Alien Architect Needs a Nanny (Alien Nanny Agency 1)

The road twisted and wound around the mountains. If this was Ra’as Drayven’s personal property, there was a lot of it.

At a certain point, the pavement gave way to big-stone gravel. Thankfully, the gadabout had hover-mode. She couldn’t imagine bumping along the path on a road-car.

Once in a while, she sensed movement between the trees, but she never spotted any animals. The idea was a little scary, but also compelling. There was just so much life here.

At last, she saw late afternoon light again as the trees fell away to reveal a sweeping meadow and a hillside leading up to the biggest house she had ever seen.

It was crafted from natural stone, with chunks of gray and black larger than the gadabout at the bottom of the structure. The stones grew smaller at each level, giving the building the appearance of being even larger and more imposing.

Archways of stone formed each window and door. And the many roofs over the various levels and balconies were topped with some sort of clay tiles.

A massive, covered porch circled the entire structure, with stairs going down to the lawn at intervals.

Emilia would have stopped to take it in if she weren’t already late.

With her stomach aching with fear, and beads of cold sweat forming on her forehead, she pulled the gadabout all the way up to the house and lowered it to park mode.

The instant it bumped to the ground, she flung herself out to race up the porch stairs. Or at least that was her plan.

But as she exited the vehicle, one of the ancient floor mats caught on her heel and she fell to her hands and knees on the stones in front of the house.

Somewhere above her, the door opened with a bang.