Page 239 of Every Almost

"Acting Chief Engineer, effective now, with the formal appointment to follow." Reyna took a deep breath. "It's a home, Charlie," she said softly. "If you want it, if you want the Emberkind, it's yours."

Reyna stopped there, letting the whole speech swirl around the office, landing for Charlie as she needed. For this, Reyna would be patient. She would wait, however long Charlie needed her to wait.

Moments later, Charlie finally spoke.

"Really?" Charlie asked. "You want it to be me?"

"Yes, you, Charlie Wickett."

Reyna watched Charlie blink and then sit up a bit straighter in the chair. And Reyna could see her start working, the stunned look giving way to something quicker, already three steps into a problem. She watched in real time as Charlie worked it through her mind, proving in that moment that Reyna had the right candidate sitting with her.

"I have conditions," Charlie said.

Reyna raised an eyebrow.

"Conditions?" Reyna asked, unable to help the smirk cross her face. "Do tell, I can't wait to hear this."

Charlie gave her a look. "It's not what you think."

"Oh, yeah?" Reyna asked. "And what do I think?"

Charlie shook her head. "It's about Tavi and Maren," she said.

"What about them?" Reyna asked, genuinely intrigued.

"Make them Co-Chiefs, Rey," Charlie said, using the nickname Reyna hadn't heard from her lips in what she realized was far too long. She didn't realize how much she had missed it. "If it has to be under me for some bureaucratic reason, so be it. But in reality, they're equal, right alongside me." Charlie scooted forward in her chair, right up to the edge of the seat. "There is no way I can run Engineering alone. So, I won't. I'll run it with the two people who've been holding it together from the start, long before I ever showed up."

And that was the difference. Right there. Reyna saw it bright and clear and knew, without a doubt, she was making the right decision.

Earlier today, Reyna had sat in this same chair across from a man who had run a department into the ground rather than admit he needed a single other pair of hands. She had spent years watching Cael Rask guard the job the wrong way.

But now, she had just handed the same job to Charlie Wickett, and the first thing out of Charlie's mouth were conditions to ensure she would share it.

This is the same woman her own parents looked at and decided they could live without,Reyna thought.This woman, here in front of her. This incredible, stubborn, unbearable woman.

"Agreed," Reyna said without a pause.

And then Charlie smiled, the real one, the one that reached all the way up and crinkled the corners of her eyes. And Reyna thought that, in seventy years, across more worlds than she could possibly ever count, it was the best thing she had ever seen.

Then Reyna felt her gold cost her. She felt every muscle holding it steady with an effort she hadn't had to make in longer than she could remember. She felt it the same way she knew shewas going to feel it from now on, every time Charlie did anything at all.

"Thank you, Captain," Charlie said gently, the smile still spread across her face.

"Thank you, Chief," Reyna said slowly, keeping her voice stable. She felt her muscles steady again when Charlie's face lit up at the use of the title.

Reyna kept her hands still and her face doing the ordinary work of a captain who had made a sound personnel decision.

But under all of it, in the place she had stopped being able to seal off, the truth sat and wouldn't move.

She was not going to be able to hold this. Reyna would not be able to hold the gold, the distance, or the careful hours of pretending there was any explanation for the thirty-five minutes besides the obvious one.

For thirteen years, Reyna believed she would never have to survive losing anyone again, because she had made certain there was no one who could do that to her.

But then Charlie came in, and Reyna couldn't help but keep this one close anyway. She had woven her into the ship, into Engineering, and minutes ago put her at the head of it. She had let three inches of air be the only thing between them in that flooded bay and had been unable to pull away.

And now someone could.

She had built the trap herself. And she had just, knowingly, taken another step into it, and called it a promotion.