“What’s a—” She paused midsentence as the shuttle went completely dark.
One second she was strapped into her chair. In the next, she was standing in the center of an unfamiliar bridge. The explosion from the shuttle was so bright through the main bridge portal that it temporarily blinded her.
Until a cry rang out from the engineer on her right, alerting the crew that they had intruders.
Caillen, Hauk and Fain leapt into action. Desideria spun and tried to disarm the first crew member who reached her. But disarming an Andarion was something easier said than done. He didn’t react to pain at all.
Did they not have the same nervous system?
He picked her up, literally, and threw her against the wall. The impact knocked the wind out of her as pain exploded through her entire being. In all the fights she’d had in her life, none of them had prepared her for this amount of damage. While she’d been bludgeoned and punched, no one had ever thrown her across the room before.
She tried to push herself to her feet, but she couldn’t. Oh my God, I’m helpless. That feeling horrified her.
Dazed, she felt the Andarion grab her from behind. He wrapped his arm around her throat and choked her until her ears rang and her vsion dimmed.
Suddenly, she was free. She turned to see Caillen beating the Andarion so hard she wasn’t sure how he kept standing. It was fierce and impressive.
Fain whistled to get Caillen’s attention. “Enough! We have control of the ship. Focus, drey, focus.”
Caillen appeared to calm down, except for the wild look in his eyes. It was obvious he was more than ready to continue the fight. But somehow he maintained control of himself.
Hauk and Fain directed the four-man crew toward the escape pods with their blasters. “Take the controls, Cai, while we toss out the trash.”
Caillen held his hand out to her to help her to her feet. “You dead?” The humor in his voice undercut the dead seriousness of his gaze. If she didn’t know better, she’d think he was worried about her.
“Close, but not yet. Thanks for the assist.”
There was a softening in his gaze that made her stomach flutter. She didn’t know why, but she had a feeling that his anger was actually over the Andarion attacking her…
“Anytime.” With an adorable and sheepish dip of his head that was completely out of character, he turned and went to the controls. It was only then she realized that at some point over the last hour, he’d removed his contacts and had his normal dark eyes. Most likely because it limited his peripheral vision in a fight and while flying.
But when had he removed them?
And why did the sight of his real eyes do such peculiar things to her body? She was both hot and cold. Shivery. Not wanting to think about that, she took a moment to push her pain into submission and to watch as Caillen slid into the chair to begin working the controls as if he’d been born to them. As much as she hated to feed his overbloated ego, he really was a great pilot. Every bit as skilled as he’d claimed and the fact he was piloting a ship with controls and monitors that weren’t his native tongue or Universal was even more impressive.
Before she even realized she’d moved, she was standing behind him, watching his hands fly over the controls and computer in a way that brought chills to her. How could he process an alien language so easily?
And that turned her thoughts to the last few days. So much had happened to her since she’d met him.
Almost all of it horrendously bad.
And yet somehow he’d managed to be a bright spot through the hell that had been this trip. How strange was that?
Right now, his presence was the only thing that kept her holding on to a life that had become a nightmare. Panic swelled inside her as she tried to come to terms with what was happening to her and the speed with which her life had unraveled.
Her mother was dead and she was being blamed for it. Every known government was looking to arrest and then execute them. Public humiliation and death.
My life is over and I’m innocent…
Caillen froze as he felt a hesitant hand brush through his hair. He turned his head to see Desideria staring at him with a look in her eyes that was both vulnerable and sexy.
He let out a relieved breath. “Oh thank the gods it’s you. It would have seriously messed up my day to have Hauk or Fain start coming on to me in the middle of all this shit.”
She laughed. “You are not right.”
“So they tell me. Often.” He jerked his chin to the seat beside him. “Lend us a hand?”
“I’m not a pilot.”
“I just need you to key in a sequence with me to unlock the controls so that I can get us out of here.”
“I can’t read Andarion,” she reminded him.