Page 31 of Gravel and Grit

and stared at him thoughtfully, her lower lip caught between her teeth. The fact that he’d done the exact same thing while she slept wasn’t lost on him, and he wondered if her thoughts were at all similar to his. He hoped they were.

He caught the flush that painted her cheeks when her gaze tracked down his body and halted at what he was positive wasnothis stomach. He hadn’t been completely sure where her gaze was aimed the last time she stared at his lower half, but he was sure now.

She is definitely looking at my cock.

His heart was thundering in his chest, but he stayed perfectly still, keeping his breaths deep and even, watching her watch him.

When she looked away, and he calmed back down, Zaek eventually succumbed to sleep. He dreamed of her on Duras. They were in his aerie and she was lying in his bed, her pale skin shining in the light of the moons as she beckoned him to her. There was a raccoon perched in the window and a pair of bunnies hopping across the floor, but these things made perfect sense as such things do in dreams.

What stayed with him, even after waking, was the sense of utter happiness the likes of which he’d never felt before.

2 1

ZAEK

Zaek sat up with a groan and stretched his arms and wings out wide.

“So. Aliens snore, huh?” came a laughing voice.

Cracking open one eye, he gave her a look and stated indignantly, “No, we most certainly do not.”

“Do too,” she smirked.

He huffed and rolled his eyes, then wrapped his wings around him like a blanket and peered at her over the top for a long moment, before climbing to his feet and stumbling off to make use of a tree.

When he got back, he found a small pile of candy, a bag of beef jerky, and a water bottle waiting for him next to where he’d been sitting.

“Thank you,” he rumbled in surprise.

“No problem,” she answered, glancing up at him with a smile before bending back over the beacon on the ground in front of her.

“Making any progress?”

“Mmhm. I don’t know how much more I can get done without access to more tools and some electricity to test the device, but… ” she trailed off with a shrug.

“Beacon,” he corrected around a mouthful of candy.

She snorted a laugh and shook her head.

“I also made some progress on the cell phone while you were sleeping. I assumed the goal was to modify it so we can listen in on the security teams’

encrypted channel.”

He nodded in agreement and leaned over to pick it up and inspect her work. Cocking his head in confusion, he glanced at her and found her a little too focused on what she was doing.

“Mira. If I am not mistaken, this does not require any more modification.

It should work.”

“You think so?” she asked, but he could hear something in her tone that told him she already knew that.

“I do. As do you. So why have you not tested it?”

Her shoulders slumped and she sighed. She put down the battery-powered soldering iron she was using and looked up at him, admitting quietly, “I’m afraid of what I’ll hear. I know you said they put out a kill order on both of us, but hearing it directly from them… I’ve worked with, or at least around, these people for the last two years. I don’t want to believe they’d think I’m a traitor so easily.”

“Ah. I am sorry, Mira,” he said lowly.

“It’s not your fault, Zaek.” At his look, she amended, “Well, not completely your fault. If they hadn’t tried to shoot through me to get to you, you wouldn’t have kidna— saved me.”

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