“And now they know about her.”
“Now they know about her.” He met her eyes, and for the first time, she saw something beneath the charming facade—something hard and calculating. “Which means she, and anyone associated with her, will be hunted until the Grorn are satisfied.”
The weight of his words settled over her. She was going to be hunted because she’d made the choice to protect a baby she didn’t know, from aliens she didn’t understand, in a galaxy she’d never asked to visit.
“So what happens now?” Her voice came out unexpectedly calm. “Where do we go?”
“First, we put some distance between us and the Grorn ship.” He rose, moving toward the cockpit. “The jump point is forty minutes out. Once we’re in hyperspace, we’ll have time to plan.”
“Plan what?”
He paused in the doorway, looking back at her over his shoulder. The lighting caught the sharp angles of his face, the gleam of his eyes, and for a moment, he looked less like a charming rogue and more like the predator his species had evolved from.
“How to survive,” he said. “How to keep her safe. And how to find the others before the Grorn do.”
“Others?”
“The other Keys.” His smile was sharp-edged and dangerous. “This child isn’t the only Key. And if we want to stay ahead of the Grorn, we need to find them first.”
He disappeared into the cockpit, leaving her alone with a sleeping alien baby and a thousand unanswered questions. She pulled the robe tighter around herself and stared out the small viewport at the passing stars. Somewhere back there, beyond the debris field and the burning ships, was Earth. Her home. Her life. Everything she’d known.
She wondered if she’d ever see it again.
The baby stirred in her arms, dark eyes blinking open. For a moment, those ancient eyes seemed to look right through her, seeing something Emma couldn’t begin to understand. Then the baby yawned, and the spell broke, and she was just aninfant again. Small and helpless and entirely dependent on two strangers who’d stumbled into her life by accident.
“I’ve got you,” she murmured, the same words she’d said a hundred times to a hundred frightened children. “Whatever happens, I’ve got you.”
She didn’t know if it was a promise she could keep. But she was damn well going to try.
CHAPTER SIX
The jump to hyperspace was nothing like the movies had led her to expect. One moment they were surrounded by the velvet darkness of normal space, and the next, the viewport showed nothing but swirling patterns of light that made Emma’s head ache if she looked too long.
“Hyperspace,” Doren said from the pilot’s seat. “We’ll be in transit for approximately eighteen hours. After that, we should be far enough from Grorn territory to breathe.”
She had settled the baby into a makeshift bed, a drawer lined with soft fabric, and now she stood in the cockpit doorway, watching the stars dance beyond the glass.
“Eighteen hours,” she repeated.
“Enough time to rest. Eat something. Adjust to your new circumstances.” He swiveled the pilot’s chair to face her, that familiar amusement playing around his mouth. “Maybe even tell me your name?”
She smiled despite herself.
“It’s Emma, Emma Carter.”
“Emma,” he repeated softly, and the sound of her name in that deep, purring voice did something to her insides that she didn’t want to examine too closely. “You’re taking this remarkably well, you know.”
“Am I?”
“Most people, when confronted with abduction, imprisonment, rescue, and the revelation that they’re now harboring the galaxy’s most valuable fugitive, tend to have more visible breakdowns.”
“The breakdown is scheduled for later.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “Right now I’m operating on spite and adrenaline.”
His laugh was unexpected—warm and genuine, nothing like the calculated charm she’d seen before. It transformed his face and made him look younger.
“Spite and adrenaline,” he repeated. “I’ve built entire careers on less.”
“Somehow that doesn’t surprise me.”
