“These were three other way stations,” he continued. “All independently owned. All in strategic locations along major transit corridors. In the past decade, each one experienced a series of mysterious system failures. Mechanical breakdowns. Supply disruptions. The kinds of problems that wear people down and make a place feel like it’s not worth the trouble.”
He tapped the screen and expanded the records for the first station. “This one had its water filtration fail three times in sixmonths. The owner couldn’t afford the repairs. Sold at below-market value.”
He moved to the second. “Heating system. Power grid. A sewage backup that drove out half the residents.”
The third. “Structural damage attributed to a meteorite strike, except the trajectory data didn’t match. The owner contested the report, but ran out of money before anyone would listen.”
Holly stared at the screen. The pattern was there. Clear and cold.
“All three failures were attributed to neglect or bad luck,” Rasker said. “And all three stations were purchased by Complete Respite within months of their worst incidents. At a fraction of what they were worth.”
Holly felt cold. It started in her fingers and moved inward, settling somewhere behind her ribs like a stone dropped into still water.
“You think Moone’s Landing is next,” she said.
“I don’t have proof.” He was watching her carefully. “I’m showing you a pattern and letting you decide what to do with it.”
She looked at the timeline again. The oven. The garden. Small, targeted disruptions. Nothing major, but then, the station had plenty mechanical issues without the need for a vital system to break. They could just wait for her to run out of patience, ornits, or both, without doing any deliberate sabotage. After their conversation in the pools, she’d pondered this possibility, but seeing it laid out like this, seeing that it had happened before, to other people, in other places, made it real in a way that suspicion alone had not.
“Why are you showing me this?” she asked. Not because she doubted him. Because she needed to hear him say it.
“Because I want you to be prepared.” He turned from the screen to face her. “No one was hurt in any of those threeincidents, but they could have been. I haven’t told Rest ’N Recharge any of this. They don’t know about the sabotage. They don’t know about Complete Respite’s history. As far as my client is concerned, this is a straightforward acquisition.”
“And if they knew?”
“They wouldn’t care without proof. If they had it, they’d likely try to litigate Complete Respite right out of business. Either way, I chose to bring this to you first.”
Holly let that settle. It was not a small thing, what he was telling her. He was a consultant, paid to close a deal for his client, and he was handing her information that could undermine that deal entirely.
“If you’re wondering whether this is something my clients would do,” he said, as if reading her thoughts, “it isn’t. Rest ’N Recharge competes aggressively, but they don’t use these tactics. Neither do I.” A pause. “Look into them, if you need to. I’d rather you verified it yourself than have any doubts about me or my intentions.”
She believed him. It was as simple as that. She believed him because she had gotten to know him. The time they’d spent together had shown her who he was, and she would bet her lastnitthat he was not a deceptive person.
He took her hand and folded his fingers around hers. “I want you to succeed, Holly,” he said quietly. “Even though it means I won’t close this deal.”
The words sat between them, simple and undecorated, like the ones he’d said in the pool. She felt her chest loosen. A tightness had held there for weeks, or maybe longer than that. Maybe since Sol-Arc. Maybe since the day she’d arrived at this crumbling, beautiful outpost and decided to stay.
“Thank you,” she said. And she meant it for more than the information. “I…have a lot to think about.”
That seemed to be the signal that the evening was coming to a close. Not in a bad way, but maybe in athis-is-heavy-and-I-need-to-processway. He walked her to the door. Bean trotted ahead of them at the end of his leash, having decided that he wished to return to his food bowl and couch. Rasker opened the door and Holly stepped into the frame, and then she stopped.
She turned back.
He was close. Closer than she expected, because he had followed her to the threshold and not stopped. The hallway light was behind her and the warm light of his room was behind him, and his face was half in shadow, half lit. She thought about the first time she’d seen him. The polished consultant with the practiced smile who had smugly asked to buy her way station. He didn’t look like that man anymore.
“Thank you for dinner. I had a really nice time,” she said. “Goodnight.” But she didn’t move.
Neither did he.
He kissed her. Or she kissed him. Later, she wouldn’t be sure who closed the distance first. It didn’t matter. What mattered was that this kiss was nothing like the one in the pool. That one had been careful and measured and deliberate, a question asked and answered in the same breath.
This one was not careful.
His hand came up to the side of her face, and hers found the front of his shirt, and she felt herself crowded backward until her spine met the frame of the door. He followed her there, and the kiss deepened. It may have started slow and thorough, but it was now entirely too much for a hallway. She could taste the citrus from dinner on his lips and feel the warmth of him through his shirt and the press of the doorframe against her back, and for several seconds, the hallway, the hotel, and the entire outpost ceased to exist. Until a cold, wet nose touched her shin.
Holly broke the kiss with a startled laugh. Bean sat at her feet, looking up at both of them with an expression of profound judgment. His brown eyes traveled from Holly to Rasker and back again with the weary disapproval of a chaperone who had given up trying.
Rasker looked down at Bean. “Your dog has opinions.”
