“It’ll happen sooner than anyone else expects it.” I don’t know why yet, but something makes Drift mad enough to break his own rule and drag Fault into these meetings.
Hazard doesn’t keep his distance like the others. He comes around behind the sofa and leans on the back between us.
“Coffee?” he asks, holding the can out.
“No, thank you.” I know he’s looking for a reaction. Neither of us will give it to him.
“You sure? You’ve got plenty in your fridge at home.”
Others hear him and they look at us, confusion betraying the questions they haven’t asked.
I look at him, my jaw tight. “I’m sure.”
He laughs as he walks away. He wanted to pay me back for not sharing our secrets.
Luckily Kimba joins us and all attention shifts to her.
She says something to Drift and then sits in the section of the wraparound sofa I’ve begun to think of as the command point.
The rest of us are in the pit; we’re all trapped in here at one time or another. I glance at the others. Some of us more often, some less.
“Thank you for coming in today,” Kimba says, shifting herself into a more comfortable position. “We have some Company news as well as other points to cover.”
“I know you’ve noticed that Arc and Kilo aren’t here. They?—”
“I’m here,” Kilo says, yawning, and making more than half of us curse.
“Ihatewhen you do that,” Cindy says, scooting her and her weeun closer to Core.
Andrea, on the other hand, who is seated right next to him, laughs and bounces the weeun in her arms. “If youalwaysassume he’s there, he can’t really surprise you.”
“And,” Kilo says, holding up a finger while he yawns again. “If you think I’m there and you tell me to get lost, I will. I respect boundaries.”
“Can we make our entire outpost a boundary?” Laurel asks, also yawning and glaring at him for it. “Because I do not need you lurking in my home.”
“If I don’t have your access codes, I can’t get into your place.” He smiles at her. “Mostof you are safe.”
We’re safe because he doesn’t have the codes, and even if he snuck in, Arc would know he was there.
“Fine,” Kimba says. The word is sharp enough to pull everyone’s attention but doesn’t sound aggravated. “You’ll have noticed Arc isn’t here. That’s because he did as he wastoldand went home to rest.”
She goes through the information that Arc found and then updates them on the crashed ship. There’s a big commotion when they finally turn to the screens to introduce Roxy—Echoand Ion’s new bondmate. Plans to meet up are made and I watch the interaction, wondering what kind of fervor Chrys’ entrance to the group will cause.
I haven’t seen that yet.
Jessica and Laurel distract me through most of the meeting. They are very like their sister, but they are so different too.
They’re both going to be worried, and then they’re going to be mad.
The meeting itself isn’t productive. I already know everything Kimba and Drift have to tell us. And I can’t ask Roxy, Echo, or Ion how they wound up bonded as three. No one else is rude enough to ask it outright either.
By the time Kimba wraps up, the only thing I have learned is that Andrea trusts Kilo with her weeun, despite how tired he is, and Cindy has plans to bakeeveryonea batch of something called Nanaimo bars before the next meeting.
I’m more than ready to leave when the others start to pack up, but that isn’t in the proverbial cards.
Jess barely waits for the others to leave before she rushes straight to me.
“Where is he?” she demands.
