Page 63 of Sunastara & the Venusian
His eyes found mine, slender blue-gray rings orbiting pitch-black pupils. “Drink yours. You need to feel this with me. It’s phenomenal.”
Not that I was averse to such things, but after ingesting a mind-altering drug he’d never taken before, he was going to need a babysitter. “Not tonight.”
He pouted, and it was so cute I almost changed my mind. Under more appropriate circumstances, taking Bliss with him might have been lovely. But I didn’t think he’d want this, to be altered like this when it hadn’t been his decision. To be out of control like this in public, where the guests might see him, where he might look unprofessional.
I commed.
Freddie chimed in brightly.
I muted Freddie from the conversation.
Garran asked.
About twenty credits’ worth of Bliss. What I needed to do was get him back to his pod before he started licking everyone in the ballroom.
There was a hint of panic in Garran’s voice.
I said while Freddie reached into the air, playing with shapes that didn’t exist.
When I clicked off the comm and looked at Freddie again, I snorted. He was gone, his gaze swooping around the room, his mouth hanging open in utter awe.
“It’s all so beautiful,” he whispered, placing a hand over his heart. “So achingly beautiful. I love every single one of these beings. I feel like I know them, like I’ve always known them. Ever since I was a tiny baby. Maybe even before, when I was only stardust, I knew them. And I loved them.”
All right. Time to shut this down. Holding my hand up in front of his face, I asked, “Do you see this?”
“Yes,” he said. “It’s magnificent.”
I kept my hand raised, letting him run his fingers over the lines of my palm, up and down the peaks and valleys of my fingers. I remembered enjoying this sort of thing when I’d been in his condition.
Sliding his fingers between mine, he drew me to him. “Dance with me, Sunny.”
My heart stuttered.
Sunny.
In all the times we’d been close like this, touching like this, he’d never once used my real name. Because we didn’t do that. Because that was the line we’d drawn. So why was I melting at the hushed sound of it now? Whydid I want him to say it again while we were close like this, so I could feel it through my chest pressed against his?
Reaching up, I straightened his mask, then I placed my hand on his shoulder. One dance would be okay, I told myself while his hand slid into the hollow of my back, while my body molded to his. One dance before I helped him back to his pod. One dance in the darkness, hiding behind our masks. One dance to imagine what my life might be like if I was able to be his, to meet up with him after work in our pods, to let him sway me side to side, holding me close while we talked about our days, our friends, our families. While we planned our nights, our futures, the way normal, healthy beings probably did. The way I might have done with someone like him before the accident changed me, made me into who I was now, broke me. One dance to imagine myself whole, all my shattered pieces put back together again, held in place by warm hands and strong arms. Just one dance.
As if reading my mind, he urged me even closer and said, “I wish we could always be like this. You take my breath away, Sunny. I think we were meant to meet. At the CAK. On this ship. There is a gravity between us.” He lowered his forehead to mine. “Can you feel it?”
The thing was, Icouldfeel it, the irresistible force drawing me toward him. And in that moment, I realized how powerless I was to fight it. Because against every single one of my better judgments, against every ounce of self-preservation that remained in my body, when he leaned in, his head slowly tilting, I closed my eyes and held my breath, and I let him kiss me. Not only that, but in this very public place, surrounded by guests and coworkers and irresponsible bartenders, I kissed him back, slipping my fingers intohis hair, sighing as his arms wrapped tightly around my waist.
And, oh,this was bliss. Kissing him like this, enveloped by his arms, no pharmaceutical enhancement was required. This was bliss. And maybe it was time I stopped fighting the gravity pulling us together. With the anniversary of Jonathan’s death only days away, maybe it was time to try, to take a chance, to let myself have the kind of life I knew my son would have wanted me to have.
But not tonight.
Tonight I needed to get him to bed before he started taking off his clothes.
Breaking the kiss, backing out of his arms, I spun him around, aimed him toward the door, and said, “Okay, Romeo. It’s time to go.”
It waslike walking behind a child in a candy store as I ushered him from the ballroom to his pod. Everything was “fascinating” or “glorious.” That light fixture, this doorway, even the carpet. The carpet on deck twelve was evidently the most amazing thing since the invention of faster-than-light drives.
When we finally reached his pod, I took his hand and pressed it to his security panel, which he spent another thirty seconds marveling at.
“How are these even made?” he asked. “Who? Who is able to make these?” His voice dropped to a reverent whisper as he ran his fingertip over the panel. “Geniuses, that’s who.”
