Perhaps that was why the name seemed to stick in her head, turning over and over. If he were one of Ellian’s associates, she would have heard of him before. She was glad she had used a pseudonym. She could not afford for him to tell Ellian what she was doing.
And Ellian could not see Talon. If he knew the man…
Something caught the edge of her vision, a small train of luggage carts. Three heavy crates sat half-hidden by the heavy plastic curtains, and Aryn reached out to take Ellian’s hand, turning him away. She needed to be careful. She needed to keep his attention for as long as it took.
“It will be strange to leave. I’ll miss you.” She almost thought she meant it.
“I will miss you as well.” His face was unreadable. “It has been a difficult few months. When you return, Aryn…will we start again, do you think? Can we?”
No. She should tell him the truth.
“I think so,” she lied, smiling up at him. “You have been troubled, Ellian. Has business been so bad?”
He paused before answering, and she tried to hold his gaze. The crates were almost loaded. Only a few more moments…
“I tire of being treated as a merchant is treated,” Ellian said at last. “We have risen so far, you and I. How dare they tell us we are not as good as they are?”
“Who tells you such things?” It was a genuine question, startled out of her. New Arizona was composed of just such people as Ellian, who had pulled themselves from the gutters of a dozen different worlds. No one here, surely, would look down on Ellian.
His stony face, however, assured her that someone had. He paused, considering, then shook his head.
“It need not concern you.”
“Then I shall not be concerned.” Steeling herself, Aryn stood on tip-toe to kiss him as the last crate disappeared into the belly of the ship. “I should board now.”
“At least let me walk you to the ship.” Now, at last, Ellian looked sad.
“Of course.” Aryn tried not to let her questions show on her face. He had never been one for sentimentality before, but now his hand was locked around hers, squeezing her fingers until they ached; when she looked over, he was gazing straight ahead. He did not even seem to see the world before him. At the ramp, he kissed her again, his tongue sliding into her mouth, his fingers tangled in her hair, and she tried to hold herself still. She must not flinch. She closed her eyes against the sight of Cade looking away.
At the top of the ramp, she waved before making her way into the gently curving passageways of the ship. They walked quickly, Cade still painfully silent, his green eyes fixed ahead of him. He had not slept well the night before, she could see—but then, neither had she. She had lain awake for what felt like half the night, wishing she’d had the courage to pull him down for a kiss, a real kiss. What would his lips feel like? What about the faint stubble on his cheeks? She drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly, feeling her cheeks warm, hoping Cade would not notice and ask what was going on.
Takeoff was quick, and Aryn laughed as her hair floated up around her shoulders before the artificial gravity kicked in. She felt free, more so than she could remember feeling in years. She was wearing pants for the first time in months, and not a speck of makeup, and as the transport banked away, something seemed to release in her chest. She looked over at Cade, and he smiled back at her.
“You like flying?” He looked faintly green, poor man.
“I’m just happy.” As the notification dinged, she unhooked from her seat and watched him do the same.
He prowled around the room, lifting the pillows and the mattress. A small cot had been set up for him at the foot of her bed and he examined that. He ran his fingers up the seams in the wall paneling, tapped at the lights, and paced the carpet in a pattern she could make neither head nor tail of. A thorough investigation of the ceiling turned up one loose panel, but nothing behind it. The taps and cupboards in the bathroom were all checked, as was the closet. A few scans from a handheld device, and Cade turned to her with a decisive nod.
“All safe.” His smile died as he saw the look on her face. “What is it?”
She swallowed. She’d promised herself she would tell him the truth and now was the best time. Now, she should come clean. He wouldn’t stop her, would he? He might even know something about Talon. He could tell her what would be best to do when they arrived on Ymir.
She just didn’t want to tell him. She looked around herself, and then—realizing the possibility of listening devices—tapped her ear, a question in her eyes. He shook his head slightly.
“You may speak freely.” He was waiting for something, she realized.
She mentally prepared herself, standing straight, chin up, shoulders back. I’ve bought several crates of weapons and I’m going to give them to the resistance. I’ve bought several crates of weapons and I’m going to give them to the resistance. I’ve…
Instead, as she walked toward him, her hands reached out to take hold of his suit. As if in a dream, she felt his arms slide around her, and he lifted her easily. His body hard against hers, her skin on fire for his touch, Aryn leaned forward and pressed her lips against his.
Chapter 19
She was in his arms, eyes drifting closed as she kissed him. He had imagined the touch of her mouth for weeks, and now it consumed him, her lips parting under his, her body pressed close. He could smell the soap she used, the scent that had become more intoxicating to him than any wine.
“We can’t do this,” Cade murmured against her mouth.
She shook her head, whether in protest or agreement he had no idea. When he set her down, however, she stood on tiptoe, one arm still around his neck to pull him down. The other palm burned against his chest like a brand. He wanted to sweep her into his arms again and deposit her on the bed, hear her shriek of laughter and feel her fingers fumble at the buttons of his shirt. He could feel, like a pleasant hallucination, how it would be to press her down onto the bed, her legs twining around his. She would reach up to hold his face while she kissed him. She would bite her lip when he pulled away to strip off his jacket—
How he broke away, he did not know. His breath was ragged.
