“They underestimated me.” A ghost of a smile flickered across her split lip. “People keep doing that.”
Behind him, the Exiles spread out through the box, taking up positions that blocked the exits to keep anyone else out.
Raaze crossed the room to Cait. His boots left bloody prints on the carpet as he reached her.
She still didn’t lower the weapon. Her knuckles were white around the grip, tendons standing out like cables in her wrist. This close, he saw the fine tremor running through her shoulders and the rapid flutter of her pulse in her throat.
She was terrified, but she’d done this anyway… walked into a box full of people who thought nothing of killing to protect their secrets and faced them down alone.
When the plan went sideways, she hadn’t run. Instead, she’d improvised, and she’d won.
Their eyes met, and he saw the triumph in her eyes. Underneath the bruises and the shaking and the hard line of her jaw, she was lit up with it. Fierce and bright and absolutely unbroken.
Draanth, this female. She was glorious.
“You came back,” he said in a low voice. Just for her.
The pistol wavered, just for a second, then steadied again.
“Someone had to save your ass.” Her voice was rough. “You’re terrible at planning.”
“I had a plan.”
“You had a warball play. That’s not the same thing.”
He felt the corner of his mouth twitch. Not quite a smile. There you are, kelarris. Still fighting.
He reached out slowly, giving her time to pull away. His fingers brushed the torn edge of her sleeve, right where the bruise bloomed darkest on her shoulder. The contact sent a jolt through him, part relief, part something darker and more possessive that he didn’t have time to name as he slid his hand down her arm and claimed the pistol.
“You did good, kelarris. Now let me take it from here.”
The corridor outside the crew quarters felt suffocatingly narrow. The stadium, the arrests, the broadcast… all of it felt a million miles away now, locked out behind the sealed airlock of the H4-RPY.
She’d taken a battering in that box. Her ribs ached with every breath, her shoulder throbbed where the stadium medics had dressed a deep cut, and her split lip stung every time she even thought about speaking.
Raaze stood by the cargo ramp controls. His jacket was open to the waist, and his undershirt was gone, revealing the dermal tape that criss-crossed his bruised ribs. He looked exhausted, as if he’d been dragged through a hedge backward. An alien hedge with carnivorous plants in it.
She took a step forward, tilting her head to study him. He had a vicious cut along one cheekbone. She winced as she reached for his face, her hand pausing halfway.
“I thought you Lathar had awesome medical technology or something?”
He snorted and tilted his head back, bitter amusement washing across his handsome features. “Yeah, you’d think, wouldn’t you? And the Empire does, but players… unless you’re attached to a team, you can’t afford a healer. The only reason the medics even looked at me was because I’m with you.”
“Huh? That doesn’t make sense. I can’t afford to pay them either, if that’s the case.”
He shook his head, red eyes fixed on her face. “You’re under the protection of the Emperor himself. No medic would dare not treat you. In fact, they’re probably compiling a report to prove that they did right now.”
Okay, he had to have hit his head somewhere because the words coming out of his mouth did not make a lick of sense. “Why would I be under the protection of the Emperor? I’ve never met the guy.”
“All human females are under his protection,” Raaze said, his voice a low rasp.
Silence fell between them. He was close enough to touch if she reached out. His steady gaze on her face said she’d have to be the one to do it.
Say something, she told herself. You came back. You don’t get to be a coward now.
“I owe you an apology,” she said.
His head came up. “You don’t?—”
