The Stowaway (7 page)

“Riding the storm!” Arek screamed back. “Hold on.”

Accelerating forward,
The Wyvern
rocketed towards the swirling arms of the storm. Rachel watched in horror as the enemy ship seemed to pop—large chunks of the hull being shredded and crushed as it was swallowed by the maelstrom. A burst of fire shooting out from the bow before it was finally consumed by the eye and disappeared from view.

Arek growled as he fought with the helm controls, sweat pouring off his temple and running down his neck. Rachel focused on the sight—too scared to do anything but stare at the straining muscles and tendons and intense look of concentration on his face. Even like this, Arek was mesmerising.

Slowly, like waking up from a daydream, she realised what he was doing. He was working the ship into the current of the spiralling arms of the maelstrom!

He’s trying to ride the spiral and catapult us out,
an awed part of Rachel’s brain shouted at her but nothing more than a squeak of surprise escaped her lips.

“Dev! Brace!” Arek managed to yell as he fought with everything he had to steer
The Wyvern
into exactly the right path.

For a moment they hung on the edge and Rachel was sure the gamble had failed. Then, with a mighty lunge they were picked up and flung forward. Like a toy boat lifted up on the crest of a wave and slammed towards the shore, they rocketed around the curve of the spiral.

Several heart-stopping seconds later they shot out of the spiral like a stone from a slingshot.

Rachel felt the air rush from her lungs with the momentum, but didn’t dare suck any air back in. Any second she expected to feel the drag of the maelstrom pulling them back to their deaths. But it never came. Against the odds, they’d broken free.

Searching the view screen for the next deadly trap, Rachel gasped in shock. “Oh gods! Look!”

Arek’s head shot up, obviously expecting the worst…and saw the clear, star-studded expanse of space directly ahead of them, opening up like a window through the swirling multi-coloured swirls of the storm.

Powering forward with everything they had left, they shot out of the storm to freedom.

Safe. We’re safe.

Over and over the words echoed and repeated in Rachel’s head, none of them brave enough to actually leave her mouth in case it was all suddenly yanked away.

Arek’s sigh of relief broke the spell.

“We did it!” Rachel laughed out loud. She jumped up and rushed forward, then threw her arms around Arek’s neck. “We did it!”

Impulsively she kissed him—full on the lips, firm and bubbling over with joy and the thrill of knowing they were alive.

Arek didn’t miss a beat. He gripped the back of her neck and returned the kiss—unexplored passion, lust and the need to celebrate life driving them both on.

Eventually, gasping for air, they broke apart and stared at each other. A slow grin pulled at Rachel’s lips when she saw Arek’s shocked expression. The man looked like she’d clubbed him.

She laughed. He’d ridden one of the most dangerous phenomenon in known space—saving them from being crushed in the deadly heart of a solar storm—and she’d floored him with a kiss. It was crazy and ridiculous and at the edge of her mind she knew the whole messed up situation between Arek, Devlynn and herself was going to have to be dealt with very soon. But right now the wonder of being alive and kissing Arek was too good to question or second guess.

Slowly, Arek smiled back—hesitant and unsteady, but at the same time looking adorably pleased with himself. Rachel guessed he had reason. He’d just saved them all…and he was a fantastic kisser.

Rachel tapped the comm-link beside them to open a signal to the engine room—needing to share the moment with Devlynn. “Dev! We made it! We made it through the storm.”

The seconds stretched out and smiles gradually faded as they processed the heavy silence that was their only reply.

“Dev?” Arek tried. But there was still nothing to break the ominous hush. “Devlynn!”

Arek had never moved so fast in his life. He felt like he’d raced through the ship from the cockpit to the engine room without touching the decking plates once. But as he rushed to kneel by Devlynn’s side where he lay crumpled in a heap against the bulkhead, everything inside him seemed to suddenly seize.

