Wicked, glorious pleasure. Ecstasy so sweet she could taste it on her tongue.

Patrick came, too. Every muscle tightening, his heart thundering, a low growl of pleasure erupting from his throat. He sank inside her again, bent forward and kissed the nape of her neck, held her until their trembling bodies stilled. Then he lifted her off the car and turned her into his arms, kissed her tenderly one last time.

His hand combed lightly through her hair. "You know this wasn't the reason I brought you out here."

"I know."

"I can't say I'm sorry it happened."

She reached up and touched his cheek. "Neither can I. Thank you, Patrick."

"For what? Making love to a beautiful woman?"

"For knowing just what I needed."

"My pleasure," he said with a teasing grin. He picked up her discarded jeans and handed them over. In the sliver of moon shining down, she could have sworn he blushed when he handed her the ruined panties.

"We'd better go," she said and Patrick nodded.

Julie let him help her into the car and close the door, then watched his long-legged strides as he rounded the Porsche and climbed in. All the way back to the house, her eyes kept straying to his dark, handsome profile, the black flaring brows, the bright blue eyes and solid jaw. She thought of the way they had just made love, the feel of his mouth and hands on her body, his hard length inside her. She had never felt more complete, never felt more of a woman.

Julie leaned back against the headrest, gazing up at the stars. The truth was plain, even if she didn't want to see it. She was in love with Patrick Donovan. Wildly, insanely, pa.s.sionately in love with him. Just like every other woman he had ever known.

The thought was terrifying.

As horrifying as Laura's fear of alien abduction. Maybe even worse.

Miraculously, five days after his near-fatal stroke, Alexander Donovan began to recover. He came out of his coma asking for his son, whose smile was wide and warm. By the end of the second week, Alex Donovan was sitting up in bed, and to Dr. McClean's amazement, his brain seemed undamaged. He had even begun to regain the use of his paralyzed left hand.

Nathan took over after that, beginning gradual physical therapy. Routines settled back to normal, and everyone went back to work.

Even Laura was working. She had taken a part-time job as a waitress in a local Denny's restaurant. The hours were flexible, which she needed, since she had decided to return to school. She only needed a few more credits at city college to earn her a.s.sociate Arts degree. She could take the necessary cla.s.ses and still be home well before dark, which gave her a certain comfort, though her fears never really ever left her.

And she had another worry. Julie. Her sister's biggest problem wasn't aliens-it was Patrick Donovan. Julie was obviously head over heels for the man and there wasn't a doubt she was going to get hurt.

Patrick just wasn't a one-woman man. As far as Laura was concerned he never would be. It simply wasn't in his nature. Laura was worried about her, just as she was worried about herself.

Since the second abduction incident, there hadn't been another, yet she couldn't shake the feeling of constantly being watched. She had argued with Brian about keeping the gun she had purchased. They had been seeing each other a lot, their feelings for each other growing stronger. She didn't want to jeopardize the relationship they seemed to be building, and Brian had been so adamant about the gun she had finally given in and let him keep it for her.

Now she wished she'd stood firm.

Brian might not think she was emotionally stable enough to handle a weapon, but he hadn't faced an army of big-headed, black-eyed, ugly little gray men.

Not that those were the ones she most feared. It was the others, the gray men's superiors, that frightened her the most. She didn't know who they were or what they looked like, but she knew they were the ones in charge.

Once, during her second time on board the ship, she remembered the thought popping in: Higher life forms don't mix with the soldier populations. She didn't know how the thought got into her head, but she knew where it had come from. And she feared, sooner or later, she would have to face her powerful abductors again.

Laura shivered to think of it. At times she envied her sister, existing from day to day as if nothing had ever happened, pleasantly unaware. Laura remembered every brain-numbing, blood-curdling moment of her ordeal.

There wasn't the least chance she would forget.

