His nosebleeds disoriented him. His eyesight crippled him. The two combined…
He couldn’t make it to the bathroom alone. Never mind fight off a trained assassin. If those two had been League assassins and not Resistance fighters, tonight’s attack might have had a different ending, too.
There was no way she could stand by and do nothing while he was under attack. It just wasn’t in her.
The door that connected their rooms opened. Darling paused in the doorway, staring at her with an adoring gaze that set fire to every part of her. Shadows played across his beautiful features as he watched her watching him. As always, he held so much intensity and command of everything around him that it sent a chill over her.
He was every bit the fierce soldier and regal politician.
Most of all, he was the one person she couldn’t live without. If his capture had taught her anything, it was that her life was empty and miserable without him in it.
And as she stared at him, she remembered how good his lips tasted. How much she loved being in his arms.
How much she loved him.
This was the father of her child…
The only man alive she would kill or die to protect.
“Are you all right?” He approached her slowly, almost bashfully. Something so out of character for him that it instantly charmed her.
It also struck her as odd that he’d ask after her well-being when he was the one who’d been stabbed. Her gaze dropped to the bandage on his side that was already marked with his blood. “Worried about you,” she admitted.
“Don’t be. I have no intention of leaving you anytime soon.”
But she was going to leave him. She had to. If she was lucky, and the Resistance cooperated, she’d be able to return to his side.
If she wasn’t…
She would never see him again.
23
Two days later, Zarya paused as she navigated her way through the charred remains of a burned-down building. Historical and regal, it had always been one of her favorites. When she’d been a little girl, her father had brought her here for cherished birthday meals.
Oh how she’d loved the cake they’d serve her with sprinkles and carved chocolate bunnies…
She touched her stomach, wondering what joyful memories like that she’d give to her child. Please, let every one of them be good.
Most of all, she hoped that everything went as planned so that she could get back home before Darling realized she was gone.
Over the last few years, she and Sorche had begun meeting here as well. Since it was close to Resistance headquarters and to the engineering firm where Sorche worked, it’d been a logical place to get together.
Now it, like most of the people she loved, was gone. Nothing more than a faint memory…
Her heart ached as she stood at the remains of her favorite table where she could keep her back to the wall and watch the door. She’d been sitting right here, in her usual chair when she’d told Sorche about her engagement to Kere.
Laughing and crying, Sorche had oohed and ahhed over her ring while taking her to task. “Only you would obligate yourself to a man and not know who he really is or what he looks like. Really, Zarya… Someone must have dropped you on your head as an infant. And by that I mean more than once.”
She smiled at the memory.
Until her gaze went to the burned remains of a painting that had hung near the register. It was of the owner’s daughter.
Please tell me everyone got out of here alive.
Saddened by the waste around her, she swept her gaze to the horizon where even more fires blazed from dozens of buildings and homes. Thanks to the Resistance and the gerents, Taranyse—the outpost where the Resistance was headquartered—was being systematically torn apart in a show of power between the two factions.
For that matter, the Resistance seemed determined to tear down anything in their path. People. Buildings. Furniture. Rodents… It didn’t matter what. If it got in their way, they set fire to it. It was like they were drunk on destruction.
But she knew there was more to it than sheer havoc. Rather than protect the people as they’d sworn to do, the Resistance was hoping to either draw Darling out so they could assassinate him, or cause so much furor that it forced the gerents or League to kill him.
Meanwhile, since the gerents couldn’t use the professional Caronese guard without Darling’s approval and sanction, they’d activated the Citizen Army to fight against the Resistance. Something that had resulted in a bloodbath on both sides as the Resistance and CA clashed all over the empire.