sedona files 05 - falling angels

by Christine Pope

  At once Raphael pulled me even closer. The sheet slipped, and the hard muscles of his chest touched my breasts. I gasped, and he kissed me, mouths coming together so we could explore one another all over again. An endless moment spun me around as I grew dizzy with his nearness, his taste, the enticing scent of his skin.

  But then he let go and said, “My love, your father was not exiled because of his relationship with your mother. Our people consider the soul bond to be a sacred thing, and, once it is established, no one would ever attempt to separate the two people involved. This is why your father did not fight very hard when it became clear to him that you and I had also formed such a bond. No, he was exiled because he was strictly forbidden to do anything except teach your mother how to use the powers that had lain dormant within her, and yet he ignored those orders and came to her aid during the night of the solstice when the Reptilians had planned their attack. In hindsight, we all realized that it was probably better for him to have done so, but the judgment to exile him had already been handed down.”

  “Is that another reason why this time it was okay to interfere?” I asked. “Because your superiors realized they weren’t quite as infallible as they thought they were?”

  “I won’t presume to guess at their thought processes. But…perhaps.”

  It sure sounded that way to me. However, I could tell Raphael really didn’t want to delve into that subject, and I decided to let it go. The person who should really be angry with them for making that kind of flawed decision was my father. Not that he talked about it much. Every once in a while, though, I would catch my father standing outside and staring up at the night sky, an unreadable expression on his face. He loved it on Earth, loved my mother and me even more, and yet I could still tell he wished things might have turned out differently, that he could have shared his world with us, rather than be trapped here forever in ours. And since he’d seemed resigned to his fate, and certainly happy enough with our life in Sedona, it didn’t appear to me that he held any kind of grudge, especially not after so many years.

  My mother was a different matter. I knew she was still angry over the way he’d been treated. But again, that wasn’t her fight. And I couldn’t say that I was too disappointed over growing up on Earth, surrounded by my family and friends, rather than off on some world I’d never even heard of.

  “Does my father have any family?” I asked abruptly. “He would never talk about it, but — ”

  For some reason, Raphael looked almost sad. “Some distant relations, yes. No siblings — we most often have only one child. Occasionally two, but never any more than that.”

  I supposed that helped to explain why my parents had been content to stop after I was born. Then again, the controlled chaos of my Aunt Kara’s household could have had something to with it as well. I loved my cousins, but before Grace moved out and all four of Kara’s children were under one roof, it had seemed kind of overwhelming to an only child like me.

  “His parents?” I almost hated to ask the question, but I wanted to know. Yes, I had Gabriel, my mother’s father, but my father never talked about his own parents. When I was younger, I’d tried to ask my mother what she knew, but she’d always shut me down. Now I wondered if she’d done so because she didn’t know anything, either.

  Raphael’s arms tightened around me. “They were scientists. Their last expedition was to a world at the edge of our territory. It should have been safe.”

  “But….”

  “But the Reptilians disputed our people’s claim, said the world in question should have been in their control. They slaughtered the research team.”

  The breath tightened in my throat. No wonder my father had never spoken of his parents. “And there weren’t any reprisals?”

  “The matter was brought up in the Assembly. The Reptilians were found to be guilty, and were compelled to make reparations. Unfortunately, those reparations could not bring back the dead.” Raphael’s lips touched the top of my head, gently, as if seeking to give me what reassurance he could. When he spoke, I could feel his warm breath against my hair. “So you see now why your father asked to be assigned to your world, to assume the role of what the people there refer to as a Man in Black. He could not retaliate openly, but he could work to make sure he was able to thwart his enemies in more subtle ways.”

  Unfortunately, I could see it all too well. And I thought that Raphael’s latest revelation also helped to explain why my father had been willing to risk everything to come to my mother’s aid. Yes, of course he loved her — but beneath that lay a darker motivation.

  Revenge.

  So much for my hope that I might be reunited with more family members, if we were to venture out into the greater galaxy. At first leaving the bounds of Earth for interstellar adventure had sounded like an exciting prospect, but now I wasn’t quite so sure. Even with as powerful as the Pleiadians seemed to be, I got the impression that they couldn’t control everything. I didn’t know if I was willing to take the risk.

  “I know it is difficult to hear,” Raphael went on. “But you needed to know the truth.”

  He was right. I knew my father had his reasons for keeping these things to himself, but they were his reasons, not mine. Now I had a better idea of what we were up against. I’d known the Reptilians were evil, but until this very moment, until the revelation that they’d murdered my grandparents, I hadn’t realized how evil they truly were. Because of them, my father’s family had been shattered. No wonder he’d wanted to make sure his new family was sheltered and safe in Sedona. It must have taken a great deal of courage for him to allow me to come along on the Mars rescue mission, knowing the type of adversary we faced.

  “Thank you,” I said quietly.

  Raphael’s fingers played with my loose hair. With his touch came another of those almost overwhelming waves of desire, my need for him surging through every vein. It took less effort than I’d thought to push aside everything he’d just disclosed and allow myself to fall under his spell once again. Our lips met, and I ran my hands down his body, feeling how ready he was for me. Just as I was for him — his fingers sank into me, stroking gently but insistently.