Val pressed the heavy barbells above his head. He worked out at the gym next door to the office at least three times a week. It was strange in a way, since he knew it was only a matter of time until he'd be leaving Patrick's body to its Earthly end, a cold grave six feet under. It made him sad to think of such a healthy male specimen rotting away, but there was nothing he could do. Patrick's soul was long gone, had left just minutes after his heart had given way. The husk of a man was all that remained.

In the meantime, Val continued to hone the cords and sinews, the tendons and muscles that seemed more and more a part of him. Perhaps it was simply that he liked his human appearance, liked the flex of muscle over bone when he moved. Perhaps even more, he liked the look in Julie's eyes when she touched him, the intimate things she whispered when they were alone.

He thought of the night in his car above the city, the wild way they had mated. Nothing he had read, no specimen he had ever studied, had prepared him for the sweeping power of their joining.

Or the way he had felt when they were through.

Fiercely protective, pa.s.sionately involved. Bonded to Julie in a way he wasn't prepared to handle. In a few more weeks he would have to leave her. It made his chest ache to think of it, made a sharp pain twist up in his guts.

For the first time it occurred to him that he didn't really want to go. He liked this wild, primitive planet with its fiercely pa.s.sionate people. He liked not knowing what challenge each new day might bring. He liked accepting that challenge and overcoming it.

But he was a scientist, commander of the science wing aboard the Ansor, a powerful man among his people. The High Council would demand his return and he would be forced to obey.

In the meantime, he had a job to do. Which was why, when he finished working out, he drove straight to Julie's beach house, why he was sitting on her bright-colored sofa helping her sort through the stack of magazine and newspaper articles about UFO sightings she had pulled off the Internet.

The articles posed little threat. No matter what in the stack he read, no matter how many people reported the sighting, they were always treated the same, as if the person or person who'd had the encounter was crazy-six bricks shy of a load, Patrick would have said.

Even worse were the reports of alien abduction. It seemed the victims were a.s.saulted twice-once by the "Visitors" who invaded their bodies and minds; a second time by society's ridicule, the refusal to believe what these people had endured.

He thought of Laura Ferris and wished he could ease Julie's worry about her. But the fact was Laura hadn't the strength Julie had and the abduction had affected her severely. All he could do was try to keep Julie's fate from being the same. Or worse.

"Listen to this-" Wearing jeans and a sweatshirt, she sat cross-legged on the floor at his feet. "'According to a study led by Nicholas Spanos, a psychologist at Carleton University in Ottawa, people who claim to have sighted UFOs are neither psychologically disturbed nor especially p.r.o.ne to fantasy.'" She glanced up. "Apparently they did a study of people who had reported sightings or close encounters and used a control group of people who had not. Both groups were found to be psychologically the same."

"That's impressive. People crazy enough to believe in UFOs aren't any crazier than the rest of us."

She punched his leg. "You are such a skeptic."

"Yeah, well, I'm not alone. It says here that two psychiatrists a.s.sociated with the Harvard Medical School believe flying saucers are misperceptions of s.e.xual organs. Hallucinations stemming from primal modes of thinking from childhood. They say a flying saucer is actually a representation of a mother's b.r.e.a.s.t.s. A cigar-shaped object is simply a phallic symbol. Flying objects are, and I quote, 'extremes of gratification and omnipotence,' unquote."

Julie looked at him as if he had lost his mind. "Tell me you are making a joke."

He chuckled softly. "'Fraid not."

She came up on her knees, pretty mouth set, and shook a finger in his face. "If you believe for a single moment-"

Val grinned and held his hands up in surrender. "I don't. Even I'm not that much of a disbeliever."

She laughed softly, settled back down on the floor and began to rummage through the papers spread out on the carpet. She picked one up and began to read.

"Okay, how about this? 'The tiny town of Rachel, Nevada, has become a tourist destination for UFO enthusiasts. Though only 53 cars a day travel the 98-mile-long State Route 375, so many sightings have been reported it has been renamed the Extraterrestrial Highway. The road runs near Area 51, a part of Nellis Air Force Base where, some UFOlogists believe, the government is testing captured alien s.p.a.cecraft.'"

