“I mean it.” I leaned my forehead against his. “No threats or hunting him down in the dark. Don’t terrify Pell until he writes up more violations. We do this the boring, legal way.”
“I hate the boring, legal way.”
“So do I.”
That almost got a smile out of him.
“I’m coming back,” I said. “Do you hear me? I’m going to town. I’m going to sit in whatever awful Agency room they put me in. Then I’m going to walk into that tribunal and tell the truth. And when this is done, I’m coming back up that ridge.”
His hands came to my waist. Careful. Like he was afraid that if he held too tightly, he wouldn’t let go.
I had more to say. Smart things. Practical things. A list of what he needed to do once I was gone.
Instead, what came out was, “I love you.”
The words startled me.
They startled him, too.
For a heartbeat, neither of us moved.
I hadn’t planned to say it like that. I hadn’t planned to say it at all, not with Pell standing outside and a tribunal hanging over us and my whole future balanced on a lie someone had been paid to tell.
But it was true.
And I was tired of hiding true things because someone might take them from me.
Kazan’s hands rose to cup my face. His thumbs brushed my cheeks, so gently it made my throat ache.
“Maisie,” he said.
Just my name. That was enough.
He kissed me, slow and deep and not remotely platonic. I kissed him back because Pell was outside and the tribunal could choke on it. When Kazan pulled away, his forehead stayed against mine.
“Say it again when you come home,” he said.
My heart squeezed. “Bossy.”
“Yes.”
That did make me smile, even though my eyes were burning.
I reached toward the hook on the wall and grabbed the purple scarf. I looped it around my throat. Kazan watched me do it, his expression going painfully soft.
“I’ll be waiting,” he said.
“You better be.”
“Always.”
I wished I could stay there. I wanted to crawl into his lap and refuse to move.
I wanted the whole stupid galaxy to go away and leave us alone in the kitchen with the figs and the storm and the house that had started feeling like mine.
But Pell knocked once on the door.
Time was up.
