Chapter 1

IN THE QUIET OF HER apartment, in the stillness before dawn, a chorus of chirping erupted outside her window. After a groggy moment of disorientation, Amy squinted through barely open eyes at the culprits. Noisy songbirds using a chronic insomniac's windowsill as the venue for their early morning concert served as a reminder of fate's twisted sense of humor.

Heartily offended by their cheeriness, and their colorful feathers, the scarlet, gold, and royal blue annoyingly bright at half past the ass crack of dawn, Amy muttered a not-so-nice word. Desperate to escape the noise and block the intrusive rays of the greater sun, choosing that precise moment to peek over the horizon, she buried her head under her pillow. But there was no escape from the assault to her senses. With the birds' obnoxious serenade and the room bathed in brilliant light, falling back to sleep was hopeless.

With a wail of exasperation, she sat up and hurled her pillow at the window. When it dropped a foot short of her target and the birds heedlessly chirped on, she did something she rarely ever did. She dropped her face into her hands and cried.

Another restless, mostly sleepless night drove her volatile emotions. She couldn't remember the last time she'd slept the night through. It wasn't the primary cause of what her doctors had diagnosed as retrograde amnesia, where large chunks of time had vanished from her recollection, but lack of sleep could prolong the condition.

It started months ago, after a "traumatic" incident she couldn't even remember. What she knew of being taken and held captive in the caves far outside of town came from others. They included little detail and never the who, why, and how of it all. The last thing she remembered was leaving work one night after dark, but then nothing, until she'd woken in a severely weakened and dehydrated state on a stretcher at the clinic. The closest thing they had to a hospital in their fledgling, frontier-like town.

Several well-meaning people had told her to consider not knowing what went on as a blessing. But they couldn't possibly understand what it was like to lose entire days of her life. Others whispered and speculated about her when they thought she wouldn't hear. Sometimes, when she walked into a room or rounded an end cap at the general store, conversation among the gossips abruptly halted. An awkward silence always followed.

She knew what they were saying. They doubted her amnesia, thinking she was a drama queen looking for attention. Often the word crazy worked its way into their hearsay. Her friends, the closest thing to family she had in the colony, and the only people whose opinions truly mattered, listened to her doctors who said not to push too hard too soon. They seemed confident her memories would come back in time.

Losing entire days was disturbing, but the chronic lack of sleep and the side effects it caused—fatigue, poor concentration, anxiety, irritability, and what she didn't need more of, memory loss—was beyond frustrating .

It wasn't typical insomnia, either. She could fall asleep practically anywhere. The problem was she couldn't stay asleep because of the persistent nightmares. Within hours of going to bed, she'd wake screaming, shaking, and drenched in sweat. It had gotten so bad, she feared closing her eyes at night.

She tried to stay up, but if she was still for more than a minute, her eyelids would droop. It didn't matter if she was on the couch, in bed, or sitting on one of the straight-backed kitchen chairs. Even if all the lights were on, the holographic video player was blaring, or while clutching her digital reader—sometimes all the above—she was so completely exhausted, sleep would eventually overtake her and then came the nightmares.

One thing was constant. When she awoke, no matter how hard she tried, she simply couldn't recall what in her dreams had frightened her so. If she was lucky enough to sleep again afterward, something would wake her in what seemed like mere minutes, either her alarm, the cheerful tweeting, or the brilliant light from Terra Nova's binary suns.

Angrily, Amy launched her second pillow across the room. Then, in a fit of anger, she jumped from the bed, tore the linens off the mattress, threw them onto the floor, and stomped on them.

"I need coffee," she muttered on her way to the bathroom to shower, dress, and face another day. "Lots and lots of strong coffee."

By the time she emerged from the residence hall, dressed in a T-shirt knotted at the waist and a lightweight cotton skirt to beat the heat, her long hair pulled up in a messy bun, she'd found her happy face. It was what everyone had come to expect from her even though her head felt heavy, the beginnings of a headache had formed behind her right eye, and, in general, she felt like warmed-over crap.

She ignored her nemeses, the chirping birds and the twin suns shining warm on her face, as she walked to Galactic Goodies, the combination bakery-coffee shop two blocks over.

