Page 32 of Radiant Exception
“Can I see what happened?” His palm twitched.
“No—it’s okay—” I looked down at my hand and the delicate bandaging that Vaughn had placed around both wounds. “I’m fine.” I glanced back up at him.
Cassidy pursed his lips but pulled his hand back, placing it into his lap. “The captain made a bad call,” he told me. “He shouldn’t have ordered you to do that—he shouldn’t have put you in danger.”
“We’re in the middle of space,” I reasoned. “Shit happens.”
“Maybe someone should report him—”
“Don’t!” I snapped.
His jaw ticked. There was so much he wanted to say, but was holding back.
“I’m not Xavier’s little shadow anymore. I can take care of myself,” I retorted.
But when Cassidy’s expression faltered, I regretted the harshness of my tone. I hadn’t meant to wound him.
“I know you mean well,” I clarified. “It’s just par for the course in this line of work.” I shrugged.
“I just—” Cassidy paused, mulling over his next words. “He’s been increasingly reckless, and I would have thought with you onboard—being granted an exception, for fuck’s sake, that he would dial it back a notch, ya know?”
I sighed. The thing was, I didn’t know.
“I just don’t know what you see in the guy—you always needed stability and order,” he observed.
“I still need that, but my entire life has been nothing but chaos,” I argued, not really understanding why this topic was getting me heated at all. “All I do is play catch-up, and adjust to whatever shit the universe throws my way. I know he’s not perfect, but I care about him.” The words were meant to be a white lie, but as they passed my lips, I found that maybe there was more truth in them than I’d realized.
Cassidy leaned back in the chair, exhaling a loud breath as he studied me, trying to make sense of why the girl he used to know would ever deign to be with someone like Vaughn.
But I wasn’t that girl—I hadn’t been for a long time, and in reality, Cassidy didn’t know me any better than Vaughn did because he hadn’t been there when I’d needed him most.
“He’s not good enough for you,” he grumbled, finally saying what I knew he’d been waiting to tell me since he discovered I had an exception with Vaughn.
I was tired and I didn’t want to fight anymore. “It doesn’t matter.” I sighed. “We have an exception. What’s done is done.”
Cassidy took a beat before pitching forward, over the desk. “I need you to tell me if he’s ever been violent with you,” he whispered, his eyes pleading with me.
“What!?” I sputtered, taken aback by the accusation.
“I thought I heard someone get hit when you were in his office.” He swallowed.
“Oh.” I couldn’t help but half laugh.
My reaction confused Cassidy.
“I—” I could feel my cheeks heat. “I slapped him,” I admitted. “Not my proudest moment, and I owe him an apology. I don’t think I’ve actually ever hit someone before today, come to think of it.” The shame of what I’d done rushed through my body, coming to rest in my chest, which felt uncomfortably tight.
“Okay.” He didn’t seem quite appeased by my answer.
“Listen, Vaughn has never gotten physical with me. But I know if I was ever uncomfortable, I could confide in you,” I offered.
He gave me a solemn nod before getting up from his chair. “I’m always here for you, L,” he said softly, using my childhood nickname intentionally to articulate his point, before sauntering out of my office.
Exhausted at the end of my shift, I felt myself going cross-eyed looking at ship schematics. When I’d repaired the engine, I’d noted something that was off, but it had been during the worst of the panic, and I couldn’t remember what it was.
I just knew that something in the engineering bay wasn’t where it was supposed to be, according to the schematics loaded onto my comm, and it had been eating at me since Cassidy left.
I closed out the program on my comm and pushed back from the desk, tidying a few things before I left to head up a level to the mess hall to grab a quick bite before going to bed.
