COWBOY ROMANCE: Justin (Western Contemporary Alpha Male Bride Romance) (The Steele Brothers Book 1) (77 page)

Chapter 8

“Where am I?” Amanda asked the being seated across from her at the small, round table, still unable to completely discern his appearance.

“That’s a good question,” he replied, “but there is no easy way to answer it. For centuries, your people have tried to explain this place in terms of religion, myth, and science, but nothing has even come close to it describing it. Suffice to say, however, that you are in a very unique place, and the fact that you are here is very significant. It’s rare for someone of your kind to be here, let alone grasp anything that happens here.

“So for the time being, please understand that you are in a safe place and that no harm will come to you while you are here. Think of this as a safe harbor if you will—a plane that exists solely for the purpose of existing and providing a place for beings to go when they most need it.”

“Am I dead?” Amanda asked, confused. She suddenly wished she had some of the
gallerine
to calm her nerves or at least a few more sweet, tender kisses.

“Hardly,” the mysterious being said. “In fact, you’re more alive than you know. and that fact puts you in grave danger.”

“I thought you said I was safe here,” Amanda repeated, trying to make sense of the words that seemed to be coming at her from nowhere.

“You are,” the being confirmed. “You are safe
here
, but I can’t say the same for you when you’re anywhere else. I don’t want to frighten you, but I must tell you there are certain forces determined to harm you, possibly kill you, and I couldn’t allow that to happen.”

“Why’s that?” Amanda asked, even more confused by the situation.

“You’re a very special girl, Amanda,” the being said. “And, in time, it will all become clear, but we must take baby steps and get to that point gradually, so as not to overwhelm you. What you’ve experienced already is enough to drive some of your kind insane, if not kill them.”

Amanda felt a lump rise in her throat, and if she hadn’t been so intoxicated by the strange creature before her, she would have wished she was still back at Marie’s dealing with “Dr. Peter Albert, Psychiatrist.” At least
he
was human.

Amanda’s ethereal companion could tell she was having a hard time digesting things, so he flicked his fingers again. Out of nowhere, an old-school jukebox appeared in the middle of the room, and, in an instant, Amanda and the being were standing beside it.

“Classic rock?” the figure asked, leaning over the glass of the machine, turning the knob at its side. “Led Zeppelin’s your favorite—or at least it was—if I’m not mistaken.”

Amanda nodded her head, and a moment later heard Robert Plant’s voice wailing from the machine. She couldn’t tell exactly what song it was he was singing, and she wasn’t sure it was anyone in particular to begin with. The sound that came out of the jukebox was like a mix of everything the band had ever done, and, instead of sounding dissident or unbalanced, it sounded beautiful, in both perfect harmony and rhythm.

“May I have this dance?” the mysterious being said, holding out his hand to Amanda.

Without answering, Amanda found herself in his arms, lulled by his presence as well as the hard rock hodgepodge coming out of the jukebox. “Baby steps,” he whispered into her, making a noise that sounded like laughter. “I guess we still need
some
of the bells and whistles after all.”

“I guess so,” Amanda replied, echoing back. She didn’t know why she’d said it, but it seemed like the right thing to say at the moment. In another quick flash, the holographic room around them shifted again, and Amanda found herself in what looked like a gymnasium, surrounded by people half her age. She immediately thought back to her 8th grade end-of-year dance, which she’d gone to with a handsome 13-year-old named Bobby Byers. She remembered dancing with him to some cheesy Led Zeppelin song and fainting in his arms when it was over. It had taken her a few years to live that one down with her peers, and she’d harbored a soft spot for Zeppelin ever since then.

“You were there,” Amanda said, and the moment she said it, she realized that she’d said it, not asked it. “You always have been,” she added, bringing her lips closer to his, wanting so badly to taste his sweetness.

“Not always,” he said without moving his lips. “But most of the time.”

In a flash almost as quickly as the flashes that indicated the changes in scenery, Amanda was rushed with a series of images and realizations. All those times she’d “fainted” or, later, “blacked out from drinking,” she hadn’t lost complete control of herself and her senses. She’d gone somewhere else. She’d gone to
this place
. She’d been here before—many times and many times more than she could remember.

