Part 10

Michael was parked at the edge of an overlook, sitting sideways on the motorcycle seat, long legs stretched out in front of him and crossed at the ankles. He crossed his arms over his chest as he stared into the canyon, dark eyes trained on some point in the distance and completely unaware of the panoramic beauty stretched out in front of him.

He didn't know what was going on or how to handle this situation. What was he supposed to do with this girl? he wondered. Okay, she was probably a woman… she was nineteen, maybe twenty years old, so technically she wasn't a girl any longer. He shook his head, trying to derail this line of thinking. All of her insane ranting and babbling was affecting his ability to think and it had to stop. He didn't care whether she was a girl or a woman, he just needed to figure out what he was gonna do with her.

She knew too much for him to simply let her go. "Which isn't a problem apparently, since she doesn't want to go," he muttered. This was not the way he was supposed to be spending his time off. He was supposed to be hanging out, getting laid, and enjoying the lack of complication in his life. But, no, that was not the way the way his vacation was being spent; instead of relaxation he was experiencing the onset of some illness that he had yet to determine whether it was human or alien in nature, his dick had gone on strike, and he had been besieged by some escapee from the psychiatric ward.

He stood and walked to the guardrail that had been built between the side of the road and the drop-off and kicked several rocks over the edge. What was he gonna do with her? If he let her go she might run her mouth to the wrong people. He scratched his chin thoughtfully. Crazy people were nothing new; what were the chances that anyone would believe the story she had told him? He couldn't leave her with Indigo indefinitely, but maybe he could leave her with him while he tried to figure what to do with her. No, that wasn't gonna work either; Indigo had a big mouth and he liked to talk as much as… He frowned. What the fuck was her name anyway? She had never given him her name. He shook his head. Not the point, he reminded himself. Maybe he could just drop her off at the nearest hospital and tell them he had found her walking in the desert, rambling about aliens and other nonsense. Something inside of him rebelled at the thought of leaving her anywhere that wasn't with him and he screamed in frustration, hating the feeling inside of him that seemed determined to hound him into doing things he didn't want to do.

"Fuck!" The single word echoed off of the walls of the canyon and he scrubbed his hands through his hair as he tried once more to focus on the problem.

He was going to have to take her home so he could figure out what to do with her. At least there she would be isolated, she wouldn't be able to give out any information about him, and if things went just right she'd quickly decide that the little fantasy she had created in her head had nothing to do with him. He had no idea why she had fixated on him, but if he could focus her insanity on someone or something else he could get rid of her without risk of exposure. Besides, she already thought he was an asshole; how hard could it be to turn her fixation onto someone else?

Especially if all of this was just because she had recently lost a lover who happened to look like him… His eyes gleamed as he suddenly realized that he had quite possibly hit the nail on the head.

"Of course!" he shouted. That had to be it! The guy she had described was nothing like him; they just happened to have the same name or something. That could happen… he probably wasn't the only guy out of several billion people on the planet to have this name. Besides, everyone supposedly had a twin somewhere on the planet, right?

Somewhere deep inside of him he knew he was fooling himself and that he was trying to come up with a plausible scenario that would allow him to ignore the thoughts she had put into his head. He didn't want to think about his origins or his past, he wanted those things to stay in the little box in his mind where he kept them because he knew there were no real answers available.

Now, out of nowhere, she - whoever the hell she was - had entered his life with this fantastic story of past lives, royalty, war, and betrayal… and part of him wanted to know more. Part of him wanted it to be true, to know that his existence on this rock meant more than it did now. But, on the other hand, what did it really matter if it was true? She had already said that the other three royals were dead in this universe… He shook his head, shoving the thoughts away. He was not going to get lost in this mind-boggling science fiction/romance story that she had put together in her convoluted mind.

He needed to get back to Indigo's house so he could collect the little package of insanity that was suddenly part of his life before she unloaded her story on the man and opened an entirely new can of worms. He would have to sort through his thoughts later and decide which road he wanted to take, he thought as he walked back over to the motorcycle.

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Michael frowned when he stepped up on the porch and heard Indigo's raucous laughter coming from the back of the house. Instead of knocking on the front door, he walked along the wraparound porch, pressing his back up against the side of the house when he got close to the back deck.

"I lost my hand, not my hearing, Guerin," Indigo called, busting his stealthy creeping.

His hands clenched into fists and he scowled when he heard the woman's amused laughter at his expense. "What the fuck are you laughin' at?" he snarled as he came around the corner and stood directly in front of her. She was curled up in one of the padded deck chairs, her placid green gaze leveled on his angry face.

"You," she answered without missing a beat.

Michael motioned for Indigo to join him at the other end of the deck, uncomfortably aware of her gaze following him.