Grudgingly, she admitted it was a beautiful day. There wasn't a cloud in the pinkish-purple alien sky, and a light breeze blew from the dense forest surrounding the growing town. By midafternoon, the temperature would soar to near triple digits, but for now, at least, it was somewhat cool, and she wasn't sweating buckets.

Amy waved to those she passed, most faces and names familiar. Working at the only medical clinic, with the population recently topping 20,000, mainly because of the military base near town, she knew most of the residents.

Several were heading in her direction, to the coffee shop, the only one of its kind in the colony.

As she approached the coffee shop, a crowd of people gravitated toward it, their eager footsteps echoing on the pavement. The tantalizing aroma of freshly baked goods and rich coffee greeted her as she pushed open the door, as did the line of at least a dozen men waiting ahead of her. Had she ever been there when there wasn't a line?

"Hey, beautiful!"

"Morning, sunshine!"

"It's another gorgeous day in New Hope now that you're here, Red."

"Morning, gentlemen," she said with a wave and a genuine smile. They were friendly, most a bit rough around the edges, but harmless. They either worked construction or in the uladite mine. Their compliments were good for her ego, but she knew firsthand they said the same—except maybe for Red—to any female, no matter her age, who walked through the door. In the colony, men outnumbered women ten to one, but with each ship's arrival, the ratio gradually decreased.

Amy made certain she didn't single any of the men out. At thirty-four, she'd been on her fair share of dates but never found Prince Charming. She had parted ways amicably with several boyfriends over the years and been dumped by as many. That was a while ago, however.

The last decade on Earth, with their world literally crumbling beneath their feet, survival rather than romance had been foremost in her mind. She'd been among the first to sign up with EPIC, the Earth-Primaria Integration Commission. As a small-town girl with no special skills to offer the mission, she expected to be one of the last to have her ticket punched, if at all.

With a renewed sense of hope, she had stepped onto Primaria three months ago, ready to embrace the new way of life that awaited her. But just when she thought she had found her purpose, everything came crashing down. The aliens, so desperate to propagate their dwindling species they snatched an entire spaceship with its all-female crew from the sky, deemed her unsuitable to meet their needs.

She couldn't perform the most basic female function. How pathetic was that?

After coming out a loser on both planets, no way was she striking out on Terra Nova and making it a trifecta of rejection. She was done with men—period, end of story, case closed—and she didn't even get a T-shirt to add to her extensive collection for her troubles.

"Mornin', Amy! The usual?" Jerry, the shop owner, asked when it was her turn.

"Venti half-and-half, ten pumps vanilla, extra whip. Can't start my day without it," she replied.

He smirked and shook his head. "Coffee, two sugars, one nonfat powdered creamer coming right up."

None of what she requested existed in the colony. Having coffee at all was a treat. She understood that as well as anyone, so she waved at the front of her shirt that read, I don't rise and shine, I caffeinate and hope for the best, then quipped, "A girl can dream, can't she?"

When the other customers laughed, she flashed them a grin while grabbing her to-go mug. It was metal and reusable. They had paper recyclables and strictly limited plastic in the colony because they weren't going down the same road as on Earth and destroying the new home they were lucky enough to find and sacrifice for.

When she returned her mug, she'd receive her deposit back, but that wasn't ever gonna happen because she required her morning coffee to be half human, which another of her graphic T-shirts stated.

Whistling in between sips, she made her way to the medical clinic where she worked as a receptionist. As she walked through the doors, she called cheerily to her coworkers, as always.

"Hey, Amy," one called back. "How are you?"

"I'm super, Meghan. How many babies are we expecting today? "

"None," the nurse midwife answered. "At least not according to my due-date calendar, but you know babies don't always follow a schedule. Are you sure you're feeling okay?"

"Never better," she replied as she rounded the front counter and waved her hand over her holographic display to wake it up for the day."Don't I look okay?"

"Since you asked, you look a little pale," one of the technicians observed, concern in her voice.

