by Amanda Boone
While Jane protested, Paul sat on the backboard and moved his legs. “If someone would help me up, that would be wonderful. I feel a little weak.”
“Then you shouldn’t be getting up,” Jane declared. “Come on, Paul. Be reasonable.”
Paul struggled to his feet, but once on them, he didn’t even wobble. He stood steady before her, gazing down at her with a lustful gleam in his deep brown eyes.
“I appreciate you getting me out of my predicament,” he told the emergency personnel, “but I am quite fine. You may leave when you finish what you are doing.”
Staring up at him, Jane studied her husband in concern. Something wasn’t right; she could feel it. He looked the same, but he talked so formally. This was something else that he never did. Maybe he had a concussion. If so, he definitely needed to be seen by a doctor. Unfortunately, if he didn’t go to the hospital, that wouldn’t happen.
“Please, Paul,” she said, “just go with them—if not for your well-being, for my peace of mind.”
“I will not go,” he declared.
With those words, Jane knew she had lost the battle.
When the emergency vehicles left the scene, Paul draped his arm around Jane’s shoulder and escorted her to the Gator. They got on it and went back to the house in silence. Jane was furious with him at the moment, and if she spoke, it would be in anger. That was something she always tried not to do, but sometimes it was hard. This was one of those times. Right now, she wanted to physically slap some sense into the man.
Once inside, they sat down to dinner as though nothing had happened. After eating, Jane cleaned up while Paul went to the living room and sat on the couch. Before long, she joined him.
“I don’t know what your problem was with going to the hospital,” she said. “What’s wrong with you, anyway? You’re really acting weird.”
“I am not. I simply do not need hospital care.”
“That’s exactly what I’m talking about. You’re talking so formally. You always use contractions and speak in a simple way. You would have normally said, ‘I’m not, either. I just don’t need to see a doctor.’ The way you speak right now isn’t you.”
Paul rose and spread his arms. “You can see that I am fine.” He paused and grasped her hands to pull her to her feet. “Perhaps we should go to bed early. We could work on that baby you promised we could have.”
“We can go to bed,” she agreed as they headed toward the stairs leading to the second floor of their farmhouse, “but you need to rest. We don’t know how long you were under that tractor, and since you refused medical care, we don’t know if you have internal injuries.”
Again, neither of them spoke while they prepared for bed. As always, Paul wore nothing, but Jane put on a pair of pajamas to dissuade him from intercourse.
“What is this?” he asked when she got into bed. “You almost never wear pee-jays, only when you have absolutely no interest during your time of the month. I know that is not the case now.”
“It’s not. I told you that you shouldn’t be having intercourse when you were just under a tractor for who-knows-how-long.”
“And I told you that I am fine. Now please take off the pajamas. I want to make love to you. I want to make a baby that will be the culmination of our love.”
Chapter 3
“I just don’t think it’s a good idea, Paul,” Jane said as his hand slipped under her pajama top.
His hand caressed her naked breast, squeezing it gently as he bent over her. “It’s the perfect idea. Do you deny that you promised me you would never turn down my desire for a child?”
“Of course not, but I was trying to keep you alive.”
He kissed her lips for just a moment. “Then you lied about agreeing to have my child?”
“No, but …”
His lips caught hers again, this time in a passionate kiss that always forced her mind to lose track of the topic. He never failed to divert the subject with a kiss like this.
She opened her mouth slightly to admit his tongue. It clashed with hers in a different way, almost as though he was timid about the contact with hers. To show her acceptance, she thrust her tongue into his mouth and grabbed the back of his head to hold him.
He pulled back to gaze down at her. “Are you sure, Jane?”
“I’m sure I can’t deny you,” she whispered. “I’m sure that I love you with all my heart, and I’m sure that I want to show you every second. If that means doing something I don’t think is advisable to make you happy, who am I to refuse you? But if our making love makes you worse, you must promise you will go to the hospital and be checked out.”
“All right. I promise.”
With those words, Jane stripped her top over her head while Paul threw the covers off of them and pulled down her pajama bottoms. Jane gazed at his nude body. He had some bruising around his thighs and abdomen, but nothing that appeared to be any danger to his health—thank goodness. That made her less concerned about what would happen.
Reaching out, she tenderly fingered the contusion near his waist. To her surprise, his penis bounced in excitement. She touched it instead, sliding her index finger from the base to the tip.
His finger followed suit with her vagina, drawing forth a moan from deep in her throat. Oh, how she wanted her husband! She couldn’t remember ever having wanted him this much in her entire life. It was almost as though the accident had changed him, almost as though he was a different man.
Then Paul joined with her. Unlike other times, he filled her slowly, as if savoring their moments, as if he wanted to take his time since he’d nearly lost his life. Finally, he joined with her completely and moved within her body.
She felt like this was a new moment in their love, which had nearly been ripped from them. But they were still together, and joy filled her soul as surely as Paul’s organ filled her.
All thought left her mind as her body overtook her. She grabbed his buttocks and gyrated in time with his movements. All the time, their pelvises ground together. Her clitoris rubbed against his excited manhood, increasing her own excitement until she felt as though she could bear it no longer. Finally, he increased his movements.
