Forbidden Territory (Galaxy Smugglers Book 3) Read online

  The visits to Earth started soon after. The Klaskians brought their technology and their incredible ability to grow new natural life. Humanity stood in awe as the rainforests regenerated, animals slowly started to repopulate and get removed from endangered lists. The Klaskians were actually healing the Earth.

  On one such visit; a brave woman stole into the encampment where the aliens slept. She gave herself to a night of breathless pleasure, and in three months was shocked when she bore a blue-skinned child.

  The Klaskians were sent for. They came and took the child. Governments tried to keep the incident a secret, but the riots and the outcry against banning contact between the species gave them pause. The world was changing. Shockingly, humanity, for the most part, had accepted that the Klaskians were part of the future and could be an ally should less peaceful beings ever arrive.

  The move, as it was called, when the planet of Klaskar found a new sun after theirs burned out, had taken a great toll on Klaskian life. Many females and young did not survive the harsh, painful period of transition. The grief on Klaskar was fresh, an open wound.

  And then, on Earth, new life. A child born between a Klaskian male and a human woman. New hope. A spark, a shimmer in the distance. The Klaskians reached for it and humanity clasped their hands in a partnership that would forever change both species.

  Chapter 1

  Desperation changes everything. Even the unthinkable is considered when there is no other way out.

  Janelle Speirs was out of options. She turned the brochure over in her hands, looking blankly in front of her. The red pamphlet had been given to her by her well-meaning best friend when she had confessed her dire situation. Shelly had always been there for her. She only person in the world that Janelle allowed herself to trust.

  The brochure was worn down from her nervous fidgeting. She read the plain cover with the gold embossed lettering, running the tip of her finger over the swirling loops of the letters.

  Tomorrow.

  That’s all the cover said, but Janelle knew what was inside. She had spent the last hour hunched over her kitchen table with her stomach in knots.

  Could she do it?

  She felt her throat closing tightly with anxiety and unshed tears.

  Blinking hard to compose herself, Janelle leaned against the back of the cheap wooden chair, her eyes scanning her tiny apartment. It wasn’t more than a living room and a kitchen combined into one open area. Down the hallway, there was a small bedroom and a tiny bathroom.

  Her place had been infested with ants when she moved in, but she’d managed to get that under control. The brown carpet was worn and stained with dubious looking splatters and splotches, and the ancient blinds in the windows were broken and sagged in several spots. They let in more sunlight than they kept out, she thought with a dry smile. The walls had holes punched into them, and. brown water stains adorned the ceiling above the cheap light fixtures.

  It had never been her dream home, but after leaving home at sixteen and having to look after herself, Janelle couldn’t afford to be choosy. It was supposed to be a temporary measure while she got on her feet, but three years later, she found herself still there.

  If she was honest with herself, all she’d ever really wanted was a roof over her head, heat during the cold Chicago winters and a place to sleep and shower. She didn’t own nice things, but that was all right with her. It didn’t matter that her couch came from a garage sale, or that she’d found her table and the two mismatched chairs thrown out beside a dumpster. It was home, and she was about to lose it.

  She was four months late on her rent. With no way to pay it and zero prospects of getting a decent job, Janelle was desperate. She had no place to go if she lost her apartment. She would never go back to her mother, not that she thought of Hannah Speirs as such.

  Her mother had told her repeatedly that she hadn’t been wanted in the first place. Hannah had fallen pregnant at seventeen, with the father bolting as soon as he heard the news. She hadn’t known nor bothered to learn how to raise a child, and Janelle’s childhood had been a miserable one as a result. She remembered being left alone at six years old while her mother was out drinking, drugging or partying. When Hannah was home she terrorized Janelle with her harsh words and anger. As soon as she was old enough to get a job, Janelle had quit school and moved out on her own.

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