He arched a brow. "Captured alien s.p.a.cecraft? Now you're the one who is joking."

"Maybe, maybe not. I've heard about this Area 51. It's supposedly so secret they bought up all the land around it for miles so you can't get near enough to see it."

"That's what governments do," he said, "try to keep its defenses secret. That doesn't mean they're testing alien s.p.a.cecraft." Though Val supposed they could be. Over the years, several Torillian crafts had gone down and never been recovered. And there were other s.p.a.ce travelers who had visited the planet through the years.

"Look at this. I printed a list of sites off Google. There are dozens of Web sites devoted to people who claim to have seen UFOs. UFOsightings.com has accounts by NASA astronauts. And look at this...there was a major sighting at O'Hare airport in Chicago fairly recently. Listen to this. 'In November, a gray, metallic, saucerlike object was spotted hovering above Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. As many as twelve United Airlines employees spotted the object and filed reports.'"

"It was probably a weather balloon," Patrick said, the usual answer to a sighting, and Julie tossed him a look.

"'Airline officials say they have no knowledge of any such occurrence and the Federal Aviation Administration is not investigating.' I find that amazing."

Patrick just shrugged. "I imagine they get a lot of false reports. They hardly have time to investigate them all."

"Here's an old magazine article from Omni, back in the days when the magazine was still in print. It's a special issue on alleged extraterrestrial visitations. It says in 1969, after sixteen years of investigation, the government ended its official interest in UFOs. But later a number of people came forward claiming that a secret military underground continued the study."

She glanced down at the pages she had printed. "A retired army major named Robert Dean said NATO issued a cla.s.sified report in the sixties stating that UFOs were real, extraterrestrial, and had visited the earth. A scientist named Bob Lazar claimed he worked in the late 1980s on an extraterrestrial s.p.a.cecraft being researched and tested in Nevada, and a retired Air Force colonel named Charles Halt said he witnessed and investigated UFOs over England."

"Does it say how much these men got paid for their stories? I'd say that's a pretty important factor in deciding whether or not to believe what they're saying."

Julie frowned. "I suppose that's true, but-"

"But nothing. You, my love, are far too gullible."

"Here's something interesting...apparently it was a big deal back in the 1970s. Thousands of cattle across the country were mutilated. There were all kinds of investigations but no one ever really found out who was responsible."

"You think they were caused by aliens?"

"The government, of course, says it was all a giant hoax, that the deaths were caused by wild animals. A few might have been caused by members of some sort of cult."

She shuffled through the pages spread around her, found the item she wanted and read the words. "'A book called An Alien Harvest, by a woman named Linda Howe, suggests there is strong evidence of extraterrestrial involvement. Howe claims the high heat and rapid pinpoint incisions made into the flesh of the cattle that were killed could only have come from sophisticated laser equipment weighing more than five hundred pounds."

"Or by natural decomposition, which is what probably what most scientists believe." Fools that they were, Val thought. For years, cattle had been used as laboratory test animals for research-until they began to use people.

Julie sighed. She thumbed through copies she had made from magazines at the library: Close Encounters, National Review; Seeking the Otherworldly, Skeptical Inquirer. Newsweek had a story on alien abduction, Omni had several.

There were items of interest in Aviation Week and s.p.a.ce Technology. Another issue of Newsweek had a major feature on the possibility of long-ago life on Mars, the current work being done, and the government's commitment to actually landing people there.

She rummaged through her pile, held up a small article from the Los Angeles Times. "I ran across this on the Internet this morning. I printed it off because of the date. It's a UFO sighting that was printed in the paper the day after Laura claims she was abducted on the beach. I haven't got round to reading it. I just copied it and tossed it into the pile."

Val reached for the article but Julie held it away from him. "I get to read it first." She turned to the sc.r.a.p of paper, just a small article on one of the back pages. "It says, 'An object described as a silver, saucer-shaped disk was spotted yesterday afternoon over Malibu Beach, California.'"

