The words shouldn’t hurt coming from him. It shouldn’t matter in the slightest what he thought. Rhys had made his own choices, none of them good. She shook her head, trying to pluck some logical thoughts free from the whirlwind of emotions swirling around in her head.
“You can’t talk to me like that.” The words were feeble and only served as a buffer to gain her a few more moments to collect herself. Rhys ignored her. The rings around his eyes grew darker as he changed tack.
“It’s been three days since I’ve had a hit. You’re a nurse, for fuck’s sake, you know what that does to a person. Have a little compassion.”
“It never ends. This hit will turn into another.”
“I’m literally dying over here! Fucking useless prim. Give me the credits or I’ll push Mom into the fucking bay. Hope you enjoy having that on your conscience.”
He wouldn’t. Without their mother he lost the apartment and his meal ticket, but it had taken Eleri years to realize which of his threats were actually worth heeding.
“I can’t do this anymore.” Eleri stood, wiping her own streaming eyes. “Everything I had on Gaia I gave up trying to save you from yourself. Mom made her choice to keep paying for you to abuse her. Don’t call me again, Rhys. I have nothing left for you.”
Rhys rose from his seat in the stripped bedroom of the apartment they had once shared and smashed his fist hard against the table. Eleri winced in spite of herself. Blood welled from his knuckles as he started to scream. “You fucking whore! You abandoned us, and now you won’t help. Are you happy being an alien slut? It’s the best you could have hoped for anyway.”
“Make up your mind. Am I a whore, or am I a prim? I can’t be both.” Eleri winced away from him and reached for the button to end the call. A hand closed around hers. Startled by the sudden intrusion, she glanced up to find S’samph behind her. His torn frill was raised in an obvious display of aggression.
“Pyo mentioned you were here,” S’samph addressed her first before turning to face Rhys. “You will get nothing from my mate. Do not call her ever again.” His voice was deadly low, and he tapped a single claw against the interface, ending the call, doing what Eleri’s hands had been shaking too badly to do herself.
“I’m fine. I’m fine.” She took a few breaths, steadying herself against the ferocity of S’samph’s gaze. “I’m used to it.”
“You shouldn’t be.” He knelt in front of her, holding out his hands, an invitation she accepted before she could consider the implications. “I understand why you left your home. I don’t understand why you let him haunt you here.”
“He’s my brother.” She knew it was a meaningless word; she couldn’t even pretend to defend him after what S’samph undoubtedly heard.
“He is not your brother. If you require a brother, K’kaen will be your new brother.” The way he stated this as if it were a truth made Eleri’s heart stutter. If only it were that simple.
“Just because I don’t like him doesn’t mean I can delete him.”
“Do you want to know what S’kasia would do to me if I ever dared treat her with half as much cruelty?”
“Your sister is a much braver person than I am.” Eleri tried her best to dam the tears she felt stinging behind her eyes. S’kasia was a warrior priestess, a war hero. She’d lost her mate and her children in one fell swoop and went on to cling to life with startling ferocity. Eleri was someone with a terrible brother, but she couldn’t compare to the suffering her friend had endured. “I ran away from Gaia because I couldn’t be brave anymore.”
“Then you are calling me a coward as well.” S’samph’s rough hands squeezed tightly around hers. “When my planet imploded, I didn’t stay to evacuate civilians. I fled with my clutch sister. If cowardice saved our lives, then let us be cowards together.”
“You make it sound easy.” She freed one of her hands from his grip to wipe an inelegant trail of snot and tears away from her face.
“There is nothing easy about what I am suggesting.” S’samph pulled a hydropod from his pocket. “Have this. You are wasting your water.”
She took the hydropod with a small laugh. “Crying isn’t going to dehydrate me.” But the look on S’samph’s face was so severe that she popped it into her mouth anyway. The lukewarm water gushed behind her teeth as she bit a hole in the corner of the pod, and it steadied her somehow.
S’samph moved toward her. He was crouched close enough for her to smell the distinct musk of his skin. “You are brave. And that monster you call your brother is the most useless ravik I’ve ever encountered.” He paused with a curious expression on his face as if trying to read the lines of hers. “I would embrace you if you would allow it. I have learned this is how humans express comfort and affection. You do nothave a tail, so we cannot twine ours.”
“Yes, please.” Eleri managed a rueful smile through her hiccups and leaned toward him. S’samph reached for her, sweeping her off the dusty stool in the holocom booth. She should have been embarrassed by the sudden and overwhelming display of affection, but instead she leaned her head against his shoulder. Sandalwood. That was the smell she’d identified earlier.
“He will not contact you again.”
“I’m not answering any other holocoms.” The promise was as much to herself as it was to S’samph.
“Good. I will alert K’kaen he is to assume the role of your clutch-brother immediately.”
Eleri burst out laughing. “You don’t need to replace my brother for me. I’m fine enough without one. The one I had didn’t do me much good anyway.”
“You expressed the loss of your brother as troublesome. K’kaen lost many siblings back on Latilla. When latil’e lose their family, we take each other in. No one should be without a family. I took K’kaen as my battle brother, so in turn, you shall be his clutch sister. It is the way things are done among my people.”
Eleri stared up at him. “Maybe you should ask K’kaen how he feels about this before you volunteer him for the job.”
S’samph’s tail twitched a few times, and Eleri raised a brow at his amusement. Finally, he released his hold on her. “Very well. I will ask K’kaen. But if he agrees, then you will claim him as your new clutch brother.”