His hands hovered over the bruised and bloodied man before clenching into tight fists above him. Vaguely, he heard Rachel yelling at him, tugging against his arm, but he couldn’t seem to focus on what she was saying. All he could see was the long, sticky trail of blood trickling down from Devlynn’s temple—made all the more vivid by his too pale complexion.

He wanted to scoop the man up and get him off the cold, hard floor, but he wasn’t sure where to touch—what he could do that wouldn’t cause even more damage. So he hovered, completely lost and impotent.

Finally, he bullied his mouth and vocal cords into forming words—and they exploded out of him in a desperate shout.

“Devlynn! Devlynn, don’t you do this! Open your eyes, you bastard!”

But Devlynn steadfastly ignored him.

Arek fought against the rising panic surging up inside him—trying to swallow him down into hysteria. His whole body was in uproar as he looked at Devlynn lying ominously still in front of him. His heart pounded against his sternum, but his lungs refused to take in enough air. Finally, he was forced to pant to keep up.

This. This is my worst nightmare. This is why I can’t let anyone close. Why I can’t admit—

Rachel continued to tug at him—her insistence finally breaking through.

“Arek! Arek, let me in! We need to start the assessment and treatment protocols.”

“He’s not waking up. I can’t… He’s—” Arek finally managed to clamp his mouth shut, very nearly biting his tongue in the process.

Not only did he sound like an idiot—even to his own ears—but he was getting in the way. He shuffled back—just enough to let Rachel in and no further.

Rachel quickly unrolled the emergency medi-kit and thrust the thick, white forehead band into Arek’s hand.

“Here. Put this on him while I get the rest set up.”

Arek’s fingers felt too slow and sluggish as he fumbled to adjust the wings of the band over Devlynn’s brow—wincing when he brushed against the gash that still oozed blood at his temple.

But Devlynn didn’t even twitch.

Oh, shit!
Panic threatened again. He didn’t want to hurt the man, but what he wouldn’t give for a gasp of pain and a nice “Fuck off!” snapped at his inept bumbling right now.

Beside him, Rachel finished applying the wrist and ankle cuffs and was starting up the small assessment unit. The wait for the data to feed through and be processed seemed interminable, but finally the screen lit up—the catalogue of findings and instructions scrolled across its luminex surface. Rachel’s eyes flicked over the display as it worked then she started scrabbling about in the kit for supplies.

“What’s it say?” Arek tried to lean over to see the readout, but Rachel shoved him back none too gently as she pushed a prefilled drug cartridge into one of the wrist cuffs then used the derma-sealer at Devlynn’s temple.

“There’s some swelling here on the brain.” Rachel switched to another gadget Arek didn’t recognise. “The medi-unit’s going to knock him out for a bit and we need to apply these treatments every hour for the next standard day, but—” Her voice hitched slightly, telling Arek she wasn’t as cool, calm and collected as she looked. “He’s going to be fine. It says he’s going to be fine.”

A tear strayed down her cheek, but she dashed it away before he could even be sure he’d seen it.

I could have lost him. He could have—

Arek slammed the lid shut on his deepest, darkest fear as it threatened to get out of control and overwhelm him. Again.

He couldn’t deal with it. He just couldn’t. He needed to get back to his carefully constructed distance from the universe and not admit to anything—no feelings, no emotion, no connections. The trouble was he was pretty sure the distance had been an illusion all along. Devlynn was a part of him. And now—

Arek turned his head to watch Rachel as she continued to work—her beautiful face completely focused on Devlynn. Concern, love, dedication and determination—it was all right there. She was radiant and fierce and with every passing second she worked her way a little further into his heart.

Without his consent, he’d ended up with twice as much to lose. Twice as much at risk than ever before. No matter how hard he tried to deny and avoid, reality was staring him right in the face—and stabbing him right in the heart.

“Okay, we can move him. Have you got a stretcher or something we can use to—”

“I’ll carry him.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.”