  I moaned, my own fingers closing around him, and he gasped. Something about that shocked inhalation only spurred me on, and in the next instant I was pushing him down against the bedclothes so I could lower myself onto him, feeling him push even deeper than the first time we’d made love.

  His hands closed on my breasts, stroking me, and I had to bite my lip to keep myself from crying out at his touch. Maybe he wouldn’t have cared, but this was all still very new to him, and I didn’t want to intimidate him.

  Not that he probably would have minded. His eyes were wide, staring up into mine, and the love and desire I saw there was enough to push me over the edge. I did moan then, the sounds tearing themselves from my throat as his hands dropped to mine and held on, squeezing tightly as he convulsed with his own climax.

  It wasn’t until his harsh breathing had calmed somewhat that I carefully slid off him, then pressed my lips to his cheek. “You know, you’re picking up this whole intimacy thing pretty well,” I murmured.

  “I have a good instructor.”

  He looked so beautiful and perfect, eyes half-lidded, forehead lightly sheened with perspiration. I wanted to stare at him forever…but I also realized that hours and hours must have passed since I came here, and I’d promised my parents that I wouldn’t be out too late. It did seem silly to have to run home like a teenager who didn’t want to violate her curfew. We’d have to come up with some sort of solution to my strange not-quite-independent state, because I hated feeling like I should be guilty because of the time I’d spent with Raphael. In the meantime, though, I thought it was probably best to be circumspect. Yes, my parents had backed off a little, apparently trying to resign themselves to the inevitable, but I didn’t see the point in making things any harder than they already were.

  So I told him that I probably needed to ge
t home, and although a look of disappointment passed over his face, he didn’t protest, only said, “Yes, it would be best to avoid an incident.”

  My clothes, which he’d made so neatly disappear at the beginning of our first round of lovemaking, turned out to be hanging in the wardrobe on one side of the room. I got into them in silence while he did the same. A flicker of surprise went through me as I realized he was getting back into the suit he’d worn earlier, rather than the white robes that I’d thought were his usual garb.

  “Going all corporate on me?” I teased, but he didn’t smile, and instead looked thoughtful.

  “No. These garments are surprisingly comfortable. So I thought it was logical enough to put them back on.”

  I went over to him and placed a kiss on his cheek as he was finishing buttoning up his shirt. “Well, I don’t know about logical, but I do think you look sexy.”

  His eyebrow went up. “That was not my intention.”

  “I know. That’s the whole point. Nothing sexier than a guy who doesn’t think he’s sexy.”

  He still appeared more puzzled than anything else, but he didn’t seem inclined to argue with me. I was just slipping my boots back on when a soft chime sounded in the chamber.

  “Expecting company?” I asked.

  “No, the chime was a notification that I have a new communiqué from my superiors.”

  I wasn’t sure I liked the sound of that. This was the first time he’d mentioned any kind of communication with the people running the show, although I assumed he must send reports back at regular intervals. I just hoped those reports didn’t include anything about me, other than my involvement with the Mars rescue mission.

  But I only replied with a noncommittal “oh.” He went over to the wall and laid his hand against it, giving me a chance to admire his long, strong fingers and the elegant shapes they made against the dark surface. In the next moment, a screen appeared there, almost looking as if it was somehow floating inside the deep blue burnished metal.

  And what appeared there — Raphael had said it was a communiqué, but the flowing shapes and colors didn’t look like any alphabet I’d ever seen. I thought then of the arch-shaped lights in the ship’s corridors, with their flowing patterns of color. When I’d first seen them, I’d thought they were only some kind of decoration, but now I wondered if those lights were now some type of sign or other form of communication.

  As his eyes scanned over the ever-changing hues and forms on the screen in front of him, Raphael’s expression gradually grew more and more grim. Even though I had no idea what he was reading, I couldn’t ignore the anxiety that began ratcheting up inside me. Yes, he’d said that his superiors wouldn’t interfere with our growing relationship, but what if he’d only been blowing the proverbial sunshine up my skirt?

  “What is it?” I asked. Better to know the worst, although having to face bad news after an evening of lovemaking felt like stepping out into an icy rain shower after enjoying a warm bath.

  He came over and took my hands in both of his, surrounding them with the soothing heat of his flesh. “Apparently, a claim has been filed against you for killing one of the Reptilians on the Mars base.”

  “I — what?” The words were English, but they didn’t seem to be making any sense. “I killed someone?” Heart beginning to pound, I tried to remember exactly what had happened when we broke into the bio-lab at the Reptilians’ base. All right, I had blasted a bunch of them, but I thought I’d seen them moving afterward. As far as I could tell, they’d only been knocked out.

  “According to this, yes.” His fingers tightened on mine, and he said quietly, “You can’t blame yourself. They would have killed Logan, and possibly me as well, if you hadn’t stopped them the way you did.”

  Maybe feeling that way made me a terrible person, but right then I couldn’t get too choked up about accidentally whacking a Reptilian. Nice people they were not. I was more worried about this so-called “claim.”

