Your Planet or Mine? (21 page)

“We’re taking a slight detour,” she said. “A detour to the radio station. It’s about two miles from here. If Brace has something to say to me, he can say it to my face.” Her hands squeezed the steering wheel until her fingers throbbed. Brace would be dealing with a different Jana this time around. A new and improved, tough-chick Jana.
Being good does no good
. “If today taught me anything, Cavin, it’s that taking the high road doesn’t always work.” Maybe the only way to get her enemies to shut up was to get down in the mud with them and fight.

“A
RE YOU SURE YOU NEVER
served in the Coalition officer corps?” Cavin’s tone was a loaded mix of surprise, admiration and amusement at her decision to show up at the station.

“No,” she said, scowling at the sound of the host encouraging callers to phone in their questions. Brace was coming on after the next news break.

“See, this is self-preservation on his part,” Jana tried to explain to help Cavin understand. “If I look bad, he looks good, and voilà, his reputation is restored.”

“I’ll give you that. But why go after your family when he could have focused on only you?”

“I don’t know…” It was a very good question. She’d suspected Brace may have been behind the attacks on her family because he’d gone after her. But what if that wasn’t true? “Still, why grab an appearance on a talk show the day a scandal hits if not to pull me down further? He got those pictures in the paper, and now he’s going to capitalize on his coup.”

“Don’t assume Brace gave those photos to the newspaper. To recognize your true enemies, you must be able to see through their deceptions and diversions.”

“If it wasn’t Brace, then who…?” She frowned at the road ahead. Viktor, maybe? Then she remembered Alex’s face, the frightening look of hatred. “Yesterday, Brace’s partners came after me pretty hard…Maybe it’s all three of them with Brace as ringleader.”

“Or, it’s not Brace at all.”

“You want me to match you two up? Clearly, you love this guy.” She offered him her cell phone. “Or here, call the show and tell him what a great human being he is.”

Cavin ignored her. “You said yourself he was a financial backer of the restaurant but had no day-to-day interest in it. You said, too, that he’d done it as a favor to your cousin while you were engaged to be married. Perhaps he wanted to leave the venture once it became apparent you would not marry.”

“It would be devastating to their business if Brace pulled his capital. They’re struggling. They told me so yesterday.”

“So your cousin and his partner looked to illegal means to bolster their profits—and encouraged chaos between you and Brace to distract you from their activities. It makes sense, does it not? You and Brace are the two main threats to criminal activity. Defuse the threat and they can operate as they please.”

“Are you serious?” One look at his expression answered the question. “Alex and Viktor masterminding a feud between me and Brace to deflect attention from their illegal activity? That is so convoluted, so farfetched.” And not entirely impossible. “Good Lord, Cavin, how do you think of this stuff? How can your mind work this way?”

“Survival. Compared to the Coalition officer politics, this is child’s play. A puzzle. I enjoy figuring it out.”

“Glad you’re having fun,” she said sarcastically, squeezing the life out of the steering wheel. If it were true, what Cavin suggested, what would Alex and Viktor be trying to hide?

Caviar smuggling, for instance, or poaching. The answers came to her disturbingly fast, because the suspicions already lurked in the back of her mind. Knowing that a Fish and Game special operations team was closing in on possibly their biggest smuggling and poaching bust ever, Jana wondered if when they pulled in their net, her cousin would be caught in it.

Fish were known to struggle desperately when pulled from the water. They fought for survival. Were Alex and Viktor fighting for survival in an environment increasingly unfavorable to smuggling and poaching? It was entirely plausible. But pit Brace against her for the purposes of distracting him from his investments, while making her look bad so she couldn’t get her strict policies approved—or so she’d lose her seat entirely? Well, it was too diabolical to contemplate.

But still plausible.

A sick feeling lay coldly in the pit of her stomach as she careened into the parking lot of KBFK. The moment of truth had arrived.

She shut off the motor and shoved open the door. “Come inside with me, Cavin.” Her voice softened. “For moral support.”

His hand lifted to her cheek. His eyes told her everything she needed to know.

“If anyone asks, you’re my security detail,” she said. “If they ask you anything about your identity, make up something.”

