“Then I’ll be there.”
Trip recovered his space legs by the time they approached the trader gate and willingly sat at the nav console, determined, it appeared, not only to learn all he could but to prove his worth.
“Don’t fret about it,” Kaidee told him when he haltingly tried to apologize for his hasty exit earlier. “You hung in longer than most. I’ve worked regular gate transits that have puke on the decking.”
That made him grin and prevented her further explanation that the reason those crew members tossed their guts was that they’d been out drinking heavily hours before. Hangovers and choppy gate transits didn’t mix well.
She also saw why Trip was fascinated with his uncle Philip. He had Philip’s love of spacecraft and an unending desire to do better. Knocking Trip Guthrie on his ass only made him more determined to succeed next time.
Shame he’d be forced to fit into a corporate mold. There were downsides, she realized, to being a Guthrie.
“If you expect the turbulence,” she told him after they’d crossed the gate, “it’s not half as bad. If I hit an old smuggler’s gate and it wasn’t choppy, then I’d worry. It’s not what the ship’s doing but whether what it’s doing is normal. Got it?”
“It’s like when Uncle Ethan’s sailboat heels over in a stiff wind. Your center of gravity is off but the boat’s performing as it should. You accept the boat is doing what it was designed to do.”
“You are totally apex, Mr. Trip.”
That got him blushing again and heading belowdecks for the galley—to see if his tweaking with the food dispenser would, this time, produce redberry ice cream.
A few hours later, she lay in Devin’s arms in the middle of her bed, listening to his laughter rumble in his chest. “Starship captain or chef, eh? Somehow I don’t think Jonathan would approve of either.”
“I’m sure Trip knows that.” She snuggled more tightly against him. “But he needs to find outlets that aren’t Guthrie-designed. I’m sure eventually he’ll be another Jonathan or Devin or J.M.—”
“I rank ahead of J.M.? I’m flattered.”
“—or whatever his corporate specialty turns out to be. But he needs to be Trip too. A little rebellion now and then is good for the soul.”
He sighed, his hand absently skimming up and down the curve of her bare hip. “That can be problematic sometimes.”
“If you weren’t a Guthrie, what do you think you’d be doing?”
That garnered a low snort.
“No, seriously,” she said. “Didn’t you ever have dreams? I mean, I can’t believe that when you were five or ten years old you said, oh, yes, I want to be chief financial-operations officer of Guthrie Global Financial Assets.”
“If I remember correctly,” he said slowly, “when I was five or ten years old, I was told that’s what I was going to be.”
Kaidee turned on her side, propping herself up on one elbow. “That sucks.”
“There were times I thought so.” He gazed up at her, his eyes half hooded. “Right now I think it’s incredibly wonderful.”
She smiled and trailed her fingers down through his dark mat of chest hair and over the taut muscles of his abdomen. “Then I think it’s time for another crazy lesson.”
His breath stuttered as her fingers caressed the length of his erection. He pulled her face to his, his kiss fierce and demanding. Intoxicating.
Incredibly wonderful. Totally Devin.
A series of discordant chimes woke her three hours later. Ah, slippery space. It liked to invent navigational points that didn’t exist. She’d already patched in one code fix to the autoguidance system. Time for the second.
“Makaid’n?” Devin’s voice was a low, sleepy growl.
“Hush.” She stroked his hair. “Minor nav tweak. Be right back.”
He snorted something and rolled over.
She slipped out of bed, grabbed for her sweatpants and thermal shirt, and padded to the main cabin, pulling her clothes on as she went. Fifteen minutes later, she not only had autoguidance back on course but she was, annoyingly, wide awake. She peeked into her bedroom. Dev was sleeping heavily.
She went back to the main room, ordered a hot sweet tea from the slurp-and-snack, then settled into the chair in front of her data terminal. She played a few hands of Zentauri against the computer, then, bored, closed out the program and brought up the news-feed database. The bombing of Devin’s office puzzled her. It seemed so unrelated to Halsey’s death and the kidnapping attempts on Trip. How could someone possibly know Devin would be the one to try to rescue Trip? Or was the bombing of his office another matter entirely?
