“We need to talk, Dek.”
“I know.” No avoiding the inevitable. “Please sit.”
“Thank you.”
“I’ll pour the kinna.”
She managed to fumble their drinkware out of her cupboard and filled both mugs without splashing the hot liquid all over the counter.
After handing one of the mugs to him, she took her seat across the table.
“Why didn’t you tell me you’re a former Network agent?” he asked.
Dek nearly choked on her coffee. Her voice, when she found it again, was barely a croak. “How did you find out?”
“Dr. K.”
“He volunteered that?”
“It came up as part of the investigation. Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked again.
She fell silent, tracing a Möbius strip on the table with her finger. How could she begin to explain?
Just…begin, she told herself.
“I told you I started working with the Network when I was just a kid. Mostly assisting my brother—who raised me—with salvaging ships for the future Network fleet. I was in my early twenties when I met Aroh, an agent based on Talstar Station, when my brother and I delivered one of our prizes to our contacts there. We were bonded three moons later.” Her gaze flickered to his eyes before dropping back to her coffee. Still, it was long enough to register the jolt she’d delivered.
“You have a bondmate?” he said.
“Had.”
Dek slumped forward, and her unbound hair partially obscured her eyes.
Sno suppressed the urge to reach out and brush back the white-gold cascade. He wanted to look in her eyes. He wanted to touch her. Badly.
“Aroh helped get me cleared for Network Intelligence,” she began. “We worked as a team for two calendars.” She paused there, her throat working convulsively.
“You don’t have to go on,” he said.
“I need to,” she insisted. “You deserve that much.”
She dipped the tip of her finger into the hot liquid and winced. “We ran afoul of a Rathskian Targa cruiser while we were gathering information on the Alliance fleet strength and deployment patterns. They boarded us. Aroh got caught in a lie to their captain, and they executed him on the spot. Right before my eyes.”
“Dek,” Sno whispered.
“Soon after, I left Network Intelligence. Not just because I lost my mate and partner, but because it was my fault.”
“You can’t blame yourself for what the Rathskians did. That’s not your guilt to carry.”
“It is. Because I could’ve stopped them. I killed them all for what they did to him. But I didn’t act fast enough to save Aroh’s life. I hesitated. And now he’s dead.”
Sno lowered his head. “I’m so sorry, Dek.” The silence stretched between them, somber and weighted.
“After I resigned, I took a position with Network security. Eventually, I ended up here.” She turned the mug in circles on the table before her. “Hiding from the universe, I guess.”
“I don’t believe that. There’s a difference between hiding and healing.”
“Is that what I’m doing? Healing? Yet still broken beyond all repair.”
“Hardly.” His voice came soft and smooth, like a gentle balm on a raw wound. “You’re the strongest person I know, Dek.”
She tilted her mug to peer into the dark liquid. “That which does not kill us…”
He reached out to take her hand, and she froze, staring down at his fingers as they wove through hers. “This probably is the completely wrong time to ask you…”
“Ask,” she said.
“We should talk about what happened between us. I need to know what you’re feeling.”
Ah. So he was going to go there. “I can’t put that into words, Sno. I haven’t been with anyone since Aroh. Only you. I can’t get a handle on what I’m feeling. But I can tell you…I have no regrets.”
“That’s good.” He squeezed her hand. “I know we have a lot of feelings to sort out, and it could take time, which we probably don’t have. But I want you to know what I feel for you is real. Something happened between us, Dek. Something rare. And…” He raised his gaze to her, open, honest, unshuttered. “I don’t want it to end here.”
Dek leaned forward, cradled his face in her hands, and kissed him. Deeply. Thoroughly. Went on kissing him until their breathing came in short gasps. His honesty was a soothing truth to her ears…followed by a sharp dagger to her heart.
How could they do anything but end here? They had different lives. Were on different paths. She wasn’t even sure what her future would be until the powers-that-be decided her fate.
Dek broke away, her heart contracting painfully. “We can’t, Sno. There’s no point. You’re leaving soon. I’m staying. So there’s going to be a whole lot of space between us. I’m going to be living with loneliness for a long time, and being with you now will only make it worse.”
Holding her gaze, he brushed her cheek lightly with his fingertips. “That could change. But it will be your choice to make.”
Rising from the table, he gave her one last, lingering look, before turning to walk out her door.
17
Oh, yes. Regret could be a terrible thing.
Dek sat in the dark of her rooftop retreat, watching the night shift patrolling their appointed stations. She’d gotten word that Sno was leaving at dawn, and she’d come here, because she’d always retreated here when she needed to think.
Why did she insist on pushing away the very person she longed to draw closer? When it came to Sno, why was her head locked in this constant struggle with her heart?
Because you called it. You’re both on different paths.
Could anything else ever matter to her as much as this detail?
A soft chatter echoed from the rock face behind her, and Dek craned her neck to find Cassie scampering across the roof toward her.
“What are you doing here, sweetie? Aren’t you and Sno about to catch a shuttle?”
The StarDog sat up and rubbed her tiny paws over her ears then gave Dek a long look with sad, amber eyes.
“You came to say goodbye, didn’t you?”
The StarDog cheeped. Dek took it for a yes.
Tears welled in her eyes as she scooped the little fur ball up and cuddled her close. “I’m going to miss you, too,” she whispered into Cassie’s soft fur, her voice breaking. “Both of you. So very much.”
CaSandra cooed softly and purred as Dek petted and rocked her for a long while.
Then Sno called for his partner and she closed her eyes tight against the jolt it caused her. Cassie slipped out of her arms. She scurried across the roof but stopped and turned to look back as if she wanted Dek to follow her.
“I can’t go with you, baby,” Dek whispered.
Sno called again.
Cassie gave a bark and made a dash toward the rock face before running back to give her a beseeching look.
“I’m sorry,” Dek managed, kneeling to run her hand over the StarDog’s silky head. “Promise me you’ll take good care of him, Cas-cas.”