Maria watched him as he stripped off his leather jacket and threw it into a nearby chair before launching into a very loud argument filled with expletives and angry questions. His tee shirt pulled taut across the muscles of his back every time he lifted his hands to express himself and she couldn't help but admire his physique.

"What the fuck did you tell her?"

"Hey, man, Maria and I were just talkin' about things; neither of us revealed any of your deep, dark secrets. Why don't you just chill out and relax before you have a stroke," the big man suggested.

Maria, Michael thought. So that was her name. He turned to look at her, unconsciously standing up straighter when he realized she was checking him out. The name suited her, he decided. "I've gotta get on the road; if I leave now I can be back home by mornin'."

"Look, man," Indigo said, lowering his voice, "she's a sweet girl, but you can't leave her here; I'm gonna have a hard enough time explainin' this to my ladies as it is."

"I'm takin' 'er with me."

"You can't expect her to make that trip overnight, Guerin; that poor girl's already worn out and that ride's what, ten or twelve hours?"

"I can do it in about ten and a half." He shook his head adamantly when Indigo's expression turned disapproving. "Look, she wants to stay with me, then she's gonna play by my rules." He turned to stalk back along the deck to the young woman.

Indigo shook his head in exasperation. He'd love to be a fly on the wall at Guerin's house once the two of them were in close quarters with no one else around. He had only spent a few hours with her, but he had a feeling that she wasn't gonna just fall into line the way the other man expected her to.

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Maria stumbled across the hotel room floor and fell onto the unmade bed when Michael unceremoniously shoved her through the door and slammed it shut behind him. She quickly righted herself and got to her feet, moving to sit as far away from him as possible.

"I don't know what you think's about to happen, but I can assure you that I am not having sex with - "

"You'll do what I tell you to do." Michael turned away from the small refrigerator, bottle in hand, and he moved to tower over her. Twisting the top off he tossed it across the room where it landed silently in the small wicker trash can. He took a long drink from the chilled bottle before setting it on the nightstand and calmly reaching down to unbuckle his wide leather belt. His right hand shot out to hold her still when she tried to crawl backwards on the bed and after a brief struggle he released her and stood back to pull the belt through the loops on his pants and then tossed it on the dresser.

Maria stared at the handcuffs connecting her right wrist to the headboard as she tried valiantly to bring her heartbeat under control. For just a minute she had thought… She shook her head, refusing to allow that thought to complete itself. He was employing scare tactics, expecting her to run like a scared rabbit or melt into a puddle of tears at his feet. Well, she had news for him - it wasn't going to work like that. She was just going to have to find a way to deal with him and learn fast to expect the unexpected.

He pulled his tee shirt over his head and folded it up, dropping it on the dresser next to his belt. His hands rested over the snap at the top of his cargo pants as he glanced at the mirror to see if she was watching him. Uh-huh, just like he suspected. He popped the snap and lowered the zipper halfway before moving back over to the nightstand to retrieve his drink.

She tensed up when he sat on the edge of the bed next to her but she refused to back away from him. She was not going to give him the satisfaction, she thought, irritated that he was acting this way. Her breathing froze in her throat when he suddenly moved and she found herself flat on her back, staring up into his cold eyes as he straddled her waist.

He leaned forward, fisted hands braced on the mattress on either side of her body as he studied her jade eyes for any trace of fear. It pissed him off when he realized that her attention was focused on his dog tags as they swung gently at the end of their chain, so close to her nose that they were almost brushing against it.

"I could fuck you right now if I wanted to."

Maria barely controlled the urge to cringe at his crass terminology as she forced her gaze away from the identification tags that symbolized a life so different from the one her Michael had led. How was she going to put herself on level ground with this man? she wondered as she met his gaze head-on. She could see the anger seething in his dark eyes, but it was unlike any emotion she had ever seen; it was edgy, dangerous, and bordered on violent. He wasn't the type of man to make idle threats, but if he had been going to hurt her he would've already done it. She consoled herself with those thoughts.

"You know why you're handcuffed to my bed?" he growled.

"Not really," she said, sounding bored.

Michael drew back and his eyes narrowed suspiciously when she answered without the slightest trace of fear in her voice.

Her gaze lowered to his crotch and she smirked as she looked back up at him. "I'm not one of your over-inflated, empty-headed Barbie dolls whose sole purpose in life is to boost your ego."

"You don't have any clue - "

"What? I don't have any clue what type of women you have sex with? I met your… friend at Indigo's house, heard her rave about your sexual prowess in the man's bathroom. She was very vocal about your…" Her gaze slid down over him again when he slowly leaned back and placed his hands on his thighs. "Attributes."

