She made her way toward the group, Laila spotting her and turning to smile. It was at this moment that Krystal’s luck, or lack of, showed itself and she tripped over the too-long hem of her uniform and fell to her hands and knees. In front of the entire group of extremely competent warriors. Including T’arq.
Taking a deep breath, she sat on her heels, her face hot. Great. Her palms stung where she’d landed and she’d just made a complete idiot of herself—
Large hands scooped her up and placed her gently on her feet.
“Oh!” Krystal gasped, stumbling a little and reaching out to brace her hand on a very firm abdomen. She blinked, realizing she was staring at a very broad, very firm, chest encased in a tight, black t-shirt that left absolutely nothing to the imagination.
She looked up to see T’arq’s concerned lilac eyes. Krystal swallowed; her throat dry as she desperately tried to recall the value of pi. Nope, it was gone. She had officially been stunned stupid by a beautiful man. Alien. Whatever.
A little voice whispered in her mind,climb him like a tree.She flushed a deeper red, if that were possible, and desperately tried to get herself under control.
T’arq lifted a hand to push back a lock of hair that had escaped her headband, and that was it. She completely lost the ability to speak and stood still, unable to look away from his face. His rather handsome face, if she was truly honest with herself.
“Are you all right? That was quite a fall.” He didn’t wait to hear her answer, instead dropping to his knees in front of her and taking her hands in his much larger ones to examine them. Kneeling, he was as tall as Krystal, and didn’t that just make her feel… well, she wasn’t sure how that made her feel. “You’ve grazed your palms.” He turned his head to call out, “CJ? Bring the medi-scanner!”
“Right here,” a human woman slapped the small, oblong-shaped device into his outstretched hands. Her eyes raked over Krystal, a blank expression on her face as cool as the white blonde of her hair.
T’arq took it without comment and switched it on, waving it over Krystal’s hands. She watched as the skin closed up, new pink tissue forming rapidly.
“Wow, that’s pretty cool. How does it work? Do you know what it uses to stimulate the body? It must work on a micro-cellular level.” She snapped her mouth shut. “I’m babbling.”
T’arq grinned, their faces at the same height, and her breath caught. He was stunningly gorgeous. No man… alien… whatever… had any right to be that attractive. Snapping off the device, he handed it back to CJ, not looking away from Krystal.
She flushed and looked down. T’arq followed her gaze, catching sight of the legs of her boiler suit that were caught over her boots.
“I see why you fell. I’ll fix it,” he said, pulling a knife from a sheath on his belt—how many of those did he have on him?—and neatly sliced through the fabric to shorten the hem on first one, then the other leg.
“Um, thank you,” Krystal said when he looked up at her with a grin, proffering the trimmed fabric.
“You’re welcome,” he said, standing to his full height.
She gazed up at him, realizing that her head barely hit him mid-chest. He stilled, the smile falling from his face as he reached a hand to smooth a fallen strand of hair back from her forehead.
“Ah, T’arq?” a deep voice asked.
“Shit!” Krystal sprung back. Everyone hadn’t been watching this, had they? She looked around at the group. Oh, they had. How embarrassing.
T’arq stepped slightly in front of Krystal and addressed Zac. “We’re done,” he said, shooting a look at Krystal. He added quietly, “For now.” And winked.
He actually winked at her!
Her eyes widened as she looked up at him, and then shot a glance at Laila, who was mouthing something at her and shaking her head slightly. Krystal walked over to join her where she was leaning against a portable ladder on wheels. “So, why did you want me to come down here?”
“Have you looked over any of the ships yet?”
Krystal shook her head. “No, they’ve had me do maintenance.”
“But you’re allowed to work on the theory for the cloak, right?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“What good is that without getting to look inside an actual ship?” Laila smiled and gestured at the stealth ship with one hand, pushing off from where she was leaning against the ladder and making her way towards it. “Well? Are you coming?”
“Really?” Krystal trotted after her sister, quickly catching up and settling into walk next to her.
“Yep. I figured you probably needed permission, and T’arq’s ship is right here. Why don’t you have a look around?” Laila reached the stealth ship and pressed the release for the lower entry, a hatch sliding open and a ladder descending.
“He wouldn’t mind?” Krystal chewed on her lip. She didn’t want to cause any problems.
“Somehow I don’t think so. But remember what I said.” Laila dropped her voice. “Be careful around him.”
“I have exceptional hearing, you know.”
Oh, dear lord. Could this day get any more embarrassing?