She’d been away from GGS for two years, and she hadn’t paid all that much attention to their corporate machinations when she was there. So she initiated a search on all news data in the past planetary month for both Garno and Sylvadae that contained the Guthrie name. Maybe there was a merger, a lawsuit, a change of command. It could be anything where someone felt they were wronged or slighted. It might have nothing at all to do with Trip—
Grallin Emberson and Tia Delaris Emberson are pleased to announce the engagement of their daughter, Tavia Delaris Emberson, to Devin Jonathan Guthrie.
The images that jumped out at her were beautiful, sophisticated, and left no doubt that it wasn’t someone else with the same name. It was Devin, elegantly suited, the perfunctory GGS silk scarf threaded through the collar of a cream-colored shirt, silver-rimmed eyeglasses framing smoky-blue eyes.
His right arm wrapped around the waist of a tall dark-haired woman who was … gorgeous. Skin the color of burnt honey, large dark eyes slightly tilted, full mouth in a poised and confident pout. She was vidstar slender, her white sweater clinging to full breasts. A seapearl-and-diamond necklace that probably cost as much as the Rider’s entire nav system encircled her throat.
Tavia. She remembered Devin mentioning a Tavia.
Kaidee couldn’t breathe. It was an aborted jump transit, a bone-jarring and damned-near-fatal dump-out all over again. But it was happening within the confines of her body, her heart, her mind, and not her ship.
… announce the engagement of their daughter, Tavia Delaris Emberson, to Devin Jonathan Guthrie.
The date. It had to be something from years ago. Though her whirling brain couldn’t remember any talk of Devin being engaged when she piloted the Triumph, maybe it was old news. An old entry. It was …
… last week. The announcement was dated the day she found Trip in the back corridors of Dock Five.
God. Damn. It. God. Damn … She shoved her fist into her mouth and bit down, hard, on her fingers. The physical pain jolted her, kicking her brain back into gear.
It was Kiler all over again. Kiler and his lies, his false declarations of love, telling her what he knew she wanted to hear so he could get her to do what he wanted her to do. In Devin’s case, he needed a ship and he needed a pilot, and he’d paid for the services of both. Obviously his definition of services was in line with his brother Ethan’s.
And why should that surprise her? More than once she’d watched Ethan in some spaceport bar, his right hand at the waist of some suggestively clad young woman while in his left he held his pocket comm, telling his wife back on Sylvadae that he loved her and missed her.
Kaidee hunched over, wrapping her arms around her midsection. God damn Devin. A man she cared about. A man she believed was honorable. This hurt. This really, really hurt.
She lifted her face and stared toward the short darkened hallway leading to her bedroom, shame washing over her. She was sure Barty knew not only that Devin was sleeping with her—oh, hell. Let’s be realistic. Screwing her. Devin was screwing her, and Barty not only knew that but knew about the lovely bejeweled bride-to-be, Tavia.
Kaidee felt cheap, dirty. Betrayed. Again.
Every inch of her wanted to charge back in her bedroom, rip the sheet from Devin’s body, and kick him out into the corridor. Naked. Cold. With luck, he’d break his glasses and his nose
when his face hit the decking.
But then he and Barty could laugh about what low-class trash she was, punching it out with him like a common prosti.
She stared at the screen, the words of the engagement announcement blurring. She wiped at her eyes, then reached out and touched the print icon in the screen’s lower left corner. The only sounds in the room were her own ragged breathing and the soft shushing of the thin sheet of paper moving across the tray below the data terminal.
With a trembling hand she pulled it out, padded softly to the bedroom, and then slipped it under Devin’s glasses on her nightstand. Then, just as quietly, she plucked her uniform shirt, pants, and boots from her closet and headed for the bridge. The only place she truly belonged.
Devin rolled over, the slow increase in illumination bringing him to wakefulness. It was morning—or, rather, shipmorning, given where he was. Which was in the middle of something Makaiden called slippery space. Bumpy space was more like it. He stretched, reaching for her …
The sheets were cold to the touch.