The space around her transformed into a playground, and she saw herself spazzing out over a busted tooth that a bully had just knocked out of her mouth. Next, she was in an empty classroom, playing checkers with a child who was just as upset as she was; then she was off at college, drunk and hunched over a toilet. She saw herself at her mother’s funeral, staring over the casket with an unidentifiable shadow looming behind her, and she could hear someone whispering in her ear only moments before she walked in on Tommy cheating.

The images kept coming at Amanda, one after the other, until she saw herself on the same road she’d traveled earlier that night, headed in the opposite direction. She saw a great light, and then she was grounded back in the moment. The space around her was again a bar scene, with its lone table and lone jukebox, still playing some collection of Led Zeppelin.

“The crossroads?” she asked, pulling back from her dancing partner without moving away from him.

“I guess you could call it that,” he said. “It’s a shared stop on our common highway.”

He was dancing with Amanda to a new rhythm now, and it seemed a little too fast for her liking. She wanted to slow things down a bit, but she couldn’t do anything to change the sounds coming out around her.

The more she was around this creature, the more lucid Amanda became, and the more things started to make sense to her, even though this situation was far beyond anything that she could have imagined.

“Why now?” Amanda asked, intuitively waving a peace sign across her eyes, dancing to the hippie tunes that were playing around her. It was like a scene from a 1970’s disco movie starring Jon Travolta, the kind she stayed up far too late watching as a child. She didn’t want to execute the corny dance moves, but she felt compelled to do so—and so did her sleek, sexy companion.

“You must have called it ‘the crossroads’ for a reason,” he said, making some strange step that made him look like a robot climbing a ladder. “You’re here because you have to make a very important decision.”

The otherworldly being continued to make a fool of himself with weird dance moves, and, as Amanda watched him, she started to get an inkling of an idea of the choice before her, and if it was what she thought it was, it wouldn’t be that difficult.

Chapter 9

“Some things make a little more sense than your awkward dance moves,” Amanda said, stopping her silly gestures. In a flash like so many that had already happened, the music changed from disco to a slow ballad—
Wonderful Tonight
by Eric Clapton, to be specific.

The dark-haired, pale-skinned, and steely-eyed creature stopped short and stared at Amanda, unable to fathom how someone other than him had changed the music.

“You’re full of surprises,” he said, pulling her close to him as Clapton sang on.

“I am?” she quipped back, taking his hand into hers, forcing him to swirl her around in a more extravagant, gentlemanly fashion. “I’m not the one to toss
your
concept of reality on its ass, now am I?”

If it hadn’t been for how comfortable and at home Amanda felt with the strange being, she wouldn’t have been able to joke with him so freely. There were still millions of questions she wanted answered, and things slowly but surely were becoming clearer to her, and, surprisingly, she was tremendously at ease with everything.

As Clapton sang about his lady love putting on her makeup and brushing her hair, Amanda gazed into the steely gray eyes of her partner. She knew that she’d known them forever and felt no hesitation as she closed her own and moved her head forward, forcing her lips against the not-so-strange-to-her stranger’s.

The next thing Amanda felt was the familiar feeling of swelling inside her—something ebbing and bowing against every inch of her flesh from the inside. It felt as if an octopus had crawled inside her and had extended its tentacles out in every possible direction, pushing and pulling her to her limits and challenging her most tender boundaries.

She felt the sensation in her head, her arms, her legs, and, of course, her most sensitive regions, and it pulsed throughout her body to the most delicate, yet steady rhythm. It was breathtaking and enchanting, and just as Amanda felt her body curling toward carnal completion, she gazed up at her stealthy dance partner, who didn’t seem at all fazed by any step in their repertoire.

“This is wonderful,” she said, referring to both the feelings she felt at that moment and the entire situation. “If I’m here to make a choice,” she went on, “I’m ready to make it.”

Amanda reached to touch her partner where many would want to be touched, but he grabbed her hand and pushed it away. “Baby steps,” he whispered in her ear again, a little louder than the last time, just to make sure she heard it.

