Chapter Two
“Nice place,”
Charity said, no trace of sarcasm to be found as she stood next to the shuttle and looked at her surroundings.
The white house was lovely and so Earther, she was surprised the Kalquorian part of the clan lived in it. It had a cute porch swing and rocking chairs. The adjacent red barn was a familiar sight, thanks to scenic photographs and the picture books she’d read as a kid.
Charity hadn’t been at any actual farms when she’d lived on Earth. Nonetheless, she’d have sworn she’d been transported ten years in the past and stood on her home planet. Darn if she didn’t hear chickens clucking nearby.
Groteg and Utber brought out her travel bins from the shuttle. “Sorry to dump you and run, but we have to return to work for a few hours,”
the Imdiko explained as he hurried past to the house.
“Don’t worry. You have me…oh, and here come the kids,”
Sara said as a long shuttle zoomed toward the farm. It settled on the dirt lane before the large front yard in front of the home.
Charity watched as the shuttle’s hatch opened and a dark-haired boy of around eight or nine years of age fairly leapt out of its environs. Clan in shorts and a shirt bearing evidence of a recent eating mishap, his sturdy legs pumped as he raced across the lawn. His face beamed in the age-old exuberance of a child released from the tedium of a school day.
Following at a much more sedate pace came a lovely adolescent girl, enviable golden curls of hair cascading to the waistband of her slouchy trousers. Her gaze was curious, neither friendly nor adversarial as she eyed Charity’s presence. She simply seemed to be cataloguing the new arrival.
Finally was another blonde, a teenage boy who was a male version of Sara. He blinked at Charity. A friendly grin spread across his handsome features. His walk took on a strut. Sara, standing next to Charity, snorted.
“Go easy on the oldest, okay? It took him a whole week to get over his last crush.”
Charity covered her mouth to smother a laugh. “I’ll convince him I’m an elderly woman, too uncool to be bothered by. How old is he?”
“Fifteen.”
Sara sighed, then her youngest was on her, hugging her. “Hey, sweetie. How was school?”
“I got a hundred percent on my math test! Hi, who are you?”
Wide brown eyes gazed at Charity.
“Hold on for your brother and sister, and I’ll introduce you all at once. Come on, guys, you have chores and I’m running behind on my own stuff.”
As the siblings lined up in front of Charity and Sara, their mother rattled off names. “Adam’s my oldest. James is our math whiz, and Tori’s twelve going on twenty-one. This is Jennifer, everyone. She’ll be staying for a while.”
“A human girl instead of a Nobek? That’s new. What are you in for?”
Tori wore a half-smirk.
“It doesn't matter. Treat her as you would your brothers…no, treat her respectfully,”
Sara hurriedly amended.
Charity had her story ready, however. Having been a pre-teen not so long ago herself, she grinned at Tori. “I might have had a bad habit of pulling pranks on those who lacked senses of humor.”
“You got sent to Haven for pranking somebody?”
“The last stunt went kind of wrong. No permanent injuries, but…”
Charity shrugged, as if to say what can you do? Then she assumed a penitent expression. “I didn’t mean to hurt my chemistry professor. It was only supposed to be a little blast.”
Sara fell into her role. “The trouble when it comes to these situations is we rarely want to cause harm, but it happens quite easily. I’ve been informed you were warned this exile would happen if you kept up your practical jokes.”
Charity hung her head. She peeked through still-unfamiliar honey-blond strands to see what reaction their performance had won.
Adam gazed at her as if impressed, his blue eyes bright. Charity might have told him she’d scaled the galaxy’s tallest mountain in high heels and won less admiration.
Tori’s attention was pointed at her mother, showing a sort of world-weariness reserved for those of a certain age who couldn’t believe how lame their parents were. Her tone was all sympathy when she said, “Accidents happen. Sounds to me like someone had it out for you, Jennifer.”
Having dispensed her opinion, she headed to the house. “Lovely to meet you. Pop by my room to chat after dinner, if you want. Later, all. Stuff to do.”
“ Stuff had better include weeding the herb garden,”
Sara called after her.