  “Can they do that?” I asked. “I mean, I thought your people had as little as possible to do with the Reptilians.”

  “That is true, but sometimes they are impossible to ignore. Now, though, because they’ve seen a way to make things complicated for us, they’ve filed a claim.”

  “So what does that mean? Is it like suing someone?”

  Raphael appeared to consider my question for a moment, then inclined his head slightly. “I would suppose that is the closest analogue to the laws of your world. Because this claim has been filed against you, you must appear in person to contest it.”

  Probably because I didn’t really want to accept the implications behind them, those words took a few seconds to fully sink into my brain. “What…you mean I have to go and defend myself to the Assembly?”

  He let go of my hands, then reached over to push a lock of hair away from my face. Something in the tenderness of that gesture made sharp tears spring to my eyes. He couldn’t stop this thing, but he also wanted me to know that he would be with me the entire time.

  “You’ll be assigned counsel to defend you,” he said. “But yes, you will have to go before the representatives of the Assembled Worlds and give them your side of the story.”

  Although it had tasted wonderful at the time, all the strange food I’d eaten earlier that evening began to churn in my stomach. “There’s no way to get out of it?” I asked, desperation clear in my voice. “After all, Earth isn’t even a member of these Assembled Worlds. How can they have any jurisdiction?”

  An approving light filled his dark eyes, but his tone was heavy enough as he replied, “I fear that doesn’t matter. Your father is a citizen of the Assembled Worlds, despite his exile, as is your grandfather. As the members of the Assembly see it, your heritage is far more Pleiadian than it is of Earth, and therefore you are subject to their laws.”

  Even though up until a few minutes earlier, I hadn’t even known they existed.

  “So when does this all happen?” Even though I was more a fan of getting unpleasant things over with, I secretly hoped the evil day would be far off in the future. After all, even in an out-of-the-way place like Yavapai County, Arizona, you usually had to wait months to get a court date. I couldn’t begin to imagine how impacted the justice system of these Assembled Worlds — however many of them there actually were — must be.

  “In thirty-six of your hours,” Raphael said.

  Oh, shit.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Thirty-six hours was not a lot of time when it came to covering vast interstellar distances, even in a ship as amazing as Raphael’s. We had to leave right away.

  “But I don’t have anything with me!” I protested. “No changes of clothes, no toothpaste…no deodorant, for God’s sake!”

  “I can provide all of that,” he said, clearly not all that worried by my lack of hair serum to fight the frizzies. “It will be fine. I will be with you the entire time.”

  “And what am I supposed to tell my parents?” Jesus, talk about flipping out. Having them discover that I’d been intimate with Raphael was a drop in the bucket compared to having to inform them that I was about to travel halfway across the galaxy to face some sort of tribunal.

  “The truth, of course.” He extended a hand, and suddenly my purse was dangling from his fingers, even though I distinctly recalled leaving it in the dining room. “Although I would suggest that sending a text might be less complicated than an actual phone call.”

  Not bothering to ask how he’d managed to conjure my purse from one side of his ship to the other, I took my bag from him and dug out my phone. “Um, I’m pretty sure that AT&T doesn’t exactly reach this far.”

  “No need to worry about that. I’ll make sure the message gets to them.”

  Of course he would. I wanted to ask if there was anything he couldn’t manage; so far it seemed as if the answer was no. However, I wholeheartedly agreed with his assessment that it would be better to send a text. Yes, avoiding an actual conversation was the coward’s w
ay out, but I was okay with being a coward right then.

  So I unlocked my phone, ignored the blinking “No Service” message in the upper right-hand corner of the display, and started typing on the screen. Normally, I dictated all my texts so the process wasn’t so time-consuming, but I wasn’t sure I really wanted to have Raphael overhear what I had to say. Maybe I was being unnecessarily cautious. After all, there was a very good chance he’d still be able to read the message as he helped it zoom across thousands of miles of low-orbit space, all of which were woefully lacking in any cellular towers, the last time I checked.

  Short and sweet would probably work best here. My fingers moved over the screen as I desperately attempted to come up with a message that would give my parents the gist of what was going on without turning them into nervous wrecks. Somehow I had the feeling I’d fail in that objective no matter what I said.

  Mom, Dad, I’ve run into a teeny speed bump. I guess when I zapped those Reptilians at their base, I didn’t know my own strength, and one of them didn’t make it. Now the Assembly needs me to give my version of what happened, since the Reptilians aren’t happy. Raphael is going to take me and make sure everything goes smoothly. But obviously I won’t be home tonight. I guess with travel times added in, this will probably take a few days. Tell Aunt Kara she’ll need to get someone to cover for me at the UFO Depot. I’ll contact you again when I can. ~Love, Callista.

  Oh, yeah, that was going to go over real well.

  Right then I was just glad that I’d asked for some time off at the wine-tasting room until after New Year’s, since things tended to slow down a bit around that time of year. The tasting room’s owners weren’t expecting me back for a week.

  As for my parents, well, I hadn’t wanted to lie to them, and they needed to know what was going on. I supposed my father could fill in a lot of the blanks for my mother, since he had to be more or less familiar with the procedure involved. As to the penalties….