Authors: Marla Monroe
The two men headed her way in determined strides. As they grew nearer, she had to swallow at their imposing figures. She didn’t remember them being so tall and built so broad. Then she had been wearing extremely high heels with her wedding dress since it was much too long for her. The dresses were reused for every set of brides that came through the process. She had decided she was lucky that it had at least closed in the back so she wouldn’t be flashing bare skin to everyone.
The two men walked up to stand in front of her. They both removed their hats, and the results left her momentarily tongue-tied. They were both handsome men. The man with the longer, dark hair spoke first.
“Are you Beverly?”
She nodded, unable to say anything yet.
He stuck out his hand. “I’m Caleb Matthews. Sorry it took us so long, but we had to wait in line for a spell to load up.”
Beverly shook his hand, marveling at his firm grip. He had honey-gold eyes that were mesmerizing. He stood around six foot three inches and had broad shoulders and a wide, muscular-looking chest. His square face had wide cheekbones and a chiseled chin. She could easily imagine his strong arms wrapped around her. The sound of a throat clearing next to her jerked her back to the present.
“I’m Jeff Bledsoe. Pleased to meet you, Beverly.” His face was all angles and hard planes with warm, hazel eyes that held green and brown tones. She had to look up at him as well and figured he was an inch taller than Caleb but not quite as wide as the other man. Where Caleb’s body looked more muscular, Jeff’s seemed more streamlined. Neither man could be labeled weak or puny.
“I–I’m Beverly Eggers. I guess we didn’t really get a good look at each other back on Earth.” She swallowed and jumped to pick up some of the luggage. “I have everything together here according to the list they gave me. I hope it’s everything. I had to search for some of it.”
Beverly knew she was babbling, but she couldn’t help an attack of nerves at finally being alone with them and knowing next to nothing about either man. Not only that, but she was their wife and was expected to trust them with her well-being. Somehow the reality of the situation hadn’t seemed so daunting while they’d been six months off from landing. Now that they were about to head off into the wilds of a planet they knew very little about, she wasn’t as comfortable with the idea as she had been.
“We’ll get the luggage. It looks like everything of mine is here. What about you, Jeff?” Caleb took her suitcase from her.
“Mine all appears to be there. Let’s get loaded and get on the road. We’ve got a good five-hour trip according to the information we have.” Jeff took the handle of one end of a trunk.
Twenty minutes later, everything loaded and secure, Jeff double-checked Beverly’s harness then fastened his own. She watched as Caleb started the transport, and the hovercraft-like buggy rose off the ground and turned toward the far horizon. Despite the noise when outside of the vehicles, she found that inside it was fairly quiet. She listened as the two men talked about their destination and their confidence in the transport’s GPS before they lapsed into silence.
At twenty-eight, Beverly wasn’t a virgin by any means, but she hadn’t had a lot of experience with men either. Being what she thought of as pleasingly plump, she hadn’t had a lot of dates growing up. Then, when the knowledge of Shear’s Disease became widespread, she, along with every other fertile female, had been rounded up like cattle and shipped below ground in bunkers designed to keep the sun’s harmful rays from touching her.
Now, she wasn’t sure how to act around two such virile and handsome men. Their sexuality oozed from them like an overstuffed pastry. She had no hopes of making them happy, and the knowledge that they were stuck with her didn’t help. She would have been more than content with two decent guys who would be happy with her like she was. Now she would have to try and change who she was to make them happy. That thought depressed her even more than leaving behind everyone she knew.
“Hey. What’s wrong?” Jeff leaned over and looked at her.
She hadn’t realized that she was crying until he spoke. Now on top of being depressed, she was embarrassed as well.
“Nothing. I guess I’m just missing home. I mean nothing here looks the same, really. The trees are weird colors and shapes, and the grass is blue.”
“It will be okay, Beverly. Just give it a chance.” Jeff smiled at her.
