Page 26 of Crave
Because she was about to walk out into space, despite several times thinking how that would be a mistake.
Okay, maybe she wasn’t breathing normally at all.
Sil gave her shoulder a pat, not so dissimilar to how he’d touched Roxy: friendly enough, even kind. But that was all.
She’d rejected anything else, hadn’t she? So he was only doing as she’d asked because anything more would be yet another mistake. And now she was choking on all her choices, like carbon dioxide from too many frantic breaths.
They just needed to collect a fortune in space dust, let Sil prove his worth to his people, resolve a rock’s abandonment issues, and pay off theDeepWander’s dues to the Luster. Then she’d take her cut and go.
But first, a spacewalk.
And somehow that suddenly didn’t seem as scary as leaving on her own again.
Because Sil was with her.
In his exo-suit, he looked more like the alien he’d seemed when she first saw the orcs. The inhuman silhouette emphasized the bulk, the extra arms, even the movement—smooth but articulated. But him being an alien didn’t matter because at least she had someone with her for this colossal mistake.
A low bar, yeah, and of course clearing low bars was even easier in zero gravity, but…
“Ready?”
“For anything,” she lied.
He’d already siphoned the atmosphere in the small sally port compartment alongside the main cargo bay, equalizing to the nothing outside. So he simply opened the hatch, revealing the blackness beyond.
“Don’t be afraid,” he said, his voice in her ear a reassuring rumble. “You are tethered to me, and your suit has an auto recall to the shuttle, just as I showed you. Nothing can go wrong.”
She winced. “Never say that. There’s no need to tempt fate.”
“Not when there are so many other temptations, eh?” Gripping her arm, he reeled her up against him with the tethering cable a taut line between them. He stared down at her. Through the visor, his eyes were especially bright and intense, more diamond than pearl. “I have you.”
She gazed up at him. “No need to play the romance hero right now,” she muttered, even though the unsteady hitch of her breath had gone from worry to something more enticing.
“Who’s playing?” Tightening his grip, he launched them out of the shuttle.
She gasped and clung to him with all her might, eyes clenched absolutely shut even as her belly spun. Being in tight spots, that she could do. But to be completely exposed? Of course she was terrified.
But also of course she wanted to see what was going on, so she could be properly terrified.
Cracking one eye, she craned her neck as they coasted clear of the shuttle. And the universe expanded all the way around them, utterly empty and yet filled with pinpricks of light.
“Oh,” she whispered. “Oh no…”
“What’s wrong?”
“It’s so beautiful.” Too much, all at once. Now she would never be able to forget this moment with Sil, hanging in an endless night of stars.
“Yes, beautiful.”
But when she twisted back to smile wildly at him, he wasn’t looking at the vast, glimmering space.
Fear and wonder fell away, and a realization went through her like a distant wandering comet, far away and fuzzy at its center but leaving a faint, shining trail she might follow if she knew where to focus.
He was looking at her.
He let out a breath she wouldn’t have heard except for the comm linking them. “Let’s see what we find.”
He kept her snug against him as he directed the shuttle to scan the dust around them, sending the findings to his datpad. The screen flashed with a dotted line. Not quite X marks the spot, but good enough.
