Invaded (Alienated, #2)(50)

Cara’s chest heaved with silent giggles. The burns weren’t lasting—it was more of a mind trick than anything—but she’d never seen her brother more motivated to board a flight. He’d even left behind his duffel. She picked it up and hauled it to a nearby crew member who was sorting crates by the cargo hold.

“Excuse me,” she said in L’eihr. “My brother left his bag. Can you take it to him?”

The man said yes but told her to wait a moment, then dug through bins and boxes until he pulled a large padded envelope from the pile. He handed it to her. “This is for you.”

Cara’s heart fluttered when she glimpsed Aelyx’s name above the return address. She hugged the soft package to her chest, torn between ripping it open right there and waiting for the privacy of her room at the Aegis.

In the end, impulsivity won the battle.

She crossed the spaceport, back to the spot where she’d answered Tori’s call. There, she leaned against the wall and ran her finger beneath the envelope seam. When she peeked inside, she found a gallon-size Ziploc bag filled with something dark. She spotted a scrap of paper and pulled it free.


Wear me.



“Wear me?” she mumbled, separating the Ziploc seal. Why had Aelyx sent clothes from Earth? He knew she couldn’t wear anything but the standard uniform. She removed an extra-large gray T-shirt, puzzled until a familiar scent reached her—warm and sweet and spicy. Like a drug, it rushed her senses and made her go fizzy all over. She would recognize that luscious smell anywhere. It was his. She dropped the envelope and brought the shirt directly to her nose, then huffed it like the junkie she was.

Oh, man, it was better than chocolate.

She sucked in breath after breath, closing her eyes and pretending Aelyx was there with her. She could almost feel his lips at her throat and the satiny tickle of his hair against her cheek. It was a nice fantasy until she opened her eyes and found Aloit and the other guards staring at her in disbelief.

Cara didn’t bother trying to explain. She rubbed the shirt over her neck and chest like a perfume stick, then stuffed it back inside the Ziploc bag and sealed it tight to hold in the eau de Aelyx. She was so sleeping in that shirt tonight.


Two hours later, Cara stepped inside the Aegis and hung a left toward her room. The headmaster had given her a day-long reprieve from classes for “emotional distress” in the wake of Troy’s departure. She planned to bang out a quick blog post, then spend the rest of the day outside, maybe practicing the spinners, the trickiest obstacle on the intermediate course.

She’d just opened her door when Vero padded by and skidded to a halt, doing the animal version of a double take. He peered at her in silence, wide black eyes boring into her skull while his nose twitched like a rabbit’s. He didn’t screech gibberish or dart inside her room to pee on her pillow.

That wasn’t like him.

Intrigued, Cara waited to see what he’d do next.

Vero crept an inch toward her and paused, crept forward again and paused, repeating the dance until he reached Cara’s boots. Nose twitching, he sniffed her pants in rapid huffs, moving up to her knee and then across to the package in her right hand. He took in the scent and pulled back, then released the most heartrending whine Cara had ever heard, exactly like a dog that missed his master.

“Aww,” Cara said, putting it together. “You smell Aelyx on me, don’t you?”

Vero eyed the envelope as if he thought Aelyx were inside it. To dispel any doubt, she pulled out the clear bag so the animal could see there was nothing to fear.

“See?” she said. “It’s just a shirt.”

He backed toward the lobby, darting glances between Cara and the T-shirt, his tiny face contorted in confusion. His whine turned into a deep, throaty ah-woo of despair.

Poor Vero. She’d totally mindfreaked the little bugger with Aelyx’s scent.

“Sorry, hon. I know how you feel. I miss him, too.”

After Vero hightailed it to the cafeteria for his ritual post-lunch scavenging mission, Cara walked into her room and stopped short. Troy’s bunk looked so empty stripped of its linens that she had to avert her gaze before the tears started falling.

Forget the blog post; she needed to get out of here.

After tucking Aelyx’s envelope beneath her pillow, she grabbed a towel so she could make it to the intermediate course between PE classes. She didn’t want an audience, and she especially didn’t want Satan to spot her practicing. She hoped to impress him by mastering the spinners on her own.

Slinging the towel around her neck, she jogged across the courtyard to the courses, then slowed her steps and peered through the trees, making sure to stay hidden. She crept within view of the spinners and ducked behind a tree, disappointed to find them already populated by a class of freshman-age clones.

“Sh’ot,” she muttered under her breath. She hadn’t gotten here in time. But maybe if she hung out for a while, she’d have fifteen or twenty minutes to herself when the classes changed. She might even learn a new technique by observing the group of students racing toward the rotating disks. Cara knelt in the underbrush and studied the clones’ tactics.

Just as the first one broke into a sprint, a shriek sounded from the sky.

Cara’s pulse quickened. She didn’t have to gaze into the heavens to know a fiery orb was about to rain down upon them. The clones noticed, too, stopping on the track and pointing toward the flames. Satan jogged into sight and produced his com-sphere, probably to report the occurrence to the capital. Cara tried to estimate the orb’s trajectory. If she was right, it should land in the woods, about a quarter of a mile from her current position.