Chapter Four

Krogan was leaving for the spaceport when the head bioengineer on the antiviral project asked to speak to him. The first iteration of the antiviral treatment had failed. In fact, the death rate in the placebo control group was slightly lower than among the group that had received the antiviral. They were back to square one.

And on the heels of that bad news, he had to meet Hope Bennett, the human woman selected for him.

It was a shitty day all around.

He jumped into a vaporator , mentally transmitted his destination, and, in seconds, materialized in the spaceport. A year ago, the spaceship depot would have been teeming with male and female Caradonians, as well as aliens from across the galaxy. Today, the near-vacant spaceport was eerily reflective of the tragedy that had struck their planet. Travel had fallen by more than three-quarters. Among the passengers, males outnumbered females by ten to one. The few females present were children clinging to their fathers' hands or grandmothers assisted by sons and grandsons. And there were almost no aliens.

Although the nano-virus affected only their species, many aliens weren't willing to risk visiting Caradonia, and several planets had issued bans, forbidding travel to and from their planet. Others had implemented draconian quarantines discouraging travel. The pandemic that had decimated their female population was destroying their economy and their livelihoods, too.

Fortunately, humans from Terra Nova were willing to come to Caradonia.

Vorgol's suggestion saved the Cosmic Mates program.

But not me.

He had been counting on the program being unable to find anyone willing to accept his terms. He'd learned only yesterday that Hope Bennett had agreed to be his provisional wife and would be arriving today. What would possess a woman to agree to such a drastic change, leave the familiar behind, and end up with nothing ?

Unless she doesn't know. Despite his orders, perhaps his terms hadn't been communicated to her. He would ensure she understood when he met her.

Of course, the ship from Terra Nova had docked at the opposite end of the terminal. He hated being late. Besides being rude to the other party, it gave him no time to compose himself and left him feeling like he was playing catch-up. To make up for lost time, he grabbed an accelerator from the rack and zoomed through the spaceport.

At the passenger meet-up outside the landing dock, a woman sat on a bench, a half-empty cloth sack at her feet. That has to be her, he guessed. The hologram he'd received had been poor quality—her facial features had been blurry. If not for the fact that she was the only human left, he might have passed by her without a second glance.

"Hope Bennett?" He stopped the airboard, and she raised her head.

He almost fell off the stationery accelerator. This is a bad idea.

She was beautiful. Breathtaking. A terrible, sinking feeling spread through his body. He didn't know why her beauty caused such dread, except it did. How can I get out of this? I need to reread that contract. There has to be something that can get me out of this sooner than a year. She deserves someone better than me, someone who will love her.

He'd never expected this. Certainly her blurry hologram hadn't given any indication, and while the human models Vorgol had shown him had been passably attractive, they hadn't been this pretty.

A silken veil of brown hair fell past her shoulders, gleaming under the light. Thick lashes framed wide-spaced dark eyes, and she had soft pink lips, neither too full nor too thin.

Maybe it's not her. She doesn't look like her hologram.

"You! I mean, Mr. Krogan?" She stood up, and the relief in her smile hinted at a vulnerability, further pricking at his conscience.

Fizzak . "Just Krogan. No mister," he said. She was tiny. Smaller than the hologram models had led him to assume. The ill-fitting emerald dress flattered her coloring but accentuated her slenderness and hid her womanly curves. Still, with a man's eye, he could tell she had them.

"I started to worry no one was coming. Everyone else paired up and left. "

"I was about to leave when something came up." He realized he was still on the accelerator and stepped off. He'd chosen a board with a rack for baggage, but he didn't see that she'd brought any, except for the lone tote. "Where's your luggage?"

"Right here." She toed the sack at her feet.

"Where's the rest of it?"

"This is all I have."

"Well then, are you ready to go?"

She nodded, and he grabbed her half-empty sack and stowed it on the accelerator board.

She eyed the conveyance with trepidation.

"I'll get on first. You step up behind me." He pointed out the overshoes attached to the airboard. "Slip your feet into those sleeves if you feel you need to, but don't worry. You can't fall off. If it makes you more comfortable, you can hold on to me."

"I don't think I'll need to do that," she said.

He stepped into the front position and twisted around, watching as she got settled. "All set?"

"I'm set."

The board took off.

Hope squealed and grabbed him around the waist as if hanging on for dear life. Her touch kindled an unexpected reaction, causing his heart to stutter and the gliteri along his hairline and across his chest to tingle. What could he do? He'd told her she could hang on to him. He'd never been more thankful to arrive at the vaporator.

"Let me guess," he said as he carried the board to its docking station. "Terra Nova doesn't have accelerators?"

* * * *

"N-no, we don't." Hope swayed on her feet, feeling dizzy and queasy, and not just because of the precarious high-speed ride through an alien spaceport on a souped-up surfboard. Her entire life had become topsy-turvy.