“I—” He didn’t know how to finish the sentence. He needed to go, that was all. If he stayed…
He needed to leave.
And he might have pulled it off, too, if he hadn’t looked back at her as he strode to the door. She was standing as if in a dream, her fingers up to brush at her lips, almost in wonder. He had never seen her look so peaceful—and he had never seen her look so sad, either. Her eyes flicked up to meet his, startlingly blue in this light, and she opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out.
“I have to leave.” It was a plea. He hoped she understood.
“Wait.”
His hand shook on the doorknob. He was going to go insane if he didn’t leave now, but her voice froze him.
“I’m…I bought weapons.” The words came out very small. She looked at him as if he was supposed to know what that meant, and when his eyes roamed over her, searching for the distortion of knives or guns under her jacket, she shook her head impatiently. “For the resistance.”
The world seemed to disappear. He could feel his hand on the doorknob, but beyond that there was only a rushing in his ears. He could see nothing. He was not thinking. There was only horror.
“Cade?” Her voice jolted him back to awareness, and he looked over slowly.
She swallowed, but she stood her ground. Her hands were in fists now.
“What did you say?” Cade asked her, hoping against hope that he’d dreamed the past few seconds.
“That was where I used the money I got from pawning my necklaces,” Aryn said simply. “You were right. I don’t gamble.”
It was odd. Usually, solving puzzles pleased him—a mystery solved, part of the world revealed. And he’d solved truly awful puzzles before. Where were the slaves? Where were the drugs? Why was one man on the transport acting strangely? Solving
puzzles meant facts, and facts meant he could act.
Except, of course, now. Now, he was filled with a blank sort of horror and a rising fury.
“Cade? Please. Please say something.”
“Do you have any idea what you’ve done?” He gritted the words out from beneath clenched teeth. She couldn’t possibly have known that she was getting herself into, but good God, shouldn’t have had at least the smallest inkling of it? Shouldn’t she have realized, if she thought for even a second, that she was getting in way over her head? That…
But of course she hadn’t thought. She’d acted on impulse, like the pampered little trophy wife she was. She was sheltered from the worst of the Warlord’s excesses, Ellian had said, and clearly it was true. Someone ought to have told her before now, because she was going to learn her lesson very quickly. And she probably, he thought, almost detached, wasn’t going to survive it.
Then the world snapped back into place. She hadn’t known. This was the anger talking, the anger that always seemed to beat in his blood now, coming in a rush he could neither predict nor resist. Anger. It was usually anger, and most of the time he preferred it that way—the alternative was the deep, yawning black and the deadening knowledge that he would spend the rest of his life like this, waiting and waiting for danger, scanning the faces of the ones who passed him by in the street, oblivious, defenseless…
“Cade.” Aryn’s hand touched his arm, and he jerked away out of reflex. He sank his face into one hand, rubbing at his forehead.
“Give me a second.”
She hadn’t known. How could she have? And even a day ago, he had felt a swell of pride at her bravery. She was taking meaningless luxury and turning it into help, wasn’t she? She hadn’t curled into a little ball when she found out Ellian’s true nature, or even slunk back to Ymir in disgrace. She had taken the resources at her disposal and she was going to do something meaningful with them. She had only overreached herself. That was all.
“Aryn.” He spoke her name before he looked up, and felt her worry like a blow. “This was well-intentioned, but it will kill you. We need to turn this ship around and go back.”
“No.” The answer was reflexive. “No, we don’t. I won’t do it.”
“If you deliver these weapons to Ymir—”
“They’ll have a fighting chance!” Her voice rang out wildly. “Don’t you see?”
“I do see. And Aryn, I know more about this than…” He looked away. “You don’t understand what you’ve done. You want to help them?”
“Yes,” she whispered.
“Then go back.” He tried to decide whether or not to tell her, but the words came out before he could make up his mind. “The rebellion is doomed,” he told her flatly. “There’s a chance that—well, never mind that.” Now was not the time to tell her about Talon’s involvement. It would only give her false hope. She, Aryn, needed not to be on Ymir right now. “If you do this…you’ll just be one more body.”
And I can’t live with that. Those words, of all of them, stuck in his throat. The only ones she might have understood, and he couldn’t seem to say them.
Her face had gone white, but she didn’t back down. She stared at him with pure fury in her eyes, and her chin lifted.
“Then I’ll be one more body.”
“Aryn!”
“No, you listen! I am not going to sit here for the rest of my life and know that I did nothing. I left them there and ran away with the Warlord’s—” She searched for the word.
“Quartermaster?” Cade supplied.
The look she shot him said she was far from happy for his intervention.
“Aryn, you did. And you said they let you. And do you know why?”
She narrowed her eyes, but curiosity got the better of her.
“Why?”
“Because they love you.” He had never met a single one of these people, and yet he had never known anything with such certainty. “You know what Ellian said to me that first day?” She flinched, but she needed to hear this. “He said he could no more have left you on Ymir than he could have snuffed out a star. Of all things he told me, Aryn, that one I believe. And I believe that’s why your family let you go. That’s why they lied. You had a way out, and they knew there was no hope for them. No one could know you and not wish you that happiness.”
