Page 132 of Commander’s Mate

I lay awake, holding her, my body still aching for the bond we had not completed. Yet beneath the ache was something stronger.

She had chosen my bed.

She had chosen my touch.

Tonight.

For now, honor made that enough.

Chapter Twenty-One

Harper

I woke slowly, aware first of warmth.

This was body warmth. Solid. Surrounding. Breathing under my cheek.

Zared.

My eyes opened to the unfamiliar curve of his chest inches from my face. Blue-gray skin. Faint scars. The slow rise and fall of sleep. His arm was around my waist, heavy but not trapping. Sometime in the night, I had tucked one knee over his thigh like I had every right to be there.

Then everything came back.

Earth gone. Not destroyed. Not reachable. The slavers. The auction house. The rescue. The kiss. The office. His bed. His hands. My body coming apart under his mouth and fingers while grief waited just outside the circle of heat.

I stiffened.

Not gradually. One moment asleep, the next alert, his arm loosening before I could ask.

“Harper?”

“I’m okay.”

He did not move. “Are you?”

Maybe.

“I don’t know.”

That was the right question and the wrong one because yes, no, both.

I pushed up on one elbow, pulling the sheet with me. At some point he had dressed me in his shirt again or helped me into it. I couldn’t remember. That should have scared me, but I remembered being sleepy and warm and him asking before moving me. I remembered saying yes without opening my eyes.

“I’m not sorry,” I said.

“Neither am I.”

“But I’m… weird.”

“Weird?”

“Confused. Sad. Turned on. Embarrassed. Hungry. Mad. Not at you exactly. At everything. Also at you a little because you’re here and Earth isn’t.”

I stared at him. “You’re not supposed to agree with that.”

“Would you prefer I lie?”

“No.” I rubbed my face. “I don’t know what I prefer. I want coffee. I want my toothbrush. I want to check my phone. I want to know whether anyone is looking for me. I want to kiss you again. I want to scream.”