They got out of the car. She was shaking. That she was doing this at all underscored how averse to risk she’d been through the years. But everything had changed.
She’d
changed. If she was going to live up to what destiny was asking of her, she had to start somewhere. She had to start now.

She walked up to the doors, and her courage wavered. She girded herself against it, forced her feet forward. At the very minimum, she was going to make sure the public heard both sides of the story. And on a grander scale, she’d shore up her reputation, which was her single greatest asset in convincing the world to listen when she announced an alien invasion was on the way, and that all she needed to do to stop it was allow an alien to hot-wire a spacecraft that didn’t exist at a place no one was allowed to visit. Suddenly, what she was about to do seemed a hell of a lot easier.

Jana threw open the door and strode inside. A receptionist sat behind a desk. Understandably, Cavin drew her attention first, but when she saw Jana, her eyes lit up. “Jana Jasper. Senator Jana Jasper.”

Jana thrust out her hand. “So nice to meet you.”

The woman shook her hand, beaming.

Cavin had taken up a strategic spot by the door with a view of the studio room. Behind the soundproof glass sat Tom and Brace, whose back was to the glass. The On Air light wasn’t illuminated yet. Jana’s stomach churned.

“What can I do for you, Senator?”

“Let Tom know I’m here if he has any questions regarding Mr. Bowie’s statements.” She tried to utter Brace’s name without spitting it.

“I’ll tell Tom you’re here.” The woman spoke into her headset. The host made eye contact with Jana and nodded, his eyes going round with surprise. To Jana’s delight, he didn’t say anything to Brace. Heh, heh. The element of surprise was a beautiful thing. Let Brace see what it felt like to have your guts pulled out without warning. Let him know what she’d felt like this morning when she saw the photos in the newspaper.

The OnAir illuminated. Jana’s heart kicked her ribs. The receptionist flipped a switch that allowed her to hear the voices inside the studio. Jana had sat in that chair many times, interviewed by Tom and others. Now she was on the outside looking in, which seemed dismally apropos considering the day she’d experienced.
No, don’t feel sorry for yourself. Stand up for yourself.

When the intro music faded, Tom began the show. “With us today is Brace Bowie, local land developer, charitable benefactor and businessman.”

“Grrr,” Jana said.

The men exchanged the usual pleasantries then Tom got right to the point. “Brace, your name is behind many of the big commercial development projects here in the city, including the eagerly anticipated River Tower high-rise. But let’s be honest, it was your romance and the very public breakup with Senator Jana Jasper that catapulted you into the public eye.”

“Of course it was, Tom. I was a benefactor for some of the larger causes in the city, and always an avid political supporter of the Jaspers and other fine politicians.”

Fine? He’d actually complimented her and her family?

“But, hey, I know my relationship with Jana was what interested most people, and made them remember my name. That’s why I’m on your show today. To talk about Jana. She’s one special woman. An admirable woman.”

“Get to it already,” she muttered.

“Unfortunately, Jana’s under fire right now. I’m here as a civic-minded ordinary citizen to say that the accusations against her are undeserved. I stake my reputation, such as it is, on her innocence in this vicious scandal. I knew her for a year and a half. I know we’ve had our differences, but Jana Jasper is the most up-front, honest and loyal woman, the most up-front, honest and loyal
politician
, I’ve ever met.”

Jana rubbed her ear, sure she’d misunderstood.

“There was quite a lot of mudslinging last fall,” Tom asked. “What changed?”

“I was out of line. I regret the billboards. I had what was in fact a very public tantrum following our breakup. If Jana’s listening, I bet she’s smiling hearing me say that, because she used that term to describe my behavior. Jana, I’m sorry.”

Jana would have been smiling if she wasn’t so frozen in shock.

“I’ve grown from the experience. I have nothing but the utmost of respect for her. And I wish her all the best.”

Brace went on to extol her record and then to chat about some of the charitable programs his organization was involved with.

Incredulous, Jana turned to look at Cavin, who didn’t appear smug, or have an I-told-you-so expression on his face; he appeared desperately, infinitely relieved.

