The Journey's End Read Online Free PDF

that why you asked that I do the
negotiations? So they would have to release me?”
    “I did not like the idea that you were being kept against
your will.”
    “Unless you’re the one doing the keeping?”  Her voice was
ironic enough to have him laughing again.
    “Perhaps.  Come, the tech grow restless.  I would have the
negotiators take over, unless of course you would care for that stroll.”
    She snorted.  “No, thank you.”
    “Then until we meet again.”  He held up his hand and she
reached over and clasped it in her own, sure that he could do nothing to force
her over the line.
    “That isn’t likely.”  Her hand was clasped firmly in his and
he brought it to his mouth and kissed the back of it, which Nori felt all the
way down to her toes.  Then he looked up and smiled such a devilishly smug
smile that Nori immediately tried to loosen her hand from his grip.  He was
unshakable.
    “Let me go.”
    “No.”
    “The techs won’t let you pull me over the line.”
    “You are already over the line.  Your hand is on my side of
the border.”
    She tried to shake off his grip.  “This is ridiculous.”  She
turned to the tech negotiators, careful to keep herself firmly over the line as
far as possible.  “He won’t let go.”
    The two little men looked at each other, then at her. “I am
sorry, we did warn you not to cross the border.  Unless he attempts to pull the
rest of you over, he is well within his rights to hold anything on his side as
long as he likes.”
    She gritted her teeth.  “That is my hand.”
    “Yes.  We did warn you.”
    She lunged at them, not sure if the plan was to dislodge her
hand from that steely grip or strike at the tech and their idiotic rules, but
she almost landed on her ass on the wrong side of the line when he didn’t so
much as budge.  She caught herself just in time.
    “You can’t be serious about this.”  She turned back to find
herself toe to toe with him across a very thin line.
    He smiled again, this time it made her think of lions baring
their teeth. All charm had been leached out and only brutal resolve remained. 
“I have rarely been more serious about anything.”
    “This was your plan?  To get me to reach across the border
and then you would just hang on forever?”
    “Your hand, your hair, anything that comes across the border
is mine and I intend to keep it.”
    “Why?  Because I jumped out of your stupid shuttle?”
    “I intended to keep you then too, if you will recall.”
    “But why?  Why me?  Why not someone from your world who
wants to be here?”
    “You will like it here in time.”
    “Like hell I will.  This place is fast becoming my worst
nightmare.”
    He smiled again, the charm was back.
    “All you have seen is the worst.  You must stay and see the
best.”
    “I won’t stay.  Even if you get me over the line, I’ll find
a way to escape.”
    “I accept your challenge.”
    “It’s not a challenge,”  she said, her anger and frustration
mounting.  “You have no idea what I’m capable of.”
    “Then in that regard, we are evenly matched.”
    She growled.  She could feel the animal close, but was
helpless to keep the sound at bay.  The tech guards backed up, looking around
nervously for what had made the wild sound, but Menelaus knew and it seemed he
took pleasure in the sound, because the light in his eyes changed from
determined to hungry as it trailed over her form.  That then touched off
something in her that she had managed to keep dormant through most of her 26
years.  She knew her eyes had changed from green to feral lavender and could do
nothing to stop it.  All she knew was that she had to get free of his hold
before she showed everyone who and what she was.
    “You need to let go.  Please.”  She knew she sounded
desperate, and though he was the only one who could possibly hear her low
whispered plea, she still felt exposed.  Captivity would never be an option for
one of her kind.  In that,