Loving Them

by Rebecca Royce

  Ari snorted, but Trenton nodded. I could see no laughter in his eyes. “I’ll keep that in mind. I believe you. Lucky guys. I had a wife who loved me like that once. She would have killed for me, and she was as sweet as the sun is bright over the Earth. Nothing will happen to them today.”

  I finally trusted him. “Thanks, Trenton.”

  We were almost to the transporter when I asked Ari, “What happened to his wife?”

  “She was caught by the Sandler Cartel giving aid to a ship that was drifting. She wasn’t the captain of the shuttle that stopped. She was a passenger. It was supposed to be an easy trip from Mars to Earth. One of the day trips. Everyone on the ship was killed. Her name was Lucia. He’ll never be okay again. But he hates the Sandler Cartel. Keeping those four who oppose Uncle G alive? He’ll see to it that it gets done.”

  I nodded, even as my heart broke for Trenton. “Thanks for making him their guard.”

  “Paloma.” He stared at the wall of the transporter. “Diana has been very sick. That zombie infection that keeps periodically showing up? She had it. Dane cured her of it on transport over here through the black hole, using some amazing medicine and tech that two of her husbands designed.”

  I grabbed his arm. “Husbands?”

  “That’s right. She had five of them over there. They were forcibly removed from her before she got bitten, and she’d all but prepared to die when her family finally got to her. She doesn’t look wonderful, but she will be fine physically. Dane’s such a genius; sometimes I forget just how much. Emotionally? She’s wounded right now. Her mother and I think seeing you might help.”

  The transporter stopped on the Alexanders’ private floor. All members of the council had their own wings of the station; it was a perk my father had always wished for. I used to hear about it endlessly.

  We’d been there earlier this week when we’d had dinner with the Alexanders. Standing in the hallway were C.J. and Geoff, Diana’s father.

  “Paloma.” C.J. grinned at me. “It’s been too long.” I’d had a massive crush on him for a while. He hugged me for a quick second before Diana’s father did. The same surreal sense that had overwhelmed me when I saw Melissa, Nolan, and Wes again came back. These were the people of my childhood. It was somehow bizarre to be back in their presence.

  Geoff nodded. “I think this is a great idea, Ari. Paloma is just what Diana needs.”

  “D’s going to be fine,” C.J. said firmly. “She’s her mother’s daughter. She’ll pull through.”

  Geoff looked away. “Do you remember what it was like when we were on this side of the black hole and she and Diana were on the other side? Do you remember what that felt like? What if we had believed we’d never see them again? I don’t know if I’d have survived it.”

  “True.” C.J. nodded. “But Melissa was surviving, and she thought we were gone forever.”

  “She had Diana.” The voice of Cooper came down the hall. He’d always scared the hell out of me. “She’d have done anything for her baby, even live through endless pain.”

  Ari took my arm. “Come on, Paloma.”

  “It’s very bad?” I could hardly ask the question. Melissa stood with Dane outside of a door, Nolan and Wes flanking her on both sides. They all stared at Dane. He turned as we walked toward them.

  Ari answered in a low voice. “It is. But it will get better. I’ll see to it.”

  “Paloma.” Dane gave me a small smile. “Has he warned you?”

  “He has.” Dane had seen me through Moon Flu when I’d been ten. He was a kind, gentle man. My mother had called him dashing when she whispered into my ear as he passed. I blinked away the memory, remembering what Ari had said about Melissa’s marriage. She was in charge, and that kept them happy.

  “All right then.” He pushed at the door. “If it’s too much, you don’t have to stay in there.”

  Melissa pounded her hand on the wall. “Don’t make her sound like she’s a monster. She’s not well right now; that’s all.”

  What had happened to Diana? I braced myself as I followed Ari through the door.

  12

  Diana Mallory

  I remembered the first time I ever saw Diana. We were both eight years old. Her mother was running Mars Station as a paid employee. Her grandfather was a big shot on Earth, and there were lots of stories about who Melissa had been before she’d been on this side of the galaxy. They weren’t powerful on the Station yet, but within the year, the Alexander family would be on the board and running the place. No one would ever hold as much power as they did on Mars Station.

