Dark Choices - I. T. Lucas Page 0,16

live in phase two and in phase three when it’s ready. I expect that the fence will stay on, and we will have two separate communities. Perhaps we should put up something nicer than a chain link, though. The double fence system with barbwire on top makes phase two look like a prison.”

“Forgive me for saying it, but that’s a ridiculous idea. Are we going to have border patrol and require a visa for visits between the sections?”

“Do you have a better idea?”

“Yes. Not to intermingle with them at all.”

Syssi arched a brow. “Do you want to run that by the single ladies?” She leaned forward. “And what about you? Don’t you want to be with Rufsur?”

“What I want is irrelevant. The clan’s future is more important than anyone’s individual happiness, and I’m not going to jeopardize my people’s safety for selfish reasons.”

Shaking her head, Syssi leaned back. “You are thinking in black and white, Edna, while life is a million shades of gray. Things never fit neatly into the little boxes we would love to stuff them in. Life is chaotic, and unless we can be flexible and willing to compromise, our boxes will remain vacant. I, for one, prefer a messy box to an empty one.”

10

Amanda

The clicking noise her own heels made on the pavement annoyed Amanda. Hell, everything had been annoying her lately, and keeping her agitation hidden from her loved ones, as well as everyone else, was becoming more and more difficult.

She hadn’t been feeling well for days, and since immortals didn’t get sick, the logical explanation was the one she dreaded most.

Unlike the rest of the clan females, she didn’t want to be pregnant. If she could help it, she would never become a mother again.

Once had been enough for her, and she’d barely survived it.

There was no way Amanda was willing to go through even a fraction of that grief again. Even a scraped knee or a loose tooth would be too much for her to deal with, and children were way messier than that. They liked to run around, get into all kinds of mischief, and get themselves killed.

Most people lived in denial, thinking that it would never happen to them, that it couldn’t, but it had happened to her, and she wouldn’t wish that pain on her worst enemy.

Well, maybe she would wish it on Navuh.

Nah, not even on him. But then he had suffered worse. Carol had learned from Areana that a child he’d adopted and loved as his own had been murdered by a jealous concubine.

No wonder that the guy had gone crazy.

Not that it excused his many terrible sins, but she understood his pain. When her sweet boy had died, if she could have, Amanda would have destroyed the entire world. Fortunately for everyone else on the planet, she wasn’t that powerful.

In time, she’d somehow managed to cope with the grief, but she’d never gotten over it. Except, unlike Navuh, Amanda had come back from the brink of insanity and had dedicated her life to doing good, not evil like her clan’s arch enemy.

“Damn!” Amanda cursed as her heel got caught in a groove between paving stones, and she pitched forward, regaining balance by sheer force of determination.

She had no time for messy falls. She had to get home and pee on the damn stick before Dalhu got back.

What was she going to do if she was pregnant?

Freak out, that’s what.

As much as she was terrified of having another child, she would never resort to abortion. That was anathema. Not only because the clan needed her to procreate but because she would never destroy a life that she had created together with Dalhu, even if it was still just the size of a grain of sand.

It wasn’t that she was fundamentally against abortions. In some cases, it was justifiable, and she would never want women to be denied that choice when pregnancy was the result of nonconsensual sex, like in cases of rape or incest. Others had severe health problems that pregnancy could worsen, and then there were the cases of unviable fetuses that wouldn’t survive after birth. But none of that applied to her, and fear, or even the risk to her sanity couldn’t justify that. If she didn’t want the baby, there were plenty of immortal females who would gladly raise it. Heck, her mother would take the child in a heartbeat.

Amanda stopped dead in her tracks.

That was the solution. If she was pregnant, when her time