Free From Eden

By T. Cobbin

A man falls in love with a woman created by scientists, but after the hellish life she's had, she's lost the will to live. Can he help her find the love and happiness she deserves?

Lulu was created by scientists who combined human and alien DNA. She's lived her entire life in a place called Eden where she was used as a human guinea pig. The last straw came when they had her impregnated. Desperate to prevent her child from living the same hellish life she's experienced, Lulu tried to kill both herself and the fetus. But waking up in the hospital was not the plan!

Lulu is finally free from Eden but still feels trapped inside her mind. Then a stranger enters her hospital room and waits patiently for her to exit the shell she hides in. In mourning for her child, she doesn't want to live, to be a part of anything.

Can Alex, the handsome stranger, knock down the walls that Lulu has built around herself? Is there life after Eden?

There are still scientists out there who would love to get their hands on Lulu. Can she ever be safe?

Content Warning: contains sexual content and some violence
 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Beachwalk Press, Inc.
• Release date: Feb 14, 2016
• ISBN: 9781944270124

Book preview

Prologue

Beep beep beep. The noise repeated over and over.

She wanted to open her heavy eyes to figure out how she could stop it.

Beep beep beep.

The tube came out this morning, and the sedatives are gradually being lowered, a deep voice came through the fog.

Beep beep beep.

She rolled her head away from the noise, but it continued, grating on her nerves. She felt so tired.

Beep beep beep.

Hello there, a friendly female voice came from beside her.

She could hear rustling and felt a little more aware than before. Noise, she tried to get out, but her mouth was bone-dry so it didn’t come out as she wanted it to.

Hold on, honey. Stay calm. You’re in the hospital, and you’ve been through quite an ordeal. Can you open your eyes for me?

Hospital? That would explain the beeping noise. That could also be why her limbs felt heavy when she tried to move them.

She couldn’t make her brain tick over. Opening her eyes, she immediately closed them again. The lights from the room felt like someone was stabbing her eyeballs. Trying again, she squinted this time, taking it more slowly. Finally managing it, she saw a plump, middle-aged woman with a smile on her face dressed in a blue uniform.

There we go. I’m going to sit you up a bit. Don’t worry about the disorientation, that will subside sooner than you think.

The bed underneath her head started to slowly rise. She began to take in the small hospital room. She was lying on a single bed with white sheets and a blanket. There was a moveable table with a bedside locker beside the bed. The room had a narrow single window. She could hear the hustle and bustle of people outside the room.

Everything seemed new and wrong. The walls of the room were light green, and the blanket over her bed was dark green. She wasn’t used to so much color. She felt she was used to huge amounts of white. She closed her eyes and her eyebrows pulled together in concentration as she tried to find the deeply buried memories hidden inside of her.

Nothing!

Here you go, honey, take a sip of this. You’ve been out a while, so you’ll be thirsty.

She looked down into the white plastic cup of clear liquid and drew a little up the straw. The water ran over her dry tongue and slipped down her throat as she swallowed. It felt good,

Mmm, she hummed.

Yeah, I can imagine. The nurse chuckled and pulled the straw from her mouth. Just take small sips. As I said before, it’s been a while. I’m going to take all your vitals, and then the doctor will be in to see you. There are also some other people who want to talk to you, but that can wait for now. Do you remember anything?

She shook her head in frustration. It was like a huge white cloud had drifted over her brain, leaving it blank. I don’t remember anything. I don’t even remember my name.

Don’t worry, it will come back.

While the nurse took her vitals she looked over herself. She was on the thin side, and her skin was milky white with small, white, raised freckles dotted over it. She had a port in her hand that was connected to a bag of clear liquid. She also had what looked like old, red welts around her wrists. The nurse caught her looking.

The doctor will explain. However, I can tell you that your name is Lulu.

It was like an electric shock to her system. The fog cleared from her brain and all her memories came flooding back at once. She had been created by some scientists after a UFO had crashed and one of them was able to splice DNA from the dead aliens with humans.

She’d been kept in a small cell in a place called Eden and tested on for her entire life...twenty-one years. Faces flickered through her mind of each of the scientists, of countless tests, and then finally...

Nooooo, she screamed.

Her room filled with people and she suddenly found herself being held down by several men and women in various colored scrubs. She fought against each one as much as she could. Her mind went haywire, her heart pounded out of her chest, she couldn’t breathe. She felt a sting and then cool liquid under the skin on her arm. Everything became hazy and slowly darkened as sleep overcame her.

Chapter 1

Two Months Later

Lulu gradually woke up, and the sleep fogging her brain began to clear. Without opening her eyes, she reached out with her senses and began to make a mental picture in her head of everything and everyone around her. The window to her right that she had stared out of for the last few months was beginning to let in the morning rays of light, and she could hear the cheerful singing from the birds through the small opened slit.

Taking a breath, she let herself smile. She was alone in the room for now, but she knew that would change within the next hour. She could hear the drip from the cold tap in the en suite bathroom and the steady blow of the extractor fan. Cocking her head slowly, she watched the mental image of her surroundings become clearer with each inhale and each sound around her. The alcohol hand cleanser, the very slight scent of the talc from the latex gloves in a box on the wall, the colorful bunch of flowers a nurse had brought in to brighten up the room.

She heard the sounds of the clock ticking its life away on the wall, the bubbles flowing up from the fish tank in the waiting area to the left of her room, then the steps of various people in the hallway. Her hearing was so finally tuned she could see an outline of each person in her mind with each footfall or voice.

It was something she remembered she could do when her mind had cleared the second time she had awoken. She’d also remembered the fact that she’d killed her baby.

Finally opening her eyes, she turned her head to the right and looked through the small window. It looked out onto a triangular piece of green space with a solitary tree in it. The leaves on the tree were just beginning to turn brown and fall from its branches; she could make out the nest now lying barren that had been full of baby birds only a month ago.

Once her memories started to return all she had wanted to do was die. Why had these people saved her? Why were they looking after her? Didn’t they understand she was supposed to have died with her baby? She’d screamed at them so many times let me die! before finally giving up and succumbing to a silent and dark world of grief.

She had been so angry but unable to do much but rant. The firm, cloth restraints around her wrists and ankles held her still, making her feel once again like she was in Eden, the only difference being they had used harsher materials to hold her down.

The hours began to run into each other as the days went past. She either slept, screamed, or stared out the window, wishing she was free enough to join her child. She wasn’t sure how long it was before the doctors finally told her she was calm enough for the restraints to come