She patted then pinched her cheeks, brushing off their worries with a laugh. "I probably should get a little sun. But you know redheads. We either freckle or burn. In my case, it's the latter. I go from pale to lobster red to pale again." Realizing she was jabbering, she reassured them, "I'm fine. Really. I didn't get much sleep last night." She raised the cup in her hand and took another sip. "But it's nothing a little coffee can't fix."

Her friend Adria came walking up the hall. Dr. Kincaid, she should say, since she had recently passed her physics' exam, becoming the first female Primarian in their history to achieve such a feat. Everyone at the clinic was thrilled for her. And that she'd married the love of her life, Beckett Kincaid, the most influential man in the colony. He also happened to be her fated mate, the first male human/Primarian female match to date. Her friend kept racking up check marks in the win column. Good for her.

"What are you doing here?"

She looked up to see Adria in the lobby, standing stock-still in front of her desk, staring at her.

"Um, I work here," Amy drawled. "Where else would I be?"

"In bed, sleeping. Perhaps taking a little time to regroup. Or seeing Anna Walker, which should probably top the list. "

"To answer in order. I slept enough. Regroup from what? And why would I need to see the trauma specialist?"

"Can I speak to you a moment, Dr. Kincaid?" Dr. Juna had walked up behind her and Adria without either of them noticing.

Amy's gaze followed the senior doctor and her friend as the two moved farther down the hall, well out of earshot. Adria was acting funny, and she wondered, even though she was only recently married, if there was trouble brewing.

From her vantage point, she could see a lively discussion ensue, the two women occasionally stealing glances in her direction. How odd.

When it was over, Adria made her way to the back without another word to her—even odder—while Dr. Juna approached.

The pretty blonde human doctor was only a few years her senior. As she reached the counter, Amy noticed her nose and cheeks were quite pink.

"It looks like you got a little too much sun this weekend. Or should I say suns, since we have two. I still can't get used to that when I look up into the sky. Or that it's pink and purple instead of blue like back home."

"I should have reapplied sunscreen. I'll have to do better, since as you say, we have double exposure." She scrutinized her more closely when she posed her next question. "You aren't sunburned and must have followed your own advice. Did you have a good time on our outing on Saturday?"

Amy blinked. "You know, until you mentioned it, I'd forgotten all about it. Do you think someone picked up my big bowl I brought the chickpea salad in? It's the only one I have, and I don't remember bringing it home." She frowned. "I don't remember coming home at all, in fact."

Dr. Juna patted her hand. "It was a trying day. Don't fret about the bowl. I washed it and brought it in. It's on the counter in the break room in back."

She nodded, wondering if the doctor meant tiring because nothing unusual stuck out in her memory as particularly trying. In fact, she'd slept away most of her weekend.

"Any other aftereffects from our picnic by the lake?"

"Nope. Like I told everyone else, I feel great this morning." She raised her near-empty mug. "And I'm gaining ground with every sip."

"I'm glad to hear that." She glanced at the clock on the wall, which read five minutes before eight, when they opened. Already, a patient waited outside. "I better get set up for my first appointment."

Amy glanced at the schedule. "That's Mrs. Granger. She's not scheduled until a quarter after. She's early, as usual."

"You can send her back when you're ready," Dr. Juna said, her expression contemplative as she walked away, as if trying to diagnose a particularly tough case. Amy had seen puzzled looks from the medical team plenty since coming to work at the clinic. They came from dealing with two similar but distinct species in the same practice. And it was why they had both human and Primarian physicians on staff.

After draining her mug, Amy made a pit stop in the ladies' room then grabbed a refill in the employee break room in back—noting her blue ceramic bowl exactly where Juna said it would be—then she opened the clinic doors for the day .

As she worked with a steady stream of patients, she didn't miss the strange looks she got from her coworkers. She checked her appearance twice to see if she had breakfast in her teeth or had applied her makeup like she worked at a circus but saw nothing amiss.

As the day wore on, the repeated we're here for yous and if you ever want to talks became increasingly irritating. She shook her head and forced a smile, insisting she was fine or thanking them for their concern, but her good mood evaporated. And every time the door opened or a sudden noise echoed through the clinic, she jumped.

Amy couldn't blame the latter on her coworkers. She poured her still half-full coffee mug—her third of the day—down the drain, exchanging it for water. Even she had a caffeine limit, evidently.

