by Cara Bristol
I whirled away and ran for the exit, even as I knew it was too late. But I clung to the hope I could catch him and burst through the door.
People crowded outside the restaurant. Pedestrians fought through the congregation of diners waiting for a seat. Cars zoomed by. But there was no sign of Braxx.
Hadn’t this been my fear all along? A sob caught in my throat. I had known children were too important to be surrendered. I was stupid, stupid, stupid to believe it could be otherwise. No wonder my infertility hadn’t bothered him—he hadn’t realized I was infertile. Addison told him the truth, and he’d left. As much as I hated Addison, I blamed myself. I’d walked into this with eyes wide shut, not questioning Braxx’s too-easy acceptance. Just when I’d had it all—happiness had been ripped from my grasp.
Fated mates. Together forever. None of that meant anything if I couldn’t provide him with children. He’d abandoned me like my ex had.
Don’t assume. Maybe it’s not what it looks like.
I swiped at my tears, trying to stem the panic. It couldn’t end this way—without us even speaking, could it?
Braxx wasn’t anything like that slimebag inside. He was a good man, kind, caring, devoted. Of course my infertility would be a major blow, but after pursuing me for a year, he wouldn’t stop loving me in an instant, would he? The whole Fated thing had to mean something, didn’t it?
Every relationship had its bumps, its crises. You worked through them.
He’s just shocked, mad, needs to get away to cool off and think things through. Didn’t men do that? Retreat to cool off? Braxx’s quick departure was a normal male response.
He probably thinks I lied to him.
In my apron pocket, my phone began to vibrate. Braxx!
I grabbed my cell only to find an unfamiliar, out-of-area number on the display. Damn robocallers! If I could have reached through the phone and choked out whoever was responsible I would have. I consigned the call to virtual oblivion and speed-dialed Braxx. His phone rang four times and voicemail picked up.
My throat thickened. He was avoiding my calls. I listened to his deep, accented recording instruct me to leave a message and he’d return the call.
Would he?
What words would fix this? I didn’t know you didn’t know? I couldn’t leave a message on a recording. We needed to meet face-to-face so I could make him understand.
Beep! went the recording.
“Please call me,” I said.
As soon as I hung up, I noticed a message from the same out-of-area number. I deleted it and went back into the restaurant to await Braxx’s call.
Chapter Sixteen
Braxx
As I charged for the Uber, my phone slipped from my grasp, hit the ground, and skidded across the asphalt. I snatched up the device and dove into the vehicle.
“County hospital, right?” asked the driver.
“Yes! Hurry!”
He pulled away from the curb and merged into traffic.
My head whirled from the events of the last few minutes.
My mate couldn’t have kits, and I hurt for her. I desired nothing more than to fold her in my arms and protect her from further disappointment and heartache, except I’d had to leave without speaking to her. I hadn’t believed the man with the insincere smile and hard eyes at first—after all, how would he know whether Holly could have kits or not? But he’d informed me they had once been engaged-to-be-mated and showed me the announcements on his phone. And then I recalled what she had said.
I can’t give you children. It’s just not a possibility.
She wasn’t afraid of having kits, she couldn’t get pregnant. Her reluctance to mate made sense now. She’d tried to tell me, but I’d misunderstood, taking for granted we’d have a family. How many times had I run on about wanting kits? I should have listened to her! If I had, I could have reassured her I only needed her. How much pain had my refusal to hear the truth caused her, I wondered.
I’d intended to go to her immediately, but then I received the emergency call and had to leave. We’d have plenty of time to talk later, but I feared my abrupt departure might cause her worry. At the least, she would wonder what had happened to me.
My phone was dark, the screen shattered, and when I turned it over, I discovered a panel missing and the battery compartment empty. The power cell must have fallen out when I dropped the device.
“Excuse me. May I use your phone?” I asked the Uber driver.
“What’s wrong with yours?”
“It’s not able to dial,” I said.
