Page 69 of The Captain's Bounty
The data-comm beeped again.
“Bruwes?” Aldar hailed. “You want the bad news or the good?”
His growl of aggravation shivered her.
“Why can’t he ever just give me good news?” he grumbled. “Why does it always have to be both?”
Bruwes wasn’t moving to answer the hail, though, and that made Lissa smile. She hugged his arm, holding him tight.
“Give us the good news,” the pilot came back. “We could use it.”
“The ship is not infested with fogal rats, like I first thought, and I just found what was banging around under the floors.”
“Oh,” Lissa said, surprised. “That is good news.”
“Wait for it,” Bruwes drawled.
The pilot had the same reserved tone when she asked, “And the bad?”
“The scavs had a hostage. She’s armed, running loose under the floors, and I think she just broke my nose.”
“Oh, for fuck’s—” Bruwes’s growl ended in a sigh.
“Captain to the bridge,” Lissa said, trying for cheerfulness but already regretting the loneliness of their bodies coming apart.
He pushed off both her and the wall, sighing once as he pulled his pants up. He gave her his shirt, and she loved how the irritation melted out of his dark eyes as he removed his belt from around her neck.
“Stay close,” he said. “Stay behind me.”
She already knew that she would. For all the days of her life.
The End
