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She stared at her dead console biting back her various emotions—of which there was a multitude. Caligher’s voice boomed through the chamber whenever he spoke, vibrating up the furniture and under her skin.
Lucca remained on edge after pouring out words she’d held in her body for months and months and months. He’d probed persistently until it finally came pouring out. She felt vulnerable about the entire thing. Judged, cowardly, useless, uncertain.
She could still feel the heat of his palm on her chest.
Belatedly she became aware of him asking her a question. He gave a reproachful growl when his words went ignored for too long.
“Lucca…”
Gone was the easy way they’d passed their hours with jokes and comfortable conversation. Now he was all commands and warnings, but it had the unwanted effect of turning her on at odd moments. It must have been innocent to him. He ordered people into cages for a living so he could fly them to the outpost and dump them off there—and he used force when they didn’t comply. But to her… nothing about this was innocent.
When he turned bodily to her she nearly had a heart attack.
“Lucca,” he repeated.
“Sorry… what?”
His eyes narrowed, his face a moving granite mask of growing disapproval. It hurt, feeling the constant brunt of his glare, but it was an addictive sort of agony. Like catching the notice of an elemental god who was furious with you. It was so thrilling simply to have his attention.
“We’ll find it without your help if we have to, but I’d like to think you would be willing to help us now.” He gave her a hard look.Ignore me at your peril, it said. “How far from the Crescent Rim was your jump point?”
“Close enough to find with a short-range scanner,” she said. “Assuming they haven’t drifted away. I have a time delta.”
She paused.
“Hada time delta,” she amended, shooting him a sharp look. “Before you fried my computer.”
She wanted—needed—her computer back. She was growing fidgety without her system.
Caligher relayed the information and ended the conversation. He’d commandeered her ship. There was nothing to wrestle back. What was she going to donow?She’d told herself that she would do anything to earn his forgiveness, but right now everything felt jagged and bitter and wrong.
She stared at the ships floating around them between the asteroid cliffs. A Ternetzi with yellow plates drifted whimsically before them, bouncing on the window of her ship before spiraling off. She watched them hop from ship to ship without a care in the world, and she was overcome with vicious envy.
“Are we going to the Crescent Rim?” she asked.
“Everyone is. Once fuel arrives…”
“Huh,” she grunted.
“Blowing up our fuel bay was quite the trick. One of my own would’ve neverdreamedof wasting good fuel before—”
“It wasn’t my idea, okay?” Lucca snapped.
His gaze shifted to the darkness between the cliffs, tail flicking rapidly. She watched his hand tap the side of the seat, measuring how dangerous he was at the moment.
“What’s the plan when we get there?” she asked. She needed to gauge the future he had in mind for her, but she was terrified of his answer.
“I’ll destroy it.”
Lucca felt a slipping sensation in her stomach. “What?” she asked.
He gave her a look that twisted up her insides. “I’m going to get there first and destroy it. That’s why I rigged this ship to go faster.”
“But… why?”
“Because I don’t want more humans coming through.”
Right. That should have been obvious. She slid her hair behind her ear, drawing a breath.