He passed me his phone over his shoulder. I called Holly’s number. It rang but then cut off. I tried again, and this time it went to voicemail.
“It’s Braxx. Sorry I had to leave without telling you, but I got a call from Anthony. He got hurt and is at the hospital. I’m going there to see him. I don’t know what time I’ll get home tonight. I broke my phone, but I’ll call you as soon as I can. We need to talk. I love you.”
I ended the call and handed the cell back to the driver.
He squinted in the rearview mirror. “What do you mean you broke your phone?”
“I dropped it in the street outside Barbie Q’s and lost the battery.”
“So it’s not working at all?”
I eyed the shattered screen. “It’s dead.” I wondered if it would even work after I replaced the battery.
“But you have a credit card.”
“No.”
“No?”
“Not with me.” In leaving Dakon for Earth, Kord and I had traded several tons of illuvian ore for Earth credits. I wasn’t quite sure how it worked, but the credits had been recorded on a small, hard card. I’d been told to guard it well, so I kept it in a drawer at my hut for safekeeping. The bank had helped me to transfer some of the credits to an account I accessed through my phone, allowing me to pay for purchases.
“Do you have cash?”
“Cash?”
“Money? Dollar bills? Bread?” He rubbed his thumb and forefinger together.
“No, I don’t carry cash.”
“Your phone doesn’t work; you don’t have a credit card or cash. How were you intending to pay me?”
“Uh—” I hadn’t thought of that! “I’m sorry,” I said.
“On this planet, we pay for services.” He swerved to the curb.
“I’ll arrange for payment later.”
“Get out,” he said.
“Excuse me?”
He twisted in his seat to glare at me. “Get out of my car.”
“But we’re not at the hospital yet.”
“This is as far as you go for free. Get out.”
“How am I supposed to get to the hospital?”
“Not my problem.”
I exited. The Uber zoomed away in a squeal of burning rubber. I stood on the sidewalk and scanned the area. I’d never been in this neighborhood before. I had no idea how to get to the hospital from here—or how to get back to Barbie Q’s.
I started walking in the direction the Uber had been headed. I stopped several people on the street to ask them directions, but they glanced at me, riveted on my horns, shook their heads, and hurried on. Some didn’t bother to reply or slow down. Phones pressed to their ears, most people charged by without acknowledging they’d heard me.
Fortunately, I’d been able to get a message to Holly so she wouldn’t worry, but I was concerned about little Anthony, injured and waiting for me. I had no way to contact him. This would be the second time circumstances had prevented me from being there for him. All he would know is I’d failed to show. I’d let him down like everyone else in his life. Since my device had died, I had no way to look up his number to call him even if I could borrow a phone.
I’d covered about a half a tripta when the neighborhood started to look familiar. Hadn’t I seen that coffee shop before? The fried chicken restaurant? The hot yoga studio? I sped up and rounded the corne
r. Yes! There it was—the Stellar Dust Bin, where Kord and I would meet for a Dakonian ale. Somebody there would let me use a phone. I could call Kord to take me to the hospital.
I entered the tavern and strode up to the bar, where Aton mopped the counter with a white towel.
“Hey, Braxx!” He tossed the rag into a bin and reached for a beer mug. “Dakonian ale?”
“Not tonight. I need a favor. Can I use your phone to call my brother?” I showed him my inoperable device. “I need him to drive me to the hospital.”
“Are you hurt?” Aton reached into his back pocket and extracted his cell.
“I’m fine. It’s my little brother, Anthony. He fell off a play fort. He’s not really my brother, more like my kit, only he’s not, but he broke his arm, and I have to get to the hospital.”
“How about I drive you?” Aton raised his hand and motioned at somebody.
“You’re working…” I offered a protest, but my relief was immense. Kord would come and get me. But in the time required to get Clemmy settled in the vehicle and drive from his hut, I could be at the hospital.
A cloud of vapor whooshed to the bar and then materialized into a female server. “Yeah?”
