Chapter 1 Holiday Hostiles #2
My hands shake on the controls. Two years of nightmares, two years of jumping at dark ships on scanners, two years of telling myself he’d moved on.
I should’ve known Ober Kraine doesn’t move on. He obsesses.
The comm crackles with a voice like dark honey poured over broken glass. “Hello, Nova. Permission to come aboard?”
His weapons are locked on my engines with surgical precision. We both know I can’t outrun him—not when he taught me half the tricks I know. But I could try. Punch the hyperdrive and pray my modifications are enough.
Except that means abandoning the packages. Abandoning the families counting on me to bring Christmas home.
The old Nova would’ve run without a second thought. The new Noomi doesn’t abandon people.
“Docking Bay Two,” I say, steadier than I feel. “But you’re not welcome here.”
“We’ll see about that, sweetheart.”
Sweetheart. Like a physical touch across two years of distance, that endearment hits me where I live. How many mornings had I woken to that voice? How many nights had it whispered promises in languages I’d never learned?
I wait in the cargo bay, trying to control my breathing while the ships dock.
My heart hammers loud enough that he’ll probably hear it through the bulkheads—his alien senses always were sharper than human standard.
The Shadowhawk’s docking clamps engage with a soft thunk that reverberates through my bones like a remembered caress.
The airlock cycles with a soft hiss, and Ober Kraine steps onto my ship like he owns it—like he owns me. The temperature in the cargo bay seems to rise ten degrees just from his presence, that Felaxian heat signature I used to wrap around myself like the galaxy’s most dangerous blanket.
Son of a bitch.
He’s exactly the same and completely different—two years have carved new lines around those dark eyes, but the predatory grace remains.
He moves like gravity is negotiable, like physics bend around him the same way I used to.
His dark hair’s longer now, touching his collar in waves that catch the cargo bay’s harsh lighting.
There’s a new scar through his eyebrow that makes him look even more like trouble wearing a leather coat.
The soft fur along his jawline catches the light as he turns his head, scanning my ship with those too-keen eyes.
That damned cat-like tail of his flicks once—a tell I used to find endearing when it wrapped around my waist possessively.
Now it broadcasts barely restrained energy, coiled tension looking for a target.
But it’s still him. Still the man who taught me to fly like the void was an ocean, to fight like my life was a negotiable commodity, to steal hearts with the same skill I used on cargo holds.
“Hello, Nova.” His voice could melt hull plating, and I feel it in places I’d forgotten existed.
“It’s Noomi now,” I say, lifting my chin in defiance. “Nova died in that transport explosion, remember?”
Something flickers across his face—pain, maybe recognition of what I’m really saying. That the woman he knew, the woman he loved, chose to die rather than stay with him.
His smile could cut diamonds. “Funny. You still smell like mine.”
Heat floods my cheeks, and I hate that my body betrays me. After two years, after everything that happened between us, one sentence and I’m back to being the woman who melted under his touch.
“I’m not yours,” I manage, crossing my arms to put barriers between us that aren’t just physical. “I haven’t been yours for two years.”
“Haven’t you?” He steps closer, and I catch his scent—alien spice and engine oil and something that used to be my favorite addiction.
The memory of his fur soft under my fingertips, his tail wrapping possessively around my waist, hits me with physical force.
My skin remembers the way his alien heat felt against my back during cold hyperspace nights, how his purr would vibrate through my bones when I touched him just right.
His nostrils flare slightly, and I know he’s reading my pheromones, cataloging my fear and anger and the treacherous spike of want I can’t quite suppress. “Because your pulse just spiked. Are you afraid of me, sweetheart? Or afraid of what you still want me to do to you?”
“I’m afraid you still think charm works on me.” But my voice comes out rougher than intended, and his tail does that little flick that means he heard it too. “Some of us learned to think with organs above the waist, Ober.”
His laugh is dark velvet with an edge of steel. “Funny, I remember you thinking very creatively with all sorts of organs. Especially around Christmas.”
The memory hits like plasma fire—Christmas morning three years ago, his hands mapping every inch of my skin while snow fell outside our hideout on Cassian Prime. The way he’d whispered my name like a prayer, like I was something sacred instead of just another thief in his bed.
“That woman is dead,” I say, but even I can hear the lie in my voice.
“Is she?” He circles me slowly, predatory and graceful.
My pulse hammers against my throat, and I know he can hear it—enhanced Felaxian senses cataloging the way my breathing has gone shallow, the heat rising in my cheeks.
The space between us crackles with two years of separation and the muscle memory of what we used to be together.
“Because you still react when I get close enough to touch.”
He’s right, damn him. Every instinct I spent two years suppressing is screaming at me to either run or surrender, and I’m not sure which would be more dangerous.
“What do you want, Ober?”
“I’m taking half your cargo.” His expression shifts, predatory amusement replaced by something harder. “I know what you’re really carrying, Nova. And I won’t let you get yourself killed delivering weapons to our enemies.”
