“You did,” I admitted, looking back out the front of the vessel. I had no one to blame but myself for believing my desire instead of what Skye had told me.
“But we didn’t know each other,” she said, the words tumbling from her. “I was primed to dislike you because you’d been part of the crew that took my best friend. As far as I knew, you were a brute who abducted females for sport.”
I bristled at this but let her continue.
“And you seemed even less thrilled to be stuck in a cell with me.” Her laugh held little mirth. “You made it clear you weren’t a fan of humans, which was fine because I wasn’t a fan of the Vandar.” She took a breath. “But that doesn’t mean we weren’t allies. Even before you lost your memories, we’d reluctantly agreed to work together to escape. That’s what we were trying to do when you hit your head, and I got knocked out and taken to talk to that creepy Zagrath you just met.”
What she was telling me sounded true.
Skye reached for my hand on the console and placed hers on top of it. “I have never lied to you. Not about us and not about being asked to seduce you. I told you all of it from the beginning. Do you really think I would go from being part of anunderground rebellion on Lexxona to falling in line with what some freak Zagrath told me to do?”
When she put it that way, it made sense. If she were working with the enemy, she’d have had plenty of chances to turn me in, but she hadn’t. She’d worked just as tirelessly to escape them as I had, and she’d saved me more than once. If she’d wanted to do me harm, she’d also had plenty of opportunity.
She squeezed my hand. “I got close to you because I wanted to, Kolt. Not because anyone told me to. I’ve never been good at doing what I’m told, anyway.”
“Now that is very believable.”
She laughed. “Oh, that’s what you believe?”
Even though she was teasing, there was an edge to her words. An edge that I deserved. I’d been too quick to believe the worst about her. I’d let the word of a Zagrath shake my faith in her, even after she’d proven her loyalty and how much she cared about me.
Shame burned my cheeks as I looked up at her. “I should not have let him make me doubt you for even a breath.”
“You shouldn’t have.” She met my gaze and smiled. “But you also forgot everything about yourself. I can forgive you for being confused about what is real.”
Since she was being honest, I should too.
“It would not have been an issue if I did not believe that humans can’t be trusted.” I watched her eyes widen. “I do not know why I believe this. That I still don’t remember, but I remember thinking that your kind would always betray me if given a chance.”
Her hand twitched on top of mine, and I suspected she was fighting the urge to snatch it back. “Well, that explains a lot, but I wish I knew why you believed that.”
“So do I.” I wish I remembered so many things, but this one ate at me. I disliked thinking that I was the type to cling to prejudice, but what other explanation was there?
“One thing I’ve learned being stuck with you,” she said with a quirk of a smile, “is that you can’t judge an entire species. Everyone is different. You’re completely different from what I expected from a Vandar. I hope I’m different from your preconception of a human.”
“You are.” Affection for her pulsed in my chest. I wanted to pull her to me, wrap her in my arms, and tell her she was the most incredible creature I’d ever met. But the flashing lights of the console snapped me back to the reality of our situation, and pouring out my heart would have to wait.
A beep made her turn toward the controls. “What’s that?”
I scanned the read-outs, my pulse quickening. “Our course reversal did not go unnoticed. It looks like another Zagrath vessel is in pursuit.”
“What about the transmission to the Vandar horde?”
I frowned at the console and the red dot moving rapidly across the star chart toward us. “We don’t have the luxury of waiting until we are farther from the planet. We will have to send it now and hope that it reaches the horde from here.”
“And what about the ship chasing us?”
I glanced at her, hoping I was making the right call. “Strap in.”
Chapter
Forty-Four
Skye
It took a moment for his words to sink into my brain. “Wait, what?”
He flicked his gaze to me, jerking his head toward the safety straps attached to the pilot’s chair. “Strap in. We’re going to outrun thesetvekkingZagrath.”