When she returned to the front desk, the door swung open again. She was ready for it this time, but not for the man who walked in. At least seven feet tall, like almost all the highly skilled warriors in the Primarian army, his long silky black hair flowed halfway down his back. He was dressed in a red tunic and black pants, the uniform of the princep's elite guard. She'd have to be blind to miss how the material clung to the bulging muscles in his arms, chest, and thighs and showed off his lean hips and flat belly. If it weren't incredibly rude and unprofessional, and if he wasn't assisting a patient through the door, she would have let out a dreamy sigh. Instead, she focused on her job and called over the intercom, "Technician to the front with a wheelchair, please."

Joe, a regular from Galactic Goodies, limped along. The warrior had him propped up with a strong arm, and she suspected if he wasn't there, the older man would have had to crawl or be wheeled in.

"What happened?" she asked at the same time she located Joe's file and sent it to the clinical team's inbox.

"Damn ruts in the road are getting to be more like trenches," the injured man grumbled. "I was in a hurry and wasn't looking where I was going. If Kincaid doesn't do something about them, someone's going to break a bone."

"Someone already has," the warrior replied in his deep, perfectly inflected English. Or was it Primarian? With the translators imbedded in their brains, she was never sure. His lavender eyes met Amy's as he explained why he was certain it was fractured. "I heard the bone snap, and the ankle and foot have swollen to double in size."

"If you don't want me to puke, please stop saying that," the usually tough-as-nails miner groaned.

Before the worst could happen, all over the warrior's pristine uniform, Kenny arrived with a wheelchair and whisked Joe to the back for treatment.

Alone with the stunningly handsome Primarian, Amy suddenly felt shy. "Thank you for assisting him," she said to fill the sudden silence. Even though she was past the age of blushing like a schoolgirl, heat rose in her cheeks when he bowed slightly, his penetrating gaze locked on her.

"It is my duty to defend, but also to assist in any way that I can."

"I thank you all the same," she insisted. "With our limited population, he might have lain where he'd fallen for some time if you hadn't come along. "

"Indeed. He was taking a shortcut through a seldom used alley." The intensity of his regard made her skin tingle, as if his fingers softly brushed her face. "Our paths have crossed, but we haven't been introduced."

"I saw you at the residence hall fire," she corrected him. "We spoke then."

His midnight brows gathered into a frown. "That must have been Remus, my brother. I am Tarus. I would have never left a woman unprotected as he did that day."

"Oh no! He had Adria to see to. I understood and found my way to the shelter."

"You shouldn't have had to. I have discussed this with my younger brother. If he had to carry you both hog-back to get you to safety, that's what he should have done."

She pondered hog-back until it came to her. "You mean piggyback, don't you?" she said with a smile. "Carrying our combined weight two miles to the shelter would have been an impressive feat."

"He's a warrior. Double that and twice as far shouldn't have left him winded." He bowed again. "My apologies for my brother, Miss..."

"Stone," she supplied. "It's Amethyst Stone, actually, but no one ever calls me that. To friends I'm Amy."

"But Amethyst is such a lovely name. It's also a purple gem in your world, I believe. I doubt it comes close to your beauty, however." His eyes shimmered as he smiled, his teeth a dazzling white, momentarily blinding her with their radiance. Lord above, he was handsome, so much so, simply looking at him unleashed a surge of longing deep inside her.

"I... Uh... Thank you," she stammered, embarrassingly thick tongued as she gazed up at him, which was a long way up. At least a foot more than her above-average frame. His eyes weren't true lavender but contained tiny flecks of cobalt blue. Each color on its own would have made an impression, but, when combined, they were breathtaking.

Once again, she resisted the urge to let out a dreamy sigh.

"I must return to my duties. You can count on fate bringing us together again, koria dral ," he declared in a deep, melty voice.

A few of his words didn't translate, but she had other things on her mind. The next instant, he was gone with a whoosh of the doors and a blast of the late-afternoon heat. Rubber-kneed and completely smitten, Amy plopped into her chair. As quickly, she lurched forward, grabbing for the counter as the wheels scooted away. She saved herself, letting out a shriek as she did so because landing on her behind on the floor was a near thing.