Butterflies swirled in her stomach when she thought of why. He needed her full focus on what loomed ahead of them. He wanted her help, yes, but not at the expense of her ruin. With Brace’s change of heart, her ruin was, well, a little less imminent.

On the commercial break, Tom opened the soundproof door and waved her in. Brace turned, saw her, and went absolutely white. In the next instant, pink rushed into his cheeks as he shot an accusing look at Tom. “He didn’t set you up, Brace,” Jana said. “He didn’t know I was going to show up. And I didn’t know you were going to say what you did.” Her eyes threatened to fill. But senators didn’t bawl in front of former fiancés in radio stations, or she would have. “Thank you. It was a wonderful show of support. I came here because I thought the public deserved both sides of the story. And you gave it to them.”

“I meant it, Jana. Every word.”

“I hated knowing we were enemies,” she said, softer.

“Me, too.”

“I’m not sure who’s making trouble for you, but I wanted it on public record it wasn’t me.”

If not Brace, then who? The question haunted her.

“Senator, would you like to stay for a while as a guest on the show?” Tom asked. “We can take some calls.”

“I would be delighted.” She sent Cavin a glance that told him she’d be entering the soundproof area. He nodded and took a place by the door. He folded his arms and leaned a hip against the wall next to the front door. His mouth tightened momentarily in pain. He rubbed his arm where he wore the gauntlet as he did whenever he thought she wasn’t looking. He didn’t want her to know he was in pain. Lately his arm was bothering him more than the wound in his stomach ever did. It seemed to be getting worse, too, sudden flashes of pain. Anxiety clutched at her stomach. If he got to the point of needing medical help, who would she take him to see? Who could keep a secret?

The music that kicked off the show played, dragging her attention back inside the glass. Before Jana turned away from the lobby, she saw the receptionist coaxing Cavin to sit down and relax. Only Prime-major Far Star would never do that while on official guard duty. He maintained a deceptively casual alert stance throughout the next hour, while Tom and a dozen callers gave Jana the opportunity to use her gift of gab to promote and, for the first time, defend her legislation. She was as serious and hard-line about poachers and smugglers as the FBI was on drug traffickers. It might not make her popular, but it didn’t make her a crooked politician, either. By the end of the show she hoped more people understood that.

“New man in your life?” Brace asked at the end of the show.

She shook her head. “New bodyguard.”

“Right.”

“What?”

“Had you looked at me like you look at him, maybe I’d have stood half a chance.”

“Brace, he’s a bodyguard.” But he’d already pushed through the glass door to meet Cavin.

Familiar panic washed over her. But when the men shook hands, Cavin gave his name as “John Smith.”

She fought a smile. He was learning fast.

If only she could hide Cavin behind an alias when it came time to introduce him to her grandfather. Former California Governor Has Close Encounter With Alien!

Yes, very close. Every molecule in Jana’s body screamed at her to avoid going to the ranch. But she didn’t listen. No one would ever call Jana Jasper a sissy again. Or, at least that was the plan.

J
ANA’S HEART THUMPED
hard as she climbed down from the rented white Ford Expedition parked in the expansive circular driveway at the front of the ranch house. It was already dark. The lights were on inside. Floodlights illuminated the driveway and lawn. Only two days ago she’d been here eating breakfast with her grandfather. Two days. It felt like a lifetime.

She turned to Cavin. “Are you ready for this?”

Looking as tense as he’d been the night news of the EMP was broadcast on TV, he brought his hand to her cheek, a calming touch. “We’re in this together,” he reminded her.

“You may not feel that way once he starts the interrogation. When I was in high school, it was tough getting dates because Grandpa would want to meet all of them, and his interrogation skills were legendary. Only the brave risked it to have a date with me. And there weren’t a lot of brave boys in high school. As for you, there’s nothing to worry about.” Since when had she become such a liar? “I’m going to introduce you as just a friend.” Then she’d just sort of ease into the rest of it.

Two border collies and an Australian shepherd bounded around the side of the house. Jana called out to them. “Hey, girls!” Barking delightedly, they ran rings around them. While curious about Cavin, they gave him a wide berth.

