I twisted out of his too-soothing grasp and barked a laugh. It sounded vaguely unhinged.
Scrubbing tears from my face, I climbed to my feet.
“You mean me no harm?” I parroted. At least my voice sounded even again. Mostly. “Too damned late for that, isn’t it?”
“Finlay.”
The weight of that single word turned me back to face him.
I noticed the porthole in the wall. It had been revealed when we’d ripped the curtain while we fought.
I don’t remember how I got there, but suddenly, I found my fingers gripping the chilly frame of the porthole hard enough that my knuckles went white.
I stared out into the starry expanse of dark night sky, empty, except for the big, blue, gleaming jewel of a planet hanging in the lower third of the porthole arc.
My breath froze in my chest.
Earth.
I was looking at my planet from such a distance that I could barely make out any of the land mass beneath the cloud cover.
Dizziness swept me. Carrollus gritted out something that sounded like a curse. It wasn’t one I knew. Or in any language I recognized.
He surged upright, took hold of my upper arms, and turned me gently away from the view.
It didn’t matter. The vista had been seared into my memory. I’d heard astronauts say that happened.
That in the instant you look down from space on the world that gave you life, you changed. You were marked in a way that meant you’d never be the same. The only way you’d forget what you’d seen, what you’d experienced, would be to close your eyes in death.
I finally managed to order my eyes shut, but still saw my home hanging miles and miles below my feet.
Disorientation rushed from my feet to my head. Or maybe it had gone the other way, but suddenly, my feet knew they no longer had ground beneath them.
Only the warmth of Carrollus’s body heat merging with my own kept me anchored.
I’d started the day interviewing for a space program and ended it on an actual spaceship. Kidnapped by aliens disguised as humans?
I cracked one eye open. My head and my feet seemed to have agreed that the floor made a fine substitute for ground. Dizziness faded and I risked opening the other eye, too.
I turned back for another look.
“No,” he said, preventing me.
“Let go,” I turned away from him. “Every kid dreams of seeing Earth from space. Now that the shock has worn off, I want a better look. You must get a terrific view of the Northern Lights.”
He chuckled and escorted me to the porthole as if I might still fall over. “One of the many charms of your little blue world. When we first arrived, we thought your civilization was more advanced than it was because of the electrical interference at the poles during a solar event.”
I felt as if the floor had lurched out from under me. I stared at him. When we first arrived? Blowing out a steadying breath, I forced myself to focus on his statement about electrical interference at the poles.
That I could wrap my mind around. “Ship’s sensors can’t punch through the aurora?”
He met my gaze, his own searching. “You’ve seen too many Star Trek episodes.”
“Undoubtedly,” I replied.
The smolder of desire in Carrollus’s hooded gaze rushed heat through my body.
A self-satisfied smile touched his gorgeous lips. He traced his right hand down my arm to claim my hand in his. Bringing it to his lips, he pressed a heated kiss to my palm.
Pleasure zinged through my blood, settling between my legs. I stifled a gasp. Palm unsettlingly connected to genitalia. Who knew?
“You are remarkably resilient. The questions are back in your eyes,” he noted.
Unable to trust my voice, I nodded. Questions in my eyes and a promise of some kind in his. Did I imagine that? Did I dare hope that I could convince him to return me to my home?
“Come with me,” he said, releasing me. “You’ll be able to ask your questions of my commanding officer.”
His commanding officer. Interesting distinction. One of the only things I felt I could process in this morass of quicksand – or airless vacuum – beneath my feet.
I eased out of his grasp and turned back for my shoes. Mary had been so careful when she’d undressed me that I could account for every single hairpin I’d used earlier in the day. She’d even left a comb, which I applied to my tangled hair.
“Which military?” I asked, stepping into my sensible brown pumps. My attempt at a casual tone didn’t even fool me.
“One you won’t be familiar with,” he replied.
A military I wouldn’t know, and that hint of dialect flavoring his words – clues that ought to add up to something useful. Who had the kind of technology that could put me on a spaceship hundreds of miles above the planet without a spacesuit? For that matter, why weren’t we floating in zero-g? Since we weren’t floating, did I know for a fact that no one on Earth had the special effects budget to mock up something like this?
I didn’t. But I couldn’t imagine anyone going to the effort and expense. It wouldn’t make sense. Again, my thoughts circled back to why.
Impatient with the disorderly whirl of conjecture in my brain, I slapped down the comb and coiled my hair into another French twist.
Light and heat thrummed through my blood. Carrollus tangled his fingers with mine before I could reach for the pins to secure the coil.
“Leave it,” he commanded, pulling my hands away as if I wasn’t resisting.
Hair spilled down my back.
He had strength in spades, and he had me trapped between him and the dressing table.
A split second of fright trailed ice down my spine.
“Your hair is beautiful,” he said, folding my arms around my middle so that I stood, confined within his embrace.
Every piece of my biology arced to life at his contact. The reaction shook me. I’d never known that I could feel so much, so strongly.
“Mousy,” I corrected. My voice sounded small. Scared.
“I’ve yet to see a mouse with strawberry-blonde hair,” he countered, humor deepening his accent. “It’s beautiful and unruly. Like you.”
I shook my head.
“Leave it down,” he urged.
I shivered at the caress of his warm breath against my ear. While I had little inclination to indulge his whim, I couldn’t control my body’s runaway response to his persuasion. Goosebumps erupted over my skin.
“Fine. Yes,” I choked. Anything to get my body back under my control.
He chuckled, released me, and walked away.
The note of triumph in his laugh made me clench my teeth. Stiffening my spine, I tugged my jacket straight, turned on my heel, and marched to the door.
Assuming I wasn’t locked in, I’d walk out the door, and wander around until I found someone else and demand to be taken to their leader.
I left the bedroom and walked into a tiny, Spartan compartment, little more than a glorified closet, really. It had a kitchenette on one side and a scarred desk on the other. Odd. So much space devoted to a bedroom and so little to the rest of off-duty life.
The door opened at my approach. I had expected a whoosh sound effect, but it opened and closed silently.
I wasn’t locked in. Fine. It didn’t change the fact that until I learned interplanetary flight and navigation, I was more effectively a prisoner than any Earthly lockup could have made me.
“This way,” Carrollus said from behind me.
He led me through a maze of corridors, any of which could have been found inside military facilities the world over. Except that this one was over the world. By miles.