“Thank you,” I said, flexing my fingers experimentally.The bandages were snug but not restrictive, and the pain had already diminished to a manageable level.
When I looked up, I found him watching me with an expression I couldn’t quite interpret. The amber color had returned to his skin, and there was something in his eyes that made my heart skip a beat.
“Rivers,” he said, and my name sounded different in his voice than it had before.
“Yeah?”
“Nothing. Just…” He shook his head and moved back to his side of our makeshift camp. “We should get some rest. Tomorrow we’ll need to explore more of the tower, see if we can access the data systems.”
I wanted to ask him what he’d been about to say, but exhaustion was starting to hit me like a physical weight. The adrenaline that had been keeping me going since the storm began was wearing off, and I could barely keep my eyes open.
“You’re right,” I said, pulling my jacket tighter around myself. “Morning will be better for complex technical work anyway.”
I expected him to set up his sleeping area on the opposite side of the room, maintaining the professional distance he seemed so determined to preserve. Instead, to my complete surprise, he spread his coat on the floor right next to where I was settling down.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Staying near you,” he said matter-of-factly. “No idea what the night time brings out here. We stay close. Basic survival technique.”
It was a reasonable explanation, but there was something in the way he wasn’t quite meeting my eyes that suggested it wasn’t the whole truth. Not that I was complaining. The thought of sleeping alone in this abandoned place, with unknown dangers potentially lurking in the darkness above us, was genuinely terrifying.
“Okay,” I said, lying down and pulling my coat around myself like a blanket. “That makes sense.”
Torven settled down beside me, close enough that I could feel the warmth radiating from his body. For someone who’d been so determined to maintain emotional distance, he seemed surprisingly comfortable with physical proximity.
“Good night, Rivers,” he said quietly.
“Good night.”
I closed my eyes and tried to relax, but I was hyperaware of his presence beside me. I could hear his breathing gradually slow and deepen, and within minutes, he was making soft snoring sounds that were oddly comforting.
It occurred to me that this was probably the first time since the storm began that he’d allowed himself to truly let his guard down. He’d been carrying the weight of responsibility for my safety, for his crew’s fate, for our survival in this inhospitable environment. Now, finally, he was able to rest.
I lay there listening to him sleep and thinking about everything that had happened in the space of a single day. This morning, Torven had been just the gruff transport captain who’d criticized my equipment choices. Now he was the male who’d risked his life to save mine, who’d shown me unexpected gentleness while treating my wounds, who’d lethis walls down just enough for me to glimpse the person behind them.
I was in trouble. Not just the obvious kind that came from being stranded on an alien planet with limited supplies and no rescue coming. I was in the kind of trouble that came from being attracted to someone at the worst possible time, under the worst possible circumstances.
But as I finally drifted off to sleep, warm and safe beside him in the darkness of an abandoned tower, I couldn’t bring myself to regret it.
Whatever tomorrow brought, whatever dangers or revelations were waiting for us in the levels above, I was grateful to face them with him beside me.
Even if he was snoring.
CHAPTER 6
TORVEN
Iwoke to the sound of wind still howling outside the tower, though it was notably less violent than the day before. For a moment, I was disoriented, unsure where I was or why every muscle in my body ached. Then awareness returned, along with the warmth of another body pressed against my side.
Zara Rivers.
She was still asleep, her face peaceful and slack. Her full lips were parted. Sometime during the night, she’d moved closer. Her hand rested on my arm and her head nearly touched my shoulder. Her blond hair had come loose from its ponytail, falling across her cheek in waves that caught the dim light filtering through the window. She was pretty, but not in a way that was considered conventional by human standards—what little I knew of them. Zara had the look of someone who was a little wild. Some would say, a littleoff. Her eyes tended to flash all around when she was thinking through something. She overexplained things. She did notworry about things like her hair, which she seemed to do battle with on a daily basis.
In sleep, however, the determined set of her jaw had relaxed, revealing the delicate curve of her bone structure. Her skin was pale, almost luminous in the morning light, with a faint flush across her cheekbones. Dark lashes twitched against her cheeks. There was something vulnerable about her when she slept, and it was so different from the slightly scattered but sharp-minded scientist I’d come to know. She looked younger and smaller than when awake—though that might have been because she was curled against my side like she was seeking warmth and protection. The sight of her sleeping so peacefully beside me sent an unexpected surge of protectiveness through my chest. I found her unbearably attractive.
I knew I should move away. Put some distance between us before she woke up and realized how close we’d gotten during the night. Instead, I found myself studying her face, noting the little details I couldn’t observe when she was awake because I didn’t want her to catch me staring at her. So, I stared now.
I couldn’t bring myself to regret our proximity. For the first time since we’d crashed, I felt something other than grim determination and fear. There was warmth here, and comfort, and the kind of peace I hadn’t experienced in years.