He opened his eyes. No Makaiden. Then a hazy memory surfaced. Something about the navigation program. And slippery space. Next trip, he promised himself as he swung his legs out of bed, he was hiring a pilot so he and his beloved captain could at least wake up together. And continue their crazy lessons or dancing lessons or whatever their hearts and bodies wanted at that moment.
At this moment, he wanted Makaiden.
He perched on the edge of the bed, listening. No sound of movement from the main room. No encouraging aroma of tea or coffee.
“Makaiden?”
No answer.
Hell. He reached for his glasses, his fingers brushing against a sheet of paper with—
He froze. His own face and Tavia’s stared back at him. He didn’t need to put his glasses on to know what he was looking at: the engagement announcement his mother and Tavia had drafted. No, more than drafted. Polished, perfected, and released.
His gut clenched as if he’d been sucker punched. No, no, Makaiden didn’t understand. That was … not him, not his life anymore. “Makaiden!”
He shoved himself to his feet and lunged for the main room, naked, his glasses dangling from his fingers. “Makaiden!”
He whirled around, heart pounding. The room was empty.
Damn it. Damn it! He plowed back into the bedroom, grabbing underclothes, pants, shirt, pulling them on, unconcerned with what was tucked in, what was straight. He needed to find her, explain, apologize. God, what must she be thinking … A dozen damning things came to mind. She didn’t understand. He had to make her understand.
He couldn’t lose her.
He punched the palm pad next to the door, then charged into the corridor. A few steps brought him to the lift, and he almost hesitated, but, no, if she was upset she wouldn’t be in the galley. He moved doggedly for the bridge.
The hatchlock was open; the bridge was in semi-darkness. She was in the pilot’s chair, her chair, angled partway toward the nav console on her right. Only the green-tinged glow from various console screens and the paler glow from the docupad in her lap served as sources of light. Her shoulders stiffened as he strode in, but she didn’t turn her chair, didn’t take her gaze from whatever was on the pad.
He stopped when less than three feet separated them. His throat felt tight. He wasn’t sure if the pain he felt radiated from her or from deep within himself. “Makaiden.”
“Request denied.” Her voice was flat.
He raked both hands through his hair. They came back down to his sides, fisted. “I can explain. It’s not what you think.” He inhaled slowly, trying to calm his stuttering heart. He exhaled. Silence.
Then she shifted, chin raised, and regarded him from over one shoulder. “You’re absolutely right. It’s not what I think.” She said the last three words forcefully. “I think you’re a friend. I think you respect me. And I think that I have value in your life. So you’re right. It’s not what I think at all. It’s what you are: owner of this ship. But you don’t own me. I’m not part of the package. Now get off my bridge.”
She turned abruptly back to her pad.
He grasped for something to say, but the phrases he needed refused to come. Emotions he kept tamped down for so many years coursed through him, almost paralyzing him. He felt mute, stupid. You’re wrong! kept surfacing. But that wouldn’t make things right.
“I don’t love Tavia. I never have.” He blurted out the words. It was a bare-bones confession and less than skillful. But it was the truth.
Then, as she stared at him, he realized it also made him look callous, shallow. “What I mean is—”
“You have so little regard for her feelings that you’d damn her to a loveless marriage?” She gave a short, harsh laugh. “You’re a real prince.”
“She doesn’t love me either.” And he never intended for there to be a marriage, just the engagement he and Tavia agreed would keep both sets of parents pacified.
“Then you deserve each other.” She went back to her pad.
The truth in her statement jarred him. “Makaiden—”
“It’s Captain Griggs, Mr. Guthrie.” She continued tapping at the pad. “I’m working out the figures for piloting your ship from Dock Five to Talgarrath, based on the current fees as posted by the CFTC. It’s a standard rate. I think you can afford it. I’ll have an invoice for you when we dock at Lufty’s.” She glanced over at him. “Sexual services rendered this trip are on the house. But don’t expect that to happen again.”