Please, don't send me back. Not yet. Right now, that was her biggest fear—that he'd break their contract, find an earlier out than the year-end escape clause. She didn't want to be here, but she couldn't leave either!

She'd recognized him as the starched and stern man in the Cosmic Mates advertisement. In person, he appeared colder, more forbidding, and huge . Far taller than she'd expected. She had to tilt her head to see his face. And then wished she'd hadn't. His face had tightened with disappointment as clear as the stars in an unclouded night sky .

He'd been expecting better. Who wouldn't? Nobody as handsome as him desired to be stuck with someone as mousy as her. She was used to being dismissed and overlooked—although that hadn't helped her with the mayor. But the one time in her life when she needed to make a positive impression, she'd become invisible again. She needed Krogan to like her enough to keep her for the duration of their term, but not to become so enamored he would try to prevent her from leaving at the end. Personal insecurities and fears for the future boiled over into a sticky mess of anxiety.

Her stomach had sunk to her toes when she'd taken in his exotic handsomeness, craggy masculine features, muscular body, smoke-blue skin, and deeper-blue long hair tied with a thong. It sank further as she watched him stow the surfboard-rocket on the rack. His shirt clung to the bulging muscles in his broad shoulders and biceps as he lifted the board with ease. She already knew he had rock-hard abs, having hung on to him as they streaked through the terminal.

I am so out of my league. Cosmic Mates made a huge mistake in matching us.

Don't panic. Try to stay positive .

At least she needn't worry he'd develop strong feelings for her. He'd be thrilled to be rid of her at the end of the provisional year. She had no intention of remaining on Caradonia; she just needed to hide out until Gleezer forgot about her and found himself another bride. She pitied the poor woman, whoever she was, even felt guilty, but not guilty enough to throw herself on the grenade. Prudence would keep her apprised of when it was safe to come home.

After getting fired, the situation had gone from bad to worse. Cosmic Mates had been her sole hope.

"We need to talk before we proceed any further," Krogan said. "But not here." He glanced around. The spaceport wasn't as busy as she would have expected, but a few blue men ambled along, and, occasionally, one would streak by on a flying surfboard. "We'll take a vaporator to my housing unit where we can have some privacy." He slung her bag over his broad shoulder and gestured to a row of silver silos reminding her of gigantic organ pipes.

No good conversation ever started out, "We need to talk," but she needed to be honest about her intentions. From the language translator she'd received aboard the ship, she understood him well enough, but some words and idioms had no translation. What was an evaporator ? It couldn't be what it sounded like, could it? She didn't see any steam coming out the top of the giant tubes.

"An evaporator? Is the dehydrator in use?" She attempted to ease her nervousness with a joke.

He gave her a blank look. "I don't understand. A vapo rator is a form of transport. It's what we use to get from one place to another. Why would we need a dehydrator?"

She twisted her mouth, feeling like an idiot. "Dumb joke. Never mind."

An opening appeared in one of the silvery tubes, and he ushered her into it.

The opening sealed, encasing them in the cylinder, large enough for maybe four human-sized people, two of Krogan's size. Luckily I'm not claustrophobic, she thought, but she was glad to have him with her as she braced for another wild ride.

The air seemed to bead up and glisten as if they were surrounded by champagne bubbles, but there was no sensation of wetness, just a fizzy feeling against her skin. Seconds later, the air and sensation cleared, and, to her astonishment, an exit materialized and revealed they were no longer at the spaceport—or at least, they weren't on the same level .

"We're here. This is my building." Her bag in hand, he stepped out of the cylinder, and she jumped out after him before the tube sealed up and deposited her who-knew-where.

The floor resembled gold-veined white marble, but it felt like a plush carpet under her feet and muffled their footfalls. There weren't any windows, but diffused bright light glowed from the alabaster barrel-shaped ceiling arching overhead.

Rows of shoulder-high vases of alien blooms splashed vibrant gemstone hues, relieving the starkness of the solid white walls. The flowers looked too exotic to be genuine, but their rich perfume revealed they were. In wide-eyed awe, she stopped to finger a velvety petal and inhale the heady fragrance.

"You must have flowers on your planet," he commented.

She'd tended her stepmother's namesake rose garden at the cottage and often picked wildflowers in the fields surrounding Bloomhaven. "Yes, but not like these," she replied in a low voice.

"Why are you whispering?" he whispered back.

She lifted a shoulder in an embarrassed shrug. "It seemed...appropriate. "

His chuckle was rich but restrained, like the hushed elegance of the space itself. "This way," he said, and she realized she was procrastinating. Tension had tied her stomach into knots. Beyond the door at the end of the hall—she assumed that's where they were headed—they would "talk."

Sure enough, he made a beeline for it. The door had no handle, knob, lever, or slider. It just opened at their approach.

"Like magic," she murmured.

"Or a program chip." He raised his wrist and then ushered her inside.