She smiled back and vowed not to act so weak again. They were real cowboys and used to roughing it, she was sure. She didn’t think they would appreciate a whiner on top of someone who looked like she did. At least she would be good at housework and taking care of the garden. She had plenty of experience with that, having grown up with four brothers on a farm. She could cook and clean and put up vegetables better than most.
“Where are you originally from, Bev?” Caleb asked.
“A little town in Iowa. I grew up on a farm.”
“Do you have any brothers or sisters?” This time Jeff asked the question.
“I have four brothers. What about you two?”
Caleb grinned. “I owned a ranch outside of Bandera, Texas. I’ve got two sisters and one brother.”
“I’m from a ranch outside of Billings, Montana. I have one sister back home. She’s married and has twin boys.”
“So we’re going to live on a ranch here on Alpha? Cows or horses or both? Back on the shuttle they only told me about things I would need to handle.” Beverly frowned.
“That’s not right. They should have told you all about your new life.” Caleb looked across her head at Jeff. “We’re going to be heading up a second ranch operation next to the original one. There will be about a thousand acres between us, but there’s another ranch house with a family halfway between the two.”
Jeff picked up the conversation, “Then there is another family moving in about a fifteen-minute walk from us on the other side. They were on the shuttle with us. You didn’t get to meet her?”
Beverly shook her head. “Not that I know of, but then there were so many women there, and all any of us really learned was about the planet and how to live off of it. One of the other women said she’d overheard that they had trouble with previous trips where people got together and, um, fraternized, so they divided the ship up so that it wouldn’t happen again.”
It hadn’t helped that some of the women had even gotten together during the long trip. To prevent that from happening again, they had moved the women from group to group to keep them from forming any close friendships. She had wondered if they had done that with the men as well. She didn’t know her husbands well enough yet to ask something so sexual.
“We met Sloan Hucklebee and Nelson Jones while we were training who will be the ones moving in next to us. They actually encouraged us to spend time together since we’re going to all be working together. I think their wife’s name is Faye, but I’m not for sure.” Caleb scratched his head.
“I’m pretty sure that was it. I liked them. They seem to be hardworking men.” Jeff pointed out the window. “Look at that. What does that look like to you?”
Beverly followed his gaze to where he was pointing out the window toward their left. A massive-looking thing that looked a little like a cross between an aardvark and a praying mantis seemed to be watching them from a distance. She couldn’t make out any specific details other than it looked scary as crap.
“I think it’s one of those things we’re building the fence against. It’s in that pamphlet on dangerous predators.” Caleb had slowed down while they were looking, but sped up again. “Is it following us?”
“Doesn’t look like it, but it’s sort of hard to tell from this distance. We need the binoculars up front where we can see better.” Jeff continued to look out the window.
“Do you want me to climb over in back and look for them?” Beverly started to unbuckle her harness.
“No!” Caleb stuck out a hand to stop her. “That thing is big enough that if it decides to ram us with you in the back, you could get hurt with all those supplies back there.”
“I wish I had kept my carry bag up front with me. I had some of those pamphlets they were handing out at the station in it. I bet it would be in one of those.” Beverly shivered at the thought of the thing coming after them.
“I don’t even see it anymore, so it’s doubtful that it’s following us.” Jeff turned back from the window and smiled at her.
She was thankful that he made the effort, but she could still see worry in the stiffness of his shoulders and the way his jaw was clenched. Caleb’s shout of
no
had shaken her as well. She wasn’t used to being yelled at, no matter how important it might have seemed. Even her brothers hadn’t yelled at her. She hoped this wasn’t how their relationship was going to go in the future.
Caleb felt like a bastard for yelling at Beverly earlier. He hadn’t meant for it to come out so loud, but all he could think was that if she got back there and something happened, the supplies could have crushed her. He would never have been able to live with that. Now she was as white as a sheet and looking straight ahead. He noticed that she was worrying the material of her jeans with her fingers. No doubt he’d scared her to death. He glanced over at Jeff, but the man was intent on watching the windows for any signs of other predators.