  My mother had brought me to school. I was in a pink dress with my hair in two braids that travelled down my back, side by side, until they hit my rear end. I had pink ribbons to match and shiny black shoes. All of it was very expensive. The school catered to whoever lived on the station or visited for a time exceeding three months. Under three months, parents and caregivers were expected to care for their own children’s education.

  Diana and I had been the only girls, except my sister who was a year behind us. Women would become more plentiful on Mars Station, and their daughters would show up in school in the next few years. Melissa would make it the kind of place where they felt safe.

  My father had two daughters, and although his wife, my mother, was loaded with money, she had no political connections to help with Earth. That’s where he wanted to be. Mars Station was a step towards Earth. Politically conquer Mars Station, and he’d be on his way.

  I’d heard it all, over and over.

  My father had wanted every person in the place to know we had money, from the top down. Hence the stupid black shoes and the pink bows in my hair. Diana had been dressed quite differently. She was also in braids, but she was in synthetic denim overalls made for space travel. She had on a white t-shirt that had a small plaid symbol on the right sleeve and sneakers with socks that didn’t match.

  She’d been staring at the ceiling. With whispers as I walked by—which had to be because of the stupid shoes—I made my way over to her. We were the only girls, after all. I looked up. All I saw were the lights.

  “What are you looking at?”

  She turned her head slightly but otherwise didn’t look at me when she spoke. “The lights are going to go out.”

  “Not during the day.” I thought I knew everything. “At night they do to keep the station at a functioning day-night clock.” My mother had explained it a few weeks earlier, so of course, I knew.

  She grinned, and then her eyes met mine. I knew something instantly. The girl in front of me was smarter than I was, and she needed me terribly. People like my father wouldn’t be kind to her. She was too much on the outside and not enough in. She had to learn to pretend. “These lights above us are about to go out. We’re going to have a short in the system.”

  “How can you tell?”

  She sniffed the air. “I can smell it. Hear it. Taste it on my tongue. But no one else ever can. So I guess the answer to your question is that I just can.”

  The lights in the room went out.

  Now in this medical bay, the vibrant, quirky girl who was more beautiful than she ever realized, looked like she had come back from the dead. Her dark hair stuck to her scalp, her dark brown eyes were blank and dull. She was thinner than I’d ever seen her. The skin beneath her eyes was pink. Her lips were white. She leaned against the wall from where she sat, half upright, on the medical table. Her hands were crossed, one of them covering a bandaged part of the other arm.

  My heart turned over. This was my very best friend in the world, and something or someone had hurt her very badly. I wanted to hug her to me and never let go.

  She stared straight ahead, not looking when we came in.

  Ari cleared his throat. “I brought Paloma like I told you I would.”

  Her gaze moved, taking us both in. “I thought you were lying when you said she was here. I thought you were delusional. Or just fucking mean.” I’d never heard her curse before. I step
ped toward her, and then I stopped because she kept talking. “I thought you had to be lying because my friend Paloma Delacroix would know better than to come here, to this shithole floating in space, where my mother is the queen.” Diana sat forward. “I thought my best friend would have known when she finally got out of the Sisterhood to go literally anywhere else in the universe. I would have imagined better from her.”

  By the time she got to the last word, she was shouting. Her gaze was on Ari. “You’re Ari, right? That’s what they called you. Oh, Ari will help Diana. He’s really a psychiatrist. This will be something he can do. That’s you. Ari.” She jumped off the table. Well, at least her skin was pinkening. I knew that was a weird thought, but nothing about this seemed real. The person on the table looked like Diana… but she couldn’t be.

  Ari, by contrast, didn’t seem at all rattled. “That’s right. You and I have actually met before. Do you remember?”

  “No.” She shrugged. “Unless you were one of the people my parents sent me to for being weird. Were you someone expected to fix me?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t fix weird. I like weird.”