“My bioimplant emits a frequency that dogs can detect. Except, apparently, for Sadie.”

“It just proves she’s one of a kind.”

One of the border collies sported a bandage across her muzzle and another below her ear. “My goodness, Tala. Were you in a car accident? Poor thing. What happened, girl?”

“Your mother thinks she was out chasing rabbits, didn’t look where she was going and ran into a tree,” Grandpa called from the front door as he wheeled out onto the patio.

“Hi, Grandpa.”

“Hi, punkin.” As they unloaded the car, Grandpa observed Cavin with suspicion. With each passing month, he became more fragile, but there was plenty of life in him yet, a point driven home by how dapper he looked in a dark blue velvet robe over crisp linen pajama pants and his favorite suede slippers. “But I don’t know about that dog running into a tree,” he continued. “Metal made those cuts, not wood. I’d say she ran into an old wreck. But we don’t have any old wrecks on the property.”

It felt as though Jana’s heart plunged to her toes. “The ship,” she said under her breath to Cavin. It was in the fields, invisible. She hadn’t thought of the dangers of the invisible hulk of a spacecraft until now, but it could have hurt more than a dog. It could have killed someone. If her mother had been out riding and…

“I will make it visible again.” Cavin appeared as guilty as she felt.

“And risk someone seeing it? No way. We leave it as is for now. Soon enough, they’ll know where it is and they can keep the dogs away from it.”

“Who’s that you’re whispering to, Jana? Bring him here.” Grandpa beckoned irritably.

Jana took Cavin by the elbow and propelled him up the steps. The wheels of the suitcase rattled along the flagstones. Their
one
suitcase. Grandpa noticed that, too. His white brows came over his eyes, which unfortunately hid his inner thoughts from Jana. She willed the nervousness from her body and her voice. This first meeting had to go well. It had to. Everything else to come hinged on it. “Cavin, this is my grandfather, Jake Jasper. Grandpa, I’d like you to meet my friend Cavin Far Star.”

“Kevin Foster, eh.”

“Cavin…Far…Star,” Jana said, slower.

“What kind of name is that—Far Star?” Grandpa’s sharp eyes didn’t miss a detail of Cavin’s appearance.

“It’s a name from the north,” Cavin explained as they’d rehearsed.

Jana waved somewhere in the vicinity of the North Star. “Pretty far up.”

Grandpa grunted. “A Canadian, eh?”

Jana elbowed Cavin so he wouldn’t correct her grandfather.

“I am honored to meet you, sir.” Cavin shook the older man’s hand.

Despite mild palsy, Grandpa’s grip remained as powerful as his intense blue eyes. He held on to Cavin’s hand a moment or two longer than necessary. It was a test, she thought, designed to unbalance Cavin; she’d seen it do exactly that to too many men over the years. But Cavin was polite and composed, his expression pleasant. He’d met worse than Jake Jasper during his time serving the Coalition.

“So, what do you do, Far Star?” The frown came back. “You’re not an actor, are you?”

“An actor? No, sir. I’m an officer in the military.”

“Ah. Very good.” The military was a profession highly respected in the Jasper family. But just wait until Grandpa found out what kind of officer Cavin was—and that it wasn’t in the Canadian Armed Forces. “How long have you known my granddaughter, Foster? She had breakfast with me on Tuesday and didn’t say a thing about you.”

“Grandpa, Cavin is just a friend. He—”

“How long?”

“I have known Jana for almost twenty-three years, sir. For most of that time, we lived apart, but we never forgot each other.”

Jana bit her lip.

“Twenty-three years?” It seemed to take a moment for him to absorb the news. “Are you sleeping with my granddaughter, boy?”

Cavin snapped to attention. “No, sir.”

Grandpa looked him over with a mix of pleasure and surprise. He started wheeling inside then stopped. “Do you
want
to sleep with my granddaughter?”

Jana made a choking sound. “Grandpa!”

Had Cavin actually blushed? “Uh, yes, sir. I do.”

“Hmmph. Honesty. I like that in a man.”

