He’d read some of her file. He knew she'd been in a crash when she was a child… when her parents had died. But knowing it and seeing the physical evidence carved into her flesh were two different things.
He traced the largest scar with the pad of his thumb. It ran from her wrist halfway to her elbow.
Protective rage hit—cold and instant. It wasn't the hot, reactive anger of the docking bay when another male had looked at her. This was the calculating, lethal focus of a War-Commander assessing a threat.
Pain had touched her. Marked her.
But it would never touch her again. He would make sure of it.
He watched her face for a moment. She looked so peaceful there, her lips parted slightly, and the tension that usually tightened her jaw was gone. Like she knew she was safe.
He intended to keep her that way.
Slowly, he extracted himself from the bed. He slid out from under her arm, replacing his body with a heavy pillow so she wouldn't feel the absence of his heat. She murmured a protest but snuggled into the furs, clutching the pillow to her chest.
He stood by the side of the bed for a moment, watching her. He needed to know more. He needed to know everything about her.
Crossing to the desk, he picked up his wrist computer. He didn't put it on. Instead, he activated the display, the blue holographic light illuminating his harsh features.
He could ask her. He dismissed it immediately. Asking meant making her relive it. Asking meant watching her walls go back up. Asking meant risking that she would minimize it, tell him she was fine, tell him it was nothing.
He didn't want the sanitized version. He wanted the raw data.
He pulled up the secure comm channel to Kellat, typing the command rather than speaking.
REQUEST: FULL MEDICAL AND INTAKE RECORDS FOR SUBJECT SAWYER, HARPER. FLAGS: ALL TRAUMA HISTORY, PHYSICAL SCANS, PSYCH EVALUATIONS. PRIORITY: IMMEDIATE.
He hesitated for a fraction of a second. It was an invasion of privacy…
But she was under his protection.
That trumped everything. He'd told Kaarigan he would use anything to keep her safe, and he meant it.
He hit send.
A rustle from the bed drew his attention.
Harper rolled over, blinking, her hair a messy halo around her face. She looked disoriented as she reached out and found only sheets and the furs.
Her eyes snapped open.
"Kirr?" Her voice was rough with sleep, a husk that went straight to his groin.
He was back at the bedside in two strides. He sat on the edge of the mattress, leaning over her, boxing her in with his arms.
He caught her searching hand and pinned it to his chest. "Here."
She blinked up at him, her eyes struggling to focus. She looked soft. Pliable. "Where'd you go?"
"Just checking something." He leaned down, brushing a kiss against her forehead, then her temple. She smelled like sex and him. It was the best smell in the galaxy. "Go back to sleep, kelarris. You're exhausted."
"Don't tell me what to—" Her yawn cut it off; she frowned at herself more than him. "Are you coming back to bed?"
Gods, he wanted to. Wanted nothing more than to slide back in between the sheets with her and make her scream his name all over again.
"Soon," he promised. He ran a hand over her hair, smoothing it back. "I'm going to make breakfast. You need to eat."
"If it's alien sludge, I'm filing a complaint,” she mumbled, already drifting off.