Meanwhile, James had discovered a large red bug trundling over the grass. He was busy setting sticks, leaves, and other debris in its way. If he’d taken any notice of Charity’s supposed sins, he’d forgotten them already.
Sara shooed the boys off to do their chores and start on their homework. “Dinner table at six. With hands washed, James.”
She grinned at Charity as soon as they were out of earshot. “Pretty good cover story.”
“I wish I could take credit, but the Kalquorian powers-that-be concocted it.”
Charity gazed at the front door, through which the children had disappeared.
All three were fully human, no doubt from an earlier relationship Sara had been in. Sometimes the hybrid offspring of Kalquorians and Earthers appeared to be solely of Kalquorian heritage, but even those possessing strong human traits had some hint of the other species in their appearances. She wondered why Clan Amgar had no hybrid children, but it wasn’t a polite question to ask. Especially not of a woman she’d met less than an hour ago.
“Let’s go to the kitchen,”
Sara suggested. “A cup of coffee or tea?”
“Coffee would be amazing,”
Charity said gratefully. “But if you have work, I don’t want to hold you up—”
“Nothing too pressing. Claiming I’m behind on my work is what I automatically say to the kids because it’s usually true.”
Sara laughed. “They gave us a decent heads-up you were coming. I set aside time to get you settled.”
They were soon seated at a small table in what had to be the most technologically advanced kitchen Charity had ever seen. It made sense it would be, thanks to Utber being an honest-to-goodness chef. Because the farmhouse was so traditional from the outside, she’d expected a more rustic setting. She had to admit the modernity disappointed her a little.
Sara stirred real cream in her coffee from a nearby dairy farm. Charity sipped hers, enjoying the decadent richness as if she indulged in a particularly luscious dessert.
“I don’t mind answering most personal questions, especially considering your situation. You must worry about whom you can trust these days,”
Sara told her. “You were wondering why I have only human children after eight years of clanship.”
“I was, but it’s none of my business. Seriously, if the people who sent me trust you, then I do too.”
“Thanks, but as I said, I don’t mind. James came earlier than expected due to a major pregnancy complication. When I say he came early, I mean on the kitchen floor of my first house here. I nearly died.”
“Wow. I bet you were terrified.”
“That’s putting it lightly. Having him left internal damage, which couldn’t be corrected. The doctors warned me against having more children. They couldn’t guarantee they or I would survive future pregnancies.
“My first husband had died a few months before James was born. I’d never farmed before coming to Haven. With two small children already to care for, I wasn’t doing so well. Clan Amgar swooped to the rescue and helped us. Hell, they saved us, me particularly. It was considered scandalous how quickly we fell in love.”
“Probably especially where your fellow Earthers were concerned,”
Charity guessed.
“Don’t get me wrong; I loved my husband Jesse. He was a good man. Unfortunately, we’d married for the wrong reasons…to be grown up and escape from our small Midwestern town on Earth.”
“It reminds me of a romance movie or a book.”
“We were romantics, including pie-in-the-sky dreams. We even accomplished a couple. We earned college degrees despite working full time and having Adam and Tori. We were saving for a home. Then Armageddon hit and tore our lives out from under us. We counted ourselves lucky to get a chance to start over on Haven.”
Sara’s blue eyes gazed in the distance. Her sweet face was sad, and Charity saw the faint lines of care a tough life had etched in her pretty features.
“What happened to Jesse? How did he die?”
“He got sick. At its beginning, Haven was a lot different from how it is now. The Kalquorian governor, a Dramok named Ospar, was eager to help the residents in any way he could. He was limited in that respect since Haven’s original charter meant we Earthers had to rely on our human governor. Governor Hoover was tightfisted when it came to aid. He acted as if the money came out of his own pocket. A real ‘pull yourself up by your own bootstraps’ type, and tough luck if you couldn’t afford boots in the first place.”
“Sounds similar to what they have on Mercy and New Bethlehem. He would have been an Earthtique,”
Charity supposed.
