Excerpt From: CHANGING THE ODDS

© Copyright Treva Harte, 2001

Chapter One

“Ewww. It’s a male!” Clea squealed.

Rho looked up from her biology book and sighed. If she ever hoped to pass her summer course she had to finish the chapter. On the other hand, although she could usually tune out Clea and her little friends’ voices when she chose, that last sentence was too strange to ignore. She was supposed to be keeping an eye on them this afternoon. Rho strolled to the door of the cottage and looked out.

Something unusual was out there, though she couldn’t quite see what it was with the crowd of jumping, yelling girls gathered around it.

“Clea! Stop poking at whatever you have with that stick!” she yelled and gathered up her long skirt to run outside.

After grabbing the stick away from the still squealing Clea, Rho turned to investigate more closely. Somehow the little girl hellions had managed to uncover a trap. A man trap. The cottages out here were so isolated that several of the people in the outpost had set traps in case wild animals or men shouldtrespass onto their property. She pushed the curious little monsters away and peered inside.

Rho blinked. For once Clea wasn’t exaggerating. It was a man. Or close to a man anyhow. He looked young and battered and…and naked. She took a step back but couldn’t help staring.

She’d never seen a man, any man, before. This one glared up at her with hot, angry eyes. His face was bruised and he had dried blood around his mouth.

“Clea, go get some help,” Rho ordered.

“Who should I get?” Clea demanded.

Rho hesitated. Even though they were close to the clinic, few of the inhabitants had ever seen a man either. Most of the women would be of no help. They’d be terrified or disgusted. Dealing with men was left to the sperm traders.

“Call Amma or Tory!” They were sperm traders. They’d know what to do with this feral creature. “Have them come quickly. All of you go and leave the man be.”

As Clea and the others ran screaming down the small dirt track to the clinic, Rho edged a little closer. Did the man talk? Cautiously she reached a hand into the cage, expecting him to snap at her the way a wild animal might. Her hand touched his thigh. He flinched. Rho froze, afraid to move until he grew used to her touch.

He stared at her, his eyes wide, breathing heavily.

“I won’t hurt you,” Rho soothed. “I’m going to help you.”

Rho’s mouth dropped open. As her hand rested gently on his thigh, the— the most male part of this caged man began to change. She frantically thought back to her college text. While the information hadn’t seemed particularly relevant then, she now remembered that part was called a penis. And it was growing!

She couldn’t help staring. She couldn’t tell what the face would look like without the bruises and cuts, but this male body was very different from any other she’d seen. It was bronzed with hard angles and muscles where women didn’t have any. Even bruised and bleeding as it was, she thought it quite beautiful. And that penis—she wanted to touch it, to marvel at how it could expand.

She didn’t know why, but the whole sight made her feel uncomfortable. And interested. Very interested. She leaned forward a little more, her face and breasts pressed against the bars of the cage.

“How close do you think you might want to come, sweetheart?” the man asked suddenly in a raspy voice. “Once you do, I’ll tell you just how you can help. In detail.”

Then, suddenly, his eyes rolled back in his head and he pitched forward, falling heavily...