Amanda felt a little slighted by his rejection but wasn’t about to let that stop her. She reached for him again, and this time she wasn’t going to take “no” for an answer.

The moment she touched his manhood—or the place where his manhood should be—Amanda was overcome by an incredible stimulation. She felt herself being touched the way she was touching him, even though his hands weren’t moving. She gasped as shivers went down her spine. She’d touched at least a dozen penises before, but even though what she felt was hard, throbbing, and ready, it wasn’t a penis like any she’d ever known before, and it wasn’t like
anything
she’d ever known before.

Another shot of light flashed through the room, and, before Amanda realized it, the music had stopped playing, and she was seated at the table with her companion. As she looked at him, for the first time, she could make out the specific details of his features. He looked sad, upset, and challenged. He was obviously weighing something in his mind, though Amanda had no idea what.

Amanda rose from her feet and walked over in front of the mysterious being. She knelt down on the floor in front of him, gazed up at him, and spoke directly into his steely gray eyes.

“I’m sorry, Alocar,” she said. “I didn’t mean to offend you.” Amanda had no idea where the words—or the name—came from, but they rolled off of her tongue as if they were second nature.

“It’s okay,” her mysterious companion said, leaning forward to kiss her. She was running her hands up his thighs, and there was no way he could resist going in for more.

“I’m not Alocar though,” he said, a moment after their tongues had touched and given new life to the octopus inside of Amanda. “I’m Khavere,” he added, pitching his back against the chair as Amanda rose to mount him.

“Khavere?” Amanda asked, perplexed but not desisting. She was on top of her companion now, and again felt as if he was inside of her. “Who the hell is ‘Alocar’ then?”

Amanda grinded herself against Khavere, not expecting to hear an answer, but, no sooner than she felt her muscles churning inside of her, she got an answer.

“I am,” another voice sounded. Amanda looked up just in time to see another man standing by the jukebox. He looked
exactly
like the creature she was on top of. He had the same pale ashen skin, the same mussy black hair, and the same steely gray eyes. He was like a mirror image of the man beneath her, only he was some distance away, standing in front of the music machine. He flipped a coin in his hand, and then he willed it into the slot, causing a different song to blare out around them.

Wicked Game
by Chris Isaac filled the space around Amanda, and she felt totally in-tune with the concept behind the handsome hunk’s lyrics.

“There are
two
of you?” she asked, taking in the identical creatures.

“Yes,” Alocar said back to her silently. “There always have been.”

“That’s why you’re here,” Khavere added, though Amanda struggled to understand who was saying what amongst all the words that came at her.

“You have to make a choice,” both beings seemed to tell her at the same time.

Amanda bit down on her lip, closed her eyes, and prayed that she’d wake up somewhere else, in some other place rather than wherever it was that she was. But, the moment she opened her eyes, Amanda realized that her pleas to God and the Universe had been futile. She was still right where she’d been, not a minute earlier, staring down the faces of two beings who she would’ve, and did, mistake for one.

She thought of all those other times in her life when she’d been put in challenging, precarious positions, and she prayed, against the odds, for the same guidance and help she’d received then, but, as she stared out at the two dark-haired, light-skinned, and steel-eyed creatures before her, she knew that the “help” would never come. It was already there. One—or both—of them had given it to her before, and it was now only a matter of deciding which one of these two souls would help her now. Which one of them really had her in his best interests?

For some, it might have been an easy decision. But, for Amanda, it wasn’t—and neither was it for her suitors. What Amanda didn’t know at the time was that her decision carried great import with it, and how she’d act in the next few minutes would not only determine her fate, but could determine the fate of the whole universe and an entire breed, if not two, of its people.

“I think you both have some explaining to do,” Amanda said, closing her eyes and opening her mind. The two incredibly captivating creatures looked at each other, then both looked at Amanda.

“Okay”—the words came at Amanda in another flash, which carried her away to a distant place and time. It felt strange to her, but she had no choice but to give in to the moment.

The End