Page 3 of Charmed By the Alien Warrior

“Oh, sweetie. What did you say?”

“I was in shock. I didn’t know what to say, so I just walked away. Then, I walked a mile down the road to the hotel and waited for you.”

“Why didn’t you come in? It’s cold out tonight.”

She shrugs. “I don’t know. I didn’t want to face you right then.”

“What?” I do a double take at her. “What do you mean?”

“You never liked him, and deep down, I knew he wasn’t really a good boyfriend, but I liked the attention from him. But now, I feel like a fool for staying with him for so long.”

“Maddie, you’re not a fool. He is. Any guy that would treat my baby sister that way isn’t worth crying over.” I glance at her. “Hey, do you want me to beat him up for you?” She thinks I’m joking, but I really would do it.

Maddie rolls her eyes. Then, after a quiet moment, she looks at me. “Don’t you ever get lonely?”

Her question stuns me, and I don’t know how to answer it.

Yeah, I get lonely sometimes. But I’ve seen the damage bad relationships can cause. I’ve lived through the aftermathand survived, just barely, and after a lifetime, I’ve learned that most people can’t be trusted. Especially men.

No, there’s only one person that I really trust and she’s sitting beside me. Which makes me sound pathetic. But Maddie deserves an honest answer, even if it’s a short one.

“Yeah,” I admit.

“You don’t ever date. I don’t think you’ve ever had a boyfriend, have you?”

My thoughts immediately flash back to a boy with brown hair and hazel eyes. Jason Parker. I haven’t thought about him in years. He was my boyfriend in high school and college, but he dropped me as soon as… Well, as soon as life got a little rough.

“I date.” I bite out begrudgingly, even though it’s not exactly the truth.

I do date, but not seriously. I’m not a nun after all, and I go into any date knowing it’s not going to lead to a relationship. And I make sure they know it.

I try to be as safe as possible. Never bringing them to my house. Always keeping the location services on my phone set to on. Checking out their social media. I even do a quick search for them on one of the background check sites that I use regularly in my side gig.

But I never bring them around Maddie.

At first, it was because she was the little sister I had guardianship over, and I didn’t think it would be a good idea to introduce her to some random guy. But she’s twenty-five, an adult, and I still don’t bring any guys I’ve went out with around her.

Maddie snorts. “Uh-huh. Sure, you do.”

“I do.” I insist.

Thankfully, she drops the subject and goes quiet, but after a while, she clears her throat.

“You’ve always got it together, Mara. I wish I could be more like you, instead, I’m just the screw-up.”

“Hey.” My voice is firm and commanding and my hands clench the steering wheel. “You are not a screw-up. You’re perfect the way you are and don’t let anyone, including Connor or yourself, tell you otherwise. Got it?”

Maddie sighs. “Yeah, I got it.”

We lapse into silence for the rest of the drive, my mind buzzing with thoughts of my sister and her words. Maddie may think I have it all together, but if she really knew how I felt most days, she’d think otherwise.

But my job is to keep it together for both of us, and I take my job seriously.

Finally, I turn the small car into the driveway that leads to our isolated house. Our nearest neighbors own forty acres of land and their house is on the far side of it. I still don’t understand why my mom wanted to live so far from town, but as soon as she saw the small house on half an acre, she fell in love with it. I think maybe it reminded her of the home she was kicked out of when she got pregnant with me as a teenager, but I don’t know.

I park the car in front of the little yellow bungalow and notice that the motion-activated light at the corner has a bulb blown again. Ugh, I’ll have to replace it tomorrow. Withoutthat light, the entire front of the house is dark. I feel a frisson of unease creep into my mind, but I shove it aside. Maddie is always telling me I’m overly cautious. That I need to live more.

I thought I’d be back home by this afternoon, so I didn’t leave any other lights on, and I guess, my sister didn’t think to leave any on before Connor picked her up, so the entire house sits dark and ominous with only a beam of moonlight for illumination.

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