  “Here’s how it’s going to go, Ari.” The woman wearing Diana’s body walked toward him. “My uncle should have let me die. He should have known that waking up in this world feeling like this, without the loves of my life, was no way to live. Don’t you all take an oath? Shouldn’t I be dead?”

  He walked toward her. “Use your brain, sweetness. Do you think your Uncle Dane was going to kill you? Or do you think he’d let you in here with me if I would?”

  “That’s right. Because you’re all afraid of her. What would Melissa do?” She pointed all around. “Which medicines in here will take care of the job? Let me know. I’ll end it myself.”

  He snorted. “Not any, I’m afraid. Worst you’re going to get is an upset stomach and a trip into the med machine.”

  “Ah,” she screamed so loudly. She sounded like a wounded animal. I’d heard some at the Sisterhood. Dog-like creatures called the Hyunda would sound like that when they were dying. I backed up against the wall. She picked up a remote to something and threw it at Ari. Then a large piece of equipment that I thought scanned the eyes. Over and over she threw things at Ari until she finally gave up and launched herself at him.

  He caught her in his arms. “Paloma, you should go.” How did he not even sound stressed? “I’m sorry I did this to you. I was hoping for hugs and tears. You won’t believe this, but this is an improvement to yesterday. I’ll see you soon. The guys will be up by tomorrow.”

  I backed out of the room and nearly collided with Asher, Diana’s brother, who waited by the door. Diana was Geoff’s daughter and Asher was Cooper’s son, but they were all raised, as was the case in most multiple marriages, as though they were full siblings. Diana loved him.

  His eyes were huge, his skin pale. “This is my fault.”

  Cooper heard him down the hall. “Asher—”

  I ignored Asher’s father. “How could it be your fault?” He was a young man now, a teenager at least. Or close. I’d held him when he was a baby. Diana and I had dressed him up as various animals and paraded him around the promenade until we got told to stop.

  “She got zapped through that black hole saving me. I should have been with her. Or it should have been me.”

  I touched his shoulder gently. “I see.” I actually did. “Diana would never have wanted that, and she’s going to be fine.” I parroted C.J., but that was okay. “Ari Bennett, who’s in there, he’s a really good doctor. He fixes people when they’re sad, helps them learn how to live with it. He’s got this.”

  Asher blinked rapidly. “Do you think so?”

  “I do.”

  I didn’t, but I had hope.

  Trenton stood when I entered the suite. “All is quiet here. Not a peep.”

  “Thank you for keeping them safe.”

  He nodded at me before he left the suite, closing the door behind him. I could hardly breathe, and I was glad I’d faked my way through our interaction. Diana had lost her husbands, and it had broken her. Trenton had lost his wife, and it had destroyed him. I could understand all of it. If anything happened to the four men in this suite, I’d do more than throw things at Ari. I would be, to quote Tommy, done. Officially and completely lost to the universe.

  Driven like a possessed woman, I ran around the suite just to lay eyes on my husbands. They were all there, all breathing. I sunk to the floor in the living room. This marriage thing was going to give me a heart attack.

  Poor Diana. Poor Trenton. How did anyone survive that kind of loss? I had to get busy before I became obsessive. When we’d been on the shuttle, I’d asked Quinn if I could look for and speak to his missing uncles as a means of trying to get a better sense of his father. He’d told me I could. Probably I should speak to the others about it, too. Although at the moment, I could use the project. I was going to assume they wouldn’t have a problem with it.

  I took out my tablet. Information was easy to come by, particularly about famous people. A random farmer on the Isle of Laverne in the third space corridor? Not so much. Garrison Sandler and his family were there for the looking. Most of the information I knew; Garrison had been married five times and had twelve children. I blinked. Twelve? I only knew four of them. Who were the other eight, and where were all these women coming from that he kept marrying?

  I shook my head. The way the universe worked would never make sense to me. So many men living on planets, going their whole lives without even getting to talk to a woman and Garrison Sandler had five wives?

