Kai rolled his eyes.
Grasping a pipe, Cinder hauled herself to her feet and shoved the wrench back into her pocket. “I didn’t learn it anywhere. I just look at things and figure out how they work. Once you know how something works, you can figure out how to fix it.”
She ducked her head and tried to shake out the last bits of dust, but there seemed to be an endless supply.
“Oh, you just look at something and figure out how it works,” Kai deadpanned, standing beside her. “Is that all?”
Cinder fixed her ponytail and shrugged, suddenly embarrassed at his questions. “It’s just mechanics.”
Kai scooped an arm around her waist and pulled her against him. “No, it’s impressive,” he said, using the pad of his thumb to brush something off Cinder’s cheek—dust or grease or who knew what else. “Not to mention, weirdly attractive,” he said, before capturing her lips.
Cinder tensed, briefly, before letting herself melt into the kiss. The rush was the same every time, coupled with surprise and a rush of giddiness. It was their seventeenth kiss (her brain interface was keeping a tally, somewhat against her will), and she wondered if she would ever get used to this feeling. Being desired. Being wanted, when she’d spent her life believing that no one would ever see her as anything but a bizarre science experiment.
Especially not a boy.
Especially not Kai, who was smart and honorable and kind, and could have had any girl he wanted. Any girl.
She sighed contentedly against him, leaning into the embrace. Kai reached for an overhead pipe and pressed Cinder back against the main computer console. She offered no resistance. Though her body wouldn’t allow her to blush, there was an unfamiliar heat that flooded every inch of her body when he was this close. Every nerve ending sparked and thrummed, and she knew he could kiss her another seventeen thousand times and she would never grow tired of it.
She tied her arms around his neck and he responded by tightening his arm around her waist, molding their bodies together. The warmth of his chest seeped into her clothes. It felt nothing but right. Nothing but perfect.
But then there was the feeling, always lurking, always ready to cloud her contentment. The knowledge that this couldn’t last.
Not so long as Kai was engaged to Levana.
Angry at the thought’s invasion, she kissed Kai harder.
Her thoughts continued to rebel. Even if they succeeded and Cinder was able to reclaim her throne from her aunt, she would be expected to stay on Luna as their new queen. Not that she was an expert, but it seemed like it would be problematic to carry on this relationship on two different planets—
Er, a planet and a moon.
Or whatever.
The point was, there would be 384,000 kilometers of space between them, and that was a lot of space and—
Kai smiled, effectively breaking the kiss. “What’s wrong?” he murmured against her mouth.
Flinching, Cinder leaned back to look at him. His hair was getting longer, bordering on unkempt. As a prince, he’d always been groomed to near-perfection. But then he’d become an emperor. The weeks since his coronation had been spent trying to stop a war, hunt down a wanted fugitive, avoid getting married, and endure his own kidnapping. As a result, regular haircuts had become a dispensable luxury.
She hesitated before asking, “Do you ever think about the future?”
His expression turned wary. “Of course I do.”
“And … does it include me?”
His gaze softened in a way that made her pulse skip. Releasing the overhead pipe, he tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “That depends on whether I’m thinking about the good future or the bad one.”
Cinder shut her eyes and tucked her head under his chin. “As long as one of them does.”
“This is going to work,” Kai said, speaking into her hair. “We’re going to win.”
She nodded, glad he couldn’t see her face.
Because defeating Levana and becoming Luna’s queen was only half her worry—which seemed like plenty enough.
It was only the precursor to an entire galaxy’s worth of worries. She so badly wanted to stay just like this, cocooned in this little spaceship, together and safe and alone … but that was the opposite of what was really going to happen. Once they overthrew Levana, Kai would go back to being the emperor of the Eastern Commonwealth. And someday, he was going to need an empress.
She may have had a blood claim to Luna, and the hope that the Lunar people would choose anyone over Levana, even a politically inept teenager who was made up of 36.28 percent cybernetic and manufactured materials.
But she had seen the prejudices of the people in the Commonwealth. Something told her they wouldn’t be as accepting of her.
Even if they were, she wasn’t even sure she wanted to be empress. She was still getting used to the idea of being a princess.
“One thing at a time,” she whispered, trying to still the hopelessness that swirled through her thoughts.
Kai kissed her temple (which her brain did not count as #18), then pulled away. “How’s your training going?”
She disentangled herself from his arms. “Fine.” She glanced around the engine. “Oh, hey, while I have you here, maybe you can help me with this.” Scooting around him, she opened a panel on the wall, revealing a bundle of knotted wires.
“That was a subtle change of subject.”
“I am not changing the subject,” she said, although a forced clearing of her throat negated her denial. “I’m rewiring the orbital defaults, so the ship’s systems will run more efficiently while we’re coasting. These cargo ships are really made for frequent landings and takeoffs, not the constant—”
“Cinder.”
She pursed her lips and unplugged a few wire connectors. “Training is going fine,” she repeated. “Could you hand me the wire cutters on the floor?”
Kai scanned the ground, then grabbed two tools and held them up.
“Left hand,” she said. He handed them to her. “Sparring with Wolf has actually gotten a lot easier. Although it’s hard to tell if that’s because I’m getting stronger, or because he’s … you know.”
She didn’t have a word for it. Wolf had been a shadow of his former self since Scarlet had been captured, and the only thing that seemed to be holding him together was his determination to get to Luna and rescue her as soon as possible.
“Either way,” she added, “I think he’s taught me as much about using my Lunar gift as he’s going to be able to. From here on, I’ll just have to wing it.” She examined the mess of wires, aligning it with a diagram over her retina display. “Not like that hasn’t been my primary tactic this whole time.” She furrowed her brow and made a few quick snips. “Here, hold these wires, and make sure they don’t touch.”
Edging against her, Kai took hold of the wires she indicated. “What happens if they touch?”
“Oh, the ship will probably self-destruct.” Pulling out two of the fresh-cut wires, she began to twist them together into a new sequence.
Kai barely seemed to breathe until she’d taken one of the threatening wires out of his grip. “Why don’t you practice on me?” he said.
“Practice what?”
“You know. Your mind-manipulation thing.”
She paused with the cutters hovering over a blue wire and peered at him from the corner of her eyes. “Absolutely not.”
“Why?”
“Because I said I’d never manipulate you, and I’m sticking with that.”
“It isn’t really manipulation if I know you’re doing it.” He hesitated. “At least, I don’t think so. We could use a codeword, so I’ll know when you’re controlling me. Like … what were those called again?”
“Wire cutters?”
“Like wire cutters.”
“No.”
“Or something else.”