Page 16 of Claiming Sarah

I stopped in my tracks. “Is Ode okay?” I asked, wanting to make sure the ship’s doctor, the only female in our midst, hadn’t been hurt in any way.

“Not her.Me,” Tiger fumed.

Oh.“Are you alright?”

He rolled his eyes. “I’m fine. I just…I know I’m not like my cousin Kapok, and I know I don’t have his reputation for violence, but sometimes, I wish I did. It would keep the creeps in check.”

I reached out and squeezed his shoulder. “Sometimes I wish you had his rep, too, kid.”

“Great,” he muttered, hanging his head. “Make me feel worse.”

“What I mean is, we need to get you out in the field more often. Get you some more experience, maybe scar up that pretty face a little bit. That’ll keep the creeps away.”

That made him laugh. “Thanks.”

“Cheer up, Tiger. We’re going back to Halla. Maybe you can meet a nice girl there.”

“I prefer my girls alive,” he said, since Halla was mostly inhabited by ghosts.

I arched a brow. “With standards like that, no wonder you’re still a virgin and have never gotten laid.”

He laughed again, and his morose mood shifted. “Yeah, yeah. I’ll lock down the gear.”

Kapok’s old job.My stomach twisted at the thought, and the loss. “Thanks. I’m cockpit bound.”

I strolled past the half-blinking panels in the walls, occasionally smacking one to make it work again. I walked past the infirmary with a half-hearted wave at Treg and Ode to let them know we were about to depart.

Inside my cockpit, my trusted android, Camp Deo, waited for me. Her blue eyes lit brighter when she saw me. Her coppermetallic body glimmered beneath the low lights of my cockpit. “Captain—”

I shook my head at her formal greeting. “I know your protocols have certain settings, but I believe I told you to change those settings.” I sat in the pilot’s seat and readiedSovereignfor takeoff.

“Right, right,” she nodded mechanically. “Not Captain.Jacaranda. Now that Sarah is back on Halla, will we be in residency there?”

“I’m not sure what the plan is just yet, Camp.”

“It’s just that, if we were, then perhaps I could, if Silence and Valor and you don’t mind…maybe I could be the nanny for the twins?”

I smiled at her. Androids were given all kinds of programming from language translation to analytics, but they were also given personalities to help them ingratiate themselves with their owners. I wasn’t sure why Camp’s programmer made her adore babies and children. But I had never seen her as happy as when she was holding Silence’s twins.

I said, “Anytime I don’t need your services while we are on Halla, feel free to nanny the twins, with their parents’ permission.”

Her eyes brightened even more. “Thank you, Jacaranda.”

“Now check in with Treg and see if he needs any help,” I said of theSovereign’s engineer.

“Of course.” She left in an instant.

I let everyone know we were heading out and took off. My heart had soared when Ode had told me Sarah was back, but the joy was short-lived when my brain started to work again. As soon as we broke atmo, I fought the urge to call Deacon’s ship. I didn’t want to see her over comms. I needed to yell at her in person.

Why in the hell did you come back to Halla, the one place in the universe where you know you’ll be hunted down?

Okay, in all fairness, it was thesecondplace in the universe where she knew she would be hunted down, but still.The only worse place for her to be is Orhon.I didn’t understand how she could do this to me. I died a thousand deaths when I took her back to Earth, but I knew it was her best shot at safety. It was one of the hardest things I have ever done.

And it was all for nothing.

I punched the passenger seat to release some of my frustration. It wasn’t enough. Punching inanimate objects never worked. I huffed and my foot tapped impatiently the whole way back to Halla.

When we arrived, I parked next to Deacon’s ship,Allegiant, and we disembarked. When my boots hit the ground, I was on the hunt for Sarah. She made my job easy by standing in Valor’s front yard with Deacon and Silence.

---