Water World Warrior: A SciFi Alien Mail Order Bride Romance (TerraMates Book 1) Read Free

course. I still felt that if I were so smart, I could have figured out a way to follow my dream of being an environmental scientist.
    Sam was not stopping. "And if that hadn't happened, wouldn't you be doing something different with your life? You didn't need to be stuck working for Maura and sewing dresses for the rich women in town so they can go to their silly President's Ball." She held up her hands, then, palms facing away from herself. "Not that that's not honest work, Ash, it is. But I know you wanted more for yourself."
    "I did, Sam. But somehow the bills keep piling up and with Jeremy's tuition and, of course, the mortgage, I just can't get ahead." I shook my head. "I'm not sure I'll ever be able to go back. The scholarships aren't for twenty-something seamstresses, they're for brilliant high school students. It was all different before. I don't know. I've tried, but I can't see how I'll ever be able to make it happen."
    Sam looked me in my eyes. "Don't talk like that, Ashlyn O'Connor. You've got more in you than people see on the surface. I know that you'll get that dream."
    I smiled sadly and sighed, shaking my head.
    "The Maldives will be underwater before I ever get a chance to study them and figure out a solution," I said. "They're now only about three feet above sea level. By the time I'm an environmental scientist whose earned her Ph.D. and got funding to study them, they'll be underwater, and the people will all be environmental refugees."
    "Then you'll study some other islands. I know you're going to do it, Ash, I have faith in you," she said.
    "Thanks, Sam," I said as we passed out of the rich neighborhood, back on to a street with small businesses.
    "Of course, you could just go in there, and all your troubles would be over," she said. She grinned at me with a mischievous look in her eye, as she pointed at TerraMates, the mail-order bride agency.
    "Stop," I said, getting annoyed. "That's for people who… God, I don't even know what sort of people are so desperate that they would let someone arrange their marriage for them. I have other plans, all right?"
    "I'm not saying you should do it to find your Mr. Right. I'm saying you should do it for the money. You could pay off the mortgage, you could go to university, you could start your seamstress shop, you could go on a vacation for the first time in your life."
    "I would never, ever, ever do anything like that. It's like selling yourself."
    "But it's only for a year."
    "What?" I looked at her suspiciously. "How do you know that?"
    "What?" she looked at me innocently, shrugging her shoulders like it was nothing. "I happened to grab the brochure one day, just to see."
    "You didn't!"
    "I did, and I'm not sorry. Well, except that I don't qualify to be an interplanetary bride."
    "An interplanetary bride? You're insane."
    "It's like the wild west. Remember? There were all those men and no women. They would correspond with some woman, and if they decided they liked each other she would go out there and they got married. You check out the portfolio and choose a few that meet your standards, and they match you up. At the end of the year, if you're not happy, you can get divorced, and you get to keep the money."
    I paused. "What money?"
    "Five hundred thousand credits, Ashlyn."
    "Five hundred thousand…" I said, faintly.
    "It would set you up for life. All you have to do is go live with some guy for a year. They screen everybody. There's no serial killers or anything like that. It's all perfectly safe, and they monitor to make sure everything's all right. No chance of the guy being abusive." Sam laughed. "I sound like a commercial."
I shrugged. It didn't matter. I wasn't going to be one of those brides. Who would take care of the boys if I left for a year? I guess they weren't children. All of them were in their twenties, but they still needed a mother figure.
"You're crazy, Sam. You go and sign up if you think it's great," I said.
    "I told you, I can't. Remember