He followed her gaze, glancing down at himself and just barely bit back a curse when he realized that his dick had decided that it was ready for action. How the fuck had that happened? he wondered, pissed off that his dick was reacting to this woman. He refused to believe he was interested in her sexually despite the erection that would seem to indicate otherwise. He was reaching for his zipper to tug it up when she shifted beneath him and started to speak again.

"If you lower that zipper any further I swear your days as a sexually active hybrid will end tonight."

"Believe me, if I was the slightest bit interested in fuckin' you, I would, and you couldn't do a goddamned thing to stop me," he snapped.

"No? I was involved with an alien for five years, went up against some very bad aliens, and evaded law enforcement numerous times… do you really think I haven't learned a thing or two after those experiences? Touch me again and you'll spend the rest of your life as the only neutered alien on the planet."

"You're a mouthy little bitch." He punched the wall above the headboard and climbed off of the bed. "Don't turn your back or close your eyes," he warned, turning his back to her. "You just never know who might make your worst nightmare come true."

His stomach rolled with nausea as he stalked into the bathroom and started the shower before slamming the door shut and leaning back against it. He raised a trembling hand to his face and drew in a shaky breath, inhaling lungfuls of the hot, moist air. What he had just done felt wrong in every possible way; he wasn't nice by anyone's standards but even he had never stooped so low as to imply that he might force a woman to have sex with him. It was her fault, he decided. If she had just kept that last comment to herself he wouldn't have lost his temper and made a threat that he would never, ever, carry out. He blamed it on the illness; it was still too new and the lack of knowledge surrounding it was making him edgier than normal.

In the bedroom, Maria grabbed a handful of the comforter and pulled it over herself as she curled up tightly into the fetal position. Tears leaked from the corners of her eyes and fell onto the pillow she was hugging with the arm that wasn't hanging from the headboard. It had taken everything she had to keep her face from revealing her fear to him; at first she hadn't believed he would really hurt her like he had implied, but he had been menacing enough to scare her and now she was questioning whether or not she was safe with him.

She briefly let herself think of her Michael, imagining his long arms wrapped around her, holding her securely against his big, warm body as he whispered reassurances in her ear. She hugged the pillow tighter and as she drifted off into an exhausted, restless sleep, she could almost feel his presence right there with her, making her feel safe and protected.

Michael stepped out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around his waist and he glanced into the bedroom, surprised to hear nothing but silence. He crept around the bed, ignoring the droplets of water dripping from his hair to splash onto his shoulders and roll down his naked torso. He looked down at the little blond, sound asleep and curled up into a little ball. Her tearstained face was buried in his pillow and she was gripping it tightly with her free arm.

His dark gaze settled on her right arm, suspended above her head and hanging from the headboard by the handcuffs. Bruises marred the flesh of her upper arm where he had grabbed her several times that day and that nauseous feeling surfaced once again. His eyes followed her arm up to her wrist and he winced when he realized just how tightly he had closed the handcuffs; the skin was red and irritated where the metal had pinched her tender flesh. He reached up and with unaccustomed gentleness he released the handcuffs and eased her arm down under the covers.

Refusing to look any deeper into his actions, he backed away from the bed and walked back to the bathroom so he could finish getting ready. Okay, he thought, he had meant to scare her as badly as he obviously had, but he hadn't intended to make her believe that he was capable of that kind of violence.

He roughly towel-dried his hair before hanging the towel over one of the chrome rails, grabbing a fresh pair of pants, and pulling them on. He walked over to the sitting area and turned a lamp on before walking back over to the bed. For several very long minutes he stood beside the bed, arms crossed over his chest as he studied her. He looked down when he noticed her feet, still clad in a pair of shoes, sticking out from under the comforter. She was probably sleeping due to exhaustion and he knew she wasn't going to sleep well if she slept the entire night constricted by her street clothes. Not that he personally cared one way or the other, but if she woke up pissy because of a bad night of sleep he'd probably have to listen to her bitching and whining all the way back to L.A.

"Lucky for you I'm an expert at undressin' women," he grumbled as he quickly and efficiently stripped her clothes off and placed them on the nightstand, leaving her dressed only in her bra and panties. Free of the constriction she stretched a little and he could see her visibly relax, though it was only fractionally. He covered her back up and looked around for the small bag she had been carrying earlier, finally locating it sticking out from under the edge of the bed.

He snatched it up and turned off the light next to the bed before grabbing another bottle from the refrigerator and dropping down on the couch in the sitting area. He took a long drink before placing the bottle on the table next to the bag, leaning forward to unzip it and pulling the contents out, one by one. He placed the few pieces of clothing on the table, followed by a folder filled with black-and-white copies of… he flipped through the sheets of paper, frowning when he realized they were old newspaper articles, probably copied at a library.