“Betty, can you tend the bar for a bit? I gotta take Braxx here to see his kit at the hospital.”
“No problem!” She disappeared in a puff and reappeared on the other side of the counter.
Aton hung his apron on a hook and led the way to his car behind the tavern.
* * * *
I dashed back to the parking lot where Aton waited. “Anthony is still here!”
I feared I might have missed him in the two hours it had taken for me to get from Barbie Q’s to the hospital, but I’d found Anthony and his foster mother seated in a room crowded with sick and injured people.
“Should I wait for you?”
I shook my head. “No, you’d better go back to work. I have no idea how long I’ll be. Anthony’s foster mother says because of triage, being seen by a healer at the emergency room can take a long time. I can’t thank you enough.”
“Happy to help. Hey, let me know what happens, okay?”
“I will.”
Aton drove away, and I reentered the hospital where people huddled under blankets to ward off the chill. Some rocked and moaned, others coughed into their hands, some clutched bloody cloths to their heads. Kits cried. Anthony sat in a hard chair next to his foster mother. He held his swollen left arm against his chest. Tear tracks and dirt stained his cheeks.
I took the vacant chair next to him. “How are you doing, slugger?”
“My arm hurts.” He sniffed.
“I’m sorry. The healer will fix it, and then it will be better.” Gently, not to disturb his injury, I put my arm around his shoulders.
“How did you get hurt?” I asked.
“The kids were roughhousing on the swing set, and he fell off the platform,” answered Margery, his new foster mother. I’d seen the play apparatus. It resembled a small hut but with a rope ladder to climb to the top. To get down, kits could slide through a tube or down a pole. Swings hung from an extension. “It was an accident—nobody’s fault.” She flicked a hard, accusatory glance at Anthony.
He hung his head and pressed his lips together.
“Is that what happened?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said. Anthony shrugged.
She sighed. “I don’t have time for this. Robbie—my husband—is home, but the kids are probably killing each other. We’ve been here two and half hours already, and Anthony won’t get seen for another couple of hours.”
Her expression sour, she surveyed the full waiting room. “Most of these people were here when we arrived,” she said.
“Why does it take so long?”
“They handle the most serious cases first. A simple fracture isn’t that serious. Now, if he’d been shot or was having a heart attack, he’d get seen right away.” She didn’t sound sympathetic to the injury Anthony did have. He was a little kit, and he was in pain.
“I’m glad he wasn’t hurt worse,” I said.
“Now I have to notify Tyra. There will be paperwork and reports up the yin-yang. Probably an investigation.” She shot another hard glare at Anthony, who shrank in his chair.
“You look like you could use a break,” I said. “I saw a machine that dispenses coffee. Why don’t you get a cup? Maybe call Tyra. I’ll sit with Anthony.”
“Tomorrow will be soon enough to call her, but I will step outside for a smoke.” She tapped a vape against her palm. “They don’t allow smoking of any kind in here. Not even vapes.”
She sauntered through the automatic double doors to the outside.
Anthony lifted his head and stared straight ahead. “Her kids don’t like me,” he said in a low voice. “Her real kids, I mean. They don’t like any of the fosters, but they hate me. Especially Corwin. He’s twelve.
“He gives the fosters Indian burns, and he holds them down and makes them eat grass. He breaks their toys and pretends it’s an accident.”
“What did he do to you?” I asked.
“He pushed me. It wasn’t an accident. I went to slide down the tube, and he shoved me off the edge so he could go ahead of me. I fell. My arm got hooked on the rope ladder. I told Margery he pushed me, but she called me a liar and said if I spread any more stories, they’d send me to an orphanage or to juvvie.”
“What’s an orphanage?”
“It’s a place for kids nobody wants.”
“What’s juvvie?”
“It’s where bad kids go.”
Anger burned through me at the foster mother’s callousness. She didn’t deserve to be called a mother of any sort. There was something wrong when she could have kits, but my caring mate could not. I ached anew for her loss. It was my loss, too, but I suspected it had hit her hard. I’d observed her with Clemmy and Anthony. She was a natural mother, and to be unable to fulfill that purpose and desire had to have hit like a major blow.