But Cavin wasn’t being as honest as Grandpa thought. If not for Evie’s Honda blowing up, they would have slept together. One look at Cavin, and she knew he was thinking the same thing. They’d been close, so close, and it had been incredible, what little they’d done. Who knew when they’d next have another chance to be together like that? Certainly not staying at the ranch under Grandpa’s eagle eye and the rest of her curious family’s scrutiny.

Grandpa didn’t miss the loaded glance they exchanged. The hungry look. His fluffy white brows descended over his eyes. “Stay for dinner,” he told Cavin. Jana suspected it was more to have the opportunity to question Cavin further than genuine hospitality.

He turned the wheelchair with a whir of an electrical motor. Jana and Cavin followed him and the aroma of steaks barbecuing through the foyer and down the hallway. The kitchen opened to the back patio, where Jared and Evie stood, talking, around a barbecue stacked with sizzling steaks and teriyaki-glazed chicken breasts.

Jared wore a gray Yale hooded sweatshirt and jeans. Evie looked perky and comfortable in a bouncy ponytail and pumpkin-colored terry sweats. Beyond them, cast in light from the floods shining down from the roof, was the yard with its pens for animals, where Minnie, Jana’s long-ago pet potbellied pig, had lived. Jana remembered sprinting through the yard in her pink flip-flops and tripping in her haste to find Cavin before he left. She remembered the scrape he’d healed with just a touch. And how she’d shouted after him when he’d turned to go. Shouted, because he’d healed so much more than her knee.

She caught Cavin gazing at the yard and the barn with a sweet, sort of faraway expression and wondered if he was caught up in the memories, too.

Jana’s mother turned as they came in. Tears streamed down her wan face. “Oh, Mom,” Jana said, walking into her outstretched arms. “You’re crying.”

“This time, it is onions.” She dabbed her eyes with the back of her hand. Jana saw the cutting board and made a sound of relief. Jaspers never ate a steak without crispy fried onions on top.

“Ah! And who is this man?” Suddenly her mother was all aglow.

“He’s Jana’s
friend,
” Grandpa said with no small amount of sarcasm placed on that last word. “A Canadian she’s known for twenty years whom we’ve somehow heard nothing about.”

“It is an honor and pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Jasper,” Cavin said.

Mom focused the full force of her glamorous warmth on Cavin, beaming as he clasped her hand. “What is his name?” she asked Jana as if he weren’t standing there.

“Cavin Far Star.”

“Far Star. An unusual name, yes?”

“Not in the far north, apparently,” Grandpa said. He pulled a couple of beers out of the refrigerator, popped the tops on both, and handed them to Jana and Cavin. Jana took a long, grateful swig.

Mom dropped onions into sizzling oil. Soon the aroma of fried onions filled the kitchen. “Tonight we will forget our troubles,” she proclaimed. “We will be happy in our company and delicious food. There is time to be sad tomorrow, but not tonight.”

“Then let’s clear the air right now,” Grandpa said. “I don’t like being coddled. Since when do you think you can insulate me from the news?” he demanded.

Jana wanted to sink into the wood floor. “You found out.”

“Of course, I did. That newspaper has come to this house without fail for decades. I knew that if it was missing, someone made it so. Plus, your mother is a terrible liar. I called the
Sun,
and they delivered a copy. Easy as that.”

“I didn’t want you to see the photos. Not until I could break it to you. I…didn’t want you to get sick.”

“You worry about your health, not mine. I won’t let a bunch of lying cowards ruin your chance at reelection this fall. I’m doing what you and your father can’t do because of your positions and all the eyes on you looking for conflicts of interest—I’ve put an army of hard-assed attorneys and private investigators on the case. We’ll get to the bottom of this. I heard
The Tom Kennedy Show,
by the way. You handled yourself quite nicely, I might add, taking that loose cannon Brace Bowie and defusing him.”

“Jake, you promised!” her mother scolded him. “No talk of these attacks on our family. Tonight we enjoy each other. We enjoy Cavin Far Star, too, yes? From Canada!”

Just then Evie carried a platter of barbecued chicken breasts through the sliding-glass doors. She saw Cavin and stopped. Jana took another, even longer swallow of beer. “Hi, Evie,” she said, her eyes watering from the stinging bubbles.