“No doubt. When Jesse got sick, we’d just planted our first crop. There wasn’t money for him to see a doctor. So he didn’t and…”
Sara’s hands splayed wide.
“Assholes,”
Charity muttered. She blushed when she realized she’d said it out loud.
Sara grinned. “I had a few nasty names to call Hoover and his gang. Jesse should still be here. He deserves to be here. It’s funny to think so when I love Groteg and Utber, but it’s how it is.”
She gazed into her coffee. “They and Amgar showed up in my hour of need. They made sure me and the kids were taken care of. Knights in shining armor, pretty much. When I realized I was starting to feel more for them than gratitude, I was shocked. I’d recently buried my poor Jesse. I’d just had his baby. How could I fall in love again so fast?”
“It wasn’t the same love as what you and Jesse had.”
Charity prompted when she paused, swept up by the tale.
Sara smiled at her, surprised. “You’re right. It wasn’t pie-in-the-sky. It wasn’t a couple of kids who were too dumb to think their future through. It was a mature love between people who’d seen the worst of what life could throw at us.”
She thought, trying to put together the right words.
She must have found them because she added, “I saw Clan Amgar as they were. The fact they were stable and loyal and kind was a plus…but they had their shortcomings, as I do. Instead of wanting to mold them to fit my ideals, the way I had with Jesse, I was willing to take them as they were. I loved them for who they were, imperfections and all. I guess I’d grown up.”
“They weren’t unhappy you couldn’t give them kids of their own? It was a big deal to Kalquorians at one point.”
“Careful. Don’t suggest to Groteg and Utber those three fiends of mine aren’t theirs too. They’ll take it personally.”
“Really?”
“Right from the start, they and Amgar adored the children. When they asked me to clan, they asked Adam too. Tori and James were too young to understand what was going on, but Adam accepted them for fathers on his and his siblings’ behalf.”
“Wow. No jealousy?”
“Adam was scared and looking for security. He was lost without Jesse. He clung to my clanmates probably for all the wrong reasons at the beginning, but they’ve come to mean what they should to him.”
“That’s wonderful.”
Charity couldn’t imagine being so accepting had her father remarried after her mother’s death, but she’d been older than Adam when she’d lost her parent.
“James never knew Jesse, of course. Tori took to Clan Amgar almost immediately. Especially Groteg. She’s a total daddy’s girl where he’s concerned.”
Sara chuckled, her earlier sadness gone. “So my clanmates are their fathers, and they’re excellent ones. The biological question doesn’t come up.”
“It sounds like you got lucky,”
Charity said.
“Definitely, though losing Amgar and Jesse…I’ve wondered if I’m cursed. At any rate, it makes me appreciate Groteg and Utber.”
Sara shook her head, as if to dispel the subject from her mind as well as the conversation. “Speaking of men, what’s the scoop on the cutie who rode in on the shuttle with you? Dramok Ilid?”
“I wish I knew,”
Charity sighed. “He’s so nice. He has this weird hint of tragedy too.”
“Weird? In what way?”
“I don’t know. Every now and then he looks haunted.”
She snorted. “It’s probably a case of me being romantic and dramatic. I’m dying for a taste of passionate excitement, I guess. A riveting tale of the wounded soul aching to be healed.”
Charity struck a theatrical pose, her hand to her brow.
Sara snickered. “You should have asked him.”
“I considered it, but it felt wrong to interrogate him for too many personal details since I’m hiding who I am.”
Regret tugged at her anew.
“His parent clan seemed stable. They were protective of you.”
“Clan Codab are absolute sweethearts. My whole take on Ilid’s tale of some fascinating past woe is probably sheer fantasy. Seriously, how messed up is it to find the idea of a damaged man exciting?”
“No more messed up than a couple of teenage kids eloping the night of their high school graduation and running from home just because they were desperately bored and unhappy.”
Sara sipped the last of her coffee and checked the time. “Goodness, I need to get a move on and do some work.”
Charity stood. “Point me to what you want done once you’ve armed yourself with all available patience.”
Sara laughed. “To the cellar then. We’ll bring up some potatoes and onions to prep for Utber. Then you can see your room and unpack.”