She heard running feet, and Adria's head popped through her doorway. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing!" Amy exclaimed. "Why does everyone keep asking me that?"

"You know why, sweetie," she said softly.

"That happened months ago, Adri," she whispered, never enjoying discussing the lapse in her memory. A chunk of her life was missing. More frustrating was that everyone in the colony seemed to know about it, in great detail, except for her. "The Primarian battlecruiser blew his ship out of the sky. He's gone, and I'm over it. "

"Are you? Really? Juna said you didn't recall our picnic on Saturday."

"So, I'm absentminded. Lots of people are when under stress. And before you say that's another sign I'm not okay, look around us. On the planet we now inhabit, where neither of us was born, we've had to navigate encounters with alien species, as well as deal with explosions, fires, mysterious deaths, and vampire bugs. I'd be concerned about someone who wasn't a little wired under these conditions. And, let me add, I can't help but be over it, since I have no recollection of what happened."

She hesitated, unconvinced, then admitted, "I'm worried about my best friend."

Amy leaped to her feet and rushed to embrace her. "And I'm grateful to call you my friend, but I'm okay. Really. Although, I have one itty-bitty concern."

"What's that?"

"How do I get to know a certain warrior twin a little better?"

She glanced toward the lobby. "Are they here?"

"One of them brought Joe in."

Within seconds, Adria's worried expression transformed into a mischievous grin, as if she had stumbled upon the perfect puzzle to solve.

"So, you want to get to know Remus better? I can make that happen."

"Not him. I'm talking about Tarus. He's quite charming."

She stared a moment. "Are you sure you don't have them confused? They're identical. "

"Quite certain. He introduced himself. As for identical, that's not true. The one who just left has the most incredible blue-lavender eyes."

Once again, a look of surprise crossed Adria's face."Huh. I never noticed."

Amy blinked before she exclaimed, "How could you not? Even I know, after being on Primaria only a few months, that blue flecks in purple is unusual."

"It is. I can only blame my preference for dreamy chocolate brown for not noticing."

"Yeah, yeah. Beck's a hottie, but we're talking about me, the single, unmated one in the room."

"I thought you'd given up on men.",

"That was before a seven-foot-tall warrior flashed his pearly whites at me and called me koria dral . What does that mean anyway? It didn't translate."

"Tarus called you that, did he?" Adria tapped a finger against her lips, looking pleased and contemplative at the same time.

"Called me what? You never said."

"Oh right, sorry. It's ancient Primarian, which isn't in use any longer and likely why your translator didn't work. It means precious gem. Most appropriate for a woman named Amethyst, I must say."

Amy's heart turned over. "That's so freaking sweet! See what I mean—charming." She gripped her friend's arm. "Arrange whatever you had in mind quickly. Before one of the new arrivals snatches him up, or your mate database finds him a match. "

"I'm on it," she assured her. When she walked away, Amy could practically see the wheels in her head turning. Like her, Adria had given up on being mated. She'd turned to her career instead, but now that she'd found Beck, she wanted all of her friends to be as happy as she was and seemed to be on a mission to make it happen.

Her friend didn't waste any time, either. An hour before quitting time, her communicator buzzed.

Adria: Wednesday at the Watering Hole. Eight o'clock sharp. You're meeting me and Beck and Tarus for a beer and a game of pool.

Amy: What did you say? What did he say? How did you make this happen so fast?

Adria: Beck took care of it. He's quite fond of the twins, and you, so it didn't take much arm twisting.

Amy: But what did he tell him to agree?

Adria: Beck only said that he'd have him there. I didn't ask for the details. Was I supposed to?

Amy didn't reply other than to type out, thank you, see you there .

Adria was Primarian and a physic. She had a scientific brain. Her action had achieved the desired outcome, and she didn't have time to get bogged down in the process.

Conversely, Amy was all about the process. And that wasn't the only way they differed. Like day and night, it amazed her they had hit it off and become best friends.

Glancing at the time on her holo-screen, she saw it was several minutes past six. As she locked up for the night, she was already thinking ahead to Wednesday and wondering what the heck was she gonna wear?