“It didn’t happen to me. I made it happen.”
Doran glanced at her hands, now concealed beneath black leather. He wanted to confess the real reason he had panicked when he’d first seen her tattoos, but he couldn’t get the words past the knot in his chest. So instead, he said, “I guess we’re stuck with each other.”
She gave him a sad smile, and he realized for the first time that her eyes were hazel, not simply brown or green. A starburst of warm amber surrounded her pupils, giving way to olive-hued irises that were rimmed in glowing emerald. The effect was striking. Odd that he’d never noticed before.
Looking into those smiling eyes, he felt a little less alone.
“Guess so,” she said. “Too bad you make lousy tea.”
In the weeks that followed, Solara settled into an unspoken cease-fire with Doran, neither hostile nor friendly. They hadn’t shared any more secrets since the day she showed him her tattoos, but he’d stopped calling her a felon. And while she still coerced him into galley cleanup and cargo loading, it was only in the interest of improving their standing with the crew, not out of spite.
Well, okay. Maybe a teensy bit out of spite.
She couldn’t deny the tingle of satisfaction that came from watching Doran get his hands dirty. With each new chore, his fingernails lost a little more of their sheen. A few blisters on his palms had hardened into calluses, and in her opinion, that was far more attractive on a guy than baby-soft skin.
So really, she was doing him a favor.
“You missed a spot,” she told him, pointing at a patch of mildew encircling the bathroom drain. The ship’s recycled air was so dry that only the hardiest molds took root, making them nearly indestructible. “That’s going to take some serious elbow grease.”
Doran took a break from his work to sit back against the wall. He dragged an arm across his sweaty forehead and locked those indigo eyes on her, the heat of physical labor glowing brightly behind his gaze. He released a tired chuckle that lifted one corner of his lips, and for a split second, a tiny pair of angel wings fluttered behind Solara’s navel.
She rubbed a hand over her stomach to erase the sensation. She was probably just excited about shower day. Nothing more than that.
“Feel free to show me how it’s done,” he told her.
“Nice try.” She slung her towel over the nearest stall and hooked her caddy of toiletries to the showerhead. “I spent all day turning the engine inside out to find the reason for that screeching sound.” With no luck. “This shower has my name on it.”
“We paid ten thousand fuel chips for this trip,” he said, tossing aside his scrub brush. “And by we, I really mean I.”
“So?”
“So are you sure all this extra work is making a difference?”
“Of course,” Solara told him while pulling a hairpin free. “It’s endearing us to the crew.”
“Doesn’t look that way to me,” he said. “The captain’s getting free labor, and he still won’t take me to Obsidian.”
She pointed her hairpin at him. “Not with that attitude, he won’t.”
“Psh,” Doran scoffed. “I doubt a few smiles will change anything.” In demonstration, he flashed his teeth and used both hands to frame a grin. “Not even on this pretty face.”
Solara laughed with her whole belly. Lame as it was, that might’ve been the first joke she’d ever heard Doran tell. “Patience, my attractive friend. I’ll get you to Obsidian.”
Still smiling, he arched a brow. “I thought we weren’t friends.”
“We’re not.”
“Then what are we?”
“You want a label?”
“Yeah,” he said. “I think I do.”
She thought about it while combing out her hair. They’d attended the same academy, but the word classmates implied a certain level of camaraderie that didn’t apply to the boy who’d once uploaded a picture of her stained coveralls to his SnapIt account to prove she’d worn the same pair twice in a row. Last month she had considered Doran an enemy, but that didn’t apply, either. They were in uncharted territory now, feeling their way one day at a time.
“Cohorts,” she finally decided. “That’s how the Enforcers would classify us.”
He wrinkled his nose. “Cohorts. That sounds sketchy.”
“If the shoe fits…”
“Or the gloves, as it were,” he said, nodding at her hands. “I was right. You do shower with them on.”
That wasn’t true and he knew it, so she didn’t bother with a reply.
“You should stop wearing them. Nobody here cares about your markings. By hiding them, you’re giving the ink too much power.”
“Oh, so you’re a therapist now?” she asked.
“It’s just common sense.” Abruptly, his lips pulled into a frown, and he stared at his own knuckles in silence. A shadow passed over his face, making Solara wonder what he was thinking. “Believe me,” he muttered. “If I can stand to look at your ink, then so can you.”