Charity was happy to follow her hostess. The worst of her angst at having to stay on Planet Farm Hell had disappeared, thanks to having Sara to talk to.
* * * *
“What’s this I hear about you taking in a human girl, Chief? I thought you specialized in troubled Nobeks.”
Groteg chuckled at the man who’d popped in his office. “Sara and Tori are sick of being outnumbered. They insisted we even the odds for a change.”
Martin Wilkes laughed. The assistant chief of security for the Earther side of Haven’s law enforcement force was a friendly guy, personable and easy to talk to. He was also as tall and muscled as a Kalquorian, six-foot-five of pure brawn at forty-two years of age. “I’m sure those ladies can hold their own, even when it comes to Nobeks. You don’t mind me nosing in, seeing as this new ward of yours is Earther?”
“Not at all. I had planned to send you a report detailing the particulars anyway. I waited until her actual arrival due to the Darks taking over the Galactic Council and the pandemics…”
“Yeah. She might have been refused entry.”
Martin’s demeanor turned appropriately serious as he was reminded of the multiple areas of trouble befalling the galaxy as of late. “What’s the girl’s name?”
“Jennifer Seng. She was tossed out of college after damned near blowing up her professor…hell, most of the university’s chemistry lab too. It was the last in a series of escalating pranks to impress her peers.”
Martin stared in wide-eyed shock. “Why wasn’t she brought up on charges? Or was she, and this is what they decided on? Is it her first criminal offense?”
“She meant no real harm. Nonetheless, she’d been warned on multiple occasions to rein in her mischief. Her final antic made her family and the authorities decide she should face punishment. She’s never been on a farm before. The isolation is quite a shock.”
“She’s used to an urban setting, huh? Clubs instead of corrals?”
Wilkes grinned.
“It’s a wakeup call. She’s in for quite a few surprises.”
“You’re in for it yourself, my friend. I have sisters, and you’ve never heard the intense distress of a teen or twenty-something when they can’t go out and have fun.”
The young woman Groteg was determined to fix in his head as “Jennifer”
hadn’t struck him as particularly shallow. She was probably too worried about those eager to find her.
He wished he could bring Wilkes into his confidence as to his ward’s true identity. Unfortunately, the spy contingent of the fleet had warned only he, his clanmates, and the spy liaison present on Haven were to have the information.
“What was she studying in school?”
Martin checked the time, indicating he had to stop indulging his curiosity and be somewhere soon.
“Astronomy. Smart girl, but a lot of growing up to do. Similar to the troubled Nobeks we get.”
Groteg hit a button on his computer. “There you go. Full report straight to you and Chief Connelly.”
“Thanks. Hate to chat and run, but I have to give a speech at the local school on the advantages of staying on the straight and narrow. Universities don’t have an exclusive on pranksters.”
“Better you than me.”
Groteg didn’t mind community outreach, but he hated giving speeches.
“Which is how I feel where your latest miscreant is concerned. Maybe I’ll use her as an example of how not to behave. Enjoy the angst.”
Chuckling, Wilkes left the office.
* * * *
“This is the best mac and cheese I’ve ever had,”
Charity declared after a single bite.
Imdiko Utber chuckled. “I had a lot of practice, thanks to the kids. Chicken tenders, mac and cheese, and pizza. You’d swear there were no other foods worth eating.”
“Tacos,”
Tori declared. “Tacos are always to be on the week’s menu.”
“Grease and lactose, the fuel of the younger generation.”
Charity had another forkful of mac and cheese and had to fend off a moan of sheer lust. Utber’s recipe was utterly decadent.
“It is a challenge to make sure it’s healthy,”
the Imdiko chuckled.
“Such language. How dare you assault our ears with words like ‘healthy.’”
Tori grinned at Charity, whom she sat beside.
