Page 84 of Stardusted

Still, it didn’t hurt to be cautious.

I forced my legs to move. Pulse jumpy, I crossed to the kitchen and yanked open the junk drawer, snatching up the bottle of mace my mom had insisted I take when I moved to the “big city.” It had lived there untouched ever since, but, hey, anything was better than nothing. I clamped my trembling fingers around the canister, gripping it tight.

Armed and moderately dangerous, I crept to the stairwell. The steps seemed to stretch foreveras I padded down them in my wet socks. The door loomed at the bottom.

Reaching it, I swallowed and squeezed my eyelids shut. “Please be Amelia.”

I tightened my grip on the spray, opened my eyes, and reached for the locks before I could talk myself out of it and into hiding in my closet the rest of the night. Muffled thunder rumbled asI twisted the handle tab. Turned the deadbolt.

Bracing myself, I cracked the door open.

And froze. My stomach dropped through the floor. Horror iced my cold feet to the threshold.

It wasn’t Amelia.

Sky stood on my stoop.

His head jerked up as soon as I opened the door. Wariness pinched his eyes in the corners as he stared at me, hands in the pockets of his leather jacket, his body hunched against the storm. Rain plastered his dark hair to his head and ran down his tanned face.

His tanned,humanface.

I bleated like a startled goat, slammed the door shut, and locked it for good measure.

Oh no.

Sky was here.AlienSky.

Was he here to kill me? Or worse,abductme?

I’d left my phone behind, on the counter. I couldn’t call the police. If I screamed, no one would hear me. Bob was half deaf and lived across the lawn, a whole house away.

I’d locked the door, sure, but what use was a lock against an alien? He could probably just…beam right in here. Hell, he could probably rip the whole building apart. Blast it with a laser cannon or something.

Maybe he could control alien robots. Maybe hewasan alien robot.

Oh my God. I was so,soscrewed?—

He knocked again. Gently. Just a soft tap of knuckles.

I screamed anyway.

“No!” I shouted at the door, as if admonishment alone could keep it shut tight. I leapt back and pointed the mace at it like a tiny, spicy bazooka. “Go away!”

Quiet fell. For a wild moment, I thought he’d listened.

But then his voice filtered through, muted but very definitely still there. “Raven, it’s okay. I just need to talk to you. Give me a couple minutes, and I promise I’ll go.”

“It’snotokay!” I yelled back, the words cracking. “I’m not going to tell anybody. Seriously. You don’t have to kill me!”

There was a stunned pause, and then a strangled,“What?Killyou? Why…?”

Well, huh. He sounded surprised. As if it weresurprisingI feared my demise at the hands of a freakingextraterrestrial visitor.Had he even seen a sci-fi movie? Maybe not. Maybe he found them offensive. I probably would now, too. If I survived long enough to watch any more.

My legs felt strange, weak and trembly, enough so I leaned on the wall, still clutching the spray. Another few seconds passed, during which I eyed the white door panel. The still intact door panel.

For a super advanced robot race, he was being surprisingly cordial about not vaporizing the wall or anything. It almost seemed like…well, like he was actually waiting out there for me to let him in.

I jumped when he knocked again, and I nearly sprayed mace all over the closed door. I checked my trigger finger right in time, swallowing hard despite having no saliva to speak of.