“When can I see you again?” I asked quickly.
“If you’d like, I could introduce you to Erika; she’s coming back from the east coast tomorrow morning.”
“That would be lovely, thank you, but I’m hoping to get started with my work as soon as possible.”
“I’m sure I could convince her to go on a picnic close to your digging site. That way we could have lunch together.” She smiled.
“I would like that,” I said, but secretly I feared the mother would be like her sons.
CHAPTER 12
The Wedding Night
Boulder
When Laura came out she nodded politely to me.
“How did it go?” I asked.
“Fine. I find Christina very interesting,” Laura responded.
“But what did she say?”
“We spoke about marriage and she had questions for me.”
I stepped closer to her and was happy Magni wasn’t there to stop me. “What kind of questions?”
“Intimate questions.”
“Like what?” My eyes were boring into hers as I wished I could read her mind.
The door opened and both Laura and I turned our heads to see Christina standing in the doorway with a hand on her hip.
“If you want to know what I said, why don’t you ask me?”
Laura looked a little surprised by Christina’s tone with me, but she hurried along while I faced my new wife.
“Are you coming?” she asked and opened the door.
I didn’t like her running the show and had felt like a fool waiting outside my new bride’s room when everyone would be expecting me to be busy with her inside. I knew very well that women from the Motherlands oppressed men for a pastime, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to let her do that to me.
“How about we go for a walk instead?” I asked to regain control. Surely, she wouldn’t fight with me in public, and we’d been cooped up in that room for too long anyway.
“All right,” she said and stepped out in the large hallway. “A walk in the garden then?”
“Yes.” I swung my arm for her to follow me.
We didn’t talk much in the beginning, her staccato steps indicating that she was still upset and unwilling to look at me.
“Do you regret your choice?” I finally asked.
“What choice? I didn’t have a choice,” she said sourly.
“You could have stuck with Archer.”
“And been pregnant within a month,” she scoffed. “I don’t think so! He would have taken me to get inseminated next week if he had anything to say.”
I wondered what she meant by that, but left it for now.