The girl had wandered in Charity’s room as she was unpacking earlier. Her nonchalant facade had faded as they got to know each other. It had taken only half an hour before she was gabbing in the breathless way adolescent girls had when they’d found a confidante. Charity was amused, touched, and a little saddened…when had she left similar eagerness behind? Had she ever experienced it? She thought she might have been denied, having spent a portion of her own formative years under the yoke of hardline followers of Holy Leader Browning Copeland. There’d been Copeland himself, making it clear Charity was to become his latest wife when she was only fifteen…
She felt a rush of gladness Tori hadn’t grown up under the shadow of fear. Her angst was of the pure preteen kind, the testing indulged in by someone flexing independence from parents and teachers. Charity’s had been more of a defense mechanism to keep growing terror at bay.
She glanced at those around her, this fascinating family formed from a series of tragedies. Adam snuck worshipful glances at her when he wasn’t telling Groteg of the new coach for the football team he played running back for. Sara and Utber gently coaxed James to eat his buttered wedi stalks, which they’d caught him trying to hide under his napkin. Tori pumped Charity for information regarding college and the men she’d met, beaming at Groteg when he turned an anxious eye toward her and said, “Why are you asking about boys?”
“I’m just curious how those in GC space are different from these around here.”
“Well, don’t be, Lady Sunshine. There’ll be plenty of time for boys later. Much, much later.”
“Oh, Daddy. You’re cute freaking out over me dating.”
“You’re dating?”
He turned his horrified gaze to Sara. “She’s dating ?”
She waved him off. “Of course she isn’t. She’s talking of the future when she’s sixteen.”
“Eighteen,”
Groteg countered in a growl.
“Daddy!”
The warmth as they bantered and Groteg panicked reminded Charity how far she was from her own family. She’d left behind her aunt and uncle mere days ago when the bounty had been put on her by the fanatical factions of Mercy and New Bethlehem colonies. It had been months since she’d seen her sister Hope and father Borey in person.
We had no chance of being a family like this when we were together. Not after Armageddon. Not after Mom died.
“Don’t worry.”
Sara had caught Charity’s state of mind, though not the reason for it. “We don’t always argue at length.”
“Usually, we’re worse,”
Tori said cheerfully.
“Young lady,”
Utber warned.
“Dating,”
Groteg groaned, staring at his half-empty plate in despair. “How can she be thinking of dating at her age?”
“I’ve been thinking of dating for years. I’ll be old enough in a few months. Then look out, girls.”
Adam grinned until he met Charity’s eyes. He blushed furiously and concentrated on shoveling his dinner in his face.
“They’d better not have to look out. If I hear of you being anything except the perfect gentleman, mister, you’ll be sorry.”
Sara shook her fork at her oldest.
Utber looked at Charity and shrugged. “Welcome to the family. This is as good as it gets, I’m afraid.”
If you only knew how good you have it. As the bickering eased to laughter, Charity decided they might. Her angst abruptly transformed to a soft, sentimental joy.
She was glad for them and basked to be at the edges of their warmth.
* * * *
Assistant Chief Martin Wilkes eyed Jennifer Seng’s official identification picture, part of the information Chief Groteg had forwarded. He brought up another I.D. on his computer’s holo screen. He enlarged both so no detail could be missed. He looked at the two women side by side.
Jennifer’s honey-blond hair was shoulder length, a fabulously tousled mass suggesting windswept beaches. Sultry lidded deep blue eyes, which recalled the ocean, bore the slightest hint of an Asian background in their shape.
In contrast, the young woman so many were hunting for had dark brown hair and less-hooded hazel eyes. Jennifer’s nose and chin were narrower too. The second woman’s cheekbones were more sculpted, giving her a haughtier appearance.
There was a vague resemblance if one searched for it, but they did appear to be two different women. Surgery could have accounted for the variations…but if Jennifer Seng had undergone a cosmetic procedure, it was impossible to detect.
Wilkes considered them, wishing for a telltale scar or some other unmistakably shared detail. If there’d been any, if it were the same woman, the characteristics had been erased. He could only wonder until he had a face-to-face encounter with Groteg’s newest ward.
If Jennifer Seng was the recently vanished Charity Nath, Wilkes’ work was cut out for him to prove it.