Page 94 of Star-Crossed Captive
How was he supposed to let her go?
Chapter thirty-four
Thedoortotheirtemporary quarters shut, blocking Mace’s view of Nia sleeping on the narrow bed, naked except for the thin, CORE-issue blanket covering her body.
He stood there a moment, staring at the blank beige of the door, his body tense and his mind racing. There was a large part of him that wanted to sayfuck youto the universe, to steal Nia away from both the CORE and Tellusians, to screw responsibility. For it just to be the two of them, together, where politics and lineage didn’t matter.
But common sense intruded. Where would they go? They were still too far away from anything Tellusian to use the Condor for the journey. The outpost’s shuttle would have even less range. There was no place in CORE territory that would be safe for him, and no place in Tellusian territory that would be safe for her after what she’d confessed. And traveling to Calypson territory…they might as well commit suicide if that were their only option.
With the weight of everything pressing down on him like a thousand asteroids, he’d held Nia for as long as he could, for as long as he thought he could get away with, before his sister would pound on their door demanding answers.
Swallowing, he turned away, and started down the ramp. On the lab level, Lexi stood at a terminal, one arm braced above her head, her black hair swooped over her shoulder. She lifted her head when he neared. Eyes narrowing, she straightened, then strode to meet him at the bottom of the ramp.
He spoke before she could. “I need to get Nia to a safe CORE location as quickly as possible.”
The laugh Lexi released was tinged with hysteria. “Are you out of your ever-loving mind? We don’t have the time or resources to coordinate a soft re-entry for her, not with the maintenance crew arriving in thirty hours.”
Panic squeezed his chest. He needed to get Nia to safety. With her possible participation inOrion’sseizure, unintentional or not, she wouldn’t be safe in the Tellusian fleet.
He settled his hands on her shoulders. “It needs to be done.”
“That may be so, but not from here.” She shrugged off his hands and took a step back. “You’ve got to know it’s a mistake to let her go. She’s seen this place, met us, she’ll sell us all out.”
“She won’t.”
“She might not want to, but they’ll get her to talk whether she loves you or not.”
His heart lurched in his chest, and he swallowed. “That’s why I need her to get to her family first.”
Lexi shook her head. “I can’t believe you put us in this situation.” She didn’t raise her voice, but it sounded like she wanted to.
“I didn’t have a choice.”
“Explain,” she demanded, crossing her arms over her chest.
Mace paced in front of her. “We didn’t make the first rendezvous to receive the coordinates for the second. The Condor we stole wasn’t fully charged. If I hadn’t come here, then we’d be adrift right now, at the mercy of anyone who came upon us.”
Her expression softened, arms dropping to her sides. “Why didn’t you make the rendezvous?” She jerked her head toward a sitting area next to the lab.
They walked side by side. “We were picked up by a Guardian.”
Her head whipped to him on a sharp inhale, the color leached from her face. “A Guardian? How did you escape?”
They settled across from each other on a U-shaped sofa. “I overpowered the four guards they sent with me to the brig. They’d thought I’d been stunned. Then I found Nia in a lab.” He shook his head, a hard lump growing in his throat. “I heard her screams across the whole deck. They’d been torturing her mentally.” He hung his head. “She won’t talk about it.”
Lexi’s hand covered his. “I’m sorry she went through that, but it doesn’t change the fact that having you here, especially her, is extremely dangerous.”
He couldn’t deny it, but if there’d been an alternative, he would have taken it. “I need to make contact with the fleet as soon as possible and couldn’t do it from a Condor.”
But Lexi was already shaking her head. “It’s too risky. I wasn’t going to deliver my latest report until we took leave in two weeks’ time. Anything sent from here can be retraced. I can’t jeopardize our position like that. Not now.”
Her gaze moved over his shoulder, and Mace turned to see Justice walking toward them. Something about the man put him on edge—and it wasn’t because it was clear he and Lexi had some sort of relationship.
“How wasOriontaken?” Lexi asked, recalling his attention when Justice sat beside her.
“It was an inside job,” Mace said after a moment. “Well-planned with multiple people working together or they would never have been able to pull it off.” Nia’s confession came back to him, and he wondered again if she’d played a unintentional role. “All four engine cores were blown, power diverted, shields disabled—” He shook his head in disbelief. Saying it aloud highlighted how enormous the undertaking. How many traitors would it have taken to co-ordinate?Too many.“And two Guardians waiting to swoop in. They detonated a massive portion of the minefield to get through. We’ll have no foothold in the sector going forward.”
The nauseated expressions on the pairs’ faces matched the feeling inside Mace’s stomach. He and Lexi had been born and raised onOrion—and now their home was in the hands of the CORE.