Jane exploded in an orgasm unlike any other. Even Paul hadn’t previously made her convulse in such ecstasy. As soon as she relaxed, He drove into her one last time with a lusty growl of satisfaction. This was the first time he’d ever made noises like that when he came, but then everything seemed different this time.
A moment later, he collapsed onto the bed beside her and took her into his arms.
“That was magnificent,” he praised. “I cannot believe how much I enjoyed it.”
“It was wonderful, wasn’t it? Maybe your being so close to death, being in so much danger, heightened our senses and emotions to the point that we needed the release like never before.” She laid her head on his chest and listened to his heart beat. “I’m so grateful you survived that accident that I can’t even begin to put it into words.”
“Shall we dress and go to the site? I would like to see what the tractor looks like.”
“All right, if that’s what you want.”
***
As they neared the accident scene, Jane stopped short. It was unbelievable! The paramedics and fire fighters were still there, but she and Paul hadn’t left until after the emergency workers left. What was happening?
Beside her, Paul slipped her arm through his. She looked over at him. But it wasn’t Paul; it was somebody with his looks but with pale fuchsia skin. She looked back over to the scene, where paramedics labored to help someone on the ground. Gazing closer at the prone figure, she saw that it was Paul.
Jane felt numb, as though she wasn’t even present. This whole scenario was impossible! Paul was escorting her past the site, while another Paul was lying on the ground.
“BP 43 over 20; pulse 10,” a paramedic announced. “We’re losing him. Let’s bag him and get CPR going.”
Unable to believe what she was see
ing, Jane stared at the events unfolding before her. She moved without thought beside fuchsia Paul while she watched paramedics perform a life-saving procedure on her husband. As they passed the scene, no one appeared to notice them. Everyone concentrated on Paul. She kept her gaze on them, turning her head so she could see.
“Checking for vitals,” the female paramedic said. She put her stethoscope to his chest then checked the machine beside her. “I’ve got nothing. We’ve lost him.”
“We’ll continue CPR for a few minutes.”
“No!” Jane cried out. “He wouldn’t want to live as a vegetable. He wouldn’t want to live in a wheelchair for the rest of his life.”
“Maybe we should let him go,” the woman said. “He’s a farmer like my uncle. He wouldn’t want to be confined to a wheelchair, because he wouldn’t be able to do his job.”
“Exactly,” Jane said. “He wouldn’t be happy if he couldn’t work the farm.”
“Fifteen minutes,” the man said. “If he hasn’t come around, we’ll call it.”
Jane and Fuchsia Paul continued walking, but they appeared to go nowhere. The entire time she could see her husband receiving CPR; she could see the paramedics working to save him.
“Okay, call it, Sally.”
The female paramedic looked at her watch. “Seven-twenty-two.”
This whole thing was surreal. She was standing near Paul as the paramedics covered him with a plastic sheet, but she was moving away from the site with Fuchsia Paul. She wanted to stay with Paul, not walk away from him. In the field, she collapsed. No, she was still strolling away with …
She looked up at Fuchsia Paul. The handsome male, whose arm was linked with hers, was fuchsia; but he certainly wasn’t Paul. This man had the features of an Adonis.
Staring up at him, she tried to conjure up words to ask him what was happening. All words, however, were stuck somewhere in the back of her mind. This stranger was taking her somewhere, and she had no power to stop him. It was as though he had stolen her soul.
Chapter 4
“What happened?” Jane asked as she gazed around at her unbelievable surroundings. “Where am I?”
“You are on your way to Cartonia,” he announced. “You are my mate now, and you must change your body. I brought one for you.”
“Cartonia? Where’s Cartonia? I’ve never heard of it.”
“It is my planet. We need females from Earth to repopulate our land because Earth comes closest to our planet. Now I will take you to the body you will use. It will help you adjust to our planet’s atmosphere easier, and you will be able to understand what our people are saying.”
“What if I don’t want to go? What if I want to go back and bury my husband?”
“You cannot. We have mated, and now you are bearing my child.”
“For heaven’s sake,” Jane exclaimed, “we just had sex. You can’t possibly know that yet.”
He held her hand up in front of her face and said, “You are changing color already.” Stunned, she stared at her fuchsia hand as he continued. “Taking the new body will erase the memory of your mate. You are now mine. You will not remember him or the pain of losing him.”
“But I love him. I don’t want to forget him.”
“I am afraid you must. You are Cartonian now, and you will take the body I brought for you.”
What a fantasy this is! she thought in wonder. She had no idea how all of this came to her, but she knew it couldn’t be true.
“Everything you see, everything you feel, everything you remember will be gone soon. You will know only about Cartonia.”
Taking her hand, he started away from the controls of whatever kind of spaceship they were in, but she didn’t move. She wasn’t about to let him take away her memories.
“Who are you, anyway?” she demanded. “You’re certainly not my husband.”
“I am Tyr. I am a soldier of Prince Odin. My grandfather was king, but he abdicated the throne to Prince Odin’s grandfather because he did not want it. You are now royalty and will be treated as such when we arrive on Cartonia.”
