Total pages in book: 61
Estimated words: 57268 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 286(@200wpm)___ 229(@250wpm)___ 191(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 57268 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 286(@200wpm)___ 229(@250wpm)___ 191(@300wpm)
Better not—she’ll just think I’m “coming on to her” as the humans say, he told himself.
No, it was better to leave things alone, he decided. It was a strange twist of fate that had brought him and Kara together in this way, but it didn’t mean anything. He would just have to do his best to ignore her female-in-heat scent and her soft bottom planted directly on his aching shaft for the rest of the journey.
There was nothing else he could do. Kara didn’t want him and she never would. He just wished there was some way to change her mind…and to show her how he really felt about her.
5
KARA
“You know—I think I will take some of the Dream Gas,” J’orn remarked when the flight attendant came around again.
“You will?” Kara craned around to look up at him. “In that case, I think I will too. It would be good to, er, take our minds off…”
She trailed off because he was frowning at her.
“Off the fact that you’ve been forced to sit on my lap?” he rumbled.
“No, no—you know I’m grateful you let me, er, sit on you,” she protested. “I just meant I can never sleep on flights because they always make me so nervous. It would be nice to get a little nap and get to our destination refreshed instead of frazzled—you know?”
He gave a noncommittal grunt which could have meant anything but finally, he nodded.
“So you’d both like the Dream Gas?” the assistant asked when J’orn lowered the divider to talk to her. She was pushing a cart with a round silver canister on it. There was a long hose attached to the top of it.
“Yes, please,” Kara said politely and J’orn nodded as well.
“Very well. Let me just attach a new mask…” The flight attendant produced something that looked like a triangular oxygen mask and fitted it onto the end of the tube. “Now, I’ll be giving the gas to the gentleman first,” she said, speaking to both J’orn and Kara. “Since he’s in the back of the seat. Then the lady can have her turn.”
“Thank you,” J’orn rumbled. He took the mask and pressed it over his nose and mouth.
“Very good, Sir. Now let me just twist the nozzle and if you’d take two or three deep breaths…”
As she spoke, the attendant turned the silver valve at the top of the tank and Kara heard a faint hissing sound. Behind her, J’orn was breathing deeply. After a moment, she felt his big, muscular body relax and he slumped back in the chair.
“There we go! Now let me just get a fresh mask for you.” The attendant pulled back the tubing and swapped out the mask for another one, which was smaller, for Kara. She handed it to her but before Kara put it over her nose and mouth, a new thought occurred to her.
“Wait—this stuff—this Dream Gas—won’t make us do anything we, uh, wouldn’t normally do, will it?” she asked anxiously.
She was thinking of a story she’d read about a woman who took an Ambien before getting on a long airplane flight. While under the influence of the drug, she took her jeans and underwear off completely and began masturbating vigorously. The flight attendants tried to stop her, but they couldn’t wake her up. The poor woman had no idea what she was doing or why—when the plane finally landed and the Ambien wore off—the police were waiting to arrest her for public indecency.
But the flight attendant was shaking her head.
“No, no—I assure you Miss, you won’t do or say anything you don’t want to. The Dream Gas has a mild muscle paralytic to be sure passengers who take it can’t get up to any mischief. In fact, this particular formula is what they give to sleepwalkers to keep them in their beds at night,” she assured Kara.
“Okay, well…all right then, I guess.” Kara took the mask and pressed it over her mouth and nose. After all, wasn’t sleeping through this uncomfortable situation better than being bored and anxious for the next three and a half hours? She believed the answer to that was “yes.”
She had no idea what was in store for her.
6
KARA
Kara was walking through a deep blue mist that seeped up from the unseen ground below and drifted around her in mysterious waves. Was it some kind of alien ocean? But no, she didn’t feel any water brushing against her—no wetness. The sky above was pale green and she could hear birds calling somewhere, though she could never quite see them.
Then she managed to make one out. It was a huge crow-like bird—as big as an airplane—and it had brilliant, iridescent feathers that were shiny black with blue, gold, and green woven through them.
“Oh my,” she said aloud. “That thing is huge.”
“It’s a Dream Crow,” said a deep, male voice behind her.