He sighed and concentrated on driving the transport. They still had another hour and thirty minutes before they made it to their new home. He needed to be alert in case something else happened. They were vulnerable out in the middle of nowhere and so far from town. The buggy was outfitted with a radio, so they could contact the town if anything happened, but it would be several hours before anyone would be able to get to them.
He stole quick glances her way, enjoying the fact that she had a heavenly body. Covered as she had been in her wedding dress back on Earth, they hadn’t been able to tell much about her. Now he could easily see curves that had his dick hard and his balls aching. She couldn’t be much over five foot four inches with honey-gold hair that softly curled down her back. He could easily imagine holding on tight to that glorious mane as he sank his cock deep in her hot cunt.
He noticed Jeff checking her out as well. No doubt his partner was just as enamored with her as he was. Both of them had similar tastes in women he had discovered. They liked rounded over thin, which amazed him since a lot of his buddies back on Earth went after the anorexic bottle blondes. Beverly’s pine-green eyes seemed hesitant when they’d approached her, but he was sure they would relax once she got to know them. Or at least he hoped that would be the case.
The silence in the transport stretched, feeling almost oppressive in the wake of their earlier conversation. He didn’t think Jeff noticed since he was watching all around them. He just hoped that Beverly would get past the incident by the time they arrived at their destination. Deep down he knew he needed to apologize, but he also needed to be sure she would take him seriously in the future. Caleb vowed he would figure out a way to make it up to her later. Neither he nor Jeff would ever abuse a woman either physically or emotionally.
Finally, the GPS signaled that they were within a few miles of their new home. As soon as he saw a shape that looked like a house, he pointed it out to the others.
“Look, I think that might be our house.”
“Hard to tell anything about it from this distance,” Jeff said.
Beverly didn’t say anything. He glanced toward her and sighed. She was awake at least. Then, as they drew nearer, the shape became much easier to see. It was indeed a house along with several other outbuildings around it. Now he noticed that his quiet wife leaned forward as if to get a better view.
“What do you think of the area around the house so far, Bev?” he asked.
“It’s hard to tell much. The trees are colorful, and the blue grass sort of blends with them.”
Jeff laughed. “Leave it to a woman to think about color coordination.”
She frowned and turned toward the other man. “I’m not sure what else to say about it. I don’t know if it’s safe out there or not. For all I know, everything out there is dangerous.”
Jeff cocked his head. “I guess that’s true. We’ll have to really look at those pamphlets we all have and make note of anything that we aren’t sure about.”
“Well, looks like we’re here. Let’s check out the house. Then we need to unload this stuff before it gets dark.” Caleb turned off the transport, and it settled down to the ground.
He unfastened his harness as he watched Beverly fumble with hers. He waited until she had hers off before he climbed down. He would leave Beverly to Jeff for right now. He pulled out the gun stowed behind the seat and noted that Jeff did the same before he helped their wife out of the transport.
“Stay between us, Bev, until we check out the house. I don’t want to take a chance that something dangerous might be inside.” Caleb didn’t look at her. He assumed she would follow his directions as he walked toward the front porch.
Caleb unlocked the door with the key they’d been given and pushed it open. He stepped inside, leading with his gun. Nothing jumped out at them, and he couldn’t tell that there was anything inside the house. Without waiting to see if his wife and partner were following him, he walked deeper into the house and began searching each room.
Twice he turned around to nearly run over Beverly as she followed close behind him. Jeff then took the lead as they moved to the next room until the entire house had been searched and pronounced free of dangerous creatures.
“Jeff and I are going to unload the transport. Stay inside where I know you’ll be safe.” He followed Jeff back outside leaving their wife alone in the house.
He was sure she was much safer in there than she would be outside helping them. Besides, she was a woman. She didn’t need to be unloading supplies. Beverly already had a huge task ahead of her in taking care of them, the house, and the garden. Thank goodness there were two of them to help her when she needed it. Even though he knew that women had survived back during pioneer days in the Wild West, Caleb wasn’t exactly thrilled to think that their wife was going to have to learn to live in similar conditions. At least they had electricity generated by solar energy. That was something anyway.