“Little menace,” she told him affectionately as she dropped into the co-pilot's chair. He settled in her lap like he'd been there all along, kneading her thigh with his claws out because Barnaby believed in tactile affection and didn't care if it hurt.
"He's got a prescription food," she said, scratching behind his ears until he melted into a boneless puddle. "For his stomach. It's the only thing he'll eat that doesn't make him sick. Emily had it on auto-delivery every month. Costs more than my rent, and I don't pay much rent." She paused, her fingers stilling in his fur. "Well, I didn't, before Miranda canceled the lease."
Thyaar's jaw tightened, and she watched him decide not to say whatever had risen to the surface. That one small motion told her more about his opinion of Miranda Evans than any words could have.
"So." She kept her voice light because she wasn't going to think about Miranda right now. "Emily. Is she okay? I mean, the last time I saw her, she was heading to the Mate Program offices to sort out some kind of alert. She said she'd be back in an hour, and then..."
She trailed off, because there wasn't a good way to end that sentence. Emily hadn’t come back. Then Miranda stripped the apartment and canceled the lease and Barnaby was the only thing left. “Did something go wrong? I mean I know something went wrong… but what the fuck happened??"
“She was matched,” Thyaar said. "And then things got complicated."
She blinked. “Wait… what? Complicated how?"
"She was taken." His voice flattened into something hard and controlled. "Kidnapped from the cargo bay on the station. A faction called the Purists. Raaevik was her bodyguard. He went after her alone and got her back, but they'd infected her with a biological agent. She's a carrier now."
Amelia's hands stopped moving entirely, buried in Barnaby's fur. "A carrier of what?"
Thyaar leaned his head back against the back of the chair and closed his eyes. He looked tired, as if he’d been running for days on nothing but fumes.
“No idea, I’m not a scientist. It was designed to kill anyone who carries certain bloodlines, apparently. She can't go back to Lathar Prime, she can’t come back to Earth because of it." He paused, and when he spoke again his voice was quieter. “But she's alive, and she's safe, and she's with Raaevik. The Emperor gave them a ship. They're on Parac’Norr, in exile.”
She sat, letting the words sink in as Barnaby purred against her stomach.
Em, kidnapped. Em, infected with something that made her lethal and now on some alien planet, in exile.
"You said Raaevik was her bodyguard," she said slowly, frowning as she tried to fit the pieces together. "Why did she have a bodyguard? Who was she matched to?"
Thyaar was quiet for a moment, then turned to look at her. “She was matched to the Emperor."
"The Emperor," she repeated, hearing the words but not believing them. “As in the Emperor of the Latharian Empire. That emperor?”
"Yes. That emperor.”
“Holy shit.” Then she laughed. “God, Em, talk about go big or go home!”
She wriggled around in her chair, bringing her legs up to curl up as she looked at Thyaar.
“Wait… but now she’s with your brother?”
He nodded. “The bond hit him like a supernova. He recognized her as his at first sight.”
“But is that..." She gestured vaguely. "I mean, that's got to be bad, right? Muscling in on the Emperor’s mate? Like… politically or something?”
Thyaar snorted. “It's treason. Punishable by execution." He said it evenly, as if he were stating the weather. "But the Emperor let them go. Whatever else he is, Daaynal is not a fool."
She looked at him. "And you? How did you end up involved in all this?”
"Emily asked me to bring Barnaby to her,” he said, “Before she left for Parac’Norr.”
Amelia looked down at the orange lump in her lap. Barnaby blinked up at her, slow and smug, as if he'd known the answer all along and had just been waiting for her to catch up.
“That thing you said,” she said after long moments. “About Latharian males recognizing their mate. First sight."
She didn't look at him. She was looking at Barnaby, at her fingers working through his fur, at anything that wasn't the broad-shouldered alien sitting two feet away.
“Does it always happen like that? Just... bam, you see someone, and that's it?"
Thyaar had gone still, the easy way he'd been sitting in the pilot's chair shifting into something more careful even though he hadn't moved. "The recognition is immediate. What happens after depends on the individuals."