Her head jerked up. "Malibu? My G.o.d, Patrick." Her head went back down. "Several witnesses reported the sighting, including a United Airlines pilot whose name has been withheld. The pilot said the trail of the object was visible for about two minutes after it pa.s.sed." She fell silent, madly scanning the rest of the article. He could see the pulse beating rapidly in her throat.

"This can't be coincidence, Patrick. Someone reports a UFO over the ocean near Malibu beach the same day Laura claims she was abducted. Maybe-"

He s.n.a.t.c.hed the newsprint out of her hand and read the article to the end. "Maybe it was a failed missile launch from Vandenberg Air Force base, just like it says." He handed her back the copy and Julie read it again.

"I know that's what it says, but..."

"But you'd rather believe your sister was abducted by aliens."

Julie leaned back against the sofa, using his legs to prop herself up. She blew out a long breath of air. "It just bothers me, is all. A lot of people believe in this stuff, but the people who don't seem to have all the power. If they wanted to cover things up, they probably could."

"Why would they want to do that?"

"Any number of reasons. Public panic, I suppose. Or maybe they just don't want to deal with the ramifications of admitting such a threat exists. I mean, we're already facing terrorists all over the world. Maybe its just too much for people to handle. Maybe-"

"And maybe UFOs don't exist. Maybe the sound you heard that day on the beach had something to do with the Vandenberg missile launch."

Julie sat up straighter, her head c.o.c.ked in thought. Then she rolled away from him and grabbed up the phone.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm calling the newspaper. It doesn't give the exact time of the sighting in the article. I want to know when it was. Then I'm calling the paper in Lompoc, since that's where the air base is. Somebody ought to be able to confirm the time of the missile launch and the time it was aborted. If they can't, I'm calling Vandenburg."

"Don't you think that's going a little too far?"

"Maybe. I guess we'll have to wait and see."

It took the better part of an hour before she had the information she wanted. Long enough for her eyes to be shining with a mixture of satisfaction and what he would guess was fear, and her hands were shaking.

"I told you, Patrick. I said they could cover things up. The sighting was at 3:07 in the afternoon. The missile was launched at four o'clock and aborted at four-thirteen. The Vandenberg missile wasn't even off the ground when the UFO was reported."

He shook his head. "That doesn't mean what was sighted was actually a s.p.a.cecraft."

"No, but it d.a.m.n sure wasn't a missile."

Val said nothing. He didn't like the way this was going, but at present there wasn't much he could do. "So what now?"

"I'm not sure. I only went into this hoping to find some way to help my sister. At first I was sure she was just being paranoid. She's always had emotional problems. I was certain they had escalated into something more. Now...I just don't know. After listening to her sessions with Dr. Heraldson, after sitting in with Dr. Winters's abduction group, I can't say I'm a hundred percent convinced this isn't real. I told Laura I'd try to keep an open mind and I think I've done that. At least now if she tells me little gray men have taken her aboard their s.p.a.ceship, I can listen with a sympathetic ear."

"You're saying you believe her."

"No, I'm not. I'm saying there's a chance it's the truth. A lot bigger chance than I ever would have guessed." Julie shivered, and Val reached down and urged her up on the sofa, then lifted her onto his lap.

He looped a curl of her glossy dark red hair back over an ear. "Even if it were true, love, if s.p.a.ce travelers really existed, it might not be so bad. In most ways people are the same, no matter where they come from."

"If it's true, they're hurting people. Innocent people are suffering and there is no one who can stop them."

He eased her back against his chest, smoothing his hands over her hair. "Maybe they don't mean to hurt anyone. Maybe as intelligent as they are, they just don't understand."

Julie eyed him strangely, but she made no reply, just nestled against his chest. He could feel fine tremors racing through her. When she raised her head, her face looked a little bit pale.

"Take me to bed, Patrick. I don't want to think about this anymore."

Neither did he. But unlike Julie, he didn't have any other choice.

Seventeen.