Doran rolled her beneath him and interlaced one of their hands high above her head, gazing down at her with so much gratitude that it tightened her throat. “You’ll come home with me, when all this is over?”
She nodded against the pillow, breathing in the scents of soap and oil vapors that their joined bodies had made. It was unique to them, and sweeter than any perfume implant in creation. “I’ll go anywhere with you.”
As she locked her legs around his waist, a shiver spread out from her navel all the way down to her toes. Soon their hips grew restless, and their breathing turned choppy. He whispered one more time that he loved her and lowered his mouth for a kiss.
After that, there was no more talking.
“Hand me the two-thirds hydraulic wrench, will you?” Solara asked, facedown in the shower’s filtration system while her backside wiggled in the air, turning Doran’s thoughts far from repair work. She must’ve known he wasn’t paying attention, because she clarified, “The one with the blue handle.”
“Uh-huh,” he said, still staring.
“Doran!”
He tore his gaze away and handed her the blue wrench, then leaned forward and glanced over her shoulder to see if she was almost finished. The tangle of tubes beneath the floor looked like disemboweled innards, so the answer was probably no.
His shoulders slumped.
In the days since they’d waited for the geomagnetic storm to pass, Solara had taken it upon herself to give the Banshee a full tune-up—a nice gesture, but Doran was tired of sharing her with the ship. He kept daydreaming about whisking her away to someplace tropical, just the two of them. In his fantasies, life had returned to normal and he had full access to the Spaulding toys.
“Have you ever seen the ocean?” he asked.
“Once,” she called over her shoulder. “The nuns took us on a day trip to Galveston. It rained the whole time, but we had fun. Sister Agnes let me bury her to the neck and sculpt her into a mermaid.”
“I want to take you to the Caribbean,” he said. “We’ll borrow one of my dad’s smaller yachts so we can drop anchor in the island shallows.” That way they’d have total privacy—no hotels, no touristy beaches, not even a crew to disturb them. “We can snorkel and swim right off the boat.”
“A personal yacht? What’s next, a private shuttle?”
“Well, yeah,” he said. “How else would we get to the marina to fetch the boat?”
Solara righted herself and leaned on one elbow, smiling at him. “If you’re trying to spoil me, it won’t work. I can earn my own keep.”
He returned her smile while his whole heart melted. His feelings for her were nearly tangible, swelling like billows inside his rib cage, and he found himself constantly consumed by the need to express it. Each night he did his best to show how much he loved her—until they were breathless and weak—but it wasn’t enough. He wanted to give Solara closets full of glistening ball gowns, to take her to exotic places and fill her belly with the finest foods. There was no better reward than seeing her happy, so from now on he was going to pamper her like it was his job.
“I’m highly motivated,” he said. “So I suggest you don’t fight it.”
She leaned in for a quick kiss before returning to her work. “You’re getting ahead of yourself. We might not be able to go back.”
Doran frowned. He knew that better than anyone. “A guy can dream.”
The captain’s voice came over the Banshee’s intercom system and put an end to the reverie. “Looks like the worst of the storm has passed, so prepare for takeoff. We should arrive at Planet X by morning.”
Planet X—the site of Doran’s errand. That meant his ordeal was almost over, though whether it would end in his favor remained to be seen.
“Want to talk about that?” Solara asked.
“No,” he said.
He didn’t want to think about it, either. In the last few weeks, he’d nearly thought himself to death trying to puzzle out how to save himself and free his father. Now that he realized how many lives in the fringe depended on his return to Spaulding Fuel, he felt a weight on his shoulders so heavy that sometimes he caught himself stooping over. What if he failed? Or if someone else found out about the coordinates and beat him there?
No, he definitely didn’t want to talk about it.
“Well, scratch that,” Captain Rossi grumbled over the intercom. “The storm must’ve shorted the main transmitter. I don’t want to lift off until it’s fixed. Lara, can you come take a look?”
Solara hauled herself out of the coils of tubing beneath the floor. “Sure, just give me a minute.”
“I think the parts are fried,” the captain said. “Maybe you can salvage what we need from the other system.”
“What other system?” she asked, scrunching her forehead.
“The emergency com. It’s a decent backup, but between the two, I’d rather have the main transmitter running.”
“I didn’t know we have a backup.”