Her words hit him like a slap in the face. He would have preferred a slap. He almost wished she’d come at him, screaming and punching, because that anger, that pain was something he not only felt he deserved but it was something he could understand. It would get it out of her system. She would cry and he would hold her, apologize, and this would be behind them. A mistake made, rectified, forgiven. But she’d gone cold, detached. This was services rendered in a business relationship, and there was no place for forgiveness in that.
He understood that only too well. He’d lived his life that way for a long time. But something had shifted in him when he found Makaiden, when she was no longer just an unattainable fantasy but a very real, warm, intelligent woman he’d long admired and who now could be his.
Kiler’s dead. If someone had asked him what words had the capability of changing his entire life, he would never have guessed they’d be Kiler’s dead. But they were. And they had.
And this is what he got for breaking J.M.’s rules. Hell to pay. This was hell.
“But—”
“Your rules. When I want you off the bridge, I tell you, and you comply. I’m telling you for the last time: get off my bridge.”
He had told her that. And if he broke that rule now, he knew she’d believe he had no honor at all. There would be a time when he would, somehow, make her understand. This was not the time. He nodded mutely and turned away.
An hour later, Barty found him in the galley dining area, clutching a mug of tea—his ineffective attempt at breakfast—long gone cold. The older man still walked slowly and his breathing still wheezed. His eyesight and acumen were as sharp as ever.
“Why do I get the feeling that you’ve done something abysmally stupid?” He eased down into the chair across from Devin’s.
Devin sighed and scrubbed at his face with his hands. He needed a shave. “Where’s Trip?”
“Sprawled on a bunk in the crew quarters, engrossed in Elementary Piloting Procedures for In-System Freighters. Evidently Captain Griggs found some of her old academy vidtexts and uploaded them to his bookpad.”
“Captain Griggs found my engagement announcement to Tavia in the last data feed.”
“Ah.” Barty leaned back, drumming his fingers on the table. “I saw your mother working on it. Can I assume you neglected to inform our dear captain of that situation?”
“It honestly slipped my mind.”
“Slipped? Or avoiding confrontation?”
He couldn’t deny that. But when would have been the right time in the past two, three days to tell Makaiden that, oh, by the way, I have an engagement party waiting for me when I get back home? When he was dancing with her, trailing kisses down her neck? Or when he was tangled in the bedsheets with her after one of her “crazy lessons”? He nodded slowly. “You’ve known me a long time. I’m not comfortable with conflict.”
Barty shoved himself to his feet, then patted Devin on the shoulder on his way to the galley. “That may be true. But then, some women are worth fighting for.”
——————
Kaidee put the half-eaten cheese toast back on the plate and pushed the tray away. Not much of a dinner but, as with her soup-in-a-mug lunch, she’d eaten only to have something to do. She turned back to her ship’s data, scrolling, blinking, and occasionally beeping across her console on the bridge. There was really nothing to watch, no reason she should still be here other than she wasn’t yet ready to face her quarters, and she had again braved the galley only long enough to grab the toast and flee back up to her pilot’s chair.
She needed sleep. She was bone-tired and, worse than that, emotionally exhausted. How could things go so well—discounting being threatened and shot at—and then go so horribly wrong?
And in only three or four days?
It was only three or four days, a little voice chided her. A brief fling, an affair. Get a grip, Kaid. Grow up. Women your age have flings all the time. Hell, Pops’s daughter back on Dock Five was younger than Kaidee, and she had a new lover every few weeks. She probably assigned them numbers.
If Devin had been a number, it wouldn’t have bothered her. Trouble was, Devin was Devin. She knew him—had known him—for years.
As she’d known Kiler for years. Obviously, both her long-range and short-range personal scanners sucked miserably when it came to finding trustworthy men.
So? It’s not as if this Tavia will find out about what happened. It’s not as if you’re going to be invited to the wedding. Plus, it’s already history. And he is just a number: an invoice number. By end of tomorrow you can file him away under PAID and forget about it.
Rebels and Lovers Page 26