“This is ludicrous,” she said as she went with him down a silver-lined hallway to a different room. “This couldn’t possibly be real.”
“It is very real,” he insisted. “You will take a nap, and when you awaken, you will remember nothing of Earth or the ways they live on Earth. You will only know about Cartonia, even though some things you will need to learn.”
They approached a door, which opened automatically. A beautiful female lay on a table, her skin nearly a translucent yellow. When he motioned to a nearby bed, she sat down on it. If she really was pregnant, how would that transfer to a different body? Curious, she posed the question aloud to Tyr.
“Your body is on Earth, but your soul is with me. The child will remain with your soul as if you are connected to it physically. The body assigned to you will carry the child and love the child as you would on Earth.” He held a glass of water out toward her, so she took it. She could use a drink right now, but she wanted the kind of drink that had some alcohol in it. While she drank, he explained further.
“The woman you saw collapse at the site of your mate’s accident was you, but your soul had already moved on. That woman on Earth will not feel love as you did, but the female on the table will. Therefore, you will still know the feeling.”
Unexpectedly feeling groggy, she returned the empty glass to Tyr and lay down on the bed. This had been a very long couple of hours, and she was exhausted.
“You will sleep now,” he told her. “I will check you to determine if you have completed the transfer. When you do, I will awaken you, and you will be refreshed and ready to meet your people.”
Before Jane could respond, darkness engulfed her.
***
Jane opened her eyes to a bright room. The four-poster bed in which she lay appeared to be made of brass. Brass beds weren’t uncommon on Earth, so someone must have taken her in when she fainted upon … upon … For the life of her, she couldn’t remember why she had fainted, only that she had.
Sitting back against the brass headboard, which was engraved with several fleur-de-lis symbols, she surveyed the room. The walls were of silver, not stone or wood. Where was she?
A silver door across the room opened, and a lovely female with pastel green skin entered.
“Terrific!” she exclaimed. “You’re awake. We thought you would be about now. My name is Lynne, and I understand you’re Jane.”
Lynne approached Jane with a tray containing some unfamiliar items. Setting the tray on the bed, Lynne continued as though she was very comfortable.
“I hope you speak English because I don’t know any foreign languages.”
“I do,” Jane replied. “Where am I?”
“Cartonia. Didn’t Tyr tell you?”
“I don’t know. I don’t remember much right now.”
“I’m not surprised. A lot of things will come back to you in time, but I wouldn’t mention it to Tyr if I were you. The men here think we can’t remember anything from Earth. Fenrir doesn’t know that I remember a lot of things, either.”
“Who are Tyr and Fenrir? And what is Earth?”
“Tyr and Fenrir are our … spouses, I suppose you could call them. They call us their mates. You must be famished. Go ahead and eat. The food here is actually pretty good.”
Picking an item from the tray that looked like a cross between a pear and a peach, Jane bit into it. It tasted like neither, but Lynne was right. It was good.
“I think I remember Tyr now,” Jane said. “How long did I sleep?”
“I don’t know. Time is weird here, not like it is on Earth. You’ll like it here, though. Most people are friendly, although they don’t usually want to be friends. Princess Melanie is from Earth, too, so those of us who are here have a bit of a bond if we can speak the same language. We can understand Cartonian, but we still can’t understand other languages, like French or Swahili.”
Jane studied t
he woman in the white jumpsuit then looked at her own jumpsuit, also white.
“Don’t worry. Everybody wears white jumpsuits. Only the direct royalty—the prince, princess, and their children—wear colorful or silver ones.” Lynne paused then said, “Take some food with you, and I’ll show you around the castle. It’s like nothing you’ve ever seen, not that you would remember yet. You will, though.”
Not knowing what else to do, Jane took another pear/peach and a flat, indescribable piece before she followed Lynne.
The castle was quite bright and airy. Open windows faced all directions, capturing any breeze that happened by. Anything lightweight was held down by bronze or silver knick-knacks of various shapes. However, Jane couldn’t place any of the shapes to even connect them to something on Earth, like she had the peach and pear.
The interior walls of the castle were silver, just as the bedroom walls. Why was nothing made of stone or wood? She remembered enough to know that’s what a building on Earth was made of.
Lynne led her to a window. A breeze caught them. Jane remembered the scent; it was that of the ocean. Outside, beyond the sand dunes colored like a rainbow, stretched a vast aquamarine ocean.
“We’re on top of a small mountain here,” Lynne said, “so we can see all around us. This is my favorite view, but I love just staring at Prince Odin’s palace, too. We can see that from Fenrir’s office. He’s out right now, so I’ll show you that, too.”
They went through silver walled corridors lined with three-dimensional photographs, which were framed in copper. Jane could hardly believe that there was so much metal in the building and wondered what the smaller houses, the houses of ordinary people, were made from.
As they approached a large, shining copper door at the end of a hallway, Jane heard muffled voices. Apparently, Lynne did, too, because she told Jane to be quiet before they approached the closed door.
To her surprise, Jane understood every word she heard.
“You do not have an option, Tyr,” a male voice said. “You are in my command, which is why I am allowing you to live in my house. That and because you are my favorite nephew and heir. You will do as ordered, and you will not complain.”