Devlynn wasn’t small by any stretch of the imagination, but Arek knew he could carry him. He
needed
to.

Carefully lifting Devlynn into his arms, Arek refused to falter, stagger or even grunt with effort as he headed towards the crew quarters. He might be a complete emotional basket case, but he’d carry Devlynn to the end of the universe if he had to. And he’d never, ever let him fall. He’d protect both of them with his very last breath.

Rachel quietly peeked into Devlynn’s quarters.
The Wyvern
wasn’t big enough to justify a dedicated infirmary, so they’d settled Devlynn into his own room and improvised.

At the moment Arek was on watch—propped up against the head of the large sleeping platform in the middle of the room. His eyes were downcast and his chin rested on his chest. Rachel wasn’t sure if he was awake or not. She kind of hoped he’d fallen asleep on the job actually. The medi-unit would alert them if anything went wrong and gods knew Arek needed the break—he was stretched tight as an Aruvian funeral drum at the moment.

Taking the opportunity to just look, Rachel hovered in the doorway. Arek sat as close to Devlynn as he could possibly get without actually lying on top of the man. Admittedly, he didn’t have much choice—there wasn’t enough room to sit anywhere else to wait out the long hours for Devlynn to wake up. But Arek seemed to
need
to be there—hovering close, watching the man breathe slowly in and out.

Rachel knew exactly how he felt. The only reason she wasn’t right there with him was because someone had to periodically check their course—slowly orbiting around the uninhabited planet of Orphos . And, of course, meals still had to be prepared. Stubborn men watched over to make sure they ate them.

“Hey,” Rachel whispered—gently testing to see if Arek really was asleep.

She should have known better. Arek’s head instantly lifted and he stared across at her with exhausted, red-rimmed eyes.

“Hey,” he croaked back, his voice rough and hoarse so he had to clear his throat at the end of the greeting.

Rachel ached for Arek. So much misery and pain and uncertainty stared across at her. It almost hurt to look at it. But she couldn’t turn away. Not in the face of such obvious need.

Moving quietly into the room, Rachel carefully eased into the sleeping platform and settled beside Arek. Unable to help herself—and not really wanting to try anyway—she stroked her way down his arm, skimming over the warm flesh until she reached his hand. She tucked her fingers into his palm and squeezed, reassured she’d done the right thing when she felt him squeeze back.

“He’s going to be fine, Arek. The medi-unit prescribed something to make him sleep, but once it wears off he’ll be fine.”

Arek knew all that, of course, but she had the feeling he needed to hear it again.

Haunted eyes locked onto her—seeking her out, wanting to know she was telling the truth.

“You sure?”

“Yes. He’s going to be fine.”

Everything about the man had changed in the blink of an eye when they’d run into the engine room and found Devlynn lying unconscious on the floor. Rachel shivered. Arek wasn’t the only one haunted by that memory. Now, instead of the cool, self-confident, supremely capable man she’d come to know, she caught glimpses of an unsteady, fragile one in need of reassurance just below the surface. Arek quickly hid it, but it was a shock every time she encountered it.

“Never trusted these things,” Arek grumbled, pulling his hand away from her to fuss with one of the wrist cuffs monitoring Devlynn’s condition.

After a few moments, Rachel reached across and stilled his movements—trapping his hand as it passed over Devlynn’s. With the three of them finally connected—Devlynn’s hand under Arek’s, Arek’s held by Rachel’s—something intangible settled inside her. She looked up and thought she caught the same sense of calm in Arek’s eyes.

“It’s going to be all right.”

And for an instant, everything was. It all just fell into place—tranquil and perfect while the chaotic universe was left to go on around them. Then Rachel saw the doubt and worry slowly cloud Arek’s piercing blue eyes.

“Once this is over I’m taking you back.”

“What?” Rachel couldn’t have been more shocked if he’d dumped a bucket of ice water over her head.

“As soon as we’ve unloaded at Nareen, I’m taking you back to Thebia .”