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My heels drag across the pavement as my captor pulls me backward. The world tilts and spins. Jack's unconscious form grows smaller, farther away. No, no, no. I kick, twist, claw at the arms holding me, but it's like fighting against steel cables.

The mercury-skinned creature looms over Jack's body, its featureless face reflecting the dim alley light.

Tears blur my vision. My lungs burn from lack of air. The hand over my mouth presses harder, and black spots dance at the edges of my sight. My muscles feel heavy, weak. Some kind of drug? Or just panic?

The last thing I see is Jack's limp form being before the darkness at the edge of the alley swallows us whole.

CHAPTER20

VANESSA

My head throbs as consciousness creeps back. Cold seeps through my clothes, making me shiver. The floor beneath me is smooth, hard - metal, not concrete. Not my apartment. Not the alley.

I force my eyes open. The ceiling above me gleams with a dull, silvery sheen. No light fixtures, but a soft blue glow emanates from somewhere I can't pinpoint. The walls curve up from the floor in one seamless piece, like I'm inside a giant metal egg.

"Hello?" My voice cracks. The word echoes strangely, bouncing back at me with an electronic undertone that makes my skin crawl.

I push myself up to sitting, fighting a wave of nausea. My muscles ache like I've run a marathon. The events before I blacked out flash through my mind in disconnected fragments:

Jack's face changing. Red skin. Black eyes. Horns.

The grip of steel arms around my chest.

The mercury creature appearing behind him.

The sickening crack as Jack fell.

"Oh god." I press my palms against my eyes, willing the images away. "This isn't happening. Wake up, wake up, wake up."

But the cold metal floor doesn't vanish. The strange blue light continues its eerie pulse. And when I lower my hands, I'm still alone in this impossible room.

Jack is an alien. The thought bounces around my skull, refusing to settle into anything resembling sense. The man who held me, kissed me, made me feel safe - he's not even human.

A laugh bubbles up, edged with hysteria. All those weird questions about dating. His intense focus on human behavior. The way he moved during laser tag. How could I have been so blind?

I bring my knees to my chest, trying to make myself smaller in this vast, empty space. The memory of his transformation plays on repeat - familiar features melting away to reveal something otherworldly. Something impossible.

But what terrifies me most isn't Jack's true form. It's the desperate look in those alien eyes when he tried to reach me. The raw fear in his voice when he screamed my name.

A soft hiss cuts through the silence. A panel in the curved wall slides open, revealing a figure that makes me scramble back until I hit the opposite wall.

She's tall - at least seven feet - with iridescent scales covering her body in shades of blue and green. Her eyes are huge, silver orbs without pupils, and what I first think is hair turns out to be dozens of delicate tentacles flowing from her scalp.

"Please don't scream." Her voice has a musical quality, like wind chimes in a breeze. "I'm not here to harm you."

I press myself harder against the wall, heart thundering. "What do you want?"

"My name is Mar'oo." She stays by the door, hands raised in what I guess is meant to be a calming gesture. "I'm supposed to prepare you for transport."

"Transport where?" My voice comes out stronger than I feel.

"To auction." She tilts her head, tentacles swaying with the movement. "Pure humans are... rare out here. Especially ones as physically appealing as you. The bidding will be fierce."

The words hit me like a punch to the gut. "Auction? You're going to sell me?"

"I don't want to." Mar'oo's silver eyes dim slightly. "But we all have our roles here. The collectors find specimens, and we prepare them for sale."

"Specimens? I'm not a specimen. I'm a person."