“Christmas presents,” I say flatly. “They’re Christmas presents.”
He laughs, and it’s not a pleasant sound. “Right. And I’m running a charity for displaced orphans.” He gestures at the containers. “Military-grade quantum locks for holiday gifts? Priority routing through pirate territories? Payment rates that could buy a small fleet?”
“Maybe because some gifts are worth protecting.” I step into his path, close enough that his alien warmth washes over me like a memory. “These aren’t weapons, Ober. They’re hope. They’re proof that somewhere in this cold universe, people still care enough to send love across impossible distances.”
Something flickers in his eyes—doubt, maybe. Regret. But it’s gone so fast I might have imagined it.
“Pretty words. But I’ve seen what hope gets you in this business.” He moves toward my cargo with that liquid grace that used to make my blood sing. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. But I’d rather have you alive and angry than dead and noble.”
“Don’t.” The word comes out sharp as broken glass. “Touch those packages and I’ll show you exactly how much this reformed bad girl learned about creative violence.”
He pauses, one clawed hand hovering over the nearest container. “You’d fight me? Over strangers’ Christmas gifts?”
“I’d fight the devil himself to keep those families from waking up Christmas morning with nothing but empty promises.” The truth tastes like copper and determination. “I don’t abandon people anymore, Ober. I learned that from you.”
“From me?” His voice drops to something dangerously soft.
“You taught me that some things are worth fighting for. Worth dying for. You just never thought I’d apply that lesson to anyone but you.”
We stare at each other across the cargo bay, two years of hurt and need and unfinished business crackling between us like live current. His breathing is carefully controlled, but I can almost hear his heart racing—Felaxian hearts beat faster than human when they’re emotional.
Then he moves, smooth and decisive, selecting exactly half my packages with mathematical precision. Even in theft, he’s being fair. It’s such a fundamentally Ober thing to do that I almost smile despite the circumstances.
“Six hours,” he says without looking at me, moving to my engine compartment. “You’ll have power back in six hours.”
“The families waiting for those packages—”
“Will have to wait.” There’s genuine pain in his voice as he starts disabling my hyperdrive with surgical precision. “I’d rather have you alive and furious than dead and right.”
He’s almost to the airlock when I find my voice. “This isn’t over.”
He pauses at the threshold, looking back with an expression that could bring down starships. Longing and regret and something that might be hope, all wrapped in the careful control that’s kept him alive this long.
“I kept something of yours,” he says, voice dropping to that honey-dark register that used to make me forget my own name. His fingers brush his throat, where something glints beneath his shirt. “Something you left behind. Been carrying it for two years, waiting for you to come home.”
The admission hits like a plasma blast to the chest. Whatever he kept, it’s important enough that he’s worn it next to his heart for two years. Important enough to mention when he’s trying to wound me.
“So no, sweetheart,” he continues, and there’s something almost vulnerable beneath the predatory confidence. “It’s not over. It never was.”
The airlock seals behind him, and I’m alone with my broken ship and broken promises. Through the viewport, I watch the Shadowhawk vanish into hyperspace in a wash of distorted starlight, taking half my cargo and all my carefully rebuilt peace of mind.
But as I stare at empty space, I realize something important.
The old Nova would’ve given up. The new Noomi?
The new Noomi gets creative.
I’m already moving toward the engine bay, fingers steady as I examine Ober’s sabotage. Elegant work—he’s disabled without destroying, delayed without permanent damage. Professional to the core.
Too bad for him I learned a few things in two years of legitimate engineering.
Six hours later, the Star purrs to life with a sound like barely contained lightning. I haven’t just repaired his sabotage—I’ve improved it. My ship’s faster now, more maneuverable. Capable of jumps that would make customs inspectors weep.
The tracking beacon I slipped into my cargo—old habits die hard—transmits clearly from its hiding spot in the magnetic coupling of his stolen container.
A little gift from the reformed pirate to the man who thought he could outsmart her.
Heading for the Karrion Nebula, exactly where I’d go to ground if I were him.
Let’s see how he likes being hunted for a change.
“PIP, run a diagnostic on our defensive systems.”
“I was not aware we possessed defensive systems, Noomi. However, I am detecting elevated stress hormones and what appears to be significant reproductive attraction to the boarding party.”
I smile for the first time since he walked onto my ship—sharp, dangerous, nothing like the woman who used to melt under his touch. “Watch the sass, PIP. And the defensive systems? I’m the defensive system now.”
Two can play this game, Captain Kraine. And this Christmas, you’re about to learn exactly what two years of going straight taught this bad girl about being very bad when it matters.
I punch the engines and leap into pursuit, hunting algorithms spinning up in my nav computer. Algorithms he taught me, turned back on their teacher with interest compounded.
Christmas is in seventy hours. Families are counting on me.
And Ober Kraine is about to discover that the most dangerous thing in the galaxy isn’t a reformed pirate.
It’s a reformed pirate with something to prove.