  I…

  A noise caught my attention, and I stopped my reading. Someone had moved in the suite. The guys hadn’t budged, not once. I rose, heading in the direction of the noise. Clay had shifted slightly on the bed. Was he starting to wake? I looked down at my tablet. He’d be in the early edge of the range of waking time, but he might very well be getting up soon. I climbed in next to him. There wasn’t any reason I couldn’t read about Sandler history pressed up to a Sandler while I did it.

  He sighed, pressing his head against my side. Yes, he was definitely waking up soon. I looked down at my tablet and kept reading. The brothers’ names were listed. I was going to have to get onto an outside server, and then I would…

  “Hey, beautiful.” Clay kissed my cheek. “Nice to wake up to you here.”

  I set aside my tablet and rolled over to hold him tighter. He kissed my forehead. “How long did I sleep?”

  “Just a little over twenty-four hours. You’re the first up.” He hadn’t really opened his lids more than a slit yet.

  Clay nodded, cuddling closer. “Love you.”

  It was so nice to hear his voice. The last thing Clay needed after being medically induced into a relaxing sleep was to wake up hearing me either crying or complaining. I had to pull it together. He finally took a deep breath and opened his eyes fully. There were his Sandler blues staring at me with nothing but love in his deep depths.

  “Hi.” I knew we’d already covered that, but I wanted to say it again. And again. And again.

  He kissed the tip of my nose. “Don’t let Ari drug me again, okay? Not without at least having a discussion with me first. I’m not suggesting he’s wrong—I actually feel clearer about my case now—but I’m not sure a lovely steak dinner, you in lingerie, and whisky that wasn’t drugged wouldn’t have done the same thing for me.”

  “Having you guys so completely out cold for so long… I won’t ever let Ari do that again. Besides, I think he’s got his hands full for a while.” I pushed my head to his chest and breathed him in. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be sorry; you had the best intentions. I am totally relaxed.” Under the covers, his hand moved until he unzipped my pants.

  I sucked in my breath. “I thought you were relaxed.”

  “I am.” He grinned at me. “Now I want you that way.”

  Clay tugged my pants down my legs and then followed up by t
aking my underpants off, too. Goosebumps broke out all over my body. His mouth met my own as he stroked my clit with his fingers. He circled my sensitive bud, and I cried out against him. Eyes closed, he seemed perfectly content to tease me and nothing more.

  I reached between us, managing to get my hands down his pants to stroke his cock. It got harder in my hand. Clay moaned against me. “You were born for me, you know that, right? There’s no way the universe didn’t plan this.”

  He was so sweet. I’d never heard him get philosophical before. I bit down on his lower lip, and his cock jumped beneath my fingers. “I know that I love you, Clay. I don’t believe in much, but I do believe in us.”

  That must have been the right thing to say. We pulled at each other’s clothes until we were naked, and then he was inside of me. I didn’t need any more warm up, and he must not have either. He hardened fully, my body stretching to welcome him home. We were facing each other on the bed, side-by-side, and this was a new position for me. I lifted my leg, and he pressed deeper.

  “Clay,” I whispered because I had to.

  He put his head on my shoulder. “Fuck, I love you. I love you.”

  I knew he did. I could feel it all the way deep inside of me, where my heart met his soul. We came together. It was sweet and perfect. I loved that man.

  I stood over the stove, spooning sauce into Clay’s mouth. “Good? Bad? Eh?”

  He winked at me. “It’s good. What is it?”

  “My own invention. I was so sick of potatoes at the Sisterhood. I had to find a sauce to make them palatable again. Hence, this concoction. Oh, I’m making potatoes tonight. Might just be you and me. They could sleep another twenty-four hours.”

  He stretched, his shirt coming up a little bit to show off his tight abs for a second before it dropped back down. “The whole time I was sleeping, I wasn’t hungry, I didn’t have to pee. Just nothing. Then it all came back to life.” He winked at me. “All of it.”