He set the folder down beside him on the couch and checked the bag for anything else of interest. The last thing he found was a man's leather wallet and he shoved the things on the table aside so he could slouch down and prop his feet up. He flipped the wallet open, mentally counting the meager amount of money tucked inside one of the folds before moving on to the clear pouch in the center that housed a drivers' license. He stared at the photograph of a twenty-year-old that did bear a striking resemblance to him, but despite the name below the picture he didn't believe that it was some other universe's version of him.

He dug through the last couple of pockets in the wallet and pulled out a few photographs, carefully wrapped in clear plastic to protect them from damage. He dropped the wallet on the cushion beside him and unwrapped the plastic, dropping his feet to the floor and leaning forward once more so he could place the pictures face-up on the surface. There were five of them in all and on a hunch he reached for the folder of copied articles and quickly matched the snapshots to the photographs in the articles.

He picked up the group photo and turned it over to look at the names scrawled on the back, frowning as he looked back at the obituaries lined up on the table. Four of the seven people in the photograph were dead… two of them at least eight years before the picture was taken, and another two wouldn't have made it to seventeen, as indicated on the back. Two of them had moved away several years prior to the picture and the last person in the picture, the one that resembled him and even bore his name, couldn't have been photographed on the date written in feminine handwriting.

His gaze settled on the kid that looked like him - not that he ever would've been caught dead with hair like that - and the small blonde tucked in safely against his side. It was easy to see the boy's protective nature in the way he held her and the way his eyes were watching the person who held the camera. He glanced down at the obituary for the young woman sleeping in the bed behind him and for the first time he began to think that the insanity she had been spouting might be true.

He put everything back the way he had found it and placed the bag under the edge of the bed before he checked the locks on the door again. It was all too much to consider; he had to put the thoughts out of his head until he got home and he could focus on it without any distractions. That thought had him shaking his head as he dropped back down on the couch. Maria DeLuca was going to be trouble and he had no choice but to take her with him because if any of this was true he couldn't risk letting her get away.

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Maria awoke by degrees, shifting against the scratchy hotel sheets and freezing when she realized that she could feel them rustling against her bare skin. She knew she had been fully dressed, all the way down to her shoes, when she had fallen asleep, which meant that… she had to grit her teeth at the reminder that he shared the same name and face as her Michael… Michael had undressed her. Perverted jerk probably enjoyed that, she thought indignantly. She lifted the comforter up and glanced down at herself, calming slightly when she saw that she wasn't completely naked.

She sat up, surprised to see that she was no longer handcuffed to the bed, and looked around the room. Judging by the weak light filtering in through the closed blinds it was early and her gaze momentarily settled on the man sprawled out on the couch that was too short for his tall frame. Maybe he did have some redeeming qualities, she mused as she grabbed her bag and crept into the bathroom for a quick shower. She couldn't deny that he had scared the hell out of her the night before, but as she thought back over those few minutes and she recalled his expression as he left the room, she began to wonder if he hadn't scared himself as well.

After a hot shower, she dressed and crept out into the bedroom to place her bag on the bed. She chewed on her thumbnail as she eased around the furniture in the sitting area to get a better look at the sleeping man, curious to see how much he resembled her Michael when he was asleep. His right arm was bent at the elbow, his head resting on his forearm, and his left arm was lying over his stomach… Her eyes traced over the well-defined chest and abdominal muscles, his skin tight and toned, bronzed, probably from working out under the sun without a shirt on, because she couldn't imagine him being so vain that he would spend time in a tanning bed.

"Decide you wanna piece of this?" he asked, his voice gruff from sleep.

Maria jumped when he spoke, his voice unexpected in the early morning stillness. So much for redeeming qualities, she thought, shaking her head. "As tempting as your offer is, I'm gonna pass." She rolled her eyes when he shrugged carelessly and proceeded to scratch himself without the slightest bit of modesty.

"Suit yourself," he muttered. "Your loss." He rolled off of the couch and got to his feet, towering over her as he met her annoyed glare. "Unless you're interested in fuckin' me so I can get rid of this hard-on I'd suggest you move so I can spend some quality one-on-one time with my right hand."

"You're disgusting."

"Deal with it," he tossed over his shoulder on his way to the bathroom. "And while you're out here wishin' I was nailin' you through the mattress, maybe you could get your shit together so we can hit the road. You've already fucked up my schedule and we've got a long ride ahead of us. We're leavin' in fifteen minutes, whether you're ready or not."

Maria gaped after him when he sauntered into the bathroom and turned the shower on but didn't bother to close the door after him. She couldn't believe his audacity and for just a moment she wondered if it was just her, or if he talked to all women that way. He was crude, cruel, and disgusting, and she had a feeling she hadn't even scratched the surface with him yet. She had no idea what she was getting into by going with him to his home, but she had no choice; she had to follow this through to find out why she was here in this universe.