Evie’s voice sounded curiously flat. “Is this your friend Peter?”

“Shush,” Mom warned. “No talk of past friends. This is a new friend of Jana’s. Cavin Far Star. From Canada.”

“Cavin, meet my sister, Evie,” Jana said.

“It is my pleasure to meet you,” he told her. “Jana’s told me much about you.”

“She’s told me a lot about you, too. I’m still not sure what to believe.” Evie put down the platter and shook Cavin’s offered hand. “We’ll talk about the car later.”

“Car?” Mom lifted a brow.

Jana’s knees felt dangerously weak. She locked them and pasted a pleasant expression on her face. “Nothing important, Mom. We borrowed Evie’s Honda. We have some details to work out.”

“A few,” Evie said dryly.

“That old thing? What details can there be? It is a wonder it has not blown up yet.”

Cavin, Jana and Evie coughed simultaneously. Grandpa narrowed his eyes. Unlike Mom, he knew something was going on. From the counter, Evie ran an admiring gaze over Cavin’s muscular frame and gave Jana a conspiratorial “he’s hot” wink that reminded her more of the sister she knew.

“Yarp! Yarp!”

Suddenly the din of barking and the scrabble of claws on hardwood filled the kitchen. Sadie bolted through the door, preceding Jana’s niece and nephew inside. Seeing Cavin, the little dog skidded sideways, slid into a kitchen cabinet before regaining her footing and lunging at Cavin. Her tail wagged so hard that her entire tiny frame wiggled. Cavin bent over and scooped her up. Sadie wriggled, squirming in delight, covering Cavin’s face with kisses. Cavin laughed, juggling the ecstatic dog in his muscular arms. The family watched, stunned.

“Omigod, Mom, she loves him,” Jana’s niece Ellen said. “Sadie hates strangers.”

“They had a chance to meet the night before last,” Jana explained. “They slept together.”

“Slept together, huh? He gets around.”

“Evie,” Jana growled warningly.

Grandpa was silent, absorbing it all.

Jana turned to her niece and nephew. “Hey, you two. How was Disneyland?”

“Aunt Jana!” Ellen and John joined Jana in a group hug. Away from their friends, it was okay to be uncool and do things like let your aunt hug and kiss you. They didn’t stare at Cavin as they gushed about their trip, or even after Jana introduced them, which told her they hadn’t made the connection between Cavin and the man on the roof.

Finally Jared came inside, his hands filled with a heavy platter of steaks. The sight of Cavin brought him up short. “Hey, Jana,” he said and put the platter on the counter. “How’s the nun life these days?”

Jana shot him a frown and a mimed “shush.” The men shook hands.

Cavin had so many qualities in common with Jared. For one, they were both military officers. Would fate allow them to someday be friends? Here on Earth, she hoped. Not pitching tents on Mars because they’d been evicted from the planet.

As conversation swirled around him, Cavin quietly absorbed it all with an adorably hungry expression. It was almost poignant, to Jana, the way he seemed to enjoy the chaos of her family. She was reminded once again how little exposure he’d had to a family environment.
You can give him this. A gift
.

That was, if her family still saw Cavin in a favorable light after they found out who—and what—he really was.

Everyone took seats at the table. Mom asked Cavin, “How long are you going to be in town?”

“It will be, perhaps, a long visit,” he answered evasively.

“Mom, Grandpa, do you mind if Cavin and I stay the night? We don’t feel comfortable going to a hotel.”

Evie made a noise.

Jana narrowed her eyes at her. “My apartment was broken into. Nothing was stolen,” she said to everyone’s sounds of dismay. “It looked like someone went through my files.”

Evie looked worried now. “Funny you should say that. The police told me there was a prowler in my house today. The neighbors saw some guy dressed in ghetto chic. With lots of bling.”

Jana and Cavin froze.

“Nothing was taken, either,” Evie went on. “But someone went through my newspapers, and when I came in, Sadie was hiding under the bed, trembling more than usual. I never saw her so distraught. We’re staying here, too. I don’t feel safe at home right now.”