Free Cassandra's Challenge by Michelle Eidem

Finding him watching her
she gives him a sheepish look.
    “I didn’t realize I was so hungry.”
    “You needed it. Do you want more?”
    “No. Where do I put these?” She gestures to the
now empty dishes.
    “I’ll take care of them.” Rising he picks up the
plates.
    Returning he finds her in the middle of a big
yawn. Seeing him she grins. “Sorry, it’s not the company.”
    “You need sleep, come on.”
    “William its only 2130.”
    “And you’re tired. You need sleep.” Cassandra
looks at him as he leads her to the bed.
    “William…” She isn’t sure what to do.
    “Cassandra, get undressed, get into bed, go to
sleep. I have paper work to do. I’ll be in later.” He pulls the
blanket and sheets down on the bed, realizing she’d restored
it.
    “But, I thought…” She stuttered to a stop.
    “Thought what?” Realizing what she’s thinking he
finds he wants to hear her say it.
    “That we’d…” Confusion fills her eyes as she
looks up at him.
    “Cassandra, don’t think I don’t want to mate
with you again.” He rubs his hands up and down her arms. “Your body
needs time to recover. We have time. Get into bed, get some sleep.”
Pulling her up, he kisses her then walks into his ready room.
    Standing by the bed she watches him leave. Is
she ever going to figure him out? She expected a repeat of this
afternoon and finds she’s disappointed. She can’t stop the next
yawn that hits her. Maybe she’d just take a short nap. Undressing
she puts her clothes on the chest at the foot of the bed then
climbing in she’s almost instantly asleep.
    In his ready room William is replaying his day.
Cassandra. The transmission. Falco. All in all an eventful day.
While she’s brought up some good points concerning Falco he thinks
she’s reading them wrong. Leaning back in his chair he remembers
how responsive she’d been. That she’d been able to accept his
entire length. His never experienced that before, she truly is his
life-mate. Now he just had to make her understand what that
means.
    Turning his attention to his desk he thinks
about Falco’s missing report. That is something to deal with
tomorrow. At the comm center he brings up the Regulian transmission
to study again.
     
    The nightmare has Cassandra sitting straight up
in bed looking franticly around. Where is she! Where’s Victoria!
Heart pounding she tries to get her bearings. There’s a light but
it seems so far away. It’s the scent that finally calms her.
    “William.” She whispers. But he’s not here,
picking up the pillow that carries his scent, the nightmare comes
back to her and she lowers her head to the pillow.
    She’s been having the nightmare since the
Regulians attacked Earth. There’s supposed to be a light but all
she sees is death and destruction. Every time she tries for the
light someone she loves dies. Its’ all her fault…if she’d just been
smarter, she could have saved them all. But tonight the nightmare
changed, for the last seventeen days it’s always had her dropping
Victoria, falling after her, something that even now makes her
shutter. But tonight it included William, William falling out of
the Raptor after both of them. What does it mean?
    Her maternal Grandmother had always told her to
listen to her dreams to learn from them. They would reveal things
that we need to know. She’d always believed her, but she doesn’t
know what this means.
    What she does know is she wants William. He
scares her, not with his size or passion, but with what he makes
her feel. She could lose herself to him, trusting he would take
care of her. How did she know that? It isn’t her mind telling her,
it’s her heart. She’s never trusted it to anyone other than family,
but her heart says she can trust him. Does she have the courage?
There are so many things they don’t know about each other.
    In the later part of his life her father had
been a carpenter. And while he’d loved to build things, he’d gotten
his greatest