I'm a junior but will graduate this year so we can go to college together after we're married."Janice's eyes went wide. "You two were in the paper, th... hero and his lady!" Britt and I both blushed. She said to Janice softly. "We try not to make too big an issue about that. Chad is the hero. I was just stubborn."I grinned. "She still is, too."Britt said, "It's tough having to change schools in your senior year."Janice said, "My brothers went through it. Dad's job has moved him a lot. We're used. Across its eyes was what appeared to be a sleeping mask. In actual fact the mask was made of a lightweight material, that housed microcircuitry that connected the Pilot’s optical nerves to the scanner arrays on the outer hull. Feeding out of this mask were hundreds more microfilament cables that appeared to plug into random sockets above the Pilot’s head. To a stranger the Pilot looked like a marionette that had been carelessly dumped on its back, its strings in disarray, and no master to. They assumed that I was mute and devoid of understanding. The lowly state in which they’d found me doubtless contributed to that impression. This was a grace from God and was to work to my advantage.I listened to them carefully and as they did not attempt to censor their speech I soon learned the object of their voyage.What I learned was more horrible than I could have imagined. I was not the only girl they had taken nor would I be the last. These men were professional abductors of girls. They. She actually felt shaky. She had to tell Sam, but she couldn’t. Her promise was one she dared not break. Her broken promises had been at core responsible for everything bad that had happened to her and to her used to be man. It would be on her husband now to decide how to handle things. Yes, Owen would have to be the one; he’d think of something. He had to.****She pulled into the drive and sagged back into the car’s seat. There was nothing she was realistically going to be able to do for her.