“Wyatt,” she responded in an equally brisk tone. He didn’t know how she could be more beautiful than he remembered. Valene looked like she was trying to be stoic, but her lip trembled before she turned away, heading back to Diesel’s big SUV.
He was still clueless as to why they couldn’t be together. But he wanted her even more, as if the past two weeks had only made his love for her grow with an out-of-control exponential force.
Diesel started talking. It took a moment for the urgent tone of his voice to penetrate Wyatt’s distraction. “Wait. What are you saying?”
Diesel let out an impatient growl and repeated, “There’s been an escape. I need you to help me track down some prisoners in the woods outside of Alienn.”
“A prisoner escape?” Wyatt looked toward his police radio on the desk tucked in the corner next to his dining room table and wondered why this was the first he was hearing of any kind of prisoner escape. “Federal, state or local?”
Diesel started to say something, but stopped. Then he said, “None of the above. It’s…well…other.”
“Other?” Wyatt went to the hall closet where he kept his gear. Automatically, he grabbed his jacket and badge and retrieved his gun from the locked safe on the top shelf. His mind raced trying to understand the wordother. “Like a foreign escape?”
“That’s closer.” Diesel motioned Wyatt toward his SUV as he locked his front door. “I’ll explain everything once we get back to Alienn, okay?”
“Okay.” Wyatt had no idea why he was going along with this. As sheriff, his first response should have been to check in with the deputies on duty to see if any notices had come into the station. Instead, he’d grabbed his stuff and followed Valene’s brother out the door.
“Cam’s riding shotgun. Hop in back with Valene, okay?”
Oh no.“Um…okay.” Was this about to be some sort of comeuppance because he and Valene had broken up? Would he be surrounded by all of her brothers once they reached Alienn and forced to explain why she looked so miserable? Did they not know he was miserable, too?
Wyatt climbed into the back seat of Diesel’s big, black SUV where Valene was already putting her seat belt on. He asked in a low voice, “What’s this all about?”
She didn’t look at him, staring at the space on the seat between their legs. “You’ll see. And then you’ll understand everything.” The last part of her sentence was said in a whisper, but he heard her.
Cam Grey nodded at him from the shotgun seat in front. He didn’t look particularly angry to Wyatt, but definitely worried about something.
They drove in silence for several minutes until Wyatt started seeing the billboards for the Big Bang Truck Stop and Maxwell the Martian as they reached the last five miles to Alienn.
Diesel pulled into the main parking lot of the Grey family’s Big Bang Truck Stop, but parked around the side near an employee entrance gate to a fenced-in area at the back of the convenience store. The four of them exited the SUV as the gate opened.
Axel Grey stepped into view. He noticed Wyatt and asked, “Hey, Wyatt. Ready to go down the rabbit hole?”
Wyatt’s lids narrowed. “I’m sorry. A rabbit hole? What does that mean?”
“We haven’t told him yet,” Cam said.
Axel rolled his eyes. “What are you waiting for?”
They all stepped through the gate and into the fenced-in area. Wyatt noted it was actually a very solid-looking metal door. There was a clicking sound as some mechanism bolted solidly in place behind them.
“To get him behind a locked door so he won’t be able to run away screaming when he finds out what we all are.” Valene stayed well out of Wyatt’s reach as she answered Axel, but her attention was on Wyatt.
“What you all are? What do you mean?” Wyatt didn’t get what was going on. Abruptly, a horrible thought occurred to him. Were they felons, hiding in plain sight at a truck stop to keep a low profile?
“You aren’t about to tell me you all run some sort of criminal enterprise, are you? Because friends or not, I will arrest you.” Wyatt’s tone was light, but he wasn’t kidding.
“We aren’t criminals. We’re aliens.” Cam stared at him. They all stared at him, waiting for a reaction.
“Aliens,” he repeated. Not a question. A statement. That was not at all what he expected. “Like from another country?” he ventured a guess, but his sixth sense told him that was not at all what they were saying.
“Nope. Like from another galaxy. We are from the planet Alpha-Prime, two galaxies away.” Diesel stood tall, arms crossed, his expression expectant.
“Another galaxy. A planet called Alpha-Prime.” Wyatt looked at each of them, a smile poised on his lips as he waited for the punch line. His fledgling smile died as their expressions remained serious. Apparently, they weren’t kidding. “So, are you all hideous, slimy creatures with a dozen tentacles, but you’ve taken on a human form to hide in plain sight here on Earth?”
“Not all of the species from our galaxy have tentacles or are slimy. Alphas are humanoid, but we are taller and stronger than the average earthling, plus many of us can read human minds.”
Wyatt laughed. This was crazy. “You can read my mind. Sure.”