Her eyes filled with tears, but she did not come to him for comfort. She did not, he saw, want comfort.
“They were wrong, then. It’s not a kindness to lie to me. It wasn’t their right. I should have known.”
“If you had known…”
“I’d have done something like this sooner,” she said flatly. “Or I suppose I might have stayed with the rebellion.”
That shocked him into silence.
“Are you surprised?” she asked him bitterly. “Did the Dragon not figure it out?”
He watched silently, at a loss. There was venom here he could not name, and a flush building in her cheeks. Her hands were clenched.
“You may think it’s a lost cause,” she told him, her voice low and ugly. “And maybe it is. But in this war, you don’t pick your side because of who you think will win. You pick it because it’s right. And if they’re going to die, then I’m going to die with them. I will do anything in my power to make the Warlord pay.” She crossed her arms, satisfaction on her face. “And Talon is going to help me.”
It felt like he’d been doused with ice water.
“I’m sorry, what did you say?”
“Talon is going to help me,” she repeated.
And Talon was not a common name.
“Talon Rift?” he asked her, and she swallowed. Her nod was fractional. “Is he on the ship with us?”
Another nod.
Dear God, what had he stumbled into?
The click of the door behind him was perfectly timed. But it would be, of course. Talon would have been listening. Cade was at Aryn’s side before she could react, half-throwing her across the bed to sprawl on the floor as his gun came up, Talon’s head in his sights.
Chapter 20
“You son of a bitch.” Cade’s voice was filled with a rising fury. A lesser man would be shaking, but not him. With Talon in his sights, he had gone cold and still.
Talon, whoever he was, did not draw his weapon. His hands were up, his eyes locked on Cade.
Neither man was paying her the slightest attention. Wincing, Aryn pushed herself up off the ground. Her breath was coming short. She had to admit she admired the results of Cade’s quick action—she just wished, considering that Talon didn’t seem to be armed, that it hadn’t been quite so painful.
“Listen to me.” Talon’s voice was quiet, but commanding. Like Cade, he was broad-shouldered, holding himself with the grace of a large predator. Like Cade, he seemed to own any room he walked into, not in command, but in knowledge. He wasn’t looking at her, but Aryn was quite sure that he knew exactly where she was. She wouldn’t get a foot toward him before she was dead.
“It isn’t what it looks like,” Talon told Cade. “I promise you that. Let me explain.”
“There’s nothing to explain,” Cade hissed back.
“He’s not armed,” Aryn protested. This was the mild-mannered contact who had gotten her the guns? Something didn’t add up. She had to know the truth.
“Oh, he’s armed,” Cade said flatly. “A Dragon is always armed.”
A Dragon? Aryn pushed herself to her feet, furious. She didn’t even think, just launched herself at Talon.
Impact slammed her sideways onto the bed, and Cade caught her before she sprawled, yanked her against his chest. She could feel his heartbeat racing against her cheek. He shielded her with his body, turned away, his gun still pointed. She would bet, she thought somewhat woozily, that it had never wavered, even as he held her back from Talon.
“You were always the best.” Talon’s voice seemed always amused. “Put the gun down, Williams, I’m not here to hurt anyone. I’m on your side—both of you.”
“Like hell you are,” Cade said, his voice low.
She was glad Cade didn’t believe him. Her head still clearing, Aryn curled against the warmth of his chest. She had been angry about something… Her eyes snapped open, and she craned around Cade to glare at Talon.
“I don’t want your help. Not yours.”
Both men looked at her, surprised.
“You…hired him,” Cade reminded her.
“Before I knew he was a Dragon.” Aryn pulled herself away with an effort, and a twinge of regret.
“You see?” Cade’s smile was bitter. “Even she knows you’re playing both sides. Aryn, stay behind me.”
“I’m not playing both sides.” For the first time, there was the hint of anger in Talon’s voice. “Let me speak, Williams. You know very well that if I meant any harm to you, I’d never have tried to take you on in a fight.”
Slowly, reluctantly, Cade’s arm dropped.
“You’re going to believe him?” Aryn demanded.
“Aryn, Talon was my commanding officer.” Cade shook his head. He looked back warily at Talon for a moment. “I’m not sure what he’s doing here, but the fact is, if he wanted us dead…we’d be dead.”
“No, the fact is, unless we want the rebellion wiped out, we need him dead!” She threw her arm out, pointing. “He’s not going to help us! I’ll do it if you won’t.”
“Ms. Beranek.” Talon’s voice was dry. “While I have only admiration for your many fine qualities, I must inform you that I do not take kindly to people trying to kill me.”
“And I,” Aryn shot back, “do not forgive the Warlord’s pets. Cade, give me the gun.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“He’s a Dragon!” Aryn scrabbled at his arms. Cade held the gun away from her easily, damn him. “Everyone knows what they are!”
“What? What does that mean?”
Dragon's Honor (The Dragon Corps Series Book 1) Page 11