I needed to go to her, tell her what I’d learned, but I had to take care of Anthony first.
Tomorrow I would call Tyra myself and fill her in on what had happened. I couldn’t promise him anything because what if I couldn’t change anything? What if no one believed me? I couldn’t raise his hopes and then disappoint him.
I hugged him. “You’re not bad, and I want you, Anthony,” I said. “You’re my little brother.” I glanced at the clock on the wall—10:47 p.m. Margery had been gone more than half an hour. How long did it take to smoke a vape? I wondered.
How long did it take to see a healer? On my planet, each tribe had its own, and if you were sick or injured, he came to you. You didn’t wait for hours in a big hut with other sick and injured people. And Anthony was just a little kit—and in pain.
“May I use your phone?” I asked him. Holly might be home from work now. I wished I could be with her, hold her, celebrate our mating, comfort her for her loss, for our loss.
“Uh-huh.” He winced as he shifted on the seat and handed me the device. He’d been sitting on the phone.
I dialed Holly’s number from memory. It rang four times, but rather than go to voicemail, the call dropped. Odd. It had happened earlier when I tried to call her from the Uber. I tried once more, and this time, it rang once before disconnecting. Why weren’t my calls going through?
I handed the phone back. “Thank you.” I’d try again in a little while.
The big doors slid open, and I half expected to see Margery, but instead, a man entered. He wore dark baggy leggings, a long-sleeved tunic, mittens, and a scarf. A wide-brimmed flowered hat partially obscured his face, smudged by a brownish powder. I couldn’t recall seeing him before, but something struck me as familiar.
An injured man limped by, nearly bumping into him. “Sorry,” the Earther muttered.
“No problem, sir,” the man in the hat answered in a singsong voice.
That voice! “Ala
r!” I said aloud.
The Somarin from the Stellar Dust Bin spotted me and ambled toward us. “Braxx! So nice to see you again.” He glanced at Anthony, whose eyes were as large as saucers. Alar might pass for human at a distance, but up close there was no mistaking he wasn’t from around here. I surveyed the waiting area to see if anyone observed us, but they were too preoccupied by their miseries to pay us any attention.
“Why are you here? Have you been injured?” I asked.
Alar chuckled. “Good galaxy, no. And if I was, I wouldn’t seek medical assistance on a class D planet. My studies drew me here.”
“Why are you wearing a girl’s hat?” Anthony asked.
“I’m in disguise.” Alar winked. “Dressing as a local helps me to blend.” He’d powdered his face in an effort to conceal his facial anatomy, but the internal structures were still visible.
I recalled how he’d shown us his vanishing act. “Can’t you just disappear from sight?”
“Yes, but it requires energy, and I can only maintain the effort for so long without tiring. Besides, winking in and out tends to draw even more attention.”
Anthony gawked. “You can become invisible?”
“More or less.”
Anthony scrutinized me. “Can you become invisible?”
I shook my head. “No.”
Anthony glanced from me to Alar. “Are there more aliens on Earth?”
Alar chuckled. “More than you’ll ever know, young man.” Alar met my gaze. “So, what brings you to this location?”
“Anthony broke his arm. We’re waiting to see a healer,” I explained. They’d called some patients into the treatment area, but more people had arrived needing care; the hospital waiting room was more crowded now than when I first got here.
“Perhaps I can help? If I may examine him?”
“Is it going to hurt?” Anthony asked.
“It shouldn’t, but your physiology is a little quirky. It’s hard to predict how the human body will react.”
I touched Anthony’s knee. “Why don’t you let him try?”
He nodded. “All right.”
Alar tugged off his mittens and tucked them into a pocket. After taking a deep breath in and exhaling slowly, he rested his four-fingered hand on Anthony’s left shoulder and closed the six fingers of his other hand over the right shoulder. He closed his eyes.
