Free Enhanced: Brides of the Kindred 12 (The Brides of the Kindred) by Evangeline Anderson Page B

you.”
    “Oh, uh…goodbye.” Mei-Li was suddenly
nonplussed. She had shouted at him and said things she normally wouldn’t have
said to anyone. Sometimes it seemed like she spent her whole life being
professional and polite. But the minute Six showed up, she just lost it. Mostly
because being scared made her mad but still…
    She wondered if she ought to apologize but
he was already turning to go. He stepped through the narrow doorway, turning
sideways to fit his broad shoulders, and walked past the dirty rattan couch.
Despite the black armor that covered his body, he moved smoothly down the
sagging steps of the front porch although how he kept from smashing through the
rotting wooden steps with his massive black boots was more than Mei-Li could
understand.
    That’s it then? she thought as she watched him leave. That was all I
had to do to get rid of him? Just tell him off and send him away?
    It seemed ridiculously easy. Maybe
insultingly so. Probably he had realized that she wasn’t his type the moment he
laid eyes on her. One look at her nonexistent breasts and hips and he had no
doubt decided he had made a mistake coming at all. Her shouting at him like
Angry Mom probably didn’t help either.
    Abruptly, Mei-Li felt ashamed. He had said
he’d only come to make sure she was safe. Was that really such a bad thing?
She’d been frightened and angry because he had showed up so suddenly and he
looked so big and scary in person. But really, he had behaved like a
gentleman—not at all like what she had expected.
    What had she expected? That he
would throw her over one broad shoulder, caveman style, and carry her away? The
idea seemed ludicrous now. Instead of acting primitive and possessive, Six had
spoken politely, if somewhat coldly, and had gone when she asked him to. And in
return, Mei-Li had treated him like the world’s biggest jerk.
    Manners! whispered her adopted mother’s voice inside her head. Where
are your manners, Mei-Li? That poor man came all the way from another planet
just to meet you and you snubbed him! What is wrong with you?
    Abruptly, the guilt became too much. She
stepped out onto the porch and opened her mouth to say something but Six was
already almost out of eyesight—nothing more than a black dot in the night. As
she watched, he disappeared completely though Mei-Li couldn’t tell where or
how. He was just…gone.
    There was still screaming and sobbing
coming from inside the house. Mei-Li was aware that there was a lot to do but
now that Randy was gone, Kristin and her sister were safe. And she just
couldn’t bear to go back in the shabby little house and be shouted and cursed
at any more.
    Instead, she sank down on the dirty rattan
sofa and put her head in her hands. God, what a day. And it still wasn’t
over.
    Well, at least you’re not being hauled
away in a spaceship to some distant world where everybody is half Terminator! she tried to console herself. But somehow the fact that
her “claiming” hadn’t happened after all was small comfort. Mei-Li tried to
tell herself she was relieved but instead she just felt empty inside. And she
didn’t know why.

Chapter Seven

 
    Six frowned as he got into his camouflaged
shuttle again and started the engine. Mei-Li had really surprised him.
    In every dream he had shared with her, she
had seemed frightened and frail—a timid little creature that reminded him in
her mannerisms of the furskins, the tiny half rodent, half mechanoid creatures
that scurried around the medical barges. She had seemed ready to run away and hide
at the very sight of him.
    But though her tiny body looked frail, she
had hidden strength.
    When the action began, he had been sitting
in his shuttle, far down the street and watching her watch the little domicile.
Nothing had been happening and he’d almost decided he would just go and leave
her when he’d seen her jump out of her vehicle and go charging into the place
she’d been watching with nothing more than a small