definitely did feel different, and Jeanell knew there were so many good reasons for that. She looked different, like a sexy secret agent from some old TV show. The pretty blonde she’d always been was a recluse, afraid of what her beauty might inspire in others, even in herself. But the new Jeanell was ready to dance, ready to fight, ready to live and love. The new Jeanell felt like the real Jeanell, the better Jeanell, and more and more she was willing to turn herself over to it, to him, to it all.

  She was also more willing to turn herself over to Ric.

  But something caught Jeanell’s eye; no, not something, someone. Jeanell muttered, “Brad? Is that Brad?”

  Ric spun to peer through the lights and the crowd just as Brad ducked down, suspicious and devious. Ric said, “Oh shit!” before grabbing Jeanell’s hand. “We gotta go!”

  “What? It’s Brad!”

  “Just run!”

  He led her through the crowd, suddenly thick and hard to penetrate. The bodies were close together, grinding in ignorant bliss to the tune of their own requiem. Ric ran faster, his fist tight around Jeanell’s. They ducked down low, pushing through the crowd toward the exit, which seemed to get further and further away the more they tried to reach it.

  Even above the scramble and the music, Jeanell asked, “Why are we running?”

  “To stay alive!”

  Ric finally found the door and pushed hard, angry customers balking as he shoved them out of the way, screaming, “Run for your lives!”

  But by then it was too late. Jeanell looked back through the still-open front door to see a flash of light, a crowd full of terrified screams, and then the sudden absence of activity… and people… inside the club.

  “Oh, my God!”

  “He’s not here,” Ric said, pulling her out onto the street. “Neither is anyone else!”

  They ran out onto the street and kept running, the medieval block of old Prague stretching out before them.

  CHAPTER NINE

  They ran down the streets of Prague, Jeanell’s heart pounding in her chest, the smell of cigarettes wafting through the air. “What happened? What did Brad do?”

  “Stole the whole crowd,” Ric said, “Fish in a net meant for us.”

  “And Brad was looking for us?”

  “Who would recognize you better? He’s probably not the only one of your former team working against us.”

  “And why are we running?”

  “As long as we’re running, they can’t hole us. You have to be more or less in the same place for a reasonable amount of time.”

  “How reasonable? How much time?”

  “As far as we’re concerned,” Ric said, “a few seconds here and there.”

  “A few seconds? And what do we do in the meantime?”

  “We keep running.”

  They ran down one of the old, winding cobblestone streets toward the big Prague Castle. They ducked around a corner and saw a pair of black-uniformed soldiers from the chancellor’s private police service, the CPP. And they were quick to point at Jeanell and Ric, sticking out in their once-common white suits.

  Ric grabbed her hand. “Run!”

  Jeanell’s feet slid under her as her legs pumped hard, throwing her forward with all the speed and assurance she could muster. She didn’t dare look back, certain it would slow them down, a lethal and final mistake.

  They turned a corner and kept running, hitting a throng of pedestrians, many more than anywhere back in Colorado. Jeanell’s hand slipped out of Ric’s as the thick crowd separated them. They reached out, unable to reunite. But both knew they had to keep rushing forward, even if it meant that the crowd pushed them further and further apart with every step.

  Their pursuers called behind them, bringing more troops down on them from other directions. Jeanell could foresee them being besieged and captured. Ric had been right; there was no escaping them anywh
ere on Earth, no escape for them nor for anybody else. The chancellor and the powers of the entire office would have to be assaulted to preserve humanity, that much was clear. Whether Jeanell or Ric would survive long enough to attempt such a thing was another matter entirely.

  Jeanell couldn’t resist the temptation to look back, the chancellor’s forces closing in on her from behind. Their eyes locked, and she knew that they knew, there was no question and no doubt. They were chasing her, and now they knew they had to catch her.

  Alive.

  Ric reached out of the crowd and grabbed Jeanell’s arms, pulling her out of the throng and into an alley. She released a frightened scream but stifled it quickly, relieved to see her only friend reunited with her at last. Ric pulled out his smartphone, swiped the screen, and took Jeanell’s hand in his own.

  “Hold on,” was all he had time to say. In a flash, they were gone.

  ***

  Traveling though the artificial black hole was a blinding experience, no time to calculate the event. It was traveling in a flash, in an instant, the two of them suddenly arriving where they intended to be. And where they intended to be was back at Graham’s apartment in Boulder, Colorado. But both Jeanell and Ric knew that they wouldn’t be able to linger.

  They were being hunted, from every angle, and there was no longer such a thing as safe harbor.

  The apartment was quiet, Ric leaning forward to lead them out of the bedroom, where they’d landed. The corpses Jeanell had dreamt of were vanished reminders of her foresight. Ric whispered Graham’s name, but received no answer. He lead her down the hall and into the living room, calling his father’s name again.

  A bloody gurgle answered him.

  Ric let go of Jeanell’s hand and fell to his father’s side, Graham laying on the couch. His guts were a bowl of blood and gore, his face pale, drained of life. Ric fell to his side, taking his hand and pressing it to his face.

  “They came for you,” Graham croaked out, his own blood glistening on his lips. “I… I told them you were in the woods, that should keep them… keep them busy for a while.” He coughed, more blood jumping from his mouth, landing on his quivering chin. “You have to stop him, m’boy, you and Jeanell… you’re the only ones who can.”