“Ready, sweetheart?”
She looked around the station that had been their sanctuary, their private world for the past days. The place where everything between them had changed.
“Ready,” she said, reaching for his hand as he opened the hangar doors. The pale Martian sun was breaking through the thinning dust clouds, casting long shadows across the rocky landscape. Ahead lay Border Town, their friends, their work.And somewhere beneath their feet, mysteries waited to be uncovered.
She squeezed his hand one last time before they mounted their respective vehicles. “Let’s go home.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Zach kept his senses on alert throughout the journey back to Border Town. Every shadow on the horizon, every unusual rock formation, caught his attention and he found himself listening for the scrape of a claw against rock. The creature they’d encountered might have been a solitary anomaly—or the first of many. Either way, he wasn’t taking chances, not while Cass was with him.
He didn’t like the fact that she was tucked away inside the rover, even though she was safe there. He’d rather the two of them were together so he could watch over her.
“We need to take her for a ride,” he told Phantom, and the horse tossed his head in agreement.
He didn’t relax until the settlement’s dome finally appeared. Border Town was built around a tall rock formation in the center of a huge valley, surrounded by homestead claims. Everything was covered in dust from the storm but he could see settlers already hard at work clearing it away from their homes.
They passed through the small airlock close to the lab area and he dismounted as she parked the rover.
“Ready for this?” he asked.
“As I’ll ever be.” She couldn’t quite hide her nerves as she gave him a quick smile. “I feel like our secret is tattooed on my forehead.”
He smiled and ran his thumb across her smooth forehead.
“It’s perfectly clear.”
She rolled her eyes, but he saw some of the tension leave her shoulders. He lifted Roland down from the rover, then the three of them walked towards the research complex with Phantom trailing behind.
“I’ll stable Phantom and report in,” he told her when they reached the entrance to the labs. “Then I’ll meet you in your lab.”
“All right. I’ll start telling Alina.”
Most people were busy with their duties at this time of day but the street wasn’t deserted and he hesitated for a moment, not quite sure what to do. Human-cyborg relationships were not unknown, but they were relatively rare and some of the colonists still believed the original government propaganda that the cyborgs no longer deserved to be treated as human. As much as he wanted the whole world to know that Cass was his, he didn’t want her subjected to any unwelcome attention.
She seemed to understand his hesitation because she placed Roland on the ground, then stepped towards him and slid her arms around his neck.
“Don’t I get a kiss goodbye?” she asked teasingly, her eyes sparkling.
“You get whatever you want, sweetheart.”
He bent his head and captured her mouth in a searing kiss that left no doubt of their relationship. He heard a few distant murmurs, but he ignored them, his attention focused on her.
“I’ll be back as soon as I can,” he promised when he finally released her.
“I’ll be waiting.” She smiled up at him, then went into the lab complex with Roland, leaving him standing outside.
Phantom huffed, and he nodded in agreement.
“I don’t like leaving her either. Let’s get you stabled so I can make my report.”
Despite his eagerness to return, he wiped down the horse and made sure he was comfortable before going to the ranger station. B-194, a grizzled cyborg with one of the original cybernetic arms took his report. He kept it deliberately vague—routine patrol, storm shelter at Station 12, nothing unusual to report. He’d learned long ago how to speak truthfully while omitting critical details. B-194 recorded it without comment, his face expressionless.
He turned to leave, then paused. “Any unusual reports come in during the storm? Increased seismic activity, unexplained readings?”
B-194 shook his head. “Nothing out of the ordinary. Why?”
“Just checking that all systems are normal after the storm.”
