Page 58 of Shellshock

“Lucca.”

And he ate up the way she jumped at that with too much satisfaction. She drew a thin breath, looking at her knees. “Back when I was on the big ship… the Aerinus…”

He waited. Sometimes a good, heavy silence was enough to bleed information out of a person.

“We woke at midnight to Ternetzi ships surrounding us. Way outside your star system. We didn’t expect them.” Her breathing quickened, her eyes glazing over. “They tried to board us. We fought them off. I was working in the control room in the middle.”

She tried to leave it at that, but there was clearly more to her story. There was always more. He stared at her coldly until she supplied it willingly, tugging on her hair in jerky, stilted motions.

“The Aerinus is a fortress. You saw the map. It’s gargantuan. We fought them off until they retreated.” Tightly, she added, “I didn’tknowwe made all those ships go missing. I thought they gave up and left. I thought we let them go…”

Her hands twisted in her lap, wringing the corner of her towel. His thoughts darkened as he studied the nervous gesture, picturing things he could do with her restless hands in ready detail. He shoved the images back, focusing on the present, on the fact that she was human and she had vital information about a warship coming to destroy his home.

Perhaps she was telling the truth.

Maybe the rest of her human crew had attacked the remaining Ternetzis without her knowledge. She wasn’t a soldier. She wouldn’t be privy to their every operation. A ship that large could house smaller ships that could finish the job. It was possible that she was simply along for the ride.

And Caligher wanted to believe it. He wanted to believe she was innocent of all wrongdoing.

But her fists would not stop twisting that towel.

“There’s more,” he said, imagining how soft the flesh above her kneecaps must be—how she would react if he parted them. He took a ragged breath, a scratch entering his voice. “More you aren’t telling me.”

Her eyes squeezed shut, trying to go back to that place where she could shut him out.

“What is it, Lucca?” he demanded softly, acutely aware that he needed to stop thinking of sex while he questioned her about something so important. Life and death hinged on her words, but he wanted to cover her mouth with his and get inside her.

“I was following orders,” she said, her eyes going wide with horror right as the words left her mouth. “That, uh, didn’t sound right. I was in the control room on the warship and I… helped them catch a Ternetzi who’d gotten on board. We used the doors to close her in.”

He froze solid, all sensuality dying. The reality of her confession was too much to stomach.

Someone else taken. Tortured. Lucca behind the window, holding the controls. His pendulum swung dangerously back to retribution. Depending on the next words out of her mouth, he was prepared to act on his anger.

He could easily make her life hell. He could confine her until she begged for forgiveness and accepted that she’d never see her own kind again. He wasn’t letting her reunite with them. He might not let her touch so much as another button or lever, so long as he lived. And thatwouldbe hell to Lucca.

Lucca shook her head suddenly, visibly cringing.

“We had a big party in the mess hall, to celebrate… winning, I guess. I was blackout drunk when I broke her out because it seemed…” Her lip twitched. “Wrong. I already had access to everything—so I just… opened some doors and turned the cameras off. I know they figured out it was me.

“It’s the reason they sent me out here. I think the commander wanted to get me off the warship. I think he hopes I don’t come back alive, but he would never say it to my face. He told me I was here to collect mapping data, like a science project.”

She frowned in misery.

That pendulum in his chest swung in the opposite direction. Toward something warm and almost safe, but too delicate for trust to take hold. He wasn’t sure he would ever be able to trust her, and that was the saddest part. He’d thought…

He’d hoped…

He stopped himself from spiraling. If he was in this back-and-forth state, he couldn’t trust himself to act on his feelings.

She started trembling. Her words rushed in faster waves. He’d never heard so much talking out of her.

“We were sent here to collect data on you. I didn’t realize my ship was sending it back to the warship for a long time. They hid programs in my computer and I didn’t know what those programs did. I didn’t delete them until recently because, well… what if they controlled the life support? You don’t just delete programs you don’t understand, especially when that computer’s keeping you alive. But these programs… aggregated data about you and broadcasted it to every corner of your star system, andIkept those programs alive.”

Annnd—every other confession out of her lips made him stare at her in blank, mute horror.

She’d been sent into his star system to scout. The awful thing was that he believed what she was saying. That she’d been ignorant of the harm she was causing.

Lucca was a vital cog in their machine.

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