"I know." The words came out hard. Hewes had been running illegal human trafficking operations for years. The things he'd done to his victims made the gladiator pits look merciful.
Munroe studied me for a moment, then nodded. "Well. You're probably tired. I'll let you get settled." He headed for the door, then paused. "I'll see you around."
The door closed behind him, leaving me alone in the quiet cottage.
I stood there for a moment, feeling the strangeness of it. A house. A bed. Privacy. Safety. Things I'd once taken for granted, lost, and found again. Things the seventeen refugees outside were probably experiencing for the first time in years.
I thought of Peanut's vacant eyes, of Charlene's desperate scheming, of the man who'd kissed the ground.
Then I thought of her. Sunshine hair and gentle fingers and a smile I'd never see again. The phantom sensation of her touch on my cheek was so real I could almost feel it even now.
She was safe. She was home.
And for the next few days, I could pretend I understood what that felt like. I could pretend that the hollow ache in my chest was something other than the space where my heart should have been. The heart that belonged to a woman I'd never hold again, whose name I'd never know, whose love I'd never earn.
But she was safe. And in the end, that was the only thing that mattered. Even if it meant carrying this longing for the rest of my life, it was worth it.
She was worth everything.
Chapter 2
Ruby
I leaned against the trunk of the large oak, watching the construction crew maneuver another roof panel into place. The new Space Pearl's restaurant was taking shape, rising higher each day like a promise I still couldn't quite believe—a dream made real by a chance encounter that had changed everything.
My grandfather taught me to bake, his flour-dusted hands guiding mine as we kneaded dough in his tiny kitchen back on Earth. The warmth of that kitchen, the scent of rising bread, the love in every lesson—those memories sustained me. When I arrived on Tau Ceti five years ago, opening my own bakery seemed natural, the only thread connecting my old life to this new world, the only way I knew how to build something good from the ashes of what I'd lost.
I never imagined Chef Pearl herself would walk through my door.
That was six months ago. The famous chef had been touring the outer colonies with her mate Jutuk, scouting locations for her expanding empire of Earth-space fusion restaurants. I was pulling a tray of my signature fruit tarts from the oven when the door chimed, and there she was—the woman who'd been a famous chef even before being abducted from Earth.
Chef Pearl tasted everything. The honey-lavender croissants. The cardamom buns I'd adapted from my grandfather's recipes. The Earth-meets-Tau-Ceti pastries that had become my specialty. Then she made an offer that left me speechless. She wanted to make my bakery part of the new restaurant, to incorporate some of my recipes into Space Pearl's menus across the galaxy.
A sharp yelp cut through the afternoon air. I glanced up to see Vrex clutching one of his four hands, hopping awkwardly on the scaffolding while his tool belt swung wildly from his midsection.
"Is fine! Is fine!" he called down in heavily accented, translator-produced English, waving his three uninjured hands at the human foreman already climbing the ladder. "Only small pinch!"
The foreman—Marcus, a grizzled man who'd built half the colony—shook his head as he reached the Bracciuan. "That's the third time today, Vrex. You're supposed to hold the drill steady, not let it spin free."
"On Bracciu, robots hold drills," Vrex protested, his ochre skin flushing a deeper orange with embarrassment. "Robots do not complain when drill spins."
Two other aliens on the ground chittered with what I'd learned was laughter. One of them—I think her name was Ssila—had somehow gotten her leg stuck in a bucket of sealant yesterday. It took three humans, two aliens, and a bottle of solvent to free her.
Marcus descended the ladder, aggravation clouding his grizzled face. "Well, you're not on Bracciu anymore. And we don't have construction robots out here. So you're gonna learn to do it the old-fashioned way."
"Old-fashioned way is barbaric," Vrex muttered, but he picked up the drill again.
I bit back a smile as Marcus demonstrated the proper grip for the third time. The patience required to train an entirely alien workforce in human construction methods was impressive.
"Ruby!"
I turned to see Mei jogging toward me, her dark hair swinging around her chin. She was the village mayor and had been my first friend on Tau Ceti.
"Did you get the new humans settled?" I asked.
"Yes, finally." Mei dropped onto the grass beside me, pulling a water bottle from her bag. "All seventeen of them. They're resting now."
"Do you think any of them would be interested in working at Space Pearl's?" Chef Pearl would send one of her trained chefs to run the kitchen, but hiring the rest of the staff was my responsibility as manager.
